New Technique To Help Develop MMORPG Content? 71
ShipLives writes "Researchers have developed a new method that can predict MMORPG player behavior. The tool could be used by the game industry to develop new game content, or to help steer players to the parts of a game they will enjoy most. I don't think it should replace user feedback, but it's a pretty cool data-driven approach. Ideally, it could help developers make good decisions about new games/expansions."
They needed a research group... (Score:4, Insightful)
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Really? 2007 called, they want their rick-rolling back.
User feedback is overrated (Score:5, Insightful)
Asking users what they think is generally a bad approach to game development. People don't really know what they want. Your questions are likely to be leading (you are not a professional pollster). They might lie about what they found to be difficult if they're embarrassed about losing, or alternatively they might demand that everything get simplified because they want to win, not realizing that it wouldn't be fun if it were too easy. And in competitive games, forget about it. Every class/weapon/tactic that kills them must be nerfed, whatever they like to use must be buffed.
It's far more effective to simply watch them play the game, without speaking to them at all, and see what frustrates them, what confuses them, what they enjoy, and so on.
Unfortunately, the method in TFA(bstract) seems to just evaluate player behavior based on what achievements they have. That will, apparently, tell you what aspects of the game they like best, but it's not going to help much with the small stuff. I suspect Blizzard is already gathering that data anyway.
Re:User feedback is overrated (Score:5, Interesting)
But then you come to the balance between enjoyment and grief. Sure, you may take enjoyment from raiding a rival faction's cities, but at the same time, if someone raided your city and took your stuff that you had worked hard to accomplish, the shoe is on a totally different foot. The classic PK/Non-PK dilemma. It works for some, but most people get more frustrated with the loss than they feel the reward of the victory, especially when it happens multiple times in a row.
You're right about the "amusement park with security guards" aspect, however. The MMORPG addiction equation is about making the player feel that they're accomplishing something through their actions, the human delayed gratification response. "If I just do this now, I'll get X, which will let me do Y!" But then you get X, and there's a brand new X to get, then another, then another, etc -- and "Y" is usually just a means to get a different X anyway. But that doesn't mean that games need to be construed so narrowly, only toward that specific reward mechanism.
Another way to reward players is to let them feel that they're really having an impact in changing their world -- that they've modified something that others will experience in a durable manner. This could be anything -- tunnelling an underground palace, permanently wiping out a kingdom of orcs, inventing a new type of attack or spell that can be taught to other players, etc, etc -- the possibilities are endless. The ability to point to something concrete and say, "I did that!", is the same reward mechanism that drives the FOSS movement (among countless other endeavors of humanity ;) ). Making gaming world be able to be durably modified is often more difficult to code than "amusement park" style games, but is a worthwhile endeavor. Weaknesses to this system are that if making change in the world is too easy, it has no meaning.
Most games have some degree of involving a third powerful human reward mechanism: social interaction. But they can do way more. Look at how many people Facebook has sucked in. Ostensibly social interaction may be a secondary, tertiary, or whatnot purpose of the game, way below "saving the galaxy from aliens" or "keeping the zombies from overrunning the countryside". But it really isn't, and developers shouldn't treat it that way. The social networking aspects in the game should be well thought out and well developed. You want it so that when they disconnect from the game for several days, they feel disconnected. Note that the social interaction aspect is generally not something that will keep people in the game on its own; it simply amplifies the feeling of needing to return and helps make experiences within the game feel more meaningful.
There are a variety of other human reward mechanisms which can be exploited in various degrees, but usually only the first reward mechanism is stressed.
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Ah... Slashdot is not quite dead - a comment far more interesting than the article :-)
Mod up, please.
Re:User feedback is overrated (Score:4, Interesting)
Another way to reward players is to let them feel that they're really having an impact in changing their world -- that they've modified something that others will experience in a durable manner.
This is one thing that always brings me back to A Tale In The Desert [atitd.com]. It's not the prettiest game in the world, and can definitely be awkward at times, but it's unique in it's mutability. For those unfamiliar, every aspect of the game is democratic. Don't like something? Then write a law and attempt to convince others to pass it. For example: a resource that is needed for certain recipes is cactus sap. To get this cactus sap you have to cut the cactus and wait for it to come out after a few minutes. Common courtesy is that, when done, you cut the cactus for the next person to make their time shorter. Someone decided there ought to be a law that when you collect sap, you auto cut the cactus. This saves you clicks (1 click to cut and collect vs. 2) and it means there will always be sap for the next person. Everyone loved the idea, it was passed into law, and the developer implemented it. It's a beautiful system.
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I think using data and listening to feedback and using common sense about what rational conclusions can be drawn is all helpful, but each has bias.
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A good number of them will go through 90% of all available achievements just because they are there to go through.
Is the title for completing 100% of all achievements called "Mom! Bathroom!"?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffjBxA-cnbM [youtube.com]
http://www.southparkstudios.com/full-episodes/s10e08-make-love-not-warcraft [southparkstudios.com]
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I somewhat agree with what you're saying but I think valuable feedback particularly for MMOs can still be gained by listening to users.
I think Dark Age of Camelot was a fine example of Mythic doing a bad job of this, when they release a new character class into the game that's capable of killing 4 other equally or more skilled players simply by virtue of the fact that class is overpowered, and you have thousands and thousands of users screaming about it on forums but then choose to ignore it anyway and not
Feedback Is For Sissies (Score:4, Insightful)
Fuck that.
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Incorporating feedback is the death of creativity.
I suppose that's why all the really great writers don't listen to editors, and all the really great scientists ignore peer review. Obviously, unbounded chaos is the epitome of creativity!
Oh, wait...
Incorporating feedback intelligently is the soul of creativity
FTFY
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Then as soon as the two hop between the sheets, the show is ruined, and not long for the airwaves.
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Asking users what they think is generally a bad approach to game development.
If you want a great example of this, look at Final Fantasy XIV.
Now, you might think with the game being as big a failure as that one, that they should be listening to fans and closely as it's obvious that the developers have absolutely no clue what makes a good game. You'd be wrong, because the only people answering are the people still playing.
They added a feature to mark which enemies "aggro" (attack you without provocation). Now, you might be thinking "doesn't just about every MMO do this?" or "didn't FF
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It's far more effective to simply watch them play the game, without speaking to them at all, and see what frustrates them, what confuses them, what they enjoy, and so on.
Are emotions visible and obvious without speaking to players? What about seeing a player going over one part of a map again and again tells you it's 'frustrating' or 'enjoyable' for them? Did you mean physically sitting next to them, because the article is about predicting in-game actions.
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MMO's like WoW are constantly at odds with themselves. They want the world to be "dynamic" and changing based on the user's decisions, but they can't just make everything happen at random. There is always a *story* that must be followed. They want the game to be challenging, but ultimately the point is to sell subscriptions and make money, which means the game has to be 'simple' enough for the lowest common denominator. Players who constantly get their asses handed to them are likely to leave. Winning is fu
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"Asking users what they think is generally a bad approach to game development."
If the game industry of the last 10 years is anything to go by they need a lot more feedback. I think what you meant to say was - most feedback isn't very useful but that that top 10-20% of feedback is golden. What game developers really need is feedback from people who have a good skills articulating what is good/bad with the game.
Feedback is good, the problem is getting quality feedback is hard. If you think the game indust
The most boring life... (Score:3)
How long 'til what I wanted yesterday no longer represent an interest today?
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How long 'til what I wanted yesterday no longer represent an interest today?
Uh, one day? :)
Anyone else? (Score:2)
Anyone else find tfa stupid?
“For example,” Roberts says, “you could develop a program to steer players to relevant content. Because it is a data-driven modeling approach, it could be done on a grand scale with minimum input from game designers.”
They are saying this as if game designers regularly sit on servers telling users where to go, they are also implying the game will suggest where the players will 'go'. I dont see how this is related in anyway to developing new mmo content.
One interesting element of these findings is that the achievements that are highly correlated – or part of the same clique – do not necessarily have any obvious connection. For example, an achievement dealing with a character’s prowess in unarmed combat is highly correlated to the achievement badge associated with world travel – even though there is no clear link between the two badges to the outside observer.
Here they admit some correlations dont make sense so all they are saying is these achievements seem to be done by users together. Is this what passes for a 'new technique' and 'research' now? it looks like something from steam stats could do pre
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Hey! Listen! Listen! Hey! Link! Listen! Listen! Hey!
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They are saying this as if game designers regularly sit on servers telling users where to go, they are also implying the game will suggest where the players will 'go'. I dont see how this is related in anyway to developing new mmo content.
Perhaps I am misunderstanding you, but modern MMOs commonly do indeed tell the player where to go next. Between quest trackers and breadcrumb quests, it is unusual in any MMO these days to be standing in a field with no overt guidance.
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The veritable Mr Bartle discussed this a short while ago: http://www.youhaventlived.com/qblog/2009/QBlog170509A.html [youhaventlived.com]
-Jar
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Hmm quite. Venerable was the word I was going for. FAIL on my part...
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Actually I was just looking at that pair of correlated achievements (unarmed combat and exploration) in the article.
And I know exactly why they are correlated; because only people who make a point of collecting achievements will do them.
Noone in WoW goes around hitting things with no weapon equipped unless they are going for that achievement.
Noone in WoW will completely explore every zone in the game unless they are going for that achievement.
Someone who does either of these is highly likely to be AN ACHIEV
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No, not stupid at all. Remember, when they say "content," they mean advertising and premium paid content. A MMORPG is about making money, so once a player has joined, the question becomes where to put the toll gates to maximize income and minimize player loss.
or let them fire developers (Score:2)
'congrats boss, we just figured out a way to eliminate another bunch of labor costs'
"great! if only henry ford could see me"
'actually, i think henry ford raised all of his people, even the janitors, to something like 5 times the going wage'
"oh. i never liked him anyway, he was a nazi."
"no clear link" ? (Score:3)
"For example, an achievement dealing with a character’s prowess in unarmed combat is highly correlated to the achievement badge associated with world travel – even though there is no clear link between the two badges to the outside observer."
Am I the only one who sees a really clear link between those two things? I did both back when I played wow -- for the same reason. I was achievement farming, for no real reason except it was something to pass the time doing waiting for a raid or PVP queue to pop.
Neither are things I ever even would have thought to bother with, except suddenly they presented a checklist of Things To Do, so I went and mindlessly did them.
I don't play WoW anymore, but back when I was -- I have a pretty clear memory of my guildies, and I swear, everyone who would have gone and gotten one of those were the people who I bet went and got the other, later. They weren't, of course, the sane* people who mostly ignored ToDo List of Boredom (except the raid ones, because you got a kickass mount out of it).
* no I wasn't sane.
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Someone else in the thread pointed out that user experience questionnaires are seldom written by professional pollsters and usually loaded with leading questions. Achievements are t
Achievements (Score:2)
There are of course an endless variety of reasons why people play MMORPGs and what they are interested in doing while there. I know a lot of people who deliberately chose to rack up all the badges they could in various MMORPGs because they are completionist types when playing. Does it make any sense to me? Not at all, but that doesn't mean it doesn't appeal to a segment of the population. I think its a mistake to assume that no one enjoys that sort of thing just because you and your friends in the game do n
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Evidently you never rolled a rogue or shaman, since Fist Weapons used Unarmed weapon skill.
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Time for /. to allow those with Excellent Karma to report spam-dudes like this.
Did they even ask? (Score:2)
Really, no clear link? Did they even ask one player? These are both low-h
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Really, no clear link? Did they even ask one player? These are both low-hanging fruit for the solo completionist.
This is also why the "automated suggestions" they propose would be laughable.
"We noticed your mage spent countless hours walking to every corner of the world, to get a badge that no-one is impressed by and which does not impact gameplay. Perhaps you would enjoy spending countless hours looking for low-level mobs to punch?"
Eliminate Players (Score:4, Interesting)
Really, the most annoying part of a mumorpuger is the "community" that forms like an accretion disk around the game itself, usually a bunch of pushy whining kids who won't ever be satisfied, will always feel underpowered with their favourite in-game character, and threaten to leave to other games for years instead of packing up and leaving.
If there was a technology to eliminate actual players from those games, it would improve the communities a lot. We are finally getting closer to a point where it becomes possible. Exciting times.
Subscription MMO's (Score:1)
Well ... (Score:2)
How about finally moving past the usual crap of "travel to location X, kill as many monsters of type Y until you've collected Z items of the specified type"???
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If only it didn't map so well to real life...
ITT: Goto X to kill Ys to collect Zs.
- Get to the office to kill hours of your life hunting bugs.
Predictive (Score:3)
Players have a desire to perform repetitive tasks 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
Players seem to enjoy movement in a cross-stitch pattern, picking herbs, mining, and skinning hides
Players are more predictable than the predictive model predicts.
Bad game design means the "content" doesn't matter (Score:3)
When you design a game with stats and grinding as the key to keeping players going, that is when developers get locked into needing new content to keep the players interested. Many single player games have a fairly large world, but because everything is STATIC, and does not really change, other than introducing new NPCs or doing the occasional update, you end up with a pretty boring game WORLD, where expanding on the world is the source of keeping things interesting.
If the game world were more dynamic, with a true economy and world that evolves over time, where NPC thieves look around the game world for things to steal, or just to survive, and where all NPCs actually live their lives, with or without player involvement, THEN you get a more interesting environment. Humans that are monitoring the world so that players can't "game the system" would of course be needed, but AI needs to become the center of a solid MMO, and letting the world evolve.
If you play a character, and you travel to a town, every NPC would have a history and story that has evolved from interaction with other NPCs as well as interaction with the players. Once you get THAT sort of situation down, the game world itself provides the changes to content, and developers can focus on larger events, such as earthquakes, floods, or other natural disasters. Underground cave complexes could open up to add more monsters to the world, but in general, people should find entertainment just in wandering and exploring the world, because it SHOULD be large enough where it would take players a long time just to go from one end of the world to the others.
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The article's methodology also doesn't accurately differentiate b
Clippy The Barbarian (Score:1)
I see you want to play a game! Would you like to:
- Earn achievments?
- Kill some not-too-hard enemies?
- Enjoy a cutscene with scantily-clad ladies?
- Mine gold?
Oh, we've had this for years (Score:2)
What type of gamer are you? [ihobo.com] It already figures out what sorts of gameplay people enjoy, and based on anecdotal feedback, most people seem to agree it's relatively accurate.
Wow (Score:1)
From the article it sounds like they figured out that people who liked getting achievements were more likely to get more achievements even if the achievements were not related to one another.... SHOCKER.
MRPG (Score:2)
It's time to embrace the somewhat shorter abbreviation MRPG. Massive Role Playing Game. If it is massive, it is multi. If it is massive, it is online. The second M and the O are redundant.