Making a killer MMORPG 1

3. Overly text based games.

I love macros. Sometimes, they become super fun to use. The Half Life engine's use of the console is probably one of the smartest abilities they have on the system, because it takes the functionality of a text box and turns it into a powerful control center for those who know how to use it. However, most companies make these horrible little code systems in the text box, and expect you to know how to use them. For example, a nice litle compact code macro for changing your weapon (Which, you should be able to do this with a key, but just as an example..) should be something like this:
/changeweapon sword
but, some companies like to go overboard and expect you to know either the datafile for the sword, or the image file. So it turns into some shit like this.
/changeweapon (sword,sword.tif,sword.png);
That kinda shit needs to be taken care of in the CODE, not in the user interface.

4. Assuming the player knows how to play the game

Yeah, this is a major issue. No-one inherently knows how to play Everquest II. When I was born, I didn't have the little players manual for Evercrack II in my fists. I didn't even care. I think I still don't care. But whatever. The fact of the matter is, people will never know the gameplay from the start. No-one reads your god damn play manual, either. When they sit down, they won't know I is up. They'll look for the arrow keys or the WASD keys, depending on what kind of gamer they are. But it's not a common thought that "Oh, IJKL is the left handed version of WASD". But I digress.

The game needs to be self explanatory. I want someone to sit down and UNDERSTAND it within a few minutes of gameplay. The old Mario Brothers games were like this- I could hand my Grandmother the controller and within a couple button mashes, she knew exactly how to play the game.

Overall, I think the main rule I'm going to stress through these future articles is that I'm trying to aim for the everyman's MMORPG. But first, I need to know what I'm going to make the Everyman's MMORPG WITH. Expect that in the next installment of my "Making a killer MMORPG" series!

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