Soraya Xel
Abandoned Privilege
Top Men.
4022
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Posted - 2014.10.07 17:04:00 -
[1] - Quote
A short personal soapbox on game balance.
I hear a lot about the effects of balance changes on the game. Most of it is positive, but there's also a lot of commentary about "after the hotfixes are done" as if it's a one-time thing to make an MMO balanced, or suggestions that ongoing balance changes are just there to force people to buy AUR for boosters or gear to compensate for having to change roles to continue being the fit of the month, or what have you. Here's my thoughts:
World of Warcraft is about to celebrate it's ten-year anniversary. It has a massively higher budget, many more developers, and has had as many as 13 million subscribers at it's peak. It dwarfs EVE Online in playerbase, even though their age is similar.
But if you take a look at http://www.mmo-champion.com and see what the current beta patch notes are, as you scroll through. You'll notice something. Balance changes. They're still doing them. Ten years after the game was released.
True game balance is a magical space unicorn that does not exist. True game balance is pretty much impossible to achieve once your game is more complex than rock-paper-scissors. (Many games try to use that game as a setup for balance as well, but there's an inherent point that an MMO will always be more complicated than rock-paper-scissors, even if you use that game's general concept for some balance designs.) No matter how many developers, no matter how much money you throw at a game, balance will not be perfect.
As perfect game balance can never be achieved, game balance is iterative. A continual work in progress, always monitored, always tweaked. Always getting closer, but never reaching the goal. Often, combined with adding new content like items and skills, you will continue to make perfect balance harder to achieve as your game progresses as well.
Game balance will always be getting better, but it will never be done. So here's to Hotfix Alpha-Alpha, which I assume comes after Hotfix Zulu.
CPM1 Elect. Thanks for all your support. [email protected] for ideas, thoughts, and feedback.
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Soraya Xel
Abandoned Privilege
Top Men.
4024
|
Posted - 2014.10.07 17:09:00 -
[2] - Quote
Leadfoot10 wrote:Anytime I'm chatting with someone in-game and they bring up balance. I ask one simple question:
"What FPS have you played that's completely balanced?"
I've yet to receive a good answer.
Indeed. The difference between DUST and titles like Call of Duty or Battlefield, is that those games rarely iterate heavily on their game balance. They simply change it up for the following year's new game, that's going to make you buy it all over again.
CPM1 Elect. Thanks for all your support. [email protected] for ideas, thoughts, and feedback.
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