Feb 1 Coffetalk highlights
By
Agent White,
Posted on: 2012-02-03 12:27 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
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I know how you feel. Hope it worked out. I hate having to light a fire under my Dr office to get a script called in.
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Originally Posted by Von Krieger
Yup, no VK write up this week. Ran out of pain meds and am waiting for the pharmacy to call my doctor.
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All in all a good coffee talk barring a couple of things that lept out:
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I think you need to ask Posi about the first month of AE and then think whether a 'high adoption rate' is actually a reflection of how fun or popular it is in good terms. |
Originally Posted by Agent White
I22 beta stuff. Drowning in Blood Trial. Main thing, they wanted to make a whole trial that was a follow up to the sewer trial. They consider the sewer trial a success for its high frequency and fun (a high adoption rate). DiB functions as a continuation, helping folks level, etc. Easy to get burnt out on the sewer trial. Zwill plays about up to 15. Others play it up to 22, where you can get SOs.
... Back to drowning in blood. People are riding sewer to 50 and they want to add something else on. DiB deals with the Shivans as a precursor to the Coming Storm and involves both the old shivans and new shivans. Set out to avoid the clash with a situation like old/new klingons. Star Trek tangent. They wanted to explain the influence of the coming storm on the shivans and their history and current nature, as a bit of a send off to the blood bay shivans. Happiest with there actually being a separate trial and different options. Objections are largely the same but heroes/villains have different sides. So much content hinges on story, trials are meant to be fast, fun and simplistic, didn't want to get crazy with stories like cut scenes, etc. But for players that want to slow down, you can talk to different people and experience it differently. Goal for drowning in blood was to provide both a lot and as little story. Stuff you can kill through dialogue trees. Villainside you can ally or go against arachnos, some murdering (DEFEATING). Easter eggs: there's a lot of references to Aliens, some Smurfs (making fun of the old shivans color) Creepy body snatcher with a funny name. The beta feedback on the trial has been sparse. |
It's a trial starting at level 1 and it's a very basic "go here, smash this" unless you're going for badges and the only alternative is the new Atlas and Mercy stuff which is fine once or twice but then it's the frankly awful Shining Stars or Dr. Graves 'extended tutorial' arcs. A case of the devil you know is better than the shoe-horned plot. It also means they can log in to Atlas/Mercy and coast up to 50. Funnily enough I was just reading about "Content Locusts".
Most people are coasting it in beta too because they need to get their alts up to the high enough levels since there's no level shifts being given out atm. Wink-wink
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Originally Posted by Agent White
Q: when will some of the old hazard zones get some love? Ex. revamping boomtown, perez park.
There's an interesting grab bag, but he can't say much about too many plans for the future. Think Tank spends time playing the game on a nightly basis, has some concerns about some of the low level content stuff, ex. the Hollows. Each designer has their own stuff they want to see revamped, improved, streamlined, etc but that has to be balanced with new content and higher level play. As far as old hazard zones, they have new tech to implement in places, new things to experiment with. The devs have the freedom to walk in at the start of the day and be irritated from something the night before, wanting to fix it, and folks will find time to take a look at it. With the old hazard zones, he's not sure what the scale they'd be looking for, for instance how many Atlas park revamps will be seen vs Dark Astora style revamps. There are definite quality of life changes to be made to areas, like the Hollows. The zone doesn't sit right in terms of when you get sent there, it's an awkward place to transition to. A lot of old content can be seen as the 'low hanging fruit' of the game. One of the factoids someone brought up, the game has in the neighborhood of just 10 zones for a 20 level range. |
Anyone who's played Redside content will know there's an arc in the 15-20 range that features a Baumtown restoration project where the few entrance buildings are being given a makeover similar to what happened with Faultline. Of course given the arc is about as old as mayhems the original model stock may not be available but there is some groundwork to build off (pardon the pun).
It's also a zone filled with conflict and upheaval so it would be similarly small scale building till the 'zone' could be fully reclaimed. They don't all have to be Atlas Park scale revamps because in the real world there aren't that many size restorations that go on. There are several housing developments in the town where I live but they've bulldozed the entire plot and started building them in sectors. One sector is finished and then they move to the next. Even the Arenas had building sites before they were put in the game proper as did the long-lost travel method for the moon zone. They're still working on that wall in Steel (despite the GvE box coming with a map showing the expanded Steel Canyon).
There's been plenty of other small scale changes from the University innerds to Wentworths and the Black Market and even the AE buildings. Small changes do get noticed.
Tyger (50), Mutation-Controller Mind/FF - oldest Mind/FF on Union
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Originally Posted by Dispari
I don't know why Dink thinks she's not as sexy as Jay was. In 5 posts she's already upstaged his entire career.
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