A lesson learned from Ultima Online's Virtual Ecology.

granthor

Hey gang. I found this while checking out older vids. I think they make a great cast when dealing with the ECO systems of any game, Have a look and comment if this might happen in ACO. Thx

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KFNxJVTJleE

unknownsystemerror

This was plugged a year or two ago here and debunked in a livestream. Ashes will not have those mechanics that led to the crash of Ultima's virtual ecology. Look for Jeffrey quotes on it.

Wandering Mist

The biggest takeaway from this for me is that just because the devs have a particular vision for their game doesn't mean the players share that same vision. When the players deviate from the planned vision, the devs have 2 options:

1. Attempt to force the players to stick to their desired vision
2. Adapt the game to what the players are doing

When you give the players so much control over what happens to the game world (like Ashes will) there will undoubtedly be things that the devs never anticipated. It will be interesting to see which way Intrepid jumps when those situations happen.

Damokles

Things to take away from that video:
1. Never assume to know the future player community.
2. Never assume to know the possible created meta.
3. Dont overcomplicate things.
4. Tell the players what you implemented from the beginning. (Except things that are supposed to be hidden)
5. Adapt as fast as possible, without compromising your original gamedesign.

Gimlog

There shouldn't be big issues with the game environment reacting at players because they make it so that we don't know what do what.
We generally know that our actions will generate xp for the node but we don't know what is the most efficient.
And for the resource they just have a randomized respawn so there to nothings to worry.