If you had $100 Million to make a game...

[Alexander the Pretty Good]

It would be impossible to do for many unfortunate reasons. What would be the point in me buying lets say WoW, when some one has already won? It means I can't "win" it. Pretty lame. Then I would be in direct competition with people who scrounge on benefits and too lazy to work so can afford to play WoW 18 hours per day, compared to my lets say 4-6 hours. They would have had all that time to 'grind', and other things, which I cannot compete with on any realistic scale.

The list goes on...

That's why he needs $100M, to afford the expenses of being creative and figuring out solutions to those problems or coming up with completely different gameplay structures. I don't think (though I don't know) ACIN meant "WoW with a win condition."

[Vladimir]

I've always wanted to see all the officially licensed Star Wars (IV - VI) games updated and merged into one. It would incorporate Edyz's idea of taking control of individual people, ships, whatever and Rabbit's idea of realistic damage; you can always hop into another body. Instead of fighting the battles depicted in the movies, the player should participate in peripheral but essential conflicts so the outcome isn't known and can change. Each outcome could modify the overall story without reversing the inevitable outcome. Maybe the player could form his own empire and continue the battles into the books. A good combination of Force Commander, TIE Fighter, and Rebellion.

Maybe it could also be an MMORPG

That's just a brief summary.

[Greyblades]

So an rpg battlefront 2?

[Vladimir]

So an rpg battlefront 2?

I've never played the game so I can't comment from first-hand experience but basically, yes. However it would incorporate morale, 3-D combat, atmospheric and space flight (in the same mission). From what I read of Battlefront it was OK but lacked depth. Plus I've always fancied forming my own empire/fiefdom in the Star Wars universe. What if you were allowed to research technology and upgrade your military? How could you control your planets, etc. When you're tired of micro/macro management your domain you could participate in an ongoing battle. Good storyplaying allowing your character to start at the bottom/middle/top and progress (or regress) from there.

I know the origial episodes are rather obsolete now but that is my preferred setting.

[Greyblades]

Oh so it would be a Star Wars mount and blade?

[Vladimir]

Oh so it would be a Star Wars mount and blade?

If you can conquer Europe in it then yes.

[Greyblades]

Well no, but if you get a mod that puts you into europe instead of the vanilla game's made up world you can.

[a completely inoffensive name]

It would be impossible to do for many unfortunate reasons. What would be the point in me buying lets say WoW, when some one has already won? It means I can't "win" it. Pretty lame. Then I would be in direct competition with people who scrounge on benefits and too lazy to work so can afford to play WoW 18 hours per day, compared to my lets say 4-6 hours. They would have had all that time to 'grind', and other things, which I cannot compete with on any realistic scale.

The list goes on...

It wouldn't be an individual player winning. In Eve Online you have corporations who are able to take systems away from other corporations. I don't know how it handles one corporation steamrolling everyone but I assume for some reason you can't own everything.

This is my vision:
Basically the collective group (AKA a "side" like the Horde in WoW) operate the macro scale of the MMO as a game of war from a FPS. In an MMO you have usually two or more sides that are "against" each other. But the goal is always pointless quests and "raids" or having some lulz just attacking the others sides cities. But this is all pointless and time wasting because you could attack stormwind with a gang of 10,000 Horde players and dominate the city for 5 days straight but that city will be and always will be an Alliance city. Where is the consequence?

Make a WoW like MMO with cities and such, and quests but the quests are not grinding but instead task based. You gain levels through working hard in the military of the side you are on. All beginners start at boot camp and do have to do some basic grinding of creatures to get to a high enough level to actually enter the main fighting force, it also allows them to learn how to play the game. The highest levels are generals who can do incredible damage and also have the ability to coordinate the attacks. With any MMO when you die, you always just respawn. So you are never going to run out of soldiers, always increasing as people join the server, which makes things more complicated and successful attacks more rewarding. Allow it so that a town can be captured and controlled if it is held onto long enough by an invading force. As a punishment for death you will lose "points" attributed to your level and if you keep dying, then you might be demoted. This allows scrubs to naturally work their way back to the bottom and allows people in higher levels to gain a better sense of trust with his teammates, which makes artificial gangs (Guilds) somewhat less needed.

As the game progresses for the most part since no one ever really dies in an MMO, the war in a server will likely last a long time. However, when one said eventually does manage to dominate the other side and take control of the entire map, then the server will reset and start with a brand new map. People's characters won't be deleted, I don't know the mechanics of how it would work, but everyone's character would simply be re-uploaded to the reset server and map. The players of the winning team gets lots of goodies and titles (in game or material idk) to make them feel good and rewarded.

So you don't "win" per se, you help your team win. And if it does, you get rewarded. You compete against the other team which might have people playing 18 hours a day, but so will your side.

As a side note, in order for battles to actually be won, when a battle is flagged in a region, when you die in battle you are not allowed to participate in the battlezone anymore, but may roam around the rest of the map and could be recruited as reinforcements to get back into the battle. Idk, I have to think the mechanics out some more in that regard.

EDIT: Also, just coming from the top of my head, the game economy would be a naturally evolving free market. Instead of a million NPCs in a town selling an infinite amount of stuff with certain prices, the crafting ability that WoW has could just be extended to actually make weapons and armor. Those that spend most of their time making stuff instead of attacking will be able to make more things faster and will be able to make better weapons and armor. They would post their goods to sell on a massive list, which essentially would act as an in game ebay. If not enough people are crafting, you could tak advantage and sell your goods for higher amounts of money and vice versa. This will add a whole nother level off complexity both on the individual level and on the macro level because if people are not crafting, then people can't get the improved armor they need which makes the army as a whole weaker.

That's why he needs $100M, to afford the expenses of being creative and figuring out solutions to those problems or coming up with completely different gameplay structures. I don't think (though I don't know) ACIN meant "WoW with a win condition."

See above.

[a completely inoffensive name]

If you guys like my idea, I was thinking of writing it out completely and posting it in the frontroom.

[Subotan]

It wouldn't be an individual player winning. In Eve Online you have corporations who are able to take systems away from other corporations. I don't know how it handles one corporation steamrolling everyone but I assume for some reason you can't own everything.

Because the players are smart enough to realise when such a corporation in powerful enough to do that. There has only been one recorded instance of the devs intervening in a PvP war, and it was quite a minor one. All the other times, when one corporation has become pre-eminent, the other corporations will form an alliance to take it down.

E.G. This is the current state of affairs in the EVE Universe. Black areas are controlled by NPC Empires.



EDIT: Read this: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2008...the-great-war/ as well as http://www.tentonhammer.com/eve/spymaster/50

[Mailman653]

A WW I game in the style of the Close Combat game series.

[Crazed Rabbit]

I think, if I wanted to improve on M&B, some main points for me would be making seamless integration between campaign and battle map. The battle maps would just be zoomed in from the campaign map. So instead of discrete instances for battling, you could fight across the whole of Calradia. If you wanted, you could ride across the map without ever zooming out to 'campaign' view.

I'd also like a major refinement of the fighting mechanics.

One thing I'd really like to see are cities that come to life: huge interdependent environments with people going about their lives, and the ability to enter all buildings and have the AI react appropriately.

Finally, a way to make the other lords into characters with depth.

Askthepizzaguy: That's a really interesting premise. Thanks for sharing.

One thing about Eve Online that stands out to me is how easy it is to rip people off for a lot of in game money and escape by (IIRC) transferring the money to a new account. In real life, robbing the mafia of millions and running will make them come after you. But in Eve, it seems like a lot of the risk is gone.

I'm not quite sure how I would fix it.

ACIN: You should write out your idea and post it here!

CR

[a completely inoffensive name]

ACIN: You should write out your idea and post it here!

CR

Ok! I will think about it for a while and try to hammer out the main points of it. Needless to say, I think that MMO's could use a additional sprinkle of elements from other genres such as RTS, and FPS. Hopefully you guys will appreciate the way I implement those characteristics.

[Veho Nex]

One thing about Eve Online that stands out to me is how easy it is to rip people off for a lot of in game money and escape by (IIRC) transferring the money to a new account. In real life, robbing the mafia of millions and running will make them come after you. But in Eve, it seems like a lot of the risk is gone.

I'm not quite sure how I would fix it.

They have a bounty hunter system in the game. Though its not that effective since there is almost no way to locate people, you would have to have contacts all over the Eve universe in case someone happened to seem that person.

[Vladimir]

They have a bounty hunter system in the game. Though its not that effective since there is almost no way to locate people, you would have to have contacts all over the Eve universe in case someone happened to seem that person.

That's odd. There has to be something.

[Subotan]

The problem with the bounty system in EVE is that eventually, if you are a good enough scumbag, then your bounty will exceed the value of your clone (Which is a back-up you stored t space stations which you have to pay for in order to maintain all your skills - getting your ship blown up and death aren't the same in EVE), and if you can find a trusty friend, then your friend can kill you, claim the bounty, and then you two can split the bounty.