Change a Little, Change
the World
By Cody
“Micajah” Bye
Humans are creatures of habit. We create routines for
ourselves, little nuances that allow us to think about other tasks
while we are finishing the one we are currently doing. We brush our
teeth in certain ways, cook our bacon in just the right fashion, and
scratch our heads so many times a day.
These routines help free our minds, but often drive us to
monotony. We accomplish the same task day in and day out, whether
that’s getting up and going to work, rolling out of bed to go
to school, or recovering from a hangover. Nothing changes, and things
can very easily slip into nothing but a blurry string of events.
However, when we reach this point, the smallest alteration in
your life’s schedule becomes a tremendous obstacle or a
harrowing adventure. The road to work is closed? You’ll have
to find an alternate route on the fly! The local pub is closed? Perhaps
a rousing game of lawn darts can recapture your adventurous nature!
These small things can stand out in a person’s mind, even if
they are not particularly important or exciting to a person you relay
the story too.
alt="Amazing that she can cast spells in that dress."
title="Amazing that she can cast spells in that dress."
name="photo_j" border="0" height="120" width="150">
Sword of the New World's gameplay is significantly
changed by the MCC system.
For many gamers, MMOGs have entered into that state of
monotony. Since the original Everquest, very little has changed for the
gamer. You enter a game, create a character, fight monsters, do quests,
dabble in a bit of PvP, raid, rinse, and repeat. The setting may
change, going from a futuristic sci-fi world to a dark, war-embroiled
fantasy world, but the characters and the actions you partake in are
generally the same. With the current crop of MMOGs, players have played
through different versions of the same game for nearly a decade, yet
the persistent nature, online friends, and competitive atmospheres keep
these gamers coming back for more. Even World of Warcraft, with its
staggering 8+ million subscribers function on that old model, functions
on many of the old principles, albeit with refined, honed, and tempered
gameplay. The monotony of the MMOG has risen to an incredible level,
and the routine is beginning to drag on many MMO players.
But similarly to the human condition that was explained
earlier, even the smallest change in the gameplay of an MMO can lead to
an amazingly different experience. Take for example Ten Ton
Hammer’s current preview of Sword of the New World. Many
gamers could take that game for granted, noting that you can control
more than one character at a time.
“So what?” the gamer might ask, curious as
to why the game would provoke such a potent response from the
previewer. “You might as well dual-box and get the same sort
of effect.” However, this sort of thinking would be
incorrect. The change in the SotNW’s gameplay changes the
entire structure of the game world. In order to keep the user occupied,
more monsters are available for the player’s party to kill,
and thus more action takes place on the screen. However, this is far
from overwhelming, and people who have tried multi-boxing in past MMO
games and failed should not fear SotNW. The characters you are not
directly controlling actually have AI!
alt="I can't wait to jump on a horse and swing my sword!"
title="I can't wait to jump on a horse and swing my sword!"
name="photo_j" border="0" height="120" width="150">
Age of Conan will feature a combat system that requires
an active amount of participation by the user.
The same sort different gameplay experience is going to be
tested on Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures. In Funcom’s
upcoming title, the major difference in the game will be the hands-on
control the player has over his on-screen character. In other MMORPGs,
combat was done with the push of a button and a pre-built strategy. Age
of Conan offers MMOG enthusiasts direct control over their
character’s sword swings and fireballs. Sword strikes are
connected to various directional points, and if a player can chain a
combination of swings together, they’ll achieve some
incredibly gruesome results.
The incredibly intriguing factor in both these games is how
these seemingly small changes influences the way the entire game works.
For instance, in SotNW the multi-character control system (MCC) allows
for particularly challenging PvP battles, where veteran might spread
their characters across an environment to insure that they are not hit
with an Area-of-Effect spell from an enemy mage. The MCC system also
allows for more monsters to be on screen, thus more loot is generated
at the same time. SotNW has integrated a “Harvest
Mode” into the game that allows characters to pick up
numerous pieces of loot in a matter of seconds.
alt="Mean-looking guns." title="Mean-looking guns."
name="photo_j" border="0" height="90" width="150">
It's all about first-person-style combat in
Tabula Rasas
Tabula Rasa also has incredibly different gameplay than what
many are accustomed too. While Anarchy Online, City of Heroes, and Star
Wars Galaxies all sported high-tech weaponry and gadgets, Tabula Rasa
is actually bringing them to life in a first-person, aim-and-shoot
style. Unlike the three previously mentioned MMOGs, Tabula
Rasa’s combat, from what the public has seen so far, is much
more intense and relies on the wits and quick thinking of the user
rather than merely relying on randomly generated dice rolls alone.
Stargate Worlds is also bringing combat up to the high-speed
level that it should be. However, SGW delves even further into the
changing gameplay situation, offering users an escape from combat and
crafting in the form of puzzles. These puzzles are also integral to the
gameplay, as several classes are better at puzzles than others and
solving puzzles is necessary to continue the storyline.
In general, the next generation of MMOGs will be different, at
least in small ways, than what our current MMOG market consists of.
From combat to puzzle-solving, the next generation of MMOG developers
are trying desperately to escape the mold left by past games and
develop something truly new and intriguing. It still remains to be seen
whether gamers will consider changes to the standard MMO gameplay a
step in the right direction, but I can only assume people will enjoy
the escape from the monotony. All these changes may be
“small” but they certainly change the
world’s they exist in.
Agree with what Cody had to
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