What would you have done differently?

[Seer]

I'll preface this by saying that this isn't a wishlist, or even a claim that I (or anyone else) would have done a better job at designing the basics of this game. Post what you would have done differently in the early stages of game design that now, for budgetary or technological reasons, are impossible. Some of these items are things I have problems with in the present implementation of PS, others are just things that, while satisfactory now, I would have tried to do differently.

Vehicle constraints

One thing that always frustrated me about vehicles was the extreme simplicity of their weapons systems. While I hesitate to use the modern world as a template, vehicle mounted weapons these days exhibit extreme sophistication in terms of targetting and range. The critical weakness of Planetside vehicles has never been about armor, or speed, or even the less than desirable physics. In my opinion, this weakness has always been their inability to identify or engage any target at standoff range.

The devs wanted to keep everything 'up close and personal'--and while its an impulse I respect, I think the game is shallower because of it. Tanks must be literally on top of you to kill you, bombers are restricted to an extremely low flight ceiling. The devs always focused on the frustration players feel at being killed by things they can't see. They don't see the other side of this frustration--the rush of adrenaline a player feels upon successfully countering it.

In other words, when designing vehicles the devs didn't want to make them too mean, or else players would get frustrated and quit. In single player FPS games you're offered a difficulty switch at the beginning, and the devs unequivocally decided to set it to easy. I don't know if it would have moved more product, but I would have set it to hard, or at least medium. Give tanks and snipers a standoff range as far as their clip plane. Double the flight ceiling and make aa somewhat effective beyond visual range.

Day and Night

I would have included a night cycle. You don't need lighting effects from splinter cell to make a convincing night time--everquest did it in 1998. It would add another dimension to the game.

Tracers

This falls under the heading of Planetside being designed as an easy game. No one really has to worry about identifying snipers here because, in addition to the helpful directional damage indicator, you get a bright red line tracing the snipers back to their location. I'm not a sniper, but I would consider removing these tracers. They verge on insulting.

Bases and Terrain

They said they'd change these if they could, so I won't belabor this point. The bases are evidence that the art direction in Planetside was among the least inspired art direction ever seen from SOE. I don't see why they couldn't shoot for the same variety and quality that defined Everquest. If they thought it was expensive, they should have thought in terms of how much money they'd stand to lose by pushing such an artistically boring game as they ended up doing. The terrain feels randomly generated and the bases are some of the most cookie cutter constructions I've ever seen.

Also, they included far too many bases and continents. As a matter of basic game construction, I would have halved the number of continents. If it meant I needed more servers in the end, that's fine, because the servers would be less expensive. This also would have enabled them to breath a little life into the maps and bases they had by making less of them. Bigger is not better, and the idea that you need 10 sizable continents is one that continues to fail this game to the day. Effectively defending the amount of terrain in the game today is like using one of those tiny butter packets they give you at restaurants for two slices of break.

Infantry

The game would be extraordinarily lethal to the infantryman when he was outdoors and on foot. This would be his weakest posture. However, I would have made sure the terrain and base design facilitated the thoughtful infantryman. At bases he would find powerful defensive emplacements that take more to neutralize than a guy hiding behind a tree with a phoenix, or even a tank. Over land he would have trees and would be able to pass over terrain that was impassable by vehicles. No more walking around as an infantryman only to be stymied by a 50 degree embankment.

Terrain would be tougher on vehicles, for the most part. The trees would be impenetrable, the mountains unscalable. Infantry would be able to slip through these elements without even asking nicely. Roads would matter, and ground vehicles would move faster over them. Only tracked or hover vehicles would be able to move effectively over certain surfaces, such as snow or sand. Others would slow to a crawl or bog down entirely.

Air

Combat air vehicles (reaver, skeeter, lib, anything else) would have fuel--they would not be able to stay out long without going back and filling up. Their fuel limitations would be appropriate to the pace of the planetside world. Midair refuelings with the loadstar? Sure, why not. I mentioned earlier that I'd have doubled the flight ceiling and revamped aa. I'm not sure what I would do with air vehicles, but in my mind they would be both powerful and fragile. While I don't think the idea of a reaver rising from the trees and decimating a tank is a bad one, I do find the idea of hitting one with a decimator or two and having it fly off like nothing happened to be really silly. It's toasted in that case, but it should have an advantage on me of sufficient value that it shouldn't be hovering 3 feet above my head and firing a bunch of rockets at me.

I'd give them a better flight envelope, one that included being able to do a full roll. Hopefully between that and the flight ceiling, fragility wouldn't be as big an issue.

Sanctuaries

If an empire loses all of its bases in the world, it deserves to be attacked. War is hard. If a faction loses their sanc, the world resets to neutral--game and match. A little window pops up, like in normal multiplayer FPS games, giving the vital stats for the round. Fight harder next time, wankers!

Conclusion

I guess I've always thought that PS was a little too shallow. The bases are merely edifaces, the terrain is simply there (except for Ceryshen), the vehicles are powerful but in all the wrong ways. Nobody in this game can be very proud of their technical prowess, because everything is so excruciatingly simple. Would it have killed them to introduce a little more simulation at the expense of the arcade?

Other elements of the game are inexplicably there to shield players from frustration. Where were you guys when I was getting bind-camped in everquest by aggressive monsters many times my levels. Where was the babying during the total wipeouts in the Plane of Hate? Truth be told the massive frustrations of playing everquest were easily eclipsed by the exhilaration the players felt on achieving their goals, or making a plan work. Planetside took the middle road. It doesn't frustrate people, but its pleasures are equally small. What it offers is only adrenaline.