End Game Content

Discussion in 'Archived Topics' started by Razimus, Jun 17, 2015.

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  1. Razimus

    Razimus Avatar

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    There's a similar thread but it is totally different so I'm making a new thread for End Game Content.

    End Game Content is an MMO term, and it obviously refers only to the MMO aspect.

    End Game Content is what keeps a player from moving on to another game the second they reach the max level. What will keep the online players from leaving SotA after they've reached the maximum level?

    * Their plot/house
    * Their vendor/wares
    * Their community/town/village etc.
    * Their guild
    * Player run quests/Non-player run quests.
    * Collections/collecting items.
    * PvP areas PvP/competitions/leaderboards.

    There are only so many things that will keep players coming back after they reach the maximum level. I can guess as to what will keep me playing SotA after max level, and I'd say the above includes most of them but here are examples of why I either stuck around or left other games.

    Star Wars The Old Republic
    I played this game for 3 months but not regularly, a few hours a week. Had the collector edition but it wasn't enough to keep me interested. The quests were repetitive. Just like WoW every 3 quests felt like the 3 quests before it. The arenas that matched players was fun for a short while, they got old fast.

    Ultima Online
    I played this game off and on for a few years. Reached GM of my specified choice quickly and the only thing that kept me playing was my houses and guild. When I left I gave my large tower away, but I came back and when I saw my rares were worth a lot it sort of kept me playing but it wasn't enough so I quit forever. But highlights involved housing, guild, rares collecting, and random encounters, the random PvP is unparallelled. I did come back a few times and mostly to check out the PvP scene. Bad neighborhoods existed due to it which was as immersive as it gets when it comes to player based communities. I've yet to see a bad neighborhood ever exist in any game since then. The neighborhood wasn't designated good or bad, the notoriety grew based on the reputations of the players in the area. Very fun. But quit due to the monthly fee basically, and boredom. Even if UO was free to play on the official servers I'd login once a year to check it out. And the community is pretty dead now I noticed, when I check it out during free month campaigns.

    Warhammer Online
    Before the game became extinct I saw potential. The questing, especially cooperative questing was more complex than WoW ever was, it was very cool. Too bad all players ignored the world map and grinded in the arenas. This game had the same issue SWTOR has, most players grind the arenas and don't play anything other than the small match games.

    World of Warcraft
    Like many other MMOs I noticed most players are mute, they login, grind a few quests and log out. The repetitive task must feel like a professional gold farmer. Everyone's armor looked the same. Every other quest seemed the same. Plus a monthly fee, I don't know why it's so popular, but I heard they recently lost a few million subscribers.

    Elder Scrolls Online
    Feels like a slightly better version of WoW or closer to Guild Wars 2. I don't know what endgame content is yet, but quests even though some are cool, some are very 'mark off the list' and feel like a job as opposed to fun. No monthly fee is a plus and hopefully I'll see some fun end game content but I'm not holding my breath.

    Guild Wars 2
    Was fun for a while. Haven't logged in for about 1 year because it's too repetitive, it's more creative than WoW, I like the crafting and the questing much more than WoW, but something felt empty about it, perhaps the community is 99% mute, people login, kill stuff and log out like it's a job. Maybe I'll check it out sometime but, I have no intention on buying any of the expansion packs.

    Diablo 3
    Was too short. The previous Diablos were easily 2x as long if not 3 or 4x as long. The shortness is very unimpressive, because they expect you to beat it in all 3 modes. I'm not interested in beating it in all modes. I gave up about halfway through the 2nd mode. Diablo 2 was clearly the best one, and that game gets very repetitive very fast, the coolest thing about the Diablo games is combining gems/runes and upgrading them, and grinding to get an amazing slotted weapon/armor piece to enhance or just use. But beating every level over and over is tiresome. Forgot to mention, the Diablo 3 team mentioned at the Blizzcon year after year after year, at least 2 or 3 years in a row that Diablo 3 would have PvP. 1 year after launch the game still *didn't* have PvP, I hear it might have some PvP but they lost out and I'm not interested in their broken promises. Even with PvP it wouldn't be enough for me to login.

    ---------------------------

    So for SotA or any game I'd recommend a few things....

    * Rare item drops/rare craftable possibilities
    * PvP leaderboards
    * Non repetitive quests, and a lot of them
    * Perhaps an end game area/access, an area dedicated to top level players, social/PvP/trade/ purposes, some benefit which will cause top level players to not say, I'm done game over, but a new area of interactivity opened up and an area not boring, but something that will help in keeping players around for a long time after the top level is reached.
     
  2. Earl Atogrim von Draken

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    Goid one Raz.
    Funny how i would say pretty much the same about the same games ^^
     
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  3. Alexandra Cornfellow

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    Hi Razimus. I was just wondering how you (we) define 'top level players'? Are you talking about the folks that can win every PvP match? Or those that can craft the finest wares? Or the ones that engage to improve the world and the fun that we in the 'lower levels' can enjoy? I believe I would choose something akin to the latter. And I must say I see a great potential for SotA to excel in this area. I've only been playing for a couple of weeks, and already I have met and made more friends than I did playing Rift for several years. In real-life I'm not much of a social person--but in UO (and perhaps pre-free to play D&D Online) I've found folks that have similar interests and philosophies. For me this is the gist of game longevity and my confidence level in a similar buzz from SotA increases with every hour online.

    Of the games you've mentioned that I've had experience with, I tend to agree with your summaries. WoW bored the poop out of me quickly--I don't recall ever interacting with another player. And I lost interest in Diablo 3 after about a week. UO will always hold a special place in my list because of the fun factors that you mentioned--I never even thought about an 'end game'.

    Cheers
     
  4. Razimus

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    Ok, cool good points. Yeah if there is no literal maximum number, or if that is too limiting to be considered a 'veteran' perhaps it can be broken up into categories. Veteran PvPer, Veteran Crafter, Veteran PvEer ETC... Those "Veterans" having some major incentive to continue logging in. At the point of "Veteran Status Achieved" 90% of players say to themselves "I beat the game yeah game over! What to play next?", it's the reason so many MMOs have a dropoff point. Because they don't have any worthwhile endgame content. What's the point in grinding to get the best gear when that gear can get you nothing other than that which you already have? The only thing it gives you is street cred to show off, showing off is the most boring thing you can do and it gets old fast, eventually they only login to refresh their plots, Endgame Content encourages veteran players to continue to interact and play the game, not simply logging in to refresh their plots.
     
    Last edited: Jun 17, 2015
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  5. Alexandra Cornfellow

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    I keep trying, somewhat unsuccessfully, to draw and analogy with real life. I think the primary things that keep me interested in life is the vast potential to experience new things, places and people. Its a bit disturbing to imagine an 'end game' in real life as nothing more than a weekly shuffleboard tournament at the retirement home. Personally I'm hoping that SotA is still around and growing when I get to this point, perhaps with a virtual reality upgrade or two. I can take my medications and hop into my other world. Who knows, the two 'end games' may become one. Cheers!
     
  6. Jatvardur

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    I'm not fond of the concept of "end game content". The big MMOs have been designed almost entirely around this concept and it shows (in a bad way). SWTOR, oddly, focused on having a good storyline but the end game content was poorly done. My problem is that such games prioritised combat levelling / raids and gearing up, which was at the expense of everything else.

    Some games didn't start with the premise of "let's have awesome end game content" but rather "let's build a game with interesting mechanics". I think / hope that SotA is the latter.
     
  7. Razimus

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    No doubt, a great game will have a great storyline. And for the single player version that's great, but for the MMO version, NPCs treating you differently for example, "here's a special deal, because you're a so an so crafter", any tiny thing to give the game special twists and turns to keep the player interested instead of a reality of, whelp you beat the game, time to move on. Not everyone will feel immersed in the game and may easily detach from it once the max levels are reached, end game content is a reality for all MMOs. All MMOs that do not ever focus on it and do not have it are magically the same MMOs that have 90% of their veteran players quit shortly after reaching the maximum limits. End game content is important, it's literally a concept many have never once thought about. I remember I posted a thread about end game content on the SC forums about 2 years ago, 80% of the thread had never heard of the phrase. Many made the comment "there is no end game to an online game". End game content does not literally translate to "End of the game", it has a broad meaning, it means, "Content added to the game to keep the high level veteran players interested in the game". I'd understand if it's an MMO term some are not familiar with. I stick to the importance of End game content in online games.
     
  8. Ghost Heretic

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    One of the end game goals could perhaps be the option to turn your character into an npc - dungeon/open world lair-boss that could have the armor and weapons and x amount gold you specify. It would be an interesting way to populate the game world like so.... of course the player would then have to start over a new character :D
     
  9. Alexandra Cornfellow

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    Very interesting :). Or perhaps your end character could launch herself/himself into space and become a star in the cosmos which could be viewed by special telescopes. :rolleyes:
     
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  10. WrathPhoenix

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    We already have some content that the veterans have that keeps them in the game... the community, and community events...
     
  11. Themo Lock

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    That is one of the coolest ideas i have seen in ages, not that i want that to happen here..but nice!
     
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  12. Jatvardur

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    Technically, yes, although there are some games that put off the end game for along time because it took years to hit the end game. I'm thinking of Runescape, but I'm sure there are others.

    So if the end-game is far away then people are "forced" to do other things until they get there. Runescape was mostly about levelling and not necessarily the best example. They slowly added mini-games and other activities to introduce a notion of end-game content.

    SWTOR comes to mind here, even thought it was clear that they had thought about it, their end game sucked and tons of people left.

    Surprised about SC but perhaps there is a lot of non-MMO players.

    I'd also re-iterate what @WrathPhoenix said, we can create another type of content to keep vets interested which would not technically be classified as end-game content. If player created quests / events are available at the start of the game then I wouldn't place it into the end-game category, even if it was the most popular activity to do once you hit max level. In my head I can't separate mindless repetition of raids from the term end-game-content; anything which breaks that mold, for me, is something else. To re-iterate I think the focus in development should be somewhere else; it may require MMO developers to think up or create something entirely new (player created content is probably part of it).
     
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  13. Stryker Sparhawk

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    Isn't the true End Game content the words at the end of the storyline...

    To Be Continued in Episode 2
     
  14. Mastese

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    Perhaps time as an endgame.

    What if your characters aged over time? Age playing the ultimate antagonist as a character advances through youth, prime and into twilight years. Elixirs and magical artifacts used to offset the deterioration of physical attributes, while experience over time sharpen knowledge based skills. But ultimately, the character would be obliged to surrender to time itself, leaving way to the next in the family bloodline.

    This next generation, inheriting the holdings built over the combined lifetimes of its forefathers. Thus creating a heritage and history that evolves over time. A new branch added to the tapestry that maps family tree. A new chapter is scribed in the book of ancestry.

    Would the feuds of a father carry over to his sons or daughters? Would wealth be lost and regained over ages? Would an heirloom handed down over generations be pilfered?

    I dunno...just thinking out loud here.
     
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  15. Razimus

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    Sounds kind of like the SC thing, where once your avatar dies you are forced to re-make your character and are given a family name tag so people know it's you. But that mechanic surely is a bit overly complex and I wouldn't expect to see it in SotA, but it's still pretty cool.
     
  16. klepp0906

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    You forgot raid content that isn't instanced and long epic type quests to access the most amazing and elite of zones/items ala the original EQ (well to be fair every mmo until wow destroyed the genre).

    Here's to hoping right?

    It's a real shame they didn't go first person but at least they brought some of the immersion/rp back to the genre (as immersive as third person can be I guess).

    Now so long as it isn't easy mode/welfare epic fest I can see hundreds of thousands of long term players. (Yea you won't hit millions without making it a moba/faux mmo and even then it's a revolving door. Not the type of community the purists want). Let alone the toxic children that plague such games :(

    PS : wtb full screen mode for those of us who use SLI. Getting 25fps with 4 Titans makes me cry.
     
  17. Beaumaris

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    No level cap means players can grind for more and more skills all they want at end game. But of course there are diminishing returns, and at some point it is probably quicker to just level a new character with different specialties.
     
  18. Galdar Grimmstone

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    The idea or expectations of "end game content" in a sandbox game world is ludicrous at best.
     
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  19. Miracle Dragon

    Miracle Dragon Legend of the Hearth

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    I like the idea in the end-game of having to battle time itself. Searching for ways to cheat death, being able to start a family and pass the adventure cap down to your children when they come of age.
    Though that's not for SotA. In SotA all Outlanders live a very very long time, and are always resurrected at death.

    I suppose 'endgame' is whenever the story line/skills have all been learned/completed. Since we'll have 5 episodes over at least that many years, new content will be added several times a year to support the episodic format of development.
    For those who speed through content, even if they don't enjoy all the sandbox elements like social interaction, PvP, town sieges, economy management, player events and quests, item collection, guild politics and warfare, or leader board placement; they will still be driven to come back periodically as the new episodic content is frequently implemented.
     
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  20. pirAte gAmbit

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    Very nice opening post, in my rush to lunch I will leave one point that would make "endgame" interresting enough for me to keep with it and that is:

    - SEASONAL LEADERBORDS IN MANY CATEGORIES and some nice flavour prices attached to them (like your name written on the desk put on a wall of the craft society building, your name beeing shouted in celebration as champion on all next season pvp tournaments, etc etc...

    + the ability to see how I was standing in specific seasonal challenges in past (I hate it when you only can watch the "top30" and your results are forgotten - how can you see that you are getting better and better every season in the discipline you want to conquer?)
     
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