[MUD-Dev] MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of the market.

[Matt Mihaly]

On Thu, 19 Jun 2003, Chris Holko wrote:

> Non PvP games are popular because a majority does not care to have
> their gameplay dictated to them by another player.  Players CANNOT
> be trusted to police themselves.  Just as you cannot put code into
> the client because of hackers you cannot put justice into the
> hands of players.

Players cannot expect to police themselves, it is true. The admins,
on the other hand, can. Our PK system is largely governed by a set
of laws that players must follow that boil down to, "Don't attack
someone who hasn't directly or indirectly (stealing from you,
insulting you, attacking your friend in front of you, etc)." Does it
happen sometimes? Sure. Is it a huge problem? No. We have it under
exceptional control actually, and all three of our games (Achaea,
Aetolia, Imperian) have strong player killing elements.

I actually don't at all buy the "Well, try doing it in a game with
100,000 players." argument. What you're dealing with are X number of
servers maxing at maybe 2000 simultaneous players. That's larger
than any of our games, granted, but we usually do 500 simultaneous
every day on our largest game. And while handling enforcement of our
laws is kind of a pain sometimes, it's really not a big deal in the
grand scheme of things.

> PvP works when investment in character isn't as meaningful as
> found in most MMOs.  Planetside is interesting, but I can't see
> paying for what is essentially Tribes+Quake+CounterStrike.

Lots of other people are though. Similarly, we've been around and
growing since 1997, though our games focus on more than just player
killing.

--matt


"Are you gay?" - Dale Gribble's Dad
"What?? No! I sell propane!" - Hank Hill
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