Independence Day...or Not

By Shayalyn

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Each Monday, across the Ten Ton
Hammer network, we take a moment to write about a common theme. This
week, we were given carte blanche to celebrate Independence Day by
freeing ourselves from the confines of the MMOs we cover in order to
imagine an MMO exactly as we would want to see it. And so I started
thinking about my perfect MMO: what would it be? What features would it
have? Call me single-minded, but what I came up with bears a striking
resemblance to a game already in development. Here are my criteria:



Vast, Diverse Worlds



It feels to me like game worlds have shrunk since the days when I
roamed Norrath in EverQuest. I remember the sense of vastness, and how
overwhelming it could be to go to a new location and find yourself
amidst a completely foreign landscape. Here’s an example from my newbie
days:



I started my first character in EverQuest as a half elf bard. By level
5, I was just starting to learn my way around the city of Qeynos, and I
had managed to slay myself a few giant bats and beetles and even a
gnoll or two outside the city gate (always with the href="http://vanguard.tentonhammer.com/modules.php?set_albumName=article-illustrations&id=Qeynos_gates&op=modload&name=Gallery&file=index&include=view_photo.php"> alt="Qeynos"
src="http://vanguard.tentonhammer.com/files/gallery/albums/article-illustrations/Qeynos_gates.thumb.jpg"
style="border: 2px solid ; width: 150px; height: 113px;" align="left"
hspace="4" vspace="2">guards in close range). But I wanted to
adventure where some of my other friends were adventuring, and so I
asked my husband’s friend, who had a high level druid, to teleport me.
He took me into the Butcherblock Mountains, and then led me on to the
city of Kelethin. I went from a sparse, prairie-like landscape with a
city gate I could see from a distance and run to for help as needed to
a misty forest full of orcs with a wood elf city dangerously high in
the trees. After my teleporter and tour guide, left me...I sat down by
the lift and whimpered. This wasn’t like home at all! I felt so lost.



And that feeling of being a fish out of water is what I remember most,
because it was such a genuine feeling. Was I really lost? No--I was
sitting right here in front of my monitor, in the safety of my own
home. But I felt lost, and I felt afraid. Once I explored the landscape
a bit, I began to feel more confident...even brave. But each new world
I ventured into brought that same rush of trepidation and excitement.
What could be waiting around this corner in the Oasis of Marr? What was
inside the giant fort in the Frontier Mountains? What lay behind that
shimmering waterfall in the Great Divide? I miss having someplace
enormous and epic to explore--a place big enough to inspire a sense of
awe href="http://vanguard.tentonhammer.com/modules.php?set_albumName=article-illustrations&id=Kelethin&op=modload&name=Gallery&file=index&include=view_photo.php"> alt="Kelethin"
src="http://vanguard.tentonhammer.com/files/gallery/albums/article-illustrations/Kelethin.thumb.jpg"
style="border: 0px solid ; width: 150px; height: 113px;" align="right"
hspace="4" vspace="2"> and respect.



Depth and Complexity



When I began my wood elf druid character in EQ (one that started as an
alt and quickly became my main), I invested myself in the lore. I
refused to kill wolves, because they were my friends. I felt every bit
the part of the elven free spirit, a priestess of the woods and a
guardian of nature in the service of the goddess, Tunare. I spoke
elvish, and common tongue. Later, I learned to speak goblin and a few
other languages. I undertook an epic quest to earn a powerful weapon--a
quest that ended with me and 20 of my closest friends battling a dragon
for the final piece. (Okay, it was a small dragon, but a dragon
nonetheless.) EQ allowed me to be as geeky as I wanted to be; and I was
pretty geeky.



I’m looking for this again in an MMO. Essentially, I want to feel like
a newb once more, with languages to learn and religions to understand.
I want to join my companions in meaningful quests that don’t just net
experience, but some prize that’s intricately linked to the lore of my
class, and perhaps my race. I want depth! EverQuest had it, but EQ has
aged and become archaic by today’s standards. To my way of thinking,
when it comes to depth, nothing has compared to EQ since.



Advanced Character Customization



I remember when EverQuest II offered a demo disk of their character
creator with any preorder. When I preordered my game, the retailer
happened to be out of the character creator disk. I was depressed--I
wanted to play with the advanced system EQ2 promised. We’d been told
that, with the EQ2 character creator, it was possible to make a
character that was identifiable instantly just by appearance, and not
by the text name above his or her head. I had such a craving to fiddle
with that new toy that I hounded the retailer repeatedly until he
managed to cough up a disk. The EQ2 character creation tools were
indeed fun, but I want even more from my ideal game.



href="http://vanguard.tentonhammer.com/modules.php?set_albumName=article-illustrations&id=EQ2_character_creation&op=modload&name=Gallery&file=index&include=view_photo.php"> alt="EQ2 character customization"
src="http://vanguard.tentonhammer.com/files/gallery/albums/article-illustrations/EQ2_character_creation.thumb.jpg"
style="border: 0px solid ; width: 150px; height: 113px;" align="left"
hspace="4" vspace="2">The bottom line for me is...I like character
creation tools. I want them to be infinitely robust. I don’t want to
just choose my character’s face and set the color of her hair and eyes;
I want to form the shape of her brow, and adjust the width and jut of
her chin. Will her lips look pouty or will they be shaped in a
permanent smirk? Will she have wide-set doe eyes or smaller eyes with a
direct, piercing gaze? I want to be able to decide, and then tweak
everything in minute detail. And I want to choose whether my character
is short or tall; wiry or muscular. If I choose, I want to be able to
give her broader hips below a narrow waist--that Mae West hourglass
shape. I don’t think any set of character creation tools could be too
complex for me. The more the better!



For Now, It’s Elves and Orcs



Some of my co-workers tweak me occasionally for my love of the fantasy
MMO genre, but I’m unashamed. Fantasy MMOs still have my attention, and
probably always will. There’s something about elves and orcs and
faeries and goblins that appeals to me. So far, super heroes and sci-fi
have yet to capture my imagination. Historical MMOs hold some appeal,
but I’m not sure I’d like to be saddled to one particular time period.
Right now, I think the only thing that could pull me away from fantasy
MMOs might be a game that involved time travel. A Dr. Who MMO? Color me
so there! But until there’s a time travel MMO, fantasy is where I find
myself drawn.



Miss Independent...Not!



Maybe I'm not much of a visionary, but I want an MMO that brings back a
lot of the things EQ and EQ2 offered--an enormous world capable of
earning my respect; a complex, deep lore and quest system; and
customization that allows me to create a character that looks
completely unique. Put all that in a fantasy setting, and I’m a happy
girl. Make the game challenging (yet still user-friendly), and it’s all
the better.



So, given my independence, and the ability to design the perfect MMO,
it seems as though I’ve designed...Vanguard. And as much as this looks
like unabashed sucking up, I’m preaching the truth. From here, with 6
months or more to go before launch, Vanguard appears to be the game I’m
going to want to play not just for a few months, but for a few years.