Creativity. I was thinking of this when reading reviews of Star Wars: Galaxies. Having a dancer enter "Dance Mode" to dance is moronic. Instead, the player should be able to create the dance moves themselves by essentially animating the model -- they enter a dance editor and create keyframes. The flexibility they have in posing the model is dependent on their level or skill points or anything like that. Also they can get special moves like the ability to move around while dancing or to jump in the air, and at much higher level they can add special effects to the dance (hey, why not?). Then they save the dance as something and can select it and enter Dance Mode later, and dancing is done with respect to the beat of the music playing if there is any.

Similarly, musicians should compose their own music, maybe starting with one instrument but being able to add more as they gain in level, plus increasing the range of notes they can play... though for realism reasons you may want to limit them to one instrument, but let them hire NPCs to play the other instruments they composed for.

Architects, fashion designers, weaponsmiths, and armorsmiths are other classes that should be able to design what they create. Of course, a game with these elements is no longer an RPG as you need genuine skill to perform your duties. But I don''t like RPGs that remove player skill from the equation.

~CGameProgrammer( );

I would like an intrepid company to acquire some backbone, strike out and make a unique game. Anything other than a Diku/MOO/Mush/MUD with some inconsequential 3D graphics thrown onto it.

I think that it would be interesting to decide on a basic core gameplay mechanic/theme, and then build everything else on top of that. For example, we could build a game about trust/betrayal, where the core mechanic is deciding on what other players to trust. In this example, let us make it advantageous/necessary to put the life/well-being of your avatar in the hands of another player, in a fantasy RPG setting.

How do we do this? What about a magic system that requires (for any reasonably powerful spell/attack) one player to put "buff" spells on another player, to increase that player''s strength, magical ability, etc. That player has to "let down" their magical defenses to the buff caster, allowing the player casting the buff to buff them (trust), or fireball their innocent, well-meaning rear-end (betrayal. Set it up so a single person could take out much of a group that way... I believe you would see people grouping together with trusted online companions more often. It truly becomes a *meaningful* choice to let someone new into your group as you go on a quest (no walking into the town square and yelling "We need any random cleric to help us camp the Pit of Doom!". You might have to walk into a guildhouse).

There are holes in this example; by design in encourages rampant PKing, but that is necessary for the betrayal mechanism here. One would have to include creative death mechanics (something else MMORPGs need to work on). Perhaps after being reincarnated (minus some experience and anything plundered off your corpse), you get a quest to kill the person that PKed you. You get everything back once you assasinate the PK, plus a good deal of bonus exp.

Sorry the last paragraph wasn''t on topic, but I thought it was interesting ;-)


-Steven Rokiski

"Nothing in the above should be taken as professional advice; my credentials are a couple of board games my friends play and a few starts on computer games..."

Roleplay. And, by extension of roleplay, permadeath.

I would say there are alot of main things that make up a great mmorpg.

First off there is the creativity as you were saying.

Now every game can just add in alot of cool features that people will come to love and expect to have a top golden seller.

Some of the basics of the mmorpg''s are the fighting and battle system.

Other things that make up a good mmorpg are the PK systems.

Alot of people have come to love the PK system. I mean look at D2 now a days, you cant travel anywhere without seeing some kind of battle going on around you some where and people getting slaughted.

Another good thing that I personally thing that makes a good mmorpg is the gameplay and interaction.

Honestly I dont give a shit about how the game looks, I mean look at graal online.

Either way these are some things that make up a good mmorpg, talk to ya laterz

Most important feature: group activities/combat
What I''d like to see: dynamic terrain and buildings

- setting brush and forest fires
- destroying a dam and draining a lake, or plugging a river to flood a village.
- seige engines that break down walls and buildings.

I want a MMRPG game where the world is so dynamic that it is practically the result of hundreds of players changing it. Towns and cities will be created and destroyed, people will design their own dungeons to protect their loot from other players that will try to steal it. People will ally with each other and huge wars may erupt. Actual PCs will be running shops, passings laws, building buildings, and leading armies.

Shadowbane tried to implement some of these ideas, but I have heard they weren''t implemented very well.

quote:Original post by Platinum314
I want a MMRPG game where the world is so dynamic that it is practically the result of hundreds of players changing it. Towns and cities will be created and destroyed, people will design their own dungeons to protect their loot from other players that will try to steal it. People will ally with each other and huge wars may erupt. Actual PCs will be running shops, passings laws, building buildings, and leading armies.

Shadowbane tried to implement some of these ideas, but I have heard they weren''t implemented very well.

But you want - GASP! - roleplay for that! And as we all know, MMO players don''t want that... [/sarcasm]