Are you devs in a position to answer a question like what are you all doing with the technology and mechanics that revolve around the social and grouping aspects of Pantheon? This is an area in MMOs that has not evolved much over the years and is something I strongly believe needs evolution.
In my opinion, almost EVERY MMO has missed the mark when incorporating voice chat into their game. Almost all MMOs have the little chat box which is still fine to this day but we are eons past EQ and the original chat box MMOs. I've not played an MMO in recent memory and not use Teamspeak or Ventrillo or Mumble daily. But there is a wall in between two players who initially meet in the world where voice chat is not second nature. I believe this is where a lot of the MMOs of today fail with being 'social' or where they have troubles with grouping because you shouldn't have to stop to type out introductions in todays game. You shouldn't have to stop and get your new acquaintance's vent info, jump out of game to plug in the info to jump back into game just to say hi.
Another area is with grouping mechanics. LFG buttons and dungeon ques are usually pain inducing features. What can be done to have players come together more easily when others aren't around. I honestly believe that if the game is designed well enough there is no need for a LFG button.
What other features are being developed or can be developed to promote social gameplay?
I would love to hear other players suggestions as well.
An idea I have is to have voice chat on automatically in game. A great feature would be so that if 20 people are in a smaller room that groups of players could speak to each other without the interference of the other players in the room. Maybe the player you have targeted is the player you can hear crystal clear while the other players in a 5 foot radius give off a small audible level. Maybe you can select a few players to hear crystal clear and players outside specific radii have their audible levels adjusted accordingly.
Elder Scrolls Online for the consoles does voice chat well (definitely not perfect) where there are channels for things like guild and group and local which you can mute on and off. Definitely a good place to start.
The voice chat question has been discussed so many times on different MMO forums, and here as well. I'm one of those that absolutely do not want any form of voice chat when I'm playing an MMO for various reasons that almost always gets mentioned on those other forums, so I don't see any reason for me to list them once more.
EQ2 has voice chat built into the game. Guild channels, Group channels, proximity channels... it is not all that great, becuase it is in game the quality is not as good as even a free service like gamvox, raidcall etc. Often times you get immature or foul mouthed people on there you have to squelch anyways.
I am happy with them focusing on a great guild/group system and sticking to chat in game, and voice chat outside of game for guildies/groupmates.
It is probably a little bit early in development to be discussing this yet, as we still have a long way to go and will definitely consider our options when the time comes, we will also have to consider technology, compatibility with Unity, resources, funding etc. but so far we have adopted the chat box system that worked well in EQ, VG and many other MMORPGs, we will, of course, tweak it to suit our game and our community better as development continues. :)
If people choose to use a 3rd party chat system like Ventrillo, Teamspeak, Mumble etc. then we will not stop that but some of our best memories have been speaking to new people and old friends via the chat box especially during downtime or grouping!
I think in a slow paced game like Pantheon is supposed to be (like how EQ was) typing in a chat box is absolutely fine. It's all those fast paced games like League of Legends and Tera (the only two I could think of that I played personally) where you need a voice chat system to communicate with your team because the minute you look away... well, let's just say every second counts in those senarios.
I personally don't like voice chat. Never have. I feel like it takes away from the immersion of the game when you have a big beefy tank and he's talking to you in a 13 year old boy's voice, not pronouncing character names or locations correctly - but that's just me. I know times have changed a lot since then, and it seems like a better way to do things... but I don't know. Look at all the kids these days with their mobile addiction, lol. It would take them half the time to send a message to someone if they just picked up the phone and called, but for some reason text is funner. Therefore I don't see Pantheon not having a voice system build into the game as a problem.
Neat idea though. :D
H1Z1 has in game chat, which is proximity.
Freaked me out at first, standing there looking through a house and hearing people talking, and quickly realizing that it was not NPC type chat.
I give H1Z1 credit for thier voice-chat, because it really is pretty cool. The closer they are the louder they are, the sounds of other players shooting, slicing, etc.
That said, I don't like voice chat in my fantasy MMoRPGs, at least not open world proximity chat. Nothing kills the game more than a 300 pound ogre with the voice of a 10 year old. :)
But a in-game system for raids or groups would be nice.
I can think of two games that i've played recently that have an in-game ability to speak with other players the first being EQ2 and the second is H1Z1. I prefer to use Teamspeak/Mumble/Ventrillo honestly because most of the time I don't honestly want to speak to people espicially in large groups. I prefer to use a system outside the game when I'm raiding with my guild or grouping with my friends. Most of the time when I'm just hanging out or doing a pick-up group I'd prefer to just hang out by listening to music or talking with my wife while she's spending time on her hobbies. I'm not against an in game system similiar to H1Z1 or EQ2 but I'd prefer the team spend their time on other things first.
No voice chat please. Immersion breaking. Typing like in EQ and VG is quite fine.
This is not supposed to be a super-fast game where your fingers are always busy with the mouse or keyboard commands.
If someone wants it for raids, Ventrilo or other such systems are perfectly fine. I certainly do not want voice chat in pickup groups or when meeting with 1 or 2 new people.
Even for raids it's not critical - I have lead raids in EQ, rather large ones, with nothing but text chat. But a lot of people like it for raids, so if they want, ok, Vent, TS or something can always be used. No need for the game itself to implement it.
Voice chat takes up development resources and connection resources, etc... Even if these amount to nothing, I would not use in-game voice chat unless I was in a group with friends.
I would not want to listen to some folks voice spewing out the crap I see in chat all the time (and end up turning off world chat). I only use vent, ts, etc... if my friends are the folks in the group.
Another reason I dislike voice chat - when some people are in their home they do not feel as though they are in public and so they whistle, suck teeth, sing, fart, eat, drink, yell, and burp, right along with their music blaring, babies screaming, their spouses yelling, the dog barking....
Yea. There is just no need to waste time on in-game voice chat.
I prefer to have no in-game voice chat. A text box is not immersion-breaking for me, but rather immersion-inducing compared to voice chat. Like others have posted, I often find myself squelching people because they're annoying, or they're using voice-activate and someones mom is yelling at them in the background. 15 minutes in Call of Duty on Xbox will convince you that this is a bad idea for immersion. Not exactly an apples-to-apples comparison, but you'll get a taste at how disruptive voice chat can be.
Would prefer to use my own 3rd party voice chat program.
Consensus seems in on voice chat lol. I don't know, I can't tell you the last time I've played an MMO without voice chat on and this goes for all of the people I've played with. I guess I'd just like to see some sort of evolution in the communications department with MMOs, and I just don't mean for voice chat. Although I don't know what else could be done with communication other than voice chat to be incorporated.
All I know is that MMOs of today have developed solo playstyles and I think a lot of that has to do with the communication and grouping tools featured in those games.
NoobieDoo said:
All I know is that MMOs of today have developed solo playstyles and I think a lot of that has to do with the communication and grouping tools featured in those games.
The main reason that I play solo most of the time in "modern" MMOs' are simply because they are so easy, and the only way to get any form of challange from them is to do the intended group content by yourself.
I would support voice chat as an alternate rule server but I do not want to have it enabled on all servers. If you enable it for everyone people who are not comfortable using VC may be excluded from content, groups, or guilds becuase they don't want to VC. I cringe at the idea of advertising '/ooc Looking for more VC group!' or non-vc group ... that shouldn't be something we have to deal with.
But just because I personally do not like it does not mean I am against others using it. I just want to make sure I can steer clear of it by selecting a different server.
Regardign the LFG tool, I think have a LFG tool or /lfg /who tools available is a good thing. However, I do not want tools that can port you around the world to groups. Leave fast travel to players helping eachother get into the group, and selling teleports or summonings.
Hieromonk said:
How do you role play an Elve, or other non-human races..?
We use to pull off 50 person raids with text chat. If a few need to jump on Vent/Teamspeak there is nothing stopping them. I just don't need to hear a baby crying in the background when I am off in fantasy land..
Good points here. Background noise on someones mic is a huge distraction, and I very clearly remember 72 man raids without any voice chat... all through in-game text. That said, I think its important to remember we can always use 3rd party voice programs. I know I will for raiding if nothing else. And these programs are free to boot.
If this is added as an in-game feature, I can foresee this becoming the norm over text chat for casual groups and social chat. "Hey Dekaden, get in voice chat" No thanks, I dont want to hear your baby crying in the background in while trying to immerse myself in a fantasy world. Im genuinely happy that you have a wonderful young addition to the family... i have my own too. But if I dont jump on voice chat, I'll get zero communication from anyone. So, I either waffle through the dungeon unaware of whats going on or break immersion and jump in voice chat.
This is not to say all voice chat experiences are immersion-breaking, but it really is more often than not. Push-to-talk is rarely used anymore (thanks xbox), so i get the pleasure of hearing all kinds of background noise: every angry wife, every crying baby and barking dog, everyone with a cold sniffling in the mic. I honestly cant think of anything MORE immersion-breaking than this. Ok, I need to calm down and breathe...
I always use push-to-talk when using VC because I want to be able to talk to my family without that conversation broadcasting to everyone.
Now what I think may be a neat addition to in game voicechat would be to have a filter applied based on the race and gender you select for your character. That way if you talk it sounds more like your character than yourself.
Niien said:
I'd be cool if they could do some voice to text haha... would be even more awesome if they could do some voice to text that would convert to RP text on the fly!
Yeah, I mean the 'evolution' I'm speaking of doesn't necessarily have to be voice chat. Maybe some how text chat can be evolved such as something like voice-to-text. They have it on smart phones now so why not. Anything to make communication smoother and more second nature without breaking immersion or interfering with the game is all anyone could ask for. But again, Pantheon's team is small and may not be the right team to try something new and different.
Having a voice modifier that altered your voice to sound like the race you are playing is another great idea. I don't know, call me a dreamer lol. I'd just like to see something new in this deparment.
a voice channel imo has no ill effect on the game when you can just turn it off. I have made some great friends with in game VC over the years. I do NEED the option to control it , its nice to be able to have it as a utilty when you want it. MAJOR PITA to get people to use the same VC when in a pug~ Seperate channels like in EQ2 but BETTER!
I always hated using voice on raids because if you missed something that was said, you couldn't "re-listen" to it unless you asked it to be repeated. Raid instructions in a chat box raid channel can be easily re-read. My guild on Al'kabor would create raid instruction hot-keys for each encounter, which was pretty awesome, and worked well.
Perplexing89 said:
not pronouncing character names or locations correctly - but that's just me.
Haha! me too! I mean raid chat was hard enough, and limited in who could "type" in raid chat, an we all had sub chats to filter down. in an intense situation I imagine ventrillo would become a shouting match.
Oh, and its pronounced " loose-lin" not "luck-lin" and "kway-nos" not "key-nos"...*cackle* poe-TAY-toe, poh-TAH-toe, lets dance like Fred and Ginger
Linkamus said:
I always hated using voice on raids because if you missed something that was said, you couldn't "re-listen" to it unless you asked it to be repeated. Raid instructions in a chat box raid channel can be easily re-read. My guild on Al'kabor would create raid instruction hot-keys for each encounter, which was pretty awesome, and worked well.
Most definitely, I wouldn't want to see the chat box entirely removed because I use it HEAVILY during raids. Makes things very simple when you have clean and precise instructions sitting right in front of you to read. But I would also use voice chat a decent amount too. Our raids had rules and keeping Vent/Teamspeak and the chat box clear and quiet during raids was important and was easily adhered to. I like a good mixture of both.
I agree Kreet, having control options with voice chat is vital to having a good voice chat system. I don't see a problem with having a good VoIP in-game, something that you can easily have turned on and function seemlessly. Being able to turn it off is just as important though. ESO on the consoles has a decent voice chat where there are a few separate channels; local, guild, party, etc. You can join whatever channel you like and leave whenever you like. Works well. The big question though is just how much resources would this cost Pantheon's small dev team. If it would take ANY considerable amount of effort I'd be fine without it.