Exploration of Vast, Beautiful Ages & Creation Capabilit

DigitalDarrell · **Joined:** Tue May 16, 2006 7:49 pm **Posts:** 11

For several years now, I have played games like EQ, EQ2, Eve, Anarchy Online, Second Life, and others. Although many of them have beautiful scenery, no one can really enjoy it, since most of the time is spent killing or being killed. There is a place for those worlds; however, wouldn't it be great to be able to simply walk around and enjoy the beautiful surroundings, solve puzzles, play games, and never die?

"What," you say, I am "talking about URU!"

Yes, of course, but let's take URU even further, with the ability to create personal ages (do some writing) that could be made public for others to enjoy. Give us a powerful, complex D'Ni word-set to build worlds with, and let us create. Give us books to study and learn writing. We don't mind the work, even if it takes a long time to learn. I would rather spend my time learning to write D'Ni, than continue killing gnolls and orcs.

Also, please have large ages where the whole point of being there is to simply explore, and maybe find goodies we can use to improve our virtual lives. Have those ages be inhabited by friendly NPCs that are all about helping us explore the land. Give us NPCs that we can converse with and learn from.

I took the survey, as have many others, and checked off those things as VERY important.

I am so sick of mindless virtual killing, killing, killing and leveling, leveling, leveling! Many of us have moved beyond the current "slaughter the local monsters" mindset, and crave a place to go where you never age, or die, and can have some fun.

Second Life tried it, but their streaming idea kills the ability to do anything really useful. URU Live could become a real Second Life, with the ability to build, explore, and communicate. No need to stream anything, just download the latest expansion with new ages to explore.

I'll commit to paying you a goodly sum of money each month for a world like this, and will happily buy new expansions into the endless future. I've played EQ for nearly five years now. Could I play URU for 10? I hope so!

grilox · **Posted:** Wed May 17, 2006 4:07 am

no no no no no no NO!

This is URU, not Second Life. What you propose would make the entire point of Uru live pointless, you could do just as well with until uru with age builders...

This is Uru live, not Second Life. This actually has a story and a community, instead of random people making random things randomly.

lightshadow · **Joined:** Tue May 16, 2006 4:07 am **Posts:** 24

grilox wrote:

This is URU, not Second Life. What you propose would make the entire point of Uru live pointless, you could do just as well with until uru with age builders...

True enough. But I think what they are trying to suggest here is some alternative ways that the game could be played.

A way for players to actually interact other than chat.

DigitalDarrell · **Joined:** Tue May 16, 2006 7:49 pm **Posts:** 11

Grilox wrote: "What you propose would make the entire point of Uru live pointless, you could do just as well with until uru with age builders..."

I answer:
How does my learning to write D'Ni, and create some ages destroy the story line? The entire point of the D'Ni, from the books I have read, was to create ages and enjoy them, harvest food, items, etc. for use in other ages.

In other games, I am a heavy tradeskiller, with much less emphasis on killing orcs and leveling than most. Age creation is a very desirable feature that is similar to the tradeskilling idea. It is merely another way to enjoy the virtual world, not a storyline replacement. It fits right in with the storyline if I take a few classes from a Yeesha-like person, then start studying D'Ni writing in earnest.

I have no interest in URU becoming a pointless Second Life style world, where anything goes. What I meant was that Second Life does not work, because it is not very permanent. URU can be much more permanent. The story line is what's important, however, I can be part of that story line by creating my own age with the provided D'Ni word-set that will take me months, if not years, to master.

Also, since we have no idea what happened to the original D'Ni that linked out before the gas attack, we can surely interact with those NPCs and learn from them. They are out there somewhere, are they not. Wouldn't it be fun to explore a few dozen large ages on a quest to find the D'Ni race?

The D'Ni race is NOT dead, they are just not on Earth any longer. I'm sure we could find them out there. And, in the meantime, I'm sure we could be studying scores of new book translations by someone like Nick. Or, even I could learn some D'Ni and translate a bit myself.

I do not want URU to become Second Life. I would like URU to become a REAL second life, where I can get out of the real world for many years in the future. Maybe I'll see YOU there, and we can share some new D'Ni words we have learned.

Owehn · **Posted:** Wed May 17, 2006 4:22 am

I don't think DigitalDarrel is saying that the only ages Cyan should make are those solely for exploration, or solely switch Uru Live over to fanmade content. Both of those, however, will probably find their niches in Uru Live.

(I hardly think a Saavedro-type reaction is appropriate to such a thoughtful post.)

Besides, let's hope more people are in Darrel's boat and are craving a virtual world where the point isn't to level up or kill off your surroundings. We should welcome them with open arms.

Edit: Sorry Darrel, I hadn't seen your new post when I wrote this.

Cyan_Husky · **Posted:** Wed May 17, 2006 6:06 am

Owehn wrote:

(I hardly think a Saavedro-type reaction is appropriate to such a thoughtful post.)

Ahahahahaha! :lol:

Sorry, that just made me laugh so hard...

Tahm · **Posted:** Wed May 17, 2006 8:23 am

Without puzzles? Uru wouldn't be a Myst game without puzzles, and believe me, people would not enjoy the scenery as much if we didn't have puzzles as partial barriers, keeping us in one locale until we've managed to observe a hidden detail, or infer something we would not have if the prospects of the rest of the age didn't depend upon it.

Andrew

Whilyam · **Joined:** Tue May 09, 2006 1:04 am **Posts:** 4134

ZOMG! Fan interaction! We're all going to die! Curse you, independant thinker!

*runs around screaming*

Seriously, I wouldn't mind going around fan made ages that were purely scenery. After all, that's pretty much what Eder Kemo (and, presumably, Eder Delin) are.

However, I want to point out that puzzles can help make that scenery even more enjoyable. When I figured out the moon room in Kadish and got out to the cliffside, it was much more enjoyable than if I had just walked through. One of the big things with Myst and the other games is that you had a puzzle, you strain at it, and then you get a reward and another puzzle, which leads to another reward and a puzzle, etc. Through this, an otherwise normal Age (like Gahreesen, for example), is much more because of the act of discovery.

I'm not saying it MUST be like this, just that fan-made ages might want to take into account that their ages might be more enjoyable if they had a few puzzles in them.

Starfyre · **Posted:** Wed May 17, 2006 3:28 pm

I wish everyone would get off this trip about Fan Ages being in UU only. Cyan has already said they intend to bring fan ages into Live. They just have to work out a few details on how to do that.

And personally if their only included in UU then Cyan will loose my money. I don't want to hurt them because its not their fault there going by what a portion of the community thinks and its not even the majority of the community. So I hate taking money out of their pockets but if Fan Ages are not included in Live eventually then I personally won't be joining Live.

Zardoz · **Posted:** Wed May 17, 2006 4:27 pm

Plus there's nothing that says any puzzles or story in fan made Ages must be D'ni in origin. To be honest, I'm skeptical that fan-made Ages are the right way to supplement the main Cyan-based storyline, because that's a form of storytelling by committee, so to speak, and that tends to lead to contradictions, wildly different styles, etc.

Uru is basically a hub-and-spoke structure. Let Cyan control the hub (the basic D'ni story) and let fans contribute to the Ages explorers encounter at the ends of the spokes. Who says the D'ni have a monopoly on mystery and intrigue? A new Age is discovered that has its own, native puzzles, and while there might be traces of D'ni visitation, the true mysteries are the world's own. Just imagine Skull Island (from King Kong) as an Age. What happened to its civilization? Where did this solitary beast come from? How did Peter Jackson produce such a turgid movie -- no, wait, that's not a mystery . . .

jwall · **Posted:** Wed May 17, 2006 7:00 pm

Well said Digi-Darrel, I agree completely.

It seems a lot of people are stuck on the Myst story, but the title of Uru was "Ages Beyond Myst"

I took that to mean that there are a lot of different stories out there. There were thousands of people living in D'ni and thier ages. Atrus, Gehn, etc. are one story line, let's see some more. This is where fan ages come in if you ask me.

Jeff

Maratanos · **Posted:** Wed May 17, 2006 8:19 pm

Unfortunately (and I'm not saying it's a bad idea, just impractical), we either make Uru seem totally cheesy by making the D'ni AI, cost Cyan too much money acting them, or do it wrong by having fans act them. I don't think we will be seeing many D'ni soon if ever.

DigitalDarrell · **Joined:** Tue May 16, 2006 7:49 pm **Posts:** 11

EQ2 has some pretty impressive NPC / player interaction, and their quest system adds tremendously to the game. Voice takes up relatively little space, as does text display; so, I can invision a nice classroom where I attend lectures on D'Ni writing by an old gnarled D'Ni Master Guild Writer.

Of course, stuff like that wouldn't be there in the opening world, just like EQ2 was very limited for nearly 6-months after release. But, if GameTap and Cyan want to keep getting my money, they will have to keep providing active content to keep me entertained, OR, give me tools to let me entertain myself...or both!

grilox · **Posted:** Thu May 18, 2006 3:16 am

What I'm saying is merely this:

Cyan should never incoperate Fan made ages into the story, other than a hub of fan made ages, and as a curiosity, perferably in a newsletter type format of some kind.

Edit: Of course, between fan ages, they can have their own story, I just mean not incorperating it into the main cyan story.

P.S: Everyone is saying that Cyan is gonna definitly have fan made ages in Uru live. Can someone get me a quote?

JWPlatt · **Posted:** Thu May 18, 2006 4:51 am

grilox wrote:

P.S: Everyone is saying that Cyan is gonna definitly have fan made ages in Uru live. Can someone get me a quote?

Well, there's this in the FAQ page on this site:

GAME INFO FAQ wrote:

Q. How will fan created content be used in Uru Live?
A. We are working out the logistics; we hope to have more information soon.

And if you really need a top-level quote, here's a portion of a chat log with Rand Miller:

Uru Obsession Forum chat log wrote:

(03/31 01:42:17) Rand: this has to do with the future (c.o.)
(03/31 01:42:28) Rand: we want "writers"
(03/31 01:42:37) J'anim Paedet: Ah, yes. That mysterious future...
(03/31 01:42:40) Rand: and that's what we're talking about really
(03/31 01:42:41) Legacy: Cautious optimism then? ;)
(03/31 01:42:45) ShadowDude: If you'd like we can give you access to our test server, Rand
(03/31 01:42:51) D'Jerid: How exactly would we be able to create Ages?
(03/31 01:43:12) Rand: for now the tools are just what you have
(03/31 01:43:16) Rand: but picture this...
(03/31 01:43:47) Rand: if things start up again - tools might be slowly released...
(03/31 01:44:02) Rand: so that you guys become writers...
(03/31 01:44:27) Rand: and maybe after ages are tested (maintaners?)...
(03/31 01:44:41) Kedri: Ooh! Ooh! Let me! :P
(03/31 01:45:00) Rand: then they can be added to a section of Uru Live (not UU)
(03/31 01:45:08) J'anim Paedet: Exciting times, to be sure!
(03/31 01:45:25) Kedri nods his head
(03/31 01:45:29) Rand: that's a vision that we have - if we get a chance to move forward
(03/31 01:45:46) Legacy: *sigh* I've always been terrible with this whole "patience" thing. The sooner the better. :P
(03/31 01:45:48) J'anim Paedet: Best of luck to you, then!
(03/31 01:45:49) Rand: so for now - the work you do would create a kind of test area...
(03/31 01:46:10) ShadowDude: :)
(03/31 01:46:16) Rand: for the very first writers to experiment in - right?
(03/31 01:46:25) Kedri: Uh huh.
(03/31 01:46:32) ShadowDude: Yes
(03/31 01:46:40) J'anim Paedet: Indeed
(03/31 01:46:47) Rand: but the goal would be to have a part of live that was reserved for fan ages that could be...
(03/31 01:47:14) Rand: verified (maintainers?) and maybe mapped (cartographers?)
(03/31 01:47:20) Kedri: We also have the Uru Age Manager" for offline testing in PotS.
(03/31 01:47:30) Rand: right
(03/31 01:47:42) J'anim Paedet: Like a living, breathing version of what Live could be!
(03/31 01:48:12) Kedri: Mapped...I think they're trying to start the Uru mapping projects up again.
(03/31 01:48:13) Rand: yeah - we're hoping that Uru Live won't JUST be the ages that we add - but the ages...
(03/31 01:48:21) Rand: of new writers as well

Read the entire thread on the Uru Obsession URU General Discussion Forum

There are a large number of interviews and chat logs just like this where Cyan is making a commitment to fans to include fan-created content.

Exploration of Vast, Beautiful Ages & Creation Capabilit

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