could this be successful?

[Chiropteran]

Long before Ultima Online or Everquest, there were MUDS. Text based, some supported hundreds of players at the same time, with multiple classes, races, zones and such.

One particular MUD had me addicted for several years. ArcticMud, it's still around although I don't play it anymore for various reasons.

The reason I bring it up is because compared to all of the commercial MMOs on the market it was much more hardcore.

Some aspects of the game:

-When you die, you drop everything you are carrying, including money, and worn equipment, and you lose a large amount of xp, which can and does result in level loss. You can't store items in a bank either, only money can be placed in the bank.

-PvP is allowed, and you can pretty much kill other players anywhere in the game. The only exceptions are the Inns where you enter and leave the game, and a few scatter areas. Even in these "safe" rooms you can still be attacked and killed if you recently participated in PvP or stealing from a player.

-Rooms exist which are known as "deathtraps". You step inside such a room, and you instantly die. There are always warnings if you look for them, but careless players tend to die in them. Since entering the room results in instant death, it's impossible to recover gear lost in such a room.

-The best equipment is limited, and the very best is limited to only 1 item existing. If someone else has "the shield of huma" for example, you couldn never get one... unless you kill that player and take it from him.

Compared to current games, like world of warcraft, swg, or everquest, this is super hardcore. Even shadowbane, which was supposed to be based around pvp, you kept your equipted items when you died, losing only gold and unequipped gear.


Could a commercial MMO as hardcore as an old MUD like that ever succeed?

 

[glutenberg]

Not unless the game is free.

 

[akubi]

no. unless the grind was super easy and farming for gold and items is fast, dropping all your ****** on death will not be fun.
i don't support carebear pvp like wow but what you are describing is way too harsh. i wouldn't pay for that.

 

[spunkz]

niche market, i doubt anyone with the resources to create an MMO would dare to try it

 

[r6ashih]

dont forget that for mages, spells are learned at several cities so travel is a must. Higher level spells are only gained from spell books which have a low drop rate.

Edit:
and to be a good healer you need to make several attempts at xak tsaroth for the damn heal spell.

 

[DivideBYZero]

Originally posted by: r6ashih
Something a WoW addict says.

 

[neutralizer]

The only mmo that is similar to that in hardcoreness would be EVE since when you lose your ship, you lose everything equipped on the ship and the cargohold. PVP is allowed anywhere outside of high-sec space. It is also allowed within high-sec space if a war is declared.

 

[pontifex]

no, some of it sounds ok, but the penalties are too harsh.

 

[Mo0o]

unless you can get things back easily, people would stop playing pretty soon after losing all their stuff

 

[pontifex]

Originally posted by: Mo0o
unless you can get things back easily, people would stop playing pretty soon after losing all their stuff

exactly the reason why i quit UO back in the day. I died, spent 20 minutes trying to find a res (when you res you had nothing on you), got the res, died 3/4 of the way abck to my corpse, spent about 10-15 minutes trying to find a res again, got res, made it back to my corpse but all that was left was my skeleton. everything decayed because it took so long to get back to my body.

 

[randay]

Depends on how you define succeed. these days, mmos are getting easier and easier, its a big disappointment for me. like you, i too spent many days on a MUD. I think a hardcore mmo could succeed on a smaller scale, but if you're thinking of one killing games like WoW, it ain't gonna happen. The only reason why WoW is so popular is because its so easy. You don't lose anything when you die, not even experience. Theres no way a hardcore mmo could win over that player base ever.

 

[Thraxen]

I played Arctic and loved it. Anyway, I agree with what some of the others have said. I don't think a game like that would be financially successful if people lost all their stuff everytime they died. You might attract a small hardcore audience (which is what you had with the old text muds), but not your average gamer. I do like the idea of unique items that are truly unique though. But then again all of those items would likely just end up on Ebay.

 

[Balt]

Wouldn't work. You'd have the 'power gamers' pretty much control the entire game and pick off anyone new or upcoming. That discourages a broader subscription base.

Ultima Online was pretty harsh way back in the day, but it still wasn't as cut-throat as what you are describing.

Edit: And by 'power gamers' I mean the people who literally play 16 hours a day.

 

[dullard]

I was also a huge MUD fan. I think all it would take is an additude change.

A) Imagine a world full of powerful items and people are relatively people like (very little difference in the physical powers of people). In a world like this, 5 of anyone can take out 1 of anyone else. In a way this is like the real world, there are no superhuman people, there are no Chuck Norrises that can take out an entire army with their left pinky finger. In a world like this, equipment is everything. To get better (which is where the addictiveness comes from you always strive to be better) you simply get better equipment. In the real world, we are always striving to get a better weapon, better technology, etc. In a game like the real world, if you lose all that, you are basically back to nothing. You lose everything. So you cannot go out into tough areas because you risk too much.

B) Now instead imagine a world where equipment isn't that special but that you gain big from levelling up. This is like Dungeons and Dragon's based games. A naked level 20 fighter can take out a whole army of level 1 people in full armor. If you lose your equipment here, you still have your own powerful self. Equipment is minimized, and thus loss of it is not a big deal. You can take risks, because if you lose your stuff, it isn't the end of everything.

Of course, you can imagine any world between those extremes.

For your idea to work, we need to shift drastically from the (A) side to the (B) side.

 

[randay]

ah this brings back so many memories. on the MUD I played on, you also dropped everything and lost xp, but no deleveling. in most cases players were allowed to loot only a few things from your corpse, but in some instances full loots did happen(they take everything). you would then have to go back to your corpse to retrieve the rest of your equipment. you could restring(rename) items using tokens that you get for winning events and stuff, in this way people had whole sets of equipment themed around whatever they wanted. there were also unique items, there was one really strong weapon, that every week or so the owner was forced to fight a challenger for possesion of the weapon. good times.

 

[Atheus]

I'd play it. It would have to be limited to a couple thousand, maybe even just a few hundred players per instance though.

Not as harsh as D&D, where if you die, you die.

 

[ElFenix]

i'd love a massively multiplayer online idea.



anyway, UO was like that back when it started. you die, you lose everything you've got on you because everyone would loot your body. there weren't any uberweapons or items in the game, just whatever the fotm was. corp por corp por corp por

 

[Savarak]

I got my screenname from playing a MUD... Realms of Despair... those were the good o'l days...

 

[CityShrimp]

I think any MMO idea could succeed as long as it is fairly balanced in gameplay, rich in content, and easy to pick-up. You just need to come up with a way for new players to level up or at least gain some gaming experience before the slaughter begins. For example, they won't lose all their equipment until level 10 (e.g. in WoW, you have no res sickness in low level). However, the ideas you posted seem to be more appealing as an additional feature. Players could choose whether or not to play in hardcore mode. If they do, they gain access to additional dungeons, quests, etc.

 

[TheVrolok]

Not a shot. I played Apocalypse III, IV, and V and it was way too hardcore for mainstream MMO users.

 

[Chiropteran]

UO was similar but different. The "problem" with UO was that while you lost gear when you died, that gear wasn't worth anything anyway. A full set of "bone" armor which was almost as good as expensive plate was pretty much free.

And while there were a few rare nice weapons, virtually all the pvpers used spells to kill people, and only carried the minimal reagents.

So it didn't have the same feel as arctic did.

Plus you could save your bounty in the bank or on a vendor.

 

[PaperclipGod]

Originally posted by: Chiropteran
Long before Ultima Online or Everquest, there were MUDS. Text based, some supported hundreds of players at the same time, with multiple classes, races, zones and such.

One particular MUD had me addicted for several years. ArcticMud, it's still around although I don't play it anymore for various reasons.

The reason I bring it up is because compared to all of the commercial MMOs on the market it was much more hardcore.

Some aspects of the game:

-When you die, you drop everything you are carrying, including money, and worn equipment, and you lose a large amount of xp, which can and does result in level loss. You can't store items in a bank either, only money can be placed in the bank.

-PvP is allowed, and you can pretty much kill other players anywhere in the game. The only exceptions are the Inns where you enter and leave the game, and a few scatter areas. Even in these "safe" rooms you can still be attacked and killed if you recently participated in PvP or stealing from a player.

-Rooms exist which are known as "deathtraps". You step inside such a room, and you instantly die. There are always warnings if you look for them, but careless players tend to die in them. Since entering the room results in instant death, it's impossible to recover gear lost in such a room.

-The best equipment is limited, and the very best is limited to only 1 item existing. If someone else has "the shield of huma" for example, you couldn never get one... unless you kill that player and take it from him.

Compared to current games, like world of warcraft, swg, or everquest, this is super hardcore. Even shadowbane, which was supposed to be based around pvp, you kept your equipted items when you died, losing only gold and unequipped gear.


Could a commercial MMO as hardcore as an old MUD like that ever succeed?

Yes, it could. What you just described is Ultima Online circa 1997/8.

 

[DrPizza]

I used to play a game similar to what you're describing way back in the mid 80's. It was a blast. However, after a couple months, one of the guys who was playing started playing on 3 terminals at the same time. He took huge risks with two of his players, then brought back the bounty to a 3rd player who he would allow to kill his other characters... No one realized what he was up to until it was too late - he created a god-like character and from that point on, just went around slaughtering everyone and taking their loot. (The WoW episode of Southpark pretty much summed it up, except it was all text-based.)

 

[Chiropteran]

Originally posted by: CityShrimp
I think any MMO idea could succeed as long as it is fairly balanced in gameplay, rich in content, and easy to pick-up. You just need to come up with a way for new players to level up or at least gain some gaming experience before the slaughter begins. For example, they won't lose all their equipment until level 10 (e.g. in WoW, you have no res sickness in low level). However, the ideas you posted seem to be more appealing as an additional feature. Players could choose whether or not to play in hardcore mode. If they do, they gain access to additional dungeons, quests, etc.

I would never consider a "easymode" setting that prevent characters from being killed by other players, because problem arises where a pvper kills someone, and passes the gear to a friend who is in "easymode", and now he has your gear and you can never possibly get it back.


However, the idea that it would just be all-out war with people camping the newbie spawns etc wouldn't be true at all either.

For example, you would start in your own faction town and there would be guards. It might not be 100% safe, but any player attacking another in the town would be attacked and probably killed by the guards, and the risk/reward of trying to kill a newbie with no gear worth anything while risking all of your gear wouldn't make sense.

There are other ways to allow pkilling while discouraging total random killing of anyone and everyone. I liked the idea behind UO's red/blue system but it was far too simple and exploitable.

I think a system could work really well though if it had multiple factions each independent of each other. There might be one generic "good" faction, that if you kill a newbie or innocent player you lose large amounts of faction from, but it wouldn't be the only faction that matters.

There would be a faction for each town or nation. For that reason there will be areas near towns which are somewhat safe, even without guards, because most pkillers won't want to become hated by that town's faction for little gain. There would be some risk, because maybe some player who has been relatively "innocent" finally decided to take the plunge and "go evil", but those cases wouldn't be common.

As a requirement, I think a limit of 1 character per account is required, as there are potentials for abuse when you can have multiple characters.

There will also be players who are basically at war with your town's faction, and they will be the ones to watch out for, but they will be easily identified as such and players of your own faction will probably be willing to help defend against or kill these enemies. They will also be away from their own lands, which would have it's own disadvantages.


There are also ways to lessen the blow of losing your gear, making rewards and goals that involve reputation and such, that won't be lost just by dying. For example instead of having a quest where you kill the red dragon and get a fancy magic sword, the quest to kill the red dragon would reward you with being knighted to "the order of red dragon slayers" and as a member of that order you could enchant any sword, with an enchantment that is attuned to you, such that if you lost the sword it would just return to it's mundane non-magical form and you could go enchant a different sword.

 

[Chiropteran]

Originally posted by: PaperclipGod
Yes, it could. What you just described is Ultima Online circa 1997/8.

1- Not really. UO was very similar, but it lacked "loot". All the best items in UO were obtainable very easily, there wasn't any amazing limited gear that people fought over... they just fought over gold/reagents.

2- UO as it was failed, and was changed to much less hardcore version. So you can't really say it's still successful.