Game Design for February

Our top priority for February is to give marketing a Demo that they can proceed to put anyplace they can imagine. We feel that allowing players to see what's going on in other parts of the world without being able to quite take part in the exciting parts of the game will put us in a much stronger point of view, from a newbie retention point of view.

Our second highest priority is to retain existing customers. Our customers have told us what we want, and that is: more monsters, more items, more areas, more clothing -- just more. So let's give it to them.

New Features and Areas

• Demo Area - Our number one priority is to provide marketing with an area that both demonstrates all positive aspects of the game, while teaching players the interface of the Meridian 59 system. Our current demo system is inadequate, since players must strain through a 28 mg download to play on a server with no guardians and few players.
• The demo area will be connected to live servers, so that demo players will see a full who list, as well as the excitement that is going on in the broadcast channel.
• The demo itself will be made smaller by not including most of the rooms and graphics. We only need 500K out of 10 mgs of rooms, 4 out of 8 mgs of graphics, and a minority of the 8 mgs of sound. However, there is a cost. For example, guardians need to be instructed not to drop items or create monsters that players don't have the graphics for, and any attempt for a guardian to bring a demoer to the real world will fail. We plan to put in failsafes, which will disallow bad things from happening. Note that this means that, if a player becomes a paying customer, he has to either download or purchase the rest of the package.
• The real world will be sheltered from the demo server.  Thus, a demo player does not have the option of broadcasting themselves, nor can they tell, nor can they attack any other players.
• The demo world will contain sort of a "Meridian Tutorial", explaining such things as how to fight, how to move, how to buy stuff, and other things designed to acclimate the player to Meridian 59 quicker.
• The demo area will contain baby rats and spiders, as well as the new newbie monster, the mummy.  The mummy will be tall enough that a player doesn't have to look down to fight it.
• An effort must be made to prevent demoers from in any way messing up the game for paying customers. Keeping demoers off the who list and off the broadcast channels are ways to reach that end.
• Assassin's Game - You sign up with the Assassin in the sewers. He gives you a black blade with a name on it. You must use the blade to kill your target, but you do not know who has the blade with your name on it, so you must always be on your toes.
• The assassin's game is fully voluntary.  Anyone who does not wish to take part may choose not to, and players in the midst of a scenario may quit at any time. Last player alive wins.
• The game is a multi-day puzzle, designed to keep people paranoid and on their toes at all times.
• Override the combat math, so that newbies and experienced players may both have equal footing. Rough math - a player has 4 gems. A hit from a black dagger dulls one of the gems. If all four gems are dimmed, the player 'dies'.
• The death is a 'fake' death, so nothing is really lost, other than any chance for the prize. When you 'die', the person who had your name on their dagger now gets the name that was on your dagger. Your own dagger disappears.
• Daggers cannot be shattered nor swapped, are not weakened by combat, and cannot be dropped. You do not lose your dagger when you die a conventional death.
• Such cheeseball tactics as logging off mid-combat or just not logging on for days at a time result in expulsion from the game.
• Fey Forest - The Fey Forest is an area of conflict. Inhabited by two warring clans of faeries (good and evil fey), the trees around you show which group of faeries are in power. Players can affect the mood of the forest by actively taking a role, killing off all the good faeries or all the evil ones in order to swing the balance of power.
• If good faeries are strongly in power (i.e. the trees are sparkling), then good players may meld with a mana node which appears in the center.  Good faeries are strongly in power when players kill all the evil faeries, but leave the good ones alive.
• If evil faeries are strongly in power (i.e. glowing eyes in the trees), then evil players may meld with a mana node which appears in the center. Evil faeries are strongly in power when players kill all the good faeries, but leave the evil ones alive.
• Extended Sewers - A good, old-fashioned killing zone, which contains rats, trolls, and a new monster, the lupogg. This area is not to be treaded on lightly, and contains a supermonster in the central zone.
• This zone will not be reachable by players until early March, to help keep the game fresh until the April update.
  

New Monsters:

• Good Faerie - found in the faerie forest. Not terribly tough, but faeries will fight to defend each other.
• Bad Faerie - found in the faerie forest. Not terribly tough, but faeries will fight to defend each other.
• Lupogg - new monster, tougher than a spider, found in extended sewers. Slimy, armless plant-thing, this is truly disgusting.
• Lupogg King - new supermonster, found in extended sewers. This area may be opened in March.
• Mummy - a 'dust mummy', this monster is a low level monster that does very little damage and rarely hits, but has a lot of hit points.

Other New Stuff:

• Greater Character Customization -- We plan to offer more clothing types. Thanks to the new color translation functionality in the client, we can expect to see new pants, new hair, and new armor.
• Smarter Monster AI - Expect to see:
• Monsters that flee when wounded.
• Monsters that defend a 'friend' (i.e. faeries defending other faeries).
• "Guard" monsters, which attack PKers or combat instigators on sight.
• Monsters that will look for a new target if they can't quite reach their primary target.
• Improved Advancement - going to make it more intuitive and easier for players to understand. Also going to give guardians more tools to answer player questions about spell, skill and health point gain.