[MUD-Dev] Bay Area Press re: UO, the good the bad and the Ugly.

[Charles Hughes]

On Monday, June 05, 2000 11:18 AM, Dave Rickey [SMTP:daver at mythicgames.com] 
wrote:
> On Saturday, June 03, 2000 10:21 PM, Raph Koster <rkoster at austin.rr.com> 
wrote:
>
> >Consider leaving in your time-consuming mechanics, as above, but put in
> >other mechanics and forms of play that do not require time. For example,
> >allow offline mass production for crafting skills, or ways of doing
> >guild management via a website, etc. These will tend to drive down
> >your average
> >while leaving all the other mechanics intact and able to addict. Some
> >players will play for these other mechanics exclusively, and even the
> >addicted players will likely use them to some extent, reducing the time
> >spent online. Some play sessions will consist entirely of doing these
> >brief activities.
>
> Consider leaving out your time-wasting mechanics completely.  I see no
> purpose in designing a game that is flat-rated, but designed to make the
> player spend 3/4+ of his time doing *absolutely nothing*.

Absolutely. :)

> Nothing he
> really cares about, anyway.  My opinion on macroing in games is simply
> this: If a major portion of your gameplay is so repetitive it can be
> performed by simply looping the same mouse-clicks over and over, you
> already screwed up.

Anything macro-able and worthwhile (to the player) is going to be macroed.
I'm going to pick on UO here just because I was talking to a friend about
it last night, but this scenario applies to any game.  My friend on UO
likes to make arrows - he has fletching and lumberjack skills.  He can
make about 1k arrows per RL hour.  Are there any forests left on UO?
Do Druids go around casting 'plant growth' just to replenish the forests?
I know that in a massively multi-player game like UO the concept of
limited resources is hard to enforce when players are clamoring for the
Sword of Lamda or Arrows of Death, but it's really hard to suspend
disbelief when I hear these kinds of numbers.  (And if UO suddenly
gets restricted resources, I'm going to disclaim any responsibility. :)

> At least combat, although repetitive, is fun.  Churning out thousands of
> worthless items, or holding your place in line for your chance to get the
> Sword of Lambada, is *not* fun.

>From my own point of view, repops/regens/whatever are stupid.  There, I've
said it.  Don't use that mechanic, or use it across epochal time (say 1
regen every RL month) and stop relying on it.  It is possible to create
non-regen based games, not easy, not necessarily cheap, but possible.

> Deliberately including things that are not fun in your game is stupid.

Actually, that's a personal call.  I make bannocks (food) on MUME,
something that takes considerable time, can be automated, and is *not*
fun to many people.  I happen to like it.  I also happen to like
exploring, and on the rare occasion when some evil thing crosses
my path, I like to kill it. (Or, more often, be killed by it. :)





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