Nos482 wrote:

ShadowElusive wrote:
But no feelings okay?
Awwwwww. :(
Bwhahahaha... sorry =P
Grimfox wrote:
As it relates to heroes. I think any hero in costume standing around not doing much should draw a crowd of the curious (maybe just for higher levels) that will want selfies and autographs (maybe triggered by an AFK flag)
I really like this idea... but what would Villains draw, protesters?
Maybe the occasional camera team could show up on longer outdoor fights.

You know I'm totally stealing that picture don't you?

This update is considered 100% canadian content by volume.

I imagine Titan City as something of a sophisticated mega-metropolis to the point where its influence covers 100 of miles of topography. It is a destination. It is large to the point where a large scale event can happen in one district and the rest of the districts can be impacted to various degrees, but continue to operate fairly normally. The size of such a city would naturally attract and, in some cases, retain all sorts of 'creatures'. In this environment there would be such an exchange of culture to make it THE city through it's architecture, scientific centers, governmental operations, trade, etc. Gives the game a nice platform to develop on, don't you think?

One of the memorable things about CoH for me was the music that was distinct for a zone, or even areas within a zone. I wouldn't mind a similar function in Titan City. For example, a more heavy bass beat for an industrial zone like the sound of machinery, or maybe more up-beat poptastic electronic music for the club/entertainment district, or even more eclectic carnival-style music for a beach-side boardwalk/causeway with vendors and skiball and coin-operated fortune teller machines (this would make a great Big movie homage if there was a secret mission from the fortune teller mini-game where you grow to gigantic proportions with hilarious consequences, such as inability to take the local subway or enter buildings without complaints and/or damage)

I have many of the music tracks still from CoH, and upon occasion do listen to them, and I don't have to see the track listing to know which area/zone it's from. That's how in-grained the music is for me. Sure, after awhile, I turned down the game music to listen to the music on my computer, but I'd always, and I mean ALWAYS, have it on for the first time I zoned into AP on a new character.

Anyways. Food for thought.

For these first two paragraphs, I'm speaking from my point of view as an artist and former-drummer. The third paragraph is more on general zone functionality. I apologize in advance if this comes off as "tl;dr" or if I completely missed the point... I don't think I did anyway.

Audio is 50% of the experience in most all cases. It's also preferential and subjective though. In my 7 years of CoH, I had the in-game music off and the ambient noise turned down for nearly all of it. The music and their choice of certain environmental effects took me out of it the experience a lot for just being bland or annoying. I usually played to my own music so it very much caused me to form a different opinion of the game world. Paragon to me became a modern backdrop to a soundtrack of 80s AOR Rock and Heavy Metal. So that's a tough one to balance from a design standpoint. You want very believable ambiance that doesn't get irritating and music that suits the different vibes of each area but it can't sound phoned in and forgettable or people will turn it off to listen to their own stuff. Maybe I'm over-critical is all but I can generally tell when well-made backing tracks in films and games are perfectly interwoven into the complete presentation, no matter what the genre. CoH doing the Techno/Electronica thing most of the time would have been fine if it all didn't sound so bland and generic.

Whatever the style of music you land on, it should be an auditory representation of what the player sees. Best example that comes to mind is the orchestral soundtrack to the original RoboCop. Basil Poledouris had thematically formatted it in a way that represented the internal struggle Murphy was having between his humanity and his programming. When it was RoboCop programmed as he was intended, the music incorporated a lot of brass, metallic sound effects, and synthesizers. When his humanity emerged, the music consisted of strings and gentle harmonies. I mean this is pretty much the principle of most movie scores but I like using RoboCop as an example for how poignant and memorable the music is. It's no different than writing themes for town areas that reflect the visuals.

Functionally, one point of contention for me is style vs. convenience in terms of zone layout. I've seen this a lot in online games that didn't have very well thought out town areas. They reserve spots to be considered social areas that are woven into the environment to look seamless and stylish for players to mingle in and they're always empty because everyone just converges on the most central and/or convenient location. Auction houses, a popular quest contact, guild vendors.... under the Atlas statue. Or how Pocket D had all that room and everyone just hung around the blue side upstairs bar or the middle of the club where the Cape Radio DJs usually showed up. A portion of that I blame on the static "No Touching" nature of the set dressings in that game. I feel like people would have been more inclined to spread out if the chairs and booths had been properly interactive instead of static objects you can't manipulate.

Hope that all made sense.

I'm a fan of being able to buy rp items in businesses with in-game currency. And be able to gift some of those items, emote/hold some of those items, and even buy items that can be used as placeables in a superbase. A pharmacy or lab supply store might sell a medical bag that could be equipped on a glove hand, or a stethescope around your neck. Also tabletoppers for a superbase such as medicine bottles, beakers, microscope...etc. A miltary surplus store might sell canteens or a lantern that can be equipped in hand, or a tent placeable for a superbase. Restaurants could sell food that can be shared or emote eaten, or tabletop placeables like pizzas, or birthday cakes, balloons etc. Florists that sell bouquets that can be gifted and equipped. Pawn shops could sell all sorts of things like jewlery for gifting, old speakers for superbase placement..etc. Buying newspapers or items from vending machines too. All these make a city feel livable. That's flavor to me. Buying a certain amount of non-power rp items could even be a badge collector task. That's my food for thought.

Distilled down to its core ... an MMORPG is a combination of Sights and Sounds, as well as a collection of Desires and Challenges. The Eye Candy (and Ear Candy) are what "get you noticed" as a game ... but it's really the core of the gameplay, the things to do and how many different ways you can do them, that form the heart and soul of a game that will keep people coming back and logging in again and again. That latter part revolves around Things To Do, and how those things get done. Simple "navigation" around the game world is one of those things, which is why even to this day a lot of us who "lived" in Paragon City for years would be able to know, remember and recognize portions of that city even now if you showed it to us.

An MMORPG is a visual/audio medium that incorporates disparate MOTIVATIONS to log in and "do stuff" to maintain interest, even if that "stuff" to do is things you've done before. So long as the gameplay and the community of players are engaging and fun to interact with, retention will in many ways see to itself.

That said, I agree with the notion that music tracks for neighborhoods and the architecture of the locations can create a very strong imprint on the mind and the memory of a wide variety of locations and settings. Just watch any Samuraiko video from the City of Heroes library on youtube and you'll see what I mean.

Hard for me to put it into words. I just know CoH managed to feel like a real place to me. Having zones with very few (or none) players was even a nice retreat at times. I would sometimes go to the Shadow Shard...just because I liked to visit.

Echo others who pointed out the familiar music which would play when you went to certain areas. I only ever "silenced" one thing...the really loud portal sound effect in Portal court.

I think it would be cool if we could casually stroll into any random store/building just to look around if nothing else. That might take more resources than it's worth I guess. But maybe you could get a mission from any shopkeeper...even a small one like "Deliver groceries to Mrs Jones". If we got to have alter-egos, maybe be able to go grocery shopping, go out to eat, or get our shoes shined. Maybe a movie theater which showed short films about the lore of the city? (That's getting pricey I can tell)

I would also like to feel like each zone was a part of the city. Like if something big is happening in Atlas Park, shouldn't I hear about it in Founders Falls?

Rigel wrote:

I'd also like it if there was some impact to the environment after a large event which would persist for a while afterward; days or even weeks depending on the nature of the event. Possibly even a semi-permanent change after something really colossal.

Cool idea.

The city should certainly be a character in its own right, but not a static character. As Grimfox and StellarAgent mentioned, the city should change. They needn't be large changes and they can be timed changes, although the occasional permanent change, like one business being replaced with another, would be great to see. Naturally this includes the NPCs. In essence the city should have little surprises in store for players from time to time, rather than being a static, painted backdrop. To me that's the foundation of a "living city".

ETA: I don't know if this is a viable idea, but it could be very neat if discrepancies in otherwise very regular schedules lead to clues. E.g., if Mr. Brownstone stops by his local cafe at 3 PM ever day for an espresso and one day he fails to show up, some investigation could lead to a mission (maybe he was kidnapped by Dr. Tyche or maybe he just needs help cleaning his gutters).

Foradain wrote:

The other is that when that comic book convention Gabby mentioned comes to town, it should be obvious, especially near the convention center, with NPCs cosplaying as both iconic Super NPCs and possibly select prominent (read: high-level) PCs (although that may need a bit more thought put into it; permission of the player, etc.)

This is an interesting idea that could lead to all sorts of hijinks. There could be related missions where real villains try to disrupt the convention and you could have a bunch of normal cosplaying NPCs be mistaken for real heroes/villains to add a bunch of chaos to the situation. You could have a villain try to cosplay as a PC hero (like CoH doppelgangers) and do something bad at the convention during a "meet-n-greet" to discredit the PC. Might even be an opportunity to have some kind of role reversal where you play as your "secret civilian ID" attending the convention as an average citizen without anyone realizing you have "actual" powers. There are many possibilities with this.

Empyrean wrote:

Ok, first, let me say I know little about Black Desert and care even less, but the second half of this short piece (http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/game/944/feature/10683)--the part that starts with "Logging into an MMO just to explore"--I think really speaks to what this thread is about. The "other half" of a truly great game. The stuff other than game-play mechanics and art style--a world that you can live in and explore.

I remember feeling this way about City of Heroes. I think I only actually "played" or even socialized at most half of the times that I logged in to City of Heroes--I just really enjoyed BEING there. I know CoH was more of a "theme park" than a "sandbox", but somehow they really pulled off making you just want to be there.

I just got around to having enough free time in the last few weeks to give Fallout 4 some serious attention. Better late than never as they say. Anyway while the overall game is great I think I've spent a majority of my time with it so far just walking around exploring. It's weird but the parts of the game that involve combat or questing almost seem like "secondary mini-games" compared to the way I'm primarily enjoying it which is just to walk around and see what's hidden over the next virtual hill. Don't get me wrong - popping random heads with a fully modded sniper rifle is a good bit of the fun too. ;)

I'm looking forward to "exploring" CoT as well. I realize that unlike Fallout 4 its not going to be quite as "exploration oriented" but it should still be fun seeing what might be hidden in secret alleyways or on isolated rooftops. If CoT is anything like CoH it'll have the draw of a great costuming system as well - that alone should have me hooked for near-countless hours by itself.

Darth Fez wrote:

The city should certainly be a character in its own right, but not a static character. As Grimfox and StellarAgent mentioned, the city should change. They needn't be large changes and they can be timed changes, although the occasional permanent change, like one business being replaced with another, would be great to see. Naturally this includes the NPCs. In essence the city should have little surprises in store for players from time to time, rather than being a static, painted backdrop. To me that's the foundation of a "living city".

This harkens back to the idea I presented [i]years ago now[/i] of leveraging the idea of Control Points from Tabula Rasa as a way to allow Players to [i]influence the character of city neighborhoods[/i], such that you didn't have an entirely static environment. Yes, it's still a "capture the flag" kind of setup, but rather than it being a Black Hats vs White Hats kind of deal (like usual), I was proposing that "which flag got planted" would matter as to WHO Controls that neighborhood, with the NPC Faction the PC was aligned with when they "planted THEIR flag" becoming the Dominant Force in that neighborhood for a time. Get enough NPC Factions in on the "Control Game" so it isn't a simple Red vs Blue system and you've got something rather interesting on your hands.

The whole thing turns into a Player Initiated Event that can take on a sort of life of its own in which you can have Take Back Our Neighborhood! movements happen that result in a more dynamic "churn" in how various parts of the city present themselves. That way, Player actions INFLUENCE what the city looks like at any given time, without necessarily being the only/deciding factor.

A more granular diversity?
Not sure how to put this exactly, but I am always delighted when I find some small surprise in a zone. Something that is out of the ordinary for the neighborhood, or something left over from a by-gone time that somebody is still keeping up. Like a seedy, run down neighborhood with one perfectly manicured lawn with brightly painted lawn ornaments. You know there is a story there; 'Who lives here? What kind of person would keep up this little patch of green in the face of all this? How do they stop others from ruining it?' But it's a story you will never learn. Or the opposite, In the middle of a modern downtown, surrounded by steel and glass skyscrapers is a grimy, neo-classic building that might once have been a prosperous bank or public building. For some reason it was never torn down or renovated and appears deserted...or is it? Or step into a little used alley in the 'nicer' part of town and find a hidden, but thriving, and apparently long-established shanty city.

A city whose history shows at the seams feels more 'real' to me than one where perfect urban renewal is manifest. A long-time citizen might know some of these places, but many would go unnoticed or overlooked except by a new-comer seeing it for the first time and wondering 'What is that doing there?' And maybe, now and then, it turns out to be something that needs investigating.

Dark Ether wrote:

Having some NPCs (not all) flock to a hero, or maybe take out a camera for a photo, would be nice. Citizens, imo, wouldn't flock around a villain to protest them - they'd be much more likely to avoid the area altogether unless they were a fan of sorts of the baddie.
Theme songs for an area are okay as long as they're not too long and do not persist. One of my biggest issues with some games is that the background music is incessant and repetitive to the point that I turn that slider all the way down. I'd rather miss them entirely than have them in my ear the whole time over and over and over and over....
Other things that make a place come more alive is variety. NPCs that look all too similar are a real turn-off, as in some of those sim games where you see the same person in the same clothes walking down the same sidewalk, or identical cars down a street, etc. More games should have some randomization of various color palates for such things so you don't always get that one guy with the yellow shirt you've seen hundreds of times.
Including things such as sidewalk food stands or news kiosks that are there during certain times of day but not others would add to the variety, as well.
Weather makes a big difference, too, or it can. Playing a game for a long time and having it always be a sunny spring day is something that may get old without people really realizing it. Having it rain periodically, leaves change color, fall off, having snow for a while, all that adds to the realism which keeps things fresh. Having some rain and snow/ice conditions also can lead to car accidents or the like, which might be a place where a hero could lend a hand...or a villain make things worse.

Gender correct names are kinda important IMO, because there were too many of the npcs running around with names from the other genders common ones, once in a great while is funny as in a boy named sue type thing, of either gender, but, not half or more "men" manes on women and vice-versa... And I think that having jokes and a quirk, such as an area that has the same few people passing by in the same order on a regular time schedule, possibly a story or plot hook would be enjoyed by a lot of people... An X-Files type area or areas would have it's fun and fans... The fact that places are memorable, even a skyline area such as an overlook, or, rooftop/tower that all can get to to watch a sundown, meteor shower (safe), lunar eclipse, etc would be nice to add. Something to just experience without it being anything to do with any plot would be good to have, also, a waterfall, with actual digital audio of a waterfall, set up so that as you approach, it is like doing so to a real waterfall IRL... Sound fade in and fade out, etc...

ChaoticSunder wrote:

I'm a fan of being able to buy rp items in businesses with in-game currency. And be able to gift some of those items, emote/hold some of those items, and even buy items that can be used as placeables in a superbase. A pharmacy or lab supply store might sell a medical bag that could be equipped on a glove hand, or a stethoscope around your neck. Also tabletoppers for a superbase such as medicine bottles, beakers, microscope...etc. A military surplus store might sell canteens or a lantern that can be equipped in hand, or a tent placeable for a superbase. Restaurants could sell food that can be shared or emote eaten, or tabletop placeables like pizzas, or birthday cakes, balloons etc. Florists that sell bouquets that can be gifted and equipped. Pawn shops could sell all sorts of things like jewelry for gifting, old speakers for superbase placement..etc. Buying newspapers or items from vending machines too. All these make a city feel livable. That's flavor to me. Buying a certain amount of non-power rp items could even be a badge collector task. That's my food for thought.

This is a great idea. Making people work to find "the perfect item" to complete their base or apartment etc is a great way to facilitate exploration of the city. They could even be used as a collection type achievement (find 3 leg lamps each with a different shade) I know of at least two people who would go nuts over a feature like this.
It's been brought up before and was brought up here at least once, and I agree, that weather can be a great way to change the character of a zone and make it feel more alive. SWG did a great job with weather effects that were "experienceable" but not intrusive. Changing the color of the sky, adding clouds, some sound effects, and changing the foot step sound effects massively changes the experience of a zone. You can go from bright and happy musical to Noir in 5 effects or less. But it's not so simple either. It breaks the reality when it's been raining for 20 minutes and people are calmly walking the streets without umbrellas at a regular pace. That's not what people do when the rain starts they hurry to their destination. They call a cab. They take shelter in a shop. They buy a street umbrella. They hold a new paper over their head. They react.
Busses. COH was known for having bus stops and no busses. Ever.

I think the summation is that the city needs to be dynamic. It needs to evolve and react. It can't be on an endless loop or repeats. It's a tall order. I know you are working on it. It sounds like you are coming up with art assets that can be mixed and matched to avoid repetition. While still creating unique character for different districts.

Springing off of the idea that crowds or protestors gather around AFK PCs- I'm sure this has been already discussed, but I would love to see some more-than-subtly pro-hero and pro-villain neighborhoods. Sure, in the bustling "Anthem Village" maybe a few adoring fans greet your hero, remark how safe they feel, etc. Venture over into "Tyche Town," though, and maybe the locals give you a piece of their mind- "Hey cape, we don't 'preciate your kind 'round here" or "Get lost, hero." Maybe even a concerned mother telling you to keep your head down, lest the doctor's goons get wind of you. Obviously vice-versa for villains, with people being fearful/protesting vs showing solidarity.

Not that you'd want to do this in every zone, and obviously it shouldn't be constant spam. I think that would make the alignment decision a lot more immersive though- especially if combined with certain heroic factions not attacking heroes but going after villains on sight. Then when I swap over to my nefarious alt I'll really see the city through totally different eyes.

And please put an italian place that's a known mafia front in the game somewhere. Where EVERYONE knows it's the HQ of the notorious "Fat Tannim" and we can walk in- but we can't touch him (magic crowbars and all that.)

One of my favorite things about CoH was that everything felt real, the very first time I was able to get a travel power and I flew, it was amazing! And then I play games like DCUO and I just feel like everything is cheezy and fake. I hope I can experience that feeling I felt first playing CoH again..

Lost Deep wrote:

What did I love about Paragon City?
That's a good question. I didn't really think about it at the time. Maybe it was that it didn't remind me of anywhere I knew; but it was still a big city, full of exploration opportunities, and exploration was easy, even casual. Even places with no overt reason to exist had some content, and for that matter there were some places with no overt reason to exist. A lot of MMOs have very specific landmarks: A place for everything and everything in its place. But CoH and CoV were different; there were some areas with thick apartment buildings, some with warehouses, streets connecting it all, like an actual city where people actually lived and worked. You might say that space was wasted, but it was there for the atmosphere. It didn't have the 'rpg town' feel, where there's five buildings total and you'll use them all in some capacity. I remember the rogue islands, seeing a group of smokestacks with my super jump character and wondering whether I could get to the top of them. I didn't know what the factory was for, or whether there was some great importance to it. It was a factory with smokestacks and I could super-jump.
I think that's what I want from Titan City.
Driving down a street of a city you're visiting is odd if you think about it. An unlabelled building, a sandwich shop, a bank you've never heard of, you'll never interact with these, but someone does. You'll come, and you'll go, and you won't even scrape the surface of the city, much less get a good feel for it.
I think that's what I want from Titan City: not my home, but a place that feels like it's home to other people. Somewhere with all the little oddities of architecture and layout that comes from a living, growing city. Roundabouts out in the middle of nowhere, roads with jogs in them, dead-end streets for no good reason. So many video game cities feel very calculated, and though it's strange to say, I'm hoping Titan city will feel a little bit more like a mess.

Also ALL of this!! :D

Garrilon wrote:

I really got a kick out of the punny "Businesses" like the "Paragon Pizza, made by made men" and Infront Steakhouse, there was also the suggestive double meaning of "Family Jewels" jewelry store... Even little things like that are a flavor, so to speak, and, you might ask a few large businesses for the permission to use their name and logo and such in the game, never hurts, and, I suspect a few at least would be glad for the extra exposure, even some small ones might be happy to be included, from your home towns... Of course you should be able to use the joke names for things like "Taco Hell", "Pizza the Hut", and any others that are clean enough, maybe "Burger Queen" (Using the head of the "King" from commercials and putting it on top of a dress, although that may be called homophobic by some), I had one I (and maybe a lot of others) thought of : "Joke in the Box" (perhaps with a spring for an arm with a pie in the hand...)

I enjoy a good joke and pun as much as anyone (I can quote many Monty Python sketches from memory) but it could easily be taken to an extreme. I prefer those sorts of things to be somewhat understated or at least used judiciously enough that it takes you by surprise when you first see it.
I've seen many complaints about the excessively campy stuff in CO.

I have to look back to our old City to try to find an answer to this, because that's the only MMO that has ever felt like a virtual home to me. Many of these have been mentioned already, and I'm not sure that any one of these is more important than another. It was probably the whole mix that made it feel like home.

• Badges and plaques encouraged exploration while giving a bit of history. I honestly did these with every new character over 7 years.
• Each zone had its own flavour -- sometimes specific landmarks, but also general style and mood.
• There were 'quiet' areas that didn't necessarily have a spotlight as a landmark or congregation spot.
• Neighbourhood music within zones. I liked that it faded out after a while but was always there as a sign you had crossed into a new area. I'm with the folks above who still listen to some of those tracks now and again.
• The city wasn't static. Not only did we keep getting new zones, but the old ones were updated occasionally as well. I loved when the construction crews would show up an issue before the release of something like Wentworth's, and as passers-by we'd speculate on what might be coming. (I still want to know what was being built at the north end of Steel!)
• I liked the way that a combination of dev design and player actions gave certain landmarks a special significance, from the obvious Atlas Park costume contest spot to lesser-known ones, like the Rikti-fighting hill in Talos.
• The combination of semi-randomly-located mission doors and the scarcity (at least in the early days) of instant travel (plus simply how much darn fun travel powers were) kept players from either ignoring the city or just making well-worn ruts between static mission locations. This kept people moving about the city and seeing new parts of it.
• A huge element that made the city seem more 'real' to me than areas in other MMOs was the fact that (until Freedom) mobs never spawned on top of you. Not only did this help with immersion, but it meant that you could stand and chat or RP with other players without fear of instantly finding yourself in the middle of a bunch of enemies.
• NPCs commenting on characters' recent exploits.
• Special zone events, especially ones where the devs were there spawning GMs live, as they did on some anniversaries. Note that what made these special was the fact that they didn't occur every day.
• Seasonal events. (Though the endless night at Halloween got old quickly.)
• The way missions and contacts were acquired in sequence made my actions seem more important to the city. Rather than the typical MMO hub that encourages your character to run about a green zone asking everyone if they need any rats exterminated or packages picked up, the number of missions one had at any time in our old City was kept trim and focused, such that arcs and stories had more significance. I always found it felt more heroic to fly across the city to rescue one person in trouble than it did in other games to reach an area and kill 10 spiders for one person, pick up 20 watermelons for another, and talk to these 3 other NPCs just because they are nearby -- while several other players were doing the exact same thing.

I hope our new city has all of the above and more. MWM seems to be infusing various areas of the city with a richer background than we ever had in the old City, so I think we have a very healthy foundation already. I think weather effects (that don't affect powers) would add a lot to making Titan City feel like home. While I'd love to see more difference between day and night, possibly with NPC schedules, I think something like this has to be implemented carefully. It's one thing to have to wait for a shop to open in a single-player game where you can press a Wait key; it's another to log in and find you have to wait till the next game day to buy what you need. As for NPCs gathering about, I'd think this would have to be applied sparingly, and only in especially visible locations. I wouldn't want to go afk for a couple minutes in a dark alley and return to find the alley crammed with civilians.

From everything I've seen from MWM so far, I have a lot of faith that our new home will exceed my expectations.

[EDIT] I forgot to mention chat channels, especially player-created ones.

Perhaps there would be designated areas, or Stances, like the alignment/faction stances in CoH, which would trigger the 'attract a crowd' code? The Areas could be hidden about the city, to be discovered by accident and intent? It could be that events, such as the Apartment Fire in CoH, if completed successfully, might trigger the 'attract a crowd' code.

For villains, it would probably be less a crowd of civilians and more a pilgrimage of local toughs and criminals, come to pay homage to their 'genius'. That would be likely to happen in a back-alley location, rather than the 'scene of the crime'.

Be Well!
Fireheart

Redlynne wrote:

Garrilon wrote:
"Paragon Pizza, made by made men"
Paragon Pizza Pie ... pizza made by made men!
And don't forget ESPizza ...
And who could forget Ghost Widow's Salon and Day Spa?

ESP(izza).. lol.
I was expecting them to say "No Need to Call" near the end.. but they change it up. :[

I don't think this needs to be in at launch, but it is something I know I and many others would enjoy. People have mentioned quite a bit how they want a living city, and there was a major thing CoH lacked from start until close that I thought it really needed.

Almost every building was just an appearance and a mission door. We saw restaurants, bowling alleys, all kinds of things but could do nothing with them. Every time there was a place to hang out players would flock to it to roleplay in, to film in, or just to hang out and chat in, but even those buildings you could not DO much. BUT from a development side of things I understand there is difficulty there. You are making a super hero MMO, not a bowling game, not a billiards game, and developing things like that would slow down the game a ton for something that only a small percent of people would do, but I think there is another way to approach it.

What if you were to go into a bowling alley with some friends (perhaps on a team), and then went through a series of animations as your group took turns bowling. Maybe the players have some control over which animations to do, options like "bowl annoyed" or "bowl goofy" to control some of the body language, but for the most part the results are randomized or everyone ended up doing the same. The point is that everyone is doing/watching something while they are talking/roleplaying. You go into a restaurant and can choose from a few different meals, then your character goes through an animation to eat it while you chat with others at the table. A dance club where you can pick a few different dances to do, dance with partners, have a drink, ect. There is no cost or benefit, it is just an option that people can choose to do to have settings for their normal gatherings.

This kind of thing obviously would not be something that people would be constantly doing other than leveling up, working on bases, crafting, whatever, but I think that it would give the city a whole new layer of life that it could use. I don't think EVERY building needs to be intractable like this, but having a handful of these per zone and a few different options would be so cool to see.

A great discussion topic. I agree with a lot that has been said. When I thought up of a character I always asked where would this character want to live and why? Some lived in Talos, Some were from Kings Row, one was wealthy and lived in Founder's Falls.

To improve on what made COH seem more alive.

1) Real street names, Some street should be narrow and old and some big and wide. Some concrete, some brick.

2) Unique business names on buildings (sure there are chains too! Up and Away Burger) So many opportunities for easter eggs and homages ;)

3) City areas should have defined socio-economic influences (rich and poor areas, etc.) Often city areas were made at different time resulting in different architectural designs and building materials. (Art Deco, Modern, Brick & Mortor, Shopping Malls, Strip shopping centers, etc.)

4) Well defined landmarks that can also be places for gathering. Bourbon Street, Mission District in San Diego, Wall Street, Jersey Shore and Atlantic City, The Mall in Washington DC. Go easy on the statues, they should mean something.

5) Every city should have a sports stadium, museums (and yes we need a hero museum!) a train terminal. a bus terminal, parks, restaurant districts, bars district, business district, industrial district, public housing, upscale housing with lawns, a cemetery or two, police and fire stations, hospitals and urgent cares, library, large corporate headquarters (including Missing World Media), a university, a large water source like a river, and perhaps an oceanfront docks area with warehouses. Remember business planners group restaurants and bars together for good business reasons. We need an airport, and maybe even a military base. Heroes need a turf to defend, think Daredevil and Hells' Kitchen. Don't forget water towers, cell phone antennas, and other infrastructure we take for granted (e.g bridges, hills, waste water treatment plants, etc).

6) A place you can go to watch a sunset or the city from a distance to get the big picture, or just be alone. Sometimes I would watch the sunset from the top of Talos' head.

7) More diversity in traffic and automobiles. We should have police cars, ambulances, fire trucks, buses, motorcycles, limos, junkers, sports cars, mini-vans, food trucks. Wouldn't it be great if you could follow an ambulance or a fire truck to a scene so you could help do a rescue? I liked putting out the fires in Steel Canyon.

I love everything that's been discussed here so far. Billboards, interesting local businesses, realistic scales, NPC crowds and interactions. I always liked when an NPC would walk by talking about one of my accomplishments. Smaller zone events like the fire in Steel Canyon, troll raves in Skyway, the ghost ship in IP and Talos... etc. These were great. They don't all have to be big events like the Rikti invasion. Just those smaller things you discover in an area and get to experience made that world feel unique, alive and fun.

Another thing I loved about Paragon was how much exploring you could do. In the interim I've played ToR and a little CO. One of the more annoying obstacles I've run into is how much of the outdoors space is just a "fake" backdrop. Especially in ToR where you are basically following a literal pre laid out path through a zone. You can occasionally stray off that path but not with much to show for it. In CoH yeah we had copses of trees we had to go around in the forests areas, and we couldn't enter every building (it would be great if there were a few scattered around we could enter and "street" sweep in). But we could cut across alleys and hop fences and go over roof tops. The best (or should I say worst) example for me in ToR is Corellia. You feel like the coyote running into a tunnel painted on the wall. It makes the world nearly impossible to feel immersed in. The sights and sounds are very important, but so is being able to explore them.

Everwind wrote:

6) A place you can go to watch a sunset or the city from a distance to get the big picture, or just be alone. Sometimes I would watch the sunset from the top of Talos' head.

I just did that last night in Paragon Chat. Was just flying/running around Crey's Folly and stopped to watch the sun go down. Really cool feeling.

Quote:

What is it about City of Titans and Titan City that will get you to stay and make a home of it, rather than simply checking into a hotel?

For Titan City to become my new virtual home, it will need it to feel as genuine as its predecessor. I have some clear opinions on what made Paragon City feel genuine, and using it as a reference, I'll elaborate on what I feel were the most important components of its authenticity.

First, the environment and architecture of each district stood out most to me: the waterways and bridges of Founders' Falls; the flying overpasses of Skyway City; the shipyards and warehouses of Independence Port; the sprawling electrical jungles of Terra Volta. The nature of every district was made unique by the structures that defined it.

Attention to the smaller details is also very important. It wasn't just the largest landmarks that stood out to me. All of the little bits and pieces of a functional city that filled the streets were equally notable: cars, benches, fences, trash cans, dumpsters, boxes, forklifts, manholes, litter, graffiti, and so much more. Without these things, Paragon City would have felt sterile and artificial.

Also crucial to each district was its population. Think of the Longbow protecting Atlas Park, or the undercover police in Kings Row, or the dockworkers found in every port. NPC's were essential to the realism of every district -- even those that the player never had to interact with. Their actions, their movements, and their speech (bubbles) were all key. This is true for citizens and enemies alike.

I like to believe that all of these things are being taken into consideration as Titan City is brought to life. Given what we've been shown so far of the game's early prototypes, I have no reason to believe that any aspect of the city, large or small, will be forgotten.

Lovely thread. There's so much potential for catching people off-guard, with puns, meta, homage, the personal and just good ol' homey-realistic. Let's have everything we had before, but also more! Somewhere, someplace, there's a seagull that won't cooperate.

I'm both astonished and pleased by the response my little philosophical reflection has developed. It seems rather unusual to me that my background proves so beneficial to the development of a stable society centered on a game that hasn't even been released yet, especially considering the negative perception and response many legitimately have to things that even remotely touch upon the religious elements of life. I don't hide the fact that I have a degree that is essentially on the history and anthropology of religion, and that most of my research has been prehistoric in nature.

Evidently, taking what I have learned about the original development of organized permanent settlement and applying it to the mechanics behind building a digital city was a very smart move, even if it simply looks like pontificating about the things I don't like about modern urban living. :)

I do recall there was a monolith in Kingsrow. It was in the bottom section of the L kinda in the top corner. It was a massive building. Easily one of the largest in the game, in terms of square footage. It had no doors and no windows. It had a small place on the first level that was open air and there were two or four shafts that went from the top of the building down to this open air section. I only knew about it because someone complained about it on the COH forums, and I went to find it. As I recall it was made of two buildings half the size joined in the middle to form the monolith. So COH wasn't perfect, we all wear rose tinted glasses when it comes to COH.

Which is not to say that such buildings shouldn't exist in COT. Everyone always wonders what is going on behind those gates. No one ever goes in and no one ever comes out. But the lights stay on and the smoke stacks still billow with steam. And outside we wonder.

One thing that would be really cool and help liven up the city, for me, is if businesses had specials and advertised them. As an example:

[img]https://s3.amazonaws.com/sandkkd/KKD16001_SHD_TabletMarquee_f.jpg[/img]

A jobless hero is a successful hero!

*wonders if sidekick doughnuts are slightly smaller and not as well glazed"

Planet10 wrote:

The scale of the world needs to be normal human sized. Something near 5'10" should be a standard sized human.

Great post, but that one part made me grin a bit. The girls might chafe at the idea that 5'10" is described as "normal human height". hee hee..

Nadira wrote:

Rather than glossing over this, the game could embrace this. Battles causes damage and this is not magically repaired. Instead damaged buildings get repaired over the cause of several game weeks. And occasionally some buildings are too damaged to be salvaged and instead over the course of a game year or more a new building, or block, gets constructed. Which does not have to look the same as the old ones. This would lead to a city that has its (battle)scars and that over the years changes in reaction to the player activities. It would give a sense of history to some places within the cities where long time players could see a high rise and know 'there used to be a block of brownstone houses here'.
On a smaller scale, swap out textures slowly. Shops close and new shops open all the time. Even if we can never enter those shops, the changes are, for the attentive players, another evidence of the city being a living thing.

Great ideas here too.

But part of my brain urges caution that some things should remain the same. It's like going back to visit your home town and seeing those landmarks that bring back memories. Logging onto Paragon Chat is nice because I still see all the stuff which was there from the beginning.

Another one of those "find the right balance" things that Devs have to wrestle with...and that players will complain about no matter what they do. lol... :D

Huckleberry wrote:

My fondest memory of all from CoH was the villain mission in which I discovered I had a clone who ended up sacrificing his/ her life to save me. That was such a touching mission and now looking back, I realize that the personal feel of some of the mission plots were a large reason I kept going back to play.

+1

Genuine humanity and heart in storytelling trumps graphics and mechanics.

If it's real.

Edit: Well, maybe not trumps, but greatly accentuates :D

I recall the kindness of developers and community managers who take an interest in players' ideas, understand that players make mistakes, yet stand above it all, never taking sides and truly making it fair and fun for all to participate. The CoH crew really knew how to manage the players by the end.

It will be more complex this time around with players as developers but with so much time to prepare I am sure all will rise. This is a challenge all first-time managers face when they move from individual contributor roles to managing populations that include some close friends. For MWM it should help that keeping the environment non-toxic and egalitarian appeals to the abundant altruism of CoH players :)

desviper wrote:

On of my favorite things to do in CoH was knocking baddies off of buildings! So please 1) have knockback, and 2) spawn baddies on buildings!

And, every so often, give the baddies a jetpack or three so they come back up on you just when you think they've gone splat!

I used to use the stomp-looking kick from the fighting pool to boot snipers. That thing had some serious knock distance. Hours of fun.

That explains that day that I got caught in a hellion storm.