After deciding on a method of handling the economic transactions in my game, I now have to take into consideration the items that would be fun to get and use in this economy. My game is set in the far future, on an alien planet where humans have crash landed in a large ship. In the crash, the ship''s main systems (power, production, etc) become broken, but each of the crew members have little PDA-devices that still work. These PDA''s can organize data between themselves, simulating a distributed computing network. So, you have a basis for trade using these PDA''s. However, the planet you are on has resources available like iron ore, trees, other "standard" resources. As part of the game, where the people are in a space-age time, I''m afraid that it would feel horribly convoluted to make the players at the beginning have to use picks and axes and stuff to gather resources and build basic things, waiting for the engineers on the ship to repair the vital systems. The game and the economy could scale up to cover all the items available to people, with laser rifles selling for 1000 dollars and axes going for about 10 or 20... But coming down to the game design issue, would it make a fun game if the newbies started off with picks and axes and they see other people running around with full body cyber-armor and laser rifles and such? And if not, I''m considering that I "start" the game after the humans have been on the planet for some time and have established mining operations and repaired the vital systems on the ship, thus exposing the newbie people to high tech equipment like laser picks and rifles instead of stone-age equipment. I think either would work economically, I just think it might be a very different experience depending on whether I include the full range of play including the crash time or imply that everyhing goes well... I''m pretty sure either approach should work economically, it just seems strange to make the jump from axes to laser rifles...if you could give me an opinion on which experience would be more pleasing and viable, let me know.

why should anyone start off poor? I would never, ever, ever play a game where it started off with a mining session. Break away from the UO/EQ/AC mode, people don''t like starting off poor and weak. Those kinds of games need to become more like FPSs, at least in terms of starting conditions. When I spawn in Quake3 I have a full compliment of life and an ok weapon, chances are I can get a rocket launcher or shotgun in the next five seconds. That''s what pulls people in, the sense that they are something more than poverty stricken newbies. The fact that I have next to no skill, no coordination, and that I rarely play doesn''t ruin my experience. I still have a lot of fun every couple of months when I boot it up for a change of pace or for a lan party. People always have to invest time to master a game, but they shouldn''t have to invest time in a particular character. In maybe 3-5 years I expect a major revolution the MM market, companies not currently involved in it are going to make some fun games and all the current companies will die away and never be heard from again. Which group do you want to be in?

I see where you are coming from, but basically, the market needs diversity. There are already internet-ready and many-player FPS games (half-life, UT, quake3) that satisfy the action crowd. Those games provide a quick and easy way to satisfy your desire to kill other people (unhealthy, but better to kill virtual people than real people). Sort of like reading a magazine, you can pick it up, flip to almost any page, and find something interesting and new.

However, the games industry also needs the kind of game that can parallel the effectiveness of a novel on the industry. Novels are bigger, longer, say more, and have more development and depth than any magazine article you''ll read. These kinds of games should allow the player to start on chapter 1, get through that, seeing all they can, moving on through chapters 2, 3, 4 and so on. These people feel more satisfied with the feeling of accomplishment that they get from boosting up a character and having a higher set of skills or more expensive weaponry. These people like RPG''s, especially the social MMO kind.

And, believe it or not, despite the people like you who want to get a quick kill, there is still a market for the people who want depth and meaning in their games. I want to make a game to satisfy those people. The sense of accomplishment that goes with starting out with nothing and building your way up through the ranks just instills a person with a sense of self-worth and happiness, more than just an adrenaline rush as they scream "eat rocket, loser!"

As far as my decision, I have currently decided to have 2 separate "zones" on the server system: 1 for newbies fresh from the crash, who have yet to meet up with the masses of people around the crash sites of the spaceship, and another for the people who''ve played for a while and have journeyed across the land to find the wreckage and salvageable technology. The difference between the two zones is like between medieval and space-age times. The players will move from a melee-style, survival-dependent, government-less environment to a regulated and subsidized economy, a technological advancement with computers, robotics, and all that good stuff. Most players should spend no more than a week on the initial server, so those games could be started and terminated every day, with about 7 running at once, and then the people in the teriminating game are booted into the mass, continuous zone where they are free to follow the economy, trade, fight, steal, whatever, and face the consequences.

On a gameplay standpoint, please tell me if you think this concept would be more annoying than fun or if it would actually be enjoyable.

in times of survival money is forgotten about and everyone does everything together so that the whole group can survive. Unless, what you mean is that the humans have to buy stuff from indigenous people (I hate the word aliens) on the planet. But then, how are they going to get the money in the first place?

Are you even trying to be intelligent?
'cuz if you are, it ain't workin'

The idea is that the players have to work to support the base, because that''s the only way they''ll stay alive. A government isn''t self-sufficient without the people working under it. They have to develop and make all the new equipment that''s necessary to fight a war, and they are lacking major resources and methods. So throw in an economic system and the people who can do the job will be rewarded by staying alive and gaining power, while the other people will become dependent on those who know how to work the system. It shouldn''t make it un-fun for anybody, because everyone has the choice to do what they want. The game balance can be different on different "realms" for different styles of play. Resources can be more or less abundant, technology can be easier to obtain, damage models can be changed, and the different realms can effectively present an almost totally different game experience. People will play on whatever realm(s) they enjoy the most.

Would you play on a system like that?

I''m a little unclear. Are you talking a massively multiplayer game where you start off with a pick-axe (possibly) and work to support the human settlement?

Some things to think about: How do you handle conflict? An axe vs. a rifle and cloth vs. semi-sentient shape metal (or whatever ) is the proverbial knife in the gunfight. If you''re like most designers, the meat of your game is probably combat, so I don''t see this as being too enjoyable for the guy with a knife (unless you''re building in stealth, and surprise, and grappling and such... but still...)

BTW, you could model the spread of technology for the native culture after the spread of guns among Native Americans in North America. Many tribes were extremely flexible, and seized on the advantage that superior technology (esp. weapons, but also things like cookware and tools) provided. So going from axe to laser rifle isn''t so strange if the humans needed to trade their tech (tho'' why they''d be dumb enough to give up weapons tech is another thing...)

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Just waiting for the mothership...

I''m trying to not give too much away here, but the concept of the game is that a human spaceship crash lands on an alien planet. The survivors start out quite a distance from teh crashed mothership segments, in escape pods, and are left with only the things around them when they start off. When they make it back to the mothership, they would then have access to all the stores and supplies on the ship, including weaponry. Some people might choose to stay with some of the lower level items, such as knives and rocks, and train in skills that would allow them to dodge bullets and move very fast, causing death blows with melee weapons while avoiding being shot. I think the concept is interesting at least, so I''m gonna give it a shot.