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Thrillhouse Van Houten
Expert Intervention
Caldari State
10
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Posted - 2013.03.01 03:21:00 -
[1] - Quote
There is a gigantic elephant in the room here...
DUST 514 needs players to be successful. Normally, you'd never hear me speak out for lazy mushbrains who can't take 3 days of playing a game to figure out how it works, but the entire enterprise that CCP is going for here is a massive COD or MW FPS crowd to populate the ground level combat of the Eve universe.
Two major things could crush this game if only 100k dedicated people end up playing it: 1) It is totally free. All incoming money relies solely on the AUR market. More players playing equals more people buying gear, boosters, etc... on the market. The second 2) is that there are literally a thousand solar systems or more in the Eve universe and most of those systems have belts, moons or planets that could be potential battlefields. If there are only 20k people signed into Dust 4 months after launch during a given hour because so many people jumped ship, that will make for a pretty pathetic number of active battles literally strewn across a thousand star systems.
I don't know about you, but I want as many people to stick around as possible for the second reason and CCP wants just as many peeps to stick around for the first reason.
IF implementing some kind of rookie skill and equipment training system will keep people logged in, I'm pretty much all for it. I am not for the dumbing down of this system as it is (it hardly seems complicated to me as I am typically not a FPS person) but the OPs idea would keep the game open to both types of players AND doesn't do anything that they couldn't do on their own already. The one point of contention I have is making stock dropsuit fittings easily available. MAYBE add some kind of "completed fitting" tax (5% over actual market costs) so lazy people can still play, don't lose too much ISK but are still being held responsible for their being lazy. "Convenience fee."
One thing is certain in DUST 514: more players, more battles, more AUR and ISK being spent...more fun for everyone. |
Thrillhouse Van Houten
Expert Intervention
Caldari State
10
|
Posted - 2013.03.01 03:37:00 -
[2] - Quote
Buster Friently wrote:I respect what you are saying, and I think you're right - to an extent.
Personally, I like playing Dust. I'd rather have a better game with fewer players than the most popular game in the world - that I think sucks.
Yeah, that's selfishness for you, but so long as we don't fall below whatever threshold is necessary for proper integration into Eve and proper compensation for CCP, I vote for a more cerebral shooter.
Oh don't get me wrong at all...
I have played Eve off and on for 2+ years and, thus, this game being considered "complex" somewhat baffles me. There IS a threshold of how simple and "canned" this game can get without it going to hell in a ham sandwich. It is still a good deal of new information for a typical gamer to absorb and many people will simply quit if they aren't assimilated into the system in a relatively fluid manner.
There is no way this game is getting LESS complicated than it already is. No way. As corp battles get more involved, maps get bigger and things like racial dropsuits and suit skill bonuses get added and integration with Eve get added into this game, it will only get more complicated. Much more complicated. The basics shouldn't change much, but player involvement and objectives sure will...which will only serve to alienate the uninitiated further without some serious help.
The OPs point is that a system can and should be implemented into the game that, without reducing its appeal to the hardcore/pro complicated/steep learning curve crowd, make the game more easily played by the newly injected FPS gamer. In essence, make it "simpler" by adding mechanics that allow someone to build a stock class quickly and efficiently so they can get out there and kill people without diminishing the awesome complexity that is the DUST skill system. People who learn the game mechanics will always have an advantage over people who just spawn without knowledge. |
Thrillhouse Van Houten
Expert Intervention
Caldari State
17
|
Posted - 2013.03.07 05:16:00 -
[3] - Quote
I think their GOAL is to appeal to a wider group than the Eve'ers and in order to do that they have to dumb it down. This game is already dumbed down compared to Eve. Maybe that is just because they don't have as many weapons, modules, dropsuits, vehicles, etc... as they plan to have but I doubt it.
In terms of roles, there are only COMBAT roles in Dust. In Eve, you practically never have to leave a station if you don't want to. I could have (assuming the know how) hopped in a Cal shuttle on day 1, flew to Jita 4/4 and made myself into a billionaire in 3 weeks. Not likely fresh of the capsuleer employment line, but possible. You could become a research scientist, an industrialist, non-combat explorer chasing down WHs for a corporate pension...you name it. You didn't just have to choose Launchers or Turrets? Shield tank or Armor? Passive or Active? Frigate or Cruiser or BC or BS? A good chunk of the skills in the game are not directly tied to combat. Not so in Dust. Thus, the number of things for a new guy to choose are pretty minimal in the grand scheme.
It is (relatively) simple. It is hardly TOO COMPLICATED for the average person to understand. The problem isn't that its too hard for people to understand. It is that they aren't getting ANY explanation and they don't care enough to go looking. Tutorials are practically useless. Most people skip the stupid things and FPS gamers WILL skip the stupid things. Many FPS gamers just want to play the game. Putting token tutorials in and justifying the lack of "easy mode" by pointing and saying "see, you have tutorials" isn't going to make new people and the typical FPS gamer stick around to play.
Easy mode suit and skill configurations will. So CCP should make them. Make them cost 10% or 15% over market cost, basically as a punitive tax on being lazy. Call it pandering to the lazy dummies who don't really want to play Dust but just ANY shooter outer there because that is what it is. Pandering. That doesn't mean it isn't worth it to keep the players active and around.
We NEED the population a shooter calls to the table. It'll make the game more vibrant and alive in the long run to have those massive number of boots on the ground. We should all want those boots crunching...
I say let the people who want to think and make fancy strategies and conquer planets and make clever suit fits so that and let the people who just want to shoot stuff do that. The two don't combine into |
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