A very useful census on game design statistics for anyone looking to create a new game project, know your stuff!
http://www.theesa.com/facts/pdfs/ESA_EF_2011.pdf
Also I'll have a topic new post up soon, I'm currently finalizing my portfolio page which you can check out in the link below:
http://williamgamedesigner.weebly.com/
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Sunday, June 12, 2011
Defining Game Mechanics, what makes a game fun?
As a request, I decided to jump ahead and discuss Game Mechanics.
Game Mechanics are core features that define the game. These features are what separate the game from other games. Game mechanics highly differ depending on genre of game.
Some game mechanics often cross over from-game-to-game. These mechanics are what we call Staple Mechanics. Staple Mechanics are a good thing. They allow for players to immediately get into a game with an easier learning curve.
Game Mechanics can be anything, here are a few staple game mechanics they're seen in almost all genres:
HP Bar/Ammunition
Targeting System
Minimap
Standard movement controls (Directional, Click, or WSAD)
Story guided gameplay
Interaction/Attack function
Additional Attack/Interaction function (for more strategy)
Clutch function (Something to use on rare occasions that get you out of hard situations)
These are a couple core mechanics. They're fairly universal in almost any genre from fighting games to puzzle games.
Game Mechanics come in many different ways. Mostly game mechanics are the back-work in the game that makes it a playable experience. But also, its the strings that attach the player to the game in whatever means necessary. It could be from your interface, the fluidity of the controls, the combat design or even the interactivity found within the game itself.
Developing interesting mechanics are often difficult, the mechanics should be easy to understand, but also entertaining. Without them, the game is a lifeless, entertaining experience.
So what makes a game fun? It's the game mechanics. How do you make a game mechanic fun?
First off you need to know your audience and genre. A game mechanic designed for an older playerbase may be too complex for a younger audience. Likewise, a more simple mechanic may be uninteresting for an older audience.
While the target audience increases in age, the difficulty for the game should also equally increase. This does have a fall-off point around late 20's to mid 30's. This is due to the majority of that age ranges' reasoning to play games is typically casual short-term recreation. Where as the age range for 14 to 18 is more centered around immersible, long-term recreation. Genre doesn't particularly work hand-in-hand with age range. There are certain genres that go well with others, but for example, the Puzzle game genre is pretty much justifiable for any age range.
Once your audience and genre are established, now you can really start figuring out what game mechanics should be incorporated. All genres of games have staple mechanics. Without them the game would fall apart. For example Hack-And-Slash games, an HP bar is a staple mechanics. In a shooter game, Ammunition is a staple mechanic. In a platforming game, jump mechanics are a staple mechanic.
Once the initial staple mechanics are put in place, then you can start defining what makes the game unique to every other game in the genre.
In Super Mario 64, changing your hats to allow access to new areas was one of many mechanics set in place.
For Halo, to allow a more fast-paced, and freely short-term recklessness factor, the energy shield mechanic was implemented.
In Max Pane, bullet time was created to give the player a moment to assess the situation, and strategically find a way to get through it.
For Final Fantasy 7, the Materia system was created to give more in-depth character customization than just standard equipment upgrades.
What makes all these mechanics fun are the connection they have with the genre, none of them are necessary, but the make the game stand out and enhance the rewarding experience of the game, making it more meaningful to the player.
Because of the vast possibilities that game mechanics can have, going into each section of game mechanics would take an eternity. However it is important to know that the game mechanic should in some way, psychologically affect the player, allowing the player to have a more engaging experience, understand an objective more clearly, give the player additional options, change the difficulty of the game, or improve upon duration of gameplay. There are many other ways game mechanics can be added, but these are very important factors to this section of the game design process.
I've Been Busy
I know I havn't posted much recently, I'm still finishing up my degree and this quarter has had the three hardest classes in my degree at the same time. I will be updating more often now that this quarter is over. Some topics that have been on my mind...
-Integrating environment Design into Game Design
-Defining Game Mechanics, what makes a game fun to play?
-Overly complex controls vs simple controls.
-E3 2011
-Unity vs UDK What game engines and why?
-Linear Gameplay vs Open Ended gameplay.
-THE GRIND! How important is it?
-Trolls in the MMO community. How to solve the problem.
-Integrating environment Design into Game Design
-Defining Game Mechanics, what makes a game fun to play?
-Overly complex controls vs simple controls.
-E3 2011
-Unity vs UDK What game engines and why?
-Linear Gameplay vs Open Ended gameplay.
-THE GRIND! How important is it?
-Trolls in the MMO community. How to solve the problem.
Monday, March 7, 2011
The Funnel System
"Hey William! Wanna try out this new MMO?"
"Nah, not really."
"Why not?"
"That's just another funnel system MMO"
"What's a Funnel System MMO?"
What is a Funnel System MMO you may ask? Funnel System MMOs are MMOs that follow a typical formula, most popular MMO titles use the Funnel System because it's the most basic style of MMOs development. The reason for this is because it's the traditional gaming system derived from the game systems before video games were even developed. Most of this stems off the traditional systems of Dungeons & Dragons, there's no denying that. After that this system was also used in most traditional RPGs and then was tweaked into what we refer to today as the funnel system, specifically defined to describe the gameplay experience in a traditional MMO.
So what the heck is it? The Funnel System is a way to describe your path of gameplay through an MMO. From the very beginning to the very end. The Funnel System also describes where a majority of the players are in perspective of the entire gaming community of one individual MMO. So here it is:
What are some advantages we may see with this system? Well, to begin with, we see that from the beginning the player is continually engaging in new activities along the way, and the deeper into gameplay they go, the more exciting the experience is. (Hence why Raiding is at the very bottom.) This is because only the most diehard players of the community, after working hard get to be rewarded with the ultimate challenge of Raiding. Also, for those who tire of artificial intelligence, most people hold off on Player vs Player interaction until the very end. Many people feel that the most deadly enemy is another player, therefor, players at max level are on equal ground and all classes/archetypes should be balanced at this point.
The most successful MMOs have defined the genre with this system (A prime example, World of Warcraft), and if a player wants to play this style, then they'll play the MMO that did it best, logically speaking. So if so many MMOs use this system and it works great, hence why so many successful MMOs use it, then what's the problem?
There's a lot of problems with it. To begin with, lets use World of Warcraft, for example; The level cap (currently) is 85. The Funnel System is designed to push the player to max level to enjoy the new content. Well, when the content is complete, then what? Wait until next expansion pretty much. So this leaves players re-rolling and repeating the same motions on a new character. If the gameplay was immersive the first time, then that wouldn't be an issue. If the final stages of the gameplay were extensive enough to keep the player's attention until the next expansion, and continue the process again, that also wouldn't be an issue. When rerolling several times, the goal is to get back to the final level the fastest way possible (this often happens with twinking for a more enjoyable, and less tedious experience), but only to do the same rutine all over again on a new character. The same raids, but possibly with a different role.
Considering any time around after the first one is typically faster with a goal intended, most of the levels before the last one are, in fact, irrelevant. The reason why I call the levels irrelevant is because no matter what for you do, or how you do them, you still achieve max level all the same.
Hmm, 85 levels, and 84 of them are irrelevant... That's a lot of unnecessary filler gameplay if all that matters is the final level. For the most part, this is true! That's the main reason why the funnel system is bad.
The other problem you fall into is the lack of things to do. In a standard MMO at max level you typically have the following things to do:
Gear up
Get money
Raid
Craft
PVP
Help Friends
Quest (Ussually Daily quests)
Some MMOs have understood the funnel system and have implemented things to add some flavor to the mix.
World of Warcraft implimented phasing technology into their game. This is probably one of the best methods any MMO has ever done to both add diversity to questing, and divert the player away from grinding simply to gain EXP or loot. The phasing technology allowed access to a variety of things by overlapping new sections of the game, this included things such as gatherable nodes, vendors/quartermasters, flight paths and new most importantly, quests that opened up to move to the next section of the phase. Sometimes, completing phase quests was necessary for opening up endgame content.
The new game Rifts designed an interesting twist to the gameplay and it's one of the games most iconic features, the rifts! (Obviously.) Rifts designed periodic enemy invasions to happen all around the world and these invasions could wipe out cities which held a majority of the quest NPCs and vendors. So if you neglected to do the rifts, your towns would be destroyed and your quests won't be completed until the town is saved.
As much as people hated the game, Final Fantasy XI steered away from the funnel system as much as possible. People who played entirely through the funnel system were typically the people who enjoyed the title the least and is the major reason why there is so much negative feedback toward the game. Final Fantasy XI did not focus entirely on endgame being the center of the gameplay. Instead, they developed challenges you had to accomplish along the way.
These challenges were called Limit breaks, and without a max level player running the player through a majority of the quests, they were extremely difficult. Limit breaks disabled your player from leveling forward until the quest was completed, and these quests happened every 5 levels after the 50th level. other challenges that would greatly benefit your gameplay if the player chooses. A prime example of this was called Artifact gear. Artifact gear was the iconic gear sets for every class, the gear for the most part, provided critical stats that were almost necessary even at max level.
Lastly, the most unique part about Final Fantasy XI's anti-funnel system gameplay was your inability to progress into endgame without completing the storylines for each expansion pack. Example: If you did not complete Chains of Promathia, you could not raid Sea and/or Limbus endgame content. These quests were nothing like typical MMO quests (go kill x amount of x monster), but instead, were designed with a story in mind first, and then gameplay second. With that in mind, the storyline was your driving motivation to progress typically. The cutscenes demonstrated frequently through questing was the cornerstone of the gameplay style and almost forced the player to care about what's going on, instead of blindingly clicking through quest dialog and moving on. Secondly the quest objectives were intensely difficult, even at max level, up until recently, most expansion quests were incredibly difficult and required a full group (sometimes even an alliance!) of people to complete a single section of the quest.
With all this gameplay, most of it had no real relevance on your level, and had more to do with your usefulness to the group and your ability to cooperate with others. This brings me to my last reason why the Funnel System is terrible.
With the Funnel System, achieving max level is typically not difficult, and certain MMOs give you abilities to speed through the levels through certain advantages. Jade Dynasty, you can level simply by meditating in town. World of Warcraft rewards you with rested EXP your character resides in town. Aion and many other MMOs give players Double EXP weekends. All with the intent to progress the character to max level, as if this is really the problem.
The biggest problem with this module is by progressing through the game so easily, the player is more likely to do it all over quickly if desired on a brand new character. This becomes a serious problem with rude players. Rude players are able to abuse the system and do whatever the hell they want with no more than a slap on the wrist.
Steal loot at a raid, your account gets banned, re-roll and in two weeks you're back up to the top like it never happened. Most of the time players already have multiple players at max level and it's not even a problem, only a minor setback. Likewise, even if they don't get banned, if their character name becomes down as a bad player, they simply play a different character and hide from the problem until it passes. No consequence.
This level of negativity becomes a very serious issue and makes gaming for good, polite players, problematic and unenjoyable. Studies show that about 20-30% of an MMO playerbase evidently quits an MMO due to drama-related issues. Things such as a guilds or clans splitting, harassment issues, demotivational actions from other players and so fourth.
Looking back as Final Fantasy XI, the anti-funnel system MMO, the player community is significantly more social, and positive than other MMOs, this is because the morality system put in place by basic human judgment. If a player is bad and you know he's bad, typically you won't play with them. Considering the difficulty of leveling from the beginning in Final Fantasy XI, and the shear volume of required objectives to achieve before max level, very rarely does a player re-roll a new character. This is also solved with the ability to be any job in the game on the same character by job changing in your designated mog house.
There's no reason to re-roll, for most people, if they were banned for bad behavior they would simply quit instead of restart. This weeded out most of the negative players in the game and allowed a more enjoyable experience for polite players.
So now you know what the Funnel System is, it's positives and negatives in the MMO industry. If you notice, many new MMOs are developing new systems that make the game more dynamic outside of the funnel system. I can only hope that a lot of these systems happen pre-max level so the game is just as enjoyable before max level as it is at the end.
"Nah, not really."
"Why not?"
"That's just another funnel system MMO"
"What's a Funnel System MMO?"
What is a Funnel System MMO you may ask? Funnel System MMOs are MMOs that follow a typical formula, most popular MMO titles use the Funnel System because it's the most basic style of MMOs development. The reason for this is because it's the traditional gaming system derived from the game systems before video games were even developed. Most of this stems off the traditional systems of Dungeons & Dragons, there's no denying that. After that this system was also used in most traditional RPGs and then was tweaked into what we refer to today as the funnel system, specifically defined to describe the gameplay experience in a traditional MMO.
So what the heck is it? The Funnel System is a way to describe your path of gameplay through an MMO. From the very beginning to the very end. The Funnel System also describes where a majority of the players are in perspective of the entire gaming community of one individual MMO. So here it is:
What are some advantages we may see with this system? Well, to begin with, we see that from the beginning the player is continually engaging in new activities along the way, and the deeper into gameplay they go, the more exciting the experience is. (Hence why Raiding is at the very bottom.) This is because only the most diehard players of the community, after working hard get to be rewarded with the ultimate challenge of Raiding. Also, for those who tire of artificial intelligence, most people hold off on Player vs Player interaction until the very end. Many people feel that the most deadly enemy is another player, therefor, players at max level are on equal ground and all classes/archetypes should be balanced at this point.
The most successful MMOs have defined the genre with this system (A prime example, World of Warcraft), and if a player wants to play this style, then they'll play the MMO that did it best, logically speaking. So if so many MMOs use this system and it works great, hence why so many successful MMOs use it, then what's the problem?
There's a lot of problems with it. To begin with, lets use World of Warcraft, for example; The level cap (currently) is 85. The Funnel System is designed to push the player to max level to enjoy the new content. Well, when the content is complete, then what? Wait until next expansion pretty much. So this leaves players re-rolling and repeating the same motions on a new character. If the gameplay was immersive the first time, then that wouldn't be an issue. If the final stages of the gameplay were extensive enough to keep the player's attention until the next expansion, and continue the process again, that also wouldn't be an issue. When rerolling several times, the goal is to get back to the final level the fastest way possible (this often happens with twinking for a more enjoyable, and less tedious experience), but only to do the same rutine all over again on a new character. The same raids, but possibly with a different role.
Considering any time around after the first one is typically faster with a goal intended, most of the levels before the last one are, in fact, irrelevant. The reason why I call the levels irrelevant is because no matter what for you do, or how you do them, you still achieve max level all the same.
Hmm, 85 levels, and 84 of them are irrelevant... That's a lot of unnecessary filler gameplay if all that matters is the final level. For the most part, this is true! That's the main reason why the funnel system is bad.
The other problem you fall into is the lack of things to do. In a standard MMO at max level you typically have the following things to do:
Gear up
Get money
Raid
Craft
PVP
Help Friends
Quest (Ussually Daily quests)
Some MMOs have understood the funnel system and have implemented things to add some flavor to the mix.
World of Warcraft implimented phasing technology into their game. This is probably one of the best methods any MMO has ever done to both add diversity to questing, and divert the player away from grinding simply to gain EXP or loot. The phasing technology allowed access to a variety of things by overlapping new sections of the game, this included things such as gatherable nodes, vendors/quartermasters, flight paths and new most importantly, quests that opened up to move to the next section of the phase. Sometimes, completing phase quests was necessary for opening up endgame content.
The new game Rifts designed an interesting twist to the gameplay and it's one of the games most iconic features, the rifts! (Obviously.) Rifts designed periodic enemy invasions to happen all around the world and these invasions could wipe out cities which held a majority of the quest NPCs and vendors. So if you neglected to do the rifts, your towns would be destroyed and your quests won't be completed until the town is saved.
As much as people hated the game, Final Fantasy XI steered away from the funnel system as much as possible. People who played entirely through the funnel system were typically the people who enjoyed the title the least and is the major reason why there is so much negative feedback toward the game. Final Fantasy XI did not focus entirely on endgame being the center of the gameplay. Instead, they developed challenges you had to accomplish along the way.
These challenges were called Limit breaks, and without a max level player running the player through a majority of the quests, they were extremely difficult. Limit breaks disabled your player from leveling forward until the quest was completed, and these quests happened every 5 levels after the 50th level. other challenges that would greatly benefit your gameplay if the player chooses. A prime example of this was called Artifact gear. Artifact gear was the iconic gear sets for every class, the gear for the most part, provided critical stats that were almost necessary even at max level.
Lastly, the most unique part about Final Fantasy XI's anti-funnel system gameplay was your inability to progress into endgame without completing the storylines for each expansion pack. Example: If you did not complete Chains of Promathia, you could not raid Sea and/or Limbus endgame content. These quests were nothing like typical MMO quests (go kill x amount of x monster), but instead, were designed with a story in mind first, and then gameplay second. With that in mind, the storyline was your driving motivation to progress typically. The cutscenes demonstrated frequently through questing was the cornerstone of the gameplay style and almost forced the player to care about what's going on, instead of blindingly clicking through quest dialog and moving on. Secondly the quest objectives were intensely difficult, even at max level, up until recently, most expansion quests were incredibly difficult and required a full group (sometimes even an alliance!) of people to complete a single section of the quest.
With all this gameplay, most of it had no real relevance on your level, and had more to do with your usefulness to the group and your ability to cooperate with others. This brings me to my last reason why the Funnel System is terrible.
With the Funnel System, achieving max level is typically not difficult, and certain MMOs give you abilities to speed through the levels through certain advantages. Jade Dynasty, you can level simply by meditating in town. World of Warcraft rewards you with rested EXP your character resides in town. Aion and many other MMOs give players Double EXP weekends. All with the intent to progress the character to max level, as if this is really the problem.
The biggest problem with this module is by progressing through the game so easily, the player is more likely to do it all over quickly if desired on a brand new character. This becomes a serious problem with rude players. Rude players are able to abuse the system and do whatever the hell they want with no more than a slap on the wrist.
Steal loot at a raid, your account gets banned, re-roll and in two weeks you're back up to the top like it never happened. Most of the time players already have multiple players at max level and it's not even a problem, only a minor setback. Likewise, even if they don't get banned, if their character name becomes down as a bad player, they simply play a different character and hide from the problem until it passes. No consequence.
This level of negativity becomes a very serious issue and makes gaming for good, polite players, problematic and unenjoyable. Studies show that about 20-30% of an MMO playerbase evidently quits an MMO due to drama-related issues. Things such as a guilds or clans splitting, harassment issues, demotivational actions from other players and so fourth.
Looking back as Final Fantasy XI, the anti-funnel system MMO, the player community is significantly more social, and positive than other MMOs, this is because the morality system put in place by basic human judgment. If a player is bad and you know he's bad, typically you won't play with them. Considering the difficulty of leveling from the beginning in Final Fantasy XI, and the shear volume of required objectives to achieve before max level, very rarely does a player re-roll a new character. This is also solved with the ability to be any job in the game on the same character by job changing in your designated mog house.
There's no reason to re-roll, for most people, if they were banned for bad behavior they would simply quit instead of restart. This weeded out most of the negative players in the game and allowed a more enjoyable experience for polite players.
So now you know what the Funnel System is, it's positives and negatives in the MMO industry. If you notice, many new MMOs are developing new systems that make the game more dynamic outside of the funnel system. I can only hope that a lot of these systems happen pre-max level so the game is just as enjoyable before max level as it is at the end.
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Value of games
Alright this might come off as somewhat of a rant, because it is.
The further the gaming industry progresses toward realism the longer it takes to develop a game. It takes more time to develop high poly objects, animate them, and get textures to look exactly realistic. Likewise, games are still games, and even realism requires a great deal of planning to develop levels that interact like a game, not just a simulated virtual space representation or recreation of an existing environment.
The problem I'm having lately is as games become more realistic, and the time to create said realistic games, the shorter the game becomes. However, the price of the game still remains the same, and sometimes increases!
This is actually why I stopped buying many next-generation gaming titles, specifically for Xbox 360 and PS3. However I don't speak negatively toward the gameplay, asthetic, style, or graphic quality of said games, but I believe that if the game doesn't have a certain amount of content to play, then the game simply isn't worth my money.
Let's put it this way. I bought Vanquish recently and before I begin bashing it, let me start by saying dear god yes, the gameplay is amazing. Emphasis on forward momentum was a winner in my book and the immersion of the game was ideal. However my gripe was this game costed me 60$ and I was barely able to get 10 hours of gameplay out of it before I had already completed the campaign on normal mode.
This is where the cost of games gets me. A lot of my friends laugh at me for not keeping up with next-generation titles but to me I simply don't see it worth the money. Typically I'll buy the game used after several months and play it later when it is worth my money. Example, I loved the concept of Bayonetta but I couldn't see paying 50$ for it. Eventually I found it for 12$ used. Definitely worth the money.
The breakdown if of next gen games giving about 10 hours of gameplay at the average going price equates to about 5-8$/hour of gameplay. If you look at it like this, games can get exceptionally pricy.
This is another reason why I continue to emphesize my gaming experience within online games. 12$/month and I'm almost guaranteed I'll get more hours of gameplay than I could ever attain. A good example, I played Final Fantasy 11 for nearly a decade. (10 years of gameplay x 12 months of subscriptions, 12 months x 13$ = $1560). So yes, I payed a good deal of money, but when you look at the amount of time I played the game, I had over 900 days playtime. When you get down to the math, I saved a lot of money if I were to buy consule games that equated to the same amount of time I played. That's 21600 hours of gameplay, at the going rate of 5-8$/hour of next-gen games that would equate to about $136,000 worth of games to equate to the same amount of gameplay.
Although, Final Fantasy 11 is a slow gameplay style, you can argue playing next-gen games yields a more rewarding experience, it's a matter of preference at that point.
My ending conclusion is simple, the value of games is getting to the point where gameplay (In a factor of how much content you get out of it) is being driven lower as the graphics are driven higher. If you're looking to get the best gaming experience out of your money, I would recommend picking up less graphic intensive games that focus more on gameplay and story. Games such as Golden Sun: Dark Dawn, Legend of Zelda (Just about any of them), or Street Fighter. There are many kinds of games with lots of content in almost any genre of game, so there's a lot to choose from.
Overall, stop wasting your money on overpriced games that lack content. Get the best of your money. And to game designers, learn to build games in a more modular fashion to cut back on the time needed to complete games, but also, emphasize more on gameplay than graphical quality. Maybe it's just me, but I would much rather sit back and play Castlevania: Symphony of the Night than play Heavenly Sword.
The further the gaming industry progresses toward realism the longer it takes to develop a game. It takes more time to develop high poly objects, animate them, and get textures to look exactly realistic. Likewise, games are still games, and even realism requires a great deal of planning to develop levels that interact like a game, not just a simulated virtual space representation or recreation of an existing environment.
The problem I'm having lately is as games become more realistic, and the time to create said realistic games, the shorter the game becomes. However, the price of the game still remains the same, and sometimes increases!
This is actually why I stopped buying many next-generation gaming titles, specifically for Xbox 360 and PS3. However I don't speak negatively toward the gameplay, asthetic, style, or graphic quality of said games, but I believe that if the game doesn't have a certain amount of content to play, then the game simply isn't worth my money.
Let's put it this way. I bought Vanquish recently and before I begin bashing it, let me start by saying dear god yes, the gameplay is amazing. Emphasis on forward momentum was a winner in my book and the immersion of the game was ideal. However my gripe was this game costed me 60$ and I was barely able to get 10 hours of gameplay out of it before I had already completed the campaign on normal mode.
This is where the cost of games gets me. A lot of my friends laugh at me for not keeping up with next-generation titles but to me I simply don't see it worth the money. Typically I'll buy the game used after several months and play it later when it is worth my money. Example, I loved the concept of Bayonetta but I couldn't see paying 50$ for it. Eventually I found it for 12$ used. Definitely worth the money.
The breakdown if of next gen games giving about 10 hours of gameplay at the average going price equates to about 5-8$/hour of gameplay. If you look at it like this, games can get exceptionally pricy.
This is another reason why I continue to emphesize my gaming experience within online games. 12$/month and I'm almost guaranteed I'll get more hours of gameplay than I could ever attain. A good example, I played Final Fantasy 11 for nearly a decade. (10 years of gameplay x 12 months of subscriptions, 12 months x 13$ = $1560). So yes, I payed a good deal of money, but when you look at the amount of time I played the game, I had over 900 days playtime. When you get down to the math, I saved a lot of money if I were to buy consule games that equated to the same amount of time I played. That's 21600 hours of gameplay, at the going rate of 5-8$/hour of next-gen games that would equate to about $136,000 worth of games to equate to the same amount of gameplay.
Although, Final Fantasy 11 is a slow gameplay style, you can argue playing next-gen games yields a more rewarding experience, it's a matter of preference at that point.
My ending conclusion is simple, the value of games is getting to the point where gameplay (In a factor of how much content you get out of it) is being driven lower as the graphics are driven higher. If you're looking to get the best gaming experience out of your money, I would recommend picking up less graphic intensive games that focus more on gameplay and story. Games such as Golden Sun: Dark Dawn, Legend of Zelda (Just about any of them), or Street Fighter. There are many kinds of games with lots of content in almost any genre of game, so there's a lot to choose from.
Overall, stop wasting your money on overpriced games that lack content. Get the best of your money. And to game designers, learn to build games in a more modular fashion to cut back on the time needed to complete games, but also, emphasize more on gameplay than graphical quality. Maybe it's just me, but I would much rather sit back and play Castlevania: Symphony of the Night than play Heavenly Sword.
Saturday, January 8, 2011
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
F2P and P2P
This post is specifically focusing on the development of games in MMO industry. To me, this is one of the most important topics in gaming.
I'd like to present this helpful link, if you're familiar with anything MMO, you should know this site, however for those who don't, here it is:
http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/gameId/0
There's also this one, but we're going to discuss the first one:
http://mmohut.com/gamelist
The reason we're discussing the first one (even though mmohut is, personally, a more reliable source.) is because mmorpg.com specifies if the game is pay-to-play, or free-to-play.
If you look closely, you'll notice that there's a significantly larger amount of free-to-play games than pay-to-play. There's also a distinct difference in the popularity between the two types of games. There's a struggle for dominance in the online gaming industry right now. It has been somewhat drilled into our heads that a pay-to-play game should have a better quality than a free-to-play game. This is for the most part, not true.
Pay-to-play games such as World of Warcraft, and Everquest work of an expansion system, where every time another section of the game is developed it is packaged in an expansion pack and the efforts within the game are sold directly to the players. This method is a static system and it is frequently used. The reason this system is static is because the publicity ultimately results in the profit margin.
Pay-to-play games also have the advantage of having the game packages on the shelves at stores such as Wal-mart, or Game-stop. This itself creates advertisement, and focuses the advertisement where the playerbase is. This also results in a higher player-base and the whole project projects upward.
Free-to-play games however, don't have the opportunity to sell their expansion packs on the shelves like pay-to-play games because simply, they're free. As a result, most "expansions" to free games are sometimes considered to be "patches" instead of expansions. So what is the advantage of this method? Why are there so many free-to-play MMOs on the market? How are they gaining profit?
Well, most games gain most of their revenue from cash shops. The cash shop method is not a static marketing method. It is also very complex, and delicate. However, when exicuted correctly, can result in equal, and sometimes superior profit margins to generic pay-to-play.
The reason why Free-to-play games can become popular quickly is because of their accessibility to play. They require no fee, and are simple to set up. Pay-to-play games typically use security keys that result in additional steps to get into the game. Free-To-Play typically you can simply download, log in, and go. With the ability to easily jump into the game, people are more inclined to try it. And statistically speaking, the more people who try the game, the more people will stay in the game. This is the fish line into the game, the bait at the end of the hook is the cash shops.
Cash shops entice the existing players to purchase in-game items to fund the game. This offer is a very delicate balance. In order for players to buy these cash shop items, the item must be heavily desired. But in order for the item to be desired, it must be extremely useful, but if you make it too powerful, you create an unbalance between non-cash shop players, and players who do buy items from the cash shop. If the item isn't enticing enough, nobody will buy the item and the company will not make any money. However, if you intentionally force an imbalance within the game, diehard players who didn't buy ingame items before, are now forced to in order to be as good as other players. This can only happen in certain circumstances.
1: The game must have some form of PVP Interaction.
-To make performance items significantly important, the moment PVP interaction is implimented, players WILL abuse the cash shop function to utterly decimate their opponents with unfair advantages.
2: The game must be Free to Play from the beginning.
-Free-to-play games easily hook players in and creates an easy way to lock in their targeted community size.
3: The game must be balanced from the beginning.
-If the games' cash shop function forces players to buy ingame cash shops from the beginning, then the game will not keep the player-base necessary for the game to breathe.
4: The cash shop items must, for a limited time, be more easily obtained (or at discount prices).
-limited discounts make the items more enticing and give the players an opportunity to push more pocketbook further.
A grand example of abusing the system is the game developed by Neowiz Games/Pentavision: S4 League
S4 League is a free-to-play game that was released in 2006. The game gained a large playerbase until early 2010 when the adjusted the game to be very PEN (in-game currency) restricting. They did this by making items (weapons and armor) wear off in 30 days, and you would have to re-buy the item. This forced players to play more frequently to avoid getting PEN locked. Then, several months later, developed the game to have Force Pack items. Force Packs were weapons with significantly large status boosts (HP+5% SP+5% Movement speed+3%). These items were stackable in a set of 3, as well as 1 accessory. Once they did this, the balance between cash shop players and free players was completely broken. cash shop players had the ability to obliterate anyone in their path with little-to-no skill at all. And skilled players with cash shop items were near-invincible.
However, to recap; this was only possible because the game became popular before these adjustments were made. The adjustments forced players who loved the game, even players who didn't buy cash shop items, to now buy cash shop items to stay competitive. Neowiz understood this would eventually drain the games' player-base so they inflated the prices of these Force Packs to be extremely expensive at times, this was possible by making the obtain method of gaining a Force Pack chance based, only available by buying cash shop currency. This made the value of geared accounts to be, at minimum, about 60-90$ per account. Some unlucky players would have to buy about 200$ to gear their characters to be fully competitive.
To recap; how does this add up against Pay-To Play games? Pay-to-play games tend to be more structured, they tend to have stronger, and more stable engines. They tend to have better quality graphics, and are more frequently advertised outside of the internet which results in a larger player-base. Pay-to-play games also have the ability to gain more money through expansions.
So what does this mean for the future of online gaming? Hybrids. Many Pay-To-Play game companies are giving cash-shop features, such as Aion, and even World of Warcraft to some extent. The reason for this is this is a transition from the pay-to-play system to a free-to-play system. Pay-to-play is a reliable way of making money within a game company, but it also costs more to start and maintain. I predict that we will be going a new route of a Buy-to-play, cash shop hybrids. Buy-to-play (example: Guild Wars) allows the advertising of the game within game stores, no monthly fees allows the player to easily stay in the game once they enter the game, and lastly, cash shop system to generate funding for the company.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)