Improving/Promoting Creativity
Posted: Sat Feb 05, 2022 10:09 pm
As someone who made a ton of art for the game, I personally think creativity should be prioritized over things like arbitrary ideas of difficulty and such. Come on, look at Maplestory and how many monsters the game has for just the first 20 levels: https://maplestory.fandom.com/wiki/Monster/Level_1_-_10
https://maplestory.fandom.com/wiki/Mons ... el_11_-_20
Those guys know how to liven up environments and make things creative!
When making monsters, I've made monsters ranging from environmental buffers (Batlings and Sandshags) to monsters with interesting mechanics (Madmasks, Necrostinkers, and Kingscorpees). Ultimately, the only way to liven up environments is to add more in everything. Here's what I can say about each case.:
More Monsters
Okay, so CrazyVanilla had stated that he thinks there are too much content for Level 40-ish players, but too me, I think he failed to account for the fact that monster variety in general is very lacking, which seriously deters the liveliness of the environments for the games. Here are the points I'll make in that regard.
Livelier Environments
The way I see it, the biggest benefit to adding more monsters to the game's already-existing areas is the fact that monster variety livens up the environment. For instance, in my version of Tumbleweed Desert, I've made TEN monsters: nine regular mobs and one mid-boss. Imagine how lively the desert would be if all ten mobs were included in the game. You'd be seeing the wide variety of creatures that could be fought along with a wide variety of loot drops to obtain and the vast amount of biological, environmental, and "Moonchyllus' personal thoughts" information on each mob. It would feel like a world is actually being created rather than being severely roadblocked by CrazyVanilla's creativity-hating complaints about difficulty and whatnot. Seriously, I think he's gone too far with it that time.
More Experimentation with Mechanics
I think another benefit to this idea would be the fact that it would give Robby more room to experiment with a variety of mechanics. For instance, Robby had told me through email that he wanted to have mobs that can boost their own defense. But to me, I think movesets are the most important thing to experiment with. Currently there are only four monsters with movesets: Logons, Scorpees, Lumbercore, and Cionic Organism. Night Stalkers have a clawing move, but it only gets used when players ride the thing.
Beyond that, there are many mechanics to explore that can only be done with expanding the monster variety of the game. Things like offensive debuffs, defensive debuffs, offensive buffs, Protection Field-bypassing, self-resurrection, summoning, bleeding effects, making players MISS their attacks, and more can be considered.
Worldbuilding
Wider monster variety also promotes worldbuilding. Like, for instance, wider monster variety would answer questions such as "What would a Dumtilian eat?", "What can eat a Grunt?", "Where the heck are all the poisonous shrooms?," etc.
It would be cool to see a Dire Rat being a predator of Grunts and Scrap Bots, and some giant, long-tongued lizard can be eating Waffle Cones like candy. Heck, there would be a wide variety of nocturnal monsters to boot.
More Equips
For the record, I think creativity should matter far more than level gaps when it comes to equipment. Seriously, all caring only about level gaps does is promote heavy equipment price inflation. I've made a variety of equipments of all shapes and colors. heck, there are a ton of references to boot, like Indiana Jones (Raider set), Total Drama, Final Fantasy (Dark Mage set), Helmet Heroes, and a variety of sports and civilizations. But there are other things that I should go for here, like...
Item Drop Variety
I personally found it difficult to come up with drop lists for various monsters due to the lacking equipment variety in the game. What if I wanna give Waffle Cones ice cream-themed items or a monster made out of wooden blocks toy-themed items? What about marine-themed items for aquatic monsters like Proteums and such? Heck, what if I wanna give Egyptian-themed or desert-themed items to Lizags or Kingscorpees or even just regular Scorpees? There's a whole untouched palette out there that is being left untouched due to a forced "only appeal to the high-levels" attitude when it comes to equipment. Why not go back and fill some holes?
Gap-Filling Because OCD
I am pretty OCD when it comes to huge gaps of power and defense when it comes to equipment. I would love it if said gaps were filled with in-betweener equips. Let's say I want to put something between the Mushroom Plate and the Casted Crow set. BAM! Gap filled, less OCD. Simple enough?
Greater Element of Choice
Going further on a limb, what if players make it to Level 45 yet, say... They don't want to wear a Helmet Heroes set and would rather wear something more original? In that case, give them original equipments around the same tier as the HH sets. Already that would give players mroe options. Also, as it currently stands, there are hardly any slow guns, slow handguns, fast handguns (ex. UZIs), slow handguns (ex. Flintlock pistols), etc. If slower guns and faster guns are given more variety, they would allow gunmen to have a choice between raw power for grenades and clamp traps, or DPS for coin shot. So many options!
Also, Quiwi recently said to me that higher equipment variety would allow players to go glass-cannon like they already do when wearing Priest and Tengu gear, or go tank like they already do with Element or Romance gear. After all, people tend to love picking between glass cannon, middle-ground, and tank builds. Mhmm.
Area Expansion
As pointed out by Geralt, areas would need expansion themselves. And I do think there are some benefits for it. Granted, people might complain over area size as they once did with the expansion of the ENTIRE WORLD in Helmet Heroes, but here... Honestly, what is 20-30 seconds more walking in each area gonna do to stop people from, say, taking the PVP shortcut for example?
Improved Farming Ability
Really, it's mainly about the farming, which... Well, why not? I always wanted the game to be more. Granted one can argue that the game is worked on by one guy (though technically I am in the back seat when it comes to in-game art), but... Come on. Matt Roszak made 216 monsters, with even the recolor-y monsters having unique aspects to them design-wise and combat-wise and he's only one guy making an RPG (only help he got was Phyrnna in the music department and Ronja with some of the art) for Epic Battle Fantasy 5. What the heck is stopping Eliatopia from being a one-man Maplestory?
But back to the point. While currently the low player counts are sustainable by the game, if 400 people are needed to make a new server, then it is best to think about how the game would satisfy 200 players as opposed to 40-70 (80 on a good day). To me, Areas 6, 7, 10, 19, 24 (though that would get in the way of Robby's intention of that area being narrow), 25, pretty much the entire Slime Factory, 32, 33, 35, 37, weirdly enough 38, 48, 58, 59, and 78 are the best candidates for expansion, especially 48 and 78 since most of the complaints are directed at those two specifically.
Improved Exploration
Yeah, this one is a big one to me. While the areas in the game have been very... Ehh... Linear, I do think area expansion would encourage some level of exploration. For instance, you can find more bargain bins, or heck, you can put in Easter Egg spots. I personally feel out of bounds spots should be turned into Easter Eggs instead of spots that need to be closed off. And why not? You would find new places for rune farming including but not limited to ice runes. Most importantly, and I do think it would help a lot, there would be new landmarks or new objects to check out with enough love and care put into area expansion, and I try to put some love into each thing I make for Robby.
Personally, I do think exploration would wind up not being too encouraged if off-path niches weren't included. Like, say, what if going west of Area 33, for example, you can walk off into a new map that would contain lots of Rafflesias, Logons, Fire Monkeys, P-Sicles, Spark Mantises, whatever. Now THAT is how you encourage exploration instead of keeping players stuck on a linear path.
So yeah, there ya have it.
https://maplestory.fandom.com/wiki/Mons ... el_11_-_20
Those guys know how to liven up environments and make things creative!
When making monsters, I've made monsters ranging from environmental buffers (Batlings and Sandshags) to monsters with interesting mechanics (Madmasks, Necrostinkers, and Kingscorpees). Ultimately, the only way to liven up environments is to add more in everything. Here's what I can say about each case.:
More Monsters
Okay, so CrazyVanilla had stated that he thinks there are too much content for Level 40-ish players, but too me, I think he failed to account for the fact that monster variety in general is very lacking, which seriously deters the liveliness of the environments for the games. Here are the points I'll make in that regard.
Livelier Environments
The way I see it, the biggest benefit to adding more monsters to the game's already-existing areas is the fact that monster variety livens up the environment. For instance, in my version of Tumbleweed Desert, I've made TEN monsters: nine regular mobs and one mid-boss. Imagine how lively the desert would be if all ten mobs were included in the game. You'd be seeing the wide variety of creatures that could be fought along with a wide variety of loot drops to obtain and the vast amount of biological, environmental, and "Moonchyllus' personal thoughts" information on each mob. It would feel like a world is actually being created rather than being severely roadblocked by CrazyVanilla's creativity-hating complaints about difficulty and whatnot. Seriously, I think he's gone too far with it that time.
More Experimentation with Mechanics
I think another benefit to this idea would be the fact that it would give Robby more room to experiment with a variety of mechanics. For instance, Robby had told me through email that he wanted to have mobs that can boost their own defense. But to me, I think movesets are the most important thing to experiment with. Currently there are only four monsters with movesets: Logons, Scorpees, Lumbercore, and Cionic Organism. Night Stalkers have a clawing move, but it only gets used when players ride the thing.
Beyond that, there are many mechanics to explore that can only be done with expanding the monster variety of the game. Things like offensive debuffs, defensive debuffs, offensive buffs, Protection Field-bypassing, self-resurrection, summoning, bleeding effects, making players MISS their attacks, and more can be considered.
Worldbuilding
Wider monster variety also promotes worldbuilding. Like, for instance, wider monster variety would answer questions such as "What would a Dumtilian eat?", "What can eat a Grunt?", "Where the heck are all the poisonous shrooms?," etc.
It would be cool to see a Dire Rat being a predator of Grunts and Scrap Bots, and some giant, long-tongued lizard can be eating Waffle Cones like candy. Heck, there would be a wide variety of nocturnal monsters to boot.
More Equips
For the record, I think creativity should matter far more than level gaps when it comes to equipment. Seriously, all caring only about level gaps does is promote heavy equipment price inflation. I've made a variety of equipments of all shapes and colors. heck, there are a ton of references to boot, like Indiana Jones (Raider set), Total Drama, Final Fantasy (Dark Mage set), Helmet Heroes, and a variety of sports and civilizations. But there are other things that I should go for here, like...
Item Drop Variety
I personally found it difficult to come up with drop lists for various monsters due to the lacking equipment variety in the game. What if I wanna give Waffle Cones ice cream-themed items or a monster made out of wooden blocks toy-themed items? What about marine-themed items for aquatic monsters like Proteums and such? Heck, what if I wanna give Egyptian-themed or desert-themed items to Lizags or Kingscorpees or even just regular Scorpees? There's a whole untouched palette out there that is being left untouched due to a forced "only appeal to the high-levels" attitude when it comes to equipment. Why not go back and fill some holes?
Gap-Filling Because OCD
I am pretty OCD when it comes to huge gaps of power and defense when it comes to equipment. I would love it if said gaps were filled with in-betweener equips. Let's say I want to put something between the Mushroom Plate and the Casted Crow set. BAM! Gap filled, less OCD. Simple enough?
Greater Element of Choice
Going further on a limb, what if players make it to Level 45 yet, say... They don't want to wear a Helmet Heroes set and would rather wear something more original? In that case, give them original equipments around the same tier as the HH sets. Already that would give players mroe options. Also, as it currently stands, there are hardly any slow guns, slow handguns, fast handguns (ex. UZIs), slow handguns (ex. Flintlock pistols), etc. If slower guns and faster guns are given more variety, they would allow gunmen to have a choice between raw power for grenades and clamp traps, or DPS for coin shot. So many options!
Also, Quiwi recently said to me that higher equipment variety would allow players to go glass-cannon like they already do when wearing Priest and Tengu gear, or go tank like they already do with Element or Romance gear. After all, people tend to love picking between glass cannon, middle-ground, and tank builds. Mhmm.
Area Expansion
As pointed out by Geralt, areas would need expansion themselves. And I do think there are some benefits for it. Granted, people might complain over area size as they once did with the expansion of the ENTIRE WORLD in Helmet Heroes, but here... Honestly, what is 20-30 seconds more walking in each area gonna do to stop people from, say, taking the PVP shortcut for example?
Improved Farming Ability
Really, it's mainly about the farming, which... Well, why not? I always wanted the game to be more. Granted one can argue that the game is worked on by one guy (though technically I am in the back seat when it comes to in-game art), but... Come on. Matt Roszak made 216 monsters, with even the recolor-y monsters having unique aspects to them design-wise and combat-wise and he's only one guy making an RPG (only help he got was Phyrnna in the music department and Ronja with some of the art) for Epic Battle Fantasy 5. What the heck is stopping Eliatopia from being a one-man Maplestory?
But back to the point. While currently the low player counts are sustainable by the game, if 400 people are needed to make a new server, then it is best to think about how the game would satisfy 200 players as opposed to 40-70 (80 on a good day). To me, Areas 6, 7, 10, 19, 24 (though that would get in the way of Robby's intention of that area being narrow), 25, pretty much the entire Slime Factory, 32, 33, 35, 37, weirdly enough 38, 48, 58, 59, and 78 are the best candidates for expansion, especially 48 and 78 since most of the complaints are directed at those two specifically.
Improved Exploration
Yeah, this one is a big one to me. While the areas in the game have been very... Ehh... Linear, I do think area expansion would encourage some level of exploration. For instance, you can find more bargain bins, or heck, you can put in Easter Egg spots. I personally feel out of bounds spots should be turned into Easter Eggs instead of spots that need to be closed off. And why not? You would find new places for rune farming including but not limited to ice runes. Most importantly, and I do think it would help a lot, there would be new landmarks or new objects to check out with enough love and care put into area expansion, and I try to put some love into each thing I make for Robby.
Personally, I do think exploration would wind up not being too encouraged if off-path niches weren't included. Like, say, what if going west of Area 33, for example, you can walk off into a new map that would contain lots of Rafflesias, Logons, Fire Monkeys, P-Sicles, Spark Mantises, whatever. Now THAT is how you encourage exploration instead of keeping players stuck on a linear path.
So yeah, there ya have it.