[MUD-Dev2] [REPOST] Value

[Sean Howard]

"Paolo Piselli" <ppiselli at yahoo.com> wrote:
> It occured to me that this is in many ways a return to the "world" vs.
> "amusement park" argument.  If a MMO/MUD follows a world model, then
> it makes logical sense that you are limited by your abilities and
> resources in where you may go.  Not everyone can climb to the top of
> Mt. Everest.  If a MMO/MUD follows an amusement park model, well then
> you have paid the admission fee and you may go on any ride that suits
> you so long as you have the time to do so during your stay.  You can't
> go on all the rides in a day and don't expects to, but you do expect
> to have the option of going on any of them.

That's a horrible analogy, and not just because it would boil down to an
argument over whether or not a subscription fee is the same thing as an
admission fee.

When people talk about virtual worlds, they aren't talking about a dog
eats dog gameplay mechanic of elitist players power leveling to see
content casual players cannot. They are talking about a systematic
approach to the simulation such that a butterfly flaps its wings in China
and it rains in London. That's called emergent gameplay and it comes from
unintended, but exceptional results due to the freedom of interacting
elements. In an amusement park game style, there are no unintended
interactions because it is tightly controlled. You don't get to move
around the anamatronic Lincoln and see the wires coming out of his ass -
you only get to see him from the angle the designers want you to. It says
NOTHING over how much content a player deserves to participate in.

In a world, virtual or not, there are not arbitrary limitations to what I
can and can't do. Sure, there are rules, like if I don't work at Denny's,
I may get in trouble for going back into the kitchen. But there aren't any
rules which say I can't work at Denny's. Most MUDs/MMORPGs have some
really stupid limitations above and beyond something like levels. For
instance, a character may only be ONE class. I don't know about you, but
I'm multi-talented. I'm an artist, writer, programmer, and occasionally,
when the mood strikes, a philosopher. And that was yesterday. If I listed
off all the variety of skills I've collected over my life, we'd be here
all day.

With your "world" argument, you are essentially stating that players
should be treated separate but equal, and I think we all know how well
that works. I have NEVER seen a game, MMORPG or otherwise, that had
content that one player DESERVED over another. It's mostly a matter of
lazy or incompetent designers who have an inability to see the forest
through the trees.

Seriously, would World of Warcraft be worse off if the instance dungeons
scaled to the level of the party such that a single healer could find it
just as challenging and rewarding as a group of 47 mages? People have
gotten it into their head that when a group of players can't do content,
it's their fault for not being good enough. I blame that retarded "risk
equals reward" bumper sticker crap, where people have somehow mistaken
reward to mean "advantage".

We need better designers. Not better players.

-- 
Sean Howard