Starcraft 2 - make money from custom maps

During the Battle.net panel just now at Blizzcon, it was announced that Starcraft 2 will have some really kick ass tools for map/mod makers. In addition to this, they are going to be implementing a "marketplace" where map/mod authors can place their creations for download - and charge for them if they like.

The goal appears to be to get more people making mods on Blizzard games, instead of a competitors platform - I say appears because this *is* a stated goal, just not sure it's *the* goal.

It all sounds really damn cool, and I for one am looking forward to it, even though I'm not a big SC fan (omgsaywhat?!)

Next WoW expansion: Cataclysm

It had been rumored over the last week or so, but it is now official. Cataclysm *is* the next expansion for World of Warcraft.

Some of the notes:

• Level cap raised to 85
• New Alliance Race: Worgen (werewolves)
  
• New Horde Race: Goblins
• Massive changes to the old zones (Kalimdor/Eastern Kingdoms)
• The Barrens is apparently to be full of lava and split into two zones
  
• Wetlands are destroyed.
• Ashenvale has been hit some too
• Azshara will become a low-level zone
• Flying mounts in Azeroth
• New race/class combinations (Human Hunter, Orc Mage, Night Elf Mage, Dwarf Mage, Blood Elf Warrior, Dwarf Shaman, Undead Hunter, Tauren Paladin, Tauren Priest, Gnome Priest, Troll Druid)
• Azeroth zones changed forever. No more going back to how they are now, apparently
• Shadowfang keep and Deadmines will now have a heroic option and will also be revamped
  
• A new leveling system for guilds
• Achievements for guilds
  
• Deathwing is back!
• Archaeology is a new secondary profession
• New Rated Battlegrounds

Thanks to WoW Insider for their live blogging coverage, from which I grabbed most of this info! Also thanks to MMO Champion, who apparently is buddy-buddy with someone at Blizzard.

So what's next?

So Project Overlord is on the back burner. I had the design doc just about complete, and then decided to just skip the whole web platform for now, and start working on a real game.

I have some ideas in my head, but I need to play around for a bit with the toolset I just purchased (Torque 3D for anyone wondering). Not sure what my first foray will be - I want to jump right in and start working on a MMO, but my gut tells me I need to do something small first to get acclimated to the toolset and to brush up on my C++.

Just a quick update for now, will post more once I have spent some time with my new toytoolset.

Everquest Next

It seems that work has begun on the next installment in the Everquest Franchise.

From the link:

"So you can see there's a lot to wrestle with as we begin laying the foundation for EverQuest 'Next.' As I write this, we have concept artists and game designers working hard in our studio-taking the lessons of the past, the best parts of the present and the most promising ideas for the future-to bring the world of Norrath to a new generation of players, as well as the dedicated legions of fans who made the EverQuest franchise timeless. I hope we'll see you there."

Off on a tangent

I am still working on the design doc for Project Overlord. It's my first time attempting to fully spec out a game design idea, instead of just little notes here and there. I have to admit, even for such a small project, it's a lot harder than you would think. Mainly because of the scope of the game - I have to keep rejecting features I want to add. Anyhow...

I haven't been doing much MMOing lately. I tinkered with Vanguard a little more after almost giving up on EQ2. Vanguard is closer to what I want to play in an MMO. If only it were a little more polished, and had more players! That being said, I have seen quite a few people running around the newbie island while I have been playing.

So what is taking up my time the last few days? Well, when I have time, I have been playing the beta for Heroes of Newerth. HoN is a game that spawned from a map-mod for Warcraft 3 call Defense of the Ancients. So it's kind of like "Team Fortress" for the RTS world. The game has a super steep learning curve, but holy cow is it fun - even though I get my ass kicked quite a bit.

If you enjoy RTS games at all, and don't mind learning a new game while getting beat down, you might want to look around for a beta invite :)

Project Overlord (working title)

So I was talking with my boss today, who is the original developer of Chivalry. It's a small web-based game that is somewhat like RISK. Development on it has pretty much tapered off, but we talked about maybe bringing it back from the dead (again).

It got my mind working, and I started tonight putting a design document together for my own web-based game. Right now, the working title is "Project Overlord". I am planning on it being a 2D, web-based game using XHTML and Javascript for presentation. Nothing overly fancy. But I want it to be engaging and damn fun to play. Something people can waste some time at work keeping up on, but not requiring them to sit in front of the computer like zombies in order to make meaningful progress.

It will be quite a while before actual development begins. I have the basic document completed but I need to go back through and flesh out several areas. I am planning to make this a free-to-play game, with a subscription component that doesn't really affect gameplay. It will probably be ad-driven for revenue, with the subs removing the ads.

The general idea is somewhat akin to an old BBS door game called 'Exitilus'. I'm sure not many of you remember this game as it is a bit over a decade old. Anyhow, the general premise is to become the "top ruler" in the game. You will do this by working your way up from a commoner to eventually a king. There will be politics, combat and city management all rolled into one. In addition, your "player" will level up outside of each game instance to give you certain bonuses and abilities to be used inside the game.

It's going to be fun trying to balance this game - but I have high hopes for it. It's a concept I have been wanting to tackle for years. I don't have the time to develop a client/server game, so the browser and a database will have to do :)

I will keep the blog updated as I make my through this adventure.

Bad design in MMOs - part two - content vs advancement disparity

Introduction
Yeah, it's been not one, but two years since I posted part one of this series. You see, right after I posted that first piece, I met the love of my life - and we just got married this past weekend. Now aside from the cleanup from the wedding, I should have some time to sit back and relax and game - and write! So here we go

This post will cover what I call the "Content vs Advancement" disparity that I find prevalent in most level-based MMOs. I should state that this really doesn't apply to skill-based MMOs due to their nature of progression, though I am sure this can apply at some level to them as well.

What I mean by Content vs Advancement is that, in level based MMOs, any given piece of content is typically created for characters of a set level range. Each content area, whether that be an overland "zone", a dungeon or a raid instance, is usually only relevant to a small subset of the playing population. Once you out-level the content, there is no real reason to go back and visit that content, save for power leveling a friend, leveling an alt or helping a guildie or friend with a quest.

Sure, there may be some high level quests, or that one named mob who you always ran from that might bring you back - but this is more the exception than the rule. So what we have is content that is created that will only be experienced for a very small time, if at all. Some games have so *much* mid-level content, that players cannot possibly experience it all in the normal process of leveling.

The current trend
In most level-based MMOs, you have a few zones for level 1-10, a few zones for 11-20, a few more for 21-30, etc. Toss in a few dungeons here and there to spice it up and that's about it. Many of these games have enough content in each zone that a character can level through the content and into the next "tier" without ever experiencing the other 4-5 zones the developers created for this level range.

What ends up happening a lot, at least from my experience, is that you level a character and see maybe 30-40% of the leveling content. What a waste this is!

Now, as MMOs are ongoing, evolving (in a sense) worlds you have new players that pick up the game and start from the beginning, or you have experienced players starting alts. The problem is, most of the lower level zones tend to be empty - or at the very least sparsely populated.

What is my vision?
Ideally I want to see characters of all levels, working together through content. I want there to be a reason for uber_raider_92347 to go back to the starting zones - and actually be able to obtain something from doing so. Everything is so level focused in these games (remember, level based progression games) that there isn't much room for other options in this specific subset of the genre. Imagine if you logged in to a five year old game for the first time and there were dozens or scores of people in the "old world" zones. Remember at release time for your favorite level-based MMO? Remember all the groups forming? All the dungeons being explored? What if that experience could be maintained throughout the life of an MMO?

So how can we get there?

What can be done?
Well, there are several options in my mind as to how to combat this, and some games have tried to address this in a indirect way. EQ2 for example allows a high level character to "mentor" down to a lower level character and group with them. So you have a level 80 character becoming a level 23 character. Stats and abilities are scaled down, and abilities that they shouldn't have at this level become unusable. It's a nice idea, but has some flaws. The biggest one for me is losing abilities - some of which players come to rely on or are used to using while adventuring. It's kind of silly to ask players to keep two sets of hotbars - one for normal adventuring and one for mentoring.

In my mind, I would want players to have a reason to come back to zone or area because there is something for them at their current state of progression. So what can new games do?

Dynamic quest and mob scaling is one way to achieve this. What this would entail is quests automatically increase their "level" for each character. NewPlayer_0001 who is level 15 can get the quest just as VetPlayer_8762 can get the quest. The quest will be of appropriate level for both characters. In order to make it challenging and the rewards applicable to both, the mobs that need to be killed, or avoided, or whatever scale to the level of the character. The problem comes in when both players are in the same zone at the same time with the same quest. In order to break this apart so the quest is still applicable to both players and the mobs are the correct level, would be to instance each zone based on level. This is not something we should ever see in an MMO, imo. This leads to further breaking apart the "community" feel I personally believe an MMO should have.

Alright, so what else can we do? Well, another method combines an idea with other gameplay mechanics that would need to be in place - some of which I am not fond of. If you have locked encounters and limited grouping based on level - meaning you can only group with someone +/- 5 levels, for example - and quest/mob scaling, combined with an intelligent proximity aggro mechanism, you can have players of all different levels on the same quests, killing the same mobs, running the same dungeons. It's a solution, but not one I really like.

Another option is one I touched on concerning EQ2 - and that is the "mentor" system. I believe City of Heroes has a similar system that works in reverse - you can bring a lower level friend and their stats and abilities "scale up" - a sidekick system. Unfortunately, I think this is the closest you can get in a level-based game. I like EQ2's system a bit better out of the two, because it encourages higher level players to visit lower level content. So let's build on that a bit and see what we come up with:

-characters can scale their level, stats and abilities down to that of a lower level. No "student" required to mentor to. When you enter a zone, you optionally scale down to that level range. Probably on the top end of the range.

-Abilities you should not have at this level do not become unavailable. they are simply scaled back. This opens a small can of worms as far as exploits go - but it should be a non-issue if this idea is worked into the game from the start

-You receive experience at the same rate/scale as if you were your "normal" level. In other words, a level 80 character scaled to level 50 would receive experience amounts as if they were level 80 killing a mob that was around their level, or completing a quest about their level. Otherwise, why would a level 80 go to a level 50 zone and get level 50 experience?

-Gear is scaled back as well. Special effects on items remain but are also scaled back in power.

-Gear obtained is scaled up with level - so going back and getting that uber sword off a level 20 mob might actually be worth it to a top-level character.

This allows players to play with each other a lot more instead of isolating each section of the population into different zones.

I could probably find a few more things to add in here, but my brain is tired.

In Closing
There really needs to be a way for players to experience all the content, on whatever characters they choose, even after they have "out leveled" it. My opinion is that the mentor system from EQ2, with some modifications, would be a great way for a future level-based game to address this issue. This is one thing I like about skill-based MMOs, is that this is really a non-issue for the most part.

How about you? What are your thoughts?