PS:N Story/Lore?

[Lonehunter]

Well we know story had a small part in Planetside. Those of us here from the beginning may even remember the origin stories of each empire. From the little events, to the Bending Trailer, story has definitely had a small part in Planetside.

Does it have a place in Planetside: Next?

Personally I think they should scrap it just because it never had a big roll or was even important, unless they went a new direction with it. Make it comical, make a joke out of it. If the game can even make fun of it's own errors, then it takes negative attention away from those errors. SOE's could give the game a new attitude to make it even more unique.

I'm trying to hold back the 100 ideas I've started with this. What do you guys think?

Edit: and I just wanted to say I liked the original Planteside story, it kinda inspired my own sci-fi novel. But from a game design point it was lacking, and uninvolved.

[p0intman]

I personally liked the narritive when it came into play.

[Miir]

I think that having a story maybe helped people choose a side earlier on or helped define the overall feel of the game. But I don't think it had much impact on the game once you started playing.

If they do a big CGI trailer and bring in some of the original story I think that will be enough for me.

The great thing about Planetside was that it gave us the tools to make our own stories. I think that's why we have such a connection to the game.

[Canaris]

I think they should keep the PS story hopefully they take it up from just before the whole CC & bending thing went on.

For us we know alot about PS and Auraxis and rebirthing, the saga of the three factions ect, but try to think of it from a selling point of view and a new potential player.
Without some kind of back story to explain just what's going on I think most people would find how the game plays rather confusing.

The story was never a huge part of the game but it did add great depth.

I've always liked the fact in the original that it gave the idea it was the planet itself that allowed humans to colonise it, then seal them off from the rest of the terran republic like some giant experiment to see what would happen or it was lonely without the original inhabitants.

[wildcat140679]

As far the planetside story element goes, it was really thin. It was (from my point of view) the bare minimum what was needed to give a general idea of each empire, the world and technology in it.
Each empire had its own reason why to be in war with the other two empires. Even without any background story at all, the game would have played the same, but people might have found some difficulty choosing their starting empire. In the end I ended up the empire with the lowest population.

I do however believe that PlanetSide could have been so much more if more story driven events would have taken place more frequently that could have added reason for combat and have added some changes to the daily capture and hold battles that go on.

Just to come up with a quick events on the fly
Technology black out:
For unknown reasons all empire specific technology have disappeared from the data records.
Empires are limited to common pool weapons and have limited access to vehicles.
All over the world high NTU concentrations have been detected that hold bits and pieces of the lost empire specific data. Retrieve this data and bring it to a tech-lab to recover portions of your lost tech.

An event that changes game play, soldiers will have to adapt, open field battles to retrieve these NTU concentrations, fighting to regain hold of some object that might hold and recover bit and pieces of their missing technology.



I really hope PS:N will have more story based events, that will have impact on the regular game play. Even if there are randomly generated on a weekly basis I'm all good with it.

[Sentrosi]

I second this idea Wildcat. I just hope they don't go hog wild with it. At a random point once a month one of 30 things happens to the world. Could be as simple as a realignment of the lattice or as significant as all tech is gone and you're forced to fight from trenches with knives and spears.

[Dorest0rm]

I always loved reading the Monoliths, and planet description.

[Silverfish]

Originally Posted by Dorest0rm

I always loved reading the Monoliths, and planet description.

Me too. I always appreciated that they gave some background story to go along with the action. Like when they added the caves, there was some story to go along with that which was good.
The story made it more fun for me. I don't think they should focus more on story in Next though. Like Miir said, its about the stories we make too that made it so fun. They should leave it at the present level and that would be great!

[LordReaver]

PS's story was really bad when you think about. For example, everybody got to Auraxis through a wormhole, that then closed up. Yet somehow the original empire was still able to send stuff through. Whom by the way share the exact same name as the TR, even though they are different. Then you have the fucking retarded bending...

I say PSN just forgets PS ever happened story wise. The only thing I can say about it that was good, was that each empire seemed like crazy assholes to the other sides. The TR were crazy dictators that wanted everybody to "obey", the NC crazy terrorist that wanted anarchy, the VS were crazy scientist that wanted doomsday technology. Yet each empire thought they were doing the right thing. The TR just wanted to get rid of crime, the NC just wanted a little freedom, the VS just wanted to make stuff to help everyone. It was a giant case of misunderstanding.

So, I would like to see the story revamped, and the extremists stuff delved into.

[Aractain]

I sort of redefined the lore of PS to make more sense.

While the Original Terran Republic is authoitarian they did mange to unite the human race and had a peace lasting for hundreds (original was a thousand) of years. The alternative was endless war claiming millions of lives.

Expeditionary force checks our Auraxis (fidling powers up systems shuts down FTL travel options; thats wormholes or whatever).

Traditionalist TR try to maintain control.
Stuborn NC try to found a 'new order' without the restrictions of the TR.
Vanu are looking at hundreds of years in the future for their ultimate goal of total technological superiority.

Its sort of like TR are companies trying to keep thier profitable businesses afloat. NC are 'pirates' sharing everything over the internet and Vanu are the people that put togther the next big thing (iTunes in this example).

That gives meaningful reasons to play all three empires rather than the classic "Evil, FREEDOM!, Insane" of before.

[Oty]

I would like to see more motivationposters and propaganda in Sanc and/or bases, I'mean if your figthing a war that cannot end, damn you need some motivation to keep going, a bit of black humor in them wouldn't hurt either.

[Lonehunter]

*Poster in TR Sanc* (if it exists)
"New Conglomerate: They Beat Old People, Fight for the Republic!"

is the kinda stuff I wanna see

[otomotopia]

NC: Revolution, Revolution, Revolution, reload.

Oh god that would be AWESOME! I am in full favor of using propaganda in game.

We don't need more amounts story, but we don't need less either. An explanation really helped set the foundation for the fight, the ideology did matter slightly, and the back story mattered a bit, but that all made me really feel like my enemy wasn't just my enemy because he wore different colors and had a red tag above his head.

[TRex]

Maybe they could have an actor(s) or something talking on the big screen in sanctuary and occupied bases , one for each empire .
Kinda like Kane from C&C for the TR , and so on. He could be the overlord . NC could have Justin Beiber and VS have some evil bitch from 'V' . Just suggestions.

[Raymac]

You can't have a game like Planetsde without some sort of backstory / lore. While it may not play a big role in the game itself, it certainly is important to establishing who the factions are. There needs to be a context for why we are all killing each other.

I would however like to see an evolution of the story, something along the lines of the difference between the original Star Trek and Star Trek: The Next Generation. Even thought Star Trek: TNG was totally new, it was still instantly recognizable as Star Trek.