State of the ruined wasteland of Fallen Earth
by Eliot Lefebvre 
Oct 11th 2009 at 12:00PM
Filed under: Sci-fi, Fallen Earth, Game mechanics, New titles
There's definitely a developer communication theme running through MMOs these days. After one month of players being able to stomp around in Fallen Earth, the game has received its first State of the Game address from developer Colin Dwan, better known as "Ilkor" on the official forums. The address goes through some of the concerns players have had, some of the minor bugfixes and improvements, and what the developers are planning on introducing for patch 1.1 and 1.2. The former is slated to have a content improvement for levels 32-35, and the latter is intended to boost social content and group-oriented activities.
The address also takes time to respond to some issues that have come up on a repeated basis. Faster travel is on the list to be implemented down the road, especially once later updates arrive, but it will be expensive and between very strictly delineated points for thematic reasons. Respecs are also on the table, but again will be expensive and limited. As Dwan himself puts it, "[We] would like to help the people who spend a few points wrong and want to fix those mistakes, not folks who want to rebuild their whole character. The specifics are still up in the air, but it will be expensive, slow, and limited." If you're interested in the near future of the game and are curious about the overall developer plan, take a look at the whole address at the official Fallen Earth forums.
[ via WarCry ]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Anticrawl said on 1:13PM 10-11-2009
Why not let them respec their whole character? Just give everyone one free chance to do that and make it impossible after that.
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Graill said on 5:31PM 10-11-2009
Exactly Anticrawl. The why is below, it has to do with monthly subbing, the longer it takes to fix your toon the longer you are forced pay. the clueless devs think continue to think this is the way to go.
Ok , read up folks, this is the the example in realtime how devs screw up constantly, they simply refuse to do as their PAYING customers say. If you wanted an axample of the whining (as the devs put it) we are all doing because of ignorant dev choices, this is a prime example of what they want verse what the paying consumer wants, the example in its glory and as ignorant as can be.
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"[We] would like to help the people who spend a few points wrong and want to fix those mistakes, not folks who want to rebuild their whole character.
endquote]
Who gives a squat devs, and how exactly are you helping?, your not paying for the game, in fact your jobs depend on keeping that sub. I'm sorry? you devs are independantly wealthy?
I understand now, you devs are still stuck on your "if the players have to redo a character they will have to pay to keep playing instead of getting insta fixed".
Devs your as ignorant as a lemming looking up that hill into sunshine, stupid as you ever were, still stuck on that pay-play-time model and you dont see the shear cliff, well you know its there, you just dont care. And we wonder why so many folks fail to sub to these games? A prime example of what not to do in progress.
Anticrawl said on 6:03PM 10-11-2009
Well I remember Guild Wars being perticularly punishing towards the endgame when you realized (OH FUCK, I picked a terrible combo) but that was for early adopters and really it didn't matter because well it had no subscription. However a subscription based model with 60-90 levels should allow atleast fresh-faced players during the first year of the game being out the chance to respec their entire character for free, just once. There is no reason to punish a paying customer who has been playing the game so long. Just silly is all, and to think it upsets other players says a lot about the typical MMO player.
Zheitgeist said on 9:22AM 10-12-2009
@Graill, what is it with people and thinking that because you pay for something it should be tailored to what you want. If you pay $8 bucks for a movie, does that make you able to call the director and tell them you want more blood in it, oh yeah and don't use this actor I don't like her.
You are paying for a game because it is a large scale game and requires a team of people constantly monitoring, balancing, and maintain.
Don't get me wrong devs should listen to their players suggestions. But if you are shocked they arn't doing what you say don't get up on your soap box about that measley 15 bucks you give them, it lets you log on every day not call all the shots.
If you don't like it please please please just dont play, whiney people like you ruin games enough as it is. Where does everyone get this false sense of entitlement these days?
beefaroniap said on 1:34PM 10-11-2009
Because a complete respec would take all the challenge out of specing your toon.. w/o respec's you have to plan out your toon and every decision takes thought(one of the things i love about f/e this idea is seen throughout the game) If it were as simple as gimmie a free respec i think it would take alot of the fun out off building a character. this isnt champions online where the communitty controls every single thing in the game, dev have alot more control in f/e.. ( i loved champions just thought whining community and constant game changes plus lack of content ruined it after the first month..plan to go back to champions in next 6 months to see how its progressed.. till then f/e is where il be and i recommend checking it out, even if it is for just the first free month..
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Sam said on 5:50PM 10-11-2009
while the two commentors above put it somewhat nastily, they have slightly good points - the main point though, is that in FE your training doesn't only affect a few skills - where you put your points has an effect on your crafting, etc - so a full respec would inevitably have to make you start your crafting all over again as well.
Whereas their current method, a few points per use, means you can back out of a bad decision, but not have your character majorly affected.
The Claw said on 7:03PM 10-11-2009
The problem with the "no respeccing = you have to think about your decisions" angle is that it puts a huge crimp in the developers' ability to fix/change/balance things down the road.
Because "thinking about your decisions" leads to choosing the most effective combination of skills/abilities/talents/whatever, which are, by definition, the ones most likely to be made LESS effective if the developers are actually allowed to work on balance.. so what are you supposed to do? Go flavour-of-the-month and then reroll every patch, like in Diablo 2? Go for middle-of-the-road stuff in the hope that it is effective enough now, and not likely to be nerfed in the future?
GRT said on 2:36PM 10-11-2009
Sad news: the dumbing down begins.
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Ronix said on 3:56PM 10-11-2009
Need some MMORPG devs to act like FROM SOFTWARE, who made Demon's Souls. You want a respec? F--- No, as a matter of fact when you die, you drop a level instantly, and each time you die enemies hit you harder.
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Wjowski said on 7:48PM 10-11-2009
So MMO devs need to start making shittier games?
Dblade said on 11:15PM 10-11-2009
Yeah, let them act like From Software, and let MMO's enjoy all the success the games based on King's Field (like demon souls is) has. :/
devilsei said on 11:52PM 10-11-2009
Actually, when you die you don't de-level, you lose all your currency/exp, aka Souls. If you can get back to where you died without dieing again you can get them all back though.
The only way you De-level is if you invade another's world and die in any way besides them, if you lose to them in a duel, or a certain spell is used upon you. The latter two technically just "transfer" the level over, as the winner/caster gains the amount of souls you spent to get to that level.
As for you two, STFU, simply put. Your opinion, personally I love Demon Souls because you actually need to pay attention to what happens. And how does the game run off the name of another game? I never heard of Kings field but I bought Demons Souls first day because the concept is something I liked, and so far I'm enjoying it. Game isn't crap, you're skills and reflexes are.
Dblade said on 1:01AM 10-12-2009
Devilsei, From software has been doing dungeon crawlers like that since the ps one. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kings_field is the very first one, but they all were punishing, hardcore games, and very few people even remember them.
That's why the "enjoy the success" comment, chances are demon souls will be forgotten as quickly as the kings field games were, and there are quite a few games based on the same principles that tank at market: Etrian Odyssey and the Dark Spire for nintendo DS come to mind. There isn't a shortage of offline games like that, and I'm not sure its a good example for MMO's to follow.
Tumorseal said on 6:33PM 10-11-2009
I vote for No Respec and No Fast Travel!
F- all the whiners go play something else. Fallen Earth is finally doing something different and people want to change it to be like everything else.
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GRT said on 8:49PM 10-11-2009
Exactly. You want a game that holds your hand and doesn't let you make any mistakes? There's 3 dozen of those out there, go play one of them.
Utakata said on 6:03AM 10-12-2009
I bet dollar for donuts that there many who play FA who wish you two would go play another game.
Ronix said on 9:23PM 10-11-2009
No, they need to stop listening and making it easy. Every MMORPG in recent years has be mind numbingly easy. Unless you count PvP to some extent. When you die, you need to lose something. We need more MMORPGS that make you not care about getting to the next level or just rushing to "end game". I find it pathetic that people just say that about, "How's the end game". That also shows how stale the middle area is in our MMORPGs.
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Dblade said on 11:29PM 10-11-2009
Uh, respecs have zero to do with dying and losing something, what the lack of them does punishes players for making their own decisions. You want players to be able to experiment and learn on their own without risking their entire character build becoming trash and needing to reroll.
As for the whole "make stuff a pain in the ass when you fail" idea, and letting you make mistakes? It really doesn't add much to a game.If it takes ten tries to beat a boss either way, the game that forces you to take a break every 3 tries because it forces you to spend time grinding back levels and gold isn't any better, and the boss fight isn't any more meaningful. It's even worse a lot of times, the more risk, the more players will be conservative and be unwilling to try anything new.
heartlessgamer said on 10:57PM 10-11-2009
I think some people miss the point of why respecs are important. Having no respec punishes early adopters by forcing them to live with their mistakes or skills that have been changed in a patch. Players joining later on have the luxury of the early adopters having figured things out and can come in far more likely not to have a jacked up spec by the "end game". Essentially, that early adopter is punished for figuring things out, instead of being rewarded. That leads to canceled subscriptions within the core community of the game and that is never a good thing.
Having respecs is neither hardcore nor carebear. It is a smart design decision. Its like calling Fatal1ty a newb because he plays a game where he changes his character every thirty seconds as he swaps to different weapons when playing Unreal Tournament.
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Ronix said on 11:42PM 10-11-2009
I'm saying that they shouldn't allow full respec only partial or VERY expensive as you go back farther. Players should stick with there choices and not be able to have that unless there is a major change in the system.
The less risk, the more players care less about what happens and can make the game quit dull. Running into unknown territory, suddenly a monster comes up and kills you are you auto-run through the wilderness. Oh well, I died, who cares no penalty, let me try again. Or there is a collecting quest. Without risk in death, I see death to be used an an advantage over the game itself. I'm not saying it HAS to be XP, because we ALL know XP can take forever to get back, especially in a grinding MMORPG. Besides..Since when was a boss fight "meaningful" in an MMORPG other than getting past it to move on to the next "level" and quest.
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