Monthly Archives: April 2013

[GW2] Farming Arah and the ugly Face of Anonymity

For reasons not entirely transparent to myself, I’ve recently decided to set myself a goal in GW2 which is farming tokens from the Ruined City of Arah in order to acquire the only set worth a look on my female Norn Elementalist. It’s not that I require the gear statwise, as it’s identical to my current armor which also happens to look smashing – but then, GW2 endgame is all about creating your own challenges. And Arah surely is that, although not in the way I initially anticipated. While this might be one of the more challenging dungeons, its greatest annoyances come in form of skipping content and frankly obnoxious people populating pickup parties.

Here’s a confession: I hadn’t been to Arah-the-dungeon prior to my decision to farm tokens. My personal story is pending just one or two chapters before that. I have finished a story mode run more recently but my first runs ever were in complete ignorance of the place (which is usually the case when you do something for the first time) if not of Orr. That said, story mode is no preparation for exploration mode really, so what is a player to do other than to start and build up experience from there? I would also say for myself that I’m far from slow when it comes to steep learning curves.

arahz01

Yet, my first few Arah PuG runs almost made me give up completely on my set goal (and humanity). They were spent group-rushing through large packs of trash, frantically spamming cooldowns and hoping to keep up with the others because no idea where I’m going. More often than not, they were spent being one-shot by said trash which either wiped the entire party or “the unlucky one” (as I like to call him by now), then re-attempting the same leeroy act, corpse-running over and over until somehow the entire party makes it through alive. Should you happen to be the unlucky one, don’t count on much help; you then get to attempt the insanity all by yourself with the rest of the group waiting impatiently, rather than porting back to retry together and increase your chances. Because what nobody likes to admit is this: thank god it wasn’t me and I’ll be damned to go back and help anybody! I’ve actually been in parties where people were happy to stand around for 15 minutes, rather than helping the person rushing trash alone, dying over and over. This gotta be the saddest, most asocial show I have ever experienced in an MMO which pains me a great deal to admit.

Most of Arah’s trash is ridiculously overpowered and probably meant to be skipped, which doesn’t excuse shitty behavior one bit. The absurdity of the trash combined with the vast scale and multiple paths within the dungeon, make it every beginner’s nightmare. Not only do you not find your way alone, your group is too tired and annoyed by the trash to play more cooperatively. You’re supposed to know your way around or be damned. This of course leads to many more questionable situations, soon making you wonder whether you are really saving that much time by skipping mobs:

  • Groups wiping because it’s not clear if a particular trash is to be avoided or killed, ending up with three players rushing through and two pulling.
  • Everybody reluctant to be the first one / on the front-line of a rush.
  • The group deciding to continue without the unlucky one, in order to activate the next waypoint. This may include killing a next boss without the person.
  • Squishier classes getting the greatest beef. Direct quote from my last Arah run: “this is why we don’t play Elementalists”.

 
Now, I’m happy to admit I still have things to learn on my class and I’ve already improved much as far as individual performance goes. It’s the whole randomness about skipping trash in Arah that gets to me. Rushes are so chaotic and hard to coordinate (with strangers), it’s often a lottery who gets through and who doesn’t. I’ve had runs where I didn’t die once and I’ve had the most horrible and frustrating runs which in fact made me ragequit once or twice – not last because of how thoughtlessly people behaved in general.

The paradoxical thing is that you can go through all this negativity before ever hitting your first boss. From my experiences from paths 1-3, there’s not one boss in Arah as frustrating as the long, to-be-avoided trash routine. I can easily survive through Lupicus by means of my own survivability skills and despite what some say about the bossfight, I don’t think it’s too hard. It’s one of the greater fights in all of GW2, one where tactics and your survival skills can truly shine.

And the whole grouping mess already shows before finding parties. Generally, players will use gw2lfg.com for lack of an ingame grouping tool in this cross-server MMO (!), then whispering random strangers for an invite. Only, that’s not how you do it, which I discovered after being ignored a couple of times. “Use self-inv” was the gracious reply I finally received one day and so I added myself to a party where quite obviously nobody was interested in who I was. Which to some degree makes sense in a setup-free game, only doesn’t if you then also have a look at popular party requests for GW2:

arah02

Random days, random dungeons on LFG (click to enlarge)

“EXP ONLY NO NOOBS” – “LF ZERK WAR / MESMER” – “Excessive dying will not be tolerated” – “RETARDS WILL BE KICKED” – “full exotic gear, must ping gear”

Here’s the funny part: nobody can truly tell experience by looks or gear in GW2. Hardly ever do you even get asked for gear level and “proving” it is pretty useless without inspect or armory functions. More importantly, you need neither the greatest gear in the world, not a certain warrior or other class, nor years of experience to run a dungeon like Arah (or any other dungeon). All you really need is a decent group of human beings.

What exactly is the point of lines like “exp only” or “full gear” if nobody checks on you anyway as you self-invite yourself?

The ugly face of anonymity

We’ve known since WoW latest that cross-server anonymity is one of the big banes of server community. The upside of shorter queues is won by too a high a price and it’s not just the exceptional troll that makes for lousy group experiences. There’s a common dynamic of caring less about others not from your own server, caring less for your own performance because there’s little consequence, caring less for decent communication because explaining things to strangers is tedious – and why do it when they’re so easily replaced? A note about social mechanics in any human society: anything that makes people “care less” is generally a bad thing.

Furthermore, there appears to be a direct, inverted relation between downtime tolerance and the actual downtime in an MMO: GW2 is a game of few downtimes related to grouping. Not only can players cooperate without formal grouping on outdoor quests, there’s the self-invite function and lack of strict group setup requirements. You could therefore think that players are generally less in a rush and more inclined to wait for each other or explain something – but not so! Being used to little downtime results in an even lower tolerance for the same. At least people treasure their groups more in MMOs where they cannot take them for granted and where losing a member is to risk more wait time.

Do I advocate to bring back grouping barriers and artificial downtimes? No. However, for all its improvements on the social side, such as dynamic outdoor grouping with shared nodes (I know GW2 is not alone in this), res-anyone and setup freedom, GW2’s pickup dungeon experiences are as bad or worse as any other MMO’s – not least because of ANet’s concept of the global village. The entire server/world is your guild? If so, where’s the g-quit button?

GW2 removed a few dated concepts that came with their own set of issues. Unfortunately, it did fail to replace them properly. I’m thinking of more positive ways to motivate spontaneous grouping between levels 1-80 and better overall cooperation in dungeons (I would’ve expected a lot more in terms of encounter design or combo mechanics). I’m in full agreement with Psychochild here – I’ve no wish to go back to good old bad times but there’s clearly a lot more to be done about cooperation and social interaction in this genre which continues to push mega-servers, paradoxically enough for a not-so-MM experience. I wish we could go back to small or even private server communities already.

To close, an attempt at balance: yes, there are good PuGs in GW2 sometime, just like there are in any game. I’ve had few runs by now which were almost pleasant, with people I would sadly never run into again because they weren’t from my server (and friendlists are a downtime). Every now and then you’ll find “relaxed group” advocated in LFG, although that’s fairly rare. There’s a much greater issue at large here and while bad design does not excuse nasty behavior (it sure does not), it has a way of coming through and slowly affecting everyone and everything, until even the most supportive person resigns to what’s been established as the most efficient way of playing, rather than the best one. The fastest way to treasure, so we can be done playing this already.

Yeah, I did have some good groups in Arah…still, I’d rather not ask how they may have turned out had I dared to be unlucky.

P.S. A new episode of Battle Bards is up – go check it out!

Picture of the Day

Thanks to the wonderful Tesh, my mug collection (yeah I have one) got two shiny Battle Bards mugs added to it today. Naturally, I had to take a quick picture with the family. Sometimes you plan everything out carefully and then the cat is being awesome, so here’s the result:

sia

A happy weekend to all of you, with hopefully less rain than over here!

Three Indie games, three ways of handling story

Last week I wrote on storytelling in MMORPGs and why I think there should be less telling going on in this genre in particular. Judging from the passionate discussions this topic sparked in my comment section as much as on other blogs (such as over at Nils, Bhagpuss, Rowan, Tesh,  Soresu or Eri), it’s  become apparent that many of us feel strongly about this subject and how MMOs should deal with it. It’s probably a fair guess too that most of us actually want stories, so the games we play need to allow and in some cases (such as lore) prepare for them. Interestingly enough, the debates also showed a wide consensus insofar as that many of today’s MMORPGs (which feature heavy exposition) fail in this regard and don’t sufficiently challenge player imagination. I find this rather noteworthy.

On the weekend I’ve played through another indie game, called Proteus. I hadn’t heard about this title previously and went into the whole experience, a term which certainly applies here, unbiased and without expectations. It so happens that Proteus is another antithesis to how story is delivered in many of today’s games, making a perfect addition to a follow-up I’ve been meaning to write on indie games which handle story a little differently. If you find yourself generally curious about different narrative approaches in videogames and are looking to delve further into this subject, I can highly recommend playing these and I will attempt to summarize for you in which way each game tackles story and includes the player in the narrative process (if at all).

Before I get to this though, it’s important to briefly cover my bases as far as definitions go. There is always some wiggling room for interpretation in terminology, but generally when I refer to lore, story or story-telling, my meaning is this:

  • Lore: lore is the unspoken framework of the world. It’s its past and history and is (or should be ) all around you. In the real world lore shows itself via culture, language, architecture, art etc. The same applies to plausible virtual worlds. There is much more to lore than reading books or hearing a story told by elders.
  • Story/Narrative: while a story can be “told” (or narrated), the most engaging stories are the ones that are not explained but developed, discovered, unearthed and experienced step by step. Story happens inside the recipient’s mind and can be achieved in many different ways, to different effect. In games, the player should be part of an experience rather than just a reader.
  • Story-telling: the most direct way to communicate story is via spelling it out for someone, in written or spoken text. This applies to random stories as much as lore and is rarely the best way (and certainly the least engaging or immersive way) to include the player (=/ players are not “audience”).

 
With that out of the way, let’s continue with the way each of the games below handles story. I vow to keep this on a conceptual level and to steer clear of big, bad spoilers as much as possible.

A) “Journey”

journey

Journey is a game of no words, featuring incidental but non-verbal player interaction. While the player is set on an unknown (but essentially linear) path through a visually stunning, limited open world of soft pastels, the only rough guidance comes in the form of paintings on ancient ruin walls, occasional riddles/triggers or NPC presence. Gameplay mechanics are limited to few commands. The player is an errant wanderer, the goal is unclear.

How story is created in Journey: Journey is all about lore. While linear in essence, the game offers more or less opportunities to marvel at details found in the environment and speculate on what appear to be remnants of ancient civilization. Between “zones”, the player’s journey is recapped in form of animated mural artwork. There is a beautiful conclusion (or interpretation) to Journey although it is as much a beginning as an end.

Do I feel like a part of Journey’s story? – Yes. Do I feel as if I am driving the narrative? – Yes.

B) “Dear Esther”

esther

Without intending to make a quality statement, Dear Esther is a title I would call more book than game. It’s visualized story-telling in which the player gets to travel strange landscapes of the mind or memory, with narrated monologues by someone else (or maybe not). The player’s path is therefore limited and gameplay in the traditional sense is virtually non-existent. The vistas you travel are tied to the information given as the story moves along.

How story is created in Dear Esther: despite being narrated, Dear Esther presents the player with more questions than answers. The story is hard to follow, text consists of non-expository, ambiguous and often unclear snippets which need to be puzzled together and leave much room for interpretation. While Dear Esther is all about the narration, it leaves much guesswork to the player. The conclusion is a riddle in itself, leaving the player wondering how much of a part he truly had in what’s been told.

Do I feel like a part of Dear Esther’s story? – I’m still figuring this one out. Do I feel as if I am driving the narrative? – Not really.

C) “Proteus”

proteus

Proteus is both a game of very limited gameplay as well as minimalistic graphics, putting emphasis on music and sound effects. Cast away on a strange small island, the player gets to move around freely in an attempt to map and explore the natural habitat, including few mysterious ruins scattered across the place. Acknowledgement of player existence is given through sound effects and some NPC reactions. Other than that, there is nothing to be “learned”, no particular path to be taken nor any other action possible in order to “move things forward”. Proteus is literally about (patiently) experiencing the flow of time and its impact on the environment.

How story is created in Proteus: as there’s neither narration nor lore worth mentioning, Proteus is an extreme example of leaving gaps in story. The experience is literally about being there and biding one’s time. While player action or presence seems insignificant, there is still change happening in the world which can be detected and interpreted. Ultimately, Proteus delivers a conclusion similar to Journey’s although much more timidly so. Story in this game is whatever you choose to tell yourself.

Do I feel like a part of Proteus’ story? – No. Do I feel as if I am driving the narrative? – No.

My personal conclusion

Of the three games, Proteus proved to be my greatest challenge. It’s bewildering to “play” a game which hardly acknowledges your presence and generally offers no way of participation. The same could be said for Dear Esther, yet there purpose gets clear from the beginning and the game still offers the player a weak sense of driving chapters forward, if not the actual story. Proteus on the other hand comes with a sense of open world and seems to follow its own timer; while the world changes around you, there’s a feeling of helplessness or lack of understanding that I personally found unnerving. To me it felt like shouting into a well with no echo. I had a very hard time engaging myself where there was so little to engage yourself with (and the island is too small to explore for a long time). I cannot say that I found any story worth telling despite there being a final “conclusion”.

No doubt there are players who would disagree with me on Proteus and whose experiences differs greatly. Maybe players who also dig the musical aspect of the game which I found annoying after a while. This is the interesting part though: the way we experience games tells much about ourselves. Proteus strained my patience and frustrated my impulses for activity. It showed that just wandering a world influenced by time is not enough for me and won’t satisfy my wish for story in games. To be fair, the game is stripped of almost everything. At the very least it could do with some more lore but that’s my opinion.

That experience also confirmed I need some traditional gameplay and means of interaction to enjoy myself; in Proteus, the concept of the “player” is reduced to a point where I found it difficult to feel emotion or attachment (can there be such a thing if the “self” is removed?). This is not just due to the lack of visible avatar (which is the case in Dear Esther too); the game makes a point of how unimportant you are as an entity. You might as well be a hovering, maneuverable camera taking wildlife shots. No thanks – but it sure was an experience.

Journey remains my favorite for overall accomplishment and story – although I would pay for more games coming forward and expanding on Dear Esther’s concept. Journey achieves a stunning balance between player inclusion and leaving gaps, showing story rather than telling it. It features enough gameplay to retain a sense of driving things forward while the player remains a wonderer, wanderer and puzzler within a much greater tale. It’s the game I therefore also found the most immersive and the only one I have replayed. Unfortunately Journey remains PS3-only (worth borrowing the console if you don’t own it!). Both Dear Esther and Proteus can be acquired on Steam.

I recommend all of them if you’re looking to blow your narrative mind sometime and also to test the limits of your very personal notions of what constitutes game. You never know what you may discover.

Happy Moday Post: A Gamer’s Dream

I am a crazy dreamer which I’ve always attributed to my rampant imagination. I dream very vivid dreams on most nights, in stark contrast to my partner who never ever dreams and if he does, he never remembers. I, on the other hand remember lots of things although on average memory is at its freshest right after waking up and then fades miraculously soon after. It’s only ever the most impressive, horrible or delightful dreams that stick with me longterm and honestly this dream business is as much a blessing as a curse at times. Dark dreams can overshadow my mood for the entire day to come – not very pleasant! On the other hand, nothing beats being woken up by your own laughter (and creeping out whoever may be in close proximity). I don’t place much meaning on dreams though; I’ve always interpreted them as “brain doing a clean-out or re-arranging furniture”. I’ve definitely had dreams in the past which were a direct consequence of intense experiences or stressful times, still dreams are ripples on the surface of our subconscious at best, without any indication of what’s to come. I believe as little in oneiromancy as in palm reading. Did you know that’s a word?

Anyway, it so happens that I’ve had one of the most fantastic gamer dreams ever only two nights ago and I’m still thinking about it. I’m having lots of cool gaming-related dreams of late, it must be a lucky streak! That particular one was so geeky and epic however, I just have to share it on this sunny Monday morning! Most people would give me funny looks over this but I feel this blog is a safe place to tell the tale.

“The Ultimate Escapism”

Artwork by HeeWonLee

Artwork by HeeWonLee

So, I am standing on the balcony of my apartment which happens to be a different apartment, but then dreams never seem to care for this type of accuracy. It’s a sunny day and I am looking down on the green lawn below. Suddenly, this tall and bulky male Troll warrior in full battle armor materializes out of thin air; he is lying on the grass quite relaxed, staring up at me. He is also an ingame character (as in WoW cartoon while me and the rest of the world are still erm photo-realistic). He’s winking at me while I’m trying to catch up with my brain. Next thing a shiny sword starts materializing beside him, followed by a Draenei, this time a woman, grasping it. Apparently they’re here to fetch me. And I’m late.

This is where the dream “zones” or makes a cut, or maybe I just don’t remember how I left the balcony. I’m now in company of these two mysterious figures leading me to a WoW style city, where numerous other game characters are fighting and training and basically doing MMO THINGS as I’m given a tour around. I end up being introduced to a cheerful troll girl with pink hair (she actually had a haircut that exists in the game…and tusks) who takes me to the inn. She had a name too but I’ve lost it.

Troll girl introduces me to her girlfriends at the inn and they’re talking about fashion (…). Apparently there’s a party later on and I’m not dressed for the occasion. Worse: I am still no cartoon figure! Immediately I’m taken to this lake where – wait for it – there’s a sort of fishing mini-game going on with small rafts. I have to compete against 7 other players and win the thing by collecting most items from the water.

And so I do! Victorious, I head back to the lobby (or whatever it was) and grab the reward sitting on a table. It’s a fairly lackluster cardboard box really and when I open it, there are several cockroaches swarming out (which I interpret as tokens for the losers). What’s left is a grey bushy tail.

(I’m not kidding! First I thought it was weird but then I remembered this…….)

The tail looks more like a short brush and is made of some cloth fabric (rather than real tail thank god). I’m supposed to eat it to complete the transformation to cartoon Syl. As I start chewing on the thing, the troll warrior from the beginning is back cheering at me. I’m still trying to gulp down what’s left, feeling strangely warm inside.

…And that’s when our neighbor from downstairs (I hate these people) rang at the door, waking me up. It’s SO cliché yet it’s nothing but the truth. And I never got to know what else would’ve happened in that strange dream land after becoming a WoW character, DOH! I went back and tried but re-connecting to dreams is virtually impossible. /sadface

Oh well. It was a wonderful dream nonetheless, a gamer’s dream. One that I got to share with you. Happy Monday everybody – and hang on to those dreams of yours!

Why Storytelling in MMORPGs is overrated

I am so tired of all the MMORPG lore I’m supposed to know about. Or care.
Why can’t I be the one writing history? (Syl)

I know there are players who would fiercely disagree with above sentiment; lovers of MMO lore for one thing and all those of you who feel that the player should not be the hero of the world. I’ve disagreed with that before – and I still do.

As great as the story of Arthas was in World of Warcraft and it’s one of the few I ever really cared for, it also made me a by-stander. I was allowed to accompany him through the Culling of Stratholme and assist Jaina several times over but I had neither power nor say in any of these matters. A load of good all the leveling up, gearing up and gaining reputation have done me. Worse though, what the story arch of Arthas really did for Warcraft was ending something; the central theme, the big ambivalent villain figure ended in Wrath of the Lich King. And on a personal level it’s where the game ended for me, too.

No matter what efforts have gone into writing the next expansion or attempting to introduce Deathwing as “that new threat” (another boring force-of-nature dragon in a fantasy game), everything after WotLK is basically “post Arthas” and we know it. That is the nature of storytelling: it ends. To tell a story, recounting events, is to acknowledge the flow of time. All good stories, the ones that engage and touch us, must end lest they not be literally point-less.

Who may be allowed to linger who is fulfilled by purpose? (C. Morgenstern)

tmd

Art by E. Foster

Is it really such a good thing to emphasize storytelling in a genre that wants its virtual worlds to exist forever? There’s a reason why the internal narrative of LOTRO, now in its fourth expansion, has only just reached the chapter of Rohan. It took the fellowship five and a half years (!) to get to that part of Middle-Earth and for a good reason. For what will happen if they ever reach their final destination? What will Turbine do after the One Ring was cast into the fiery chasm from whence it came? As long as their game goes strong it must never happen.

More Lore Bore

Narrative is an important part of the RPG genre; it adds depth to the fictional worlds we play in and the characters we meet, as far as we like to make NPCs an important part of the experience anyway. Traditionally, it can make us connect with individuals, identify more with quests we are given and add purpose to our stride. Yet, if my personal MMORPG experiences are any indication, lore and storytelling do not actually make for much player immersion. There is a disconnect between myself and a world I have “so much to learn about” (like a tourist purchasing a guide book), trying to follow the narrative’s red line and let’s face it: read lots and lots of text! Or alternatively listen to it.

I have all but switched off to my personal storyline in Guild Wars 2, those cut-scene screens cannot come off fast enough. Trehearne is the hero of the day and for all the forked story-choices I get to make, all roads inevitably lead to Zhaitan – yes, yet another faceless, boring fantasy game dragon. Never has a more formidable creature from our favorite genre’s bestiary known more “narrative mistreatment”. I am so detached from what is supposed to be my personal story(?), it feels like ArenaNet should have re-named the whole thing to “world campaign”. Only, the entire narrative doesn’t just feel disconnected from the player on a personal level, it is also not very well integrated in the rest of Tyria.

gw440

However, Guild Wars 2 storytelling failings are far from the exception. And I honestly think the constant demand for increased “story telling” in MMORPGs is mislead. The so-called fourth pillar of game design is overrated for this genre in particular, for should not the player drive the narrative rather than being driven by it? And it would be a good thing to remember how great stories are really created and why more and more story-driven quests and events in MMOs are in fact counter-productive to the immersive experience. Worlds are immersive when they engage us and make us partake – not listen to.

Don’t “tell me” the story

Great writing is the art of not saying things. It’s the skill of knowing which things to write and which to leave out. The greatest of authors understand that it won’t do to spell out all the details, secrets and twists about a story; this is not how interesting characters or plot are created. I believe typically most writers spend the first half of their journey learning to flesh out, formulate and construct interesting, complex plot-lines. After that, they spend the other half of the time removing information and un-saying too many words. I can confirm this for my own writing journey, that it’s a struggle of learning what not to say, rather than what to say and mustering that “courage for silence” which tangentially, is also a central theme in the education of teachers (which happens to be my professional background). Didactics 101 will teach you that for greatest learning effect, impact and longevity, your audience needs to make as many steps of the journey on their own as possible. They must try unearth and unravel the story (or learning subject) by themselves. The teacher should only ever be the prompter, the one asking questions and if required the fallback plan.

Accomplished (fiction) writing follows very much the same principles. Unfortunately, it’s not as easy as grabbing the eraser and cutting extra holes into a story; we need to set up the things we aren’t telling and often that takes a lot more doing than just spilling the beans. Writers must balance that tiny margin between frustrating readers with gaps and inconsistencies versus treating them like children. Both shortcomings are equally bad.

Half of the world building in MMOs relies on us completing the picture with our own mental imagery. It’s when the real magic happens – the alchemy. (source – Syl)

I would re-phrase my above statement in this context to the following: “Half of the story building in MMOs relies on us connecting the dots by means of our own imagination. It’s when the real magic happens – the alchemy.”

Where does narrative happen? And impact? Not inside the game surely. They happen inside our minds and most exquisitely so when we connected the dots ourselves. When we have a sudden moment of understanding, of surprise, suspicion or that big game-altering epiphany: “Oh my god, a-ha!”

MMO players aren’t a lazy audience, they’re in fact experts when it comes to finding secrets, puzzling together bits and pieces of information scattered seemingly at random across the world. Yet, less and less are they being challenged to do this in MMORPGs. I’d like to play sherlock in the games I play in and unwind themes and stories in my own time. And I want to be part of them rather than just a reader plowing his way through chunks of narrative thrown at me ever so often by writers. Most of all: I want less story-telling and spelling it all out for me. Heck, less is a lot more here! Leave something to my imagination? It tends to be bigger than anything anyone could write.

Winding back the clock

I’ve been playing through several retro RPG hommages this last weekend, such as Half-Minute Hero or Evoland. While they’re parodies of oldschool console RPG tropes and mechanics, they made me think back on how much simpler stories used to be in this genre and how well I remember them in spite of this. Characters weren’t nearly as well written or complex, either. Yet that “blankness” or lack of certain pieces of information allowed me to make them “my own” a lot more than newer games do. It allowed me to project some of my own wishes and speculations into them and to keep looking for clues around the world to back me up. To this day, I still wonder about Crono, that mute “protagonist” from one of the greatest games in existence. And I still speculate over pieces of the puzzle that is the story in Xenogears. I like not getting answers to everything. It means I can find my own answers.

Interestingly enough, I came across two links in this context after starting to write this article. One is a Gamasutra analyzis on “Chrono Trigger’s Design Secrets“, a piece that focuses almost exclusively on the balance between delivering narrative versus emergent gameplay and freedom in the SNES classic. This big design challenge applies to MMORPGs too, maybe even a lot more so.

Thanks to modular narrative sections, carefully designed battles, and the use of levels to guide progression, players are given a sense of freedom while actually playing a relatively linear game and experiencing a set overall narrative — but Chrono Trigger‘s narrative freedom goes much deeper than that.

My second link is Total Biscuit’s critical Bioshock Infinite review on youtube. Most players agree that there’s not much in terms of open world in this shooter RPG and it doesn’t need to be – BI is a linear and heavily story-driven, visually stunning journey (with guns). The players is and always will remain a spectator. Yet, at one point through the video (39:40) TB comments on general exploration in Bioshock games:

Generally speaking the world itself tells a story way, way better than anything else would. Like, if you would’ve just said: Oh, I’m gonna tell a story through a bunch of exposition with dialogue – that’s not as strong as the way Bioshock has traditionally told its stories, because Bioshock shows you things. And it also leaves a lot to the imagination and a lot of conclusions which you yourself have to actually make. Which is in itself pretty fantastic.[…] And I would say that if you wanna design your game really well and you wanna do a reasonably open-world game which encourages exploration, you have got to do that stuff. You’ve got to have the world tell various stories.

While I’m not so sure this necessarily applies to BI in particular, I agree with it as a principle.

In conclusion: 3 maxims of storytelling in MMORPGs

I’ve touched on several issues of storytelling in RPGs and MMORPGs in this post, all of which intersect heavily but are also questions of their own. First and foremost whether MMORPGs should feature pre-written stories and if so, how much is too much? And how should ongoing narrative be driven and delivered in online games in order to engage the player and remove him from the spectator’s bench? I haven’t reached any final conclusions on this myself. However, in summary and based on insights from past games, I would state the following three “maxims” of storytelling in MMORPGs:

  • MMORPGs should avoid that one central and finite story arch. Instead, the world should feature various stories to be discovered by the player and followed in his own time.
  • There should be less story-telling and explaining going on. Instead, offer the player more engaging hunts for truth and connecting dots. Dare to leave gaps and not explain everything or everyone.
  • Narrative should be driven by the player as much as the other way around (at the very least).

 
These could possibly be refined or worded better. I think it’s safe to say that many MMO players do enjoy good stories but it’s a question of how they are initiated, how they engage and include us in the worlds we play in – whether they remain tales or become experiences.

Every minute spent on reading or listening to educational text blocks in MMOs is a minute in which I am a passive recipient rather than the player / hero. And with every such minute my world inevitably becomes a little bit smaller – more explained rather than explored, more narrated rather than experienced. What an unspeakable loss.

[GW2] The Three-fold Cosmetics Fail

I love the Super Adventure Box in Guild Wars 2, I really do – but this needs to stop! –

gw2vests

So, there are new vests available in the gemstore and I don’t even wanna know. The only emotional response I have to such announcements by now is seeing the Simpson’s infamous “See my vest, see my vest” play down before my inner eye. Besides the underwhelming variety of cosmetics in general, the ingame shop has seen no additions worth mentioning between the temporary Halloween costumes and Quaggan/Charr backpacks since the beginning in August 2012. Remember some of the GW2 “shop panic” pre-launch? Yeah, that was a waste of time!

Now granted, the shop has been a bit more active of late; there are the SAB mini-pets and items that will finally let you redo the overall looks and hairstyle of your character. You know, what’s usually called a barber shop in other games. Oh and they added one more epic piece of gear to the store in 2013: hoodies! Yep, you heard that right. The armor designers at ANet have gone completely wild with this one –

These come in three different colors, one of which is an unidentifiable mesh of grey and brown, although why you wouldn’t re-dye is beyond me (but then, if you actually paid money on this already who knows what else you’ll do). They’re about as exciting as the riding pants which have also been added recently – not at all.

This isn’t even funny anymore. I actually love playing with looks in MMOs, so this mess is just tragic. And I just don’t get it! Let’s get this straight: we are talking about a visually stunning, fantasy MMO epic where players, myself included, generally run around looking like this:

gw636

Yes, so much yes! And in which conceivable, parallel reality would I ever consider wearing one of those lackluster, plain boring hoodies instead of the badass royal armor composition above?? That’s not the worst of it though because TOWN CLOTHES!

Cosmetics gone wrong, Chapter #2: Introducing town clothes

My character currently possesses two pieces of town clothes which I was given via promotional code by other players. Both items are ANet “fan attire”, displaying the red dragon logo in an attempt of ingame merchandising – because you need to promote GW2 to those who have already bought it. The pieces are extremely ugly (not to mention immersion breaking) so needless to say, I never ever display them and why on earth would I? I’ve mentioned it before and it bears repeating: town clothes are the most inane and failed attempt at cosmetic gear ever! This is where you will find consensus across the board: nobody thinks it’s fun to have cosmetics you can only ever wear inside cities! A great deal of players won’t spend money on such items. Simply put, ANet is losing a big avenue of additional income by under-using their shop and also using it the wrong way. My 850 gems (which I transferred via cash, not ingame gold) have been rotting in the market tab since last year. Why does this company not want to sell me anything?

Cosmetics used to be a big deal in Guild Wars, especially considering the lack of high-level gear progression. I was probably not alone in the assumption that GW2 was going to be similar. I stand corrected and vastly surprised. ANet’s poor attempts at adding to the gemstore since launch can only be interpreted as an equal lack of enthusiasm or inspiration for the whole thing, so maybe we get lucky and they remove the town clothes feature already and let players finally go wild on their combat gear. Anything else bespeaks an ongoing lack of understanding of your customer base.

What I do wonder at this point too is this: did ANet shoot themselves in the foot by also allowing ingame gold to be converted to gems? Is this why they put no effort in offering more interesting items on the market?

Cosmetics gone wrong, Chapter #3: Introducing Transmutation

Unfortunately we’re not quite done with the cosmetics gripes. GW2 has possibly the worst approach to armor skin-transfer (of non-town clothes) I have ever seen. I’m not kidding. Anything, from WoW’s transmogging to the simplest and best of solutions, the cosmetic tabs in Rift or LOTRO, is preferable to the transmutation system in GW2. In case you missed it, transmuting items in order to give one the look of the other, always results in the loss of one involved item! If you are matching stats of item a (which would be your best combat gear for example) with the looks of item b (a new skin you received), you will irrevocably lose item a as far as looks go. Tough luck if you kinda liked them both and were only looking for a bit of diversity!

Again, this makes no sense to me. Not only is the system hurting collectors (by far not all skins are easily acquirable or cheap), it’s reducing armor variety in a game that already has very few sets to choose from compared to its predecessor. If there’s something GW2 currently could use more of it’s epic cosmetic armor and not more urban hoodies! If I wanted to dress up in street-wear in MMOs, I’d be playing The Secret World (and be much happier with my choices there)!

“Dear Armor Designers at ArenaNet”

I think you created a fantastic, visually stunning game. Not just that, it’s subscription-free and nobody is complaining about featuring an item store in a game like yours – only seems fair. When it comes to your approach to gear and cosmetics however, you are currently missing out and bigtime. Here’s why: there’s plenty of people in your player base who…

  • Care for cosmetics, like variety and would love to hang on to and collect gear
  • Are happy to pay extra money for great cosmetics
  • Would actually want to wear their cosmetics (not just in towns)

 
MMO players are incredibly imaginative and enthusiastic when it comes to making their characters look unique and different. There are countless webpages dedicated to nothing else. Many players will go to great lengths to acquire new skins, trade skins, update skins. Gear looks are a source of fun, pride and recognition value in MMOs.

And also this: beautiful, eye-catching cosmetics and Guild Wars 2 go together like chocolate and coffee. They are literally meant to be! So, can we please have some consistency here? Thank you!

Shard Mechanics in SotA: No country for Strangers?

Nobody was more surprised than myself to see Shroud of the Avatar, one of the most horrible name-givings in MMO history surely, reach its one million goal with an added extra of 30% on kickstarter. I know some players are desperate to bring “anything a bit like UO” back but still – surprised! And what better figurehead to sell that promise than Lord British, Richard Garriot, or Lord Snakependant as I like to call him. He and his eye-catching accessory seem to appear everywhere of late. Where can I get my fortune read, please?

This Tuesday night, Grakulen from MMORPG.com had the honor of interviewing Garriot on twitch and get some of the fan-base’s more pressing questions answered. For some obscure reason I found myself following that show, bravely ignoring the trashtalk going on in the live chat window. Now, I have no idea if any future version of myself would even consider playing SotA, nonetheless some of you might be interested to hear the following “news” or tidbits which were elaborated on by Garriot:

  • SotA will be all about meaningful, moral choices; players will supposedly be challenged in various ways and have to live with the consequences of their actions (taking extenuating circumstances into account). Tricky.
  • Outdoor player housing is back! While houses will be more exclusive than in UO and bound to designated town zones, players will not only be able to own public buildings but set up shops and vendor NPCs. Wahey, right? Also: you can choose to play a pure “farming” character.
  • There be world events; for example, towns will be besieged in various intervals (“every new moon”) and players will need to band up in order to save their infrastructure and NPCs. We’ve seen hubs taken over in Rift, so personally I hope there will be more drama and significance to this in SotA.
  • As SotA won’t be featuring different servers but one global mega-server, a sort of culling-mechanic is in place to reduce the amount of other players you can see at any given time. It’s not actually “culling” the way we have it in GW2 but rather dynamic instances (or shards) of the same server that players play on in order to avoid heavy traffic. Shards aren’t exactly new, yet in SotA the system ensures that friends will always end up on the same shard. The more removed an acquaintance, the less likely you will ever see them (however, those “invisible players” would still be able to access your shop as customers, since you are strictly speaking playing on the same world). The friend-feature aside, players will be “re-sharded” pretty much all the time, says Garriot.

 
This last part is where it got complicated. I understand it’s becoming trendy for MMOs to re-introduce that “one world feeling”, the way it’s also been announced for the Elder Scrolls Online. While I’m certainly pro server mechanics that ensure friends can play together (although there’s this wild thing called server transfers), the whole concept loses much of its appeal when we’re back talking about different layers/instances/shards and invisible people. Not such a big world after all?

Before I was able to formulate an even bigger concern however, another viewer in the twitch audience, Garbrac, beat me to it in live chat:

moz-screenshot

 
“So if I have no friends, will I be playing the game alone?”

Ever since MMORPGs have come out of the shadows with World of Warcraft, new games are being created under the solid assumption that players will show up “with friends”. You don’t make online friends in MMOs any more – you’re supposed to bring them. You can see it in game design too: the learning curve, jumping into medias res and the leveling journey become ever more trivial. At the same time, endgame challenges and/or difficult group content persist; big world or guild events require functional communities. Tough luck for the one who travels those first bits of the game alone! With little hardship comes little cooperation. Cooperation is where chance encounters transform into lasting bonds and guild invites (or creation) are generally the consequence.

Mind, I am not talking about enforced role setup and I am happy that new MMOs allow for playstyle variety. But if cooperation is a core value of high level content, it needs to be a requirement on low level too! Otherwise there’s a clear issue in preparing and setting up new players for the whole journey. And there’s an even bigger issue if server mechanics prevent soloers from ever meeting the same people twice! I cannot imagine anything more dreary than playing on a server that constantly changes my social environment! How on earth am I supposed to establish connections here? High level group content yay – but erm, can I please find some companions first?

Anyway, I can’t wait to hear a solution to this from the guys at SotA (unfortunately it was not addressed in the twitch talk). I don’t know about you, but I am not looking forward to MMO worlds that are constantly re-sharding me anywhere, unless I bring existing friends and family along!

Battle Bards Podcast Episode #1 – Going live!

In July 2011 I started my ongoing soundtrack seriEpicLuteTall200x300es to have an outlet for my love of fantastic videogame tunes and also, to reach out to other gamers of similar inclination in the blogosphere (and few and far they are in between – or so it always seemed). If the world of RPGs and MMOs is a niche, collecting MMO soundtrack is probably a sub-niche.

Imagine my enthusiasm then when I heard about a fully dedicated MMO music podcast by Syp from Biobreak (and Massively)! When offered to co-host this show together with two more venerable MMO bloggers and soundtrack geeks, how could I possibly say no?
Even better: the podcast comes with the name Battle Bards! How awesome is that?

I’m so very excited about this project and proud to finally present its first episode which is dedicated to MMO main themes! At the same time, I am happy to be able to reveal the wonderful Battle Bards banner which was graciously created by our very talented and close blogging neighbour Tesh (who also regularly shares soundtrack goodies on his blog). Thanks again, Tesh!

The podcast will air on a fortnightly basis and we absolutely encourage everyone, not just declared OST lovers but hopefully soon-to-be-converts, to tune in and leave us your feedback (I am working on that mic!)! Each show will feature up to 8 different tunes from various MMOs (of which audio snippets are always included) and while we’re definitely geeking out together, we are including some interesting background information on the chosen tracks and composers. I have to admit, I’m in this for my own selfish reasons – it’s such a big opportunity to discover new pearls and learn new things!

Without further ado, all you need to know about the Battle Bards podcast below.

Introducing the Battle Bards team!

 

I would like to thank Syp, our very experienced podcast mod, for organizing this wonderful opportunity and also putting our first show together! Speaking of which – you can find our current and all future episodes on the Battle Bards homepage or on iTunes. To jump directly into “Episode #1: Main Themes”, use the embedded player below or direct download via this link. Happy listening!