Ignacius

The process is easy. Wooden characters mean that there is often something missing (unless wooden is what you're going for) from a character's personality. If it's popping up a lot, it is probably something that comes up a lot in RP. Look back and see what is working, what isn't, and at what point it goes off the rails. For instance, if you haven't worked out a character's reaction to confrontation, and confrontation appears, you may get sucked out to sea and set adrift. See if there is a simple piece of personality that's missing that would fix it. Wooden characters can also mean that you're experiencing "Dragonball Z" syndrome, in that you're constantly repeating the same RP and it's not going somewhere. This happens if you're in a sort of small RP group and there is no variety. In that case, a lot of people will act woodenly because this has all happened before and it feels like it's not going anywhere. Check and see if it's that. Finally, wooden characters might indicate forced scenarios. This is actually one of the most common issues people get into in RP. You have RPed with someone, and want to hook up your character to one of theirs. Thus you force the issue, starting a romance, for instance. But if that's not natural for the characters, you're constantly going to have to mute your character's traits. That's going to come off as very wooden. If it's not that, it is likely a fundamental issue and you'll need to wipe it out and start from scratch. That means you're not working with enough information or there's simply too much conflicting information. If it's that basic that you can't fix it with a simple tweak of personality or change of scene, you've got a fundamental problem that probably can't be fixed. Go tabula rasa on the character and start again in a more measured way.

This is easier with the martial classes simply because the idea that a fighter could know how to use bows, swords, spears, axes and also punch stuff is fairly believable. Many martial experts are trained in the use of multiple weapon types because different weapons are designed to address different combat situations on the battlefield. The magic classes are a bit different since the class or Job doesn't simply determine the type of training they have, but also determines what type of aetheric energy source they use to power their spells. Aeriyn is ICly a scholar of magic, a researcher into the conscious manipulation of aether. She was a thaumaturge; she delved into the allegedly forbidden knowledge of black magic in order to better understand Allagan technology (and by extension, Garlean Magitek). In her effort to bridge the gaps between the various disciplines of magic, Aeri has also studied some conjury (she has not yet examined white magic due to the near-total control the Elementals and the Padjal maintain) and has also studied arcanima in the tradition of Limsa Lominsa, Nym and Allag. She's dabbled in every form of magic that is and/or was recently practiced in Eorzea, as well as both Allagan and Garlean device magic. Her understanding of nearly all of these disciplines is academic at best, with the exception of black magic--for purposes of combat in roleplay, Aeri fights with black magic (and occasionally somewhat poorly with a shortbow) and that's pretty much the extent of it. And here's where the issue comes in--a soldier who can use a sword, swing an axe, pick up a pike and take up a charge and then grab a bow and knock a cavalryman off his horse is a lot more believable (and far less overpowered) than a mage dropping massive explosions while simultaneously curing their own wounds and commanding a summoned primal fragment and a Nymian fairy. So Aeriyn is for all intents and purposes a black mage, even though she knows quite a lot about a lot of different disciplines of magic. That does bring up more of a philosophical question. Actual "job" classes require you to have a minimum working knowledge of another discipline. So is a White Mage, for example, a hybrid conjurer-arcanist? Or is that just a game mechanic? Or is magic a more fluid art than the game gives it credit for. It might be completely feasible that someone knows all the disciplines, but it's not really necessary that they practice them all. For instance, as per my example, Orleans knows quite a bit about polearms and bows both, but I don't play him as specifically knowing much about great axes (even though he had to learn it to be a Dragoon, so I have it). I'm sure it's an uncomplicated enough weapon that he can direct the sharp bit where it needs to go, but he doesn't ICly know any of the disciplines behind Mauraders (going out and breaking rocks is just a little undignified for him). Magic might be similar; there's nothing saying you can't know everything. It might be a lot more like why I don't know anything about plumbing. As an architectural designer, I might be aware of things like floor drains, sump pumps, and so on, but I'd be terrible at actually putting them in. General knowledge is easy to obtain. However, it does seem like everything is a sort of hybrd once you're into soulstones so it might be that the weapons you bear REALLY have something to do with the magic you throw, meaning you might know everything, it might simply be impossible to cast, say, a major heal through a black mage's staff; it's just a matter of not having the tools for the job. It might then mean that you could carry a radical and a staff and act as if you knew both disciplines at once, but you can't actually USE both at the same time. That's how I generally work Orleans. He is very versed in bows and lances and he often carries both around with him, but it's not like he can just fire an arrow while wielding a lance.

I also wanted to add, the idea that "girls don't play games" kind of goes to FFXIV to die. I don't know whether it's because of Square's more default-glittery atmosphere than the average blood-guts-and-rocks atmosphere you usually get in these games, or whether it's just because Japanese games have a tendency to focus less on that old-fashioned 18-24 year old male demographic, but there are a LOT of women that play this game. Proportionally to other games, at least. I remember playing Battlefield or similar games and just figuring everyone on the opposing team was a guy. If there was a girl on our team, we lost (usually not the girl's fault, they tended to score decently, but every guy on vent suddenly weren't paying attention for some reason). After being heavily involved in RP in WoW and especially now FFXIV (and the fact that I married a woman who plays WoW, D3, and XIV with me), that's much less of a sure thing. Which, honestly, I'm totally happy with. I'd encourage more women to play as many games as they can. Seriously, nobody wants to know what happens when you shove 20 men into a game with relative anonymity and no women. The most foul things ever said on Earth are said by men who don't think any women are listening.

I'm sort of... divided on the game. Honestly, the stuff everyone seems leery about is stuff I love. If there's one thing about MMORPGs that has completely eluded most developers, it's atmosphere. That's one thing Blizzard gets, it's one thing CCP sorta gets, it's one thing Square kind of gets, but it's something a lot of people take for granted. Atmosphere. I don't know how far back most people remember, but I distinctly recall in 2004 that there was a minor war brewing. It was around the releases of two critically acclaimed FPS sequels, id's Doom 3 and Valve's Half-Life 2. I also distinctly remember being outnumbered in any conversation about my preference for Doom 3 over Half-Life 2, but the reason why I liked it better is the same as the reason I sometimes feel unimpressed by MMORPGs everyone else seems to be excited about. It's all about atmosphere. Half-Life 2 was fun to play and had a very detailed environment and physics engine, but Doom 3, to this day if I play it, scares the ever-loving shit out of me. It's all about the little things, from reality bending to just having sound effects that have nothing to do with the game, just existing to scare you. Given everyone seems to worry about its art style, that's the one thing I actually really feel excited about. It's stylized and it has a definite presentation where most games tend to be glitzy re-enactments of the Battle of Helm's Deep from Peter Jackson's The Two Towers or the thousandth forest scene where they've tried to slightly improve the light engine. Wildstar looks like it only takes itself half-seriously and it feels like almost a cartoon. That's a distinct change of pace for me. Considering I tend to really like games that know how to stand out with atmosphere alone (e.g. the Silent Hills, Killer 7, Eternal Darkness) I could care less if there are fewer eyebrow options. Now, all the atmosphere in the world won't polish a turd if the mechanics and gameplay turn out to be a complete wash. Atmosphere only takes you so far. I just think you have to have it in your game.

I should, at this point, bring up that I have known people (including one of my brothers) that have played female characters and just never told the people they play with that they're men IRL. The reason? Men playing the game will, if they come to the assumption that they're actually women IRL, apparently give them free stuff. So word to the wise, don't come to your own assumptions. Everyone could be anyone until you know otherwise. And stop trying to by romance with epics! I can't describe the weird feeling of disgust not because they didn't tell these other people they were really heterosexual men IRL, but because they were being showered with gear and money just because lonely people on an MMO thought they were girls. Eesh.

Sort of as an afterthought, how many people play on a server? How many of them are roleplayers (the only ones who are, ICly, going to be members of their class)? A few hundred for each class, maybe? I mean, granted, we could assume there are a lot more, but if we go with just the people roleplaying that they are these jobs, there aren't really that many. It's just a high percentage of the player population (I assume, lore-wise, we adventurers are a small minority). I guess, in the end, while there might be a lot of people playing dragoons, let's say, in the game population, we can assume there are thousands of beat soldiers in the grand companies and that your common mob fodder are just beat soldiers. We're a small percentage of those.

It's not released yet, is it?

Honestly, I don't play the job. In fact, I play Ignacious as personally being learned in the use of a few weapons (specifically, spears and bows), so technically he could be considered two classes. In reality, he's neither. He picks up skills along the way. He was originally trained in the use of the spear, but since then he's picked up dragoon jumping abilities. I never specify when he learned them; he's obviously not an Ishgardian and he personally dislikes them. However, he certainly picked them up. He's also very skilled with a bow and may become a bard, but I won't play that he's specializing in a martial path. He's just like any good contract soldier, he's constantly learning anything he can to give him an edge on the street. But I'll never say he's a "dragoon" or a "bard" since he has a REAL problem with authority. I can see that working into some people's stories, so it's certainly on a case-by-case basis. Some people become dragoons and want to really play a dragoon, so they're part of that order. I have a tendency not to do that unless I'm really wringing something out of it I didn't have before. Otherwise, it's too much of a handcuff.

Probably too much. From what I understand, personal housing isn't going to be the open-world housing we already have (which I kind of liked), but more like a tenement space like it was in FFXI. It's also horrendously expensive for something you can't even use on your alts. As to the post above, the weird thing is, Final Fantasy XI had free, personal housing for each character in 2004. Which means they essentially decided not to go that way this time through. That seems strange to me, functionally, since Square is supposed to make more money allocating us 7 more slots for alts per server. Not only that, but they've made sure it's almost impossible to start an alt (due to server restrictions), it's ridiculously difficult to operate one (almost nothing is shared between characters, including friends' lists if I understand it correctly), and it honestly isn't necessary to have one (since all characters can be any class they want). You'd think they'd want people to pay those couple extra dollars a month. I'm about to reduce back to the economy package simply because it's too hard to make an alt and not necessarily beneficial to keep one. I'm not as big on the concept of player housing and, if I'm going to be honest, I'm actually not happy with ANYONE's housing options for characters. I'm an architectural designer by trade. The idea of us all having to get our own personal spaces in the suburbs that none of the NPCs seem to be able to own is very eerie to me. Why can't I, as a character, have a rundown studio space above a bar? Or live in a high-rise penthouse once I have a ton of money? Or make a hovel in a sewer? Why do games, where this kind of thing just requires a little extra programming (I could generate five apartment-style layouts for the game in a month in Max, and I'm not even a game designer). More than that, what's the point of having player housing? To store stuff? To get people together in your private room? There's not enough real benefit to having one to justify the cost. I'm seriously thinking about the RP implications of Ignacius getting a house. Why would he? He's a traveling mercenary sellsword and a hitman, he probably lives out of hotels. And the hotel rooms are free! I guess I just think housing in games these days is both too much of a hassle and, at the same time, not really used to its full potential. There's too much convenience in modern MMOs to make your own personal space really worthwhile. I think developers these days need to try harder to make those spaces useful and desirable, especially if they're going to make us pay to have/upgrade them.

It's funny, my wife maintains a fandom webpage and forum for the Xeno series. Y'know, Xenogears, Xenosaga, Xenoblade. The fandom, at least as represented by the users on that forum, appears to be predominantly female. They have a running joke that there are no boys on the internet. Many of them have talked about how other spaces they inhabit on the internet women out number men by a decent ratio, and these are forums and boards based around things like gaming, anime, and comics. I've noticed that the specific fandoms and subjects of the boards they use have very strong lead females (The Xeno series in particular has a ton of them, Elly, Miang, Kos-Mos, Shion, MOMO, etc.). Even when this isn't the case, they still make spaces that cater to their particular wants and amusements as it relates to their fandom. Also, when guys on forums say "lelnogrrlzondaintarbutt" it's usually in a space that's pretty abrasive toward women in the first place. So what would any self-respecting nerd do in that situation? Make their own damn sandbox that's much less hostile. This is why I married a woman that plays with me. She runs a healer on FFXIV, has run pretty much every healing and damage class in WoW, but she REALLY loves Diablo. Seriously, she's in love with her witch doctor. So when I get home, and I say I just want to put on some pajamas and play some D3, she's already ahead of me. I have a great life! Heck, I wish I could get anyone I know to play D3 with me! Hey, if you ever see me on (which would assume I'm actually home from work and not on FFXIV or WoW), I'm always happy to include anyone who likes to full clear. And I mean full-clear. When the wife and I (and usually a brother or two) play, we sweep every single inch of the level we're on. We annoy people that want to skip straight to the boss, but when those elite mobs start stacking multiple spells and buffs, they're usually harder than the actual game bosses. That's something I want in an MMO, random-generated elite mobs where you don't know what you're going to get.

It's funny, my wife maintains a fandom webpage and forum for the Xeno series. Y'know, Xenogears, Xenosaga, Xenoblade. The fandom, at least as represented by the users on that forum, appears to be predominantly female. They have a running joke that there are no boys on the internet. Many of them have talked about how other spaces they inhabit on the internet women out number men by a decent ratio, and these are forums and boards based around things like gaming, anime, and comics. I've noticed that the specific fandoms and subjects of the boards they use have very strong lead females (The Xeno series in particular has a ton of them, Elly, Miang, Kos-Mos, Shion, MOMO, etc.). Even when this isn't the case, they still make spaces that cater to their particular wants and amusements as it relates to their fandom. Also, when guys on forums say "lelnogrrlzondaintarbutt" it's usually in a space that's pretty abrasive toward women in the first place. So what would any self-respecting nerd do in that situation? Make their own damn sandbox that's much less hostile. This is why I married a woman that plays with me. She runs a healer on FFXIV, has run pretty much every healing and damage class in WoW, but she REALLY loves Diablo. Seriously, she's in love with her witch doctor. So when I get home, and I say I just want to put on some pajamas and play some D3, she's already ahead of me. I have a great life!

I wouldn't worry about it too much. It isn't because you might be speaking romantically to a man (you may well have been), but because you might also be talking to a happily married woman, a twelve year old girl, or a woman who just killed her last husband. Don't worry about whether or not the person on the opposite end is a man or woman, just make sure you aren't getting personally romantic with a person playing a character. Don't bleed your OOC into IC.

Update: It's been almost a month. I've been religiously checking, every day, whenever I log on, to try to create my second character. Not a single day has gone by that I've been able to, and Orleans is still my only character. This is a little frustrating, as I wanted to start another character for RP purposes. What is a LOT frustrating is that I checked to see if there was a way to contact SE for advice (or to complain) and it seems like their online help center has been down for almost a week. Is there a specific time or day I should check so I can get a spot?

Yep.... The staff was a gift from her tutor from like thousands of years ago. I even described it as just being heavily decorated and the horns were made from white wood. So overtime it began to look like that giant staff head through adding more items.... I was no dragon. I was just a Night Elf Mage who had been roaming Azeroth for a thousand years looking for my purpose while also making stories and songs along the way (BARD! I CALLED IT! > : D). It was a sad day when they all shunned me or ignored my attempts to be civil in someone's rp because of said weapon. But then again I was one of the best mages on Alliance side raiding at that time before I moved late Mists when my guild half disbanded. So I reside my character on Velen as a Troll instead for the future of raiding. http://us.battle.net/wow/en/character/velen/Parthmakeyo/simple And to answer back everyone else: Yes I know it's best to use any other wep model and for the moment I doubt i can even use the Curtana in RP...but i gotta find a good weapon model for the weapon her father abandoned when it comes time to it. Still i enjoyed reading everyone's take on this subject. It was all interesting and insightful. Sounds like WRA Hordeside RP, really, if I had to guess your server. My Alliance went Emerald Dream, Thorium Brotherhood, then Moon Guard where I now reside. Still the best RP community in WoW if you stay far, FAR away from Goldshire. My Horde were on Steamwheedle Cartel, which is a barrens for RP. Finally, after everyone said that Wyrmrest Accord was the best Horde server for RP, I swapped my characters over. I'm usually fine... usually. However, WRA is easily the most frustrating server to RP on. Oddly, it's not because it's full of bad roleplayers, but because it seems to have attracted a lot of insufferable pricks. RP gets stopped every few minutes because someone is throwing an OOC tantrum. Roleplaying on there for a few minutes with my brother netted me at least two people berating us because we were winning a fight in a bar (and I literally think that's exactly what they told us, from what I could understand of their ramblings >.<). You find a few sane people and RP, it's fine there. But I've never heard so many interruptions for lore-nazying, combat arguments, people drilling other people's MRPs EVEN IF THEY'RE NOT ROLEPLAYING WITH THEM! It's ridiculous. Eventually I ended up playing more of my Alliance just because even if it wasn't me getting yelled at constantly, it really ruins the experience when people can't learn to take the money and run in random RP. As to the point, I just say use whatever weapon you want for RP purposes as long as it's not the actual "legendary weapon" itself. Second, I'd recommend you focus as little on the weapon as possible. I generally make sure people know my characters are equally dangerous with a pool cue as they are with Thunderfury, Blessed Blade of the Windseeker. Then people don't care what kind of weapon you're hauling.

Well... actually, that's sort of a good point. The characters, almost universally (except the Roegadyn) are ALREADY lithe and skinny. And the faces, unless you intentionally choose one that looks older or slap a beard on it, already look like they're fifteen. I mean, I had to go out of my way to make Ignacius look grown-up-but-not-middle-aged. FFXIV and, if nobody minds me being a little stereotypical, Japanese games in general make the characters look exceptionally young and lean. Your other option is... well.... Roegadyn. You'd think there'd be a middle-ground. Honestly, you could just shrink your character, go unmuscled, pick a young face and eyes, and look like a twelve year old. No female model required. I guess it kind of feels like you'd be going out of your way to use the female model. Males in this game already look a little fae and effeminate as a matter of course. It isn't like in WoW where you have a choice for men between running back and defensive linesman.

Wait, people in WoW were yelling at you for using a legendary weapon as an RP model even though you didn't say it was the weapon itself? WoW? The one game where I've ever seen someone playing a time-traveling dragon courtesan played straight and be taken seriously? What, were you playing on WRA? I know those people can be Nazis, but that just mesmerizes me! If anything, it was being able to get away with anything that sometimes made me facepalm in WoW RP.

XIV's politics reminds me of the politics in Ivalice games, mainly XII and Tactics. Those two games had some brutal politics where the mode of operation was the ends justifying the means. I find that XIV's politics isn't as complicated as Ivalice's, in XII there's multiple factions and everyone has their own agenda and Tactics is well... even more complicated. TBH, I don't think XIV is the darkest or the grittiest of the series, in IV Cecil destroys a village and runs away when he realizes what he's doing is wrong, and in VII Cloud's working with what is essentially a terrorist organization. So being dark, having mature themes and moral ambiguity aren't new to the series. Yeah, FFXIV looks like Candyland compared to Final Fantasy Tactics. That world was horrifying, considering it was mostly people's ignorance and ambition that led to its evil. At least now, we've got people in black robes with evil intentions to hate.

Just remember that, even with the modifications, it isn't going to read to your beat random RPer as a lithe boy, it's going to read as a boyish woman. Everyone will, reasonably, assume the character is a girl until told otherwise and everyone will still think he is very effeminate. It usually doesn't work in practice in open RP, is what I'm saying.

THE UNSPOKEN RULES OF RP: #1: You may not play a dragon, the descendant of a dragon, or anything dragon-related. It may seem cool to play a dragon at first. You wouldn't know, at first, that you've literally become the joke at that point. #2: Your brooding must be limited in scope. If you sit in the shadowy corner, keeping to yourself, eyeing everyone bitterly, well.... people will leave you alone and not RP with you. They know already that any RP with you isn't going to leave them room to brood themselves. #3: Do not produce your own flask/bottle from your bag and drink it in the bar. That makes no damn sense. It'd be like walking into a McDonalds and pulling out a chili cheese burrito. #4: Keep all your ERP in PMs. I don't care about immersion, characterization, or realism. Do not undress your character in the game world and sit them down in an empty room. The reason this rule is unspoken is because you'd think it should go without saying. It doesn't. Keep your clothes on, do all ERP in PMs, and make sure you are responding to the right person (and not dumping it accidentally in /say) when you post. #5: If you aren't ready to have your ass kicked, don't threaten anyone or talk about them behind their backs. Just because you have discretion over your character doesn't mean people will take you seriously if you're starting a fight every time you walk into a bar. #6: Don't get bigger than your in-game britches. If you're a level 10, be ready to be called out by a level 50. You may not think it's fair, but no one is going to treat you like an unstoppable ninja if you're just a level 5 pugilist. #7: If you want to be taken seriously, and you're not playing an old man, have one or both of your parents be alive. Most roleplayers will eventually start to roll their eyes at the shocking mortality rate of Eorzea if all our parents died to beast tribes. #8: If you tell people you have a price on your head, that is an open invitation to be stalked and have your ass kicked at inopportune moments. Avoid it by being a smart criminal. #9: Never say a thing like, "women desire him." No they don't. That's a profound misunderstanding of women. Ugly men throughout history have been more attractive than any of us simply by force of personality. That's not something you can dictate. Just say he's handsome, let the women desire him if you can pull it off. If you're a woman, you can say, "men desire her." That is not a misunderstanding of men. It may be a misunderstanding of "desire", but not of men. #10: There is no better way to get yourself despised by other roleplayers faster than the OOC hissy fit. Do not get other people involved in your OOC drama with other players. Do not threaten to leave the game if people don't make your character feel better. Definitely don't spend more time complaining OOC than posting IC. If "everyone" seems like they aren't roleplaying correctly, the problem isn't them. The problem is you.

Blizzard is really a standout company in today's market. There aren't many companies that are as concerned with the quality of their games. Blizzard doesn't have a "good enough". Best evidence of that is their Titan project. They literally stood back, looked at the sum of what they had developed, and wiped the slate clean to start from the beginning. I know a lot of people don't understand that, but I do. There are times in any design process that you need to be ready to start from scratch because what you have is a dead end. It shows in their game design. I think WoW has one and only one weakness. It has been around forever. Honestly, I play FFXIV, I love FFXIV, I actually think the gameplay is great and the RP community is fun, but I'm playing FFXIV solely because I've played WoW since launch and I thought I needed to try other games so I have a sense of perspective. And believe me, when Warlords of Draenor shows up, I will probably considerably reduce my FFXIV time. WoW is an old game, an almost boringly familiar game, but I do still think it's the best MMORPG out there. It isn't the best in every particular category, but there isn't another game out there with the same level of overall quality. Some games have better PVP, some better PVE, some better mass raiding, some have better customization and itemization (okay, a lot have that), but nobody's game is as good overall as World of Warcraft. And remember, in the time WoW has been out, Blizzard has released Starcraft II (RTS), Diablo 3 (Dungeoncrawler), and Hearthstone (Card Game), all to high critical acclaim. All while maintaining expansions and patches for the largest MMORPG on the market. That is an absolutely insane level of high-intensity output. We'll rip on Blizzard for any perceived imperfection, while allowing anyone else to make the same mistake, simply because Blizzard is the "powers that be". In every MMORPG's development, it's the elephant in the room. And honestly, if anything finally does kill WoW and ever matches its subscription rate, it'll probably be a Blizzard game. Very few other companies have the muscle and development pedigree to make these games and make them well. I wouldn't be at all surprised if their next MMORPG is better than anything else on Earth.

I disagree. Indie game developers can experiment with quickie Steam games, but they don't have the muscle to play with MMORPGs. I think it's easy to discount big developers as Activision or EA whores, and that's usually the case. However, some of the big developers can still kick out a decent game. I'd say they're the ones most likely to come up with something original that actually works. Like I said, From Software is one of the AAA developers who could definitely pull this off. They're used to making titles that succeed despite everyone saying they won't work. I know their work best from Tenchu (the ninja assassin game where you actually have to use skills to stay hidden back in 1998 on the PS1), Armored Core (the RPG where you pilot a mech that feels like a mech and has more lateral development than any other RPG I can remember at its time), and the Dark/Demon Souls games (the current franchise flagship that seems to be called a "throwback" simply because they're actually challenging). I think they could give us an MMORPG beyond reckoning if they actually tried. One developer that we sort of ignore because it isn't their forte (but could actually pull this kind of thing off) is Nintendo. Unfortunately, they're sort of married to the dying console world, but as developers they've created some incredibly mechanically-sound games. They can consistently market great games. Hell, probably the RPG I played more than any other when I was a kid was a crossover between Nintendo and Square called Mario RPG. They may be a bit too reliant on their old standbys and I'm really not looking forward to Mario World Online, but it could work. Another off the top of my head that looks like they're actually figuring out how it would work is Rockstar. Most of us know them as the company that makes Grand Theft Auto. They're also the devs behind Red Dead Revolver, Midnight Club, Max Payne, and Manhunt (I also loved State of Emergency, but I don't think that's as well remembered these days). I'm not entirely sure what they put out would work in an MMORPG context, but they're absolutely on the table as a group that could make an MMORPG work. As long as they can make it acceptable to the ESRB. I've brought up Capcom already and I think they'd be able to make something really worth drooling over. That is, if your previous point couldn't be pointed directly at Capcom's business staff. Capcom's development is really some of the best in the world, even after all this time. Their business team is just driving them into the ground. All told, though, I think they could do it if the "suits" would back off of the dev team and let them work. I think another studio that could do it, but might have to fight the powers that be, is Lionhead studios (the people behind Fable and Black & White). They've got a pedigree and a budget, but they're owned by Microsoft. That doesn't bode well for them. I've got a good feeling they could pull it off, though I suppose that was before the departure of Peter Molyneux. Microsoft has a habit of neutering great developers after acquisition (e.g. Rare). You know, now that I think about it, there are two developers I haven't had in mind, but have a background that would make them pretty prime candidates. One of them is id Software. They're mostly known for creating the id tech engines, but I sometimes forget that they were the company that essentially invented the FPS genre of games with Wolfenstein. They're also the people who made Doom and Quake, though I remember them most fondly for their old Heretic and Hexen series that they helped Raven Studios make. Heh, FPS RPGs. The other that I almost completely forgot was Valve, and for the same reason (we only remember them for FPS games). But those FPS games were all amazingly well-developed, and Valve has more money than Croesus at this point. They might be able to pull it off. There are actually probably a few Japanese developers who could make an impact if they stuck their heads in the game (Tecmo Koei?) but I don't know enough about them to know which one has enough muscle to pull it off. Unfortunately, indie devs have big expectations, but they usually fail to execute something on that kind of scale. Chasing Blizzard was too much for even big, respected devs like Bioware and Mythic. I guess the era of the powerhouse indie developer is sort of gone, lots of the devs like Silicon Knights and Westwood are gone now, absorbed into larger and less impressive megaliths. Maybe it's not fair to think Activision, MS, ZeniMAX, and EA aren't capable of developing the games themselves or being able to take their hands off and let some of the more impressive minds do their thing. I guess that's a prejudice of mine; I've just seen too many standout developers have their feet cut off in service to their lords. I've just also come to expect that small, independent developers struggle with long-view developement and, even if their games are sound, their ability to generate new and engaging content is severely limited. And to be honest, indie developers have a bad habit of drowning in hype. At least we don't EXPECT triple-A companies to make something amazing.

Yeah, I guess I sometimes expect a lot from game developers (at least that they can come up with better ideas than we can) but that statement is as damning as you'd need a statement to be about modern MMORPG development. All of the really cool and interesting ways you'd think of breaking the mold of MMORPG default party mechanics, and the last thing you'd think of doing is turning it into a free-for-all. I'll give them credit for trying. They failed, miserably, but they tried, and that's worth something. Especially for a F2P MMO. Such sins are unforgivable in games requiring subscription fees, but the realistic side of me wouldn't expect stratospheric development from a game I'm not going to be paying 15$ a month for. Oddly, Diablo 3 sort of does the same thing successfully. I'm kind if interested to see where the D3, Starcraft II, and all their experimentation with World of Warcraft lands Blizzard with their Titan project. Or if any MMORPG they make will ever match their standards or our hype. Not many companies would wipe the slate clean mid-process because it doesn't feel good enough. I'd honestly kind of hope another heavy swinger shows up to make a game. There just aren't many companies out there with the pedigree that I'd believe they can actually pull a game like this off. Blizzard has always had a high standard of gameplay, considering they were making games of high quality back when gameplay would make or break your game. Square has that pedigree. Who else does that hasn't taken a stab yet? I know I'd like to see what From would be able to put together if they could be assed to do it. CAPCOM might have been able to pull it off, but with their financial issues right now and the fact that their business arm seems to be jerking the development arm behind them like a dog on a leash, I wouldn't even trust them to do it. Nintendo would probably be able to do it, but they have their own console issues before they could even think about it. Who else is there that might actually be able to put together a shockingly good MMORPG right now? I just don't think something of that magnitude is coming from an indie developer with a kickstarter or a company that makes middling games. Maybe I just don't have any faith, but it seems like we just don't have very many real powerhouse developers anymore.

Well, fair and balanced is one of those things we can play with. In games where PVP forms the vast majority of player interaction, it can be more of an issue. In a game like Monster Hunter where player performance and adaptability is always more important than specific role-specialization, it can be a lot easier. I suppose it's just easier for MMO games to extend their lifetimes and make money (either by P2W or subscription) by making sure you're always having to get new stuff you don't have yet. I'm not sure why they don't just give you ways to boost your "stats" in a more organic way than by giving you a tiered equipment system. More to the point, as you said, it's a complete waste when you've spent the better part of a year putting together the graphics for your expansion pack and then never use it again. For all intents and purposes, it's a very expensive misappropriation of resources. Blizzard is constantly having to field hate coming out of the blue for their release schedule, because even considering the ridiculously vast amount of content they've accumulated over the years, so much of it is one-and-done. Considering how fast you can level now, people leveling now will probably see less than half of the Burning Crusade's Outland world, much less all the raids that used to make up the endgame. All that work to essentially be cast by the wayside. I mean, granted, at least it has pretty frequent content releases, but it does feel like a lot of effort for its somewhat disposable content, like taking the time to beautifully hand-craft and individually paint paper cups for a water cooler. There are a lot of ways around that, most of which might involve you having to run from the big bad monsters a lot if you set them to patrol low level areas. I still remember one of the funniest moments of my life being my first time in the Konschtat Highlands with my brothers in FFXI. We ran into a particularly large ram, but it didn't seem to be bothering us. So my brother walked right up in front of it and was one-shot. Steelfleece Baldarich chased the other two of us all the way to the Dem Crag. I also recall my first time in Un'Goro crater being chased by a Tyrant Devilsaur in circles until I found the way out on my hunter. I also remember being one-shot a few times when I first started BC by wandering Fel Reavers. There's no reason you shouldn't make areas useful and accessible from level one to max level besides how much games coddle us. I guess it isn't seemly for them to make us run from fights we can't win and feel like we've gained something when we don't die (one of the other reasons I feel like game-death is way too trivial is that it completely ruins the element of danger and makes death a mild to moderate annoyance that essentially costs money). Again, lots of ways to get out of the cycle, but increasing stat numbers on gear has been around almost as long as the RPG concept has been. I could come up with about a half-dozen viable ways out of it that would waste less time modeling gear (not to mention that WoW has now been around so long and inflated the numbers so large that they're instituting a stat squish so that the game can recognize all the numbers). Developers just don't; they don't need more than a gimmick or two to say they aren't like any other game out there and then they can just do what everyone else is doing.

Honestly, I think it's one of those old standbys that runs the RPG genre as a whole. It's been with us since the very first JRPGs that I remember, and even Zelda did have you slowly replacing a few pieces of gear. It's just burned into the corneas of game developers that your characters need to get stuff when they advance. What do they get? New gear to replace the old. *fanfare* This is one of those times that I'll say how good the core game of EVE is! They have that same sort of progression, but it's a bit more nebulous. Obviously, you try to get to T2 ships and otherwise you don't get many advantages trying to take your cruiser 1 v 1 with someone else's equally equipped battleship. However, advancing in "level" if such a thing exists, generally just adds capabilities and responsibilities. You aren't always getting more powerful versions of the same weapon, suddenly you're talking about having drones and you have to have countermeasures for drones in what you fly. I'll be forever disappointed that a game designed so well at a technical level applied it the way they did. In any case, that's possible in any game including a fantasy game. Let's imagine you start with a sword and a shield. As you advance in the game, you can start picking up other weapons and adding skills. As you add them, you start adding situations where you need those skills. Maybe enemies start becoming larger or more numerous, and you need skillsets to deal with both. Maybe they start circling for position or the area you're accessing means you're having to learn ancillary skills like scaling palace walls, using disguises, and so on. I may have played too much Shadowrun in my youth. I think games are maybe too objective-based? The concept of min-max gear has been in RPGs since the dawn of time, but that's because, in the broader scheme of the universe, damage is damage. When push comes to shove and all the math and modifiers are applied, it's just a number. Games seem to be fixated on changing the way that number is generated in as many different ways as possible rather than making that number less of a concern. Imagine not being able to quickly heal in a game, so suddenly it isn't just about racing damage, it's about knowing how to avoid combat at times or how to generate a killing blow without taking any damage yourself, since you won't get it back. Maybe you could add more infiltration, siege breaking, or traveling so that getting to the objective (and needing the skills to get to that objective) are more important than what you do when you actually get there. Or maybe you can go the other way, making combat much more realistic by making more decisions about defense, position, terrain, and tactics rather than our current system. I'd love a game where you defend a castle with slings, arrows, oil, and catapults, the enemy breaks through and you need to form a ring around spellcasters with your melee or pin them at the bottom of a set of stairs. Very old-school Warcraft or C&C stuff, only it's played out by people playing a single player and focusing very much on the economy of combat. That's just a few examples, but it would change things significantly so that gear isn't even really important. That way, there could be a lot more lateral progression by essentially customizing gear not to max damage (which would be dictated by skill and how the skill was applies), but to changing more interesting concepts such as weapon handling speed, attack range, elemental affinities, and so on. That way, the player could manually tweak stats individually in a zero-sum game to make a weapon "feel" right rather than having to use something predetermined by the developers.

My philosophy is that combat is generally won or lost before it starts. Not because I always work it out beforehand, but because Sun Tzu was a genius and everything he wrote is still just as true today. Smart characters play to their strengths, pick fights they can win, and avoid fights they will lose. I've seen the "referee" system of combat before where you have a sort of dungeonmaster calling the shots. It sounds weird, but if you have a good ref, it does work. That said, you should be fine if you just use common sense. If you're a squirrely archer teenager of slim build, it is generally a bad idea to get into a barfight with an eight-foot-tall mercenary with a face that looks like he peeled it off the sole of his boot and cauterized it back onto his skull. And if you're that eight foot tall mercenary and you know the archer is out there at a distance, don't walk out into the open. Walk into every possible confrontation with a plan.