Topic: Why you played Seed?

Hi and hello! smile

I am the brother of a guy, that "testet" Seed for some days and knew not that much about it.
Since the last few weeks I am very interested in everything about seed and "games without war".

Why?
Because I am trying to make a webgame, that comes out without war since that time.

Now, Seed was the without war MMORPG that sound best for me and that's why I try to make my game a little bit like Seed.


Okay, to the topic - I've got only one question:
[big]Why have you played Seed?[/big]
I mean.. I want to know, what was your goal in this game? (like "Become very rich", or so)

I think this question and what I want sounds a bit stupid and I also think, that there's no simple answer on it. Maybe it was also the RP and the community? I don't know, but I want to be inspirited. I need something like "work" for the players. A reason for them to (for example) repair everything and to run the economic. :sweat:
edit: I mean, I need an incitation for the players


Oh and please don't hurt me, because of that question. :mrgreen:

Last edited by Skasi (2007-02-07 18:50:49)

Re: Why you played Seed?

Well, since this is the Seed RP community, I doubt you'll get many answers other than:
"for the RP"

Any reason for people to do anything in game like repairing, should be IC: to restore the Tower, for instance.
Getting rich is the kind of thing people only do on the short term, it's not a good goal to have in a game, and certainly not a good thing to base a game on.

Yeah... story is everything, basically.

Last edited by Norah (2007-02-07 19:03:33)

-Norah/Liath-
"Do not follow! The milk is not ready, and you are not ready for the milk!"
-Psychonauts: Milkman Conspiracy area

Re: Why you played Seed?

Okay, that's what I've thought.
So it's really only RP?

What do you think, that I should make in my game. Things like games, that can be played while people chat and maybe eat something?
I really understand, what you mean with "only RP", I've played a lot games only because of "RP" too, but isn't there anything else too? X)

For example, I play a lot of games not because of the RP, but because of the great feeling I have, when I do something for my Guild/Town/Team (for example get money, so that the town where I life can get a.. nice looking fountain).
Was there the an incitation to for example get out of the tower and look at the world there?

It's so: I can for example make a variable named "Tech" and increase it every time a player is doing something in a laboratory. I just don't know, if I should add a brand new feature to my webgame, or if I should increase the efficiency of machines, so that players can get more "Tech" and the efficiency is more increased and so on. ^^

Re: Why you played Seed?

It was for RP and because i wanted to know the end of the story. To me seed was like a book where you are the hero.
When you create a character in a game, you usually kill monster, earn item, make some quest.. If you create a new one 2 month after, it will be the same monster, same quest.. same story. Seed was a daily surprise.

Well, in fact i's like to explain myself better but my english is too bad tongue

Re: Why you played Seed?

Skasi wrote:

Okay, that's what I've thought.
So it's really only RP?

What do you think, that I should make in my game. Things like games, that can be played while people chat and maybe eat something?
I really understand, what you mean with "only RP", I've played a lot games only because of "RP" too, but isn't there anything else too? X)

RP was the only thing, and the only thing worth anything. Sure you had repair and production and such, but that's not a goal, just gameplay to support RP.
So you can make your char enact the work they do around the Tower in their life.

For example, I play a lot of games not because of the RP, but because of the great feeling I have, when I do something for my Guild/Town/Team (for example get money, so that the town where I life can get a.. nice looking fountain).
Was there the an incitation to for example get out of the tower and look at the world there?

And that is not RP? I fail to see how playing the game IC, making money, and buying a fountain, are in themselves OOC things.

The game never got far enough for anyone to go outside, but players were already making plans.

It's so: I can for example make a variable named "Tech" and increase it every time a player is doing something in a laboratory. I just don't know, if I should add a brand new feature to my webgame, or if I should increase the efficiency of machines, so that players can get more "Tech" and the efficiency is more increased and so on. ^^

The point is that most games, you can RP in them, but your RP won't have any effect on the gameworld, and it won't progress the story at all.
Everything should be IC, and what people do should make a difference. I think if you manage that you have a good game.
As long as the actual game mechanics are not too horrible, that's fine.
I'd play a game where almost everything was IC, where my IC actions had an effect on the story and gameworld. I think we're lacking such a game right now (except maybe URU, but it just soooo sloooowww right now).

-Norah/Liath-
"Do not follow! The milk is not ready, and you are not ready for the milk!"
-Psychonauts: Milkman Conspiracy area

Re: Why you played Seed?

Oh you mean, in a game everything should have an effect on everything else? smile
I'm already thinking of how I can make the game as complex as possible.

Let me give an example: (it may sound stupid ^^)
In a game there are 3 objects. 3 Computers. Computer A is standing on the coordinates 0/0 Computer B is standing on 10/0 and Computer C is standing on 67/58.
If these Computers work together on <anything>, then Computer A and B can work good together, because they (normally) don't have such a high ping, like Computer A and C.

Okay.. that's an example. Is it that what you mean with "everything (here: distance) should have an effect on everything (and so on the story)"?

Or do you only mean things like "I've killed that monster named 'Gragh Boss', so why can other players kill it too?".

Or both? Or neither one nor the other thing? smile

Re: Why you played Seed?

Skasi wrote:

Oh you mean, in a game everything should have an effect on everything else? smile
I'm already thinking of how I can make the game as complex as possible.

I don't think it's about making the game as complex at possible.
I mean: in WoW, for instance, you can fight, get to level 60, twice over, get all the riches there are, and what? You will have had no effetc whatsoever on the gameworld. Nothing will have changed. The story will not have progressed at all.
You can do this with an infinite number of chars, and nothing ever changes.
That's what it means not to have an effect on the game and on the story, and that's a bad thing.

In Seed, players decided they wanted to make their own robot, so they RPed doing that, and the devs then made a little robot appear in the game. That robot later went on to affect the storyline as well.
This way, we had an effect on the game itself, and on the story and how it progresses.

Let me give an example: (it may sound stupid ^^)
In a game there are 3 objects. 3 Computers. Computer A is standing on the coordinates 0/0 Computer B is standing on 10/0 and Computer C is standing on 67/58.
If these Computers work together on <anything>, then Computer A and B can work good together, because they (normally) don't have such a high ping, like Computer A and C.

Okay.. that's an example. Is it that what you mean with "everything (here: distance) should have an effect on everything (and so on the story)"?

Or do you only mean things like "I've killed that monster named 'Gragh Boss', so why can other players kill it too?".

more like what you said last, yes, as I said.
Complexity doesn't necessarily make a good game. Seed was very simple.

-Norah/Liath-
"Do not follow! The milk is not ready, and you are not ready for the milk!"
-Psychonauts: Milkman Conspiracy area

Re: Why you played Seed?

Another exemple can be esme's tree. Esme tought that the tower had not enough green so she wanted to make a tree grow, AD and runestone accepted and we finally had this:

http://dark.angel.free.fr/images/seed/tree.jpg

The game was changed, the history too.

Re: Why you played Seed?

Sounds great. smile

Do you have any ideas on how runestone knew about that "tree-idea"?
I mean, was that a story in the forum? Or are there hundreds of GMs standing around in the game and see what the players are talking? Do they look in their logs?
Or what was that? *interested*

Re: Why you played Seed?

You just make it heard in the game.
Usually yes, the GMs pass it on to the devs.
We had a GM team of live actor NPCs.
Those are indispensable.

-Norah/Liath-
"Do not follow! The milk is not ready, and you are not ready for the milk!"
-Psychonauts: Milkman Conspiracy area

Re: Why you played Seed?

There were GM characters people knew, so if you had some idea you could go talk to them. Or just contact a GM on IRC. Or post something on the boards. Of course, the GMs couldn't satisfy everyone's wishes, so usually you would have to convince a lot of others to support you. And if you did, the GMs were even likelier to learn about it.

Re: Why you played Seed?

Yes, and it was realistic.
If you wanted to build that Chimbot robot, for example, you had to make the plans for each robit part, submit them for approval, and also be able to gather the needed resources in the game, or it wouldn't happen.

-Norah/Liath-
"Do not follow! The milk is not ready, and you are not ready for the milk!"
-Psychonauts: Milkman Conspiracy area

Re: Why you played Seed?

This thread also has some things we'd like to see in MMORPGs.

Oh, and yes, I was in Seed for the roleplaying too. And the ability to have an effect on the storyline.

Re: Why you played Seed?

Roleplaying...being part of the story that was going on. Being able to have an effect on the story is what made seed very interresting imo... No other (computer)game I have played has had this aspect

Re: Why you played Seed?

Hmm... first, I tried it out becouse it was soooo different than any other game I played, I was fed up with MMOs that are all the same. Then, I stayed, becouse the community was great, it was fun, and I wanted to support the devs. Then, I found the RP, and it was so great that it sucked me in.

So really, the most important part of Seed that made it different from any other game was the story, the ability to affect it, and the RP. No wonder some are playing Shadow Siege now, it has all these features.

Re: Why you played Seed?

It's all been said already. There were three big things in Seed that made me come back. The roleplay - being a major part of the gameplay, the plot - evolving and being pushed forward by player characters' actions, and the style - I guess it was the most stylish MMOG I ever played.

RP in MMOG's looks like this when trying to base it on in-game activities:
"Let's go <activity>!"
"Yay, <activity>!"
"<motivation>!"

Re: Why you played Seed?

I have played Seed because ...

... I loved Esme's smile
... I loved it to help developing a unique MMO-World, ingame of course.
... I loved the roleplay and the community around it.
... I loved the idea of the setting, and the backgroundstory
... I loved the graphics, they were really cool.

Re: Why you played Seed?

Awww, thanks Feelix!

I played Seed because of the RP. Because you had little control of events, so you always have to come up with a reaction or a solution to the situation. So it was having a story develop all around you and being part of that story that was important. And in my case trying to manipulate things to go the way Esme wanted them to!

As for the tree, I guess I can possibly answer that reasonably well being both player and GM. I don't know how the idea started, but Esme was certainly very vocal about wanting more green in the Tower. Whether the Devs or GMs picked up on it first, I'm not sure, but due to their huge ingame presence I would guess the latter. When I became a GM I discovered that the Devs had a tree ready and the next step was to encourage the community to want and plant a tree. This involved much RP, encouraging players to think about how they could create a tree and even why they would want one - yes I remember the lack of interest from some characters keenly! To be honest there were some nervewracking times for me, and we came close to not getting it there as this was player driven. We (GMs and Devs) may have wanted it badly, but if players had ridiculed the whole idea it simply would not have happened. Thanks to everyone taking part and then Quanto stepping in at the last minute to dedicate his marvellous machines to the sole job of creating it, Esme's Tree was born and saw the light of day. I honestly had tears in my eyes when I saw it smile

Such things are not complicated programming, but they are intensive in organisation. Maybe having a situation that has two solutions, and the solution that is used is dependent on the way your players interact with the item. The thing I loved about Seed was that some things happened only once. As Norah has already stated, doing the same quests over and over becomes boring so to have a change from time to time is good. In Seed we had repetative elements that were a means to an end. Like in real life, you work to get money, generally repeating set tasks. But what you do next can often have a permanent change, say you buy that book you want. You're not going to buy it twice are you? (Blatenetly ignores the stack of books that she's accidently bougth twice!)

Esme

Re: Why you played Seed?

why i played seed:
no combat
rp
good story

you could take a look at atitd ( i play that game)its whitout stupid like fighting


ok,ok there is fighting,but only politic words,like seed

sadly,you cant rp there

oh,and if you ever look for a tester,you know who to call

Last edited by Elfus (2007-05-13 13:34:00)

Re: Why you played Seed?

forum necrofiliac!

anywho, my reason can only be that my boss made me sad a very traumatic period in my life

Mecha
Former Developer and GM on Seed
Who will feed the mice now?!?!?!

Re: Why you played Seed?

We feel for you Mecha.

Re: Why you played Seed?

/me pokes Mecha

Re: Why you played Seed?

/me counterpokes Nuala softly

Mecha
Former Developer and GM on Seed
Who will feed the mice now?!?!?!

Re: Why you played Seed?

oh btw skasi,i send you a message