ID:518009
 Mar 14 2012, 5:45 pm
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Very rarely have I seen mmorpgs with a storyline that really influences or holds meaning to a player. Most influential game story telling is effective in a single player setting rather than an MMO, and some reasons could be the the emphasis on an item or advancement more so than the game itself, or the fact that in an MMORPG the game isn't centered around you. In what ways do you think a storyline could be more effective in an MMORPG
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I think you're just finding the limitations of MMO's as opposed to any lack of skill by the designers.
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One pitched game that never came to fruition was an Unforgotten Realms MMO. Essentially, there would be a bunch of "all the time" quests that anyone could do, which would flesh out your own character depending on choices. Any NPC that would be impacted by your decisions would look differently to you than they would to another player.
The other would be events. The game would have players impact the tone of an over-arching, but simple, storyline. If more players opted to assassinate the king rather than save him, the game would change to the next plot bit with the coming update. Players who attempted to save him would be shown to fail at it, and would slightly impact NPC reactions to them, while players who opted to go with the more successful route (assassination) would have the world think they did it by themselves. But eh. MMOs are kind of restricted in this matter. | |
A hybrid game would be possible. You could have a different world for each player that they play out how they want and alone unless they invite someone else and that person would have to follow the storyline of the original player. Diablo 2 is kind of similar.
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What you have described is The Old Republic MMO. Actually, it also sounds like Borderlands, depending on how lenient you're willing to be on the phrase "MMO". E: And Fable!
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Yeah, those three are the closest to it you'd get. I don't know much about TOR so that could be exactly it.
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"A hybrid game would be possible. You could have a different world for each player that they play out how they want and alone unless they invite someone else and that person would have to follow the storyline of the original player. " Sounds exactly like Dark Souls to me.
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"I think you're just finding the limitations of MMO's as opposed to any lack of skill by the designers." Those aren't 'limitations of MMO's' btw, that's why I opened with "Play TOR." Because IT DOESN'T DO THAT.
I'm not saying you could do it like TOR on byond, since you can't really have your NPC's talking to the player. But making both getting the quests and doing them have cinematic type moments rather than just "Talk to someone and a message box comes up, hit OK and carry on." might not be a bad idea | |
Sorry about the confusion, I wasn't specific enough about what I meant by limitations. I didn't mean that MMO's are incapable of presenting a singleplayer-like storyline to multiple users. What I meant was that typically you don't see the same level of depth and immersion in an MMO story as opposed to a purely single player game.
Also, I don't mean good or bad by 'limitation'. I'm just saying that it's part of the systems we're dealing with. | |
Did you find the story element intrusive? As in, did it get in the way of your "go to point A, kill things, go to point B" enjoyability?
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Personally I think it should be more like Guild wars 2 is handling it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KBEUtSGFWT0
To me this is the perfect MMO. Has a good story that revolves around your character and the decisions you make,but if you like the multiplayer aspects like PvP,random events,huge/fun bosses you can take down with friends, and server vs server vs server PvP you can do it without being punished for not doing the story. | |
I think an MMO best handles a story created by a player;
of course this must be done in some creative and unconventional way, because there are many limiting factors, such as the existence of a temporary character in a persistant world. A MMO world handled by the players must have simple yet effective doctrince in place to fortify ownership of property, and to enforce rules on the outside world; those rules must work within the confines of a world where there are objective goals which are dynamic and gameplay oriented. An example which displays how these rules are fundamental to the design of a story-based MMO may include a Legendary Sword, whose sheer power changes the way the flow of power moves throughout the game; but if ever this sword were to become inactive, through a players refusal to log on and use it, what should ever become of it? It would seem hardly epic for the sword to be reset after some inactive period to it's original place; and such a law could easily be abused by a player dedicated to holding onto the item. An altogether greater solution seems to be to allow players to create their own items, without the necessity for some arbitrary grind to obtain materials or exp, as well as some condition and incentive to ultimately destroy those items, so the game does not become flooded with power items; this rule can be mirrored with two functions, a requirement to use an item (such as the ability to only use ones own items) and the loss of items of a character upon death. Lets say for example that an item may be created with a condition; one condition a player chooses is that the item may only be used by characters of Good Alignment; therefore, by choosing either Good or Evil alignment, a character is already making one choice which has a dramatic effect on how the game is going to play out, and when an Evil character gets ahold of it, his priority will be to destroy the item, unless he can manifest its use through some unconventional way. It seems to me that one of the most essential aspects to creating a dynamic roleplaying world is the idea of loss in itself; most games want to protect the players profits, maybe because players can be subject to grief; but without loss, dynamism is quickly caught up by with staticism, where-by either all of the characters are fighting on the same level, or using the same level of equipment. If a dynamic role-playing world were ever to emerge, there would be plentiful reasons enough for some people not to engage every person they saw in combat, and would instead opt to recruit them for a quest, or channel their presence to a greater effect, which would make for a very fascinating game playing experience. | |
@Vodette: While it's not exactly a plot-story, Wakfu has countries ran by players. Everything a player does has an effect on the country, and you can potentially depopulate an entire species on their country if you don't pay attention. Again, it's less of a story and more of a large simulation, but this sort of deal has been shown to be possible.
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In my opinion, fewer, more meaningful quests without drawn out descriptions is the best way to make a storyline effective.