[MUD-Dev2] [Design] Non-cliche content creation

[cruise]

Thus spake Mike Rozak...
> So, what's a mature/professional way to design MMO content?
> 
> - Concerns about NPC personalities, moods, etc. and how they emotionally impact that player.
> 
> - The same goes for landscape and buildings. (How about some archtectually interesting buildings instead of cliche quasi-medieval wattle-and-daub housing. Or a forest that actually looks and acts like a forest, not a child's (or clear-cut logger's) impression of a forest.)
> 
> - And what about events in the world? How do these events draw the player in?
> 
> - How do the NPC social structures affect the world, and the players?
> 
> - How do players interact with the world and affect it? (Beyond cliche monster killing and resource mining.) Again, emotional attatchment?
> 
> - How do players interact with one another? (Beyond the cliche killing foozles and trading stuff) How does the world encourage this?)
> 
> - Etc.
> 
> What is/are the answer(s)?

If players are to care about the personality of the game-world, rather 
than the mechanics of the game, then the game itself has to care. Quests 
in current MMOGs (and most RPGs, sadly) only affect the game in pre-set 
ways (if at all), and aren't unique to the player. The player isn't 
actually important to the NPC giving the quest, and the quest is 
important to the game. So why should either matter to the player?

Quests have to reflect the game, and it's current state. Quests have to 
matter to the NPC. The world has to matter to the NPC.

My current r&d effort (outside of metaplace) is creating a system to 
produce npcs that can interact and spontaneously produce quests and 
missions - from the simple "I need 10 loaves" to "kill my rival for the 
throne".

> My current muddled thinking is that:
> 
> 1) There are a lot of aspects to a game: emotion, NPCs, architecture, backstory, sound, in-game events, player-with-player interaction, textures, etc., and even gameplay.
> 
> 2) Synergy: Aspects should be designed to enhance one another. Ex: Quests should expose bits of the game-world's history, and/or pull the player into the world's events, and/or show off gameplay, and/or encourage player interaction, etc. Buildings should encourage quests, give clues about the world's history, encourage gameplay, encouring player interaction, etc.

As you said with the artist - determing your "mood" and environment 
first is essential. If a back story depends on the game mechanics in 
some way, then they've been approached in the wrong order.

> 3) Aspects should be worked on much like tightening the bolts on a tire; tighten opposite bolts only a bit at a time. Trying to "complete" an aspect long before the other aspects are near completion leads to disaster.
> 
> 4) (Controversially) Gameplay is only a really small part of the entire creation. Choice, a superset of gameplay, is ultimately more important. Delight/wonder, newness (aka: avoid cliches), choice, and player interaction are all very important.

Is that really controversial anymore? Anything with a large number of 
players surely can't claim to be "all about the gameplay" - the social 
aspect has to be main point, otherwise why the MM (or even just M) part 
of an MMOG?