Lol, I AM the dad that bought the PS3 in my household. I got it for my kids to play Skylanders. I'm glad I didn't buy it for DUST. CCP has been living up to the reputation they already earned with me GÇô one or squandered opportunities that looked to be big, but deflated into crap decisions.

I thought for sure DUST was lining up to be the next HALO on the PS3. Nope. Tanks were going to be awesome in 1.7. Nope. TTK was going to be decreased. Nope (cloaks ruined that).

First, understand that my dad is not a gamer, but has spent dozens of hours watching me play Dust in the last six months. He is a fan of science-fiction and thoroughly enjoys the lore behind the New Eden universe. He also enjoys watching me die in fantastically hilarious ways*.

Dad and I sat down yesterday and he mentioned that he might buy a PS3. I asked him why and he explained that he wanted a blu-ray player and to play Dust 514. We then talked about what he would like to do in Dust, and after much deliberation, he decided upon the Amarr Sentinel dropsuit with an forge gun/SMG.

It then occurred to me that he could create his Dust character on my PS3 before he purchased his own. This way he would have some SP waiting on him. We did so**. I handed him the controller, told him which buttons fired, moved, aimed, reloaded, etc. I helped him spend his SP to get into a STD Amarr Sentinel dropsuit and fit a MIL forge gun to it.

He joined an instant battle.

First match:
0 kills
2 kill assists
0 deaths
200 WP's (he damaged two LAV's)

Considering the last video game he played was Mega Men V, not bad right? Especially when "This ******* thing has too many buttons...". Fast forward to his first non-Instant Battle Academy match...

0 kills
1 kill assist
9 deaths
25 WP's

A bit disheartened, he said he will play more today when he gets off of work.

Why am I telling you this? Well I want to point out one very specific thing he said to me as we talked after the last match. I'm paraphrasing slightly...

"Why can't we fight computers when we are first learning the game? Like a firing range, target practice, or something. Will I always be fighting other players?"

CCP... please listen to this... this is fairly clear feedback on what new players want. Instant Battle Academy isn't a terrible idea, but it is too short. Even if Instant Battle Academy was longer we still need some kind of training environment or Dust will have incredible new player retention problems down the road.

*: Like that time I held a grenade too long.
**: Explaining to him that bloodline really didn't do anything whatever was daunting. Why the **** do we even have that anymore?! At one time the bloodline provided some minor passive bonuses in Eve, but they don't anymore so can't we just cut it out entirely?

But why ammar,would it be better your dad find most suitable role by himself?

I always feel sorry for people when I hear stories like this.

I'm not, I used to play with my dad when I was "little". The Zelda or Mario parties of our time.
Man some magic memories. We did a lot of other things obviously, but the video game moments are some how more present.

I didn't mean family gaming so much as new players struggling to get into the game.

I play with my dad too. He is a gamer though but terrible, terrible with a controller. When DUST was coming out I tried to get him to test with Modern Warfare 2.

A bit disheartened, he said he will play more today when he gets off of work.

Encourage him to get into a squad, then follow them around with the sole objective of getting as few deaths as possible, while occasionally getting a kill assist.

My dad and I play Dust sometimes, he can hardly get a kill and of often ends up with 0 kills and 6 deaths.

[snip]

New players must be very special in order to stick to this game...

So what you are saying is we do not need a better tutorial, some kind of "shooting range" to experiment with fittings in a non-combat environment, and Instant Battle Academy is 100% fine and does not need to be changed in any way?

Just making sure I fully understand your argument.

A game can be punishingly difficult, while still remaining accessible. Just thought you should know...

First, understand that my dad is not a gamer, but has spent dozens of hours watching me play Dust in the last six months. He is a fan of science-fiction and thoroughly enjoys the lore behind the New Eden universe. He also enjoys watching me die in fantastically hilarious ways*.

Dad and I sat down yesterday and he mentioned that he might buy a PS3. I asked him why and he explained that he wanted a blu-ray player and to play Dust 514. We then talked about what he would like to do in Dust, and after much deliberation, he decided upon the Amarr Sentinel dropsuit with an forge gun/SMG.

It then occurred to me that he could create his Dust character on my PS3 before he purchased his own. This way he would have some SP waiting on him. We did so**. I handed him the controller, told him which buttons fired, moved, aimed, reloaded, etc. I helped him spend his SP to get into a STD Amarr Sentinel dropsuit and fit a MIL forge gun to it.

He joined an instant battle.

First match:
0 kills
2 kill assists
0 deaths
200 WP's (he damaged two LAV's)

Considering the last video game he played was Mega Men V, not bad right? Especially when "This ******* thing has too many buttons...". Fast forward to his first non-Instant Battle Academy match...

0 kills
1 kill assist
9 deaths
25 WP's

A bit disheartened, he said he will play more today when he gets off of work.

Why am I telling you this? Well I want to point out one very specific thing he said to me as we talked after the last match. I'm paraphrasing slightly...

"Why can't we fight computers when we are first learning the game? Like a firing range, target practice, or something. Will I always be fighting other players?"

CCP... please listen to this... this is fairly clear feedback on what new players want. Instant Battle Academy isn't a terrible idea, but it is too short. Even if Instant Battle Academy was longer we still need some kind of training environment or Dust will have incredible new player retention problems down the road.

*: Like that time I held a grenade too long.
**: Explaining to him that bloodline really didn't do anything whatever was daunting. Why the **** do we even have that anymore?! At one time the bloodline provided some minor passive bonuses in Eve, but they don't anymore so can't we just cut it out entirely?

Yea I have read this story before a million times over. They all sound the same. The OP brings in new player, new player either has or had played FPS games. The new player doesn't do well. The OP makes some statement of "see this is why we need NPE because my friend keeps dying"

Listen, me and many others got their butts handed to them when we first arrived to New Eden. You know what I got? A HTFU speech. And you know what, they were right. It doesn't take much for a player to skill up some so he can be competitivve. Plus NPE doesn't teach somehow how to fight, how to hide, or know when to engage and disengage.

Honestly, your dad couldn't make it in COD or BF, no offense. You want him to enjoy the game? Tell him about the harshness of New Eden, because the universe is built on it. Then its up to him what he wants to do. This isn't one of those games where you can pick up and have causual fun, really. It's a jagged pill that you learn to swallow or spit back out.

I'm all for helping the new players but the sympathy violins being played needs to stop. If some new guys I met understand this and accept the challenge, how come the others cannont?

An actual PVE mode would be a god send. People seem to think at fanfest CCP are going to announce some big things such as PVE or a market? What do you think?

It always amazes me when I see people arguing AGAINST a better NPE. Like it's some kind of virtue to have a brutal hazing for a tutorial.

And whenever I see HTFU, all I hear is "I had to be someones I3itch for months, but I stuck with it! Now it's my turn to make all these new players my I3itch, so don't you dare make the NPE better! I deserve these easy kills!

Wonderful post.

The answer, as always, is PvE.

Why am I not getting tired of typing this words?

GIVE ME PVE!!!

I AM the dad that bought his kids iPhones and iPads... so they can leave me alone while i play dust...

how much do i owe Apple for babysitting?

I am a dad of 2 year 3 month olds boys, i allready make alt to my older kid and that alt has allready 3 mil sp to spend

I didn't mean family gaming so much as new players struggling to get into the game.

I'd like to play with my 15 year old but he has decided to be a devotee of the PC master race and plays more Minecraft than anything else.

Alot of older gamers are better set for inverted controls. I always had trouble with shooters because of this. Somewhere around ff12 I just snapped and can use any config. Something with the camera.

Yea I have read this story before a million times over. They all sound the same. The OP brings in new player, new player either has or had played FPS games. The new player doesn't do well. The OP makes some statement of "see this is why we need NPE because my friend keeps dying"

Listen, me and many others got their butts handed to them when we first arrived to New Eden. You know what I got? A HTFU speech. And you know what, they were right. It doesn't take much for a player to skill up some so he can be competitivve. Plus NPE doesn't teach somehow how to fight, how to hide, or know when to engage and disengage.

Honestly, your dad couldn't make it in COD or BF, no offense. You want him to enjoy the game? Tell him about the harshness of New Eden, because the universe is built on it. Then its up to him what he wants to do. This isn't one of those games where you can pick up and have causual fun, really. It's a jagged pill that you learn to swallow or spit back out.

I'm all for helping the new players but the sympathy violins being played needs to stop. If some new guys I met understand this and accept the challenge, how come the others cannont?

I hadn't thought of this... maybe you are on to something. Will ask him to try this soon.

I know he needs the sensitivity tweaked down a little. Sometimes when he sees a redberry he panics and ends up spinning in half-circles before getting gunned down. If it wasn't so goddamned funny it would be sad.

Lol, I AM the dad that bought the PS3 in my household. I got it for my kids to play Skylanders. I'm glad I didn't buy it for DUST. CCP has been living up to the reputation they already earned with me GÇô one or squandered opportunities that looked to be big, but deflated into crap decisions.

I thought for sure DUST was lining up to be the next HALO on the PS3. Nope. Tanks were going to be awesome in 1.7. Nope. TTK was going to be decreased. Nope (cloaks ruined that).

[snip]

I'm not a dad but people call me daddy ;)

Your dad sounds awesome.

I am 100% serious; that is an awesome human being right there.

Posted by Avimaan Syam March 28, 2012


The last talk I caught at GDC was called GÇ£Breaking the Rules of Game Design: When to Go Against Competence, Autonomy and RelatednessGÇ¥ by Kaitlyn Burnell at Naughty Dog (all the Naughty Dog talks were pretty extraordinary). The brunt of BurnellGÇÖs talk was to take three metrics for user retention that most social/MMO-style games adopt and look at how designers can play around with these user needs.

Breaking them down:



Autonomy: Autonomy lets players feel in charge of their interactions and in control of the world. When you take that away from the player, they want to rebel against the power wrestled away from them. Burnell stressed that it was important that broken autonomy be focused in the game world instead of the game design, so players donGÇÖt feel frustrated with gameplay itself.



Competence: Competence lets players feel like masters of a skillGÇôthat they excel at something (this something being your game). When you take that away from the player, they suddenly feel helpless.



Relatedness: Relatedness lets players feel like theyGÇÖre contributing to something bigger than themselves. It gives credence to their actions. Taking this away from the player makes them feel alone, isolated.



Do we want our players to feel rebellious, isolated, lonely, helpless, frustrated? For an extended period of time, probably not. But in small doses? In my opinion, itGÇÖs more difficult for interactive media to delve into rich emotional context because it usually comes with some discomfort, which a user interacting with the system always has the ability to choose a more comforting decision. Generally speaking, we donGÇÖt turn off a movie when a character makes a bad decision.

I believe that if we can illicit these emotions from users by breaking autonomy, competence, and relatedness in small pockets, we can deepen the userGÇÖs experience. The lower the lows, the higher the highs feel.

Dad: 20m sp

He still need someone telling him to reload his gun at all time

Could tell you how many time hes been saved cause ive told him to reload.....cant say the others but they had to have saved him a bit too

I'm not a dad but people call me daddy ;)

Cool story, can't wait to hear more.

but to throw some new player into this ****? now?! oh man.. what a fate.

I am a dad of 2 year 3 month olds boys, i allready make alt to my older kid and that alt has allready 3 mil sp to spend

the longer i've played dust, the less i believe in the whole "new player experience" spiel

dust is a game for hardcore gamers.

Look. I was giving Donkey Kong Country Returns a good review on GameFly, and I read the other people's reviews. A couple of them were like, "this game is too hard 1/10"

It's like, if you're not in it for a challenge, then perhaps you shouldn't be playing video games in the first place? Sorry?

It doesn't help your dad or anyone else right now, but CCP knows this. PvE is a CRUCIAL part of a successful NPE, and Legion will be taking that into account.

the longer i've played dust, the less i believe in the whole "new player experience" spiel

dust is a game for hardcore gamers.

Look. I was giving Donkey Kong Country Returns a good review on GameFly, and I read the other people's reviews. A couple of them were like, "this game is too hard 1/10"

It's like, if you're not in it for a challenge, then perhaps you shouldn't be playing video games in the first place? Sorry?

A lot of good that does him when the game is on PC.

Well there is a very good chance for a PS4 port not too far after the PC release, which would have been the inevitable progression of DUST with or without going to PC. Regardless it's not going to help him anytime soon, but it IS coming (help, PS4 is obviously still up in the air)

I'm not a dad but people call me daddy ;)