Richard Bartle Article - Posted before, reposted

[grimjim]

This has been posted before, as a link, but here it is again.

I think that Ryzom is trying, very hard, to innovate and to avoid implementing many of the features - at least in the conventional form they appear - within their game, hoping that they can carve a niche of enthusiastic and creative players.

If it works in the long term then something fantastic will have been achieved and the game will likely have a relatively small, but stable, playerbase.

Reading this article, even though AFAIK this guy has nothing to do with Nevrax or Ryzom, may give some insight to oldbies and newbies alike as well as acting as an immunisation/wake up call to some of the people who whine a lot, giving them pause to consider their own attitudes to the game and MMORPGs in general.

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Introduction

Virtual worlds are being designed by know-nothing newbies, and there's not a damned thing anyone can do about it. I don't mean newbie designers, I mean newbie players - first timers. They're dictating design through a twisted "survival of the not-quite-fittest" form of natural selection that will lead to a long-term decay in quality, guaranteed. If you think some of today's offerings are garbage, just you wait…

Yeah, yeah, you want some justification for this assertion. Even though I'm in Soapbox mode, I can see that, so I will explain - only not just yet. First, I'm going to make four general points that I can string together to build my case. Bear with me on this…

The Newbie Stream

Here's a quote from Victorian author Charles Dickens:

Annual income £20/-/-, annual expenditure £19/19/6, result happiness.
Annual income £20/-/-, annual expenditure £20/-/6, result misery.
Annual income £0, annual expenditure £20,000,000, result There.com.

OK, so maybe he didn't actually write that last line.

What Dickens was actually saying is that, so long as you don't lose more than you gain, things are good. In our particular case, we're not talking olde English money, we're talking newbies, although ultimately, the two amount to one and the same thing.

Now I'm sorry to be the bringer of bad news, people, but here goes anyway: even for the most compelling of virtual worlds, players will eventually leave. Don't blame me, I didn't invent reality.

If oldbies leave, newbies are needed to replace them. The newbies must arrive at the same rate (or better) than the oldbies leave; otherwise, the population of the virtual world will decline until eventually no-one will be left to play it.

Point #1: Virtual worlds live or die by their ability to attract newbies.

Newbie Preconceptions

Another quote, this time from the 1989 movie Field of Dreams:

If we build it, they will come.

Well, maybe if you're an Iowa corn farmer who hears voices inside your head telling you to construct a baseball stadium, but otherwise…

A virtual world can be fully functioning and free of bugs, but still be pretty well devoid of players. There are plenty of non-gameplay reasons why this could happen, but I'm going to focus on the most basic: lack of appeal. Some virtual worlds just aren't attractive to newbies. There are some wonderfully original, joyous virtual worlds out there. They're exquisitely balanced, rich in depth, abundant in breadth, alive with subtleties, and full of wise, interesting, fun people who engender an atmosphere of mystique and marvel without compare. Newbies would love these virtual worlds, but they're not going to play them.

Why not? Because they're all text. Newbies don't do text.

Newbies come to virtual worlds with a set of preconceptions acquired from other virtual worlds; or, failing that, from other computer games; or, failing that, from gut instinct. They will not consider virtual worlds that confront these expectations if there are others around that don't.

Put another way, if a virtual world has a feature that offends newbies, the developers will have to remove that feature or they won't get any newbies. This is irrespective of what the oldbies think: they may adore a feature, but if newbies don't like it then (under point #1) eventually there won't be anyone left to adore it.

Point #2: Newbies won't play a virtual world that has a major feature they don't like.

Not-So-Newbies

Here's another quote (kind of), from a private study of 1,100 players by the Themis Group. Themis's researchers asked veterans of 3 or more virtual worlds how many months they'd spent in their first one and how many months they'd spent in their second one. Dividing the second figure by the first, we get these averages for time spent in the second virtual world compared to the first:

EverQuest 80%
Ultima Online 70%
Asheron's Call 70%
Dark Age of Camelot 55%
Anarchy Online 55%

Players spend considerably less time in their second virtual world than they do in their first. Why is this?

Well, the first virtual world that someone gets into is very special to them. It's a magical, enchanting, never-to-be-repeated experience. You thought it was only you who looked back wistfully on your early days like that? Nah, it's everyone.

This has consequences. There used to be a virtual world called NeverWinter Nights, unrelated to the BioWare RPG, on AOL. When it was closed down, its refugees descended on Meridian 59. They immediately wanted M59 to incorporate every piece of NWN functionality that they could remember.
In general, players view all their subsequent virtual worlds in the light cast from their first one. They will demand that features from their first world be added to their current world, even if those very features were partly responsible for why they left the first world. They'll say they hate treadmills, but if their first experience was in a virtual world with treadmills, then they'll gravitate towards other virtual worlds with treadmills, all the while still hating them.

There's a long explanation for this, to do with the search for identity, which I won't delve into here because you only need to know that players do behave this way, not why (that's a different rant). Read my book (Designing Virtual Worlds) if you want the full story.

Point #3: Players judge all virtual worlds as a reflection of the one they first got into.

Short-Termism

No quote this time.

When a virtual world changes (as it must), all but its most experienced players will consider the change on its short-term merits only. They look at how the change affects them, personally, right now. They will only make mention of possible long-term effects to help buttress a short-termist argument. They don't care that things will be majorly better for them later if things are minorly worse for them today - it's only the now that matters.

Why is this? I've no idea. Well, I do have an idea, but not one I can back up, so I'll keep quiet about it. The fact is, players do behave like this all the time, and it would only take a cursory scan of any forum after patch day for you to convince yourself, if you don't believe me.

This short-termist attitude has two outcomes. Firstly, something short-term good but long-term bad is hard for developers to remove, because players are mainly in favor of it. Secondly, something short-term bad but long-term good is hard to keep because players are mainly not in favor of it.

Design that is short-term good but long-term bad I call "poor". Virtual worlds are primarily a mixture of good and poor design, because the other two possibilities (outright bad and short-term bad, long-term good) either aren't implemented or are swiftly removed. Good design keeps players; poor design drives them away (when the short term becomes the long term and the game becomes unfun).

Point #4: Many players will think some poor design choices are good.

Summary

OK, so we now have the four points I need to launch into my tirade. These are:

Point #1: Virtual worlds live or die by their ability to attract newbies
Point #2: Newbies won't play a virtual world that has a major feature they don't like.
Point #3: Players judge all virtual worlds as a reflection of the one they first got into.
Point #4: Many players will think some poor design choices are good.

I can now construct a line of reasoning that supports my initial assertion.

The Newbie Induction

Under point #4, players will eventually quit a virtual world that has poor features. Under point #3, however, they won't necessarily recognize that a feature which caused them to leave was indeed poor. Under point #2, they won't play those virtual worlds that lack this feature. Under point #1, those virtual worlds that do lack the feature - that is, those with the better design - will die through dearth of newbies. Any absolute newbies, for whom this is their first virtual world, will be educated to believe that this is how things are meant to be, thus starting the whole cycle again. Q.E.D.

The normal rules of evolution by which computer games operate propagate good design genes from one to the next. Each generation of game takes the best mutations from the previous generation and adds to them.

Virtual worlds also propagate good genes, but they propagate poor ones more readily. The best virtual worlds don't pass their design genes around much because of their high retention rate: "Why would I quit when what I want is right here?". Poor design genes cause players to leave sooner, so it's these features that wind up being must-haves for the next generation of products. This leads to a bizarre situation: for a new virtual world to succeed, it has to have the same features that caused its antecedents to fail..!

You're not convinced, huh? OK, here are two of examples of the theory in action, one old and one new.

Example 1 (Old): Permanent Death

If characters that died stayed dead, it would open up all kinds of very convenient doors for virtual world design:

It prevents early-adopter players from gaining an iron grip on positions of power.

It re-uses content effectively, because players view same-level encounters from different angles using different characters.

It's the default fiction for real life.

It promotes role-play, because players aren't stuck with the same, tired old character the whole time.

It validates players' sense of achievement, because a high-level character means a high-level player is behind it.
Many designers and experienced players would love to see a form of PD in their virtual world, but it's not going to happen. Newbies wouldn't play such a game (under points #2, #3 and #4), therefore eventually neither would anyone else (point #1).

PD is short-term bad, long-term good: rejected.

Example 2 (new): Instancing

Instancing looks very appealing on the face of it: groups of friends can play together without interference in relative tranquillity. What's not to love?

The thing is, this is not what virtual worlds are about. How can you have any impact on a world if you're only using it as a portal to a first-person shooter? How do you interact with people if they're battened down in an inaccessible pocket universe? Where's the sense of achievement, of making a difference, of being someone?

Most players don't see it that way, though.

Newbies see it as familiar - "fantasy Counterstrike, cool!" (point #2). They don't know what it means for their long-term enjoyment (point #4). Of course, they eventually will learn what it means - boredom and disenchantment - but even so, they probably won't connect the effect with the cause. They'll just go looking for another virtual world that features instancing (point #3). Older-era players will perhaps initially avoid anything with instancing because their first love didn't have it (point #3), but they'll probably try it eventually because (point #4) hey, maybe it's that missing piece that will give them the sense of closure they crave?

Thus, instancing will get locked into the paradigm. New virtual worlds that don't have it will get fewer players than those that do have it, even though they have the better design.

Instancing is short-term good, long-term bad: accepted.

Analysis

It's not just permanent death, it's not just instancing: it's teleportation, it's banks, it's non-drop objects - it's everything that makes sense in some contexts but not in all (or even most) contexts.

Player: You don't have teleporting! How can I rejoin my group if I miss a session?
Designer: Well gee, maybe by omitting teleportation I'm kinda dropping a hint that you can have a meaningful gaming experience, without always having to group with the same people of the same level and run a treadmill the whole time?
Player: Are you NUTS? I want to play with my friends, and I want to play with them RIGHT NOW!
Designer: But how are you ever going to make new friends? How -
Player: Are you listening? RIGHT NOW!
Designer: (Sigh)

Virtual worlds are becoming diluted by poor design decisions that can't be undone. We're getting de-evolution - our future is in effect being drawn up by newbies who (being newbies) are clueless. Regular computer games don't have this problem.

The market for regular computer games is driven by the hardcore. The hardcore finishes product faster than newbies, and therefore buys new product faster than newbies. The hardcore understands design implications better than newbies. They won't buy a game with features they can see are poor; they select games with good design genes. Because of this, games which are good are rewarded by higher sales than games which are bad.

In virtual worlds, the hardcore either wanders from one to the next, trying to recapture the experience of their first experience or they never left in the first place. Furthermore, in today's flat-fee universe, the hardcore spends the same amount of money as everyone else: developers aren't rewarded for appealing to the cognoscenti, except maybe through word of mouth that always comes with caveats (because of point #3).

Possible solutions

I'm not completely pessimistic here; there are ways the cycle can be broken, mainly by attacking points #2 and #3 (that is, by overcoming prejudices concerning what "should" be in a virtual world). Here are half a dozen hopes for the future:

Innovation. If evolution doesn't work, maybe revolution will? A virtual world different enough that it doesn't map onto players' existing experiences may attract newbies and oldbies alike. Of course, there's no guarantee that the new paradigm won't itself be short-term good, long-term bad…

Marketing. People can sometimes be persuaded to overcome their preconceptions. Even a text-based virtual world could become a monster hit if it had the right licence and was advertised to the right group of people. Unfortunately, marketing costs money.

Cross-fertilization. If no poor features are ever added, point #4 becomes redundant. How do you know that a proposed feature is genuinely good, though? Simple - there are two traditions of virtual worlds (West and East) so you cherry-pick the best ideas from the other one. You speak Korean, right?

Works of art. Virtual world design involves much craft, but at root it's art. A designer makes decisions based on how they feel things ought to be. Players will eventually pick up on the differences and play a new virtual world just because they like the designer's previous work: Raph Koster, Brad McQuaid and Richard Garriott already have more creative freedom than first-time designers. Point #3 evaporates! If only designing a virtual world didn't take so long…

Time may heal. If you wait long enough that people forget why they ever objected to something, that something can come back. Fashions change, and who knows what the newbies of 2024 will think? Good ideas will always get a second chance to enter the paradigm, it's just that "wait a quarter of your life for it to happen" thing that's a little depressing.

Growing maturity. Perhaps the best hope for the future is the growing maturity of the player base. First-time newbies will always assert the supremacy of their first virtual world, but oldbies who have been through the mill enough will realise that some of the features they've been taking for granted are actually counter-productive. If they're around in sufficient numbers, we may see virtual worlds appearing that do everything right and very little wrong, removing point #4 and leading us into a golden age. I can dream…

Conclusion

Virtual worlds are under evolutionary pressure to promote design features that, while not exactly bad, are nevertheless poor. Each succeeding generation absorbs these into the virtual world paradigm, and introduces new poor features for the next generation to take on board. The result is that virtual world design follows a downward path of not-quite-good-enough, leading ultimately to an erosion of what virtual worlds are.

Fortunately, there are a number of processes at work that have the potential to arrest this descent. Thus, although the future of virtual worlds may look disappointing, it's not completely bleak.

Besides, for the purist there will always be text MUDs.

[Author's second note: A non-Soapbox version of this hypothesis will be presented at the Other Players conference in Copenhagen, Denmark, later this year. Academics should refer to that, not to this.] -Richard Bartle

[mrshad]

It has been posted before.
And, just like the last time, I still say it is little more than elitist drivel inspired form teh days when only very few had modems and those few figured they and they alone knew the path to enlightenment.

For anyone who doesn't want to parse the whole thing, here is the gist:
"If you haven't played the hardcore muds for the past 20 years, and if you didn't love every minute of it, you are an idiot newb, and your opinions will destroy online gaming as we know it."

Almost all of the features he cries about can have a positive place in a well designed MMO. Instancing can be a great feature when used correctly. No-drop items, when used sparingly, are a good feature.

...but, I wrote this all before, no need to go into it again.

[art3an]

It is an interesting read for sure... but not in any way "the mysterical truth" or "the law of nature that govern mmorpgs".

For starters, what is he really arguing about/for? What type of game is this guy interested to play him self? Because that's all I can see in the article: is there or will there be mmorpgs designed according to my (his) standards?

There are no such thing as an "ideal mmorpg design concept" objectively speaking; or, rather, is there one is it defined through the number of players playing it and nothing else. Hence, from a general point of view, it is quite hard to argue against the designs of both EQ and WoW. Though, I have no problems from my very subjective view point to rack down on such games and look for alternatives (thats why Im here .

As a pure coincidence, I happend to agree with several of his points. Namely, they happend to fit my subjective mmorpg design criteria rather well

But thats just me...

/Artean - I'm Matis and couldnt care less

[grimjim]

Say what you like but there's a lot of truth there about the difference between short termism and long term, more rewarding and involving play and the risks of letting short term 'ease' and whinging steer the design process.

'Bad' features have been inherited, such as no death, the grind, etc.

It has been posted before.
And, just like the last time, I still say it is little more than elitist drivel inspired form teh days when only very few had modems and those few figured they and they alone knew the path to enlightenment.

For anyone who doesn't want to parse the whole thing, here is the gist:
"If you haven't played the hardcore muds for the past 20 years, and if you didn't love every minute of it, you are an idiot newb, and your opinions will destroy online gaming as we know it."

Almost all of the features he cries about can have a positive place in a well designed MMO. Instancing can be a great feature when used correctly. No-drop items, when used sparingly, are a good feature.

...but, I wrote this all before, no need to go into it again.

[mrshad]

Say what you like but there's a lot of truth there about the difference between short termism and long term, more rewarding and involving play and the risks of letting short term 'ease' and whinging steer the design process.

'Bad' features have been inherited, such as no death, the grind, etc.

I didn't say that there wasn't truth to what he was saying, I said he is an elitist that misses the days where all he had to do was hang out online with other elitists.

I belive very strongly that chalenge must be present in order for there to be a reward. Risk is inherent in any real accomplishment.

But then, these are also games, we play them for fun, not frustration. You yourself posted about that in the very recent past.

And, it is very hard to argue with success. The EQ model may seem to be the embodiement of 'bad' features, but it is the most successful online game, introducing countless thousands to the genre. Sure, i don't like it, but I am the minority.

[xenofur]

eq is successful because it works well as a single player game ...

[vinnyq]

geez grim, like, stop posting stuff that I was going to post, huh?

But yeah, that "thing" that we all can't place our fingers on to why SoR keeps pulling us bad? It's because the alternative is just so painful.

FYI: I haven't play a single MUDs. But I get the gist of them and have seen people playing them.

I don't think it's elitist drivel. I think he's right with the whole feeding cycle of crappiness.

You see the same with movies and television.

But the good news is, you can break the mold. It has been done ... in other medium and genre.

Also, I just encountered this article yesterday, thought I'd share. But apprantly this is already a hot item.

[vinnyq]

<snip from other thread>

May 28th, 2005, 08:34 AM #1
vinnyq
Senior Member (100+ posts)




Posts: 758 Reading material - death of mmorpgs

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Found this article:

Soapbox:
Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies - No, Really!, by Richard A. Bartle.

....

Which parts do you agree with? Disagree with?

Specifically to SoR, do you think that one of the main reason that a lot of us are so supportive of SoR is because it is not the cookie-cutter mmorpg? That it is at least trying to achieve better design, innovation, and not cater to the "bad-designs"crowd. That we are hoping that it can become more than the average mmorpgs, and see that it has a very real potential to achieve this? Is this the thing you have been keeping you around, even if the game is in an early stage and hasn't quite realize that potential yet? And if it is, how do you feel about it?

Discuss among yerselves

May 28th, 2005, 09:31 AM #2
grimjim
Senior Member (100+ posts)

I just reposted this myself! *laughs*

And in answer to your questions...

Yes!

It feels like the only game to really be making any kind of effort to break the mould, even though many of the measures to do so are half measures.

Yes I've been waiting and I hope more changes and additions come along that take it away from the dull and usual of the MMORPGs.

How do I feel about it? That it will get there, in the end.
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May 28th, 2005, 09:35 AM #3
magick1
Senior Member (100+ posts)




Location: Denmark
Posts: 369 Re: Reading material - death of mmorpgs

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*blinks*
Wasn't this posted a day or two ago, by someone else?

Ah, it was
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May 28th, 2005, 10:11 AM #4
vinnyq
Senior Member (100+ posts)




Posts: 758 Re: Reading material - death of mmorpgs

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lol, he's getting around.

My bad, carry on. Moving to other threads to repost the questions.
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May 28th, 2005, 10:29 AM #5
dazman76
Senior Member (100+ posts)




Posts: 481 Re: Reading material - death of mmorpgs

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Well, I missed the previous (re?)post, and quite enjoyed the read - thanks Fyrx
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Also like to add that one of the article interesting point is his comment about the common community reaction to post-patch, especially for major patch. We have seen the same with the mobs dmg increase patch (patch 1 disaster), the mektoubs items transfering patch, and now the tikie bulk patch.

We might think we are smart players, but I have a feeling that we are doing the exact rejection of "short-term bad, long-term good" kinda deal he mentioned. Or maybe we're right, these are "short-term bad, long-term disastrous" kinda thing

[vinnyq]

Oh, and I did such a better job of formating that thing too. Pah!

[madnak]

Bartle has always had an extremely rigid way of looking at things. In some ways that makes his perspectives valuable (the action/interaction player/environment matrix is, I think, an artificial construction that doesn't come close to encompassing the range and structure of player motivations, but it's a useful tool). At a minimum, these are wide generalizations based on Bartle's very subjective ideas of what games "should" and "shouldn't" be.

I have equally esoteric ideas, and they happen to be almost diametrically opposed to Bartle's ideas in most ways. I believe what we call "video games" right now are a seminal medium for much of what is to come in human society. I think automatic interactive environments will ultimately be able to fulfill the needs of education, training, sport, spirituality, rehabilitation, art, communication, trade, and entertainment, among other things. Because of that "gamers" will tend to encompass a large range of motivations. And the spectrum will only broaden as time goes on and interactive environments progress. Someone looking for games to evolve as an art form is going to be understandably frustrated by someone trying to make games purely an entertainment medium. There's nothing wrong with either way of looking at it. To characterize some kinds of player motivations and developer goals as "good" and some as "bad" is a limited way of looking at it, I think. Different games for different people, that's my motto.