Another long rant from the rantmaster

[aliksteel]

It's almost like two people are using the same account, REVKhA. Your OP made me think that you was doing all you could to destroy the game, Then this ....

Please... if you think i want to make a bad name out of this project you are insanely wrong. I gave away a music album for free (no license) that album too more than a year to complete... not counting the years of experience. Sure it wasn't a tribal oriented album but a space ambient project (good for the night) but the intention is there. I want this project to survive more than you can imagine (Neocron 3 is ways off , Black Prophecy is pretty boring, cannot find any good games out there).

...... Link to comment

I just want this game to be balanced in terms of gameplay functions and events. We NEED natural disasters, migration, and lots of random scripted events. Depleted grass in the winter forcing players to stack up. I am not afraid of players not doing teamwork , i am affraid that this game never gets completed at all.

Hopefully you guys can see my point of view. I want this project more than anything because other games are PURE JUNK. Please do not let this project die . Thank you

I understand you and now am with you on most of this. And With all the new post you have started, I understand that you do want the best for the game. Thank you for making me understand. This REVKhA is the guy that I hope to be running way from, Trying to stay alive with you right behind me trying to slice and dice me to death, Goodtimes to come.

Please define your sandbox. It is clear to me that your definition of a sandbox would be different than my definition of a sandbox. I define a sandbox as a game that gives players different ways in which they can advance in the game while also not making them follow a pre-defined path in order to do so. I also consider games that have an open world environment that lets me complete tasks at my pace to be sandbox. This does not mean that a game cannot have an over-arching story, but rather that I can go about playing the game without having to do the story stuff until I want to. In a nutshell: A sandbox is a game that gives the players options. Some games I consider sandboxes include: Eve-Online, Fallout 3 and New Vegas (I haven't played the first two), The Elder Scroll Series, and the Grand Theft Auto series.

In my opinion, having NPCs does not take away a game's ability to be a sandbox. Neither does having a sort of tutorial to introduce players to some of the mechanics that they will run into.

No we are much alike, My point was about .... and Forgive me if your not one of them, people on the forums when talking about combat want to say that a sandbox is open and no one should be able to hide behind any type of game feature to save them. Then a few of you started talking about game quest for new players, I found that funny. Any way I am with you on some of that. Don't want NPC's.

Im not sure how giving someone a few quests at the start to help them along is telling them what to do or holding their hands.

Instead of dropping them off on a blank paper of a world and saying here are some tools to make brushes, then you have to figure out how to make colours, then you have to figure out how to paint with those brushes and colours.
You could say, here is a quest on how to make your first colour, here is a quest on how to use a tool, here is a quest on how to paint something small.

You tell people that the world is open for them to do anything in and dont tell lead them to do anything, you will find they will just do something else (not in game).

I think like a short instance that you go to after you make your toon, Would work nice. Say a short five to ten minute game tutorial. Then from there you pick your spawn point. I'm not hardcore sandbox, But in the last five or so years so many games came out and I felt like I was chained to them as they pushed me down a long hallway that I could not get out of. I have a fear that when you start adding a little hand holding here and a little there, That you may push it over into that type of game. But if it took us having NPC's and quest to have a good game population, I will be for it. I want like it, But I want this game to work.

[Shrimps]

I think the first problem is that people keep referring to this game as a sandbox. Anyone who has ever played in a sandbox as a child can tell you this is more of an insult than a compliment. A sandbox is a box full of dirt with 2 broken toys, ants, and lots of cat poo that sits in the sun that parents use to keep their kids busy for an hour. Honestly if you're going to label it I would call it more of a freeform MMO than a sandbox.

As for the OP Revkha obviously has schizophrenia and his two personalities both know his forum password. It's the only reasonable explenation for his wild ranting mood swings.

Don't judge the game too much as it is. There are well over 1k pre orders and less than 1/5 of that are in game playing. So it will be easier to figure out what you want to do once people start getting into it and tribes start building up and the political landscape starts to form itself.

[MrDDT]

REVKhA,

I might disagree with some of the minor points in here (like magic in Wurm messing it up etc) but I see your point about the game not being fun and not feeling like its even close to being ready to be fun.

I log in, to test stuff, and really I cant even do that because I dont know where to start? It feels to me like there are so many major things that need to be completed (Im not talking about 100%, Im talking about working and fun) that I dont know where to start.

Combat?
PVE?
Crafting?
GUI?

These are MAJOR parts of the game, which you can break down into MANY things yet they are lacking in so many ways.
Who here can tell me combat is fun? Really? No skills/powers/moves? Dodging and Parry dont work well at all (parry I dont even think works at all).
Crafting really is boring as boring gets. Moving the tools each time for no real reason. No idea what starts are on the item you DO make. Make a bone armor out of deer? Well is that better than One out of human bones? Or Bears? Who the flip knows. Cant even see the weight. Does it effect movement speed? Or attack speed? Comfort? Food or water use? WHO KNOWS!!!

PVE? You are lucky if you find something to attack (or it attacks you most likely even deer). But when you do its over in 2 seconds. You die? No biggie, you come back all your stuff, no exp loss nothing (not that Im aware of), with 1/2 your life to beat on the NPC you just die too again, likely not even healed up.

GUI is a nightmare. Feels like Im fighting it more than using it. Moving 1 item at a time, bags that you cant rename or really move around. Dropping takes no time but dont try to open something or pick up something on the ground, thats going to take about 5 seconds EACH TIME. Bags close when you open up another bag, you cant move from 1 bag to another on the ground. Seeing effects on the screen, you cant see blood, or even really if you hit someone (sorta looks like they could have just been moving or maybe dodged). Jumping is buggy as all heck.

Im just listing a FEW of the MAJOR things that are messed up and lacking in this game.

Do I think the game can be fun? Of course I wouldnt be typing this if I didnt. Im not looking for a finished game, Im looking for something thats close to being fun. So far in the last 8 months, Ive seen very little work in the "fun" area. Really its almost the same game. Sure there have been updates and changes. Mostly minor (even though I know it took a LOT of work), but its going to take many more updates and changes at this rate to have a game thats worth playing.

1k people is a joke for an MMO. If this game is released and there is only 1k people playing it at the start, you will find the world bare and empty at first, and getting worse over time.

[Pandamin]

I think like a short instance that you go to after you make your toon, Would work nice. Say a short five to ten minute game tutorial. Then from there you pick your spawn point. I'm not hardcore sandbox, But in the last five or so years so many games came out and I felt like I was chained to them as they pushed me down a long hallway that I could not get out of. I have a fear that when you start adding a little hand holding here and a little there, That you may push it over into that type of game.

Actually the bounderies between a sandbox and a themepark have nothing to do with there being quests or npc's.

One of the differences is that in a sandbox the game is open ended.
Though even there we could debate for hours.
Themeparks and sandboxes share a lot of the same elements.
We can say Xsyon is more like a sandbox then it is a themepark, but for now thats all anyone could say.
Its only after launch that a game can transtition from "playing pretend" to an actual "sandbox".

Words like ' holding hands, carebears denote styles of play.
A sandbox game can't magically turn into a themepark just by adding a tutorial or an npc.
So these ideas of 'I'm afraid this game might turn into That game because they add X or Y are silly.

Personally I feel that if you need a manual or a tutorial to do it, then it is badly designed.
Its also not said that a sandbox has to throw you into the deep end from day 1.
There is no reason why a player can't experience a linear progression that fans out into the typical sandbox tree design. Though it might be too late for Xsyon to implement that.

At this point I think what the player in Xsyon needs (IMO) is clear immediate goals.
(not the same as a tutorial)

It needs more game and less simulation.

Though I'm not trying to knock down Xsyon it is fun, for now.
Its just that I know that "sandboxes" need a certain critical mass of players to work and I'm still quite unsure as to how Xsyon hopes to hook those people.

I'm afraid it always comes back to the same idea, where is the game?

[MrDDT]

There is no reason why a player can't experience a linear progression that fans out into the typical sandbox tree design. Though it might be too late for Xsyon to implement that.

At this point I think what the player in Xsyon needs (IMO) is clear immediate goals.
(not the same as a tutorial)

It needs more game and less simulation.

Though I'm not trying to knock down Xsyon it is fun, for now.
Its just that I know that "sandboxes" need a certain critical mass of players to work and I'm still quite unsure as to how Xsyon hopes to hook those people.

I'm afraid it always comes back to the same idea, where is the game?

You took the thoughts right out of my head.

This is where I feel this game is lacking the most. Where is the game?

Im not asking for a how to instructions for new people. Im asking for them to have short goals at the start to get them into the game so they can figure out what the game is about. Dropping them into it with nothing but "Have at it you can do anything you want" isnt the way to go.
Giving them a few goals to start off with, show them the way, after that they will find a place to fit in and start creating and doing.

[aliksteel]

At what point do you stop? OK say you add some NPC's, And add the starter quest, How much is to much? At what point do you say that it's just another MMO?

Not trying to be a pain in the ass, But I do worry that when you start going down that road, And you start bringing in some of the WOW type players who starts yelling for more to do. How do you deal with that? You can't tell then that its not that type of game, Because it is already that type of game to a point when you add NPC Quest into the game.

[MrDDT]

At what point do you stop? OK say you add some NPC's, And add the starter quest, How much is to much? At what point do you say that it's just another MMO?

Not trying to be a pain in the ass, But I do worry that when you start going down that road, And you start bringing in some of the WOW type players who starts yelling for more to do. How do you deal with that? You can't tell then that its not that type of game, Because it is already that type of game to a point when you add NPC Quest into the game.

Why cant you tell them?
First off this and WOW are not even remotely close. WOW has classes, and static world.
This world is ever changing, there are no classes there are nothing like that.

I think the point you stop is when you feel that people are able to grasp that they can make their own goals instead of being fed what to do. Like in WOW, you are pushed down a storyline, told to level to max level (what is that 85 now?) and you can see all the world that the devs made.
Xsyon is about making yourself in ways you want to do it. Some people will want to be builders, others will want to be fighters. Some will want fame, others will want items, others will want to just make a dent on the world.
WOW you are told what to do the whole way, you have a main story line. Here the players make the storyline. You go make a town and get it taken by XYZ tribe. That goes down in history of the game and you were a part of it good or bad. Now those tribes are sworn to fight each other. Only later to have another bigger tribe beat on them so they must make an alliance to hold off that tribe, until that tribe breaks up....... It goes on and on. Thats just part of the fighting. Not even talking about building cities that make a trade network or clearing the land so you change something from a desert to a place with rivers and fields.

These things cant be done in themepark MMO's. Sure some of the things in some of the games. But this game has so much sand to play with. You will be able to MAKE your own quests in this game. No story line to follow, no main theme.

Key is really, I doubt the devs could put in enough now to make it a theme park. They would have to add long huge story lines to the game. Even then, I dont see that as a bad thing. As long as they keep the sand in there to play with Im cool about it. Sand in this game is mostly the changing of the world, open PVP, and how there are no classes.
If they start putting in classes, and making it so you cant change the world or limit the PVP to tribe wars only. Then we have major problems. None I really see happening. PVP is said to be open, but its not now. Which is understandable because having FFA PVP without risks would be bad.

[mrcalhou]

I don't see how having more things to do makes a game less of a sandbox. Having NPC quest givers that have their own agenda (like side-quests from single-player games) wouldn't make the game linear. If the game world is open to players, regardless of their levels and stats, and the players can play the game and still progress in the way that particular player wants, then that's a sandbox.

Eve-Online has NPC quest givers, but players can mine, become pirates, wage territory wars, be merchants, whatever. In all of these cases the player is progressing in the game at their leisure, and through their personal abilities.

This video is how I think of a sandbox game:
http://play.eveonline.com/en/home.aspx

I think the point you stop is when you feel that people are able to grasp that they can make their own goals instead of being fed what to do. Like in WOW, you are pushed down a storyline, told to level to max level (what is that 85 now?) and you can see all the world that the devs made.
Xsyon is about making yourself in ways you want to do it. Some people will want to be builders, others will want to be fighters. Some will want fame, others will want items, others will want to just make a dent on the world.
WOW you are told what to do the whole way, you have a main story line. Here the players make the storyline. You go make a town and get it taken by XYZ tribe. That goes down in history of the game and you were a part of it good or bad. Now those tribes are sworn to fight each other. Only later to have another bigger tribe beat on them so they must make an alliance to hold off that tribe, until that tribe breaks up....... It goes on and on. Thats just part of the fighting. Not even talking about building cities that make a trade network or clearing the land so you change something from a desert to a place with rivers and fields.

I think this is a good way of putting it.

[Pandamin]

At what point do you stop? OK say you add some NPC's, And add the starter quest, How much is to much? At what point do you say that it's just another MMO?

Not trying to be a pain in the ass, But I do worry that when you start going down that road, And you start bringing in some of the WOW type players who starts yelling for more to do. How do you deal with that? You can't tell then that its not that type of game, Because it is already that type of game to a point when you add NPC Quest into the game.

I'm not quite sure why that is even a concern.

I don't see any situation where you would add elements to the sandbox where at some point you transition into a themepark. It just does not work that way.
Adding a quest does not make a sandbox a themepark.

Something being a sandbox has no relation to there being npc's, quests, open pvp or even predefined content.

Furthermore why would a "WoW type" player be interested in a game like Xsyon?
How could Xsyon even convince such a player to come and play? Xsyon is a sandbox, WoW is a themepark.
Both fruit but 1 of them tastes funny.

If such a player does come into Xsyon and he is not happy Xsyon has no obligation to deal with that or even respond to it for that matter. Do you see EvE trying to mimic WoW?

Adding some basic structure for the new player experience is not a bad thing.
Nor does it fundamentally change Xsyon.

I think the 1 thing Xsyon should avoid at all cost is to tip over into a 2nd job type of gameplay.
Sandbox good, 2nd job simulation baaad.

[aliksteel]

Thank you MrDDT, mrcalhou, Pandamin, and Shrimps. All had good points, And I understand where you are coming from. Like I said, I worry. I thank you for making some good points, You have gave me some things to think on, And ever how it goes, I hope when the game goes live we all have fun.