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Old 08-11-2009, 05:44 PM   #41
Ragitsu
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Default Re: GURPS as an MMO Engine

Just because it can work, doesn't mean i'm for it :-). Seriously, have you seen most MMORPGers lately? Not exactly the epitome of ROLEplaying and patience.
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Old 08-12-2009, 07:37 PM   #42
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Default Re: GURPS as an MMO Engine

I think you'd just about have to start with a niche market, honestly. Go for an Eve-type clientele, and not WoW numbers -- at least not at first.

You can also take a few clues from Eve. It has no classes or levels -- everything is skill-based and probabilities of success are based on skills combined with attribute values. Moreover, it has an incredibly sophisticated economic engine that models reality well enough to provide valuable insights to economists. The economic structure makes the players feel as if they've accomplished something real when they get/build/find/buy the nifty widget/ship, and that they've actually lost something real when somebody blows it away.

(That said, this real loss is what keeps a lot of people out of the game. Lots of gamers have problems with the concept of actual loss in a something that's supposed to be fun. Moreover, most learned about/got conditioned to computer games on consoles, in which you always get to save and restart if things go badly.)

Finally, the last thing you want to do is have players go through character generation every time they get waxed. Loss of widgets is one thing. Having to regenerate a character, every time, is wholly unacceptable.

So, I'd want a skill-based sandbox-type game with lots of open spaces, but with a core area that's relatively safe, a realistic faucet-drain economy, and the ability to recover from death.

Transhuman Space. A Mars setting, with the concept that people have the ability to create a ghost of themselves when they can afford it, or purchase emergency insurance that guarantees destructive upload of a dying brain into a cloned body (upgradable to a genetically superior model, perhaps, or even a bioshell or cybershell, if the player likes that, instead).

I think that would be workable. It's skill-based, the characters are robust, it's wide open (once you get away from the centers of civilization and law enforcement in the Noctis Labyrinthis, Lake Marineris and the Tharsis Volcanoes); the technology for resurrection is already integrated into the setting; it's fundamentally different from anything out there now; it's expandable; and, oh yes, there's lots of sand. :)
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Old 08-13-2009, 01:46 AM   #43
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Default Re: GURPS as an MMO Engine

EVE down on the ground . . .

Not necessarily a bad thing, just an observation.
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Old 08-13-2009, 09:46 PM   #44
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Default Re: GURPS as an MMO Engine

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Originally Posted by Molokh View Post
EVE down on the ground . . .

Not necessarily a bad thing, just an observation.
Pretty much, yeah. If you're gonna start an MMORPG, you've gotta be different. Nobody does anything close to Transhuman Space, except Eve (vaguely), and that's all space battles, and will remain so for the foreseeable future.
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Old 04-27-2011, 07:58 PM   #45
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Default Re: GURPS as an MMO Engine

I would not mind an program that would allow several people to roleplay in a chat room that would accept GCA characters for stats. It would not be a MMO per se... but it would provide quick computer based info for a GM handling an online adventure. You could have voice chat for general play, text chat for GM notes (secret), player to player chat that the GM would hear, maps could be presented to the players, combat would be handled by a GM assist program where each character took their actions in turn. They would say what they are doing to the GM, but the program would keep track of their move and speed and surprise and health and when they had to make unconsciousness rolls and other rolls and so on.

THAT would be nice.
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Old 04-27-2011, 08:25 PM   #46
Peter Knutsen
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Default Re: GURPS as an MMO Engine

Quote:
Originally Posted by vicky_molokh View Post
EVE down on the ground . . .

Not necessarily a bad thing, just an observation.
That is coming. Dust 514 or something, a console-based FPS game taking place in the EVE Online universe.
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Old 04-27-2011, 10:40 PM   #47
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Default Re: GURPS as an MMO Engine

Quote:
Originally Posted by Hilary_155 View Post
I would not mind an program that would allow several people to roleplay in a chat room that would accept GCA characters for stats. It would not be a MMO per se... but it would provide quick computer based info for a GM handling an online adventure. You could have voice chat for general play, text chat for GM notes (secret), player to player chat that the GM would hear, maps could be presented to the players, combat would be handled by a GM assist program where each character took their actions in turn. They would say what they are doing to the GM, but the program would keep track of their move and speed and surprise and health and when they had to make unconsciousness rolls and other rolls and so on.

THAT would be nice.
Isn't that what the various Virtual Tabletops do already, except none of them can import GCA files directly?
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Old 04-28-2011, 01:58 AM   #48
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Default Re: GURPS as an MMO Engine

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Originally Posted by sir_pudding View Post
Isn't that what the various Virtual Tabletops do already, except none of them can import GCA files directly?
yeah, that's what I was thinking too.
And before investing a lot in a link feature for GCA, it might be easier to just build in GCA, import the data and track in the program. As much as I love GCA, it isn't very good at tracking characters after creation.
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Old 04-28-2011, 03:35 AM   #49
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Default Re: GURPS as an MMO Engine

Quote:
Originally Posted by sir_pudding View Post
Isn't that what the various Virtual Tabletops do already, except none of them can import GCA files directly?
Fantasy Grounds has a GURPS plugin that allows you to import GCA files into it.
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Old 04-28-2011, 04:43 AM   #50
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Default Re: GURPS as an MMO Engine

MMO are a very dangerous terrain: many tried and many more failed even before starting.

Actually I think the GURPS system would be perfect for a simple flash-like multiplayer combat game based on Martial Arts: you build you character (only combat stat obviously) and then you face another player in a turn-based fight with all the martial arts rules (from weapon quality to fancy hand attack) something like "Tactical Mortal Kombat".

IMHO it would be a great app for mobiles.
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