49 replies to this topic

[Colaessus]

I was hoping this was a console game, but seeing as it a F2P. I now have $60 set aside to spend on it when it comes this coming summer because I want to support this new era of Mech battles.

[Tsen Shang]

Amro_One, on 03 November 2011 - 02:01 PM, said:

I was hoping this was a console game, but seeing as it a F2P. I now have $60 set aside to spend on it when it comes this coming summer because I want to support this new era of Mech battles.

AYE! That's the spirit! Lets be friends!

[deathanxiety]

I've been a big fan of the Mechwarrior series for a very long time. My fav being MW2:Mercs. When i found out the latest MW game was going to be online only with no SP at all it's fair to say i was really disappointed. Since Mercs is my favourite game in the series, i've finally embraced the fact i'll never see an awesome SP experience that MW2:Mercs gave me as a kid again.

After reading this thread though, it's given me new hope for MWO. Multiplayer only might not be so bad after all. My brother is a big LoL fan so i've had the pleasure of watching him play it. I personally can't get into the game as I'm not good enough for a DOTA style game but MWO could be some special. Here's hoping!

[Mr Smiles]

deathanxiety, on 03 November 2011 - 03:41 PM, said:

I've been a big fan of the Mechwarrior series for a very long time. My fav being MW2:Mercs. When i found out the latest MW game was going to be online only with no SP at all it's fair to say i was really disappointed. Since Mercs is my favourite game in the series, i've finally embraced the fact i'll never see an awesome SP experience that MW2:Mercs gave me as a kid again.

After reading this thread though, it's given me new hope for MWO. Multiplayer only might not be so bad after all. My brother is a big LoL fan so i've had the pleasure of watching him play it. I personally can't get into the game as I'm not good enough for a DOTA style game but MWO could be some special. Here's hoping!

When I found out it was single-player only, too, I was initially disappointed. But then I started to think about it more and more, and now I'm actually invested in the idea of the game starting out as multiplayer and maybe moving to single-player later.

As far as I've gathered from their various "[feature/mission type] won't be at launch, but it's something we're adding later if the game's profitable enough!" statements, the game at launch is essentially going to be only Mech v. Mech combat in multiplayer. After that, we're going to get AI 'Mechs. After that, we're going to get tanks and planes and stuff. After that, we're going to get co-op missions. And after that or at the same time, we're going to get single-player missions.

Now. I'm going to teach you the basics of game development in one paragraph. Developers get wads of $$$$$ from investors. The developers convert this $$$$$ into paycheques, rent, utility bills, and computers. As a result of the paycheques portion of this chemical reaction, the company will produce 1 man-hour of productivity per man per hour. Piranha employs 65 people, and assuming they each work 40-60 hours a week, let's say each year they have 169,000 man-hours of game development. That assumes no holidays, but stay with me, the number doesn't matter.

If they were producing a fully-featured game, with an engine (a lot of game companies prefer to design their own graphics and physics engines), single-player, co-op missions, AI vehicles, and Mech on Mech battles, then they would have to divide those man-hours between all of those.

But they are actually producing only one or two features for the game: the Mech on Mech battles, and the multiplayer (and honestly they might just use Steamworks for some of the multiplayer, saving them man-hours there; the engine is already done since they're using Unreal 3).

What this means is, hypothetically, all of their time and energy is going into producing the best d amn multiplayer MechWarrior game that the world has ever seen.

We're at the if-thens again. If this were a normal game, with a normal business model ($60 purchase, and that's their profit), then even if they wanted to keep adding features to the game, they'd eventually be forced by their dwindling profits to just stop and start making either an expansion or a new game entirely.

But MechWarrior Online is using the Free to Play model. This means that their profits are directly proportional to how much new content they can put out each month. Think back to League of Legends: they might get a steady stream of profit from people buying XP boosts or skins or newcomers to the game buying new champs, but their really massive influx of cash each month is their new champion releases. And if they want to boost how BIG that influx is, they need new customers, which means they add new features to the game to attract a larger demographic. The new game mode, Dominion, attracts the crowd of people who don't have much time or patience to play 40-60 minute LoL matches, and the advent of spectator mode and replays will (once they're done beta testing) attract even more interest in the game. MWO will be the same way: they'll get new wads of $$$$$ from selling skins or 'Mechs or voices or whatever they come up with, and they'll increase the size of those wads of cash by adding features. Like co-op, single player, AI vehicles, and so on.

Now, why does this make me, as I said at the beginning, invested in the idea of adding co-op/single player/vehicles/etc. in later?

Because that means that they'll be focusing all of their energy into adding those features. 'Mech vs. 'Mech multiplayer is done, they don't have to pay any more attention to adding to that feature, they don't have to split up their man-hours, they don't have a boss telling them to just slap out the other features as fast as possible because they have other, more important features to work on. No. That 169,000 man-hours a year will have a laser-like focus on making Feature X the best possible Feature X that it can be.

To think of it another way. A company normally has (random number) $1,000,000 to spend on making a game, and 2 years to do so. After that million is gone and the two years are up, they ship, wash their hands, and start work on the sequel. MWO, if Piranha plays its cards right and makes this the best d amn game on the planet with a loyal and ever-growing fanbase, theoretically has infinite money and infinite time to work on the game. I punch those numbers into a calculator and it makes a happy face.

Might it be 2013 or even 2014 before I'm playing MWO's single-player campaign, or playing with friends against an entirely AI enemy force? Probably. But when I do, it has the potential (it might not, keep in mind, but it has the potential) of being so d amn good a single-player that it'll be worth the wait.

Edited by Mr. Smiles, 03 November 2011 - 04:27 PM.

[deathanxiety]

You definitely live up to your alias Mr Smiles! The couple of posts I've read of yours have all been extremely positive! Like I said, I haven't played LoL before only watched but how much of an added incentive does paying for xp boosts, runes etc give the player? Does it give them an unfair advantange? What does LoL do to make it fair for people who unlock things using the in game currency?

[Mr Smiles]

deathanxiety, on 03 November 2011 - 06:35 PM, said:

You definitely live up to your alias Mr Smiles! The couple of posts I've read of yours have all been extremely positive! Like I said, I haven't played LoL before only watched but how much of an added incentive does paying for xp boosts, runes etc give the player? Does it give them an unfair advantange? What does LoL do to make it fair for people who unlock things using the in game currency?

Hmm...

XP Boosts: No advantage. The XP boost is to your account, not to your character in-game. All the XP boost does is make it so you hit max level (30) faster, enabling you to have 30 mastery points (masteries are essentially your account's skill tree; however, the benefits from each mastery point is laughably small, like, 2 extra damage to a minion on a hit when this is a game where you deal hundreds of damage per attack), and at level 20 you can start buying runes. Runes are critically important to your character, but you can only buy them with the in-game currency, which you can only get by winning... and since you had an XP boost, that means you will hit level 20 with only a fraction of the IP of someone who took their time leveling up, and you won't be able to get as many runes.

The biggest problem with XP boosts though, and why I think it's laughable if anyone uses them, is that you'll hit level 30 extremely quickly... but actual personal skill is so much more important than your runes or your level that it doesn't actually matter. Take your time getting to level 30, taking your time is so much better at letting you win than buying a boost!

Runes: As I said, they can't be bought with real money. They are a cornerstone of high-level play--I would say that victory is 10% runes, 50% skill, and 40% team composition. Maybe runes aren't that big a percent, but they are a massive percent. Caveat: I made those numbers up, people are free to dispute them

IP Boost: You can increase the rate at which you increase your in-game currency from a win. However, they're massively expensive, have limited duration, limited uses, they require you to win... I suppose they do provide an advantage, since they enable you to buy runes. But I will talk more about something which counters this later, which makes me not care that much if people use it.

Champions: Champions are balanced against each other, so really, buying one mage-type like Annie isn't any better than another mage-type like Xerath. However, that statement comes with an extreme caveat: matching your champion to your playstyle is critically important. I have two champions, Ashe and Caitlyn, who technically are the same type of character: ranged physical attackers who are carries (start the game weak, getting 'carried along' by the team, end the game massively powerful, 'carrying' their team to victory). Both are Tier 1 champions (good to ban from play, commonly picked, used frequently in tournaments, etc.), and both fill the same role in-game. But Ashe doesn't fit my style as a player, so I always lose miserably with her, willing to surrender at the 20 minute mark, and Caitlyn fits like a glove, which means I always hit my stride early in the game and am able to wipe the enemy team by the end of the game.

But there's a caveat to my caveat. In order to know which champs fit you like a glove, you have to play them all. This means that during every week's 10-champion free rotation, you have to try out each of the champions. Practice them. Get a few wins and losses under your belt with them. And then, if you like them, buy them. So while it's true you can spend real money on a champ and immediately get access to a character which, in your hands, rips apart the battlefield like it was nothing, it's a bit more involved than that. It's not like, say, reading a list online which lists the most powerful champions and so you spend money to buy them. It's more like trying out every Medium BattleMech in the game and deciding which one you like best.

Skins: I feel the need to mention, skins are only an advantage if you can get everyone on your team to use a skin. During the loading screen, noticing that everyone on the enemy team is so proud of their characters enough to have a skin... scary. Not an actual advantage, but more of a "****, these guys might know what they're doing!" ding to your morale

There are also bundles of things you can get for money, but they're just packages of the things I've already mentioned.

You can also pay for a name change to your account, maybe if you join a clan or something.

That Thing I Wanted To Talk About Which Makes Everything Okay: Okay, there are two reasons why no payed advantage, no matter how big or small, bothers me in LoL. The first is the level cap: at level 30, everyone has a full rune page, a roster of their favorite champs, and preconfigured mastery pages. Who cares if you got there through cash or through steady play and IP-gathering? The field is level at max level.

The second reason is that, the field is level at other levels too. "What? But what if the enemy bought a bunch of awesome champs and also is using an IP boost to get runes and is also awesome at the game! I'll lose REALLY hard!" ...actually, no. League of Legends uses matchmaking. Rather good matchmaking. Every account has a hidden value called an ELO. It's basically your chess ranking, for LoL. When you join a game, a number of algorithms are run, taking in all available information, and puts you with teammates of about your ELO against enemies of about your ELO. The result of the match--not just whether you won or lost, but how much you personally contributed to that win or loss--adjusts your ELO. Winning against people with lower ELO than you doesn't really raise it that much, but winning against people with higher ELO raises it a bunch. Likewise, losing to people with higher ELO doesn't really lower it that much, but losing to people with lower ELO drops it a ton.

"So, wait, what does that mean?". Well, okay. I'm level 23. But, I play like a level 30 (or so I'm told): when I'm support, people do not die near me. When I'm playing my beloved Caitlyn, people ****ing die near me. So, whenever I join a random match (without my typical 5-man team of friends), the four people on my team are all level 29 or 30, and the people on the enemy team are 29 or 30.

At the same time, I've seen people who play LoL religiously, and have gotten to level 10-15, but suck so hard that whenever they enter a random match, they get put against people who are level 5 or 6.

The end result is... who cares if you bought a champion you're awesome at, or that you bought an IP boost and got a stack of runes out of it? Who cares if you're level 30 because of an XP boost? The game detects how well you're playing, and puts you with people who play just as well as you. Spend all the money on LoL you want--you might have an advantage, but that just puts you against tougher enemies.

* * * *

Make sense? Even if the individual things you can buy with real money did provide you a concrete, large bonus... it doesn't matter even a tiny bit if that bonus just puts you against proportionally harder foes.

Edited by Mr. Smiles, 03 November 2011 - 08:24 PM.

[Buzzkillin]

I would like the idea of given assigned mechs every week like LoL to try out. Would get people to try out new mechs and create new variety instead of just playing the same one over and over again. Sure if you bought a mech you can play that forever, but if you got 10 there that are free why not check it out? Be a Better idea to offer 12 mechs, but 3 in each class. So you have 3 light, 3 medium, 3 heavy, 3 assault.

[KnowBuddy]

buzzkillin, on 03 November 2011 - 08:30 PM, said:

I would like the idea of given assigned mechs every week like LoL to try out. Would get people to try out new mechs and create new variety instead of just playing the same one over and over again. Sure if you bought a mech you can play that forever, but if you got 10 there that are free why not check it out? Be a Better idea to offer 12 mechs, but 3 in each class. So you have 3 light, 3 medium, 3 heavy, 3 assault.

I could see this, and if we could see 36 available chassis at or soon after launch (not much of a stretch since there are 55 in the 3025TRO), this setup would mean ~1/3 would be available free at all times, and there would still be quite a bit of variety in how the free chassis for each week are selected even at launch, making for some interesting gameplay and better players overall.

[Draco Argentum]

Mr. Smiles, on 03 November 2011 - 10:01 AM, said:

Isn't being nickle-and-dimed a good thing though? Because I have plenty of nickles, and plenty of dimes, to spare. People act like paying tiny amounts of money for a game is a bad thing.

No, the expression 'nickel and dimed' refers to taking small quantities away over and over until it adds up into a huge sum. Thats why people don't like it, it looks cheap because each transaction is negligible but its very expensive in reality. For an example see World of Tanks' real money ammunition. I just checked one of my tanks, its 2.8 cents per shot. A premium repair kit is 20 cents.* At these rates you can quickly spend more than the cost of a retail boxed game if you play a lot.

*This assumes you buy $100 worth of premium currency, its more expensive if you get less at a time.

[Rodney28021]

we'll just have to wait for the game to release and find out how it plays. I have spent money on Star trek Online, Dungeons Dragons Online, Lord of the Rings Online, City of Heroes.