Games made for the lifeless

Spodi · **Posted:** Fri Nov 17, 2006 12:53 am

I wanted to quote this from another forum since it has a good point:

Quote:

it is really about bad game design. people are willing to pay some one else to do the not fun parts of the game so that they can focus on the fun parts of the game.

i have bought cash and characters in daoc and bought the thing you need to get a guild hall in guild wars. why? in daoc, the pve is boring, incredibly so in fact i often suspect that they made the crafting so boring and repetitive just so the pve would seem interesting by comparison. all i wanted to do was pvp so i skipped the pve grind entirely.

in guild wars, the amount of time it took to get a good group together and make it all the way to the hall of heroes was staggeringly difficult and time consuming. my guild of casual players just wasn't going to do it ever. we just wanted to do the gvg which conversely and oddly enough was much more casual player guild friendly but we needed a guild hall first.

in both cases, the game design was not geared toward people who can only log on for a less than 2 hours at a time. i.e. people with jobs and family commitments which is also the largest demographic of people who play online games.

if i do a time versus money trade off. it looks like this. i get paid roughly 50$ US an hour. so if takes me 1 hour to get 1 gold in game then logically i would be willing to pay 50$ to avoid the hassle. then, if i find that people are selling 1g for 5$ then i am thinking it is a bargain. here i am getting something for 1/10 of what it would have cost me to get myself.

this is the same basic economics behind why i don't milk my own cows for milk or build my house with my own 2 hands or put my own car together even though i enjoy milk, owning a house, and driving a car.

My reply:

Quote:

I just wanted to quote that since it is a very good thing to keep in mind when making an online game. In most every game, if you ask someone what the most boring things to do are, it is going to be either jobs (mining, carpeting, etc - has got to the point where most games you can easily make a macro to do it for you or they have a built-in macro) or PvE grinding. And it is very true that getting groups together or getting to places with that group often requires hours at a time. If a single distraction (Mom tells you to take out the garbage or clean the dog) comes up, you are screwed.

foxodi · **Posted:** Fri Nov 17, 2006 1:56 am

Ok, is this guy suggesting to purposefully make something annoying for the players, then offer them to pay rl money to get it for free or w/e? Because If he is, he is smart, sneaky and evil.
But yea, the whole thing about paying $5 for something that would take him a hour, if his average wage is $50 per hour makes sense of course.... but yea he already explained the logic behind that, which I think 80% of us would have known anyway, but reminders are nice

..
Based on his high pay ($50 a hour?

) and the way he explained the benefits of buying game gold, I would geuss hes related in business or the economy in some way

Btw, I think jobs are fun !... However I think their kind of pointless, in wow anyway. As every crafting profession out there, makes you almost no money.... or little, and thats only when you get the highest skill and the rarest patterns...
And yes, grinding = sux all.

Volk · **Posted:** Fri Nov 17, 2006 2:25 am

Heh, but another thing to keep in mind what you said about macros Spodi..

I wouldn't pay real life money for things in Runescape because anything I needed I could make a macro for. So you make 1 gold in 1 hour.. But i'd make a program to do it for me automatically, then i'd go to sleep and wake up with extra gold.

So, the people at Runescape came up with the 'random encounter' program, where every half hour or so of the grind something random happens - sometimes a mob appears and offers a puzzle in return for a rare item.. sometimes you're teleported to a separate maze, where if you escape in the minute time period you get to keep any items/gold found in the maze. Just little distractions that keep the grind a little bit more user friendly, and severely F*CK UP any macros you want to run.

(*cough* end rant)

LilMain · **Posted:** Fri Nov 17, 2006 5:29 am

I'm sorry, but; you guys type toooooo much! lol

Spodi · **Posted:** Fri Nov 17, 2006 6:43 am

Sorry the main point was the first like 3 paragraphs that basically say "Certain tasks in games are so boring that people will pay just to bypass them. Its a game, not a job, playing any part should be fun." :wink:

LilMain · **Posted:** Fri Nov 17, 2006 7:06 am

lol ok that's a lot better for me :lol:

Evil Kukka · **Joined:** Wed Oct 11, 2006 7:01 am **Posts:** 443

Volk wrote:

Heh, but another thing to keep in mind what you said about macros Spodi..

I wouldn't pay real life money for things in Runescape because anything I needed I could make a macro for. So you make 1 gold in 1 hour.. But i'd make a program to do it for me automatically, then i'd go to sleep and wake up with extra gold.

So, the people at Runescape came up with the 'random encounter' program, where every half hour or so of the grind something random happens - sometimes a mob appears and offers a puzzle in return for a rare item.. sometimes you're teleported to a separate maze, where if you escape in the minute time period you get to keep any items/gold found in the maze. Just little distractions that keep the grind a little bit more user friendly, and severely F*CK UP any macros you want to run.

(*cough* end rant)

YEs those randoms were quite annoying to bypass at first;) but now I heard they have released a enw version of the mysterious box solver to work on the older computers so no randoms are screwing up the program too often.

bmcj · **Posted:** Fri Nov 17, 2006 11:48 am

Code:

Do Until BMCJ_Gets_Money => "$5"
     Pointless_Boring_Grinding
Loop

Volk · **Posted:** Fri Nov 17, 2006 5:37 pm

I guess the other thing is to diversify..

1. Offer 'different' grinds - harvesting/collecting/mining materials, and the ability to develop trades where your player can turn raw materials into items and sell at a profit. More fun than killing mobs for cash, but develops it's own grind after a while.

2. Offer 'random encounters' - break up the grind by having various storyline NPCs approach the player (done in RS) with puzzles, questions, gifts. Can piss people off..

3. Allow 'idle grinding' - player can start a grind and go AFK (without needing macro triggers). You'll probably find a lot of AFK players which isn't fun, but at least it'll encourage players to stay online.

Anyone have any additions to the above? Ways to cut out the grind?

Spodi · **Posted:** Fri Nov 17, 2006 6:35 pm

Quests that don't suck. Or maybe another way to get EXP besides Quests and killing innocent creatures? :wink:

foxodi · **Posted:** Fri Nov 17, 2006 8:29 pm

Have experience for killing other players (exp number depends on their level, and you get bonuses if their alot larger level then you etc.).
Then add nice battlegrounds including game types like ctf, Capture the Hill etc.... You can never go wrong with pvp, but make it a little less slower then pve, so people can choose to have fun grinding for 2 months, or sad annoying grinding for 1 month.

However you will need to put in larger penalities for dieing if you do this, otherwise higher levels will let lower lvls kill them for a price.... but higher death penalities will stop this.

Or, yet another wow stolen idea is to have instances. But tie them in real tight with the storyline, and have real nifty rewards but make them difficult, so therefore only people with good teamwork will be able to complete them.... therefore increasing community... and community is always fun.

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Games made for the lifeless