Quest Design - I: Why Many MMOs Rely on Repetitive Grind Quests - Extra Credits
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 29 ก.ย. 2024
- Bad quests treat the player as an object to be transported from level to level, using five common quest types to push them through the game without any sense of discovery or exploration.
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I...
I work at FedEx.
Are all my quests FedEx quests?
Have you ever had an Escort Quest?
Fiona McCann I've had to escort people through the warehouse. Does that count?
+PartyTom Sure. Have a jelly donut! 🍙
Fiona McCann yaaaay
Your job should be fun you do quest every day XD
*APPLAUSE*! Thank you for doing this! For me, WoW was the most fun and immersive gaming (or entertainment) experience of my life. I truly loved that game! But eventually the 'lather, rinse, repeat' repetitiousness of the quests pulled me out of it. Mists of Pandaria is the perfect example: they focused on creating as *many* new quests and things to do as possible, rather than better quality quests which may have lasted longer and meant more.
Awesome video! I love the idea of an online game being more than grinding. I remember playing "Fiesta" I think it was, and around level 37 where I couldn't do anything but beg other players to help me kill the same type of enemy over and over, I thought, "am I actually having fun anymore?" So it's cool to think that MMOs can be just as immersive as other games with the right tweaking. :D
Runescape! Greatest quests of all time!
+GoldKitsuneBrony Interestingly, I've noticed Runescape's missions seem to play out like small, self-contained point-and-click adventure games. They present more of a puzzle to solve and an intriguing story rather than the aforementioned 5 basic missions design mentioned in the video. My best guess why is because of the mechanics; Runescape would be disgustingly boring if all your missions were "go kill X goblins" or "go collect some wood."
Jagex did a brilliant job, and I feel a lot of other MMO designers should go check the game out, and take notes on how they did it.
Joseph Young
Interesting you should say that. When designing the game the Gowler brothers were heavily inspired by the point and click adventure games they grew up with. Runescape was originally envisioned as the next gen point and click adventure.
There were a lot of little fun things that were done with the EQ dialogue system as well. Like the Halfling guards had ridiculous hats and hamburglar masks and if you complimented them on their attire they'd thank you for it. Had no purpose whatsoever. But having an NPC respond to my "Nice hat!" made me laugh. I also remember the guy in Freeport who asked you What House Are You From? And would accept "The International House of Pancakes" as a response.
Aaaaah, the closing music. As an ex-FFXI player, I have to say: excellent choice
Everyone seems to be mentioning RuneScape!
RS quests are great because with 26 skills they can blur the kill/fetch/fedex lines and have deeper lore that you can contribute to. RS quests you can feel PROUD when npc's talk about it after like instead of "I killed the goblin king" it's "I uncovered a jungle's mystery and brewed science."
Problem is RS quests have ALL the problems listed above, from too many quests at once to how you are guided through them.
After watching this video, I can only say: I demand a game where you play as James in his epic quest that ultimately ends in getting Dan a script for a new video. Wether you stay on topic or use this power to pull a quick one on everyone is up to you.
Totally didn't mind the Everquest ramble, in fact I'm getting the feeling that I may have missed out on a really good game... Oh and I might look at The Secret World as well once my savings have recovered from last time I went to the steam store.
Looking forwards to next week, keep it up guys =)
1 year later, and still noone has taken this to heart. MMOs take a long time I guess.
At least a few years per mmo.
I really liked how they handled the quest chain and phasing in cataclysm. Although I totally agree that in WoW wondering around and looking in nooks and cranies you don't have to go should be more rewarding. They should have made it slightly more likely to miss some of the quests
Dang, now you guys gave me a reason to try Everquest.
"Carrying many quests at the same time" AKA the thing that happens every time I play a Fallout game
Everquest sounded like a really interesting MMO
Wasn't that rat-tail quest in Kingdom of Loathing? Or is my oft-addled memory playing tricks on me again?
Anyhoo, great video; looking forward to the next one!
Good quest design is the most important thing for me. That's why I love fallout franchise so much.
Really enjoyed this video, good work! ~Subscribed
You forgot Quest Type Six: Touch Quests. Quests that tell you "Go and use these items out in the world." Like "Pull these three levers".
Similar, perhaps.
I sooo love EverQuest and yet nobody understands why I don't like wow.
Cause nobody understands the huge quality gap between the quests in EQ and the most mmorpg titles nowadays.
I've played so many mmorpg's but non of them is even close and I always end up all frustrated about just simply going around killing mobs or collecting eye balls and stuff nobody actually wants to have.
Also EQ has the best and most fitting crafting system I experienced so far. - It really doesn't deserve to be f2p now...;_; - well, just wanted to say thank you for bringing up that topic T T
As many things as Runescape gets wrong, I think it has one of the stronger quest systems of any MMO.
I never knew mmos had quests like the ring one, I had really only played EQ for a couple of weeks before WoW came out, so most of my experience is with the WoW type questing system.
EverQuest had/has many quests that were "hidden" in the sense that NPCs would do things that would hopefully elicit a natural response from you.
There is a lady in Freeport that would wander around occasionally emoting a "sigh".
Once I went over to her and targeted her, and typed, "What is wrong?".
She then went on to talk to me.
Now THAT is what quests should be like for the thoughtful, and not for the click click click click click click click I got my quest from the flagged NPC let's go gaming generation.
Well the thing about EverQuest is I have dyslexia so it is a problem for typing hell to so many times I do believe a game with a better GUI and that idea would work very beneficial
Sarutaburata theme, woo!
+Viktor Rucký Wait, let's watch the credits again... Acknowledgement, woo!
great video, but kinda dark if you watched gaming addition part 2 and know about james and everquest
I'm always waiting for him to talk about space Jews.
When Everquest Next comes out can you please do a review on it?
Now I just want to play Everrquest. O.o
Objects weren't just for stat gain. Shows picture of TF2 hats.
I was gonna say something about DFO but, yeah it was basicly those bog standard quests with a unique gameplay. Pity Nexon Pay2win that game into the ground, it was a lot of fun.
I actually played some Secret world. At the time I was feeling refreshed by a new visual take on the MMO genre, got kinda bored of it though, it, like most mmo's at the time and even still now, seemed to lack any social encouragement. There were rival factions but it didnt matter, there were other players but why bother grouping? FFXIV is what I'm playing now, and while its not doing anything revolutionary, its fun, and grouping up with people in a guild was a smart decision as there's always people to chat with and play with sometimes.
something ive been thinking about, if ultima online and runescape have been so popular, why has barely anyone made an mmo like them, whatever that would be called, why isn't there at least a few mmos that aren't all focused on combat? usually someone jumps on a different bandwagon, but I cant seem to find anything along their particular vein.
Fantastic video - I think it's helped me figure out at least one of the reasons why I don't feel compelled to play theme park MMOs for more than a week.
I think I either need a fun sandbox to play in where I make my own stories or I need to feel like the stories the devs have written need to be discovered.
Fetching water from the creek for an NPC in a main story quest of FFXIV is not really that compelling...
Oh hey it's ZiggyD :D
Play Dark Souls. You will love it. You have to "find" the story.
Wanna Give Eve online a shot? Its very very sandboxy but the quests still fall under these basic tropes. The sandbox comes from player itneraction
Might wanna look into Star Citizen...
TwilightWolf032 Wait, are we talking RO, or Revival? Because Revival is just terrible kill quests, while traditional RO quests are far closer to the EQ example. Although they do run the issue of requiring you to run through zones 20+ levels above you to gain access to a grinding spot at your level...I guess that's where Fly Wings come in.
Earliest example I can think of is the Prontera Culvert quest.
This is why I quit playing WoW after about 1 month. It is boring. Every quest was "do this so that you're closer to doing something awesome".... It seems like it was designed to ONLY be fun if you have a high level and are a member of a guild or whatever, otherwise, you're just grinding to get to that level or be accepted by the clan you want to be a part of and being bored to tears by it (at least I was).
If only more people could admit that.
You are right but, too many people discuss wow w/o knowing its mechanics. You have made valid points, but the lack of knowledge is apparent.
You see you can level up to max in wow in less than 2days of /played time(no looms and stuff). upon reaching level 15 you can get to cap without doing 1 single quest, just via dungeons and pvp content. WoW was and never will be balanced around leveling content, no game is, its endgame however is unmatched by any MMO to date, you can argue that you prefer a different ones, but objectievly the ammount of content and polish blizz provides is unmatched in any single MMO in the world. There are milions of cespool guilds in wow, to the point that it is hard to actually play without one, as the automated addons constantly spam invites. Upon reactivating my acc a while back I literally had to spend 20 mins non stop refusing automated guild invites, so the guild point is mute.
by the time you get to level 30, something that can arguably be done in around 10h nowadays, even less with looms.... regardless of your faction you will have done the following:
1.Stoped a nihilistic cult from ravaging the city of Orgrimmar by primal magic
2.Banished a ancient beast in Blackfathom depths
3.Stopped a faction of savage werewolf like Worgen from unleashing havoc around the world.
4.Defeated a group of zealous religious racists from embarking upon a crusade to purge all non humans from the world.
And thats just the 4 largest dungeons, not to mention spearhead invasions, assist in defences ect. You can't even argue that its not narrated properly anymore as every NPC nowadays just spews dialogue at you.
To be fair out of the most MMO's I played. SWTOR, WOW, HELLGATE, TERA, COH, Champions online, DCUO ect. WoW is the least grindy one, and the one that offers the most alternatives to standard questing. Hate questing? fine go level by doing PvP, use the downtime to work on your professions, witch also award XP. I mean sure I get your comment , wow has problems ofc it does. But your comment and that of the fellow who replied show absolute lack of any actuall experience with the game, the fact that you asociate level requirement with guild recruitment is a clear and obvious tell that you lack any understanding of the game, it is a popular trend amongst WoW haters, people hate it because in the 2 days they played they felt inferior to the people who have been playing it for years.
You have the right to your own opinion of course, but when a opinion isn't formed by experience and understanding it kind of makes it.. well silly :)
Good day to you!
I don't know those quests but I guess that they are all flavour text that the player does not need to read and mechanically they are all "go kill these people and maybe pull a lever or something while you are there"
Some shaman quests were fun but other than those I don't remember enjoying a single quest. It was all grinding.
You just described Final Fantasy 14, Sinuglar8ty.
@@vubitheman955 if you can level up to the cap in two days why do the quests in between even exist? /gen
If bypassing the content for new/non-endfame players is more fun that's a problem.
I'm pretty sure I'd sell that ring right after finding it.
This is why I love Dark Souls so much. There's almost no direction in the game. You go around and talk to people, read item descriptions and they give you the story bit by bit through little mentions in the conversations, snippets of lore in the item descriptions etc.
I wish I never read any wiki or guide for it. When DS 2 comes out I'll stay away from it until I feel I've discovered enough by myself.
I know that feels, bro.
Dark Souls is seriously a masterpiece. The game play is enough on its own to draw someone in with its challenge and non-hand-holding combat, but that it also has that kind of atmosphere and depth just makes it incredible.
And u can kill npcs
Not an mmo
I quit RuneScape over a year ago, it was just a giant grind of a game. However, I know quality when I see it, and RS did its quests right.
Purple Ice They made it worse by making it extremely inactive and boring. Like they made RuneSpan as an excuse so RuneCrafting can become more "social".
nice b8 m8
Dat Guy Ain't it m8, cuz i r8 1/8
*****
My bad something didn't work right with youtube, I was responding to someone who posted "this voice makes it literally unlistenable and this video is stupid". I must've accidentally clicked yours without realizing my bad.
Dat Guy Np m8.
Gah! EVERY mmo dev NEEDS to watch this video. The reason I don't like so many mmos is that the quests are mundane and uninteresting. Most of the time, I just skip through the text boxes because I know all I'm going to have to do is collect stuff or kill things. What's worse is that in mmos you always get this huge world to explore, but you're never rewarded for exploring any of it because you have to follow all of these linear paths to complete your quests. God forbid you ever explore the map without a quest in that area, or else you're forced to turn back without ever getting anything done. It's like a big tease and it's just frustrating.
Yeah, they do realize that. They also realize that doing something new is a risk and since mmos cost millions of dollars not many companies are willing to take it. Though if you like exploration then I'd suggest GW2, it kinda gets boring after you max out a character(haven't played it in like a year tho, things prolly changed) but the point of quests is that you go around and find the actual quests already taking place. Also the game rewarded you for exploring and had many great jumping puzzles and vintage points to check out ; 3
The initial quest line leading into Icecrown in World of Warcraft. (Yep, WoW...) It was a good use of phasing to tie in the players actions to the actual landscape. Of course wow fails more times that it succeeds. I do remember enjoying the runescape stuff back in the day.
Timotheus24 How many WoW devs does it take to change a light bulb?
None. Working as intended.
Timotheus24 I can only speak for myself because I'm only, you know, myself, but a lot of the stuff you just mentioned, and along with the boring quest system used to just move you along is all part of why it's hard for me to get into an MMO. I've played most of the big ones, but I almost never get to max level and usually quit playing within a couple weeks or so. The only exceptions to that being The Secret World (because I just kept playing hoping for more investigation missions), Guild Wars 2 (I liked the main story) and Final Fantasy XIV: ARR (because I love FF and the main story was amazing for an MMO).
Joshua Smith "Soon"
Runescape is a very Nice MMO Game, i have there a cahr lvl 81 i think.. but i dont play Runescape anymore, because it changed alot! I miss the old Runescape.. :'/
Timotheus24 is that a joke?
The sense of exploration... That's all you need to make your RPG better than a novel or movie. As the developers get their hands on more flashy graphic engines and better computer tech nowadays, they tend to forget about that.
Why make your ideas into games if you can't give people an experience more engaging than reading a book? :/
pINKprotege agreed,
also there's action in player's control which is basicly the diffrence between any game and a book/movie
Hey now, what about Runescape? It had the same amount of crazy quests every now and then, and none of those grind quests! Give it a bit more love yall!
Now I'm sad I missed out on Everquest.
You should be both sad and glad at the same time. Both frustrating and glorious in it's own unique way.
It was basically OSRS quests but on ironman mode haha. If you want that hardcore grindy experience you can always try that Runescape config out!
(edit to the necrobump: Anarchy online is probably the last grand old MMO if you wanna check that out too, although it has been made more accessible with less death penalty and a dwindling community/economy, it is very oldschool for its questing experience.)
I've grown up playing everquest since I was 5, going on 12 years now
Same so much
One of my favorite idle hobbies is designing characters, worlds and quests for d&d campaigns. I say "idle," because no one gets what I'm trying to get them to do. None of my players seem interested in anything beyond the kill quest, and this rich, deep world I've poured hours into goes largely undiscovered. But the drive to create remains, so instead of running games anymore, I pursue this activity alone. This video is (literally) the first time anyone has ever pointed to my creative style and said, "This is what we should aspire to."
Dang-flib-flam-nammit. I should have been a game designer.
+VarianAlastair Write a novel, or a collection of short stories. It'll put your characters and settings to good use.
+badflamer Unfortunately, you can't just pop into a studio and be like "Hey folks, I'm really good at what I do, how about I join you?". And going indie doesn't really work when you're the only person.
+LumosX This is great advice.
Shit, you inspired me.
+VarianAlastair That is very interesting. Maybe you could try sharing your ideas online. For example, you can make videos and post them on TH-cam. I like DeviantArt, because I am comfortable with drawings. On the internet you have a large audience. Someone out there is bound to be interested in your creative ideas.
+VarianAlastair You should tots run a play by post game, those tend to be a bit more RP focused. Also I'd totally "help" by playing in one because I need my D&D fix, what with my group only meeting like every two goddamned months (Not that I'm bitter or anything :P). Especially if it's 4e. I mean, I like whatever, but 4e is my favorite (of the D&Ds at least) and I haven't gotten to play for like 3 years :(.
+VarianAlastair I was just thinking this is video is excellent advice for dungeon masters. Even if you can't write a book or make a video game, maybe try making a module for a ttrpg, or even make your own rpg if your world is fleshed out enough.
The ring story reminded me of STALKER: Call Of Pripyat where you could get a somewhat rare suit from an extinct faction and when you met a certain trader using that suit, he would mention how he is one of the few surviving members of that faction and that he had made that suit. This didn't result in any quest, but it's a great example how attention to lore makes a game great.
The STALKER series was one of the best open world games I have played. It is a shame that they don't make games like them anymore.
This is exactly why I loved Runescape. Not only did completing quests unlock a great variety of things (areas, items, minigames, shortcuts, name it) but they also had compelling stories, characters and puzzles. Each were entirely unique.
EQ was so under rated. Glad to hear someone speak on it.
I can't believe Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen didn't get the funding goal even with the fact that Brad did a lot of press. Maybe it's because of Vanguard and the fact that EverQuest is, well, kind of niche, and that's why investors aren't willing to invest.
Their goal was to just hope they attract investors with their money anyway, so maybe it'll work out.
It was? I thought EQ was a pretty big thing in its day.
That said, while EQ's quests were much more embedded in the game world than a crowd of !'s standing around waiting for you to get your free XP handouts, that's not to say it was all good. Epic quests, anyone?
"I need you to get me some special ingredients to make this lute for you, so go compete with all the guilds on this server to kill a dragon that takes an entire raid to defeat, will definitely be killed by another guild before you can try again if you fail your first attempt and may or may not actually drop the guts you actually need from it. Then do that 3 more times for the OTHER dragons just like it. Oh, did I mention these dragons also take at least a week to respawn to even give you another chance to be the first guild to get them? Have fun!"
Yeeeeah, no. EQ got at least as much wrong as it got right.
Shjade Oh absolutely, but it was almost the first of its kind. We had to start somewhere.
What made me fall in love with it was the lore, the class abilities, the alternate advancement. They knew how to keep you wanting to level your character, unlike the majority of games out there today.
Really fucked me up, because now all I want is a freaking game that has alternate advancement so I dont have to stop leveling!
Naw, not underrated, just did not age well. Same with FFXI. BEAUTIFUL GAME, the UI is extremely polished for what it is, but the UI is still awful.
aaron park First of its kind for many, many things. It didn't age well because it was made before gaming standards were derived.
The worst part is when these "standard" quests translate over into other games that aren't mmos...
*Cough* Xenoblade Chronicles *Cough*
I thought of Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch almost instantly when he said something about putting too many quests at the same time.
Problem is, in that game, they give you like a hundred quests at one point, and HOLY SHIT are the quests boring and tedious. It's to the point where I'm surprised some people even came CLOSE to 100%ing it, considering that I don't ever see myself getting more than 30% quest completion because most of them are finding a guy who is like, ' AHH I HAVE EMOTIONS ', and then giving those emotions to a guy who is like, ' AHH I HAVE NO EMOTIONS '. Which sounds like a normal Fed-Ex quest except when you realize that there are like TEN GUYS WHO NEED AND HAVE THE SAME EMOTION, BUT YOU CAN ONLY CARRY ONE OF THAT EMOTION AT A TIME.
Exactly and it's a toxic that trend that seems plaguing a lot of games nowadays.
I really hope you guys drop a mention to Runescape. For all of its quirks, for all of its oddities, the one thing that has always brought me back to the game are the quests. There are actual stories, the actions of the quests have meaning to the overall narrative of the gameworld. It can be really engaging at times.
You do the Secret World for quest design, but you don't do Runescape? Come on man, they've got awesome quests!
If there's one thing RuneScape has always done right, its quests.
It's true. The rest of the game may be grindy as hell and have atrocious sound quality but those quests.
All the quests are unique.
Hey, that's kinda true. I don't like Runescape really, but when I played it in highschool I don't remember there ever being a grindy quest. They all had stories and were engaging, very little hand-holding ever being involved.
That's true... It's been forever since I played, but then Runescape was never a "combat-focused" MMO to begin with. I think the fact that the game can get away with giving you a list of all of the quests available in the game immediately upon starting says something.
I know I'm a tad late, but...
The very fact that RuneScape exists makes it so much harder for me to take those whining about wanting better MMO quests seriously.
People keep on getting excited for such and such new or upcoming MMO because they heard the quests were "finally done right". GOD DAMNIT, RuneScape's been out for over 12 years. RUNESCAPE HAS THE KINDS OF QUESTS THEY'RE ALL LOOKING FOR BUT NOBODY WANTS TO GIVE IT A CHANCE.
Runescape quests, particularly the end game quests were awesome
Only reason Runescape quests aren't really a grind is because there aren't many of them and the whole game of runescape is a grind anyway. Gotta have something fun in there.
Dargonhuman
Go play a real MMORPG and you will find that you can do 200 quests in your first 2 or 3 hours.
200 isn't jack.
Dargonhuman
That's my point.
Runescape doesn't have many quests because each quest has (or usually does) a lot of content in it.
MMOs like WoW and FF XIV have them as well and have far far more than runescape but they still have tons and tons of filler.
Runescape doesn't have crap for quests.
Izzy Games And most importantly(as an avid runescape player) the quests in runescape are one of the most rewarding things in the game. Many many of the top tier, best-in-slot items in runescape are gotten through quests(Barrows gloves comes to mind instantly) which can only be gotten through questing and nothing else. whereas most other quests in MMOs seem to just give xp, gold, and possibly some weak item rewards.
Ne2o
Ya but the rest of runescape is tedious grind which is why it is this way. It's kind of a trade off.
Man, I never knew EverQuest was such an amazing game
Holy... that Everquest quest sounds really damn interesting... too bad it's in an MMO. I don't really like to play those.
Hm, maybe you would if they were like that? It got me curious enough to give it a try, that's for sure
And if a quest like this existed today. You would have wikis and mods to help you with it...
***** me too, but i wonder if i should try everquest 2 for better graphic, is everquest 2 share same quality of game design as everquest 1?
***** - I generally don't like multiplayer RPG's and such, I'm more comfortable with playing such games by my lonesome. And it's less taxing on my internet connection...
detected spy
I never played EQ1, but the two times I played up until lvl 20 in EQ2 there was nothing like what he described in the video...
This is also one of the big reasons why I much prefer Oblivion to Skyrim. Almost every quest in Oblivion had flavour and felt unique and memorable. Where as Skyrim just had you killing a lot of draugr in a lot of caves to fetch shit.
huh, never played Oblivion... I'll give it a try
Ah hello there dragonborn! I have a great quest for you, see. Now many years ago, there was this epic nord here, a really strong fella. He would fight anything, wasn't ever afraid. Now this man, he had a legendary sword, if you can get me that thing, I will get old wizard bob to enchant one of your tools.
Oh, where that sword is? In that cave with draugrs. Which one? Hell I dont know, they're all the same!
I recently restarted skyrim and I will have to disagree. Most of the quests are very unique and not simply dungeon clearing. There is also a lot of flavor in the form of notes and journals left by NPCs that explain the surroundings.
SchiferlED Don't remember if Oblivion did this better or worse, but more then half of the quests in Skyrim are about clearing generic dungeons, defeating a slighty more powerful Draugr (Or an extremely overpowered one...) and picking up two trinket at the end, one for some store owner somewhere, and one for yourself.
***** If you're going to be like that then it's pretty easy to argue that Daggerfalls lore would put Morrowind to shame but no one ever reasonably expects people to go and jump into that like it was nothing.
And I've played some Morrowind. It's fun but it hasn't exactly aged well, it's stiff and restrictive in quite a few ways.
Gotta start putting "has watched all episodes of Extra Credits multiple times" on my CV.
Everquest 1 was the height of MMO experience so far. Hopefully EQN can reach the same height or higher, because the valley that WoW and its many clones have left us in is ruining the genre.
Agreed! Project 99 for the win =)
Now I want to play Everquest.
the way you explain things is just amazing , i hope you´re a real life teacher.
James writes the episodes, and he lectures sometimes.
If I remember correctly he does sometimes give lectures, along with James, but mostly they work in game development. I think ; 3
great to know that , this knowledge should not be wasted.
James is.
baklazan777 James runs a consultation company, Dan works at Pixar as an animator.
Came out right on schedule. Perfect between my classes.
one of the reasons why i like Runescape despite the changes that has happene, is that there are no or at least for the most part repeatable quests. And there are no quest described here in that game(with the exception of One Small Favour) They are the only reason why I still play Runescape.
I have to agree on Runescape quests being tied into the more of the world. For those who prefer the other type RS also has somet hung called the Challenge System. If you prefer to kill X quantity of monster Y this is where you will find that.
+Adrienne Gormley I actually don't at all mind Kill X type of quests but I don't think they should be called Quests, rather Tasks and RS does exactly just that with Slayer which I love. My favorite skill.
+Flynn MacDonald Runescape is the first thing I thought of when I was trying to think of different quest models. Runescape quests are more like adventure games, where dialogue and exploration drive stories instead of objectives. Too bad it never really matured with its audience.
+Adrienne Gormley Slayer is actually properly the "grind quest" thing, challenges are just mini-goals.
I'm freaking stoked for this series! Can't wait for the next part.
How about upload it now?
Runescape (I'm talking about oldschool cause I haven't played the modern version) is definitely a grindy sort of game, however the quests are incredibly varied and interesting, usually involving some actual thinking and puzzle solving and a fun or entertaining story of some sort.
RuneScape has the best quest ever hands down
AaronsGame Yeah, just the entire rest of the game is the grindfest :P
AaronsGame
Runescape quests (at least modern ones) are bascially missions of a single player game slotted into an mmo. While they are undoubtedly amazing, and imo the best example of storytelling i have seen in an mmo, they take a massive amount of recources to produce a piece of content players will only play once. There's a very good reason why it's been 10 years since launch and many questlines still stand uncompleted.
AaronsGame i was about to mention it, it is truly great about quest design. It was my first mmo and so doing quests in WOW felt boring, because in runescape although the quests had start places you could see, but always became interesting and deep, and questlines were truly epic in scale. What would start so simple would end with the fate of kingdoms in the balance
I never really appreciated the quests in RS until just now watching this video, and seeing the comments. I guess it's because I don't play a lot of MMOs, my only one ever being RS, and I usually compare it to single-player games.
Lol James and his love of Everquest
Extra Credit hasn't played RuneScape, that MMO both the old school and live version have engaging quests.
RuneScape's quests kept me playing long after all my friends stopped playing.
Questing is the bomb in Runescape, especially higher level stuff that's extremely engaging, like The World Wakes or Ritual of the Mahjarrat. While not Everquest level of engagement, it's still really interesting and fun. (Especially if you don't follow the online guides!)
Or just quest that need to have completed other quest XD
I honestly found RuneScape's quest to be boring and too directed. I played "RuneScape Classic" when it was brand new - I think it was only out for 9 days, IIRC. I also played EverQuest - the person saying that RuneScape isn't as engaging as EverQuest is correct, but even in EverQuest, it never felt that engaging to me.
I played Tibia before either of those games though, that's probably why. You don't even know you're doing a quest in there, it's so natural. EverQuest borrowed the chat style quest thing from Tibia, but didn't implement it as well - When I played Tibia, there were none of the quest tropes, which EverQuest does have. (In the video, Kill rats in my basement - kill quest).
I recall one single "FedEx Quest" in Tibia, which funnily enough was working for the postal service. No kill quests, no escort missions, none of the other crap. More likely than not, you would be exploring and stumble upon the treasure that was the reward for some quest that you didn't even know about. It was easy enough to get information out of the NPCs, but it was nuanced - they didn't show you which key words would do something (I think they may do that now though) - you had to "talk" to them trying to find information. And all of the good talking points, they never brought up on their own.
It felt like the world was alive, and any quests or missions weren't something you'd have in a quest log or journal, something to complete for the sake of completing it. Nothing nagging you about not doing it - you had to want to do it, and you had to remember it yourself. But rarely was there any social or verbal "contract" in accepting a quest. "Hello there! I am [NPC], welcome to [shop], what can I do for you?" "What do you know about the troll cave north of the town" "Oh, well, I had a friend who ventured out that way a few weeks ago, but he never returned." End of conversation unless you keep talking. Now, if you are interested in finding this guy, dead or alive, you can. But the NPC never asked you to, you never accepted a quest. But now you know there's a probable corpse out there with some mediocre loot. Maybe you can bring closure for the shop owner and get rewarded for it. Maybe the guy is alive but stuck. Or maybe he was taken prisoner by the trolls! You never know, you'll have to go find out.
I really like the idea of making quest triggered by key words.
you should see runescape quests, they are much better than normal mmo quests
Absolutely!
Sadly its very modest rewards.
Buy p2p 4 gp So true. Very rarely the rewards were good... but that Barrelchest Anchor when it came out was amazing. I want more rewards like that in games
I see now why I quickly get bored when playing MMO games, the quests are too repetitive, like Aura Kingdom, for my example, it's simply the game with 99% of the quests being these 5 categories of common quests to grind levels quickly.
There has to be more creativity in the lore of the game world in order to make me interested in it. The example you provided here is interesting and could make more curiosity out of the game!
Anyway, I'm taking a fair amounts of interest in the incoming game: Tree of Savior.
There's a plethora of things you can do there than just questing. I'd like to see where that goes ^^
Your videos are incredibly helpful. Thank you!
Great topic! I wish the videos were longer so we could let these rambles go longer. :)
I would not mind if they extended the videos by even 3 minutes, just to go a little more in depth.
although they definitely do a great job at getting to the point, and explaining said point.
Indeed. Most of the videos I watch tend to be 7-ish minutes anyway, so it'd be nice if they weren't afraid of going a little longer. I still love everything EC is able to discuss though. :D
Steve Peters I think that would be perfectly reasonable, there are youtubers that talk for longer than 8 minutes, and they have much less to say in that time. Really popular ones too! I'd like if these guys would make videos much longer - maybe even as long as 20 minutes - but I guess that would quickly become a pain to animate.
I think that the biggest problem with modern quest design, in MMOs especially, is the wiki/FAQ culture. That example 'bartender's daughter's ring' quest sounds like it would be really great, except that within the first few days of its introduction, it'll be on the wiki, and then everyone will know exactly how to do it, and what the potential reward can be, and at that point it just turns into another fetch quest, so why would the game designer bother to put effort into that kind of quest, if most players are to impatient to actually come across the elements organically?
THIS. This is the answer I have been searching for for years now; the reason why I haven't been enjoying online rpgs. I've tried so many, just to leave them mere hours later feeling dissatisfied. I had to know the reason why World of Warcraft, the single most popular game in the world, couldn't hold my interest for longer than 30 minutes - and now, I finally understand. Thank you, noble sir.
If you get up to around level 20, you can start running Instances. That is where the game starts to pick up pace, where challenge and strategy (used to) come in to play. If you didn't play long enough to reach Wailing Caverns or Deadmines, then you didn't play long enough to form a fair opinion on the game.
Lordsilverhand The days of the great immersive experiences that games like EQ or FFXI in particular were, are long gone. Now pretty much all we have left are these quest and instance grinders since WoW popularized this. I wish there was a new option for those not so casual players that just can't deal with this "standard" WoW model we have nowadays and want more out of their games.
I've been hoping to find a game that catches me the way FFXI did, and lasts me as long or longer (that game kept me interested for almost 7 years). I had high hopes for FFXIV, but then it shut down when it was getting good and A Realm Reborn came out... :/
Well to be honest, the reason why you don't like any MMOs now is because they are MMOs instead of MMORPGs. You might like the channel of Corpsealot as he often talks about subjects like that. Full channel name is Corpsealot the Harbinger of Games.
herogamer555 Thanks for the info - I'll have to check him out here later.
Lordsilverhand Asheron's Call if you haven't given it a shot. Dated graphics... granddaddy of them all. Free to play once you play like 10 bucks.
This is why I love the crazy writing in EVE Online....
***** ;) look for them.
***** EVE has quests?
***** Oh people do them, you'd be surprised. And they all have very clever flavor text.
"Objects weren't just about stat gain."
Nice job showing an inventory full of TF2 hats... hats which don't affect the player's stats at all :P
That ring story sounds really sweet. The gameplay style hasn't changed much ... fetch quest, delivery quest ... but the story adds so much more.
I had a good experience with 9 Dragons. It's kind of a samey, grindy asian MMO. However, each of the 6 Clans has a unique and clever chain of quests you have to do to join them. Makes for a pretty fun first 10 levels.
For example, to become a member of the Brotherhood of Thieves one of the things you have to do is get the skin of a tiger. This is impossible, so one of the boss' subordinates pulls you aside and says it's good enough if you just get a tuft of tiger's hair. The catch? Tigers are a high level monster. So what you end up having to do is successfully score at least 1 hit on this thing before it kills you and then just run like hell.
I found Shaolin especially entertaining. Almost don't wanna spoil it.
That reminds me of the older Maple Story when it was still new. Although it never was explicitly stated, the quest locations made players to have to travel through high level areas to continue their journey. I loved that, because it was a challenge to sneak past monsters that can kill you easily. The traveling between towns was actually enjoyable rather than monotone walking.
Of course nowadays the game is just too easy.
Daniel Alonso
Ha yeah Maplestory. :D
I used to spend hours in Sleepywood farming for ores... not because I needed ores, but because I enjoyed the challenge of the platform puzzles. Kerning City Sewers were fun for the same reason.
One thing I hate about quest is that the feel arbitrary at times like getting a quest to kill say boars. You kill them and then the NPC gives the next quest to go to the same area and kill wolves now. It makes you stop caring about why you do the quest if not just for experience and the next string of quest to get to the endgame.
This video reminded me so much of Morrowind.
I absolutely loved your Everquest example. I've never played the game myself, but I think this episode really helped me understand one of the reasons why I'm so sick of most MMOs.
Looking forward for part 2! This is a fantastic subject.
Think this can be applied to any game that has quests. For example; Final Fantasy XIII: Lightning Returns forces you to do quests in order to make Lightning stronger (increases base stats, give new schemata with higher stats, gives items to boost stats of schemata, etc.) instead of just fighting enemies to get stronger. But the quests aren't the least bit engaging and fall under many basic MMO quests you outlined.
It is called level grinding. Lots of JRPG's do this sort of thing to make it last longer. While most western RPG's give a lot of XP boost for completing quests.
The difference is that you can just grind by killing monsters to gain levels while in Lightning Returns there are no levels. You don't level up in the traditional sense in that you beat monsters so you can get stronger and you get more exp. for doing quests. In this game, you don't level up during fights or by completing quests, you literally just get stat boosts and you only get stat boosts by completing quests. This forces players to do the quests instead of just grinding, but the quests don't make sense, aren't engaging (from a story point), and are just down right boring (simple fetch quests, kill all the monsters, etc.). This is worse than just mindlessly beating the same enemies.
Scourge626 The thing about Lightning Returns: FFXIII, though, is due to how the ability combining/equipping system works, there is a limited grind effect in the game, though. When you combine even white abilities beyond a certain point, they will turn green and begin to confer a stat boost.
Many of them are boring fetchquests, but I disagree that *all* of them are. The quest where you have to dodge cats lest they steal your secret elixir was pretty awesome. Also, FFXIII-3 is a little bit better in that most of the "kill x monsters" quests are things you generally do automatically while completing the main storyline. You very rarely have to go seek out packs of mobs to grind.
Also, it should be said that the battle system in FFXIII-3 is FAR more engaging than in any MMO, meaning that even the "kill x monsters" quests are generally more entertaining than they would be in WoW or FFXIV.
The point I'm making is that for any game that makes you do quests, they should follow what this video is saying. The quests in Lightning Returns aren't engaging (in the story related sense) so the only reason you do them is to get stronger, not because you actually care about the people (some people may, but I'd say a majority of the people who play this game found most of the missions boring and only completed them so they could beat the game). And because you didn't level up by fighting enemies, you had no choice but to do quests. If you are going to force people to do quests like that then they better be fun and the stories attached to them better be engaging.
Seriously, look at Runescape quests. They're the BEST goddamn thing in the game, and are the best quests in all MMOdom.
People say the story is good. Is it just that? What do they usually ask you? Could you tell me plz?
***** That is an extremely complicated question.
The best quest I've ever experienced was in Fallout: New Vegas. It started as a simple fetch quest: go to Vault 11 and grab a filter. When you get there. you see an abandoned Vault, some dead bodies (where in FO that doesn't have some) and a mysterious recording. The game then tell you there's a quest to know WTF was going on, but really it's not necessary. So you journey deeper into the Vault to find the answer (and that filter too).
If you are the type that just rush on to finish the quest, you'll miss the tons of details are they put into the Vault and the story behind it. You can pick up the filter and leave; or you can journey even deeper to finally realize the fuck up things that happened there.
That's my favourite way to story telling in videogames: showing without telling and especially not holding you down and barf cut scenes into your face until you drown.
Those 5 quests type is the worst thing that has come into MMOs.
Sees a ring --> "There is gonna be a LotR reference"
3:03 --> "Here it is"
i wonder if it would be a good thing to let players write their own quest log? like, give every player a personal journal of some sorts...
I learned something new about Everquest today. Never knew it as that deep. Guess I should've given it more time. I just didn't because I didn't like the visuals, which weren't really pretty even when it was brand new.
Perfect example of not judging if a game will be fun or not, based on how it looks or its resolution. :}
Back when this game was first released, I was into Ultima Online, which looked a lot better due to its over head 2d visuals. You are right though, I should've looked past the visuals. Hopefully it's not too late to get into it. My biggest fear is not finding any people to adventure with.
Joseph Grutt They recently released or are about to release a new version of everquest. Its not as big as it used to be, but still has a good sizable community to play with.
Everquest, mmm.
I remember being the first person to discover Crystal Caverns on my server when Velious was released. I found it because the dwarves in Thurgadin talked about a lost expedition and this got me curious. When I found this dungeon I received no direct rewards(Items/Platinum/etc.) but I had the privilege of having Crystal Caverns all to myself for the next few days (Before trains made it a hassle /cough)
It was awesome. The extra credits guys are correct on this one, modern questing systems are garbage.
Hi guys... there's a new and interesting game that just appeared on Newgrounds and I highly suggest you to play it..., it's called "Inner Vision", it's short, it's free(since it's on the internet) and it's just one of those games that tries to focus on the decisional, dialogue, art part... or something.. damn that was a vague description, but I don't want to spoil anything, so if you have a few minutes just play it... No questions asked
Bah, no mention of RuneScape? That game had excellent quests.
***** uh no.. its definitely a Role-playing game, just because it doesn't have a more so free movement system doesn't suddenly make it a point and click even though some of the quests I think we're sort of rub item A onto object B.
I used to play a lot fo runescape. I will admit I remember the quests being quite fun, mainly because they were all story based and weren't very grindy at all. But then again maybe that's just my nostalgia talking.
***** well I wouldn't know.. I haven't played it for years now but at least 5+ years ago, it was really good even if the combat sucked. (which is one of the reasons I never got back into it either, didn't quite understand the changes and didn't want to learn how to use it.)
Welp, I was excited for them to talk about RS quests, and now I'm sad.
***** Runescape is great, there are literally 3 fetch quests in runescape out of almost 200 and all three are jokes at how bad a standard fetch quest is. there is also a fedex quest done right where every spot you take the follower to gives you some dialogue. then there are quite a lot of get this and that item quests but those are almost always logical items that are one way or another quest related.
I lost it at 3:16 how about you guys?
Lee Lee is just my absolute favourite.
Wow, so that quest design you mentioned in Everquest sounds amazing. It reminds me a LOT of the older Bethesda games which is absolutely awesome.
I know you said Everquest and The Secret World, but are there any other MMOs with fun gameplay (read: combat) as well as a similar style of awesome quests? I've been trying a few lately and none quite do it for me. The text is all skip-worthy
Hi Extra Credits! I've been a viewer for years now, but often I just passively watch your videos, nod my head and understand pretty much everything you cover. I don't know what's in store for your next part on your critique of MMOs, but I'd like to throw in my two cents.
I've only _just now_ started playing MMOs, barring Runescape while I was in middleschool. However, I'd like to add that it certainly can bore a player when they realize their entire MMO quest experience are the same 5 formulas, *unless* the game designers put enough effort into crafting together intriguing dialogue and more meaning into your questions. If the quest is written and presented in an excited, humorous or even ironic manner, it can suspend cynicism for a while, or even make the player feel motivated to put priority over a new quest over other ones.
But this is coming from a total amateur who hasn't seen everything in an MMO yet.
Guildwars2
I'm so glad at the end you mentioned about the TONNES of quest games nowadays are so fond of giving out to players. Divinity Original Sin was such a good game, but what spoilt it for me was... on the way to solve ONE quest, I get three more. And in trying to finish those four quests, I get SIX more. Eventually, my quest log looks like a to-do list full of Have-Tos instead of Want-Tos.
The grindy/boring quests are also what kept me out of MMO for the last half of my life.
Thank you for EVERYTHING you are doing on this channel. I love you guys.
4 paragraphs on my dream mmorpg:
this is what i usually think about when i try to imagine a "perfect" mmorpg that will fix what i dont like about them. i usually come up with a really complex skill system, with learnable skills ranging from cooking and summoning to pushing, lifting and detecting. i imagine skills being your main tools for interacting with the world, and there never being one single solution.
say a group of players are exploring a dungeon when a boulder traps them inside. players will then go through their skills and attempt them on the boulder, such as pushing it, blowing it up with magic, or taming a nearby rock-eating monster to deal with it.
there would need to be random elements to a certain degree, so that the players never know for sure what they will encounter. a swamp that posed no problem one day may be flooded the next day, and an npc might be in a different mood from before, or on vacation. a lot of these unpredictable situations will be influenced by a hunger or fatigue meter, and all skills, passive or active, will be influenced by the players stats.
the player would decide what the goal of the game is. this could be completely up to the player, but im imagining that each new character will get to pick "life goals" from a list, with tasks mainly about self-fulfillment, such as becoming strong enough to face a certain boss, or learning a certain recipe for a crafting profession. these would be updated periodically, for example if the developers see that many players successfully raid the castle of an evil overlord, they may update it in the next patch so that he is killed off and the castle is in ruins, and giving credits to the players that successfully killed him before. this way, an available life goal for a new character might be "bring peace to kingdom x" while in the next patch this may have already happened.
players can then pick the goals they feel would be the most fun to pursue, and along the way they will encounter unpredictable problems, such as the town of their mentor npc on their quest of knowledge being infested with zombies when they return. the player may then choose to train physically and pummel through, learn dark magic to befriend the zombies, granting safe passage, or abandoning the goal altogether and pursuing a different goal, such as mastering a profession or exploring a continent. kind of like some of the bigger achievement in wow, but made into the main goal of the game, and with slight RNG and continuous tiny updates from the developers giving the player the need to master a wide variety of skills and using them in new ways, OR working with people who have the in-game skills or problem solving skills they lack.
+Cupriferous Catalyst Play the first two Star Ocean. Almost fits in what are you saying.
+Enmanuel Tejada Asencio What part of description ?
+filip gvozdiak *of the description
Yes! One of the reasons I DON'T play MMOs is because most of them have the same types of BORING quests systems.
You generally play for the extra content, stuff like the combat or the end game. Questing is essentially an introduction, it teaches you the game mechanics in a fairly non-painful away.
Neighborbob The quests didn't teach me anything. If it's an actual tutorial quest, then that would be fine. But if I wanted to practice fighting monsters, I don't need a quest to do it.
I REALLLLLYYYYY enjoy SWTOR's class quests, it is my favorite part of the game and i encourage everyone to at least a couple of classes while doing the class quests. My favorites are Agent's, Warrior's and Sorcerer's, go do them, it's F2P anyway.
This is what I'm hoping for in ESO.
ESO will make or break the MMO industry for the time being.
I've heard that being said about every popular_before_it's_out video game ever.
Previews don't seem too promising. Just more generic quest grinding.
Played the beta, it's pretty much a boring grind. It's like they're trying to avoid being compared to WoW by just taking what worked about WoW, and what worked about Skyrim, and throwing all of that out the window.
Dagda Mor The had to, because what worked in Skyrim won't work with a hundred people playing it at once.
That was particularly interesting. I have never played Everquest, my MMO experience began with WoW, which I did very much enjoy for a time.
I have no desire to knock the game, many do still enjoy it, but after years of playing I realised that WoW had become a job, a grindy job that I did more to please people in game than any sense of enjoyment. The enjoyment I got was in SPITE of the quests and the nature fo the game instead of because of it.
So I found what you said about Everquest quite interesting and am really looking forward to seeing what you have to say about The Secret World.
Also, as an aspiring designer I'm really interested in different ways of delivering an enjoyable quest experience.
Thanks for the video, this seems like it will be really interesting!
You know having you explain how EQ1 worked... now I wish EQ2 worked that way. I remember trying one as a kid (aged 12 I think) and I was insanely lost on what to do. Now I wish all MMOs followed this...
This is the reason I have poured dozens upon dozens of hours into Fallout:NV.
Helping get junkies off the street. Deciding what clans live and die. Convincing a tribe to stray away from Caesar. Getting a suave Mexican man into prostitution.
I have written countless pages of quest design theory based on NV alone.