Good article over at Gamespy. Read it here!

http://www.gamespy.com/previews/january04/wowpc/index.shtml

excerpt...


Picture a playground. There's a slide and monkeybars and a swing set and sandbox and other stuff to do. Then unleash a whole bunch of first graders on it and watch what happens as they try to "create their own fun." There are fistfights as everyone tries to get to the top of the slide and screaming when that one kid just won't get off the swings. It's just a whole lot of grief as everyone jostles with everyone else because the structure of the environment means that your fun comes at the expense of everyone else's. Sound familiar? It should -- it's the unfortunate reality of many MMOs.

According to Kaplan, that's exactly what Blizzard didn't want to have happen in World of Warcraft. "All of our systems are designed to avoid what we call 'player collision' -- when players fight over limited content or generate their own grief-oriented fun for lack of anything better to do.


Good stuff, and sounds like they've really put some thought into what's been wrong with MMOG's to date.

Tia

I'm going to link this article to my guild board. That is EXACTLY what everquest is. The most maddening thing about it is, the people who made EQ know it but don't care to do a thing about it. In fact, they like it that way.

Even when I was on the playground I always found my own things to do. Let everyone else fight over the slide and swing.

The slide is mine, BACK OFF!
THE SLIDE IS MINE!

Throughout the development process of any of their titles, they're constantly asking themselves the same questions: 'Am I having fun now?' 'Am I getting angry at the game?' 'Am I bored and watching the clock?' In World of Warcraft's case it's, 'Am I just grinding experience levels?'


Ok, EQ developers say:

Am I having fun? No. Good!
Am I getting angry at the game? Yes? Check!
Am I getting bored? Yes. Good.
Am I just grinding levels or AP points? Yes. Excellent!

Boss, we're ready to publish this new expansion.

Wow! The quest system sounds fabulous.

The best example of this smart looting system was what Kaplan called the "Melvin's head" system. One of the most awkward moments in any MMO is players waiting for a spawn because each of them are on the same quest ("Bring me Melvin's head!") Players in that situation can be reluctant to group because only one of them will be able to get Melvin's head. World of Warcraft, though, supports multi-drops. This basically means that every member of the group on the quest will be able to pick up one copy of Melvin's head once he's dead. This encourages social interaction and grouping since nobody's worried about having to fight over the rewards.

That WoW quest example Pana quoted sounds exactly like the DAoC quest system if I recall it correctly.

Although multiple quest drops and instanced raid mob encounters in WoW will help avoid the EQ anti social behavior that results over competition for content, I hope they don't go too far in making WoW trivial to play and conquer. A big part of the lure of EQ was sense of achievement the player got after all the time and effort eventually paid off in the form of levels, loot, AA's or whatever. Make it too easy and everyone will get bored fast.