Alpha First Look: Video 5 - Quests and Combat

[strallaalaa]

But really, what makes it hardcore to begin with? time sink? I sunk less time into dark souls than i did a Zelda game and DS was much harder. I've heard complaints galore about what people see but little or no constructive feedback on how to change it, except from a few level headed folks. I hate to sound like an asshat but "I'd like to see you make a better game".

Myself I've thought it would be awesome to merge the MMO style of world and gameplay and have Soul Caliber style fights with epic boss monsters, but would this really be possible with current technology? Could internet connections realistically pump out enough data to keep up with that level of play? Could processors handle drawing that many battles going on? So on and so fourth.

I think having disparaging comments like most I see on the forums is more of a hindrance than a help. I wish people were considerate when leaving feedback. The creators of the game are real people. With how nasty things can get its a good thing they have people filter out the garbage posts, if I were Yoshi-P and I saw the stuff I do on a daily basis, I would probably say "you know what, I give up. There is no way to please everyone so lets just shut the whole project down."

but the reality is that most the devs would of easily made a different game then the one we are getting. if they weren't sucked into a big ass corporation that buys up the little ones for breakfast they might of made something better. they probably all have thoughts and ideas for what they would like to add to mmo's. but it's side swiped by the big guys on top cause of the money. it doesn't mean it's the best mmo evvaaa, it's just good enough to get the most money. i can probably come up with a front to back idea for a mmo and it would do better then wow did. and if it didn't so what it wouldn't be the same mmo with different lore that i don't read. mmo standards can go to hell in a hand basket along with the corporate world. yoshi wouldn't shut it down cause it's all about the cash, the devs on the other hand are probably burnt out and annoyed at the gaming industry. just look it up and you'll see what these real devs think about the gaming industry.

heres one post about it. http://www.onrpg.com/MMO/Warhammer-O...rhammer-Failed and it's just a small part of it cause they deleted the real post that was huge and had tons and tons of devs from many companies talking shit too lol. and you can picture just removing the names he mentions and putting in the ones from SE devs to it and it is probably closest picture to what is happening there and in any mmo.

[Maxthunder]

This is how you make level progression, repetitive, mindless and boring if you have no imagination and have decided instead to just copy almost every other MMO for the past 8 years with the same repetitive "kill x of y" crap.

Talk about uninspired and derivative.

And why even have the quest dialog in there at all? Hell even the person in the video isn't taking the time to read it. And why bother? They have *3* different indicators showing you exactly where to go for the kill quest, and 2 showing you where to go for the "moist depression".

"Well, we have all this dialog but, you probably won't read it anyway. But, in case you do, you're probably too dumb to figure out where we're directing you to. So, we'll show you on the mini-map. And because you're probably too dumb to realize the circle on the mini-map indicates where you should be, we'll put markers for the mobs on the mini map too. Now don't panic... We know you're too dumb to figure it out even then. We've accounted for that by also putting large markers over the mobs' heads in-game too. You don't even have to know what the mobs are called or what they look like. Just look for the big, intrusive golden markers walking around."

For the other quest.. "go to the clearly marked, pulsating markers on your mini-map and look for the moist depression. Okay, you're too dumb to figure out the purple hazy looking spots that just happen to be exactly in the same spot as the mini-map markers are likely them, and you're probably too much of a mouth-breather to figure out that targeting those spots will tell you what they are. So, don't worry. We'll make sure to have the words "moist depression" hovering over them as well. Hopefully it's not too presumptuous of us to assume you can read big words like "depression".

"See? We have your time in mind! We know you don't want to be bogged down with boring stuff like interesting content that actually requires your participation, attention and, you know... usage of your brain (I mean, pfft.. who wants to use that?). We realize what you're really interested in is getting all this boring gameplay stuff out of the way so you can get back to serious stuff... like jumping up and down on tents."

Give me a freaking break already with this patronizing, hand-holding "we will show you exactly where everything is so you don't even have to try" crap already. Seriously. Gamers are far smarter than this nonsense.

What a cop-out.

You are completely correct. All this is is more hand holding to the extreme. Yoshi makes a game that is so easy that a player dosent have to think its all done for them, isnt this so wonderful? So instead of presenting challenges as well as mental challenges Yoshi spoon feeds everyone. Well it seems the players asked for this and I highly doubt this is exactly what they asked for but than again I could be wrong about what the players asked for.

[Kiote]

[COLOR="#9932cc"]So the thing that I think a few people are missing is this is just an example video of quests and combat... not "in-depth documentation" that represents what all quests will look like. These are beginner quests for goodness sake! Take a breath, they are going to be easy. You don't throw brand new players into the fire immediately

RE: MMO Quests
Pure and simple, the purpose of a quest is to perform some task, (looking at Preypacer) I'm wondering what you really expected here? Quests in any MMO generally have you do one of the following:
* Tutorial - performing an action - learning controls
* Find/Speak to some NPC/object/place
* Defeat enemies
* gather/deliver items.

What more can you make a character in a virtual world do?

Here's the thing..

When you play a WoW-like MMO, level progression is always the same.

1. Go to Quest Hub
2. Obtain all Quest in the Area
3. Leave Quest Hub
4. Complete simple Quest Objectives listed above
5. Return to Quest Hub
6. Move to Next Quest Hub

This is mindless, repetitive and boring. Worse than that though, it makes people not want to read the Quests. They serve no purpose but XP. This severely degrades the enjoyability of the game. You might as well be doing an FFXI Party grind. At least in a party grind, your not alone.

The fix, is very simple.

1. Go to NPC Hub
2. Select One Quest
3. Proceed to Location
4. Complete simple Quest Objective
5. Something Dangerous happens
6. Quest Objective - Run for your life
7. Get Saved by something
8. Examine the Previous Danger
9. Get call on your Linkshell from Quest Giver
10. Investigate what caused the danger
11. Get lead to some cool location like a dungeon
12. Unlocks a new area
13. Complete a starter objective in the dungeon
14. Bring your Findings to the NPC

The Quests demonstrated in the Alpha video are the painfully boring cookie cutter WoW-Clone Quests that have destroyed this Genre by turning MMOs in to Single Player games. By simply adding plot twists and adding additional objectives to quests, you remove the boring NPC > Kill > NPC and create a Miniature story progression. Players will become immersed in the world and pushed to explore if the quest spontaneously pushes them away from their original destination and grouping will be Promoted by guiding players to group combat zones or boss fights.

NPC > Kill > NPC is the reason every WoW-Clone has failed to hold the attention of Modern Players.

[Maxthunder]

i think the markers and indicators should have a "toggle on/off" switch so that players can have a choice of how they want to do the quests (figure it out themselves without the markers and indicators or have the quests guide them step by step with markers and indicators).

this is to add to Talshara_Blade's comment, which I don't think will be difficult to implement..

Im sorry NO! Some one already posted about hints and thats fine. What they could do is actually give a general direction and or area as a hint and the rest would be up to the player. There is no reason what-so-ever for a quest to tell you exactly where to go. If with a general hint a player cant figure it out than there is a problem.

[Genjuro]

Look at all the game producers that are so lively on this forum. I would like to see all your games. Please let me know when they are released so that we may all share in your successful wisdom.

I remember different. 1.0 was different, and that went down the pooper. Well, different didn't work so here we are.

[ZakarnRosewood]

Its all where you invest your money, unfortunately. because we have based our society around consumerism, money talks, pretty loudly. SE has been the owners of the FF franchise for over 25 years and they did not survive by being fiscally inept. Right now there are people trying to break the molds, you might want to invest in them. Check out This guys project. He was one of the creators of the Wing Commander series and he has broken away with a small team of his own to create a Crowd Funded MMO Space Sim. It looks pretty fantastic. Hes doing it crowdfunded so he can avoid all the hoopla with Corporations and the BS that ensues.

WoW has been a beautiful cash cow for blizzard and many companies have tried to emulate it, for good reason. they want a piece of that pie. SE is a corporation and they have financial goals they need to meet. not sure if you realize it or not but they have suffered a huge loss with this game so far and they need to recoup. Its a genuine shame that the elite few may not be satisfied with the direction they think the game is taking (I bolded think because all we have seen are a few vids of an incomplete project, not an excuse but a fact). But the market for casual gamers greatly outweighs the elite few, it is why WoW has been so successful and the Wii has done so well among other success stories.

I hope, for all the appeals to privilege that has been made on this thread alone, they can understand buisness sense. I'm glad that Yoshi-P has not caved to the most vocal minority. I like what i see so far, i have raised criticisms of my own, but will reserve judgment until more is known and more solid an idea.

[Reika]

Everyone that is crying "Cookie-cutter"

We saw 2 out of 300+ quests. . . . . . . . .

Just sayin

[MaleficentMercury]

I guess its too soon to tell but isn't it possible that there can be both types? Some quests will be easy and tell you exactly what to do, some will just give clues and you gotta figure it out yourself. I guess when it comes down to it, you don't have to click on the thing that shows you where to go on the map if you don't want to cheapen the experience but just because you don't want to play that way doesn't mean others can't have the option.

[ZakarnRosewood]

Here's the thing..

When you play a WoW-like MMO, level progression is always the same.

1. Go to Quest Hub
2. Obtain all Quest in the Area
3. Leave Quest Hub
4. Complete simple Quest Objectives listed above
5. Return to Quest Hub
6. Move to Next Quest Hub

This is mindless, repetitive and boring. Worse than that though, it makes people not want to read the Quests. They serve no purpose but XP. This severely degrades the enjoyability of the game. You might as well be doing an FFXI Party grind. At least in a party grind, your not alone.

The fix, is very simple.

1. Go to NPC Hub
2. Select One Quest
3. Proceed to Location
4. Complete simple Quest Objective
5. Something Dangerous happens
6. Quest Objective - Run for your life
7. Get Saved by something
8. Examine the Previous Danger
9. Get call on your Linkshell from Quest Giver
10. Investigate what caused the danger
11. Get lead to some cool location like a dungeon
12. Unlocks a new area
13. Complete a starter objective in the dungeon
14. Bring your Findings to the NPC

The Quests demonstrated in the Alpha video are the painfully boring cookie cutter WoW-Clone Quests that have destroyed this Genre by turning MMOs in to Single Player games. By simply adding plot twists and adding additional objectives to quests, you remove the boring NPC > Kill > NPC and create a Miniature story progression. Players will become immersed in the world and pushed to explore if the quest spontaneously pushes them away from their original destination and grouping will be Promoted by guiding players to group combat zones or boss fights.

NPC > Kill > NPC is the reason every WoW-Clone has failed to hold the attention of Modern Players.

and you are sure they wont have detailed quests like this in ARR based on.... the 5 min video?

[Skies]

1. Go to NPC Hub
2. Select One Quest
3. Proceed to Location
4. Complete simple Quest Objective
5. Something Dangerous happens
6. Quest Objective - Run for your life
7. Get Saved by something
8. Examine the Previous Danger
9. Get call on your Linkshell from Quest Giver
10. Investigate what caused the danger
11. Get lead to some cool location like a dungeon
12. Unlocks a new area
13. Complete a starter objective in the dungeon
14. Bring your Findings to the NPC

Isn't what you said there basically what's below?

1. Go to Quest Hub
2. Obtain one Quest in the Area
3. Leave Quest Hub
4. Complete simple Quest Objectives listed above
7. Return to Quest Hub

Only difference I saw was that you detailed the objectives in the quest. Kill Monsters, Trigger Object, Kill Monster/Trigger Object/Zone, Kill Monster/Trigger Object was basically all that you did.