It is a nice concept in theory. It has a bit of resemblance to the metaverse minus monetary enshittification, but there are some challenges to this.
It would for example end up just as dead if the other players got bored of it and stopped playing. Then there is server costs for something where there really isn’t that much realtime interaction in, and all these metagames would need to be just as fun with a global time at a set flow, or be OK with synching only at the end of the day.
These of course aren’t impossible challenges.
You could leave the “online” part to a simple global api backend and skip the gameserver itself to greatly reduce costs. You wouldn’t see the other players in person but you’d see their shops grow each new day, and there could be an NPC of their owner walking around.
You could bankrupt inactive players and give their lands to new players, and implement import/export costs for distant shops incentivizing local trade. You’d probably still want normal NPCs, but their interactions would have to be predetermined each day if you don’t have a game server running all day, and want to prevent cheating.
The implementation difficulty and cost greatly varies depending on how much interaction and fairness you want, but setting up an API server is fairly easy if you don’t worry about scaling in case the game really takes off.
This is a cross-game modification system which randomizes different games, then uses the result to build a single unified multi-player game. Items from one game may be present in another, and you will need your fellow players to find items you need in their games to help you complete your own.
Ive played in a few of these. It’s an absolute blast once you get your settings dialed in and balanced to everyone else. If they’re not, then the player in the smallest game tends to have a lot of downtime.
The only downside is that the participants need to be familiar enough with their chosen game to do a randomizer which means roping in casual players is difficult.
Also, there are a massive number of unsupported games that you can play like this that are not part of the main website. multiworld.news/apworlds.html
The only downside is that the participants need to be familiar enough with their chosen game to do a randomizer which means roping in casual players is difficult.
Casual players can be fine with some games. Some actually become easier with Archipelago (e.g. Noita, Risk of Rain 2) since you’re getting meta-progression between runs that normally wouldn’t be there. Others though are especially punishing for new players (Doom comes to mind - you have to be pretty intimately familiar with the levels. There’s keys hidden in secret areas sometimes, for example, and ammo can be very scarce.)
A kind of similar thing has been floating around for decades now. Combining something like Farming Sim with Euro Truck Sim and with flight sim to create an all-in-one logistics simulator
…omg that sounds AMAZING!!! I haven’t even played any of those games. But like, your friend playing trucking simulator, and you play farming simulator. You grow corn. He trucks it.
Steam just apperently cut off support for windows 7. I better still be able to launch the games I paid for. At least offline. I haven’t tried yet. I only bought a few games.
They did. Support was discontinued from the start of 2024. That you’ve been using it up to now without any problems is literally because they didn’t break anything on purpose. As long as none of the software changes it will continue to work.
Nice idea but unfortunately good luck convincing everyone to collaborate into single super-game and integrate each “X simulator” as DLC assuming everyone also adhere guideline and consistent
Man, I managed to completely forget about that. My dad was really, really into that game. Like, that’s about all he did for most of 4 years and ended up leaving my mom for someone he met in game.
I guess SL wasn’t really any worse about that than any other game, plenty of people meet and get married in MMOs, but I think the raging custom-content sex parties in SL probably didn’t help matters at the time.
Wonder how that game is doing these days. Cursory web search says it’s still alive. I probably would have found it to be pretty interesting if I wasn’t so turned away from it by my family experience.
I was playing the demo of TCG sim today and was just thinking that myself. In fact, I’m pretty sure I watched a YouTuber play a sort of life sim game where you could do just about anything but it had full 3D graphics and an isometric view. I wish I could remember the name, because from what I remember you could start a business or be a criminal, or work your way up to CEO or even mayor.
If your goal is to achieve realistic looking city streets the best way to do that isn’t an expensive online infrastructure and much more advanced simulation.
If the developers had the skills and time to do that they could more easily have more dense NPC crowds and richer local simulation.
The reason the games aren’t already like that is likely just cost, talent, and target performance, which you’d need a lot more of to execute your plan.
Give all of those things a try. None of them are “wrong”. Experiment and see what works best with the type of people you want to spend time with. Just don’t get discouraged if your success rate is low (some people just won’t be interested) and respect people’s decisions if they choose to ignore you.
For FFXIV, specifically, if you are looking to add some friends I’d say start by hanging out one of the three starting cities (Gridania, Limsa, Ul’Dah) near the Aetherytes. Often people are just hanging and chatting some there. Limsa, on my server at least, seems to just be filled with people all the time hanging out. And you may even see some open calls for people to join Free Companies (Guilds). Those people are actively looking for new blood, so you could start up a discussion with them and see if their group is something you’d like to join. By doing so you may be able to get several friends pretty quick that way. Just remember that you owe nothing to those folks, and if the free company vibe doesn’t feel right once you get in, then bounce.
But commenting on someone’s look is fine, too! People work hard to collect or craft certain pieces of gear and dye them to make their character the way they want so if you notice something cool chances are they will be happy to talk about it.
There was one time last year during a Live Letter (this is a live streamed event the producers of the game do a few times a year) I went to Limsa and said to anyone who could hear it that I’d be “over by [a specific bench] to discuss the Live Letter” and lots of people I didn’t know gathered around and we all had a fun chat about the event as it streamed.
Or even if you have questions, say them out loud in a crowded space and chances are someone will help. FF14 is notorious for people NOT being trash, so most often you’ll find helpers before finding jerks.
And I promise that you can’t out-weirdo the weirdos that run around pretty much any game, so try to not worry about that.
appreciate the advice on getting conversations started. i think i’ll work up the nerve to give that a try in the near future. also, thank you for you can’t out-weirdo… that makes it easier to handle 😀
I’ve had random people whisper me to compliment my character’s hat and ask where did I get the cosmetic in Elder Scrolls Online. To be fair, it was a pretty silly hat.
If they look like there just roaming around, emoting, roll-playing, playing with random items/spells or generally fucking around; there likely feeling social and may respond but each MMO has a different vibe to it. Look for people loudly drawing attention in cites. Wow players tend to group up but not say anything, There is mechanical communication(IE: everyone is in perfect sync in a group activity) but that has a good chance of breaking down at the first sign of trouble. I can’t say much A lot of it is bar level interaction, you hang out for 30 minutes, do your dungeon and move on. If you get along with some one during an activity, send a friend request and they may accept or ignore it, sometime they may sit on it for a bit.
There is a lot of toxicity or other people you will just not , block and move on if its a problem to you, report if it’s still a problem after that. You will never win an argument on the internet. Being a weirdo is normal, and awkward interactions will be common, as that guy has a good chance of being from some country you cant find on the map(or your government may have literally bombed there family yesterday). Noting more honest than 2 randos finding out there at war with each other after spending 2 hours having fun.
a lot of toxicity or other people you I think that’s probably the biggest barrier to being social. not wanting to deal with toxic players is a huge thing from what I have read (Lemmy, Reddit, etc.)
thank you for this, simple but sounds effective. i’ll have to go find the player in T&L that was running around as turkey and asked they pulled that off 🤣
bin.pol.social
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