Ryan Dancey speaks - the Most Successful Year for Fantasy RPGaming ever. However...

Barak · Dec 22, 2005

Heh.

Mr Dancey, by focusing on TRPGs (what a silly acronym!) missed a much greater occurence.

Did you realize that, last year, Microsoft made a -lot- more money than Blizzard? And I mean, a lot! And yet.. They both make software! What's up with that! Something must be afoot, and Blizzard need to get their act together before they go under, as Microsoft knows something they don't, for sure.

What more, Microsoft should cut Blizzard a big check, as Microsoft clearly is getting virtually all of Blizzard's fanbase to use their products!

Flexor the Mighty! · Dec 22, 2005

Jim Hague said:
I think an important marriage here would be to develop some way for the characters to actually affect the world.

That is very important. The lack of any permenent change in the world other than via new patches and upgrades is a major drawback to online play. But how do you let every player have a major impact on the game world without causing problems for other players? If they ever answer that question then we will see a lot of tabletop guys abandon the table for the PC. IMO of course.

Jim Hague · Dec 22, 2005

Flexor the Mighty! said:
That is very important. The lack of any permenent change in the world other than via new patches and upgrades is a major drawback to online play. But how do you let every player have a major impact on the game world without causing problems for other players? If they ever answer that question then we will see a lot of tabletop guys abandon the table for the PC. IMO of course.

One halfway step is via various and sundry Crafting systems...but that causes problems all its own. Perhaps it'd be best if MMO companies hired a new tier of employee - the GameMaster, Arbiter, whatever. It worked for the MMOs' predecessors in MUDs/MOOs/MUXes, and given some hard thought, it could be extended to encompass MMOs as they are now.

KaosDevice · Dec 22, 2005

Whizbang Dustyboots said:
(in EQ, you had to talk to every NPC you saw, sometimes just firing off words at random at them, to discover quests)

That brought back some funny memories of my old EQ days watching members of my guild saying almost William Burroughs-esque strings of word salad at NPCs hither and yon.

Whizbang Dustyboots said:
There doesn't need to be spawning in NWN. If anything, I think a more robust, more easy to use NWN-style game is the natural marriage between MMORPGs and table top.

Word.

It never ceases to suprise me that even as old (relatively) as NWN is I still enjoy it. I'm looking forward to NWN 2, hopefully they will improve on things that do promote a marriage between the tabletop and the server.

Breakdaddy · Dec 22, 2005

der_kluge said:
It won't happen in my lifetime.

With a P&P RPG I can adblib anything at a moment's notice. I can build in any NPC, any quest, any dialogue tree - right on the fly. CRPGs can't replace that. If they can, P&P RPGs will die. But again - not in my lifetime.

That is absolute rubbish. In 20 years we have gone from Commodore Vic-20's and C-64's to 4+ ghz 64 bit processors with terabyte storage for HOME USERS. The graphics and playability of games have gone from Pong to WoW and Battlefield 2 in that span. Unless you don't plan on living for 20 more years, I would say you are dead wrong.

Jim Hague · Dec 22, 2005

Breakdaddy said:
That is absolute rubbish. In 20 years we have gone from Commodore Vic-20's and C-64's to 4+ ghz 64 bit processors with terabyte storage for HOME USERS. The graphics and playability of games have gone from Pong to WoW and Battlefield 2 in that span. Unless you don't plan on living for 20 more years, I would say you are dead wrong.

No...you fail to take into account the lack of easily-used scripting tools for non-programmers. Without the ability to create content, those very pretty games never happen. And that's the roost that MMOs have yet to dislodge tabletop games from, and until a new school of MMO design thought emerges, they can't.

NWN was a good first step, but considering that scripting in it sometimes exceeded what was needed to program in something like C Sharp, it never fully realized that potential. And MMOs are behind even NWN in that respect.

Breakdaddy · Dec 22, 2005

Jim Hague said:
No...you fail to take into account the lack of easily-used scripting tools for non-programmers. Without the ability to create content, those very pretty games never happen. And that's the roost that MMOs have yet to dislodge tabletop games from, and until a new school of MMO design thought emerges, they can't.

NWN was a good first step, but considering that scripting in it sometimes exceeded what was needed to program in something like C Sharp, it never fully realized that potential. And MMOs are behind even NWN in that respect.

No snark intended, but I think *you* fail to see my point. If the technology has come this far this fast, who is to say those tools that are lacking now won't be available in 5 or 10 years to anyone who wants to use them (and easily even)? If you had told me in 1985 that WoW would look and play like this twenty years later, I would have had a very hard time believing you. Even Bill Gates wasnt precognitive in this regard (I seem to remember him saying something about PCs never needing more than 1 Megabyte of ram). Technology is moving at a pace that is astonishing, and will continue to do so whether we as tabletop gamers wish to use it or not. I suspect that in the long run, the MMORPG games will be so close to tabletop gaming, that the only major difference will be not having to switch off who brings snacks for the group(minor exxageration, but you get the point

)

Jim Hague · Dec 22, 2005

Breakdaddy said:
No snark intended, but I think *you* fail to see my point. If the technology has come this far this fast, who is to say those tools that are lacking now won't be available in 5 or 10 years to anyone who wants to use them (and easily even)? If you had told me in 1985 that WoW would look and play like this twenty years later, I would have had a very hard time believing you. Even Bill Gates wasnt precognitive in this regard (I seem to remember him saying something about PCs never needing more than 1 Megabyte of ram). Technology is moving at a pace that is astonishing, and will continue to do so whether we as tabletop gamers wish to use it or not. I suspect that in the long run, the MMORPG games will be so close to tabletop gaming, that the only major difference will be not having to switch off who brings snacks for the group(minor exxageration, but you get the point )

No, I understood your point perfectly, I think. You're discarding a couple of key points in favor of speculation. I could say that in 10 years we'll all fly around Moeller skycars, and the speculation would be equally unfounded. We know a few things:

*We're getting very close to the practical limit of computing power under the current models. Even allowing for expansion, when you reach the 5 nanometer limit for processors, that's it. There's some promising work being done with quantum computing...but that's going to be the realm of inudstry and academic instiutions for the foreseeable future.

*MMOs are fundamentally different from tabletop gaming in a lot of respects. While they may grow together because of pressure towards covergent development, you're still going to need an extremely sophisticated set of tools to keep up with all those pretty graphics and persistent world models.

Right now, the drive is towards prettier games with shallower content, and those games cost literally millions of dollars. Development cost is no guarantee of success, either, and profit margins are shrinking. The big economic fights are between genre kings like Halo and Half-Life primarily, with second and third-tier niche games scrabbling for the remainder.

Fact is, Joe Average (by far the biggest market for MMOs) wants an experience that makes them feel a little geeky, but not too much, that they can sit down, play, then walk away. And you're not going to see a true convergence of tabletop play and online play until you figure out some way to have them provide content (thus juicing a different desire in their fun than whacking stuff and taking loot) and affect the world, while making the tools for that accessible to the average user. And given the current trend, you're not going to see that for a long, long time...not until the market crashes and forces a shift in thinking.

Breakdaddy · Dec 22, 2005

Jim Hague said:
No, I understood your point perfectly, I think. You're discarding a couple of key points in favor of speculation. I could say that in 10 years we'll all fly around Moeller skycars, and the speculation would be equally unfounded. We know a few things:

*We're getting very close to the practical limit of computing power under the current models. Even allowing for expansion, when you reach the 5 nanometer limit for processors, that's it. There's some promising work being done with quantum computing...but that's going to be the realm of inudstry and academic instiutions for the foreseeable future.

*MMOs are fundamentally different from tabletop gaming in a lot of respects. While they may grow together because of pressure towards covergent development, you're still going to need an extremely sophisticated set of tools to keep up with all those pretty graphics and persistent world models.

Right now, the drive is towards prettier games with shallower content, and those games cost literally millions of dollars. Development cost is no guarantee of success, either, and profit margins are shrinking. The big economic fights are between genre kings like Halo and Half-Life primarily, with second and third-tier niche games scrabbling for the remainder.

Fact is, Joe Average (by far the biggest market for MMOs) wants an experience that makes them feel a little geeky, but not too much, that they can sit down, play, then walk away. And you're not going to see a true convergence of tabletop play and online play until you figure out some way to have them provide content (thus juicing a different desire in their fun than whacking stuff and taking loot) and affect the world, while making the tools for that accessible to the average user. And given the current trend, you're not going to see that for a long, long time...not until the market crashes and forces a shift in thinking.

Ok, the skycar statement seems ridiculous to me. You assert that my speculation is "unfounded". The foundation I am speculating upon is reality, our recent past. As for the technological limitations: they have been breached in the past and will continue to be breached in the future. I fail to see the artificial ceiling you are placing on technology in our little debate just to justify your initial hypothesis. As far as shallower content: You contend that Pac Man, Donkey Kong, Pitfall, and Asteroids (to name only a few) are MORE sophisticated than Battlefield 2, WoW, and CoH? Rubbish. Your last point is the most salient one. I can agree with your suggestion that it's possible the average computer gamer doesn't want to be immersed too deeply into our geeky little subrealm. However, this doesnt disprove my statement in the least. Gaming attitudes change, both in Tabletop and Computer gaming. Technology in the computing world far outpaces any technological progression made thus far in tabletop gaming. And to make my point again: Nobody knows what the future holds for technology. All we can do is look at the past and hypothesize based upon those trends. Current barriers will very likely be breached, and new programming techniques and tools will be utilized to make the gaming experience even more enjoyable and realistic.

Jim Hague · Dec 22, 2005

Breakdaddy said:
Ok, the skycar thing is ridiculous to me. You said "unfounded". The foundation I am speculating upon is reality, our recent past. As for the technological limitations: they have been breached in the past and will continue to be breached in the future. I fail to see the artificial ceiling you are placing on technology in our little debate just to justify your initial hypothesis. As far as shallower content: You condend that Pac Man, Donkey Kong, Pitfall, and Asteroids (to name only a few) are MORE sophisticated than Battlefield 2, WoW, and CoH? Rubbish. Your last point is the most salient one. I can agree with your suggestion that it's possible the average computer gamer doesn't want to be immersed too deeply into our geeky little subrealm. However, this doesnt disprove my statement in the least. Gaming attitudes change, both in Tabletop and Computer gaming. Technology in the computing world far outpaces any technological progression made thus far in tabletop gaming. And to make my point again: Nobody knows what the future holds for technology. All we can do is look at the past and hypothesize based upon those trends. Current barriers will very likely be breached, and new programming techniques and tools will be utilized to make the gaming experience even more enjoyable and realistic.

You're pretty obviously coming at this from the perspective of the consumer who isn't familiar with technology or actual trends. But I'll play for a bit.

First, the analogy holds - you pointed out that Bill Gates, a man responsible in large part for defining the PC market, couldn't accurately predict 5 years in the future, let alone 10. I'm going to take a guess here and say that you're not in the tech industry. So your 'predictions' don't hold. You're making broad generalizations from a consumer perspective, and that just won't work. I can make unfounded predictions too...and they'll have just about the same chance of being true.

When I say shallower content, I mean that the games look good, but are growing shorter and shorter, with less and less content. Take a look at Halo 2 (current genre king) or something oddball like Stubbs the Zombie. The current trend is towards games with 10-12 hours of content. Quick fixes. But the market demands pretty, the market demands big-name (or at least name) actors. This creates a nasty spiral of increasing cost for less product. And Joe Gamer is fine with that. They want a quick fix. Unfortunately, the quick fix doesn't pay the bills. Games right now need to be either genre kings (Halo) or niche games with a hardcore market (pick a number of 2nd and 3rd tier games).

End result - with the current trending, you're going to see a market crash fairly soon as developers can no longer sustain the cost. At a fairly important and quiet game conference this year, Wil Wright, creator of the Sims, revealed his next game, Spore. Spore's built on two concepts that don't fit the current model - dynamic content spawned from the game itself (no pre-rendered art) and player-created content. It breaks the model, because it's less a game (no truly defined goals beyond making sure your Spore continues to survive and develop, even becoming several stages of a civilization) and more a toy.

And maybe that's how TTRPGs need to be approached - as a toy, not a game.