SofA Must capture what the people want inorder to be successful

I to am a fan of Ultima online from 1998. To think that this game is still running both on osi and multiple player run shards, it is mind boggling why someone hasn't just thought of redoing the game with more up to date graphics. I believe Ultima online success was derived from the games ability to please a vast number of playing styles. You could be a hunter with many different ways to hunt. You could be a murderer and gang with other players to dominate the world. You could be a brave freedom fighter and hunt down the murderers who plagued the lands. Or go the way of the crafter and serve others with fine armor and weapons. Or go the way of the shadows and steal the very weapons people made there living with. The point is the freedom to become the player you wanted to be was possible. Also the mass amount of people Ultima online harbored was great for meeting allies and enemies. With out these elements SofA wont survive.

 

The key components of SofA are comfortable arm rests, nice cushions, a remote control holder, and maybe a foot rest which folds out

A more serious reply would be... Although SotA is not UO with improved graphics (its much more than that), I think you're right and I think they're definitely taking inspiration from the Ultima games and UO.

 

I think Selective Multiplayer offers the best opportunity for appealing to a very diverse audience. UO had serious shortcomings for many people. Selective Multiplayer avoids those problems.

 

Yes but part of the success of uo was having the ability to be effected by anyone in the game good or bad. Maybe I have the wrong impression about sota. But I loved the fact of freedom in uo, it gives the game a real characteristic. For example hunting an ettin in the woods and knowing a murderer could come along and start trouble with me is more exciting than being in my own bubble knowing that I will most likely kill this ettin and make off with its loot with no problem. And it is because of this issue and many others why other games get left in the dust and I go back to uo.

 

I think they could go the UO route with this game, except make a rule like in order to pvp you need to be level (10) (if there is such a thing in this game?) (20th) level would be the highest level someone could be if they attack (10th) level. and increments of 10 up until (30th) level from there on out anyone can attack you and vice versus, that would keep the balance in pvp, and make it a free world (sand box) like old UO was, so everyone could see and be around each other.

So let me see if i can break this down better!

At lvl (10), you can be pkd/pvpd by a (20th) level (no higher)
20th level could be attacked by 10th and 30th level,
at 3oth level and up anyone from 20th level to whatever level can pvp/pk you!

I hope you understand how i broke this down! I tried! This way we could all play together and do out things, and be social!

 

It would probably be a lot less fun if the system decided who you could PK. Maybe you should get nothing, not even loot from killing low level players and there could be some kind of mark upon you that other players will know if you make a habit of such behavior and treat you accordingly. I am not advocating the constant slaughter of inexperienced players but I find it odd for so many people to talk about freedom yet want everyone to be fettered like that.

 

There are a lot of PVE people in these forums, who may not understand PVP/PK, or just dont want to get ganked easily, so they would be safe up until 10th level. Where they will have enough experience to protect themselves or take safety precautions, and they could do away with the slider thing, that personally i have my doubts about, there could also be safe zones like a majority of towns.

 

As a stranger to UO, I am going to flaunt my ignorance here. 20 years ago or so, I remember hearing that the city guards smote people quite decisively for killing people in the towns. Eventually it got to the point that most people knew distance they could be from the gates and get away with killing people (I probably find that funny because it never happened to me in a game that it mattered.)
I'm mostly a PVE player but I still like a good round of PVP mayhem now and then.

 

lol yeah the Guards in towns were beasts! and i think they were immortal! lol All i know it was a very quick death! lol

 

There have been attempts to update the UO client. Between an unwilling player-base and gross mismanagement by EA, these attempts have all been released WELL before they were ready then ignored in terms of simply completing them or resolving commonly occurring bugs.

Cases in point: The Third Dawn (3D) client was released WAY early in the era of any 3d hardware at all and as a result was difficult for many people to run and VERY low in terms of polygonal quality. The IDEA was right, but the client itself was at least 5 years too early.

Next came the Kingdom Reborn client which tried to go back a half-step by using 2d sprites that were "pasted" onto a single polygon for character models. This one offered much higher resolutions and smoother animation than the old 2d client, but not quite the smooth animation of the 3d client. However, due to pressure from EA Japan, the client was "released" when it could have been considered "early beta" at best. The incomplete nature of this client led to a LOT of people being very vocal against it in both accurate and inaccurate ways.

KR was then replaced by the Enhanced Client which basically retooled the KR client with the old 2d graphics sitting on KR terrain. Unfortunately, a lot of the lingering bugs from KR would still remain (but be balanced out by HUGE increases in the power of the UI) and the graphics quality was again dropped down significantly so that using the zoom feature yielded pixelated and distorted images. While this one is still in use and has a bit better useage than the earlier two clients, many major bugs still remain and users continue to wait for the "High Resolution artwork update" which was announced and started under GrimmOmen who has since left EA and UO. Nothing has been stated about the High Ress update in MONTHS even though new artwork for events and holidays continues to be added.

As for SotA... I'm fairly certain considering some of the names on the Dev Team that they understand what needs to be adapted from UO into SotA (and what shouldn't).

 

Something like this could easily be in the works. Only instead of making them unattackable they are never matched up with each other.

I'd have to search for the example filter for match making that Chris once used but I think level was on the list.

 

What people want is easy. UO part 2.

 

Um not all of us.

 

There, fixed that for ya.

 

I loved all three of those clients. I never had an issue more than I had on the old 2D client.

 

For its faults for being unfinished and released the way it was, KR was my favorite UO client. I would have been far more optimistic about UO's future had they actually worked on improving that client and finishing it rather than back-stepping into the EC. Of course having a 23in widescreen monitor makes the 2d client almost unusable anyway.

As it is, Management strikes again and again, so here I am following what should be "the next step".

 

I always wondered what happened to Kingdom Reborn. I wasn't playing UO at the time it was released, but from the pictures I saw of it the graphics looked great, much better than the Enhanced Client. Thank you Dermott for that little lesson in UO history.

I know when I first heard about SotA, I initially was hoping for UO2. As I got to know more about SotA am I pleased with the direction it is taking. For me personally, I don't think I want to play another completely open sandbox style MMORPG, void of any real story. Maybe I just want to switch things of a bit, but I would like a game that actually has a story, but doesn't hold your hand like the theme-park style MMOs. SotA seems to be finding that balance of select elements from single player Ultima games with the multiplayer aspects of UO.

 

As a veteran of a dozen free shards I can tell you the game was "redone" dozens of times by many different people. The kind of people that will play SotA and that have or still play UO are not the kind of people particularly caught up by the best graphics. Simply remaking UO is not going to produce those results you imagine. That is confirmed by the life cycle of the typical hyped freeshard. Everyone gets stirred up in a frenzy as a new great shard forms and starts. The population balloons as everyone starts from a clean slate. Then the population stabilizes at pretty high number. After 3 months the population drops to 1/3 the ballooned figure. After 6 months the population is 1/4 the ballooned figure and 3 out of every 4 players logged in is an afk macroer. The magic is relived for a few weeks/months. Then it dies a slow death. Finally the diminished population is not capable or willing to pay for server fees and it falls apart. The reason is simple: a big part of the magic of UO was due to the player that played it. Everything was new. UO was new. MMORPGs were new. Online communities of this type were new. Internet itself was new in many of its modern manifestations. No one has a discovery phase anymore. Replaying a UO clone would be like the freeshard experience. Veterans grind the macros to achieve the optimized game style to grief the quickly vanishing pool of actual newbies. Once the newbies are gone and the chance of actual in-the-wild PVP shrinks to 0% and the PVP arenas lose their appeal, the vets, too leave. UO can't be remade. Move on.

 

Well stated Sir!

 

What if the people want Ultima back?