I'm wondering if instances would be a good thing to have in a game. Allowing players to do missions without being "damaged" by another player. For example, your mission could be to simply kill 10 boar. And while your out trying to complete your mission, another player comes up killing them, and now you have to wait until another spawns, or they simply just kill you in a PvP fight, mission failed.
Whereas instances would allow that player to complete their mission without having to "wait" on someone else. Would this be a good thing to have in a game? Or would you guys rather have the non-instance type when your playing? I'm curious as how to go with mine, and needing insight I guess. Thanks!
Instances
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Jackolantern
- Posts: 10891
- Joined: Wed Jul 01, 2009 11:00 pm
Re: Instances
I am a fan of instancing some things. If you want to have any kind of boss fights, mobs that drop rare loot or anything like that, it is a must. Just ask any player of FFXI, which had players hunt "Notorious Monsters" (bosses that randomly spawned through the world, and dropped high-end loot). Higher level players would often sit in one place and wait for hours for a notorious monster to spawn, only to have it taken from them by one of the other 30 players also trying to get the same monster, just because it spawned closer to them. There was also a high likelihood that the player who claimed the boss was a packet-sniffing bot. It is just what some players turned to when put into a situation where they had to compete with many other players for claims on the only high-end loot they could obtain. It was an awful system.
On the other side of the spectrum is Guild Wars. Everything outside of the cities was instanced, and that includes about 95% of the game's real content. On this side, the world just feels empty and lonely. It is difficult to actually meet people without it being forced and very mission-centric. You are in a city, which is the only place you can join up with people. You yell what mission you need, and someone may join. They are joining just the mission, and not conversation. You finish the mission, and they go their separate way. There is no chance of just running into someone out in the wild and stopping for a chat or any other more natural, less forced ways of meeting people. The world just feels barren, and the cities feel cramped.
Most good games fall somewhere in the middle.
On the other side of the spectrum is Guild Wars. Everything outside of the cities was instanced, and that includes about 95% of the game's real content. On this side, the world just feels empty and lonely. It is difficult to actually meet people without it being forced and very mission-centric. You are in a city, which is the only place you can join up with people. You yell what mission you need, and someone may join. They are joining just the mission, and not conversation. You finish the mission, and they go their separate way. There is no chance of just running into someone out in the wild and stopping for a chat or any other more natural, less forced ways of meeting people. The world just feels barren, and the cities feel cramped.
Most good games fall somewhere in the middle.
The indelible lord of tl;dr
Re: Instances
Why did that just give me a brilliant idea for an MMO. To bad I have no desire/drive to make a MMO at the moment.