We live in dark times. These days, the mediocrity and cookie cutter formula of MMOs has been getting to me, as I'm sure it has gotten to a lot of you, too. I'm talking of course about combat and the dreaded ... auto-attack.
Everyone knows what auto-attack is. The auto-attack formula goes as follows:
1. Click target
2. Click attack / press attack key / press skill to begin attacking enemy
3a. Wait.
3b. Wait...
3c. Waiiiiiit...
4. Spam skills
5. Repeat steps 3a-3c.
6. Repeat step 4.
7. Monster dies, pick up loot
I'm guessing it's safe to assume that this is the formula that ... just around 90-95% of MMOs use. It's
BORING. Why is this fun to ANYONE? Where is the skill involved? Where is the CHALLENGE? A game may look amazing with awesome graphics, ridiculously beautiful visuals, and have its combat look phenomenal and interesting and deep, but then you find out it's the same genericness all over again. Yes I'm looking at you, Aion.
Jay-Z has Death of Autotune, I propose that it's time for Death of Auto
attack.
All of the freaking skill involved in these games are how quickly (or slowly if you prefer) you can get to a high level, how quickly you can enchant/slot/enhance/slap a gem on your equipment, and then how many 12093812509 hotkey skills you can spam. You win! Not really.
I don't know about you guys, but I come from a fighting game community. Games that take actual skill to play. Street Fighter, King of Fighters, Fatal Fury, Samurai Showdown, Capcom vs. SNK 2, etcetera. Games that where if you expect the game to play it for you, you're KO'd. But that's a whole different genre, and besides the point, and I'm on a tangent. Back to the topic.
And now I come to my point. I say it's time to do more research into real time combat for MMORPGs. That's right REAL fighting. It's fun, exciting, challenging, requires some degree of skill, and can separate the boys from the men (or the girls from the women, don't wanna be sexist here!
). Yes, yes, I know, there are games that already have this implemented, but really, how many can you say are actually out and playable by the entire public community? Age of Conan, Infinity, RYL1-2, CoSb, and a bunch of cartoony kid-oriented games are the only things that come to mind.
I can't really give an opinion about AoC since I only watched a couple of videos and heard good things about its limb and timing based combat, but I'm guessing it's got something good going for it. However, games like Infinity or RYL just ... lack in terms of content. With Infinity, you have next to NO character customization thanks to the premade characters and roombased system, and RYL tried and failed; oh look you click once you swing once, that's real time combat!1@1!! Sure, but it's the same damn animation over and over and over. Who really wants to look at that?
Speaking of cartoony MMOs, they are, in fact, the MAJORITY of games that have real time combat. However, these games ... just plain appeal to a generally young or young-at-heart audience or people with a soft heart for big eyes, high voices, little short characters, and flowery graphics. For example, games like Lunia, Maplestory, GhostX, Mabinogi, the list goes on. But who really wants their buddies walking in on them playing one of those? Not I, I say.
Let's take note that FPS/TPS do not fit into the real time combat category I'm trying to establish here. These games are room-based, and connect by player-to-player, not server based. In these games, there's no real NPCs to talk with to get quests or items, no bosses to an extent, and most importantly, no big world to explore with hundreds of players spread across an area, all the things that make an MMO an MMO.
What I am trying to get across here, is I think it's time that developers step outside of the dark box of mainstream boringness and into the light of excitement that people want.
In fact, I am working with a team on an MMO based on the anime Bleach called
War of Souls, and we have already developed a system of 4 basic attacks (that work kind of like rock paper scissors), parry, blocking, and free movement that allow for more user flexibility, choice, interaction, and movement. We're still in very early development stages, and just bought a new engine after being based off of NWN2 for a while, but we're alive and well and will slowly be emerging soon!
Anyway...
Wouldn't it be fun to play an online game similar to Dynasty Warriors (minus the bleak giant herds of clone mobs) or Devil May Cry where you press a button and you swing your sword/staff/mace/axe/whatever once and you hit any and all enemies within that swing's range? Then input a couple more attack inputs and keep the combo going? Once your enemy is killed you go explore the vast world or a dungeon or a hidden lost city or a marketplace ... or just do whatever you want?
So far, Continent of the Ninth and, if my eyes don't decieve me, Blade & Soul, and TERA are the only games to effectively bring this taboo subject out in the open and TRY SOMETHING NEW, and from what I can see, do it right.
Sure, I know very well that there are difficulties with developing such a system, I'm not blind to internal workings of a game. I know there are collision boxes, animation timings, etc, etc (I create characters for MUGEN, I know all about that stuff >:P), but I want us to discuss what needs to go into a system like this to make it WORK and be GOOD. You may also cry out "BUT BUT BUT server lag and how will the server keep track of all the movements and the server load with all the players and the server server server!" ... people this is 2009. Twenty-first century. DAWN of the future! Why don't we have technology for this? Why has no one invented like SUPER servers that can handle inputs of hundreds of players and movements and such? Maybe in 5-6 years, give or take, this needs to no longer be an issue.
So, I hope your eyes don't hurt too badly and your butt isn't too sore from reading all that, but I'll shut up now.
How can it be done? When will it be a possibility? Who will do it?
I want to hear what you guys have to say.
EDIT: Ok... I just played Continent of the Ninth and .... wow. That's all I can say. WOOOOW. Excuse my French, but this shit ... is just ****ing incredible.
WHY AREN'T MORE MMO'S COMBAT SYSTEMS LIKE THIS?!?!?! SO MUCH ATTACK VARIETY AND DIVERSITY. AND IT'S FREE ... WHAT?! I only did the tutorial and I'm amazed.
Developers better take a hint from Hangame because they got some good shit going right now.