- last post: 01.01.0001 12:00 AM PDT
Ok, definately drop the RP, Halo is a FPS not an RPG, and really never should be. In a MMO game I could deal with a few RPG functions, as they can enhance the playing experience if used tastefully. But space battles, and all this other -blam!-...no offense man, but drop it. Halo is based on a very simple principle, and it is this principle that grants it huge success in the gaming world. Kill, Shoot, Grenade, Kill again. It's a fragfest with an excellent storyline behind it, such a good storyline that you could actually make a CGI movie based on the game. Now I fully support making a Halo MMOFPS, but you have to KISS it man. (Keep it simple stupid) Now in another post I started I also polled other gamers like myself as to whether they would be interested in a MMO Halo, I also mistakenly mentioned the word Planetside in that post. I enjoy Planetside, but that wasn't what I meant, I meant *similar in concept to*.
To exemplify exactly what I mean:
Ok first of all you have 2 sides, Humans and Covenant. Simple right? Wrong! Ok in a MMO game balance is extremely important, because if the game is unbalanced then it won't attract long-term players and therefore will fail utterly. So if you insert too many variables into the game you decrease its functionality and worsen the playing experience... ie you make the game harder to balance. So keep it simple.
Let me elaborate:
Ok, obviously the humans and covenant have different technology, which means different vehicles and weapons as well as armor and items. This is obviously ok since a game can be very boring if everything is the same. However balancing those weapons is a very important key factor. For anyone who has played Planetside for any decent amount of time has probably heard 2 phrases uttered constantly, those phrases being "F***ing Sony" and "F***ing lashers" respectively. A lasher is an energy based weapon that, well "lashes" the enemy with an explosive plasma. Sound familiar to any Halo weapons? This was an example to SOE's inability to properly balance some weapons in the game... But it still raises the problem of balancing it in a Halo MMO game.
The covenent have the one hit kill energy sword, great for fragfests, bad for MMO play. How do you fix it? Well SOE would probably put a ridiculous certification point level on the weapon requiring a much higher battle rank to use the weapon efficiently, which isn't really a bad idea in itself but it delays the inevitable. Eventually someone will reach a point where they can use that weapon to wreak major havok on other players who are a lower battle rank then themselves...fair killing is one thing...but when you get killed repeatedly because of a freaking weapon that is an injustice....it gets annoying. OK time out.
I'm looking at this post and getting ahead of myself. There are three basic components to a fun MMO game: Balance, Rewards, and Fun.
I've talked a little about balance already, so I'll skip past it right now. Instead I'll focus on rewards.
Rewards are to give a player a sense of accomplishment. Pure and simple. They also define the rules and objectives for the entire game. Every game has them, whether it be bonus points for killing alot of enemies or a special armor type for beating the game, ect. Extremely important in a MMO game because if the player doesn't feel accomplishment they will eventually get bored with the game. Rewards also can go hand in hand with the Fun category, but that's for later. XP is a reward, most commonly used in MMO games because of the massive RPG content in those games. If Halo were to bridge to MM, it would have to get a newly created XP points system. A Halo MMO game would have to switch focus from a character development platform to a combat and tactical platform. Halo is NOT an RPG as I have stated before. This requires XP to be heavily centered on both personal kills, and the kill levels of your squadmates and/or race (within a certain radius). Less emphasis will be put on kill assists.
* To be finished at a later date*