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Longevity
Salty
Member, Intrepid Pack
I didn't know exactly where to ask this but if it's not the place please tell me! I few questions for developers and would love to hear from some other players' opinions. I am so excited about the game to release but I am concerned about longevity. Will this game have enough story and common ground between servers to make it relatable. For example, World of Warcraft has built so much lore with characters like Sylvanas, the lich king, and many more. Does Ashes intend to create this depth in characters and lore? I think the story is a huge part of what attaches people to video games would love to see more lore developed before release.
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I think a challenging mmorg can last if:
Then there are games like Elder Fashions Online that every three months throw in new gear designs for people to farm from the same old content, a small new map corner with a copy past story quest line and a couple of houses for you to decorate, while you spend money in the cash shop for a gambling chance and getting that useless and weird looking steampunkhorse or that skeletal-ghost with sprinkly aura cat ice mount.
A never ending single player rpg experience with none of that challenge nonsense.
https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Lore
We're keeping lore very close to the chest and the reason for that is because it is very rich. It is diverse. It will have applications outside of just the MMORPG. We intend to take it much further, but I want it to be something that the players get to reveal themselves, that's not just handed to them and then the experience is lost. They should feel when they're experiencing this that it relates to them on a personal level.[5] – Steven Sharif
The lore & story will be revealed WHILE we are playing Ashes of Creation.
As for longevity....
You know about the node system, yes?!
The world/cities/dungeons as you see them one month- won't necessarily be the same the following month.
Steven Sharif is my James Halliday (Anorak)
“That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons even death may die.”
-HPL
I also disagree that lore is what keeps people playing a game. I could not tell you any lore about any MMORPG I played. An MMORPG I consistently go back to is OSRS which I've played since 2005 and I couldn't tell you shit about its lore or story. I also played WoW, ArcheAge, TERA, Aion, etc. with ArcheAge being my favourite MMORPG of all time, yet I can't tell you shit about any of their lore.
Same with tons of other multiplayer games I played a ton. I played Halo 3 for over 5 years from 2007 - 2013 almost daily, yet I honestly hardly anything about Halos story apart from the basic campaign missions I played.
I hope they end up straying away from large player power increases and instead learn more towards a horizontal distribution of content throughout the game's lifespan. In the long run, vertical progression would lead to abandoned content that was once the end game, but no longer, and may even become soloable. I would like to see the available content at launch still be worthwhile and challenging 4 years into the game.
I think WoW is a testament to how vertical progression makes content stale in the long run. And, let's not forget about the stat squishes.
AoC has not one feature that suggests an experience like wow.
How can you compare the vertical progression of a different game to this one?
I dont buy to any of the 'horizontal progression' and 'old content being relevant'.
If I had a great week in the starting zones, a great month in the med lv zones, another great month in the high end zones and the current end cap provides me with challenge and pvp opportunities, why would I ever cry about starting zones not being relevant anymore?
As for the 'horizontal progression', in ESO and ffxiv I had 1 toon that was my PvE PvP and crafting character, I maxed out all the non class or weapon skill lines, in addition to class and weapons, and never once did I felt any of that was meaningful.
Btw any new lv cap for those two stale games wouldnt make sense, but not when it comes to an open world with free player interaction and guild map domination.
Yes, I look forward to big expansions once a year or two for new lv, gear and zones.
Yes, I dont care for newer players catching up, it's never realistic, unless lvling up becomes easy in the game, or was like this since day one.
New servers are for new players.
The cinematics that WoW do (like the expansion cinematics) cost literal millions to make. Intrepid doesn't have the money to do those types of cinematics. You'll get "in-game" cinematics such as this one since they're fairly easy to do in Unreal Engine, but don't expect ones like WoW.
We already know that there is going to barely any voice acting in Ashes of Creation, just basic Greeting/Farewell messages from NPCs because of how expensive it is.
What they did right was to be the first mmo of its kind. Sure there were other mmos before like Ultima Online, but they looked different for example its isometric view.
When you have a kind of monopoly then you have all the millions of players.
I played wow for many years since BC. I didnt know anything about the lore, but what made the game addictive for me at the beginning was that big world with all of its possibilities to explore.
But that wasnt what kept me there. Most of the years it were the people in our guild who i knew then for years who got me to play the game. Its the social aspect that holds you in such a game, at least thats what it was for me.
I think every other mmo that is like WoW would have a similar success over the years, if they had the monopoly at the beginning, because even if the game gets worse from year to year, the social aspect can still hold you there.
Absolutely. I've carried on playing dying games that had no more dev involvement, just cos of the people I played with.
If a game can get its social interactions right, it can help to cover up lots of little errors/mistakes. People will generally stay.
The video was great, though I didnt know it existed! If stealing a precious artifact from a city is a way to help with a siege, then count me in!
https://knightsofember.com/forums/members/winner909098.54
I really wouldn't say they were the first. There were many others that had 3D modeling like DAoC, Everquest and Even EQ2 by a month. No, what Blizzard did was take all the elements that made the other games good and re-package them under Blizzard's slick and polished commercial label. People knew Warcraft and more importantly they knew Blizzard so they had multiple brand recognition working for them as well. All that came together at the exact right time to capture a large percentage of the gaming population who were burned out on other MMOs and looking for something new.
AoC on the other hand will be an evolution of the MMO. While there is a lot of familiarity with other MMOs, AOC will also offer things we have never seen before like a complex node system combined with a full time PvP experience. I doubt it will be a WoW killer but it should offer something unique that will lure a lot of players to play it and hopefully stay for a long while.
A far better comparison for Ashes of Creation is probably EVE Online, another popular MMO that has also stood the test of time (longer than WoW by a year) and seems far more comparable in overall game design. EVE Online doesn't rely on cinematics, epic NPC Heroes & Villains, nor an overarching narrative for player retention. In EVE Online, the players themselves and the rise and fall of the empires they create within the game are the overarching narrative - the only lore comes from the games backstory and interpreting clues and information witnessed within the gameworld.
Sounds like you're describing WoW 2 No thank you, no way do I want to have to level more after my max and get new gear!
Player power is kept in check through multiple means, such as non-scaling damage (the damage of attacks doesn't change based on the level of your target, only by their resistances and other defenses).
Also, there is great design care in keeping all areas active and revisited by players. The node system itself almost corrects this problem, but there are other factors, such as available resources and quests/tasks that may take 'advanced' players back to where they started.
Another important factor would be over the course of your game, how invested are you in your character? This often overlooked I feel. There's a balance in for example. The amount of effort you have to put it for the amount of reward. If it takes too much effort for too little reward, people tend to lose interest. Too little effort and too much reward and people don't value the reward, and often by extension their character. When was the last time you started with gear that had no stats? Even the very popular WoW, at first didn't start giving you single stat points until level 10 where you got your first class quest reward proper. Whenever you level up, you get some dopamine, without actually gaining too much power. The old talent system for WoW for example. You didn't really have all that much choice, but it was always exciting to get a new talent.
Another factor. Is what I do fun? What you'll mostly find yourself doing is combat. Even when out mining, you can get attacked, both by mobs and players. So nailing combat is extremely important. There's a few things that are important here. Fluidity is one. But a degree of choice helps too. I can't wait to test this out by the way.
Yet another factor. Community. How easy is it to find people with a similar outlook on how to play? Are there even more options available? When you are bored in-game for whatever reason. Perhaps you're waiting for that last bit of exp for your node progression. Will the game not just encourage you to play together, but actually require you to? To tackle some problems. In other words, will the game naturally and organically cause you to build friendships with people as you progress? So when the time comes where you just don't feel like anything. You still log on to chat with your friends. When -that- happens. You know you're in business.
There's just something wrong when a system is trying to induce self-motivation - like a towel trying to dry another towel.
WoW only survived because of three simple facts:
1. It had a good grafic and gameplay since the beginning with a cult following already being established by earlier games. This brought in their hardcore playerbase and their innitial casual playerbase together with the social aspects of the game, which ensured that players kept on playing the game.
2. It began a rapid decline after the third expansion, but managed to hold on to many of their hardcore playerbase, because they already invested huge amounts of time and resources into the game to this point and didnt want to "lose" that by jumping ship to another game. Activision did that in combination with winning a huge casual playerbase with the implementation of LfG and LfR.
3. They held themselves over water, because they switched to a model of instant gratifaction. Everything you do nowadays in WoW does SOMETHING. It may give you some new shiny piece of gear or a pet or a new skin etc. You would have to invest serious time for such a thing back in the day's of classic or TBC.
My biggest worry about the game is a matter of server scale. Too many players or too few players for all of these systems pose a real danger to how the game operates. Its going to be extremely difficult to pin down some of those numbers at launch. Restrict things too much and after the natural honeymoon phase of a MMO is over, it could create a lot of dead servers. If AoC ends up being the next genre standard and crazy successful, you could have an issue with highly over-populated servers.
those are actually the reason why the game had a massive decline though that and the lore of the game became pretty confusing and could only be explained with book material outside the game.
Cataclysm nerfed heroic dungeons so that you no longer had to CC which overall nerfed the playerbase lowering the amount of players hardcore guilds could recruit from to replace people who burned out. LFR also gave casual players instant gratification for access to story elements, so they no longer had an incentive to become part of the community and thus had no reason to stay for long periods of time.
Mists of Pandaria had a confusing story narrative that took what the Horde thought was Grom 2.0 who had learned the mistakes of his father. To a guy who is bad cause Power good and Racism good Orc SMASH. Additionally there was large content drought. Although I think class design in Mists was at its best personally, Each class had its own niche that made it special (I played a Resto druid and I particularly liked Symbiosis).
WoD although the raids were good, Everything else was terrible. Removal of Class identity. Garrisons ruined the economy and turned the whole expansion into a phone game. The ending was terrible. A whole Islands worth of content was cut from the expansion.
Legion was a return to form, although it had its problems, the narrative was easy to understand and was consistent. Stakes were High Characters we we liked died (Ysera was particularly heart-breaking as a druid player) The raids were excellent, Mage Tower Excellent, Mythic+ Excellent. Legendaries were terrible as a hardcore player you had to level multiple of the same class to make sure you got the right ones to maintain your spot, although this was fixed by the end of the expansion (which is a consistent problem with Blizzard).
BfA was a dumpster fire. Outside of the game, books mention that the Horde sent all its druids to Silithus. Inside the game I have to take part in killing Shando Stormrage, who is basically the father of druidism and burn down a world tree, It was such a logical disconnect I didnt even take part in the main event. Removal of tier sets, endless grinding, Islands; Wasted potential. Warfronts; Wasted potential. No more legendries which created really cool class augments. Benthic items being better than Higher item level gear and requirements to win the lottery to keep your raid spot. Azerite system was a joke as certain things were massively overpowered at launch and players had to fill their bankslots with items just incase that flavor of the week got nerfed.
Shadowlands has promise, but I feel, like many others, that Blizzard is no longer catering to the MMO part of the MMORPG that is WoW, and the RPG elements have become severely diminished. If anything WoW now feels like a single player Action Gatcha game, where you run your character through dungeons and pull a lever in hopes to get the item you want while paying the company 15$ a month for the service. I hope Shadowlands changes things but I no longer trust blizzard as a company to deliver.
As far as why WoW was originally successful?
1. Extensive backstory and lore through its original games and instruction manuals.
2. Player trust. Blizzard at the time had yet to put out a bad game so players were invested and willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.
3. Openness. they didn't talk like suits back then, they talked like nerds, they were like the people who played their games. they were willing to trash talk and do self-deprecating humor.
4. Mechanics. The game was extremely responsive for its time and was rather simple to understand but took some time to master. Time = investment. Investment =Sunk cost = unwillingness to leave and do something else.
5. Community. Everyone was willing to invest time in improving each other. you could make a name for yourself on a server, whether that name was good or bad was up to you. All the great WoW youtubers all started playing the game pre-Cata, and theres a reason for that.
Intrepid doesn't have point 1, but they are working on it. So far they haven't violated point 2. they are doing extremely well with point 3. We have yet to see point 4, but because they haven't violated point 2 and 3 I trust they will get there eventually. Point 5 the game will live or die by. So far the forums have been pretty good, but everyone knows that the forums for good or ill are not representative of the whole community.
We will see where this goes and I hope it goes well!
In terms of "common ground" as OP mentions, while there is some lore fundamental to Verra itself, the node system means that what happens on one server may be totally different than another server (such as quests unlocking, events completing, etc.), so each server will have its own rich story and history to tell over time!
It's not the only retainer either, but it's an MMO. Retention value is probably already a pretty important goal. I am a little interested. Which is actually a great accomplishment. Usually I'm not interested in games at all before they come out so as long as they do it right I have no worries.
U.S. East
As someone who played since 2005 (EU launch) the settled lore did nothing for me. Granted I was rather young. But playing the game, and not having markers to follow, forcing me to read the quests and absorb the lore of the world that way. Sure, it may have helped with the initial playerbase. But that doesn't mean anything. If established lore was that important, Star Wars The Old Republic would be more popular than it is. Because the story in that game is really good. I especially enjoyed the Imperial Agent (my main)
The rapid decline actually started in the third expansion rather than after. During the end of Wrath of the Lich king. They added the LFG tool. This "seemed" like a good idea at the time. However, the drawback was that the level of a group (skillwise) dropped, hard. It was not as obvious in that expansion, as it was at the end of life. But was very obvious in Cata. Groups of friends and guildies, didn't have a lot of trouble with the dungeons. The difficulty spike was there because most people played with a group of complete strangers. Which meant teamwork wasn't as good. Resulting in those dungeons being nerfed, and the overal experience cheapened.
They lost most of their hardcore playerbase when they switched to instant gratification. They gained casuals. But the numbers have been declining with spikes only during new expansion launches. Until classic wow came out. Which saw a significant increase.
As for as grafic goes (I assume you mean graphics, as in looks of the game) The art-style they have chosen ages well. As much as I love Ashes (backed it for a reason) the art-style they chose whilst gorgeous, does not age quite as well. It looks more realistic, which means it'll age differently.
I pretty much meant the end of WotLK with my example. I think Blizzard was bought sometime after Ulduar by Activision, who then began implementing all the casual player features like LFG.
I disagree, especially for an MMORPG. I rarely see people who play MMOs just to level up and experience the campaign stick around past capping. There's never going to be an ongoing story/lore. The entire point of an MMORPG is user-generated content. The story should be the players. Every MMO I've really gotten into I can tell you about all types of storylines whether it's beef between certain guilds, a competitive relationship, drama, people leaving and forming their own guild, or a fight over specific resources. These real life stories play it just like a story in a game would, except it's natural and never ends. You're the character in an MMO's story, not NPCs and text put in the game by developers.