Can Endgame/Metagame help drive PS2 to continued success?

Asp · 2009-10-01, 03:11 PM

In whatever form PS2 takes (PS clone, modern day, near future) how do you re-establish that base of players and hold onto them? To me the biggest advantage PS had over any other shooter was the scale of the battles, hundreds of players and vehicles all fighting over a massive area.

Is that enough though to keep people paying, month after month, even if you don't make disastrous design decisions? Maybe.

Assume for simplicity PS2 is an updated PS clone with no BFRs, no core combat. Old and new weapons and vehicles are introduced, graphics and engine updates, everything seems balanced. How do you keep people playing and grow the number of players you have?

Achievements are no brainers and they're in most shooters now anyway, so that or expanded stats tracking would be nothing revolutionary for PS2.

Can you create motivation in the game for outfits to fight and defend land? The seasaw back and forth of continent hacks eventually becomes about as meaningful as your next instanced game of BF2 or Quake..

Is there a way to make some form of an resource economy work? This doesn't have to mean gold or credits specifically. The idea being give continents or land players will fight over some value; some resource they require. Allow player factions and outfits to control territory (control over bases/towers, construction of outfit outposts) to protect those resources, and you give a sense of personal stake in fighting the opposite faction(s). Not just the sense that they're tagging along continent hopping to slip into a big battle already in progress.

Expansion of player abilities, deployables, equipment. Allow outfits to control a base, and even modify it. They can add to the defenses of the base, or once conquered, maybe they're responsible for establishing the defenses period. How those resources or land connect to a benefit to the factions/outfits would define how your economy works. I'm not sure players actually crafting/supplying equipment/weapons in the game would work; but it would be a possible missing piece in the economy circle. Hold the land, get the resources, make the equipment, to hold the land, etc etc..

While the two can't be compared equally, the one thing EVE Online does really well is politics. The game is setup for players to control area and resources that inevitably lead to some huge player created conflicts.

An economy of crafting and coins may not be feasible. Though the idea of giving a personal stake to groups of players to not only attack and run off to the next fight, but to hold territory and defend it in a permanent game setting.. That would be a huge leap forward for any FPS out there today. The FPS of an updated PS, with the metagame of EVE would be wild.

Any ideas on how to get players motivated to go to war?

Firefly · 2009-10-01, 04:31 PM

I played because it was never-ending nonstop battles. I played because I didn't have to worry about the match ending. I played because the leveling system only meant unlocking more weapons - a BR1 could theoretically still gun down a BR20. I played because of the game mechanics and the possibilities of virtually limitless tactics and strategies.

I believe there's a time and a place for "e-sports" shooters, and indeed I have fun with the ones which interest me. However, those games have an entirely different set of tactics and strategies. Planetside brough something to the table the likes of which have never been seen before.

I could take two squads of BR5s, arm them with Suppressors and Standard Armour, and using the lessons we learned and the tactics we developed, we could practically decimate competition if we chose our battles and our battlefields. I recall a "Pajama Party" that my outfit ran, where we had three full squads using aforementioned Suppressors and Standard Armour. In addition to the kills we racked up, we also dropped a Vanguard tank and a Reaver.

I can't recall having ever reached "end-game", where an empire was Sanc-locked. I know I was Sanc-locked on more than one occasion, and I'd hear every now and then that the TR managed to Sanc-lock someone but I was never on so it was second-hand hearsay to me.

An economy in an FPS is about as useless as tits on a bull. Really, what the fuck do I need economy and crafting for? That's my opinion and I'm open to having my mind changed by coherent, rational, valid and interesting arguments.

The biggest problem with Planetside, for me, was the stunning lack of marketing, support and the overabundance of attempts to after-birth abort the game by the company that created it. I got tired of trying to get people interested in playing that had never heard of the game. I was also turned off by SOE's decisions to pull developers off a perfectly playable game so they could make more expansions for some nerdy elf game.

Core Combat isn't so bad. It was hyped to be urban combat, close quarters battle, but it wasn't. It was just a different playing field for the same run-and-gun. Unfortunately, I don't really see a purpose to it aside from maybe some base benefits.

From the beginning, I was all for BFRs. And initially they were very interesting. But the waffling back and forth on their mechanics, function, design... coupled with the poor implementation... followed by the utter disregard for player feedback and complaints, and the subsequent nerfing all to hell made them a revolting pariah to me. When I first heard about them, I had hoped they could be used like BattleMechs. When they were used as base door-camping, in spite of the fact that something that large shouldn't even be inside a base, it ruined the fun for me and I started avoiding them. This gave way to "revenge syndrome" and I set out with my outfit to figure out how a squad of infantry on foot could utterly destroy something that required so much resources just to drive.

To me, Planetside is about truly massive battles. Take your 32-person server with a 15-minute game and get bent. Why would I settle for the same people using the same tactic for 15 minutes when I could literally spend 8 hours online at a stretch and repeat the same tactics maybe once or twice in that entire span? Unfortunately, with dwindling numbers due to a flagrant lack of care and concern for the ONLY MMO-FPS in existence...

DviddLeff · 2009-10-01, 06:06 PM

Don't forget WWIIO; that is most defiantly a MMOFPS, and the first one released (and its about to get a massive graphics update).

Back to PS, one of the thing PS lacked were long term objectives for the empire or an outfit.

It did have a decent and extensive character progression system, which would take a new player months of casual play to reach BR20, and even longer to achieve CR5. PS also finally had merits, which were some damned good achievement rewards.

PS did daily empire objectives very well; capture the base and the continent to "win".

Empires could also have long term goals; already empires get rewards for capturing various continents, but this is short term, able to be decided in a matter of hours. Empires could work to hold their ground, and they longer they hold it the more resources the empire earns, allowing them to access newly designed equipment a week or so before the other empires if they beat the enemy factions to a set limit. This would obviously require more substantial developer presence and support.

However, long term you find yourself not caring about the empire, and just start caring about where the next big fight will be, and where the most fun can be had, which has resulted in the "zerg" not following the rare good advice from the legions of CR5s and just heading straight for the biggest stalemate they can find.

Outfits could and should be the driving force of the game; running events, organised operations and the like, and outfits should be rewarded for doing so; give them designations to reflect their size (active players) and success to start with. Then you can start giving them things to burn those outfit points on and attract players to their ranks; buying bases and then upgrades, purchasing super vehicles (mobile bases or huge tanks and aircraft) or just allowing them to alter their armour in some way. You could make outfit rank change a players armour, making player given promotions something to be proud of (obviously have to limit those in top ranks somehow). Outfits could buy barracks in sanctuary, essentially a place to hang out and train, recruit new players and display trophies from their conquests. Outfits could be awarded trophies based on how many bases they capture, and like the knife kills from BF2142, they could get a permanent record of which enemy outfits bases they have taken.

Many, many people have left PS over the years, the next MMOFPS must retain the players it starts with for longer, and must also initially attract a much larger audience; if memory serves the original 5 servers were NEVER full, and probably could have been merged, at least east coast to east coast and west coast to west coast, within a few months of release.

Giving players, outfits and empires short, mid and long term goals is one of the key things PS2 needs to achieve, and coupled with marketing and a healthy post release development scheme it can do well.

Hamma · 2009-10-02, 09:41 AM

I think an economy does have a little bit of a place in an MMO FPS. It gives more incentive to hold territory and a feeling of loss if you lose it.

Because really now if you lose a continent who cares? You don't really lose anything. If it isn't an economy there needs to be something to persuade people to attack and hold territory.

Asp · 2009-10-02, 11:02 AM

Economy might have been a bad choice of words.. It's not about picking weeds or getting gold.. It's about creating a rationale for playing the game aside from simply random firefights, no matter how large.. In other MMOs the "economy" in whatever form is the motivator for a lot of what players do. In EVE it's also a convenient tool, indirectly, for going to war.
Like DviddLeff suggested, the devs could design interesting ways to get people fighting, but the more your game mechanics put it in the hands of the players, the more you can focus on other aspects of the game.

So, economy isn't the best term for it, but the thought behind this thread was ideas (if SOE is watching) for in game triggers to fight.

Mechanics they can develop into the game to incentivize campaigns and big battles.

Baneblade · 2009-10-02, 01:57 PM

Rage, Religion, and Resources. Those are the cornerstones of war. Every war has at least one of those as the cause.

The wars in PS are a bit too arbitrary, but given it was designed as an MMOFPS and not an MMORPFPS, I can understand why resources were not really put in. I don't consider different base bonuses to be resources and NTU is too indirect and plentiful to be considered a resource to fight for (besides the fact its impossible to really control).

Manitou · 2009-10-03, 03:20 PM

Originally Posted by Sobekeus

Rage, Religion, and Resources. Those are the cornerstones of war. Every war has at least one of those as the cause.

These three are rooted in one concept: greed. The greatest motivator on the planet (any planet) is greed.

If you find a balanced way to meet that desire in this game with some type of outfit reward, you will find you have a game that will persistently hold interest.

Hamma · 2009-10-06, 05:42 PM

An economy in an FPS is about as useless as tits on a bull. Really, what the fuck do I need economy and crafting for? That's my opinion and I'm open to having my mind changed by coherent, rational, valid and interesting arguments.

There has to be incentive. In PS now there is pretty much zero incentive to do anything. You need greed, and an incentive to drive war it's the trademark.

An economy in an FPS is useless as tits on a bull HOWEVER, in an MMO FPS which is what this would be there has to be something else to drive gameplay, it can't just be an FPS with more people.

DviddLeff · 2009-10-07, 11:55 AM

Remember that there was and is again the desire to earn XP, which is what drives fights currently into the large scale zergs that steamroll bases in quick succession, or drag fights out to get lots of kills.

For a year or so before they upped it to 25 and then to 40 the main thing that drove the fights were fun, and then strategic choices, but then there was little reason to take bases so fun was the main factor.

Kyonye · 2009-10-07, 02:19 PM

You can go past BR20 now?

Hamma · 2009-10-07, 02:39 PM

Aye it's going to 40 now.

JackEarthrider · 2009-11-05, 10:08 PM

If you do implement a economy into a shooter you must make sure above all else that their is not a fun killing grind to it. The moment you start requiring ppl to be harvesting for more than a single sitting is the moment the fun killing will set in.

To summarize:
Resource gathering, yes
Some form of customization/crafting, yes

Overpowered customization, no (that will lead to everyone needing it)
Progressive resource costs, only to a point (make it interesting, but not long)

Base customization, sure, but only if its not a days to build minutes to destroy kinda thing or no one will bother.

Those are just my thoughts on the matter, im new to this game but I've played very many others.

Sifer2 · 2009-11-10, 01:01 AM

I think this is the single most important topic when it comes to Planetside Next. Next to making the game free to play on some level there is no other thing SOE can do that will improve the number of people playing it than to focus on making a deep metagame.

There has to be a hook of some kind to motivate people to keep playing an to make them feel like there is some progress. For instance in WoW the hook would be better gear for your character as you beat the latest new dungeons with your guild. That obviously wont work for Planetside. Someone mentioned Eve and yes I think we could probably learn a little more from Eve since its a more player vs player driven game.

I think they really need to give Outfits a way to advance an grow an improve over time. And they may need to make areas that can be taken over that are more permanent than the standard bases which switch sides fairly easily. For example their could be cities which kind of act like Sanctuaries now that are significantly harder to take over requiring weeks of work. I dunno if economics could play a role in this system but its work thinking about.

After all the Empires must fight over something tangible. Players should always want to go out an kick ass to improve themselves and their faction an it should continue long after your max rank. I just regret that I am drawing blanks here as to how it should work haha.

Firefly · 2009-11-10, 03:34 PM

No. No fucking economy, period. No gathering flowers. No gathering scrap metal. No weapons-making, no farming, no resource gathering. No taking PvE missions for money. None of that shit.

You put any kind of commodity in a game, and the fucking Chinese and Koreans will abuse those free accounts and spam the living fuck out of you saying "BUY MY PLAT! WWW.WEBSITE.COM CHEAP AND FAST!"

Fuck that. I fucking hate - I *HATE* I HATE I HATE - gold-spammers. You want to kill my interest in a game? Allow Hong Xiaopeng and Ji Jen-kim to come in with their army of mindless workerbees and abuse free trials out the ass. It's bad enough I had to fucking endure Smiley777 and GODJOEY spamming global broadcasts with their horse shit, and it's bad enough that I had to endure free-trial spammers causing havoc in chat.

JackEarthrider · 2009-11-11, 01:10 PM

you must really hate free trial people.

But even if resources are a no, you gotta admit the game does need something tangible to take or acquire (even if that isn't necessarily resources).

What some games do is a have a special zone where you can take bases/forts that give you some sort of special advantage/item/resource whatever for taking and holding them. But within the zone, re-spawns are harder to come by, terrain is more difficult, and bases are more spread out.

Basically it would be a no mans land with extra difficulty but extra reward. (sorta like wilderness in a few other games, you get the point).

Anyway, those are just some thoughts, i'm mostly from an MMO background so I have trouble thinking FPS style.