Guild Wars 2

Designers. I will share with you my infinite gaming wisdom on the subject of MMOs and all games that require repetition in content.. The same wisdom I tried to share with D3 devs prior to Diablo 3 release. They failed to heed my warning.

Its important to read this without thinking of these words coming from a random internet nobody. Put aside your ego, your biased, and all those ‘Making game’s for dummies’ books and start fresh.

For shorter version, skip—-
I admit that I have absolutely no palpable credentials related to game design. I do have a few dozen games I’ve designed on paper in my spare time, some maps I did for CS/Unreal back in the day, and maybe one or 2 web based games I tried to make when learning how to program PHP/HTML5.

In addition, I have played nearly every ‘genre’ of game to a hardcore level, from RTS, to MMO, to FPS to RPGs (I really think i was the first person to get the Super Suit, as I was surprised it was called such when nintendo mag and the net was calling it the Super Jacket), to iphone and kongregate, to whatever. You name it, I’ve either played it, beaten it, or hated it.

Im not boasting, as that’s nothing to boast about. I just want to state that while I might not meet the credentials that a ‘guy in the biz’ might have, I consider myself far more knowledgeable and experienced on this subject than anyone. period.
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In short, Gaming Is My Life

I love games, and moreso, I love critiquing them. I would make an amazing QA employee, but moreso, I would make an amazing designer. This is because my understanding of what players want, and how they react to specific decisions is unsurpassed. I see life in ‘game form.’ Limitations, repetition, OOP, pscyhology. Every critique I’ve made, even based on a minuscule amount of information from recent releases such as CS:GO, to Diablo 3, to GW2, and onward, has blew up in the faces of fanboys and devs.

The problem stems from a few fundamentally poor design choices made most likely through misunderstanding of what gamers want.

There are many different types of games, I will talk about the MMO genre in particular. The genre that is required to keep players active through repetitive content and grinding.

Grinding is a very important aspect of the MMO, because its impossible to churn out content at a rate faster than the user can consume it. WoW found a good model that appeased its user base (gear progression)…GW2 has yet to find a practical model.

Here is my advice to you while you seek to find how to entice players to ‘grind’ in your game. One word:

Efficiency

It is the single most important design factor to focus around. No matter how great your content is, it will be beaten, and it will get boring. The only thing left is for the player to learn how to maximize efficiency in regards to that content so that they can rationalize to themselves that completing that content is worthwhile.

Let me emphasize: Without the ability to allow for an increase in efficiency, there is no reward that can justify a player to keep playing.

Skill in MMO’s is inherently related to efficiency. The more skillful a player is, that faster they should be able to progress through the repetitive cycle, and the further they should come out ahead in terms of reward progression.

Build efficiency around skill, and your game will flourish.

The next time you release a dungeon patch, make sure that there is a pathway towards efficient grinding. Its harder without a gear treadmill, but this is what YOU wanted. You accepted the challenge to make content that requires more finesse, and encounters that have to be tailored for nearly infinite class builds.

And its possible. Easily by throwing jumping puzzles with timers into the mix. And in a tougher way by creating challenging encounters that focus more on condition/boon management than burst DPS.

Take these words for what they’re worth. You might see it as obvious, and if so, its because you’re not truly understanding the importance of efficiency.

Right. When it comes down to it, players will find and do the most efficient things, whether it’s ‘less fun’ or not. The problem lies with the approach of dungeons in general, and how to separate the players who invest a lot of time and the players who invest less than a lot of time. The best way MMO developers have concocted is the idea of doing them over and over.

There hasn’t been a dungeon patch, more like a dungeon hotfix. That’s how I saw it. Something needed to be fixed in their eyes to match the rest of the game, so it was. Calling it a patch is a huge overstatement IMO, despite it being an active way for them to “patch” the dungeon.

I’m still waiting for D3 dungeon-styles for MMOs. I’m sure it’s possible. Not only having set dungeon styles such as what exists, but semi-randomly made dungeons with bosses that exhibit random moves from a large pool, enemies that spawn in semi-random fashion, levels and terrain created in a semi-random array of possibilities within a certain environment.

GW2 took a stab at dungeons and gameplay, and I think they’re heading in the right direction. As time progresses and parses are gathered, I think the fine-tuning and mechanics, as well as overall experience, will definitely improve.

I’m looking forward to new dungeons they introduce; hoping for things like puzzles that actually involve 5 players. Imagine having a dungeon that has 6 paths in 1 explorable mode, where you have each player going down 1 and having to get something at the end and carry it back. Each path is also different; one may be a jumping puzzle; another, enemies to kill; another, an intricate set of traps; another, a sequence such as the Asura puzzle with the warp gate and numbers. Their idea of puzzles and intelligence is a HUGE factor I’d love to see implemented more in dungeons.

Also, although it may not be true, asking them to put aside their ego while still maintaining one yourself (comes across as such, lol) is pretty funny. :P