AGDC Links
I'm planning on writing up my time at AGDC this year as there are a lot of good tools that I came away with. In the interim, here's a list of links about the show that I need to read and you might find interesting as well.
Panels
MMO on Console - I missed this one but someone IS going to do it and they might even do it well. Ok yes, technically someone HAS already done. A few somebodies actually. The news here is making it cross platform, oh and probably also trying to make it suck less than previous attempts. NCSoft has already thrown their cape in with the PS3. Maybe even the PSP?
Defining Fun - I didn't see this but BLOO and many were very impressed. It defines fun through the PENS model (Player Experience of Needs Satisfaction) :
- Competence
- Autonomy
- Relatedness
BLOO notes:
Tools
Vivox - Warcry covers the Vivox demonstration. Vivox is a cool voice technology we've looked at before and it include some cool multi channel command and control layering that might just work excellent for the game.
Big World
News
Matt Frior moves to ZeniMax. I've always admired Matt and his talks at AGDC are among the best. Very focused and down to earth. ZeniMax on the other hand...hmm...well, technically I probably can't talk about it, so I won't. Good luck Matt, you'll need it.
Star Trek Online - Killer Tribbles. Really, what else is there to say? Not much apparently.
Romero - Even less to say. I did sit next to him and Stevie Case one year flying out to E3. I remember thingking at the tmie "Wow, that chick is hot!". That was years before everyone starting talking about WoW. I'm visionary, you see, just like John!
Raph Koster - Interview. Raph really stole the show for me this year in the final panel. While I don;t think the big MMOs are going anywhere soon (and neither does Raph I bet), the success of web based and casual spaces is ludicrous to argue against. Habbo Hotel, more players than WoW and more importantly a 60% ROI? Seriously...
Panels
MMO on Console - I missed this one but someone IS going to do it and they might even do it well. Ok yes, technically someone HAS already done. A few somebodies actually. The news here is making it cross platform, oh and probably also trying to make it suck less than previous attempts. NCSoft has already thrown their cape in with the PS3. Maybe even the PSP?
Defining Fun - I didn't see this but BLOO and many were very impressed. It defines fun through the PENS model (Player Experience of Needs Satisfaction) :
- Competence
- Autonomy
- Relatedness
BLOO notes:
This matches with other research and opinions of other game academics
and designers.
- Competence (PENS)
- Achievers (Killers in PvP) (Bartle Player Types)
- Game (Schubert)
- Autonomy (PENS)
- Explorers (Bartle Player Types)
- World (Schubert)
- Relatedness (PENS)
- Socializers (Bartle Player Types)
- Community (Schubert)
Richard Bartle:
Player Types In MUDS: http://www.mud.co.uk/richard/hcds.htm
Bartle Test: http://www.guildcafe.com/bartle.php
Damion Schubert: http://www.zenofdesign.com/
Tools
Vivox - Warcry covers the Vivox demonstration. Vivox is a cool voice technology we've looked at before and it include some cool multi channel command and control layering that might just work excellent for the game.
Big World
News
Matt Frior moves to ZeniMax. I've always admired Matt and his talks at AGDC are among the best. Very focused and down to earth. ZeniMax on the other hand...hmm...well, technically I probably can't talk about it, so I won't. Good luck Matt, you'll need it.
Star Trek Online - Killer Tribbles. Really, what else is there to say? Not much apparently.
Romero - Even less to say. I did sit next to him and Stevie Case one year flying out to E3. I remember thingking at the tmie "Wow, that chick is hot!". That was years before everyone starting talking about WoW. I'm visionary, you see, just like John!
Raph Koster - Interview. Raph really stole the show for me this year in the final panel. While I don;t think the big MMOs are going anywhere soon (and neither does Raph I bet), the success of web based and casual spaces is ludicrous to argue against. Habbo Hotel, more players than WoW and more importantly a 60% ROI? Seriously...
Labels: AGDC, games, graphics engine, industry, mmo design, serious games, tools
6 Comments:
Vivox looks cool.
Also, with unreal3 going cross platform and allowing keyboard/mouse on the PS3 it seems only a matter of time for mmogs to get on board. Seems like a bit of a technical stretch to me. For instance, ww2ol uses ehh ... lets call it 920megs of ram on my system. That is just ww2ol. as i recall WoW used 700meg but there was only a single 'zone' loaded and the abysmal 100 or so meter player draw distance.
So how do you shove 920megs of crap into a 256meg bag? granted, PS3 has a hard drive but paging to disk sucks the life out of your performance. these consoles need a gig of ram IMO.
oh and drivers/compatability for joysticks.
oh, and the massively threaded cell chip i hear is great 'fun' to code for :D.
FFXI is on PC, PS2, PS3, and XBOX360. At AGDC they were claiming around half a million subscriptions world wide.
I'd say it's been done and done successfully. Of course it can always get bigger.
Has Bartle (or any of the other gamer-taxonomy types) proposed a workable distinction between those Killers who highly value a simulation environment, and those other Killers who most highly value the action-intensity and don't perceive additional value in going beyond quasi-realistic immersivenessas toward simulation?
I perceive that split as important in your marketing, and I'd think it'd be important in defining and quantifying fun.
None that I've seen J. But then, I don't think the question is likely fair. The Bartle types are aimed at MUD players and not at Simulation players and even that's of little merit because Simulation lovers aren't a subset of Killers, they are primarily Explorers.
Except for the PvP Simmers, who are heavily Killers.
Bartle did expand the four types into a 3D presentation on three axes/spectrums: Action/Interaction, World/Player, and Explicit/Implicit:
http://www.mud.co.uk/richard/selfware.htm
Note the upper left, that's your Killer area, ranging from Griefers to Politicians.
I perceive significant differences in definition of desired fun/psychological-revenue between those WWIIOL players who appreciate the WWII-simulation context but express a high value-orientation toward kills/captures/rank-gain/"balance" (or better yet their-side advantage), and those other WWIIOL players who like the game's combat model and like killing and winning, but especially appreciate the game because of its realistic tactical immersiveness.
It's got to be difficult to develop a service that's about delivering psychological revenue, when two of your key customer segments have differing expectations for what that revenue should be.
Perhaps game customer taxonomy is fundamentally about segmenting customer expectations so that marketers can assure that their design/production team is building a service that delivers what they think their customers want, or have quantified them as wanting. If that's true, perhaps the existing taxonomic categories are inadequately focusing on customer appreciation of realistic-immersiveness as a significant market differentiation.
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home