[MUD-Dev] Retention without Addiction?

[Koster]

From: Matthew Dobervich
> From: shren

>> Reminds me of Anarchy Online's "enter and get your own copy of
>> the dungeon" - I believe Destination Games was discussing
>> something similar, where you go in and get your own copy of the
>> "dungeon".  (They used an amusement park ride analogy.)  All
>> you'd have to do is time-limit the dungeon entry and you'd have
>> similar features in your MMORPG.

> Worlds of Warcraft is planning to do the same thing.

I hadn't heard that WoW was planning on doing this; I know Anarchy
Online did it, and I know Tabula Rasa plans to do it.

And I think it's a terrible idea in all cases. Sure, if what you
want to make is lobbies for small multiplayer games, great. But ya
know, i think that you'll end up with a worse shared environment
than a MUD/MOO, and a worse party-sized adventure experience than
Neverwinter Nights, Baldur's Gate II, or other games of their ilk
(no way you'll make enough to match that quantity and quality of
content AND feed the desires of an online world audience!). On top
of that, this notion seems to me to miss key elements of what makes
online worlds appealing.

Has nobody heard the rants about how AO's self-contained mission
areas are dull, repetitive, and non-immersive? It is in large part
BECAUSE they are self-contained, abstracted from the larger
world. Has nobody read Jonathan Baron's Glory and Shame article and
realized that part of the attraction of these games is to be able to
publicly glory in what you accomplished? Hard to do if nobody else
can SEE it.

Sure, there's merit to embedding mini-games--and let's not mistake
it, that's what these are--into online worlds. But to make them the
primary content seems to me like it's plain old missing the point of
why make something an online world in the first place.

The core audience for this genre doesn't want amusement park
rides. They want to feel like they are THERE.

-Raph

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