Myst Online: URU Live Forums :: View topic - Live DRC Events: Good? Bad? Alternatives?

Doug Parker

Joined: 28 Oct 2006

Posts: 696

Personally, I think that chatlogs are entirely adequate. In smaller towns & smaller situations, people get their information via newspapers. Not everyone is able to attend company meetings when they are held, but companies often have newsletters that go over the major details. Not every company has the resources to make a podcast, or do a closed circuit broadcast of their company meetings. Not everyone would buy the DVD's or videotapes (It's like a square DVD) anyway. Sometimes company meetings have things that newsletters do not have. Sometimes, you win T-shirts. I've always accepted this as a fact of life. I've never demanded T-shirts from the company that I worked for. (One time, I did negotiate for a gymbag with the company logo on it, though)

That said, I suppose it would be entirely possible, and not too hard to create some sort of D'ni "holodeck". In most games, this would be a saved game viewer. Surely, the server keeps track of where all the players are. Maybe, it could save everything in some sort of a log. The 'DHD' (alternate usage) would then get information about the age that conference took place in, then it would play the log of the event. It would be just as if that person were actually there. The difference being that he wouldn't get any answers from any questions that he or she asked. There would still be lag, depending on the player's computer, but maybe there could be crowd density controls.

Alternately, these logs could be played in some of these viewers that we don't use. Maybe the pub viewers could be utilized. Maybe, certain pubs could be repaired. There could be a program that would choose a perspective where the speaker was in view, then construct a two dimensional clip based on this perspective. Maybe, fans could then dub the presentation, so that people could understand what was going on. Another possibility is different colored text. Information from a viewer could be simplified to ViewerQuestion: & ViewerSpeaker:. This would be a lot harder solution to implement, though.

I think NP characters are important to a healthy functioning URU game -- especially for MORE. Aside from user content, there will be nothing new. It is entirely understandable that those that just want to play ages will be in to do their journeys, then out when they are completed. I have no problem with that. For those that linger in the cavern, I think it's good to have a sense that things are happening. While we are waiting for things to happen, it's nice to get the impression that things are happening behind the scenes whether they are or not. For new explorers, not everyone wants to jump in the pool right away. It's good to have fellow explorers, and an active community loitering around. This way, they can get an idea of what things will be like when they choose to get more involved.

I wish that there were more things to do in the cavern. This would help to curb people's impatience when they are waiting for new ages. I think it would be cool to replace some of the heek tables with tabletop versions of Asteroids, or even those four-way versions of Pong that they used to have. With all the generators and temporary lighting, surely there is enough power to do this. Maybe not. Sad

Just a thought

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Erik

Joined: 06 Oct 2006

Posts: 1971

Location: The Netherlands

belford wrote:

If you *could* get online at a given time, but you aren't on because you aren't expecting anything to happen, then a schedule helps you.

Result: an empty cavern when nothing is scheduled, whereas the cavern would always be filled if there was no schedule.

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mszv

Joined: 10 May 2006

Posts: 2229

I think that without scheduling, the cavern would have been empty almost all the time.

So - if there would have been many events in all the areas, across all timezones, everyone's day, evening and weekend, multiple neighborhoods, multiple parts of the city, multiple city instances, then maybe people would have logged on at different times, because you might see something. Maybe. If I would have logged on and found out I misssed something by 1/2 hour, I would have been really annoyed. Perhaps I would have been less annoyed if I saw something when i was on, but to miss something and then not see anything important for weeks and weeks - extra annoying.

I thought the concept was - whenever you log on, day or night, there is something new - something you can find without too much effort.

I think all of this stuff should have been worked out before it got to this. There are ways to model people's behavior in a game, and you can look at how it worked in other games (the mobbing part) - but that's "water under the bridge".

I think we talk about this because live events were an interesting experiment, and, in my opinion, a spectacular failure. Did live events contribute to Uru's failure?. I would say "not enough to do" , and "you have to read about it, can't experience it", were the reasons for Uru's failure, but I think I'm saying the same thing.

-----------------------------------------

The good news - no promises that there is going to be more to do. When Uru comes back - once you get through the ages, that's it - until new fan ages get into Uru. Then there will be more to to. Until then, we have what we have so far, without live events. I'm fine with that, because we know it up front, and Uru is also appropriatey priced.

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Last edited by mszv on Tue Aug 26, 2008 5:38 pm; edited 3 times in total

ThedStranger

Joined: 09 Nov 2006

Posts: 2567

Location: Israel

Quote:

I think that without scheduling, the cavern would have been empty almost all the time.

I think just the opposite.We got the episodes: the scheduled events.So,people came during the episode,and then: emptyness...

In prologue,I would guess (correct me if I'm wrong),people were around because anything could happen anytime.So why people did not complained? I think it was because of the journey- it was new to many people,and it was very big,which led people to realize that live events aren't everything.

However,in MOUL we found out more problems.As time passed,people said they could not see any character and be in live events.It's reasonable that you won't be in ANY events,but people complained.Why? because the content couldn't keep them busy long enough.It was too small,so the players took the live events and made them a major part of the game.The episodes helped,but than there were TOO MUCH people during live event (which is not good by it self also),the story was told too quickly,and after the episodes the game was empty.

So for me,yes I want the live events.But I also want the formula I said for some times: a video archive of the recent live events,bigger content to keep the player's mind off the live events he missed,about 2 scheduled DRC events every month (Q&A and age release),more live events in a day (4-5 events in a day,even just DRC comig to chat and do random stuff),and the story should be told more slowly and more "interesting-ly" (characters not acting like robots,events not happening on a 5 minutes basis,let us discover what's going on).When cyan worlds can afford that,anyway.

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Tweek

Joined: 09 May 2006

Posts: 2307

belford wrote:

Tweek wrote:

Quote:
I'm sorry the argument that scheduled events is better than not due to people being able to attend is a failed argument.

Unscheduled: Things happen randomly some people miss it because I weren't on at the time.
Scheduled: Things happen at a specific time, people miss it because they can't get on at the time.

There was no problem being solved by scheduling the events to a specific time, the issue at hand remained, people could not get to see the events.

That's not correct. You're describing two different problems, and scheduling events solves one of them. If you *could* get online at a given time, but you aren't on because you aren't expecting anything to happen, then a schedule helps you.

MOUL used both scheduled and unscheduled events *both before and after the episodes started*. Scheduled stuff like "Cate will hold a press conference at 1800 Tuesday" or "An Age book will be released at 1900 Saturday". Unscheduled stuff like DRC characters showing up to chat. I don't see that either of those was *wrong* -- releasing a major Age book "randomly" is not going to make players happier with the game.

(If Cyan was running the hypothetical full-scope Uru, with major Ages monthly and small tweaks and extensions every week, then it would be cool for some of that to be unexpected and unannounced. But we've never had that Uru.)

No I'm not, I'm describing a single problem "Not everyone can participate in live events" Some couldn't because the events were random so they missed it, some couldn't because the events were scheduled and the location/server choked up and kept them from getting there...it comes down to the core point, not everyone can participate either way, so the argument that it was solving the issue is a flawed one because it wasn't all it did was change the people who were able to attend and those who could not.

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mtn'man

Joined: 29 May 2006

Posts: 502

Location: Georgia, USA

The stranger wrote:

In prologue,I would guess (correct me if I'm wrong),people were around because anything could happen anytime.So why people did not complained? I think it was because of the journey- it was new to many people,and it was very big,which led people to realize that live events aren't everything.

Actually, in Prologue, we had no idea what was going to happen at all. It was all too new and was not really "started". We did see barricades go up and come down and then go up again and then come down again (etc.) as the DRC was opening and testing parts of the city. There was no new storyline beyond URU:ABM at that time and it ended so quickly that there was no time to complain (well, except for lag issues). In essence, Prologue ended before it ever really got started.

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ThedStranger

Joined: 09 Nov 2006

Posts: 2567

Location: Israel

Yes,but it did had live events,so the story,in some kind of way,started.

Beside,the whole deal of people don't know what will happen and that's why they enter the game is what live events are about.

If we get good content and good live events,than players will understand it will be better for them to log in more to get the chance to be in a live event,than not logging at all and not caring.

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Geert

Joined: 09 May 2006

Posts: 313

Location: Stadskanaal (Netherlands)

mtn'man wrote:

Actually, in Prologue, we had no idea what was going to happen at all. It was all too new and was not really "started". We did see barricades go up and come down and then go up again and then come down again (etc.) as the DRC was opening and testing parts of the city. There was no new storyline beyond URU:ABM at that time and it ended so quickly that there was no time to complain (well, except for lag issues). In essence, Prologue ended before it ever really got started.

Maybe you forgot. Smile

Prologue was really exploring. The Neigbourhood opened up bit by bit. The city was completely new and could be explored bit by bit. Great Zero was opened and the marker missions were guided by opening the different areas bit bit by bit. The story of the accident of Henderson and the mystery of it all. Choosing of sides Yeesha, Zandi, Sharper or DRC, it were alle ingredients of the game.
All that happened in a very short period and every day there was indeed something new. Something I really missed in MOUL. because everything was allready familiair due to XP"s and Myst V.

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Rusty_Russell

Joined: 25 May 2006

Posts: 9836

Location: Luton, UK

I agree with Geert. I was part of the second wave. "Clerical error", anyone? Wink

There was something new each day, mostly concerning red markers admittedly, Tent climb and balcony jump were there for entertainment if you were bored with 'heek. Smile

I can't remember if the Gahreesen wall worked in Prologue.

mszv

Joined: 10 May 2006

Posts: 2229

I never followed the story in Prologue. To me it seemed like an inexpensive. way to give people a reason to play Uru, at the time a free multiplayer game. I honestly thought that Cyan did it the way they did (live actors, no new gameplay) because Cyan didn't want to invest resources in new gameplay during the free part of Uru. I was so naive - I thought "well, or course, when they get going, story will be tied to gameplay. Solving puzzles will unlock new content and reveal the story. Little did I know how committed at least one group at Cyan was to the concept of episodes with live actors, instead of gameplay.

From what I'm reading here, people who had not been in the beta found Prologue to be very interesting - as something new was opened every day. That wasn't the case for me - I had seen all of the city, but I could identify with that enthusiam! It was thrilling when new areas of Uru were opened - very exciting!

On the issue of subscribers and live events - those are empirical questions. How many subscribers were there before the episodes, and what was the pattern? After the episodes were instituted, were there new subscribers, or were the same subscribers logging on? We know the pattern of logging on changed - lots more logons during episode week. What did people do when they logged on? We know a lot of people tried to see the live actors - were there people who went for the new ages instead of live actors? You'd have to be careful about causation (did the epiodes cause something), but the pattern would be interesting to see. Ah well - that's not information that companies share.

So Stranger - did you ever play online Uru at all? Did you see the episodes? You alway talk about what other people like. What did you like?

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Last edited by mszv on Tue Aug 26, 2008 8:34 pm; edited 1 time in total

Kerryth

Uru Live Moderator

Joined: 17 Nov 2006

Posts: 2828

Location: Hilo, I wish...

Option 2. I'm late to this thread, and the message I thought I wrote yesterday for the other thread evidently never got posted before I closed my browser, dagnabbit. I could be brief and simply say "What Zardoz said!" And "What mszv said!" But I don't have the self-discipline to be brief and let it go at that, so here goes.

(Tries to reconstruct the essay-in-the-works that evaporated yesterday...)

When I look back on MO:UL from my own perspective, I find myself seeing "events" that happened in the game on a scale I call, for lack of a better word, Relevant/Irrelevant. This means relevance to ME, mind; I know other people have different perspectives.

Relevant: The Wheely tragedy, all the Bahro behavior, including the "war"- little as I liked the idea, and Yeesha's final appearance.

Should be relevant but not of much interest to me: Everything having to do with Nick White and Douglas Sharper. If you'd kept on leaving journals around, Doug, you would have kept me interested, but I'm just not that into you, dude. As for the "Mighty Hunter" posturing in the pub - meh. The one big exception is when Sharper brought the body of the Bahro to the Watcher's sanctuary, and I consider that part of the Bahro category above. That was real pathos and drama.

Irrelevant: All the DRC office politics and funding kerfuffle, including every single press conference/mob scene that was a DRC "appearance" in Cavern. Paradoxically, I thoroughly enjoyed the interview mob incidents I was involved in through Relayers but that was because of the camaraderie of that group and the fun of having something to do. As story, as "game play," as Uru - they left me cold.

The DRC announcements of new access and information were a different matter. Those were relevant. But as they were done in MO:UL they were not "story," or only tangentially, and I was perfectly content to find out about them later.

I suppose it's no coincidence that I happened to be present for most of the Wheely episode and in K'veer when Yeesha was there. As I said, this is a personal view. And perhaps for no better reason, I would add to the "Relevant" category those moments of pure beauty and grace, the unexpected Bahro appearances among us in the glyph cave and Minkata in the last days.

But there is another level to this besides "I'm there = Good" vs "I'm not there = Bad." The Yeesha/Bahro events, unsatisfying as they were in many ways (especially to those who didn't get to experience them first hand), were linked in my mind to the grand mythos of D'ni. Which, to me at least, is the "real" story, the Big Story. The DRC stuff, in retrospect, seems to be a side story, a distraction, almost an annoyance sometimes.

This is hindsight, remember. At the time I was always hopeful that the DRC stuff might turn out to be compelling. It certainly started out that way, if you put the Wheely story into the DRC line instead of the Yeesha/Bahro line.

What I'm taking a long time to get to is this point: Many of the things I look back on as "relevant" could have been set up and structured as private NPC events that came along in the process of playing through a journey available to each individual player on his or her own time.

Of course, you need a pile of new, complex Ages as big as the original Journey to be the foundation under such a storyline, or some fairly major changes to, or expansions of, existing ages. And we (and Cyan) didn't have that. And that was the problem.

I realize we won't have it in MORE either, at least not for a while. But my expectations are still where they were adjusted to by the beginning of February, so I'm OK with that. All discoveries from here on will be pleasant surprises.

If the Big Story of Uru is something that happened in the past (or otherwise off stage), that each of us can discover as we explore the Ages and the Cavern, then each of us can experience that story personally. The story becomes ours and holds on to each of us. So keep that Big Story in the "persistent" elements, to borrow Zardoz' term. Use the ephemeral one-off events for the irrelevancies, the side soap operas (of which we can certainly generate a few of our own... Rolling Eyes

), the festivals, parades and parties. This would be way simpler and cheaper than trying to provide canned replays of every ephemeral event for everybody. If you're there, you're there; you're entertained. If you miss it, you've missed nothing of durable importance.

Sorry that was so long. Confused

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Chad Shaw

Joined: 16 May 2006

Posts: 181

Location: The Netherlands

I like 'em, but they shouldn't be a crucial or central delivery of the game's fun

I'm in a completely different time zone (The Netherlands) I think it would be just selfish if they did make it a crucial or central delivery of the game's fun.

Not arguing about it, quote me as much as you like. This is my opinion.

magaio

Joined: 14 Aug 2008

Posts: 26

Location: USA

Quote:

No I'm not, I'm describing a single problem "Not everyone can participate in live events" Some couldn't because the events were random so they missed it, some couldn't because the events were scheduled and the location/server choked up and kept them from getting there...it comes down to the core point, not everyone can participate either way, so the argument that it was solving the issue is a flawed one because it wasn't all it did was change the people who were able to attend and those who could not.

So, I wonder what the best solution is that balances the number of lasting subscriptions? Clearly we've had three chances here without "success". I think we should take a look at what makes other persistent online worlds successful and use the best elements of them.

Here are some "balanced, constant" elements that I feel might benefit the game:

1. More NPCs, updated frequently, with rich conversation trees.
2. Periodic "Live" possessions of NPCs to increase their depth.
3. Perhaps a few more inventory items? NOT "unique" or "epic" items, nor something that makes a player elite. Perhaps I'd call them "souvenirs" -- that aren't just bling (like those dumb sticks in Relto), but add an element of gameplay in the future. E.g. the KI (not a good example) or Linking Books.
4. Ages that change -- a hopeful side effect of amateur player ages and, perhaps not as likely, Cyan development.
5. More user customization of avatars.
6. More fantasy, more D'ni, and less of the real life, boring political ho-hum.
7. More D'ni .. language, cavern, writings to translate, Indiana Jones work, etc.
8. An official reference for D'ni language and history ... promotion of the books would help, if anyone hasn't read those Wink

9. A bigger online web presence on Cyan's part.
10. In summary, "Depth"
11. ???

Just some stream-of-consiousness for anyone who cares.

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ThedStranger

Joined: 09 Nov 2006

Posts: 2567

Location: Israel

Quote:

Of course, you need a pile of new, complex Ages as big as the original Journey to be the foundation under such a storyline, or some fairly major changes to, or expansions of, existing ages. And we (and Cyan) didn't have that. And that was the problem.

Thet's right.Maybe they don't have to just as complex as the prime journey- but close.We need more places,bigger places,story,speeches,notebooks,things.And it should be more fun for us too Razz

.But they can't do that right now.Let's hope they will,someday.

Quote:

So Stranger - did you ever play online Uru at all? Did you see the episodes? You alway talk about what other people like. What did you like?

I played d'mala and MOUL,during the last episode (you know why I couldn't until than),than a quited (reason doesn't matter,though it's not like I didn't like the game,I stayed in the forums and the community,just out of the game),and then I returned at the last days.

The episode story was good,but I realized how un-prologue it was.I never played prologue,but "I was around" during 2003-2004 and could see how things were.As kerryth said: much more mysterious,bigger places,more interesting story.MOUL was great fun too,but I think the older version was better.

What I liked? the community was great.I liked the story,even though the way it was told was raugh it was good.I liked the changes in the game all of a sudden (I came back to the watcher sanctury,as the day before,but this time something new: ahnonay linking book! on my way to a new age! Very Happy

). I liked finally interacting in live events,seeing the characters and TALKING TO THEM.Knowning I can get more info simply fom what I ask was great.

And what I thought that could be improved? I could go on with that now,but I rather not,as you didn't asked,and it would take some space.There ARE places to improve,but overall I think it's a good game that deserves it's chance to be better.

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Wafna

Joined: 09 May 2006

Posts: 649

Location: Cullman, Alabama

mszv wrote:

From what I'm reading here, people who had not been in the beta found Prologue to be very interesting - as something new was opened every day.

That is certainly true for me. Maybe if you were there it didn't seem like there was something new every day, and people were really just waiting around, but for us following along in the forums, it seemed like something new happened all of the time.

Those of us not in Prologue did not have access to a lot of what we now take for granted. We had more limited access to A'egura than Prologue explorers had, just the balconies and rooftops; and no real access to the neighborhoods, either. No part of the Great Zero at all, and a rudimentary KI and Nexus. I guess since I was unable to join in when I so wanted to, Prologue seemed shinier and more exciting than perhaps it really was.

Edit: I was in error in the preceding paragraph and now recall that the Nexus was not part of the original ABM at all. People would mention the Nexus on the forums and I was clueless about it!

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Last edited by Wafna on Thu Aug 28, 2008 7:12 pm; edited 1 time in total

I like 'em	18% (15 votes)
I like 'em, but they shouldn't be a crucial or central delivery of the game's fun	50% (40 votes)
I don't like 'em	24% (19 votes)
I believe there is an alternative ... I'll post my opinion further	6% (5 votes)

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