Ultimate MMO Development Team (shamelessly stolen thread idea)

From Massively...

My post there:

Art direction would be one of the following: masamune shirow, or the lead artist of macross 2, or the lead artist of escaflowne

technical artist/direction: the guys from Lineage 2 or Aion for making gorgeous games run on very average systems.

combat/loot design: the designer of MechCommander 2 (love that inventory/skill design and it would work so well in an mmo) plus the mmo would be a small squad tactical game a la Warhammer Retribution or Mechommander 2 or who would be better to handle the companion/pet/mercenary of a traditional mmo?

experience/leveling systems designer: the guys responsible for Diablo 2 (near infinite replayability, minimal level grind until much higher levels that weren't necessary to reach but still decently incentivized)

level/auto scaling systems designer: the people responsible for the current system on PTR Diablo 3 (finally an auto-scaling content system that works, let alone works so well)

class designer: the people from Vanguard or the people from DAoC/WAR

dungeon design: the people who designed WoW's Deamines

theme: steampunk, magitech or more likely a hybrid of the two

Crafting: the crafting designer from Asheron's Call 2. Just the best system in that you salvaged junk loot; crafting while adventuring and you could critical craft for better than average crafted item stats for the level

The rest would almost be secondary, and anyone with talent would fit the bill, but if they built a mmo around the combat system they have in Chivalry. I'd would so change my mind about kids so I could name them after the developers.

Overall art direction, animation, raid design : Team ICO
Creature and environment concepts : Studio Ghibli
In-game economy and crafting design, post-launch development : CCP
Dungeon gameplay design : L4D devs
Production, monetization plans : ArenaNet
PR and community management : Doublefine
QA : Blizzard... or Valve (if this game exists in a parallel reality where we have immortality and/or cryoconservation)

Overall theme (aka dream mmo) : Mysterious ancient world inhabited by Ghibli/ICO style enigmatic denizens and tribal societies. MMO sandbox where players develop a nascent civilization through the construction of settlements, hunt for resources and artefacts, and face the occasional cataclysmic wrath of nature in the form of colossi. Element of indirect pvp as players try to recruit one another to join the most prosperous and safest city, and sabotage each other's effort.

I knew you guys would be more creative and wouldn't let me down. (in just 2 posts no less)

All the posts over on Massively are uninspiring:

Raph Koster, Richard Garriot, Scott Hartsman, Brad McQuaid, etc (and even Paul Barnett)

Reading the comments of the other thread got me thinking and reading about Shadowbane pretty religiously yesterday.

Man talk about a game that would have been amazing if it had lived up to 1/3 of its potential. And to think we owe capture point battleground pvp in every mmo since Shadowbane to Shadowbane.

But the character creation system was complex, powerful and amazing. Race selection mattered. Unfortunately the devs could only figure out how to make it function on a base level rather than work well. The models and animations were primitive and systems worked in a light switch fashion. (it either worked instantly and was crazy powerful, or it was limited in scope, had a 5 minute cooldown and easy to counter)

But man, I am drooling at the though of someone borrowing that character development system... My goal was to make a viable dual wielding thrown weapon mage or healer.

Someone appears to be reasonably far along with making an emulator. I would love to make and play on a private server.

fangblackbone wrote:

And to think we owe capture point battleground pvp in every mmo since Shadowbane to Shadowbane.

TF and other FPS had this years before Shadowbane

Doh! NM then

Well when you put it that way, I want to be the spearman who lives in 2254 and can kill a helicopter with my ancient weapon.