Vrain Matari
ZionTCD
Legacy Rising
404
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Posted - 2012.09.16 20:59:00 -
[1] - Quote
It's a good question, Gagah-Boy Brasil.
I think it's fair to say that there are many DUST players who would love some form of free roaming, and also Dust players who couldn't give 2 kittens about it, and in fact would hate if it was forced on them.
It's also prolly fair to say that the same divisions of taste exist within CCP's DUST design team.
Because this is CCP we're dealing with, if the player base expresses a stong enough interest over a long enough time frame, we prolly will get some form of open-world free roam game mode.
The game modes we know about already are:
1) Instanced matches in Planetary districts. CCP has stated and tested that the DUST code scales well, and there is little doubt that we will eventually see 100 vs. 100 battles. That is MMO in my books.
2) Instanced PVE sites where we do the zombie-drone suicide mission thingie. Later there will prolly be other PVE modes. CCP is going to be very cautious with this because of their experiences with the EVE playerbase - it's too easy to suck the life out of the PVP part of the game if you make the PVE too attractive. On the other hand, if CCP can pull it off, it's an incredible opportunity for world-building and immersive education in the New Eden backstory, and also a potentially important game mechanic.
3) Planetary Interaction a la EVE, which will be a graphical overlay on a planet's map and will allow mercs to basically set up extractor, transport systems, refineries and launch pads to get product off-planet. This will most likely be done from the Merc Quarters, and is basically just interaction with a couple of control screens.
4) The warbarge and stations in EVE. Eventually we will have free roam of these environments, the warbarge sooner and stations later. The stations will almost certainly be confined to one deck, or more likely part of one deck, the 'customs, commerce, and recreation' area. There will be customizable player-owned rooms in these areas.
If we want free-roam, the question is what form do we want it to take? It seems impractical to ask for an entire planetary surface to be generated, but to be honest I'm not sure if there is really any game-stopping technical problem with that. At any rate, such a request right now would be unreasonabe, i think.
I'd like to see in the medium-term something that would involve free-roam resource or archeological prospecting in a lonely, remote environment, but one where other players(allied, neutral or enemy), could prospect also. This is the free-roam open world part. A prospector or archeologist would employ their skills and special suit modules as well as deployable equipment & drones to locate dig sites. Imagine the logistics of choosing a loadout for your prospecting LAV or dropship, as well as packing sensor, defensive and offensive installations/drones into a limited volume/weight cargohold. Do you devote half your cargo allowance to a remote CRU unit or go in tough as nails with a single clone? Stealth scout suit with basic scanning modules or tricked out Logi-Prospector suit with god-like information gathering powers?
These sites would be instanced, not free-roam, and PVE or PVP, depending on whether another prospector/team located the same dig site and entered the dig while you were in it.
Hilarity and pants-crapping tension ensues.
or something like that. |