Ten Ton Hammer - Taking MMO Gamers to the Next Level!

Curt Schilling

Chairman/Founder, 38 Studios | Copernicus

There absolutely is a future, though I don’t think it’s something 38 will be a part of. When you get into the details of creating a world that has massive amounts of user created content it becomes the exact opposite of ‘hands off’ and easy to manage. 

If you are tailoring it to an adult audience then that can change many things, if not then it gets even harder and messier. 

The amount of users that would create content the games player base would engage with is likely to be proportional

"If you were talking about users creating content within tight little boxes (such as tattoo art for artists) I think it becomes something more manageable, but even that opens up things you just don’t think about when you consider executing on a seemingly simple and ‘cool’ idea." - Curt Schilling

to the MMO community forums. Less than ½ of 1% of the community posts on forums read by hundreds of thousands, to millions. 

This would be no different. You’d have a world of shields bearing penises, boobs on tunics and all manner of other porn, again fine for an adult only game, but the amount of staff you’d need to police and manage user created content would be huge.  

I think there are little wins to be had here, potentially.  

But at the end of the day this, in my opinion, would have to be the key driver behind a product to be done and serviced right. Meaning if you were going to create an MMO that featured user generated content, that would need to be the primary design focus if you were allowing players to create the majority of the content. 

If you were talking about users creating content within tight little boxes (such as tattoo art for artists) I think it becomes something more manageable, but even that opens up things you just don’t think about when you consider executing on a seemingly simple and ‘cool’ idea. 

So ya, it’s going to happen, it’s going to make news, but at the end of the day my argument is that gamers want to play games, not make them, and a game focused on user generated content is one of those things I’ve come to feel is way more fun in concept and on the drawing board than it is in practice.

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Chris Lee

VP of Publishing, En Masse Entertainment | TERA

Throughout my career in this industry I have been astounded by the creativity of its players. There are loads of UI mods and hacks for MMOs, and you need only look at The Sims and Forza Motorsport to see what players can

Chris Lee of En Masse Entertainment

create when they put their minds to it. The advent of machinima is another great example, and even our recent TERA Caption Contest yielded some really imaginative responses. The creativity and resourcefulness of players extends well beyond making or painting in-game items, and a company who can leverage this stands to reap great rewards.

There is absolutely a future for user-generated content in MMOGs. Many within the industry already realize that this type of content, often referred to as “crowd sourcing,” can help sustain long-term user interest by supplying an additional content pipeline. The City of Heroes franchise is a prime example of this type of user-generated content.

So why haven’t we seen it take off in a big way yet? It is a difficult challenge to harness the energy in the community in a way that directly enhances the game universe. There are some fairly obvious reasons why this endeavor cannot be entered into without careful planning and consideration. Important principals such as maintaining a coherent and consistent game lore, managing quality expectations, and the ability to support users who run into potential challenges or conflicts based on a mod are all factors that must be weighed thoughtfully. Provisions need to be made for how mods/packs/quests will be evaluated, moderated, or promoted.

Then there is the development investment required to provide the tool set for users to realize their own creative

TERA's Caption Contest garnered some amusing entries.

inspirations. Due to the high cost and multitude of touch points, it is critical that integrating user-generated content must be part of the product's original vision. All levels of development and publishing, as well as the creative visionary behind the product, must be on board with the idea and working closely together if it is to be done right. Additionally, the level of investment in the framework for this type of add-on content is extremely high. The downside is if a significant amount of players do not take advantage of the tools then a lot of resources went into something that few people participated in and as a result the content generated would be much more limited..

All that being said, MMOGs require strong differentiators to survive, in large part because they are so much more expensive to make and operate relative to other types of games. For all the reasons stated above, an MMOG that incorporates user-generated content needs to embrace the system whole-heartedly and make it a major selling point of the game for it to pay off. With TERA our key differentiator is our action combat system, but given the numerous MMOGs in development looking to carve their own niche, I wouldn’t be surprised to see a game that implements this type of system in the near future.