Game mechanics and immersion in RPGs

#1

Quote:Can a game be constructed where a players progression is not measured in numbers

I would love to say yes to that, but the answer is, honestly, not really. Aside from the fact that everything done in a computer must absolutely be done as numbers, even in real life, people look at things as numbers, even in an abstract sense, because we are mathematically inclined. It's a great idea to hide the numbers, and have players not worry so much about them, but they will always be numbers. One good way of having players not think about numbers is to take the ability to influence those numbers directly out of their hands.

Quote:Can the execution of abilities be such that they are not just a list of powers to click

Absolutely. I have seen a game prototype at IMGDC a while back that had the player drawing a shape on the screen that translated into a spell. Now, if you use vector graphics for that, you can check to see how close what the player drew was to the accepted "best" way to draw it and then use that to figure out how effective the spell was.

In another example, you can chain actions together as combos, like in a fighting game- there's no rule of game design that says you can't apply the combo design to something like MMOs or magic or even crafting. You can have deep systems where you can start with a series of two or three actions, and then the next action you take can vary the effect widely, depending on the move you use. An opponent would have to think about the situation more carefully to judge what that next move will be, especially if the defense against the differing possibilities were very different. I find that stealing ideas from different genres and applying them to others results in very nice variations of gameplay sometimes.

Quote:The problem I find with RPGs, those of the MMO type in particular, is that there is a wall between the player and the character/story/world formed by the game mechanics itself.

Richard Bartle gave a speech on exactly how that happened. Without getting into all of it, it comes down to the split in online games in the 80's into the varying types of MUDs, and the kind of MUD (DikuMUD) that was used by Everquest becoming the default model of world to use. Now, of course, people are running into problems with its limitations, but historical precedent is holding many designers back for some reason ("well, this is how it should be done because this is how it's been done"). Bartle put it a lot better than I did, though.

Quote:Too often the game mechanics get in the way of character concept and immersion in the game world.

Exactly. The mechanics of a game serve only one purpose: To provide the player with a way to interact with the game. If it's not doing that in the smoothest, simplest way possible, then it's not doing it correctly. That's not to say that the mechanics can always be super simple- sometimes things just have enough moving parts that you can simplify it only so much. But some of the game design out there really wasn't done with simplicity in mind.

#2 1. The player still needs some sort of reference as to what their character can do. If my "jump" is 10/100, I need some reference that I'm crap at jumping and when faced with a chasm, should not try to leap across.

You could have percentage abilities defined by a description "jump is crap", "climb is awesome", "speed is mediocre" - but it still has to be defined as something, and something that the player understands and can instantly relate to. Which is why numbers and percentages are so convenient.

Anyone who gets rid of the concept of level-grind has my vote for President.

#3 I'm very much in favour of giving the player a numberless presentation of his abilities. The few core attributes of a character should be words describing their level of ability. From "weak" to "godlike" for strength, for example. Still just a few numbers internally, but relative power is easy to gauge.

EQ's consider system would have been even better if there were no visible levels. An enemy's size and natural/artificial weapons should be an indicator of the challenge.

FUDGE is an excellent example of tabletop mechanics with words. You have a few words going from lowest to highest to describe an attribute, skill or whatever. It's also more of an RPG kit than a full ruleset, so pick the skill names as you go if you like it freeform.

Conflict resolution/skill checks are your level versus a challenge level, and you roll a number of FUDGE dice (dF). The results from each die is -1, 0 or +1. The average outcome is no effect. Positive results increase the effective rank of the skill in question. Weak character trying to break open an average door rolls +4 (a truly heroic success) with 4dF, ending at Strong. Resolve by computer, and present it as "You manage to summon up strength you didn't know you had and tear open the door".

That's how I think #1 can be partially resolved.

The experience and learning portion is trickier with a system like that. Do you make each skill have a pool of hidden points that need to be filled over time, or do you hand out XP and let X thousand points buy a skill rank up/Y thousand for an attribute?

Do you let skills gain tiny amounts of these skills with each use? How do you limit the skills, and stop players from maxing everything through grind?

Perhaps the FUDGE example of using fate points is an option. Finish an adventure, gain a point or two. Fate points can either be spent on an assured success, even against overwhelming odds. Make it a renewable resource, but just as easy to want to spend before raising attributes. Make death cost a few (plain old XP penalty).

#2:
EQ2 tried combos for crafting. It was terrible :)

Arx Fatalis used a symbol-drawing system, and you could pre-charge a few powers to have an instant attack (with a power level related to your skill at drawing+the characters power). Still possible to string together any spell on the fly, but tricky.

The ancient game Dungeon Master had a system where layers of glyphs were pieced together to create different spells. Power 1+fire = light, power 1+fire+motion = fireball, power 1+fire+physical = firewall and so on.

You of course need enough skill and mana to use it, and discovering spells was half the fun.

Characters can have passive abilities, of course. The most common example is stealth spot rolls. Many abilities should be automatic.

The seriously flawed game Vanguard had many ideas for other mechanics than combat. There was diplomacy, which was basically a collectible card game. You learned new cards and made your deck with powers that suited your abilities, then played a short game against opponents to coerce them into helping you with something.

In a game where magic takes a bit of effort (nothing is instantly cast), a counterspell system could be used. You'd see hints of what element/power the enemy is conjuring up, and you try to counter it with an opposing element, or power which will hinder that. Many fantasy MMOs have some basic variation of that. Very basic.

But all of the above is old-fashioned ideas :)

For an MMO which doesn't look like anything else, check out Love:
www.quelsolaar.com/love/index.html

This game truly has *interaction*. Real freedom. If it ever finishes, we might see ideas stolen from that. Very few MMOs feel slick and modern. Love will make the slickest look out of fashion.

But who says a game has to be about combat at all? A Tale in the Desert is about co-operative building of a nation. The only competition is being first at something. The game has run in phases, with each new phase building on top of the previous. It's now in its fourth phase.
www.atitd.com/

I've also had an idea for a post-apocalyptic game without combat, mutants or aliens. Just plain restoring the planet. Making a combatless game will draw a different breed of players, and might be refreshing.

I think the only way to have a real story which involves all the players is by running constant events. With ATitD, the entire game IS the event.

#4

Quote:The player still needs some sort of reference as to what their character can do. If my "jump" is 10/100, I need some reference that I'm crap at jumping and when faced with a chasm, should not try to leap across.

I tend to disagree. If I'm in the real world, looking out at a chasm, I'm going to practice jumping across solid ground a few dozen times to find out how good I am at jumping. There isn't a neon sign over my head saying, "I'm a fairly decent jumper."

I know what I can do through experience. In a game, the same can be done. A player finds out how good they are through trial and error, learning.

On the other hand, you only have two senses in a virtual world, sight and sound. You can't feel the wind blowing, you can't smell the roses, you can't taste the water to see if its poison, so graphic clues and sounds HAVE to be there, or you're basically a deaf, blind, mute like Helen Keller, and you have to learn everything by the senses you DO have. Kinda takes the fun away and makes it hard work. There has to be a balance between realism and fun.

Tony

#5

Quote:EQ2 tried combos for crafting. It was terrible :)

That doesn't mean that someone else can't implement combos in crafting in a way that is fun. It just means that EQ2 did it wrong.

Quote:If I'm in the real world, looking out at a chasm, I'm going to practice jumping across solid ground a few dozen times to find out how good I am at jumping. There isn't a neon sign over my head saying, "I'm a fairly decent jumper."

True, but if someone else asks you how good of a jumper are you, would you just jump for them, or do you say "well, I'm a fairly decent jumper"? Using the descriptive approach makes it seem less numeric to players, but on the back-end, you're still looking at numbers.

So, as a conversation piece, what about ideas like not having the player advance at all, but having the player thrive on their wits, strategy, and ability to use items in the gameworld?

#6 I think that the answer to both questions is 'of course this is possible - but likely? No!' Well, I think the second one is far more likely to happen than the first.

But I'll take the first. If people are playing an RPG, especially an MMO, it's my theory that numbers give them concrete evidence of their awesomeness - and not just that, buthow much more awesome they have become since last time they checked the numbers. And, even better, it gives an easy way to prove 'I am more awesome than you.' Maybe that's pessimistic and condescending, but so be it. Let's face it, we like competition, and competition is what a game such as an MMO is about (less so for single-player RPGs - there, I believe numbers are more about seeing yourself advance).

I'm trying what you mention in my game, having hidden characteristics that increase over time. Hopefully players will notice 'hey, I'm better at using this weapon than I was before.' But the thing is, I'm building a shooter, not an RPG - people don't expect to change, so they don't expect to be able to gauge that change precisely.

Quote:So, as a conversation piece, what about ideas like not having the player advance at all, but having the player thrive on their wits, strategy, and ability to use items in the gameworld?

That's a good ideal, though I think XP and leveling mechanics to have limited use. For example, if you're a soldier in an RPG, you're going to get more used to, for example, the weight of your weapon. Until we have full VR and motion control, players can't really compensate for that, experience that, directly. So you might use a number for familiarity with a certain weapon, and have it improve as you use the weapon more.

#7 Even in real life, we're basing our skills and abilities on numbers. My paycheck for this job compared with the last job, my grade on my Algebra midterm, how much weight I can lift, how quickly I finish a marathon... Even levels of experience exist, Captain or General, Master's Degree or Ph.D, Crew Trainer at McD's or District Manager. We always look for advancement in or jobs through a promotion or a pay raise.

Numbers can be a natural component of the RPG if used in the proper fashion. Where it tends to get messy is when you try to quantify something intangible, like a Charisma score. Some people like tattoos and body piercings, others don't. I like redheads, my brother only dates blondes. Appearance and personality are subjective and placing a number on it is unrealistic. ("Christie Brinkley is a definite 10!")

You can use pictures to show muscles that get bigger as someone exercises, but why not just use their weightlifting number?

#8

Quote:So you might use a number for familiarity with a certain weapon, and have it improve as you use the weapon more.

Familiarity is actually a huge part of hidden stats in my game. It has more to do with fighting MOBs to try and keep the player from having entire species go "gray" on them before they even come across them. Sort of based on the idea that a big game hunter in North America goes to Africa to hunt different game. The game would be similar in hitpoint, speed, and even agility, but they operate differently, and so present a new difficulty for the hunter to master, and every new species he hunts presents unique challenges.

Quote:Even in real life, we're basing our skills and abilities on numbers.

Like the skill assessments in our profiles here ;)

Quote:You can use pictures to show muscles that get bigger as someone exercises, but why not just use their weightlifting number?

Agreed. And there are always those skinny guys with that wiry strength that fools a lot of people. Ironically, as people clamor for fewer numbers in games, math is beginning to play an increasingly prominent role in everyday life, as we figure out more and more how it affects the environment around us.

My own opinion on it is that it's not so much the numbers as the way that they get presented to the player. I mean, WoW did such a great job in having profession skills autolevel, but then when the player levels, their stats go up in arbitrary ways, and then a third system is used in which they get points to spend on their combat skills. A fourth level of stats is introduced when the player is running around hunting for gear or enchants or whatever. That's too much math.

What I did for my system was to take out levels and classes (that's too artificial anyway), have all skills autolevel on use like WoW's professions do, provide no points for artificial permanent advancement, and have equipment that has an effect, but not so great that having a certain sword drastically increases your swordsmanship skills. Because let's be honest: A master swordsman can whip your ass with a wooden sword more thoroughly than you can whip his with a masterwork sword. It's more realistic that way, it's easier to understand for both the player and the designer that way, and it's easier to play the game that way, all the while not getting in the way of the fact that the wooden sword isn't doing as much damage as the masterwork sword, but still does damage because of the person wielding it.

Epic Loot doesn't kill NPCs, Epic Players kill NPCs... =)

#9 Also, more towards the original spirit of the thread itself: Instead of trying to address the drawbacks and problems of the DikuMUD paradigm that has shaped MMOs since EQ2, maybe we should be refactoring the system from the ground up.

The basic system you want for an MMO with good interaction is one that allows you to add interaction into the game at a later date without disturbing the underlying rules of the gameworld. That ruleset, in turn, must be flexible and simple enough to be able to handle those new ways of interaction at the base level as equally as any other interaction, while keeping the high-level controls freed up so that there are as few restrictions on the GUI as possible.

In the system I mentioned that I created for Epic Frontiers, there is an underlying "action framework" where all the skills are handled. Adding a skill takes about 5 minutes, and is a matter of adding the skill to the database, and adding the function that handles the conditions under which the skill is executed. It's success and failure are hooked back into generic functions that autolevel the skill, ensuring that it is equal with all other skills.

What that has given me is the ability to implement crafting in the same way as melee, ranged, and magical combat, as well as the "soft skills" used for adventuring, leadership, or conversation with NPCs. The entire system is based on skills that level on use, making it so that a player can have any concentration of skills limited by time only (there are no hard caps to skill levels), and the player can change the course of their character at any time simply by playing in a different way. Crafters, socializers, and explorers are no longer penalized or forced to do combat as a sole means of advancing because all of their functionality is tied into the same skill level system.

There are probably other systems that are just as viable, but this is one example of how to break the cycles that the usual MMO framework has caused, because bolting crafting or dialog or any other skillset onto a combat-centric MMO will never yield the freeform gameplay that people try to design into it. Of course, if you want a combat-centric MMO, then you're probably fine :)

#10 Lots of good ideas. This one is especially interesting;

"So, as a conversation piece, what about ideas like not having the player advance at all, but having the player thrive on their wits, strategy, and ability to use items in the gameworld?"

I think this may be what I'm going for. It's not that leveling should be removed in its entirety, rather the player should be focusing more on thriving in the world.

It is understandable that numbers and math will always play a role in games. As others have stated, the world we live in now pretty much rubs on math. There is a distinction between the way way use numbers to represent things in our lives and in games. If train to the point where I can lift 300lbs, then I note that after 3 months of training my abilities increased from 250lbs to 300lbs. In a game I see that I gained x amount of experience and my strength is now a 7 instead of a 6. Both instances use math to measure progress, but there is a nuance to the real life example that could be brought into gaming.

In essence, feedback on who you are as a character should come from your interactions in the game world. While the structure of the game is mathematics, the perception of the game needn't be. Kinda like the matrix. :) Obviously these are difficult things to implement, but I think it is time for game designers to consider breaking out of the classic RPG paradigm of xp leveling. Judging by the current posts, it looks like people have already done so.

#11 That's really a good topic, now let me add my two cents.

A lot of current MMO actually shock me in the sense that players publish "builds", as in how to setup their character for this or that play style.

It seems most modern MMO have a certain disconnection between the character's abilities and the actual "leveling", as in "you killed 100 mobs, now choose a new ability"

If you want to make an immersive world, this system feel artificial and stupid.

Your character shouldn't even get the choice of a new ability, the way he 'live' should reflect his abilities.
You can chop wood all day long, sure you will grow some nice muscles, but you will still suck with a sword, however we might consider that you could give a few decent and powerfull hatchet blows, but nothing like a master axe wielder of half your muscle weight.

I personally feel that, as the MMO industry tries to cather to the most casual gamer classes, they tend to stick to a few crude concepts that "always worked so far"
The interfaces tend to get complicated too because the way your character evolve in the game world isn't natural at all. In this regard, FPS games are much more natural, jump around, you see a gun, you pick it up, no inventory management, no searching around for a quest.

On the leveling side, this element is becoming quite extreme, the big game companies are so afraid to lose customers that they tend to soften every possible frustration the player could encounter: Death, objects breaking, getting mugged by other players, ...

Most games even tend to reward the player simply because they are here since a long time. Although it's an interesting "commercial" move, it's completely unfair in term of gameplay (Eg: Eve online, where skill training is realtime based, hence it's impossible to "catchup" with another player)

Now here is the thing, why levels at all? why should one player be better than another because he played the game 6 months before the other player did?

Also why giving to players advantages that are always permanent? creating a race between content development and player eating such content?

The current MMORPG industry remind me of ladder where the players try to reach the top and the devs keep trying to add more segments to the ladder.

To me a good system should have some way of recycling itself, it would be like a ladder that players climb, exepted you remove the segments behind them and add new segments in front of them, so in essence they do not go up and up and up, but they tend to stay at the same height.

I don't know if i was really clear...

But in short... old characters should be eventually recycled, aswell as old objects so that new heroes can emerge from the younger players.

#12 There was a game in progress which had some radical ideas I really, really liked. It's not going anywhere now, I guess, but I would have played. I think it was called Frontier 1865, and yes, it was about cowboys, injuns and...animals.

Characters would die permanently if they got seriously injured, so getting married and having kids would be a top priority. Gunfights would be pure twitch, and medical care was in the shitter. You could also play as extra mean animals which terrorise the humans.

It would also have a proper law enforcement system, with death penalties to horse thieves and player involvement with bounties. There was a somewhat typical skill progression system to help with some tasks, but guns were lethal in any hands.

With a system like that, permadeath doesn't hurt so much. Your children inherited some of your skills, so it was possible to go on. Too bad the game never went anywhere :(

#13 @Kyrah: You're right- MMOs are getting way too clunky. But the reason behind it is because the keep using the same underlying (and combat-centric) framework and then try to bolt on other systems that don't translate to leveling.

As for content recycling, that goes towards procedural content generation, user generated content (which should be used sparingly), and hand-made content, mixed into one in a way that allows players to go back to the areas they started in and be faced with new challenges. Purely hand-written content systems just cannot keep up. Anarchy Online does some good work towards that end.

#14 @Ted i did not ment procedural generation, even if basic quests (if you want your game to have quests) should be easy as pie to generate on the fly.

What i ment was that the game shouldn't just let the players build themselve a pedestal higher and higher, the game should eat away the pedestal.

This translate by a game mechanics that doesn't favor characters that live too long (perma death) allowing the neverending creation of "legendary" players, also mechanics that tend to make things go back to "dust", would keep the ingame economy afloat, eg:

No matter how badass your vampire +10 sword is there will be a time where it becomes impossible to repair it and you will want to get a new sword forged. Recycling of the "super" objects.

The most basic concept of an MMO (at least it was some time ago) was that it's an open ended game with NO END, this means you need mechanics that prevent players to hit a well defined ceiling.

Most of the level centric games tend to make the players believe that going max level is the goal, what they call the "end game content". And this is mainly because the industry tend to label MMORPGS, game concepts that are merely massively singleplayer rpgs. There is NO place for a scripted epic storyline involving the player's character as the main protagonist in a MMORPG where tousand of peoples will play.

#15 I haven't read through all of these posts...so i don't know if someone has suggested it...

but you could have it so that instead of saying "Jump is AWESOME" "Punch is terrible". You could have it so that it has an icon that symbolizes Jump r punch and the icon changes colour based on your "level of expert" or the icon and a "power bar" type thing (full bar is like AWESOME GOD LIKE and empty bar is BEGINNER)

from max

PS. just some ideas :D

#16 Going along with Max's "color bar?" suggestion, unused skills should decline in ability.

If I do a hundred push-ups a day for a month, my strength goes from blue (weak) to green or even yellow. Continue for a year and it goes through orange to red.

Then I start jogging every day. In a month my runner's endurance goes from blue to green, but my strength goes from red to orange. Continue jogging, and endurance goes up to yellow, and strength slips down to yellow...

A way to keep everything in balance, and just give a generalization of skill level. After all, how many color combos are there? R=255, G=255, B=255 ?

Still a graphic representation, but without displaying numbers.

#17 There is also the extreme option of no display bar at all.

Food for thoughts from g4tv:

"Imagine if you lived every single day with a health bar at the corner of your vision--how would that affect your day-to-day life? Would you refuse a third serving of beef sundae so you wouldn't deplete your fitness gauge? Or would you pump up your fatness stat by saying "Yes" to that third serving of beef sundae? Would you feel restrained from doing whatever the hell you wanted if you constantly saw a real-time measurements of your success or failure?"

It's very possible the players get too much informations, giving them too much feedback wich influence their actions, discourageing personal experimentation, wich also detach them from the game as it's only a matter of "doing the numbers".

#18 Maybe the problem isn't player progression at all. I've been thinking about game worlds and they are largely static. The players are pretty much non-entities. No matter what a player does, nothing really changes. Everyone gets to beat the same great monster or opponent, and once they are done doing that, they can do it again as the adversary is resurrected.

Since the game world never progresses, the only real achievement for the player is his own progression. Maybe game designers should be focusing more on worlds that are affected by a characters actions, than new and different ways for a character to level. This way players are more concerned with their role in the world rather than how to achieve the next level.

#19 I think, speaking of providing more content, that it would be great to see more EVE-style player-built associations and stuff. If you make the social simulation advanced enough (and the world simulation deregulated enough), you naturally will allow players to form groups, control territory and change the landscape. This creates a dynamic
world from the getgo, and doesn't require that the developers hand-craft events and stories.

Though I think we might be slipping off the topic... the bunny of conversation is hopping towards the dark woods of distraction...

#20

Quote:
the bunny of conversation is hopping towards the dark woods of distraction...

Whoaaa .... I've got to slip that line into casual conversation more often!

I suppose the problem with a deregulated world simulation system is that you'll have to be relying on your players to get off their asses and do more than "maybe just play", and it's not a given that that is what players wish to do. Players do tend to require an "overseer/gm/dm/keeper/etc" to organise the world beyond their character and keep challenges coming, otherwise your "sandbox/open play" world could very soon be a glorified chatroom.