So the new Star Wars MMO news is pouring in now, and I thought I’d have a little look at what’s known about it so far, and post some thoughts.
The thing that Bioware are most keen to emphasise is that this will be an MM that tells a story. They’re aiming to make this a game in which their classic RPG-creating skills will come to the fore, allowing MMO players to have a solo adventure of the highest standard. This is commendable, I suppose, at least if you set it against the backdrop of World Of Warcraft and the other big, quest-based MMOs. If The Old Republic is able to tell a lengthy, on-going story that encompasses our entire game life, rather than a series of multi-level bursts of questing narrative, then Bioware could be on to something.
What’s perhaps most intriguing about this focus on story is the announcement that players will have “companion characters” accompany them through the game. These are definitely not pets, but sidekicks or party-members, as seen on other full-blown single-player RPGs. Creative designer James Ohlen told Shacknews: “Companion characters–we want them to be more than pets, we want them to be virtual friends. We want you to interact with them and become friends with them. You’re gonna be able to customize your companion character in different ways. Your companion characters are going to be levelling up and getting different equipment.”
I have to admit that this intrigues me. I’ve long argued that NPCs will undergo a slow revolution in games, the point where they essentially become artificial people. Videogames are the one industry driving the commercial need for artificial life, and I suspect that it’s in projects like this that we’ll see advancements made. We’re already seeing signs of the artificial person in Turing Test-beating chatbots, and plot-driving emotive central characters like Alyx in the Half-Life games, but there’a hell of a lot more to come. When these elements all converge on a demand for believable not-people, then we’ll start to see players rating games in similar ways the way they rate friendships and interactions with other people. Of course I don’t believe that The Old Republic’s companion characters will manage more than another foundational fragment of this kind of future, but if they are a success then they will only inspire more work on NPCs in multiplayer games, and nudge us towards more sophisticated artificial people over time. If nothing else, I hope Bioware deck out The Old Republic world with believable, coherent NPCs, rather than the static quest dispensers we put up with elsewhere…
So we can safely assume that these NPCs will be tied into the story which, we are assured, can be played through solo. What many players will be intrigued to hear, however, is how PvP will factor into this. Realm versus realm conflict – between the Republic and the Sith – will also be tied into this big over-arching story that Bioware are so keen on. “This is Star Wars,” they assure us, and that means grand conflict between space empires. We’ll be fighting either as Sith or Jedi for the fate of the universe, and it’d be fun to think that if Bioware are really serious about a story with irreversible consequences, then maybe they’ll allow for the success or failures of RvR combats to actually end up changing something palpable in the world, rather than being a really big, long game of capture the flag.
Of course this notion of there being story-wrapped-PvP is nothing by vague promises for now. What is clear is that “gamers can even play it as a solo game“, which for a multi-player zealot like me is a little disheartening. I’m happy for my single-player and multi-player experiences to converge, but I want big brave MMOs to look at how to make the most of having thousands of people in a single game. If thousands of them are paying subscriptions to play a single player game, then you are doing it wrong. However good the story is, I can’t help feeling like people would rather have a single game that they could play co-op with chums, rather than have to deal with a subscription and an “OMG LoL”-spewing MMO universe.
Finally, as a child who was firmly rooted in the “Star Wars is best” camp, I feel somewhat disconnected from this attempt to make a Star Wars MMO. Whether or not the KoToR games were great RPGs is, for me, meaningless. The attraction of the Star Wars world is not the shiny space fantasy of the Republic, but the grungy dystopia of the Empire vs Alliance conflict. The repeated failure of the original Star Wars MMO was monumental and unforgiveable, but I don’t think the world of the original films should have been so readily discarded. The Old Republic might make a fine science fiction setting, and Bioware might just make a great leap for MMOs, but it’s still not the game that the original, treasured franchise deserves. That, I can’t help thinking, might now never show up.
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So as long as there are griefers, you’ll never be bored.
I’m not a big fan of the ‘mutual deterrent’ in real life for all kinds of reasons, but I think it’s totally appropriate for an MMO. In 0.0 space in EVE, you are safer from griefers than you are in 0.4-0.1 for very good reasons. In low-sec, you can’t shoot first, take pre-emptive defensive action without losing standings you need to keep access to hi-sec. A pirate/criminal or griefer is not deterred by standing loss and loves it that they can shoot first. Because it’s a different story in zero-sec where there is no standing loss for shooting first, you’re generally safer. But to reach zero-sec, CCP idiotically decided you must run a gauntlet of low-sec systems first. So if you go to 0.0, you have to stay there or you’ll be making frequent perilous trips and lose ships too much.
The general rule is that good guys outnumber bad guys, so if everyone is armed and dangeorus, it’s good that most weapons belong to the right side. There are exceptions, clauses and craveats, but it’s generally true.
The main deterrent to a griefer is the inability to grief. Artificial mechanics imposed by a developer tend to actually give them a play-ground of exploits. But players able to act pre-emptively against a griefer is not something he can do anything about unless he brings a lot of friends(which is what the Goons had to do for EVE and AoC’s FFA servers and even in EVE’s case they kept getting toasted until they started making friends), which isn’t practical got them.
Something still missing from MMOGs is GM- and staff-run events. We had them years ago in Ultima Online, hell even various MUDs ran them. I saw a few in EQ. There was the invasion at the end of the WoW beta. But they’re missing from all the current crop of games (caveat) as far as I can tell.
I long for the staff on the various games to band together as high-level NPCs and storm a castle and force the playing public to get it back. What about just interacting as an NPC and striking up conversation, giving out stories and quests?
I just remembered… When SWG started a pal and I were on Tatooine and two guys came up to us and hired us as tour guides and bodyguards. They wanted to see a bunch of places (incuding the Pit of Carkoon) and were going to pay us to look after them. Turned out afterwards they were GMs just getting out there and interacting.
Why can’t we see more of that? Community RP managers who go out of their way to interact with their community IN the game.
Okay, this is off-topic, but if they’re pushing the story, it’s something I want to see. I’m proud, really honestly proud, to have been a part of those events previously, and I want to see more of them.
Other than some basic pathfinding and target selection, Alyx is mostly scripted. She is pretty believable as a virtual person but not even close to AI.
I’m worried for this game. As many here have touched on, we just don’t need yet another WoW clone.
For those who have slated Galaxies, it was a very decent game at launch. Fantastic ideas, awesome sandbox and as a player, you could go anywhere and do anything!
However, content is king and Galaxies lacked focus and direction at launch. Then, the WoW virus infected Galaxies with NGE back in 2005 and it all went wrong from there.
Despite its best attempts to bring back alot of the old features, the damage has been done. I fear that same WoW virus has already infected SWTOR.
To those of you who predict yet another WOW clone from Bioware, you pretty much don’t get it. Bioware is that rare company who have never done a bad game. Baldur’s Gate, KOTOR, Neverwinter Nights, Mass Effect, and now the upcoming Dragon Age, which is the game so many RPG fans have been hoping for for so long. Bioware doesn’t fuck around. If they say they are finally doing their MMO, there is no reason to believe, based on their past track record that their game will suck. It’ll probably be a phenomenal accomplishment. I seriously doubt anyone can catch up to WOW with their brand and financial lead, but the game will probably come closer than anyone else.
Bioware may not throw out an incomplete MMO like Funcom, destroy a great start like SOE, or hype a subpar effort like EA, but I just am not excited. I just do not have much confidence in the corporations that make MMOs. The cash cow rules. Get in get it out, get paid and bail out seems to be the new policy.