Today Jagex announced that the anticipated high detail version of Runescape is now available to subscribers in a beta release. Also with this update, for the first time Runescape will be playable in full screen mode within your internet browser window. The update utilizes new graphics technologies to enhance the games look and bring it up to par with other MMORPG titles. The graphics will now include shadows, shading and textures which were previously unavailable in the browser based game thanks to advances in technology.
Free to play users can expect the graphics update sometime in the future. Full press release here.
In the next big patch (I beleive scheduled for next week?) is going to introduce apprentice mounts for players now at level 30. To train for the ability to ride the new mounts will be 35 gold giving the lower level players a cheap boost to speed. Every 10 levels or so usually has a nice bonus for players to look forward to, level 30 was an exception.
Level 10 allows players to unlock their talent trees, level 20 introduced new and better abilities for most classes above and beyond your normal every two level upgrades. Level 30 was pretty well limited to travel form for druids and nothing else. 40 is still going to be a nice level to hit for better armor and the level 40 mounts. I’m not sure what the difference between level 30 and 40 mounts will be - most likely it will be a difference in speed.
Most of the characters I have now are already past level 30 or at the end of the 30’s, so I’ll wait to get the 40 mounts unless the speed isn’t that different. But this will be nice in the future when I get bored with my current twink classes and decide to make another. Level 30-40 progression always seemed to drag out with no major bonuses to look forward to which makes this a smart move by Blizzard - I just wish they did it sooner.
On a side note, I see the teaser splash screen over at Blizzard.com has changed yet again and word has leaked out that this is not an announcement for a WoW expansion or even a StarCraft II teaser - apparently this is going to be an announcement for a new game. So far the leading speculation is Diablo 3 or a Diablo MMORPG. World of Starcraft maybe? Who knows but we should be finding out in the next few days as fast as that ice is breaking away!
In my ever growing quest to see some changes take place in our fast-becoming stale MMORPG template I’m going to publish more and more ideas. Out of the box thinking is what it will take to spice up upcoming titles and give them something different from the World of Warcraft mold so many games seem to be following these days.
Today’s idea is Dynamic Content or in other words an ever changing face to the game world. A world where the combined actions of players have an effect on how the world around them exists down to environment itself. One thing gamers love to see is that what they do makes a difference, going into a cave and killing a hundred cave trolls to satisfy some quest only to go back into the cave and see all those same trolls respawned makes it seem kind of pointless, don’t you think?
With a dynamically shaped world, creature populations in areas can increase, decrease or completely give way to other creatures for a time based on player actions. If a certain creature type is over-killed there is a number of in-game effects you could use to show changes beyond just decreasing there numbers for awhile. Let’s use the cave troll example, if the trolls over over hunted, perhaps that could trigger an in-game event that the trolls counter-attack against a nearby player encampment or town. Or their numbers increase for a time as they beaf up their defense? You could even have named troll bosses spawn only when a certain number have been killed in a certain amount of time. The possibilities are endless.
To make it truly dynamic, you’d want creature populations to move around. If they are under hunted in an area, perhaps that could also trigger an event with them beginning to spawn in neighboring zones. Or trigger quests to trim the population of the critters.
Dynamic content doesn’t necessarily need to be centered around a PVE style of gameplay to work however, PVP is a great way to make changes to the world landscape. Some games, like Warhammer Online and Rohan Online, are already incorporating the PVP style dynamics with player captureable towns or fortresses. In WAR the actual look of the captured fortress changes to show ownership. That’s the right idea for sure but why stop there? Why not spawn friendly NPC patrols in the area of the fortress. The longer it is owned the more and higher level NPC’s spawn to help increase the realm’s foothold.
MMO designers have to think of examples like this both large and small to really make there game stand out from the over increasing crowd of MMORG’s. Better to be different and take risks than to keep following the same path so many other companies are taking and end up being just another face in the crowd.
