It seems to me that there are several levels to URU live. There is the in cavern experience, which includes everything related to the game, when you log in, and there's the out of cavern experience, which includes all the things that happen, including our daily lives, when we aren't logged in. Within the IC experience, I see a sub experience level that includes the natural lives of people that inhabit the virtual planet of Earth (not to be confused with OOC Earth)

In my opinion, what we need are actual DRC roles. This would be the Virtual Earth (VE) equivalent of the guilds. Surely, this would solve the problem of not having enough ResEngs. I liked the appearance of the various DRC people. I think it adds a nice level of immersion, and helps build community a bit. I didn't like the fact that often major story events seemed to hang on their appearances, though. Even so, their importance wasn't as huge as some imagined. Though some felt it was absolutely necessary to be present every time someone gave a speech, it really wasn't. I think some compromises need to be made.

In real life, some people make it to events, and some don't. Others hear about these things through word of mouth. Perhaps, we shouldn't see the attendance of events as a right. On the other hand, maybe we could round up enough volunteers that "In the Loopers" could be present in all timezones to dissemenate information, and interact with explorers. I think that it is nice to have a few key figures that know the status of the restoration from the VE side. I think it's cool if explorers are allowed to interact with these characters.

I think that having an official aspect to the cavern allows us to be more tolerant of life in the cavern when we aren't exploring ages. As long as we have the DRC at least pretending to make the cavern livable, there is a purpose to hanging out in our neighborhoods and chatting. This is our home, so it is natural to talk to our neighbors. We do have relayers that do a nice job of keeping us informed, but perhaps DRC volunteers could also visit various neighborhoods from time to time. Maybe, some provisions could be built into the game for DRC personel like there are for guilds. Maybe a special meeting place could be added. Maybe ResEngs could be given headlamp powers? The alternative is to make up imaginary DRC personal and talk about them.

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Maybe, there's
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URU MOUL Lives

what drew me into this game at first was when it was a stand alone. when the things that were happening could all be experienced in game as i played and it all had to be discovered by the explorer. then i thought this would be a cool thing to share with others. having more than just myself running around discovering things and sharing their takes on what was happening or what had been discovered.

in each advertisement or synopsis of Uru live (whatever version) it said that an explorer could explore alone OR with friends.

it seems that either i misinterpreted what that meant or someone forgot what exploration means.

the DRC live events started out seeming live, they just happened. But what happened as things evolved into scheduled events was an introduction of a different community. No longer were the explorers exploring, instead they were reading Ki messages and relaying chatlogs. Less and less was anyone interested in finding any meaning to places or culture of the D'ni. And more the conversations were about why "Cate claps his hands" or when we would find out the schedule of the next event.

I am not opposed to npc's. but if having them in the Cavern would mean that the only thing to explore is the messages in my KI then i would prefer they were all eaten by the Bahro. Then we could go exploring again , maybe to find a Bahro and shake its hand.

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The only way would be happy with live events is if there was a way to experience them in the game even if you miss them.

I'm not talking about looking up chatlogs off the Internet, because that really takes away the experience when you have to use the Internet to find out the story of a game. I would prefer a system where you could access information on what you missed in the game without having to quit it. I'm not talking about a summary because that means that the information has been filtered/processed by someone else before getting to you.

Perhaps something like a system where live events are captured by video so that players can view and collect these videos IN THE GAME. This way players can still view what they have missed, far superior is my opinion to reading a chatlog. This idea would probably be very difficult to implement though so I would settle for chatlogs, but ONLY if they could be accessed and SAVED in-game for later use.

My opinion on live events would dramatically change if any of these were implemented. Otherwise, I would have to give them a thumbs-down. Keep in mind that I'm only talking about story-altering events. I'm not too concerned about things like parties or festivals. I'm happy to use the Internet if I want to see that.

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mikediggtydog wrote:

Perhaps something like a system where live events are captured by video so that players can view and collect these videos IN THE GAME. This way players can still view what they have missed, far superior is my opinion to reading a chatlog. This idea would probably be very difficult to implement though so I would settle for chatlogs, but ONLY if they could be accessed and SAVED in-game for later use.

You've got it right Mike.

I remember a time when we suggested a new age
with a theatre with a very large opaque screen for replaying live events.

Here's an idea: a button in the "help" menu,when pressed,the screen shanges to the same one when the intro plays (cave bahro glyphs) and the video window in the middle shows nothing (black).In the lower part of the screen ,there are many videos you can choose.The first one is entiteld "Last month at MOUL".When pressed,a video will start,footage of live events,along with new areas,plays,with narrating to each one.

The other videos,which could be accessed by arrows (1 video is in the lower part of the screen,with 2 arrows beside him,unless if it's the last video or first,where there is only 1 arrow.If there are more videos before it and after it there will be 2 arrows,left and right,to it's sides,used to change the video).Every video beside the first one,which is the "last month narrated news",is a footage of a live event that happened until now (the too old events will be deleted as newer ones arrive).No narrating,just the footage of the event.They will be titled,like the first video (above the little pics at the bottom of the screen): "Sutherland talk about the pods","Kodama play ayo'heek","Rebek age released",and so on.Cyan worlds can put something like "an unseen camera person" when the events happen to take videos of the events.

That is,when they have the resources to do so .

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This thread has been added to this list
under the Community Stuff section...
http://www.mystonline.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=269070#269070

Unless somebody digs up a hidden treasure under Cyan HQ I do not expect any live events staged by Cyan.

However, it would be fun if UCC comes with its own live events. An age writer could "hire" actors to enhance the storyline. Are the Cavern Players still around? Costumes... we need costumes!

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♪ KI# 33949 ♪

D'lanor,UCC live events sounds interesting...

Quote:

Unless somebody digs up a hidden treasure under Cyan HQ

That's right! everyone! start digging!

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Previously known as "The stranger"

I've always liked the random DRC visits and will do. There should have been more of those events, so that more people would have had a chance to experience those events.

Anyway, MOUL is no more, we have MORE now. It will be different and we would be lucky if we get any events from Cyan at all.

It's also kind of funny how often this topic is discussed. Not to blame anyone for coming up with the subject, not at all, but it remains funny that this discussion is restarted and done over so often, and that everyone keeps participating, isn't it?

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Artic_Wagon wrote:

Tweek wrote:

Personally I have little problem with this, the events in Uru were supposed to take place like real life events do (which I am all for), if I missed them I missed them if I didn't I didn't, at least it felt more natural not forced and false.

The big difference is that in real life you usually have the chance to relive an event
by watching news channels like CNN.

That is what was missing in the episodes versions.

And so you do in the Cavern with people taking chat logs, pictures, videos, combined with groups/sources of info like the GoMe, Cavern Today, Firemarble.

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Erik wrote:

Not to blame anyone for coming up with the subject, not at all, but it remains funny that this discussion is restarted and done over so often, and that everyone keeps participating, isn't it?

Some maybe, but not everyone. Some of us just re-read and chuckle.

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All good points, but I still agree with Tweek and magaio. It felt more "real" when events would randomly happen like in RL, but felt forced when done in the episode format. I was less frustrated when I missed events simply because I wasn't there, instead of having to miss something I knew was going to happen because of work or other schedule conflicts. Scheduled DRC events are great, but not if they are singularly important to the storyline.

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-LostOwl
KI # 00392626

I don't mind the occasional visit from the DRC, but I don't want my entire storyline comming from those visits.

Why can't we recapture them in Phil's diary... or something simular? We may need two diarys as they both can't be around to wittness the events.

Also, I seem to remember some fan created stories that were pretty cool. One in particular that was related to the lake water and I believe a fan that's name started with a K... I can't rememberr her name. The sotry was picked up on the forums and continued in the cavern. That is the kind of fan created storylines that I think would be fun

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Of course we all have our own 'obsessions' too, which is why we're here.

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.)

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