I have often wished that Wizards of the Coast would make a MMO version of D&D. Almost akin to how World of Warcraft is done. Except without the heavy handed tactics Activision Blizzard uses to monetize the game. VR would be an incredible platform to create a more immersive world. But VR is still too far out of reach for the majority of people. And most of the things I have seen made in VR don't exactly instill confidence for what developers would do the game or content justice. But a game done like WoW could be a good second option. I have played the Neverwinter game. It was fun at first but the questing was often confusing and once you are stuck its not easy to find your way back onto the right track or even know what is the right track. The leveling in the game needs a great deal of work. And the graphics are very dated. Also the combat is very limited compared to what can happen in a real D&D game. Same for WoW as well. While the cartoonish style of WoW makes it easier for the Devs and artists to create the game and such. It doesn't exactly stretch the legs of modern graphics cards or CPU's. Skyrim.....now Skyrim with heavy modding is pretty sexy graphically. And the world feels allot more immersive. And it can even be ran in VR. I constantly struggle with what kind of art style I would want to see a propper D&D MMO done in. Or how graphically strong I think would do the game justice. Again Skyrim comes to mind. But more effort in the graphics and the spell effects would be preferable. I would want a very high degree of character and NPC customization. NPC's and of course monsters, being able to add effects or maybe altering a monsters model via coloring or even adding glowing runes. Stuff like that. A DM mode for liscenced dungeons based on official content released by WoTC would be amazing as well. Imagine forming a party and the dungeon you enter is all controlled by a DM who oversees the monster rolls and dialog. A virtual 3d version of Roll20 maybe. But the world itself is alive. I would love to see a option for the community to be able to create encounters through an DM mode and then submit them for play testing. And maybe even WoTC take the best entries and make them official content.
Note: When I speak of a game like WoW I am talking about the scope and scale of WoW. The massive world that has been created and all of its content. A game that does the graphics right and also does the worlds creation right is Destiny 2. In my opinion Bungie kills it with world creation and details. They also make some of the most thrilling raids I have experienced within the last 10 years. D2 raids are crazy challenging and often include puzzles you need to solve. And you must work as a team to down bosses. Being a meat head who just sits in one spot spamming your biggest nuke doesn't make you an asset in D2. You will often be the reason the team wipes if that's your idea of playing. Working as a team is key and they create bosses and raids that reward you for being good at shooting but also working to benefit the team. I would love to see content like that in a D&D MMO.
But if this game was done in VR and truly given a solid try at doing it right. I think it would not only be a huge boost for VR sales. But a chance for WoTC to corner a market others are only dancing around. Imagine logging in and instead of just watching a monitor you are surrounded by Waterdeep. Yeah that would be sick beyond words.
These are just some of my ideas and thoughts. What would you like to see and what MMO out there do you think would be best suited to "borrow" from for inspiration lol.
Please reframe from posting politically charged comments in this thread. I want this to just be a fun discussion without any drama.
I assumed OP already know about DDO since they mention Neverwinter. I'll be honest, I didn't read the whole post (fricken long), but I found out about DDO and Neverwinter with a 15 second Google search and CTRL-F to see if he mentioned them in post.
Well their opening sentence was "I have often wished that Wizards of the Coast would make a MMO version of D&D" which suggested they were unaware of D&D Online. I skimmed the rest of their long post so missed the single mention of Neverwinter
Ah yes D&D Online a game that might as well be a carbon copy of Neverwinter. Even the starting zone begins exactly the same as Neverwinter by starting out on the beach after a ship wreck. And lets not forget the cash shop that puts most mobile games to shame. Oh and nothing screams quality gaming when they sell in game currency at EA prices for a game going on 10 plus years.
Dude if I wanted to talk about trash then I would have made this entire post about Neverwinter. And Sorry for putting so many words in the opening, I tend to forget anything longer than a text message is considered a 3 book deal these days.
Firstly, DDO was released 7 years before Neverwinter, so the latter was a copy of the former, not the other way round. Starting on a beach after a ship wreck is an old trope in MMOs.
Secondly, I wasn't talking to it's quality, just that there is a D&D mmo that's explicitly called D&D Online.
And finally, no need to be obnoxious about the length of your post, a poor attitude won't get you far. Let's just be a bit more chill with each other, I'm sorry for the terseness of my response.
Ah yes D&D Online a game that might as well be a carbon copy of Neverwinter. Even the starting zone begins exactly the same as Neverwinter by starting out on the beach after a ship wreck. And lets not forget the cash shop that puts most mobile games to shame. Oh and nothing screams quality gaming when they sell in game currency at EA prices for a game going on 10 plus years.
Dude if I wanted to talk about trash then I would have made this entire post about Neverwinter. And Sorry for putting so many words in the opening, I tend to forget anything longer than a text message is considered a 3 book deal these days.
I want this to just be a fun discussion without any drama.
Your own words...
Anywhoo: what you are suggesting/hoping for is definitely alluring and interesting,there are only a couple of big problems I see:
1. Given the track-record of digital D&D iterations (Baldur's Gate and sequels not withstanding), I suspect developers are somewhat reticent in trying their hand at D&D videogames;
2. Graphics and VR. Awesome graphics are nice, and VR would be extremely immersive, but there's a catch: money and playerbase. An MMO to be profitable give the amount of development work, servers maintenance, continuos support, development of new content etc. has a HUGE development cost, and pushing graphics and VR is nothing cheap. It also NEEDS to be available to be played by the largest number of players possible, as to offset the continuous costs associated and generate revenue. Awesome graphics come with a higher pricetag associated with the system required to support them (and they are not infinitely scalable downwards, you wouldn't be able to play Skyrim on a toaster), and VR is even more expensive and very limitedly spread right now.
Now, I am not saying it won't happen, I personally hope it will, but if it does happen it won't be soon, and I wouldn't hold my breath for it.
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Born in Italy, moved a bunch, living in Spain, my heart always belonged to Roleplaying Games
Anywhoo: what you are suggesting/hoping for is definitely alluring and interesting,there are only a couple of big problems I see:
1. Given the track-record of digital D&D iterations (Baldur's Gate and sequels not withstanding), I suspect developers are somewhat reticent in trying their hand at D&D videogames;
2. Graphics and VR. Awesome graphics are nice, and VR would be extremely immersive, but there's a catch: money and playerbase. An MMO to be profitable give the amount of development work, servers maintenance, continuos support, development of new content etc. has a HUGE development cost, and pushing graphics and VR is nothing cheap. It also NEEDS to be available to be played by the largest number of players possible, as to offset the continuous costs associated and generate revenue. Awesome graphics come with a higher pricetag associated with the system required to support them (and they are not infinitely scalable downwards, you wouldn't be able to play Skyrim on a toaster), and VR is even more expensive and very limitedly spread right now.
Now, I am not saying it won't happen, I personally hope it will, but if it does happen it won't be soon, and I wouldn't hold my breath for it.
Yeah I know VR is a long shot. I even stated as much. If anything VR would be a dream come true, but a highly unlikely to happen dream. As for graphics well there are plenty of games out there that are graphic intensive and the engines are already in place. Art assets and world building would be the money sink. Also while D&D once had a social "stink" to it in the past. And thus many major studios would be hesitant to take the job. These days D&D isn't as looked down upon socially as it used to be. Satanic Panic really did a number and D&D for many years. But thanks to shows like Critical Role and other people streaming their games. D&D is coming out and has a positive image to it. If they had asked Stephen Colbert to do a quick one shot of D&D 10 years ago, I would be very doubtful he would jump at the chance. But maybe I am wrong and he would have leaped at the chance like he did now. Who knows honestly. But the amount of stars who are coming out and admitting to playing the game or had played it does hint at public and social attitudes having changed a great deal in the games favor. So if a major game studio took up the job is more likely. Plus the games name is well known even if you haven't played it. You may have at least heard of the name D&D. The biggest road block to getting a D&D MMORPG that has good to great graphics and quality story telling is budget. Money greases allot of rusty wheels in this world. Critical Role smashed into 11 million for cartoons.....just cartoons. Imagine if Wizards of the Coast got the Critical Role crew to voice their characters in the game and made them NPC's for players to interact with. They could maybe even use kickstarter or some other crowd funding to get the communities help in bringing down the development cost. Just look at Star Citizen, they are over 300 million in crowd funding and its a pretty much no name game outside of controversy, its not impossible. Another thing that would be good to see if NO CASH SHOP! No pay to win! No EA type scumbaging. And if they absolutely must use a cash shop then I think a Destiny 2 (now after Atillizard Moneygrubment divorce) style system would be acceptable. The changes they made and are going to make are why the game is making a great come back from where it was under Actillizard. What worries me is the fact that Neverwinter and the D&D online games both have cash shops that make mobile games look like charitable institutes. My point of this post was to ask people, if you could have a new quality D&D MMORPG how would it look? What games have you seen lately would give you inspiration for what you would want in a D&D game. Instead I got people nit picking over games that are old as dirt. web browser driven. or have the graphics that a super NES would laugh at. Oh and of course the never fails " too many words brah" comments. Because reading is too much work lol. Anyway you made allot of good points and I thank you for your input. See ya brotha.
Firstly, DDO was released 7 years before Neverwinter, so the latter was a copy of the former, not the other way round. Starting on a beach after a ship wreck is an old trope in MMOs.
Secondly, I wasn't talking to it's quality, just that there is a D&D mmo that's explicitly called D&D Online.
And finally, no need to be obnoxious about the length of your post, a poor attitude won't get you far. Let's just be a bit more chill with each other, I'm sorry for the terseness of my response.
Firstly, DDO was released 7 years before Neverwinter, so the latter was a copy of the former, not the other way round. Starting on a beach after a ship wreck is an old trope in MMOs.
Secondly, I wasn't talking to it's quality, just that there is a D&D mmo that's explicitly called D&D Online.
And finally, no need to be obnoxious about the length of your post, a poor attitude won't get you far. Let's just be a bit more chill with each other, I'm sorry for the terseness of my response.
Does it matter if Neverwinter came before D&Donline? Do either of those games have ANYTHING to do with asking people about what they would want with a new modern MMORPG version of D&D? Also stating that starting on the beach is a common MMO trope is pretty much admitting that little thought went into the creation of either of those games. Its basically saying I approve of carbon copying from other games instead of being creative and making something new for players to enjoy. And while I did ask people what games they think would be great inspiration for a D&D MMO, it should go without saying the game should have its own style and story telling. Also what is obnoxious is barely reading the post I made and then jumping for joy at pointing out that I didn't mention a D&D game that might as well be dead. The Entire point of this post was to ask you and anyone else what they would like to see in a "new" D&D MMORPG. And its all written in that big block of text you fumbled through before posting what you posted. lol seriously if you can't be bothered to read what some one has posted in its whole then why would you bother replying or posting here? Is it just to derail this thread? Or do you just get some superiority kick out of stating the obvious?
There just simply is not enough market space for Dungeons & Dragons on the MMO front. DDO was one of the most faithful reproductions of the Table Top experience when it was first released, until the userbase wanted it to be more like WoW and it caved to the demands, and the more they tried to balance classes, the more the unbalanced them to the point where a "Cookie Cutter Monk Build" could solo the entire game including raids.
Don't get me started on Neverwinter, that has about as much to do with the D&D experience as a jar of applesauce. My Cleric has 200,000+ Hit Points (Try to sell that character to your DM)
Sword Coast Legends was the last great attempt at the true DnD experience, and yet...Poof, the user base managed to convince N-Space to make non DnD changes to the game that put it in the great limbo of games that want to be D&D but make money like WoW in its hey day. N-Space's noble and awesome game in Beta became horrific and bankrupted the Company.
Despite its appeal to a cult minority, DnD in video Game format is a dog that lost money for every company that tried it. Bioware lost over $ 10 million on "Neverwinter" Obsidien was on pace to loose more on "Neverwinter 2" Turbine ceased to exist less then 2 years after DDO was released and had to sell out to Hasbro (Owners of Wizards of the Coast) who found the game to be such a sink hole that they gave their own DnD Flagship Video Game away to a group of former Turbine employees. Cryptic's Neverwinter Online story was similar, except the company did not even make it out of Beta before they bankrupted and were forced to sell to a Chinese Grocery Store (Not, a racist slang term, PWE is actually a subsidiary of China's Equivalent of Walmart)
D&D is Video Game Developer poison, no one, including Hasbro wants to touch it with a 10 foot pole for anything to do with interactive group play.
If you don't think DnD is a game with a small cult following, go to your local gaming store on DDAL night, count heads, and then do the same for Friday Night Magic.
DnD is just to slow paced, a to reliant on DM & Player Creativity to solve issues, that no video game can simulate the experience because of the Binary Limitation to Imagination that Video Games have.
Think about the worst DMs you have every played for. You know the type, they wrote a story, and the second you deviate from it as a player they throw the entire Monster Manual at you until you are forced back into the story they want to tell. In today's day and age those are replaced by Video Games, and no one wanted to play with them in the 80s and no one wants to play with the video games now.
The only truly successful DnD Games are single player. Don't expect a COOP or MMO to be attempted again anytime soon.
Dude, chill out. I misunderstood your post, I thought you were unaware of any MMOs on the market. I didn't have any malicious intent, I'm sorry if it came over that way.
My point about release dates was in response to you saying ddo was a copy of neverwinter, that's all
I would like to see a mmo version of dnd that brings out the roleplay in interesting ways like journeys for example would make people have a story they tell maybe they could have a forum for pbp to discuss the things that the mmo version would help to structure.
That was DDO in its hey day before it became popular and the WoW crowd moved in. A single quest could take 15-30 minutes with raids taking upwards of two hours as people role played their characters with the built in voice system. Then it became a no talk Zergfest to complete a 3 hour raid in less then 10 minutes.
@Belminar Yeah WoW has tainted the MMO space pretty heavily. The get in shut up zerg to the last boss collect loot and insta drop party is what the game has become. Honestly I doubt very seriously anyone can bring back any real social interaction like the kind that used to happen back when WoW was in the Wrath of the Lich King era. Blizzard destroyed their own game and with it they ruined the players to other games. Communities and servers used to mean allot to the point that they did their own policing of bad players and dirty tactics for getting loot. But as with everything money was the driving reason Blizzard added in things that were cash shop options "For the players" of course was the excuse. But at $25 bucks a pop per character. That excuse becomes very thin. I have seen MMO communities that aren't as toxic as WoW's. FFIV and GW2, even D2 which is a space shooter has one of the best communities I have seen for helping other players. If I had to sit down and think about what kind of community and game engine I would want to see a new D&D MMO made after. Destiny 2's would be my blue print. The only reason the biggest reason D2 has suffered in player count was obviously Actillizard Moneygrubment. Bungie has taken allot of steps to strip away many of the things Actillizard (Activision Blizzard) has done in the name of investor greed, now that they are free of their overlords. The games player base jumping back over a million players daily is proof of what they are doing is working. The game is solid graphically and physics in the game are great. Part of the reason I think Anthem tanked is because there was already a game that is better than it, and already had a fan base that loved the game but hated the microtransactions previously.
Full disclosure I doubt seriously a MMO RPG of D&D would ever come about in reality. And sadly if it did it would be ruined by greedy cash shop incentives and in game developer and publisher driven tactics to drive people to the cash shop. It's become strange these days to see a game that doesn't do this. FFIV and new Destiny 2 excluded as while they do offer things. None of it is required to play the actual game.
Single player games are some of my favorite to play. Divinity Original Sin 2 and Pillars of Eternity are incredible examples. Heck the announcement of Baldurs Gate 3 almost brought a tear to my eyes out of sheer nostalgia.
What if they made a turn based MMO RPG that required you to choose your spells or abilities on your turn. The game engine would be the DM obviously. The monster encounters random or scripted depending on how you would want to play and what difficulty. The entire game is story driven and all combat is turn based and uses actual character sheets. Maybe replace MMO in the standard sense and replace it with MMO as a community. But the game is played in groups of 3 to 6 people. You can play how ever you want, but it would be hard to encourage RP in a technical view point. When you go on a adventure or create a party you are your own micro social sphere but you can see and interact with other players in the open world or cities. But in dungeons or zones areas. Its just you and your fellow adventurers. Maybe to keep cheating to a minimum restrict character levels with within 2 lvls of the parties average or something like that. To hopefully discourage carries like in WoW.
This is all just hypothetical. But that's the point of this thread. It's not about whether WoTC will make a new one or not. It's about what you would like to see in a new game if it was to happen. Try not to get too hung up on what is happening in reality too much with this. I just would like to see what you guys can dream up.
Blackmail, first of, I would like to say well written and you bring up some very good points. Sadly most of them were done.
Turn Based MMO - Neverwinter Nights (Not sure a server that maxes out at 500 users and requires one of the users to dedicate a computer to be the server counts as MMO, but there was a community over a million strong, and the main server allowed you to view all active servers, so you went to the "Lounge" on the main server, chatted it up until you found a group of people who seemed like a good fit, picked a server that matched the theme you like, and off you went. Great game, and spent 3 years playing it online. Sadly the formula was doomed to fail as the servers were all player run, and Atari (The resurrection version) was is financial trouble and could not find a way to monetize it. There was no way top charge a subscription fee because players could bypass the lounge and go straight to the server. This was before microtransactions and they just gave up and posted a $ 10 million dollar loss. At the time Neverwinter was the best selling video game of all time.
Your dream turn based MMO sounds like "Sword Coast Legends", if you get a change play the single player edition, the story line was awesome (Written by same guy who did the original Dragon Age) but sadly catering to the community to much in development cause the game to be a flop. I still love it, but cant find 3 other players to run through the coop with, and since they bankrupted immediately after release, there is 0 support accept from the publisher, who is only interested in Microtransactions and not expanding the game. They are trying to bilk the last dollar out of the player's mom's wallet, as no one left playing is old enough to have a job.
Wizard of the Coast, or more appropriately Hasbro and Atari (The holder of Exclusive D&D Video game rights until 2050 or some god forsaken year) have little interest in anything but money and the current way they deal with game makers is pathetic. The licensing agreement is so restrictive and costly that you would have to have a subscription based system with micro transactions just to keep it afloat, and the crowd willing to bay $ 15.00 a month plus another $ 50 a month in microtransactions, if not large enough to make a profit, given all the Free To Play D&D rip-offs out there.
You and I think very much alike in what we want, but sadly until Hasbro loosens the reigns and Atari surrenders the exclusive licensing rights, nothing is really going to happen on the video game front on a Multiplayer basis of any kind. Single player games that allow the user to "Change the Rules" to their individual liking and not affect other players are all we are going to see out of D&D for years to come, and it is very sad.
Not that I played ddo and can be sure but the idea is a pbp forum that people from the game can use to tell the story the game helps them build not a discord channel for people to talk I think theres a big difference between the two things. I think the story is about the world and when people start on their characters monologues I think they are showing the problem that is what the world needs to fix why is the world full of men that are monsters when the monsters are just in reality people that do wrong. there is no such thing as dragons its just a parody that shows what becomes of people who have become desensitized roles they been taught to play i.e we call people trolls when they say a a voice system can take the place of a forum for a mmorpg story, but there is lots of other types of monsters we could call them.
Hello there.
I have often wished that Wizards of the Coast would make a MMO version of D&D. Almost akin to how World of Warcraft is done. Except without the heavy handed tactics Activision Blizzard uses to monetize the game. VR would be an incredible platform to create a more immersive world. But VR is still too far out of reach for the majority of people. And most of the things I have seen made in VR don't exactly instill confidence for what developers would do the game or content justice. But a game done like WoW could be a good second option. I have played the Neverwinter game. It was fun at first but the questing was often confusing and once you are stuck its not easy to find your way back onto the right track or even know what is the right track. The leveling in the game needs a great deal of work. And the graphics are very dated. Also the combat is very limited compared to what can happen in a real D&D game. Same for WoW as well. While the cartoonish style of WoW makes it easier for the Devs and artists to create the game and such. It doesn't exactly stretch the legs of modern graphics cards or CPU's. Skyrim.....now Skyrim with heavy modding is pretty sexy graphically. And the world feels allot more immersive. And it can even be ran in VR. I constantly struggle with what kind of art style I would want to see a propper D&D MMO done in. Or how graphically strong I think would do the game justice. Again Skyrim comes to mind. But more effort in the graphics and the spell effects would be preferable. I would want a very high degree of character and NPC customization. NPC's and of course monsters, being able to add effects or maybe altering a monsters model via coloring or even adding glowing runes. Stuff like that. A DM mode for liscenced dungeons based on official content released by WoTC would be amazing as well. Imagine forming a party and the dungeon you enter is all controlled by a DM who oversees the monster rolls and dialog. A virtual 3d version of Roll20 maybe. But the world itself is alive. I would love to see a option for the community to be able to create encounters through an DM mode and then submit them for play testing. And maybe even WoTC take the best entries and make them official content.
Note: When I speak of a game like WoW I am talking about the scope and scale of WoW. The massive world that has been created and all of its content. A game that does the graphics right and also does the worlds creation right is Destiny 2. In my opinion Bungie kills it with world creation and details. They also make some of the most thrilling raids I have experienced within the last 10 years. D2 raids are crazy challenging and often include puzzles you need to solve. And you must work as a team to down bosses. Being a meat head who just sits in one spot spamming your biggest nuke doesn't make you an asset in D2. You will often be the reason the team wipes if that's your idea of playing. Working as a team is key and they create bosses and raids that reward you for being good at shooting but also working to benefit the team. I would love to see content like that in a D&D MMO.
But if this game was done in VR and truly given a solid try at doing it right. I think it would not only be a huge boost for VR sales. But a chance for WoTC to corner a market others are only dancing around. Imagine logging in and instead of just watching a monitor you are surrounded by Waterdeep. Yeah that would be sick beyond words.
These are just some of my ideas and thoughts. What would you like to see and what MMO out there do you think would be best suited to "borrow" from for inspiration lol.
Please reframe from posting politically charged comments in this thread. I want this to just be a fun discussion without any drama.
Thank you.
They do
It's called Dungeons & Dragons Online
https://www.ddo.com/en
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They're coming out with a MTG mom that sounds promising
Cryptic studios is still recruiting a team for that, so I wouldn't hold your breath on it being any time soon.
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I assumed OP already know about DDO since they mention Neverwinter. I'll be honest, I didn't read the whole post (fricken long), but I found out about DDO and Neverwinter with a 15 second Google search and CTRL-F to see if he mentioned them in post.
Well their opening sentence was "I have often wished that Wizards of the Coast would make a MMO version of D&D" which suggested they were unaware of D&D Online. I skimmed the rest of their long post so missed the single mention of Neverwinter
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Could be talking about Neverwinter Nights?
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Ah yes D&D Online a game that might as well be a carbon copy of Neverwinter. Even the starting zone begins exactly the same as Neverwinter by starting out on the beach after a ship wreck. And lets not forget the cash shop that puts most mobile games to shame. Oh and nothing screams quality gaming when they sell in game currency at EA prices for a game going on 10 plus years.
Dude if I wanted to talk about trash then I would have made this entire post about Neverwinter. And Sorry for putting so many words in the opening, I tend to forget anything longer than a text message is considered a 3 book deal these days.
Firstly, DDO was released 7 years before Neverwinter, so the latter was a copy of the former, not the other way round. Starting on a beach after a ship wreck is an old trope in MMOs.
Secondly, I wasn't talking to it's quality, just that there is a D&D mmo that's explicitly called D&D Online.
And finally, no need to be obnoxious about the length of your post, a poor attitude won't get you far. Let's just be a bit more chill with each other, I'm sorry for the terseness of my response.
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Your own words...
Anywhoo: what you are suggesting/hoping for is definitely alluring and interesting,there are only a couple of big problems I see:
1. Given the track-record of digital D&D iterations (Baldur's Gate and sequels not withstanding), I suspect developers are somewhat reticent in trying their hand at D&D videogames;
2. Graphics and VR. Awesome graphics are nice, and VR would be extremely immersive, but there's a catch: money and playerbase. An MMO to be profitable give the amount of development work, servers maintenance, continuos support, development of new content etc. has a HUGE development cost, and pushing graphics and VR is nothing cheap. It also NEEDS to be available to be played by the largest number of players possible, as to offset the continuous costs associated and generate revenue. Awesome graphics come with a higher pricetag associated with the system required to support them (and they are not infinitely scalable downwards, you wouldn't be able to play Skyrim on a toaster), and VR is even more expensive and very limitedly spread right now.
Now, I am not saying it won't happen, I personally hope it will, but if it does happen it won't be soon, and I wouldn't hold my breath for it.
Born in Italy, moved a bunch, living in Spain, my heart always belonged to Roleplaying Games
Yeah I know VR is a long shot. I even stated as much. If anything VR would be a dream come true, but a highly unlikely to happen dream. As for graphics well there are plenty of games out there that are graphic intensive and the engines are already in place. Art assets and world building would be the money sink. Also while D&D once had a social "stink" to it in the past. And thus many major studios would be hesitant to take the job. These days D&D isn't as looked down upon socially as it used to be. Satanic Panic really did a number and D&D for many years. But thanks to shows like Critical Role and other people streaming their games. D&D is coming out and has a positive image to it. If they had asked Stephen Colbert to do a quick one shot of D&D 10 years ago, I would be very doubtful he would jump at the chance. But maybe I am wrong and he would have leaped at the chance like he did now. Who knows honestly. But the amount of stars who are coming out and admitting to playing the game or had played it does hint at public and social attitudes having changed a great deal in the games favor. So if a major game studio took up the job is more likely. Plus the games name is well known even if you haven't played it. You may have at least heard of the name D&D. The biggest road block to getting a D&D MMORPG that has good to great graphics and quality story telling is budget. Money greases allot of rusty wheels in this world. Critical Role smashed into 11 million for cartoons.....just cartoons. Imagine if Wizards of the Coast got the Critical Role crew to voice their characters in the game and made them NPC's for players to interact with. They could maybe even use kickstarter or some other crowd funding to get the communities help in bringing down the development cost. Just look at Star Citizen, they are over 300 million in crowd funding and its a pretty much no name game outside of controversy, its not impossible. Another thing that would be good to see if NO CASH SHOP! No pay to win! No EA type scumbaging. And if they absolutely must use a cash shop then I think a Destiny 2 (now after Atillizard Moneygrubment divorce) style system would be acceptable. The changes they made and are going to make are why the game is making a great come back from where it was under Actillizard. What worries me is the fact that Neverwinter and the D&D online games both have cash shops that make mobile games look like charitable institutes. My point of this post was to ask people, if you could have a new quality D&D MMORPG how would it look? What games have you seen lately would give you inspiration for what you would want in a D&D game. Instead I got people nit picking over games that are old as dirt. web browser driven. or have the graphics that a super NES would laugh at. Oh and of course the never fails " too many words brah" comments. Because reading is too much work lol. Anyway you made allot of good points and I thank you for your input. See ya brotha.
Does it matter if Neverwinter came before D&Donline? Do either of those games have ANYTHING to do with asking people about what they would want with a new modern MMORPG version of D&D? Also stating that starting on the beach is a common MMO trope is pretty much admitting that little thought went into the creation of either of those games. Its basically saying I approve of carbon copying from other games instead of being creative and making something new for players to enjoy. And while I did ask people what games they think would be great inspiration for a D&D MMO, it should go without saying the game should have its own style and story telling. Also what is obnoxious is barely reading the post I made and then jumping for joy at pointing out that I didn't mention a D&D game that might as well be dead. The Entire point of this post was to ask you and anyone else what they would like to see in a "new" D&D MMORPG. And its all written in that big block of text you fumbled through before posting what you posted. lol seriously if you can't be bothered to read what some one has posted in its whole then why would you bother replying or posting here? Is it just to derail this thread? Or do you just get some superiority kick out of stating the obvious?
There just simply is not enough market space for Dungeons & Dragons on the MMO front. DDO was one of the most faithful reproductions of the Table Top experience when it was first released, until the userbase wanted it to be more like WoW and it caved to the demands, and the more they tried to balance classes, the more the unbalanced them to the point where a "Cookie Cutter Monk Build" could solo the entire game including raids.
Don't get me started on Neverwinter, that has about as much to do with the D&D experience as a jar of applesauce. My Cleric has 200,000+ Hit Points (Try to sell that character to your DM)
Sword Coast Legends was the last great attempt at the true DnD experience, and yet...Poof, the user base managed to convince N-Space to make non DnD changes to the game that put it in the great limbo of games that want to be D&D but make money like WoW in its hey day. N-Space's noble and awesome game in Beta became horrific and bankrupted the Company.
Despite its appeal to a cult minority, DnD in video Game format is a dog that lost money for every company that tried it. Bioware lost over $ 10 million on "Neverwinter" Obsidien was on pace to loose more on "Neverwinter 2" Turbine ceased to exist less then 2 years after DDO was released and had to sell out to Hasbro (Owners of Wizards of the Coast) who found the game to be such a sink hole that they gave their own DnD Flagship Video Game away to a group of former Turbine employees. Cryptic's Neverwinter Online story was similar, except the company did not even make it out of Beta before they bankrupted and were forced to sell to a Chinese Grocery Store (Not, a racist slang term, PWE is actually a subsidiary of China's Equivalent of Walmart)
D&D is Video Game Developer poison, no one, including Hasbro wants to touch it with a 10 foot pole for anything to do with interactive group play.
If you don't think DnD is a game with a small cult following, go to your local gaming store on DDAL night, count heads, and then do the same for Friday Night Magic.
DnD is just to slow paced, a to reliant on DM & Player Creativity to solve issues, that no video game can simulate the experience because of the Binary Limitation to Imagination that Video Games have.
Think about the worst DMs you have every played for. You know the type, they wrote a story, and the second you deviate from it as a player they throw the entire Monster Manual at you until you are forced back into the story they want to tell. In today's day and age those are replaced by Video Games, and no one wanted to play with them in the 80s and no one wants to play with the video games now.
The only truly successful DnD Games are single player. Don't expect a COOP or MMO to be attempted again anytime soon.
Christopher A. Blanchard
Dude, chill out. I misunderstood your post, I thought you were unaware of any MMOs on the market. I didn't have any malicious intent, I'm sorry if it came over that way.
My point about release dates was in response to you saying ddo was a copy of neverwinter, that's all
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I would like to see a mmo version of dnd that brings out the roleplay in interesting ways like journeys for example would make people have a story they tell maybe they could have a forum for pbp to discuss the things that the mmo version would help to structure.
That was DDO in its hey day before it became popular and the WoW crowd moved in. A single quest could take 15-30 minutes with raids taking upwards of two hours as people role played their characters with the built in voice system. Then it became a no talk Zergfest to complete a 3 hour raid in less then 10 minutes.
Christopher A. Blanchard
@Belminar Yeah WoW has tainted the MMO space pretty heavily. The get in shut up zerg to the last boss collect loot and insta drop party is what the game has become. Honestly I doubt very seriously anyone can bring back any real social interaction like the kind that used to happen back when WoW was in the Wrath of the Lich King era. Blizzard destroyed their own game and with it they ruined the players to other games. Communities and servers used to mean allot to the point that they did their own policing of bad players and dirty tactics for getting loot. But as with everything money was the driving reason Blizzard added in things that were cash shop options "For the players" of course was the excuse. But at $25 bucks a pop per character. That excuse becomes very thin. I have seen MMO communities that aren't as toxic as WoW's. FFIV and GW2, even D2 which is a space shooter has one of the best communities I have seen for helping other players. If I had to sit down and think about what kind of community and game engine I would want to see a new D&D MMO made after. Destiny 2's would be my blue print. The only reason the biggest reason D2 has suffered in player count was obviously Actillizard Moneygrubment. Bungie has taken allot of steps to strip away many of the things Actillizard (Activision Blizzard) has done in the name of investor greed, now that they are free of their overlords. The games player base jumping back over a million players daily is proof of what they are doing is working. The game is solid graphically and physics in the game are great. Part of the reason I think Anthem tanked is because there was already a game that is better than it, and already had a fan base that loved the game but hated the microtransactions previously.
Full disclosure I doubt seriously a MMO RPG of D&D would ever come about in reality. And sadly if it did it would be ruined by greedy cash shop incentives and in game developer and publisher driven tactics to drive people to the cash shop. It's become strange these days to see a game that doesn't do this. FFIV and new Destiny 2 excluded as while they do offer things. None of it is required to play the actual game.
Single player games are some of my favorite to play. Divinity Original Sin 2 and Pillars of Eternity are incredible examples. Heck the announcement of Baldurs Gate 3 almost brought a tear to my eyes out of sheer nostalgia.
What if they made a turn based MMO RPG that required you to choose your spells or abilities on your turn. The game engine would be the DM obviously. The monster encounters random or scripted depending on how you would want to play and what difficulty. The entire game is story driven and all combat is turn based and uses actual character sheets. Maybe replace MMO in the standard sense and replace it with MMO as a community. But the game is played in groups of 3 to 6 people. You can play how ever you want, but it would be hard to encourage RP in a technical view point. When you go on a adventure or create a party you are your own micro social sphere but you can see and interact with other players in the open world or cities. But in dungeons or zones areas. Its just you and your fellow adventurers. Maybe to keep cheating to a minimum restrict character levels with within 2 lvls of the parties average or something like that. To hopefully discourage carries like in WoW.
This is all just hypothetical. But that's the point of this thread. It's not about whether WoTC will make a new one or not. It's about what you would like to see in a new game if it was to happen. Try not to get too hung up on what is happening in reality too much with this. I just would like to see what you guys can dream up.
Blackmail, first of, I would like to say well written and you bring up some very good points. Sadly most of them were done.
Turn Based MMO - Neverwinter Nights (Not sure a server that maxes out at 500 users and requires one of the users to dedicate a computer to be the server counts as MMO, but there was a community over a million strong, and the main server allowed you to view all active servers, so you went to the "Lounge" on the main server, chatted it up until you found a group of people who seemed like a good fit, picked a server that matched the theme you like, and off you went. Great game, and spent 3 years playing it online. Sadly the formula was doomed to fail as the servers were all player run, and Atari (The resurrection version) was is financial trouble and could not find a way to monetize it. There was no way top charge a subscription fee because players could bypass the lounge and go straight to the server. This was before microtransactions and they just gave up and posted a $ 10 million dollar loss. At the time Neverwinter was the best selling video game of all time.
Your dream turn based MMO sounds like "Sword Coast Legends", if you get a change play the single player edition, the story line was awesome (Written by same guy who did the original Dragon Age) but sadly catering to the community to much in development cause the game to be a flop. I still love it, but cant find 3 other players to run through the coop with, and since they bankrupted immediately after release, there is 0 support accept from the publisher, who is only interested in Microtransactions and not expanding the game. They are trying to bilk the last dollar out of the player's mom's wallet, as no one left playing is old enough to have a job.
Wizard of the Coast, or more appropriately Hasbro and Atari (The holder of Exclusive D&D Video game rights until 2050 or some god forsaken year) have little interest in anything but money and the current way they deal with game makers is pathetic. The licensing agreement is so restrictive and costly that you would have to have a subscription based system with micro transactions just to keep it afloat, and the crowd willing to bay $ 15.00 a month plus another $ 50 a month in microtransactions, if not large enough to make a profit, given all the Free To Play D&D rip-offs out there.
You and I think very much alike in what we want, but sadly until Hasbro loosens the reigns and Atari surrenders the exclusive licensing rights, nothing is really going to happen on the video game front on a Multiplayer basis of any kind. Single player games that allow the user to "Change the Rules" to their individual liking and not affect other players are all we are going to see out of D&D for years to come, and it is very sad.
Christopher A. Blanchard
Not that I played ddo and can be sure but the idea is a pbp forum that people from the game can use to tell the story the game helps them build not a discord channel for people to talk I think theres a big difference between the two things. I think the story is about the world and when people start on their characters monologues I think they are showing the problem that is what the world needs to fix why is the world full of men that are monsters when the monsters are just in reality people that do wrong. there is no such thing as dragons its just a parody that shows what becomes of people who have become desensitized roles they been taught to play i.e we call people trolls when they say a a voice system can take the place of a forum for a mmorpg story, but there is lots of other types of monsters we could call them.
ps just remember that everytime you slay a monster in ddo they could have been a friend if they didn't go on that path to become a monster :)