[MUD-Dev2] Importance of emoting (Was: A rant against Vanguardreviews and rants)

[Mike Sellers]

Tess Snider wrote:
> On 4/3/07, Mike Sellers <mike at onlinealchemy.com> wrote:
> > Imagine for example if "combat" was considered to be a lame and mostly
> > irrelevant addition to an otherwise social game -- depending on your
> > assumption set, almost anything can look like gameplay, or not.  Or
> > consider that The Sims (a mildly successful game, if I recall correctly)
> was
> > almost entirely social gameplay, using a model that hasn't yet been
> applied to
> > MMOs.
> 
> I'm not sure exactly what you mean by "a model that hasn't yet been
> applied to MMOs."  It was applied almost directly (I would argue *too*
> directly) in The Sims Online.  

TSO as you know was nothing like The Sims in its gameplay: same graphics,
same types of actions, but completely different games.  I was the lead
designer on The Sims 2 for the first year of its life, and was briefly lead
on TSO... the two really are nothing alike.  TSO was a train wreck from the
beginning, I'm sad to say, in large part because the psychological and
social models inherent in The Sims *weren't* extended to TSO.  That game
quickly became the worst parts of Jr. High School -- sociality as empty
achievement.  Definitely what we're trying to avoid in creating social
gameplay -- what we're calling "relational" as opposed to "achievement"
gameplay.  

> The primary difference was the shift of
> control from indirect to direct.  If you're ever considering making a
> purely social-gameplay MMO of the sort you're talking about, I highly
> recommend playing some TSO, and reading some reviews, so you can
> improve upon what has gone before.

We're not looking at a purely social MMO but yeah, I'll keep that in mind.

Mike Sellers