5/10/2011

Shifting Sands

I was making at comment over the Mmogamerchick's blog, and noticed her second screenshot. It was her and some other raiders on their mounts, chasing after a fire rift. What came to mind was the desert sand... it all looked the same..

What i'd like to see in a future iteration of an mmo is being able to see that tracks of other players. Games these days all talk about dynamic events and breakable buildings. How about seeing the tracks of other players? How nifty would it be to try to track the player that killed you out in the wilderness by follow his/her trail through the grass? Or finding a cool landmark/achievement by following what someone else has done. I'd love to see this feature implemented; i'm one to go off the beaten path and explore every inch of the map; its one of the things I really have come to appreciate in playing my first melee dps stealth class.

If one wants to look at it as an area of immersion, how realistic is it that your raid/warband has just finished a massive fight/invasion of rift creatures, and the land doesn't appear as if there was a war going on? All there is are spotches on the landscape of the corrupted/altered lands where rift portals were. There were a few hundred people, animals and creatures rampaging about, and you're going to tell me there is no other trace of that?
Trion's implementation of artifact hunting was very well done and implementing a footprint/tracking system would work hand-in-hand.

1 comment:

  1. That's true, one of the things missing in Rift is tracks. World of Warcraft had them, and it was kinda cool because your tracks would reflect what kind of mount you were on (hooves vs. paws or whatever), pets would have their own tracks and my druid form would have her own kitty paw prints.

    Tracks that stay behind would be a nice idea, but maybe like a 5 min timer until they disappear or something, otherwise it might get out of hand in popular areas :P

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