Right now I'm trying to design a space-based game in which players are crews aboard starships. There are a lot of different missions that you may be required to complete on these starships, and the player can step into the shoes of the captain, an engineer, a science officer, or a tactical officer. I'm trying to determine whether or not to make the game massively multiplayer. I'm thinking of making it where people sign up to be on a ship with a captain. The players will have choices as to whether or not to elect a captain, have a captaincy that rotates among the players, or maybe base the ranks on the ship on who invests the most into the ship. The problem is that I'm not sure if players would want to all be on a ship together. In a lot of massively multiplayer games players just act like it is a single player game (like wwiionline). They play in an individualistic way unless they are with their squad or something. In wwiionine a lot of people didn't even want to use the chat function. Each player would have their own prestige points gained from completing a mission, but a player would have to sign on as a member of a crew to get the good missions. I could come up with many mechanisms to make players working together as a crew easier, but the question is : "do players want to play massively multiplayer games just like single-player games, or, provided the game mechanics are right, will they want to play together as a team?". If it is impossible, regardless of the gameplay mechanics, to get players to play as a team, it may be better to make the game single-player. -- Scipio3

Why not just make it multi-player, but leave the MMO element out of it?

I do play MMOs as if they're single player games... at least that's how I played UO and I play WoW now. I can't stand to play an MMO that requires me to group, e.g., EQ. I also can't stand to play single player games. The last single player game that I really got into was Ultima Underworld 2!! Now really, I don't mind grouping with people that I actually know personally.

Just an idea, but you could add other ship classes. Add a pilot class/profession/skill tree for players and a fighter, shuttle or other single person ship class. This would give players the option to play by themselves and still do specific quests like scouting, fetching, infiltration, etc.

Alot of MMO's tend to be build around a central aspect in regards to the player, but that is not always the case.

You should probably have a look at Puzzle Pirates, in this MMO-game players can buy ships and go cruising around the sea, raiding other players ships, exploring, ferrying others around, trading goods, etc. But there's a catch, each ship needs several stations to be manned, for example the sails, the bilge pump, a carpenter, a navigator, and people to man the cannons, work as lookouts, or just to stand around and work as soldiers when boarding enemy vessels. Each player can work at various tasks, which work as mini-puzzle games (thus the name, Puzzle Pirates). So a captain is usually always looking for crew, but he can also opt to have a permanent crew if he likes, and assigns which would be higher officers, etc.

If given the opportunity players may want to be captains, but that isn't always the case. So making starships really expensive or hard to acquire (as they can be in puzzle pirates) would be a good way to go. You could also allow small 1 man fighters or freighters for the people who enjoy going solo, which isn't a bad thing since they could help the larger ships out if needed, much like gr0undz3r0's shuttlecraft idea.

As for teamwork, i think Planetside did a pretty good job of having players work together, many of them were under the umbrella of one of 3 global empires, so even if they weren't in a squad, or didn't want to group they often worked toward the benefit of the empire regardless. There was also a decided lack of personal accomplishment (other than Battle Rank, which just made you more versatile, not powerful). All this can be very handy when flying in the depths of space alone, so even if your boned someone from your "empire" may come along and happily lend you a hand.

[Edited by - Gyrthok on December 15, 2005 10:55:03 AM]

An interesting concept. But, I think, with a low probability of success. It will heavily depend on the quests/missions, and whether or not players absolutely require the help of others.

In WoW for example, a lot of people play solo, unless they absolutely can't, like in case of dungeons. And even then, quite a few people play to increase their own rating/strenghts/whatever. I have often seen the situation where a tank suddenly said, 'I'm out bye', and leaves the rest in a hopeless situation, unable to finish the (remaining) quest(s).
On the other hand, I have also seen players helping out others (mostly far lower in lvl) just for the fun of it.

So in regards to your question, 'do they want to play (..) together as a team'. I think the answer is mayby. Should you focus on team play only? No, definitely not.

PS. A starships involves a chain of command, hierarchy. I wonder how you're going to implement this.

Quote:

Original post by Traveler PS. A starships involves a chain of command, hierarchy. I wonder how you're going to implement this.

Just to throw out an idea for discussion on the way to control the heirarchy is ranks and limiting certain abilities and functions to the ranks. As an example, World of Warcraft (which was brought up in a previous post) has the leveling concept in it. Each level has certain abilities that you can obtain; so for the starship example you could have it so that ensigns can't access the same systems or perform the same duties as a commander. They could gain ranks from length of service or duties performed and at that time they can be trained in the higher rank's abilities.

PvP all the way. Old style Runescape pking was the ultimate shit.

The player killing system totally makes the game, and having it so that you don't have to fight in major groups totally made the difference. However, fighting in large masses was always a blast.

Massive-war

I would say that the ranks in-game depend on the actual game world.

In a Star Wars-like setting, Han Solo was Captain of his own ship, however this was only because he owned (read: 'won' from Lando) the Falcon. Thus, investment plays a part in seniority on a ship.

In Star Trek, military service in the Federation is rewarded with titles. Upon reaching Captain (or higher, but possibly Commander) status, a player would be assigned a ship by the Fed. This would suggest long-term service to a military/government body.

What you could consider is the following, in a persistent multiplayer setting:
- a Captain is the Big Cheese who makes the decisions and takes the blame for actions (i.e. no one remembers the crewman that fired the phasers upon the Klingons, only the Captain who defied them and broke the treaty)
- a flight control officer who controls where the ship travels
- a tactical officer who controls the weapons and defense systems
- an ops officer who tweaks settings in the engine-room to boost certain systems (e.g. lowering life support for increased shields in a badly-fought dogfight, to help the crew survive)

Would be quite interesting :) I had thought of this sort of gameplay a while back. :)

Presuming that this game like most has combat as its main purpose, the most important and most enjoyable aspect and the aspect that sets it apart from other games will be starship vs. starship combat. However, this probably won't be happening all the time. What I see as the main problem is this: If you play as a member of the crew of the starship, you will eventually get board with the limited area of the ship. When you sign on to play it will just be luck whether or not anything interesting is going on at the time.

Perhaps you have thought of a way around this, however, I might suggest that you make it a regular non-massive multiplayer game. In this case a game will simply consist of a battle between two large ships. Players will take roles such as gunners, pilots of starfighters (presumably a starship carries a number of small fighters in its hangars), officers, or soldiers for boarding or defending against boarders. In order to have something of a persistent world, you can have persistent characters with rank advancement. Positions such as squad leaders and ship officers will only be available to those of high rank with perhaps the highest ranking candidate for a job getting it. Also you can have support for clans with their own customizable ship.

Just a suggestion, anyway. I'm sure you could make it massively multiplayer, but I'm sure it would be hard.