Goblin Squad Member
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As far as Post-PC goes, Fallen Earth released the Companion App for smart phones that gains access to certain parts of the game that not only allows you to chat in-game but to use the auction house and other cool things. Check it out: Fallen Earth Companion App
Adding something like this to PFO would go a long way to keeping everyone connected and involved in the game, even when not in front of a PC.
This idea is interesting. Seeing as how we are designing a dynamic world, I think it makes sense if, for example, you receive a message when your settlement is under attack,etc, etc. As long as post-pc add-ons do not end up encouraging folks to not login, I am cool with it.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I guess I'm old fashion. I don't want my game calling me. Sounds a bit too reminiscent of "War Games" with Matthew Broderick, when the computer called him to continue their game of nuclear annihilation. When I'm ready to play, I'll let the game know.
Hobbs, if you want to disable that feature fine, but I want EVERY possible feature POSSIBLE, EVERYTHING I want it ALL!!!!
Nobody in the industry thinks MMOs are on the decline. They're the wave of the future. They just won't look like World of Warcraft, or represent a $100+ million pre-revenue investment in a theme park.
That was kinda my point about this new grey area emergence of where MMOs are going. I do think MMORPGs (maybe by traditional sense) will be on a decline. But I very much agree that an MMO market is still growing.
You say nobody wants to invest in a theme park anymore; From what I've seen, the industry has a very keen ability to sell the public on almost anything. Look at games like Defiance and Marvel Heroes - Not theme park MMORPGs, but what's really the difference anymore? They're heavily PvE. They consist of leveling a character/class/specialization. The 'content' has to be provided to the players. Gear grinds. Quests. Raids and instances. Sounds really familiar to me - yet if you asked anyone if either of those two games are MMORPGs, they'd say no.
What happens if Defiance is successful? Now the genre explodes into MMOFPS games that borrow every concept from the theme park MMO that was too risky to invest in. If I asked you 10 years ago if there was a difference between FPS, ARPG, and MMORPGs you could list every attribute that separated them from one another. But instead, I'll ask what the difference is between MMOFPS, MMOARPG, and (themepark) MMORPGs as we know them to today and on the horizon. Those genres all have surprisingly common attributes, do they not? And in regards to micro transactions, the theme park backbone feeds into that. Perhaps now toxic in RPG form; theme parks are new and exciting as an FPS, or any other genre that can map RPG elements onto the gameplay.
When I look at the (traditional) MMORPG genre today, I can't help but think back to when RTS games were all the rage on PCs. Dune 2, C&C (all 50 titles, lol), warcraft, starcraft, Age of Empires, Age of Myth, Empire Earth etc... It was the go-to genre for a long time. But it reached that saturation point. After StarCraft (which many believed was the perfect version of what an RTS should be), the market grew stagnant. As 3D games, processing power and Internet connections got better, we saw an explosion into FPS games as it became the go to genre for big money.
MMORPGs will continue as RTS games still do; but I think they'll take a back seat to whatever innovations they spawned. Look at the success and popularity today of the MOBA genre and how it eclipses SC2 (and whatever RTS remnants are still out there). Both are very similar genres, and we wouldn't even have MOBAs if it weren't for WC3, mods, and a community to back it all. Maybe Sandbox MMORPGs will be the MOBA to RTS equivalent of Theme Parks. Maybe the idea of RPGs is just too stale no matter what, and something else will emerge. However it turns out, I'll be happy with PFO if 20k people play it or 200k play it.
Personally, I liked MMORPGs when they had communities of 10k-250k players. It wouldn't be the worst thing in the world to see a return to that standard, regardless of where MMOs go.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Maybe Sandbox MMORPGs will be the MOBA to RTS equivalent of Theme Parks. Maybe the idea of RPGs is just too stale no matter what, and something else will emerge. However it turns out, I'll be happy with PFO if 20k people play it or 200k play it.
Personally, I liked MMORPGs when they had communities of 10k-250k players. It wouldn't be the worst thing in the world to see a return to that standard, regardless of where MMOs go.
Interesting musings, I think Sandbox with more simulation and as with virtual economy, virtual communities will be really big. For eg, an mmo that is effectively "worlds" in a galaxy. It's got to be fairly compelling? Eg Avatar (movie), EVE + Dust, and possibly Titan.
Agree, the communities and the size and selection are the core of mmorpgs/internet hubs. Just to add: Some FPS are more actiony than action movies!
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Goblin Squad Member
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I think William Gibson may have got it right in his Bridge trilogy: Virtual Light, Idoru, All Tomorrow's Parties. I'm particularly thinking about part of Idoru, and Gibson's vision of a shared virtual reality where everyone has developed their own home area within an unauthorized part of what looks like a vast 'cloud', and which is targetted by the corporations wanting to own it all.
So in this sense if Player Generated Content really took off I could see us all building dungeons not just for ourselves but for one another, and a game like PFO the common 'home plane' of the game where everything fully community happens.
An interesting take on possible futures of games is Tad Williams's Otherland. Set in a distant future where VR has taken over games, people spend their lives online and the best way to access the Internet is via a plug surgically installed in the back of your neck, then being placed in a sensory tank so you see,smell,feel,hear everything in real time.
Pretty interesting to ponder. Especially their take on MMOs.
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Goblin Squad Member
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@Valandur, that basically describes the Matrix as well.
I think this is a very likely future for humanity, and is, in my opinion, a very likely solution to Fermi's Paradox if we're able to fulfill our needs and desires by turning inward rather than expanding outward.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Soldack,
I only got my first cell phone last year...and it's a dumb-phone compared to everything my students have. I use it to make calls...that's it. I don't text, it can't connects to the internet, it has no aps, etc. It's a phone - I call people with it.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Soldack,
I only got my first cell phone last year...and it's a dumb-phone compared to everything my students have. I use it to make calls...that's it. I don't text, it can't connects to the internet, it has no aps, etc. It's a phone - I call people with it.
My 20 year old daughter and friends ...
Generally do NOT ...
- ever use email
- use their phone for calls unless they really really have to
They do ...
- facebook message a lot
- send messages by SMS/TXT
- chat using voice or video with skype
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Goblin Squad Member
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Being: I have a Kindle. It was a gift and I have never touched it, ever.
I am a relic (only 50, but technologically speaking a relic) because...
-I do not text, nor do I have data available on my phone.
-I do not Tweet. I did sign up for a Twitter account only because I can log in to almost anything with my Twitter account. Not sent one Tweet tho.
-I do not have a Facebook account.
-I would rather receive a phone call then any of the above.
Although...
-I am a good telephone conversationalist. It is the largest single part of my full time job and have done it well for years.
-Can still write a letter to a friend or associate when I want to, and can write a formal and professional letter when necessary (a skill largley lost on today's youth).
-Can do vast amounts of tedious research using the internet or a library (remember those?).
I fully acknowledge I am part of the older segment of society that has (so far) shunned a lot of the new technologies, but in return I feel as though I have preserved some of the one-on-one social skills these new technologies do not use and cause younger people to severely lack. If you think otherwise talk to different interviewers. If an employer is looking for a technogeek they go for the young guys/gals, if they want interpersonal skills they (often) go for older folks like me.
Gaming is definately moving in the direction of these high tech devices and skill sets, and you can see the success of these games all over the gaming industry (apps, downloads, etc... Angry Birds comes to mind). But there is still a large audience that fits my mold and will pay for a game for years as long as they are having fun and feel as though they are getting entertainment for the money.
Saying that I can easily see many facets of the new technology being incorporated into current and future games to take advantage of all the things that have been mentioned in this and other threads (Settlement getting attacked and you are not on...get a text or phone call!, Got an expedition that needs help, log in from your tablet!). These tools are no brainers.
The closest I have come so far is having access to the WoW AH without being logged in to WoW (which cost I think $2.99 per month). That was handy and allowed me to "play" WoW from any PC (even in a public library) with only an internet connection without the need for downloading the game. That was ingenious, and my characters made a small fortune using that tool.
Heh, I wonder how many people could actually use a card catalog if they were standing in front of one :p. maybe more here then normal though, seem to have a good number of older people on this forum then I'm used to seeing.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Heh, I wonder how many people could actually use a card catalog if they were standing in front of one :p. maybe more here then normal though, seem to have a good number of older people on this forum then I'm used to seeing.
I could use one if I needed to, but I honestly haven't been to a library except to vote in over a decade. I still remember the dewey decimal system, but between online reference databases, kindle/ebooks, and the internet in general it is so much more efficient to just get the info online. I don't even buy physical copies of fiction unless I want to get it signed for display, but even then, I still actually read the book on my kindle.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Get your Kindle up and running, mighty handy and pretty easy to use
Wiseman,
I may yet have to use a lot of the technology I have so far shunned. I am close to getting my Masters in Business Education. Ironic huh? A lot of the tech I just can't stand because I think it's use denies a lot of other social skills. Sherlock Holmes would not read the daily newspaper because he thought it would fill his head with lots of useless knowledge, taking up "valuable shelf space" in his mind. I am hardly on Holmes' level, but understand him in that small way.
I may be using lots of these technologies in the future, not because it would behoove me to do so as a teacher (when there is funding, which there currently is not), but because I could keep up with all of my game toons.
Got to have priorities..... :)
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Goblin Squad Member
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Being: I have a Kindle. It was a gift and I have never touched it, ever.
Well, being the avaricious old coot that I am I hope when I publish for Kindle later this year (assuming my editor is able to get through it and get it back to me in time to polish it all up) you will fire that Kindle up and give me greater reason to have to file quarterly tax returns.
I don't know whether it is kosher to talk about that here though since Paizo is a publisher. Don't want to step on any delicate toes.
