So last night my friends and I were sitting around a fire, drinking beer just throwing things out there, and of course anytime I bring up gaming they all look at me like I am nuts, expect for one of them because he is all into fantasy and such.
Trying to find some common ground one of my friends who is a huge football nut, I mean huge, the guy changes Jerseys per game depending on who he wants to root for, and if you knock on his door during the game he will answer it so quickly that all you see is the door slamming in your face, and you find yourself wondering if he was ever really there at all, and what it was you spoke to him about. So this friend, who I won’t add his name because he is an alderman for our city and someone could always be looking for dirt, and how video gaming has gotten into politics who knows what could be all twisted around. Plus it could reveal my true identity.
OK, so my friend says “I have an xbox!” So OK, there is something for us to talk about that involves gaming. I say to him, “Oh? What type of games do you play, and of course the answer was football, madden stuff.” Then he goes on to talk about fantasy football.
As they were all discussing this I got to thinking. So I said to them, “Has there ever been a sports mmorpg? And they say “Yes that is what we are talking about, the fantasy football.” So of course I then I had to try to explain to them that it wasn’t an mmorpg, and then trying to explain to them what it was, and just received blank stares.
OK so my question is to those in my gaming and development circle is: Has there been a ports mmorpg? If not, could it be done? How hard would it be? I don’t know enough about sports to lay out how it could be done myself, but after last night and realizing that there is an entire audience out there who will play sports console games, but not touch an mmo because that would be dorky, but yet they will play fantasy football, this could be a way to bring a whole new crowd of people to the genre, and once you get addicted to one mmo… when you tire of it you will always be looking for the next one. At that point they will be more willing to try other types besides sports.
Some ideas rolling through my head on this, although I don’t know enough about sports myself to work enough in or lay it all out would be each sport would be like a class. You could be a tennis player, baseball, hockey, referee, coach, or even a cheerleader. Guilds could make up their guild as just one team specializing in one sport or have different divisions. There are some aspects that were in swg that could be implemented such as going to the bar to relax, then you could add even a bartender class, dancers, hairstylists that could also give players a massage to take away fatigue.
As for xp you could do a type of skill tree perhaps? Maybe players could start off young, and have to gain xp or skill points by playing against other little league teams, and as they level or skill up their character changes and grows too, and they can move on to player in the next tier until they make it all the way up to being a professional. Players could play each other, sort of like sports pvp, there could be leader boards to keep track of things. For xp zones where the players/teams zone in and play computer teams. As for loot, how about a bat that gives you +6 hit power and a really nice bat may have a 20% chance to proc a home run. Something different for different sports. During times people don’t want to be playing they could be hanging out at the bar, or throw a party at their house, maybe they could take a vacation and go to the beach? There could be crafters to make uniforms, balls, other equipment.
I don’t know if this could work or has already been done because well I am not into sports, but I do know how much guys are obsessed with sports and they generally love sports games. Let me know what you think.
I’m a guy, I like sports to an extent but I would rather be a fairy in EQ2, killing monsters and evil things. Then working on my Corner back for months at a time to gain enough XP to hit up the strip club and pay a hooker named Candy for some uber loot. I just dont see how a non-action oriented sports mmorpg could be fun.
Golf. That’s probably the sports game that would best lend itself to an MMO format. I know there’s already a Korean golf MMO thing out there – I’m talking more of a Tiger Woods typer affair with a persistent virtual 3D clubhouse (think Second Life with better trouser fashion and without the awkward sexual tension) and proper player handicaps etc.
Shot Online fits the “looser” definition of MMO. I think most sports themed games would have to fit this “Guild Wars” style of implementation where you might have a large world for interaction but since sporting events are mostly defined as being managed, staged events where teams are organized and ruled over in competition all of the actual competition would be instanced.
Fantasy Football is an interesting choice to look at because in many ways it is an MMO but not particularly a virtual world. There are cases to be made that the community itself can create the world in a non 3d representational format as it was originally in MUDSs. While these were still virtual worlds you can extract the non 3d aspect of them and see similarities to communities such as mySpace. Raph Koster, as an example, often sites these communities when discussing large virtual worlds.
http://www.vivi.com is a text based boxing multiplayer game. Kind of interesting.