Richard Garriott, NCSoft Finally Reveal Tabula Rasa

An anonymous reader writes "GameSpy has released the first concrete details on Ultima creator Richard Garriott's PC sci-fi MMORPG, Tabula Rasa, after years of development at Destination Games and NCSoft. The game promises to do away with MMO annoyances such as excessive 'travel time', indicating: 'one of the first elements added to the game was the ability to teleport to a friend - not as a power, but merely as an ability inherent to anyone in the world.' The combat system (in which the developers 'took inspiration from console titles like Soul Calibur II') and level structure is also more unconventional: 'The bulk of the game outside of the Hubs and the Estates is focused on squad-based cooperative gameplay in instanced missions that are available to anyone.'" GameSpy also has first in-depth details on another NCSoft title, Auto Assault, offering "[massively multiplayer] car combat in a Mad Max-type universe."

NCSoft

[JMZero]

NCSoft is building up quite a stable of MMORPGS. While it remains to be seen how many of them are going to be high quality, I think should consider an "all-access" pass (like Sony, only with different games to play). I can see players being really into Lineage II or City of Heroes - but also enjoying an occasional car pileup.

The market will only support so many monthly subscriptions at once - but they could ensure themselves a bigger slice of that pie by offering a bit of a buffet.

Where is the fun?

[Anonymous Coward]

I just wish that someone would make a game that featured something similar to UO's treasure hunter. Nothing was more fun that spending the day fishing for maps and then heading out at night to find the treasure.

A Combat System...

[Zangief]

like the one in Soul Calibur 2?. That would mean that, no matter how much time you played, or which level you are, some annoying kid mashing the keyboard could give you a good kicking in the ass.

3D fighters = button mashing = suckiness.

My Thoughts on Design

[Wtcher]

It's very interesting the way they approached the design of the game. Instead of pouncing on a smattering of ideas and play mechanics and pushing them together, Long and Garriott whent back to basics and tried to figure out exactly what makes games fun, and how they could narrow down gameplay to these specifications. Instead of making "just another MMO game", they're trying to do something newish and somewhat untried by combining many styles of play and interaction from various different genres. While it's not completely free of derivation (*grin*), the concepts just may work - perhaps not altogether, but overall the game sounds like a pleasure. I suppose in a way, this sounds like those cross-genre titles that've been failing to dominate sales in the past decade, but the problem with them is that [I suspect oft-times] the developers took discrete and traditional modes of play [for those genres] and tried to cobble them together with narry a thought about how players would appreciate them and how the game experience would be altered according to the mindsets that came with them.

There are specific design processes that they are utilizing here that are significant, irregardless of their knowledge of them - they're trying to focus on how users experience and deal with/enjoy games instead of just trying ideas out in a shotgun approach.

I think I'm going to put my money on it when it finally debuts.