Filed under: Sci-fi, Bugs, New titles, Opinion, Star Wars: The Old Republic, Hyperspace Beacon
Recently,
Ilum took center stage in an argument about exploits, and I honestly cannot say which side of the fence I'm on. When do the intentions of the designers take precedent over the players taking advantage of poor design? Well before
Star Wars: The Old Republic even crossed the mind of
BioWare's creative brain-trust, exploiters have been taking advantage of unintentional game design. Even more interesting about the situation with Ilum was that the design was not exactly flawed; instead, players did not respond to the designs the way the developers intended. The game was "working as intended," but the players weren't.
At what point do we blame the designers? In a game as large as
SWTOR, we know that if someone is allowed to do something, he will. At the same time, players are
lazy efficient when playing the game: They will find the fastest and easiest way to level or gear up despite the intended path. Designers should know this. I remember in
Ultima Online when players would raise skills by poking each other with low-level swords for hours on end. I am sure the designers intended that players would earn skills by actually battling each other, but the simplest solution was to prod one another with a dull stick. I honestly don't know if that was ever fixed, but I certainly don't remember a GM tossing out a ban hammer for it.
Continue reading Hyperspace Beacon: Cheating vs. poor design
Hyperspace Beacon: Cheating vs. poor design originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 10 Jan 2012 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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