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Gameplay would feel dull and recycled with only one race. And there would be no depth. You'd only see one faction's perspective. An Imperium based game is fine - if it's a singleplayer game. An MMORPG is about variety of all things, including playable races. That one race MMO would sure do well in that department. You can play those same human missions tenfold, but instead of using your Lasgun, you can use your Laspistol. Yep. Tonnes of variety.

A big chunk of an MMORPG is the multitude of stories and perspectives. Confining this to one race would still give a chance to tell multiple stories, but they'd all seem the same. "Guy follows Imperium, but tends to further his own interests", "Guy follows Imperium out of faith, and smites the Emprah's foes with his Guard BFFs" or "Guy follows Imperium and purges anyone that so much as says 'Emprah' in the wrong tone/not loud enough"

Again, ho-hum. I would sacrifice a bit of gameplay quality for a great story if it means getting to see it from more than an Imperial point of view.

Faction dominance likely won't be a problem. Apparently, they'll be using NPC troops to help negate any imbalances. IE: Let's say there's a ratio of 6 Ork Players to 1 Guard player on a battlefield. The remaining 5 Guard slots will be filled by NPCs that're set to an averaged difficulty level based on the level/rank/system of measurement of all the players present. It's far from a perfect solution, but it's still one of the best ideas I've heard yet. And to prevent side-switching so that a player can't warn of an impending attack, they're putting a temporary race lock that prevents you from switching from one race to another for (IIRC) 10 minutes after logging out.

The game has been in development for 4 years now, and most of that has been gameplay, animations, and structure. So while there will undoubtedly be some crossover missions for all races (Seek & Destroy, Capture & Control, Rescue, Etc...) I fail to see how race-specific quests for the initial release version is something farfetched.

Usually when a company dumps things, it's small stuff that won't largely change anything. Short missions, In-game character editors, minor locations, and smaller gameplay functions. I doubt that canning 3 or 4 xenos races is something that would change over 2 years. Maybe they won't include every planet they wanted to do at first, but I don't see tham just going "Hey, let's just drop the xenos races instead of some minor stuff to make up for time."

Hang on, so they ARE making this thing?

I've played enough MMOs to know that potentially sacrificing immersion and gameplay quality to cram more superfluous crap in is a bad idea.

But, to be honest, I have little to no expectations that this game will be faithful to the 40k universe. If they were to do a faithful adaptation, the game would probably be rated AO and banned in most places. I hope I'm mistaken about this.

I sincerely hope it won't be a FPS-like game, as most FPS/MMORPG hybrids I've seen (i.e. Planetside) have been horrible. Maybe MAG will change that, but like I've said before, if you want to play a FPS, play a FPS.

-Tyr

Tyr wrote:I've played enough MMOs to know that potentially sacrificing immersion and gameplay quality to cram more superfluous crap in is a bad idea.

But, to be honest, I have little to no expectations that this game will be faithful to the 40k universe. If they were to do a faithful adaptation, the game would probably be rated AO and banned in most places. I hope I'm mistaken about this.

I sincerely hope it won't be a FPS-like game, as most FPS/MMORPG hybrids I've seen (i.e. Planetside) have been horrible. Maybe MAG will change that, but like I've said before, if you want to play a FPS, play a FPS.

-Tyr

And restricting players to a single faction in an MMORPG isn't much better, but I'll agree to disagree with you on this, and leave that where it is.

It's produced by Vigil, with THQ calling the big shots. I don't expect it to be 100% faithful, but with a great company like THQ coordinating and moderating the development, I know it'll at least be worth it's monthly rate. You're also forgetting that you can get away with a lot under even an "M" rating. People getting beheaded, eviscerated, losing limbs, getting impaled or exploded, etc... is all only "M" rated. "AO" is generally reserved for games with gracious full-frontal nudity or explicit sexual content (IE: scenes/acts of intercourse).

so unless it turned into "Pornhammer 10 1/2", it won't get an "AO" rating. But it will still retain all it's gory, xenophobic, grimdark goodness.

And they have said they have absolutely no intention of making it an FPS, though they said they may consider adding the option of using a first-person camera angle (like Oblivion/FO3). But it will be made with a 3rd person RPG in mind.

metallifan wrote:...with a great company like THQ...

Ah, I remember the days when I thought THQ only did cruddy game adaptions of movies/TV shows.

Grotzooka wrote:

metallifan wrote:...with a great company like THQ...

Ah, I remember the days when I thought THQ only did cruddy game adaptions of movies/TV shows.

Lol @ the 90's

Who doesn't miss Fluorescent ski jackets, neon hair dye, pastel colours, and the last years of the Legwarmer?

And with, quite frankly, how impressive Darksiders is?

I'm okay with Vigil doing it.

Kanluwen wrote:And with, quite frankly, how impressive Darksiders is?

I'm okay with Vigil doing it.

Exactly. I almost went in my boxers when I saw the gameplay preview while at EB Games

OT: As a side note, looking at your avatars, I keep getting you two mixed up.

I don't see it. The confusion, I mean. But okay

Oh and to answer your earlier question EF: Yes, they are. they have been making it for the last 4 years, with a release date scheduled in the April 2011/2012 Fiscal Year (some time between April of those years)

I'd like to see it as a more open ended and less grind-driven ripoff of WOW. OK really just take WOW's quest system.

For races, humans start as a guardsmen, at a certain level you can advance to become a space marine or inquisitor or stay a guardsmen and become sly marbo.

chaos.. cultists, csms & maybe demons.

eldar starting as guardians and becoming aspect warriors.

tau starting as fire warriors and moving on to get their very own battlesuit or stealth suit.

nids start as a gaunt and become a warrior or ravener one day.

basically you start as something wimpy and as you get level up you get opportunities to follow different and more powerful paths.

but, IMO, what they are gonna do is make it humans only and every other race in 40K will be NPCs/monsters to kill. You'll prolly have a guardsman as a basic warrior type (tank), inquisition for magic using types, medics for healing, rogue traders for a dps type class, etc.

Necros wrote:I'd like to see it as a more open ended and less grind-driven ripoff of WOW. OK really just take WOW's quest system.

For races, humans start as a guardsmen, at a certain level you can advance to become a space marine or inquisitor or stay a guardsmen and become sly marbo.

Except that breaks fluff, as the oldest initiates are recruited in adolescence. Adult recruits have something like a .02 success rate. Besides, having players start as a scout would make more sense. And I'm not even going to get into what's wrong with the last two.

chaos.. cultists, csms & maybe demons.

Daemons as NPC allies, but not players would be better. Considering that most Daemons are slowly weakened by being in the material realm for long periods, I'm sure that Daemon players would love to constantly worry about their leeching life energy, and wouldn't mind having to return to the warp every few hours to avoid death.

eldar starting as guardians and becoming aspect warriors.

This makes sense, though I would hate to see it without players having to spend the rest of the game training. Better to just offer the aspects as specialized classes and the Guardian as kind of the "balanced" class - doesn't exceed at anything, but has a good balance of skills.

tau starting as fire warriors and moving on to get their very own battlesuit or stealth suit.

Generally, Tau promotions are done over periods of time. These spaces are measured in divisions of (IIRC) 4 years. However, the Farsight Enclave might do things differently. But they might have to bend fluff a bit if they decide to fit Tau in.

nids start as a gaunt and become a warrior or ravener one day.

Makes no sense. Gaunts don't evolve. A Gaunt is a Gaunt. That's their creature designation. However, I can see Nid players being allowed to select more and more creatures from a list when they spawn on a new world for an invasion. Example: A player starts a Nid. Gets a choice of one of the two Gaunts. Player spawns as his Gaunt on a world being invaded by the Hive Fleet. Gaunt player actively participates, and in doing so, unlocks some biomorphs that he can add. Eventually, through the course of invading more worlds, the player unlocks new Tyranid creatures (We'll say the Genestealer, just as an example), and in future invasions, he can choose to play as any of the species he's unlocked.

basically you start as something wimpy and as you get level up you get opportunities to follow different and more powerful paths.

See above Nid example.

but, IMO, what they are gonna do is make it humans only and every other race in 40K will be NPCs/monsters to kill. You'll prolly have a guardsman as a basic warrior type (tank), inquisition for magic using types, medics for healing, rogue traders for a dps type class, etc.

Not going to happen. Multiple races have already been confirmed. The "Imperial Only" speculation is done like Tiger's marriage

Check out the Dark Heresy and Rogue Trader pen and paper RPGs from Fantasy Flight Games to see an awesome game system in the 40k universe. Humans only, more variety than you can shake a stick at, and a great starting point for any 40k MMO.

-Tyr

I know what RT is. And it's too bad you'd need a non-existant monster machine to run a game that diverse and that big as an MMO. It's better as a Pen and Paper RPG anyway. D&D sure was/is.

Even if a game adaptation were made, it wouldn't make a good MMO in my opinion. It would, however, work as more of a larger Diablo style game where you create/join a small game of no more than 2 parties of 5-10 people apiece. That would feel a lot more like RT.

Nah, it'd be fine as an MMO. RT itself is a bit too open-ended (too large of a potential world) but DH would be fine (with RT elements in it). Limit it to several systems, or hell even one really detailed system with multiple planets, space stations, etc etc and it would kick butt.

Not saying DH and RT wouldn't still be better as P&P games... just that the structure is already there to have a great MMO experience with it. P&P games will always be better than MMOs for the same reason that a book will always be better than a film adaptation of a book.

The D&D Online fiasco wasn't so much from D&D not working as an MMO, but rather the implementation of the system, and the fact that the license was trusted to a crappy games maker. Oh, and rushed through beta. A guaranteed recipe for MMO failure is to have a joke of a beta test and a horrible launch.

-Tyr

I dunno. RT just feels like more of a Diablo-esque style game stretched over a much larger theatre. You've each got your characters and retinue made up of a small group of people (And sometimes Xenos) with a variety of skills. You generally work behind the scenes, rather than in public. That, to me, just sounds like a Diablo-style system would better suit such a game style. If it were an MMO, then each realm would have to have a relatively low population limit for it to still feel like an RT or DH MMO. Otherwise you'd end up with Inquisitors and Rogue Traders running into eachother all over the place.

Still though, it would make a sweet low-pop online game

I reckon you should be a rogue trader.

spamandchips wrote:I reckon you should be a rogue trader.

Well Guardsman is only one class/origin, so you may indeed get to play a small-time Rogue Trader

I was just saying, start was 1 wimpy thing and grow into something better as a way of advancement instead of the "yay I'm level 10" thing that every single RPG does. I know nids don't evolve and it would be against fluff, but just like if they made a 40k movie they'd change fluff just because they can. I just wanna see something fun that isn't a carbon copy of every other game just with prettier graphics.

Or maybe have a way to progress through your career in a more open kind of way.. Like, for combat skills you can have melee, pistols, rifles, heavies and you can spec yourself to be kinda good at all 3, or focus on say just rifles and be considered a rifleman and as a guardsman you'd start with a lasgun and as you go you can unlock other weapons like helguns, meltas or plasmas, etc. To get those really special weapons you gotta focus on it. To get a powersword or force weapon you gotta focus on melee. But, there'd be all kinds of other skills too.. demolitions, medic, psyker, leadership maybe to let you issue orders to your squad/party which would work as a group buff or something. So instead of having set classes, everyone starts the same but depending on how you spend your skill points as you grow your roll changes.

I dunno, whatever they do you know not everyone is gonna be happy and there's gonna be a 87 blogs about how they ruined 40k forever because every fanboy wants it only their way. In the end as long as the game is fun and tries hard to stay true to the fluff even if they don't get it all right, I'll be happy.

metallifan wrote:

Face...Palm...

No. It's about War. One of the 4 Horsemen of the Apocalypse.

And anyone that's aware of the MMO already knows who is deveoping it. THQ already has a release frame put out for FY APR '11/'12

Before you go "face-palming" and making assumptions, let me clarify a bit of things for you.

First off, Darksiders specific plot elements of "War's premature summoning to a battle between heaven and hell" is undebateable, thus the term "Basically".

I say "Basically" because he has a "Chaos Form" (Much like a Daemonprince) his build, armor, weapons(Almost literally, once you get the "Powerfist"), and overall atmosphere is liken to that of a chaos lord. It was more a comparison as many compare District 9 to Halo (Weaponry, Warthog, etc). In a humorous sense, it seems that THQ tasked 2 of its developers with two similar games, Relic with "Space Marine" and Vivid with "Chaos Space Marine". Space Marine seemed more marketable so Vivid instead had to use a bible instead of a codex for their plotline. (I'm joking btw...)

So if ANYONE was confused by my reference to Darksiders as a game about Chaos Space Marine Lords in the W40k Universe instead of being about the 3rd Horseman of the Apocalypse, "War's" quest for revenge... I apologise.

As for the "If you know about the 40kMMO you automatically know about the Developer"... do you honestly belive that EVERYONE who is aware that SOMEONE is making a 40k mmo KNOWS its the same team that did Darksiders? If so, open your mind. Dakka is a huge group and I am sure manypeople were surprised (hopefully pleasently) when they learned that Vigil is going to be the company behind the 40K mmo, hell, many GW Employees in my area still believe that Mythic (the same studio that made the Fantasy MMO) has the rights to it and I have heard tons of rumors that companies such as Sony, Activision (and since they are the same as Blizzard, TERRIBLY unlikely) 2K and other Publishers have the rights to this MMO. The fact is that THQ/Vigil has them, but the fact that those rumors (be they correct or false) exist is proof that SOMEONE who knows about a potential 40K mmo does NOT know who is making it...

Face...Palm...