Welcome to the 1,198th edition of Loading...
Loading... is the premier daily MMORPG news, coverage, and
commentary newsletter, only from Ten Ton Hammer.
How much xp is too much? Is there such a thing? With less and less
patience from gamers now, why bother having it at all? Join us today as
we mourn the loss of experience point value in Loading... When XP is
Not Enough
The Pulse
You vote with what you view at Ten Ton Hammer, and the
result is the Ten Ton Pulse (
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/thepulse/" target="_blank">What
is The Pulse?).
Here's today's top 5 Pulse results: href="http://www.gunnars.com/">
-
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/taxonomy/term/41"
target="_blank">World of Warcraft - Lord
of the Rings Online - Dungeons
& Dragons Online - href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/taxonomy/term/254">Aion href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/taxonomy/term/254">
-
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/taxonomy/term/117">Star
Trek Online
Biggest movers today:
- Global Agenda (Up 14 to #18)
- Dragon Age Origins (Up 9 to #19)
- The Secret World (Up 2 to #15)
MMO Releases
-
8/25
- CrimeCraft
(release date) - 9/1 -
Champions
Online (release date) - 9/9
- Dungeons
& Dragons Online Unlimited (release date) - 9/15
- Runes
of Magic "The Elven Prophecy" (expansion) - 9/22 -
Fallen
Earth (release date) -
9/22
- Aion
(release date) - 10/8
- Cities
XL (release date)
Releases
- 11/3
- Dragon Age:
Origins (release date) - 12/1
- LotRO:
Siege of Mirkwood (release date)
- 12/2
- DOFUS 2.0
(release date)
- Early 2010
- APB
Important
Dates
- 10/23 - 10/24
- Hero-Con
Loading... Daily
It seems every game today has some sort of experience boost. Tell your
friend about the game, get triple xp; buy a collector's edition, get an
experience boosting ring; shop the microtransaction store, buy an xp
potion; finish a quest, get xp bonus; log off, xp boost. It's hard to
argue that it's not cool to get bonuses, but why does it have
to always be xp?
New games launching now come with in-game items that will give you more
xp, allowing you to level faster. Um, ok... cool, but... aren't new
games notorious for having little for the player to do at max level?
The reason for that being simple, in that MMOGs evolve over years, and
you need to have a complete, polished low and mid-level game before you
should be polishing the end game. So how does it make sense to push
players into the end game quicker, so they can find the bugs/lack of
content/whatever else and start fertilizing the forums with posts of
discontent?
I think perhaps developers like to have little prizes and exciting
things for their players, and it can be hard to keep coming up with new
rewards ideas. But maybe the solution isn't found there at all, but
rather a look at the system itself.
If the ultimate goal is to reach level 50, 70, 80, 1000, then once
players reach that level, they're going to want to feel rewarded. They
don't want to be met with lack of content. So why should that even be
the goal? Remove that milestone, and suddenly the whole dynamic of the
game changes. You'll have fewer players rushing past content that took
years to develop, and more players immersing themselves in other ways.
Content would become more valuable if xp was a thing of the past.
Sure, there's plenty of arguments against it too - playres need to
level up to get to know the game, it's a good learing curve, it's a
standardized reward system, etc. etc. etc. In the end though, I think
we, as gamers, would benefit much more if we were more focused on
either self-created goals, or open ended reward systems that equate
experience with an ACTUAL experience, and not just another form of
currency.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I think it would make for a far more social and
interesting game if character advancement was done through active
choices, and not by grinding kills. What do you think? Let us know in
the forums.
2 New Ten Ton Hammer MMOG
features today! 124 in October! 2,072
in
2009!
Today's
New Features & Guides
-
The Daeva Weekly: Ten Ton Hammer's Aion
Newsletter - The Perks of Community href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/76170">
http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/76170
MMOGs are all about community. After all, there really
isn't much
point in playing one if you are oblivious to the players around you,
right? Does this unique aspect of community make Aion's community
management team vital to its success? Join the discussion on the role
of community in a game's well being and get the latest Aion and Ten Ton
Hammer news all in this week's Newsletter! -
Aion: Downtime By Design
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/aion/designeddowntime">http://www.tentonhammer.com/aion/designeddowntime
In the era of slackers it is surprising that there might
be a
backlash to doing nothing. All kidding aside, downtime is one of those
nebulous and often misunderstood ideas in gaming. Aion includes
different mechanisms for players to take a break and enjoy some
downtime if they so choose. Some players don’t enjoy any
downtime and
view it as a waste of time. Today we review the different mechanics for
downtime in Aion and how it could promote community building.
Hottest Content:
-
style="font-weight: bold;">
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/aion/editorials">
style="font-weight: bold;">
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/aion/guides/classes/cleric_healing">The
Cleric's Guide to Healing in Aion - Lord
of the Rings Online - Siege of Mirkwood Live Preview - Star
Trek Online VIP Interview with Craig Zinkievich -
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/aion/instances/nochsana">Aion
- Nochsana Training Camp Instance Guide -
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/co/guides/nemesisbasics">Champions
Online : Nemesis Basics - Sins
of the Solar Spymaster #30 - Dominion Post-FanFest - Global
Agenda: Conquest and Pricing Interview - Recession
Proof Gaming - Mix
it Up: A Guide to Synergies in Champions Online
Thanks for visiting the Ten Ton Hammer network!
- Benjamin J. de la Durantaye and the Ten Ton Hammer
team
