Warframe's Monetization And Lack Of Depth: A Challenge To De

[notionphil]

 

Everything i havent mentioned de promised us already, if you want to shape it then thats what this forum is, hopefuly they will show prerelease content in devstreams and you can comment upon it on forums, if they ignore criticism and suggestion now, nothing would stop them from ignoring it during "beta access".

 

You just illustrated the entire point of this thread.

 

Your point is well-taken, Davidoo. You don't want to spend money on these things, because you feel they should be a part of the game anyway.

 

Guess what...we all agree with you! However, I have a wake up call for you...those sorts of features AREN'T A PRIORITY TO DE.

 

This isn't an opinion. It's a fact; we can see what they have been working on, and where they spend their resources...its RNG, large format bosses, plat sinks and an ungodly amount of melee animations. Not systems, mechanics and endgame.

 

You can bet that Archwing will be a repetitive-RNG-grind-plat-sink-with-setpiece-bosses-and-tons-of-animations...(hmm what else does that describe...Kubrows), and quote me on that.

 

And from what we've all seen here...we're going to continue to get a ratio of animation/grind/plat sinks to actual engaging content of about 10 to 1. If you're OK with that, and you seem to be...then by all means...don't pay to fund content development if this idea ever becomes a thing, which it likely won't.

 

That's fine. Not everyone has to pay. If you recall, I expect about .01% to support DE. ;)

[Davoodoo]

You just illustrated the entire point of this thread.

 

Your point is well-taken, Davidoo. You don't want to spend money on these things, because you feel they should be a part of the game anyway.

 

Guess what...we all agree with you! However, I have a wake up call for you...those sorts of features AREN'T A PRIORITY TO DE.

 

This isn't an opinion. It's a fact; we can see what they have been working on, and where they spend their resources...its RNG, large format bosses, plat sinks and an ungodly amount of melee animations. Not systems, mechanics and endgame.

 

You can bet that Archwing will be a repetitive-RNG-grind-plat-sink-with-setpiece-bosses-and-tons-of-animations...(hmm what else does that describe...Kubrows), and quote me on that.

 

And from what we've all seen here...we're going to continue to get a ratio of animation/grind/plat sinks to actual engaging content of about 10 to 1. If you're OK with that, and you seem to be...then by all means...don't pay to fund content development if this idea ever becomes a thing, which it likely won't.

 

That's fine. Not everyone has to pay. If you recall, I expect about .01% to support DE. ;)

I was one of the first to criticise how much of moneysink kubrows are and im fully aware that archwing will be same story all over again.

 

Also i cant stop you from spending money, but if you dont like what they currently produce do you really believe that throwing more money will help??

 

My first thought when money would be given to me would be "look how naive these ppl can get, not only we charge them for everything but also they even want to give us money to produce more".

 

I know what im gonna do about content which i dont find good enough, im not gonna pay for it, if enough ppl will stop paying then whoever is making decision will be forced to change something.

[notionphil]

I was one of the first to criticise how much of moneysink kubrows are and im fully aware that archwing will be same story all over again.

 

Also i cant stop you from spending money, but if you dont like what they currently produce do you really believe that throwing more money will help??

 

My first thought when money would be given to me would be "look how naive these ppl can get, not only we charge them for everything but also they even want to give us money to produce more".

 

I know what im gonna do about content which i dont find good enough, im not gonna pay for it, if enough ppl will stop paying then whoever is making decision will be forced to change something.

 

I already don't spend on things that I disagree with. I don't buy prime access bc I feel its skipping content, and i do my best not to shortcut the little actual content WF has by spending plat. This means I typically spend on cosmetics and catalysts.

 

However, I can't make others do this, and as you probably just saw from DE's acquisition document, WF made over $50million (?) last year by doing exactly what we are complaining about; focusing most of their dev work on things tied to microtranscations.

 

So, it works very, very, very, very, very...VERY well for them. Did I say VERY? They aren't going to change their core model out of need. I get it. This is why I say this idea is unlikely. In some ways, these forums are similar to a bunch of food critics sitting around asking McDonalds to introduce a fillet mignon to the menu. Sure, it would be tasty, but clearly McD's average customer doesn't care about it, and the franchise is doing pretttty well without it.

 

If I wanted to eat a fillet mignon, and it had to be at a McD (for whatever reason), I'd be ready to bring my wallet with me. Heck, I'd bring the steak itself, tell the chef how to cook it and then pay for it. Otherwise, I probably wouldn't ever get that darn steak.

 

Do I believe that "throwing more money" will help?  No one is currently "throwing money" at DE with a specific purpose. The money that's being "thrown" at them is currently a result of microtransactions. It's not earmarked for a specific project, and it's definitely not pledged towards improving the game. It's general support.

 

If you're asking if I "trust" DE?

 

Hmm. I trust that they are a company and will do what's in their best interest, and outright lies to paying customers is NEVER in your corporate best interest. So, yeah. If they say "give us $50 to support creating a focus system which will be free from RNG grind" Yeah, I think they will mostly do that, or at least something that can be publically defended as that.

 

EDIT - typos galore

Edited October 17, 2014 by notionphil

[(PSN)WiiConquered]

If you're asking if I "trust" DE?

 

Hmm. I trust that they are a company and will do what's in their best interest, and outright lies to paying customers is NEVER in your corporate best interest. So, yeah. If they say "give us $50 to support creating a focus system which will be free from RNG grind" Yeah, I think they will mostly do that, or at least something that can be publically defended as that.

 

I agree with you that it's not in their best interest to lie. My concern is that they'll disagree, or someone with power in the company but no sense will put that money elsewhere.

 

I wonder if you could ask the community if there's someone with a legal background; they could help flesh out what would be required to legally bind them to spend the money given on what's asked for.

[Omnimorph]

 

This is in direct opposition to nearly every other videogame, which progress towards more challenge.

 

 

That's actually one reason why I like Warframe.  It's straightforward and honest.

 

The "progress towards more challenge" in other videogames is pure illusion anyway, videogames are always just hamster wheels, with the repetition being disguised by art and number scaling. 

 

The only thing that ever actually progresses is one's physical skill in playing the game (and of course knowledge and meta knowledge, where these matter heavily, e.g. in a game like EVE), and eventually that trivializes all possible finite PvE content.  It also means that PvP is the only form of gameplay that is always challenging, properly speaking.

[notionphil]

That's actually one reason why I like Warframe.  It's straightforward and honest.

 

The "progress towards more challenge" in other videogames is pure illusion anyway, videogames are always just hamster wheels, with the repetition being disguised by art and number scaling. 

 

The only thing that ever actually progresses is one's physical skill in playing the game (and of course knowledge and meta knowledge, where these matter heavily, e.g. in a game like EVE), and eventually that trivializes all possible finite PvE content.  It also means that PvP is the only form of gameplay that is always challenging, properly speaking.

That is a quite uninformed and disillusioned point of view.

Enemy mechanics, AI and additional systems can and do progress in most good games. New enemy types are introduced which you need to deal with. New resources or mechanics such as "light/ dark" modes re: Zelda and others. Secondary challenges such as addl objectives like "bonus: kill all enemies without breaking stealth" are introduced.

None of those are art or number scaling. You need to play better games!

[Calayne]

That is a quite uninformed and disillusioned point of view.

Enemy mechanics, AI and additional systems can and do progress in most good games. New enemy types are introduced which you need to deal with. New resources or mechanics such as "light/ dark" modes re: Zelda and others. Secondary challenges such as addl objectives like "bonus: kill all enemies without breaking stealth" are introduced.

None of those are art or number scaling. You need to play better games!

 

 

Gotta agree with notion. I don't play many PvP games, if any, but I've had a lot of good experience with PvE games as well. Bastion, Transistor, Killing Floor, huge amounts of games are based on level design, enemy design, character empowerment and increasing complexity by introducing more mechanics as means to increase difficulty as you gain more power.

 

In fact, as you get more and more powerful, the game gets harder and harder, unlike Warframe, where it gets easier and easier. 

 

I'd actually like to point one thing out as a reason why Warframe generally isn't too difficult: There isn't enough enemy variety, in some sense. This is heavily related to Notion's "Better dumb enemies". In terms of sheer types of enemies, perhaps Warframe does quite well. However, unlike other games, they all die pretty much the same way: Riddled with bullets within five seconds of appearing on-screen. 

 

There's a certain lack of variety in enemies, in the way they survive, and in the way they attack the player. In Bastion, which I use as an example for a great game, the enemies have various ways to close the distance without immediately being murdered by the player. Partially, it's due to the player not having the ability to just spam their best weapons on everything, so enemies have a chance to get within attack range. Some charge, some meander behind to close off routes, some swarm you from all directions, some dodge/teleport, etc. Quite a variety. Some, in fact, have armour that can only be penetrated when they try to attack. 

 

Warframe has a few of those enemies back then. Flameblades teleport to you. Sawmen were generally the ones charging in, while Lancers hung behind taking shots at you. Grineer enemies are generally a bit of a swarm, outside of the brutal Infested enemies which stagger you like mad. Shield Lancers had impenetrable shields, where you had to shoot their heads, or their bodies when they open up, or you could melee them. 

 

But that was back then. Before, they wouldn't die in one shot. Now, they're all fodder. I think, in some sense, numbers play a large part of it. If the enemies were tougher, then we probably wouldn't need as many as we do now to feel challenged. Then, maybe the Scorpion and Ancients' long-range grapple might be justifiable. It's no longer the case now. Times have changed. The value of enemy life has sunk like a brick, while Tenno powers have inflated. 

 

The latest archwing gameplay on Devstream looked really fun.

 

Why?

 

Cause Sheldon and Rebecca actually had to revive a few times. It was tense, each enemy didn't die in one shot, and each blow received meant something. There was a sense of threat. 

 

This seems totally unrelated, and I probably digressed, but I really do think that at some point, DE's gonna have to take a look at the numbers again, or, alternatively, implement a certain level of power limitation. Like Conclave Rating limits in one of the events. There's a level of challenge that can be regained by limiting conclave ratings, and reconsidering ALL the conclave ratings of the mods, assuming they become essential gameplay elements, and are not justifiably rated. 

 

I kinda just miss the challenge. Maybe I'll do unranked MK-1 Braton or unmodded Latron runs on Saturn or Pluto or something. I used to do that with a Loki, when health and shields didn't increase with rank, and it was difficult. But the suspense was there. And that's why I used to love going to Pluto with a Latron, unpotatoed, Redirection-less, Vitality-less Loki.

[DiabolusUrsus]

I think one thing that Warframe could really use right now (I'm gonna argue that this is on-topic because it could potentially be one of those crowd-funded dev features, especially since it should be cheaper than actual new mechanics for sort of... testing the waters?) is a little added flair.

 

Knockbacks are everywhere. But they're boring. Why? Well, because the only thing that happens is you get to watch your character fall flat on their butt for a few seconds. Why not increase the ragdoll on knockbacks a little bit so that you go flying backwards? Why not tie this into a jump-input timed for when your Warframe first hits the ground to trigger a roll/backflip onto your feet? Mods like handspring could give you extra recovery frames. Knockdown resist mods could reduce the distance you get thrown, and decrease the time it takes you to recover from failed attempts to catch yourself. 

 

Melee is boring(ish). Why? Well, because to actually delve into melee combat you have to be melee-stancing, and if you're melee stancing you start moving really slowly as you attack. This limits you to essentially one type of attack for actually getting anywhere: the slide attack. Let's face it; that crouching spin with semi-intangible hitboxes gets really old, really quickly. To make matters worse, even when you find yourself pulling off a more complicated and theatrical combo, you either kill the enemy in one or two hits and proceed to whiff on the air it used to be occupying, or you start taking too much damage from its buddies and have to cut it short or else. Why not remove movement limitations from melee combat? That should hopefully make it less flow-breaking, and would allow for the creation of enemies prompting the Tenno to take advantage of their superior mobility to access weak-points. 

 

Guns are boring(ish). Why? Well because the only thing that ever happens is the enemy falls over dead. Slash weapons are a little better off in that they can cut enemies apart, but there are far too few slash-based firearms out there right now. Why not make gun impact effects more interesting? Does anyone else miss Infested burning to death in front of you? Corpus dying of electrocution? Sure, they were annoying because they blocked line-of-sight and non-punch through bullets, but that is a problem that can be easily circumvented. Heat-deaths could cause enemies to evaporate into vapor accompanied by the sound of a stove burner going out when you blow on it and a sharp hiss of steam... Enemies could rupture with a wet *splat* when hit with fatal blast damage. Launchers could have special explosion ragdolls. Impact damage could leave visible dents in corpses, and puncture could leave a multitude of actual holes (not those missing chunks we have now.) Slash bisections need to happen more often. Simply killing enemies in Warframe is boring at least in part because it is unsatisfying. This is a problem that should take a week of concentrated dev effort to fix, with very minor bugfixes to follow over time. 

 

Dying is (among other things,) boring. Why? Well, because you don't do anything other than fall over. No visible damage. No reason to feel like you've been legitimately brutalized by an enemy. It's unsatisfying! Why can't we see a charger actually maul us? Why can't we see ourselves be riddled with bullets before dramatically collapsing into a "downed" or "dead" state (depending on party size)? Reviving (whether through teammate assistance or through a revive point) could be made more interesting as well, depicting a sort of organic regeneration of the Tenno and their Warframes. I really miss that sort of semi-organic feel Warframes gave off when I first started out. The first time I revived a teammate it looked like Excalibur was puking on him. That was really unsettling and really cool. Was I the only one who was really looking forward to those feral kubrow mauling animations they showed in some of the livestreams? I thought "oh wow, an enemy that feels legitimately frightening and dangerous!" But alas, I have been reduced to taking damage from headbutts to my crotch. 

 

I could go on, but I think most of you can probably see the point: Warframe is a really pretty game, but the universe itself and its inhabitants currently feel very bland and un-detailed. Yes, there are some really pretty tilesets. Yes, some enemies and bosses have nice, intricate models and textures. But when has that ever affected how it feels to interact with them? Don't corrosive bullets feel absolutely identical to gas bullets, save for which enemies you use them on? There are plenty of ways to make damage numbers feel less arbitrary and weapons less generic without directly tweaking their values or needing (admittedly awesome) gimmick mechanics for each gun. DE has an obvious affinity for the "Rule of Cool," but I think they're starting to go about it the wrong way. As a whole, features like these could be a part of "Combat Drama/Immersion 2.0" or something like that. 

 

I, for one, would pay to make Warframe's existing gameplay more indulgently satisfying as a quick-fix means of tiding me over while DE gets into the meat of adding depth to the game. 

 

Edit: Enemy CC could also use some touchups. I'd be a lot less irritated by Ancients if they were flesh-hooking me rather than duct-taping scorpion harpoons to their arms. Blitz eximi would be less boring if they had something other than the generic Grineer Heavy radial blast. 

Edited October 18, 2014 by DiabolusUrsus

[Omnimorph]

That is a quite uninformed and disillusioned point of view.

Enemy mechanics, AI and additional systems can and do progress in most good games. New enemy types are introduced which you need to deal with. New resources or mechanics such as "light/ dark" modes re: Zelda and others. Secondary challenges such as addl objectives like "bonus: kill all enemies without breaking stealth" are introduced.

None of those are art or number scaling. You need to play better games!

 

Any genuine challenge from AI can only exist so long as either a) the game is highly abstracted (i.e. more like a board game), and player options are limited as part of that abstraction (as in older games, because of technical limitations), and/or b) what the AI's doing is unknown and has to be learnt (which is really just the same as it is when you're learning the game at the beginning).

 

But re. a) the more "realistic" the game, and the freer player actions are, the less that option is possible without artificially/temporarily hamstringing the player, and re. b) once learnt, the challenge disappears because motor skills and game knowledge have come to match it. 

 

Asking for "challenge" from a PvE game in which players have freedom to move where they want and use powers whenever they want, is I think unrealistic.  If you start introducing artificial abstractions and limitations on player abilities (i.e. make it more like a boardgame, or an older, more abstracted style of game) then you lose the feeling of freedom and power.  If you just introduce more mob tricks, then they're learnt and then the player is back to square one.

 

Essentially, devs always have to juggle between making a game continuously challenging (on the one hand) and making it fun to relax with and get into a trance-state and feel god-like with (on the other).  With lack of human-level AI, and in a game with lots of freedom in player parameters (e.g. you're somewhat realistically imitating a "space ninja") the only way to make a game continously challenging without artificially/temporarily hamstringing them, is to make the player a perpetual beginner (i.e. simply: mobs have new tricks, you learn them).  But while that will satisfy some players, it will piss off others who expect to get better than the mobs over time.

 

Nobody's right or wrong here (and indeed for most of us, we have a bit of both - sometimes challenge is nice, sometimes it's nice to feel god-like).  But I think it's important to clearly understand the distinction, and what it implies for game design, and to have realistic expectations, so we don't lead the devs down fruitless garden paths.

[notionphil]

This thread has very little to do with challenge, so I'm going to spoiler this as to not continue to derail the thread.

 

 

Any genuine challenge from AI can only exist so long as either a) the game is highly abstracted (i.e. more like a board game), and player options are limited as part of that abstraction (as in older games, because of technical limitations), and/or b) what the AI's doing is unknown and has to be learnt (which is really just the same as it is when you're learning the game at the beginning).

 

But re. a) the more "realistic" the game, and the freer player actions are, the less that option is possible without artificially/temporarily hamstringing the player, and re. b) once learnt, the challenge disappears because motor skills and game knowledge have come to match it. 

 

Asking for "challenge" from a PvE game in which players have freedom to move where they want and use powers whenever they want, is I think unrealistic.  If you start introducing artificial abstractions and limitations on player abilities (i.e. make it more like a boardgame, or an older, more abstracted style of game) then you lose the feeling of freedom and power.  If you just introduce more mob tricks, then they're learnt and then the player is back to square one.

 

 

It's incorrect that player motor skills automatically "rise to match" the enhanced challenge provided by enemy progression, or that all hamstringing is artificial, or that we automatically "learn mob tricks and are back to square one".

 

A perfect example of this is the new infested. Sure, we all know how the ripline works, and the muta's cloud and ancient auras. But they are still more challenging and engaging to fight than they were before. We've "learnt" the tricks, but the ripline still catches us at times, and we end up caught in the muta's (very nerfed) cloud often, and we have to avoid and deal with the auras in their own ways. Simply because we can understand and attempt to compensate for their "progression" doesn't mean the level of engagement resets back to square one.

 

In addition to the above, here's the problem: You've decided challenge is 'artifical' without any justification. It's a game. Everything is abstracted. An "orokin energy sapping device" is no more artifical or abstracted than an energy orb or an energy regen aura. A "realistic space ninja" simulation is an oxymoron, but that's not even the problem. Realism in terms of a fictional work should be defined within it's own terms.... and there's also no reason why other space ninja-esque characters can't exist, who also follow the same logic/rules as our Tenno, and offer a challenge.

 

In fact, such characters do exist (stalker, g3 etc), and in my view, we simply need more of them (them = elite mobs who follow different rules, appear in small doses and turn the typical gameplay interactions on their head, when in high level content). So, I don't find any constructive critque of challenge or enemy progression in the above portion of your quote.

 

Now, here's where I do agree, and find your point interesting (except for the portion I put in brackets, which is referring to the above.

 

 

 

Essentially, devs always have to juggle between making a game continuously challenging (on the one hand) and making it fun to relax with and get into a trance-state and feel god-like with (on the other).  With lack of human-level AI, and in a game with lots of freedom in player parameters (e.g. you're somewhat realistically imitating a "space ninja") the only way to make a game continously challenging without artificially/temporarily hamstringing them, is to make the player a perpetual beginner (i.e. simply: mobs have new tricks, you learn them).  But while that will satisfy some players, it will &!$$ off others who expect to get better than the mobs over time.

 

Nobody's right or wrong here (and indeed for most of us, we have a bit of both - sometimes challenge is nice, sometimes it's nice to feel god-like).  But I think it's important to clearly understand the distinction, and what it implies for game design, and to have realistic expectations, so we don't lead the devs down fruitless garden paths.

 

Not quite. Devs don't need to juggle "continuious challenge VS relaxing in a trance like state". Those are the two extremes.

 

Do you think Star Wars would have been as compelling if Darth Vader and the Emperor were not proficient in the Force? Of course not. Luke would have hand-waved them and credits would have rolled, much like any given Warframe battle. OR what if EVERY enemy in star wars had the force? A constant slog for survival. Neither would have been as compelling as the spikes of heroic conflict in a sea of mundane individuals.

 

Overcoming conflict and the resultant tension is what creates drama. Take a look at the dramatic curve: http://www.mindplasma.net/Root_Folder/Assets/Artwork/Doorman/0.2_Dramatic_Curve.jpg

 

IMO, this can and should happen many times over, with longer 'trance' periods in between.

 

The question you pose which is a good point, is that not everyone wants drama. Some want rhythmic slaughter. But I argue that most players will feel more like warrior dieties when they stomp a skilled orokin enhanced Corpus elite with crystalline shields, than when they kill a crewman.

 

However, a key issue with implementation of such challenge in WF is that DE relies on buffing enemies offensively instead of defensively. So instead of having to figure out how to take down a challenging mob with a combination of melee and gunplay, it typically becomes a new "annoying power" the mob has that ignores shields or one-hits you. So, when we discuss adding challenge, the debate is colored through the lens of "adding new things which remove player agency or unfairly kill you". Not enjoyable to anyone besides the worst of try-hards.

 

If DE rethought how challenge could be applied, in terms of making challenging enemies who are tough but fun to kill (as opposed to enemies which are hard-not-to-be-killed-by), I think we'd have a very different conversation. OK, anyway, enough derailing my own thread, but thanks, you inspired some thought on challenge.

 

Edited October 20, 2014 by notionphil

[Liminal]

If it's true that Syndicates will give us "interesting missions" as it was briefly said in the last stream it could be what we are looking for (yeah I know it's higly unlikely, but a man can dream).

[notionphil]

If it's true that Syndicates will give us "interesting missions" as it was briefly said in the last stream it could be what we are looking for (yeah I know it's higly unlikely, but a man can dream).

 

The combination of Sigils and Syndicates is the most promising thing I've heard so far since I've started playing WF.

 

This takes my personal hype from the "sigils" thread and multiplies it by 2.

 

Sigil System: The Most Encouraging Idea From De I've Ever Seen

[The_Hanged_Man]

Planet, moon, asteroid or blackhole or even ship for veterans would be plenty.

 

Just make it for veterans not for everyone and their dog.

gear check, skill check and some actual challenge.

How do you gear check though? Conclave rating has nearly no relation to relative strength.