[MUD-Dev] Mass customization in MM***s

[Marian Griffith]

In <URL:/archives/meow?group+local.muddev> on Sat 13 Jul, John Buehler wrote:
> Marian Griffith writes:
>> In <URL:/archives/meow?group+local.muddev> on Thu 11 Jul, John Buehler wrote:

>>> it knowing that the Death Star is coming our way and that we
>>> have a collective fight on our hands.  If we win, then I was
>>> there.  I did something to help.  If we lose, perhaps my
>>> character survives to tell the story of what went wrong and how
>>> we need to put down the Empire.  (The Death Star use is a
>>> problem in that it catastrophically wipes out whole planets,
>>> precluding non-miraculous 'survival', but you get my point)

>> Actually, I tend to think that the death star is an excellent way
>> to make the fight very, very meaningful to the players
>> involved. But to work it needs a different approach to games than
>> you normally see.  Players would purchase an account with a
>> number of 'lifes' to it. If they lose all lifes the account is
>> cancelled, and they have to buy a new account to resume
>> playing. In compensation the game world is not really out to kill
>> the character.  Players can happily spend their time on a little
>> backwater planet and never be bothered by anything, much the same
>> way nothing much is going to bother you or me in real life.
>> However, if they become involved in the game's main politics,
>> then they are likely to get into a fight, and those deaths are
>> per- manent. That way the big assault on the rebel stronghold is
>> going to mean a great deal to the players defending it, seeing
>> that if they lose they are one step closer to being forced to
>> reinvest in the game.

> The only people who are going to want to help out in the assault
> on the Death Star are the ones who believe that they are going to
> get some remarkable experience commensurate with their risk.

I do not know, perhaps you are right, but I think that there are
sufficient players around who are looking for a more meaningful game
than you give them credit for. The problem being that after a while
ordinary (as in: customary on muds today) gameplay tends to become
boring and stale precisely because there is no point to it. The game
is repetitive and resets exactly the same. All a player can do is
wait at some point, sometimes in a queue, for a monster to reappear
again. And again.  Some of these players may well be willing to risk
something of real value in order to con- tribute.  After all, for
many years now people have been willing to pay a lot of real money
to steer some blinking dots across a screen in game arcades.

> The inability to ensure that everyone gets something worthwhile
> out of the overall encounter is the real difficulty.  If I'm
> flying my X-Wing fighter and get blown out of the sky in the first
> 10 seconds of the fight, am I going to be happy about having
> simply been part of the casualties?  Especially if I've lost one
> of my lives - which might be expensive?

Not necessarily expensive, I would not be able to make up some
numbers without knowing more about the players and what they are
willing to pay, and the amount of risk they think acceptable.  Also,
while the game itself would not be out to kill the players (i.e.  no
roving monsters that attack on sight) the same should not be true of
the game plots.  If the death star would come pay a visit then the
players allied with its faction would presuma- bly be pulled out.
The opposing forces would have a fight, and the players who would
not want to risk their accounts can only hope they win, because if
they lose the whole planet, and their character with it, is going to
be blown up.  The same is true if the two factions happen to fight
it out in their hometown.  They might still get caught up in the
crossfire, and get injured, or worse.  The world might be safe, but
that does not mean the game has to be.  The idea is, after all, to
make the events matter to the players, and something like this
certainly would.

> Disappointment and disenchantment from game encounters by the
> player population is something that I'm particularly sensitive to.
> I want to be able to be sure that I can provide a certain level of
> entertainment to the vast majority of my players - and then
> underpromise on that experience.

I certainly agree that potential players of the game must have a
fair, and clear, warning that the game is not your run-of-the- mill
mud. On the other hand, giving the players a number of lives to play
with, and a way to limit the amount of risk they feel is acceptable,
would help a long way for the *players* to find the level of
entertainment they seek, without you having to second- guess them.
It must be possible, even easy, for players to avoid a fight they do
not want, and if engaged in one it must be about strategy and
tactics, not about clubbing each other to death with a blunt object.

> The sheer volume of messages on boards that say 'such and such
> game stinks' is, I believe, partly a result of the game industry's
> desire to provide that emotionally-charged environment, but
> without being able to ensure that the emotions are *positive*.
> Folks are getting charged up, but I suspect that it's a wash as to
> whether it's a positive or negative experience.

I am afraid you can not have both.  It is impossible to appeal to
all the players all the time, and I think pointless to make the
attempt.  You can only be honest about what your game offers, and
about what it does not offer. You may draw less players that way,
but they are likely to be those who want to play that particular
type of game.

> So I continue to eye a model where the players are on one side and
> the gamemasters are on the other, each controlling characters in a
> struggle that never gets too emotionally charged because there is
> never that much at risk.  Players play the game because it's
> entertaining, not because of its ability to elicit strong emotions
> from the players.  Those who are entertained only through strong
> emotions will simply have to look elsewhere than my non-existent
> game :)

Which is certainly a fair approach. After all I only came up with my
idea as an example of how you could provide a game where the main
conflict realy mattered to the players on a personal level.

Marian
--
Yes - at last - You. I Choose you. Out of all the world,
out of all the seeking, I have found you, young sister of
my heart! You are mine and I am yours - and never again
will there be loneliness ...

Rolan Choosing Talia,
Arrows of the Queen, by Mercedes Lackey

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