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Russell "Rusty" Williams talks about chat systems in his freshly updated web log at the official site for Pirates of the Burning Sea. Here's how he starts his entry:
Today is the spec review for our chat system. I thought I'd talk a little about the design of it to illustrate how one thing always leads to another...
When I started to think about chat, the first thing I did was to go look at the chat systems of other MMORPGs. I was a little surprised, because for the most part, the chat systems are very limited. But a lot of this comes from their game focus. For example, if you're just running around and killing people, then you care about Nearby, Your Current Party, and Friends. If the game supports a guild mechanism, you add Guild to that last. And you're pretty much done in covering people you want to chat with.
In Pirates, there are a number of gameplay elements that encourage significant social organizations. For example, many players will belong to several organizations (i.e., Far East India Trading Co., and the Port Royale Defense League). When you add a political structure on top of that, it becomes clear that Chat needs to function as more than just a shortcut to sending a message, it also needs to become a contact manager. |
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Pirates of the Burning Sea: Web Log Update
