[MUD-Dev] expansion packs

[Daniel.Harman at barclayscapital.com]

Matt Mihaly wrote :

>   1. Existing games keep releasing more and more content in the
>   form of expansion packs. This makes the bar for a new game
>   increasingly high, especially as it's nearly impossible to
>   really know what's going to work until you've got players
>   actually playing the game. That gives games that have been
>   around for awhile the ability to tweak here and there in small
>   ways that add up to a huge incumbent advantage, potentially.

I don't see any 'potentially' about it. I buy pretty much every
online game that I don't get to beta in (although I'm going to have
to stop, there are too many). I find it really depressing that for
all its flaws, EQ still beats them hands down. Perhaps its because
EQ was just an extrapolation of several years work by the MUD
community, whereas others keep trying to reinvent the wheel, or more
charitably, innovate ;)

I played AC2 a little more last night, and further flaws dawned on
me :

  - They haven't got the grouping mechanics sorted.

    ... There is no way to acquire another persons target so that
    you can easily attack the same monster (interface obstruction).

    ... There is no easy way to target another player in your group
    e.g. for healing(another interface obstruction).

    ... To buff another player in your group, you have to actually
    target their weapon etc. That's easier said than done (interface
    obstruction).

    ... If someone in your group dies, there are no resurrection
    type abilities to bring them back there and then, that person
    has to make a long run back which is largely pointless. That
    doesn't make for long lasting groups.

How do they keep releasing games that have a worse interface than
the one a 3 year old game shipped with? It beggars belief. Do the
people designing these games even play them in anger?

My tolerance for elementary omissions is now approaching zero - I
won't be hanging on three months whilst they fix these things. I
suspect others feel similar.

>   2. The more expansion packs a game releases, the less impact
>   each one is going to have on existing players, and on new
>   players. If you're a new player, do you really want to buy 4 or
>   5 boxed products to get "everything" available in a game (like
>   Everquest), or will you want to purchase one of the new boxed
>   games, that may have features (mounts or whatnot) available only
>   in the expansion packs of existing games?

> Do those of you working on the big games think this is a problem? 
> Will players get "expansion pack fatigue"? It's one thing for text
> games to continually add content for years and years, because
> there are no downloads, and usually no cost to enable the extra
> features, but I would find it very daunting to approach EQ as a
> new player and see all those expansion packs I know I'm going to
> have to buy. My girlfriend has experienced something similar with
> the Sims and all their expansion packs.

Well Verant are a little smarter than that. They role up all the
expansion packs except the most recent into a gold edition or
whatever. Anyway I don't want this to sound like an EQ sales
document, so I should point out I've stopped playing and found
something else to get obsessed with :)

Dan

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