Thx Hal, nice article.
Well, I'll just say NO to an Experience-Based System that could be similar to Halo by translating Player Skills into a Number will never work well enough.
We shouldn't take Halo 2-3 like GODS, it's plenty of bad design decisions. Call of Duty 4 totally surpassed it. The Experience System is one of the WORST system that has been created to evaluate and reward players, and I can explain exactly why I wouldn't suggest it. Why? Each player does have his potential and his actual skills. Eventually he will get better, but everyone got his ''peak''. It's how life works and we won't change it right now unless we just get a wonderful life miracle. Consequences of using an Experience System? An action game isn't some kind of RPG game. A lot of players will already start as being very skilled players and it will allow them to break the fun of other new players.
IT IS THE BIGGEST COMPLAIN OF ALL TIME AND WHAT ACTUALLY BREAKS DOWN EVERY GAME USING AN EXPERIENCE SYSTEM.
''Dude, that game is crap! I'm a noob trying to enjoy my $50 game and each time I got freaking killed by crack addicts! WTF is that system?''
The other point is, yes it's true... experience can make you a better player. So yeah after playing the game for a few days or weeks you can get better, so maybe your Level 32 would makes sense. The bad point behind that is... if you are a good player and not playing more than one hour per day or week, it will take you a huge amount of time to get at a ''Level 32'', so basically that guy that bought the game for his challenge will definitely get screwed up for months.
Plus, with an ''Experience-based System'', those Level 32 guys... aren't all that skilled. A lot of them just played a lot and are just now Lv 32. There isn't any justice behind that System. Plus, we shouldn't forget that those players could just stop playing the game for two weeks and equal a Level 7 quickly.
Getting levels just doesn't work.
Another factor is that a lot of player do play alone without friends, but play Team Deathmatch. The problem is... they may face 4-5 other players that always play in Team. Call of Duty 4 made a Gametype to avoid that.
Mercenary Team Deathmatch (lonewolves) & Team Deathmatch.
I'm telling you that because I did play a lot of online Games using that kind of system, it doesn't work. Also because I played more than 10 000 games on Halo 2 (recorded on Bungie.net using various XBL accounts) including MLG pros and semi-pros, but at the top spend a lot of time in the Matchmaking.
Same goes for the first Gears of War, Rainbow Six Vegas 1 & 2 and Halo 3.
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The best would be to stick with a System that can evaluate the player skills after each matches, without giving him a free Level Gap. You can be awesome in one game and be totally bad in another game because you just didn't face the same type of opponent.
But there are two major options here, but the final idea is to get a system that can analyze the players [it may be in the game rules or the system itself].
FIRST OPTION
The Game itself may reward the player only in a Specific way. The Experience System would have to compensate by analyzing the players in another ways. Halo by example doesn't reward players for assist, they just note it in the Final Score. The Rank is only using the Final Score to build his opinion of what makes the players good so it is just FALSE on all the line, because it doesn't consider what makes them really good and do not consider that the other players that didn't get the greatest amount of kills could also be better players.
SECOND OPTION
If the Game does include the following Statistics at the end of a Match, then having an Experience System that just takes the final ''Skill Points'' [each action should give ''X'' amount of ''Skill Points''] from the players. Instead of using Levels, the System should only compare the Average Skill Points gained after a match on a daily basis.
So on the Leaderboards we should just see:
LEADERBOARDS
MarkRein - 6 860 pts
CliffyB - 6 850 pts
Tim - 6800 pts
Carmack - 777 pts
STATS THAT SHOULD BE CONSIDERED
You can't base a system only on that, because we may also consider that a lot of good players are using ''suppress fire'' or well placed grenade... not to kill... but to keep in a corner or force the movement of an opponent. So Accuracy is important, but should be the least of our concerns to define ''skills''.
Deaths aren't important here... what matters is the KILL/ DEATH ration rather the just the deaths.
Kills are adding Skill Points to a Deathmatch, but doesn't define that the kill totally remains to the player who did it. A kill is just... the final touch. That's why we got...
Assist is very important to consider. The best way to manage it would be to consider the % of damage done what could be better translated into team ''Skill Points''. The Assist is even more important then a KILL because it includes all the Health Points of a player except the final strike. Plus, you maybe never notice it, but a game that doesn't reward ''ASSISTS'' become dirty because it forces the players to STEAL the kills to get the Only Reward that would offer the ''Kills''. In other terms if you take Halo 2-3 as good examples... the Kills are all ''fake'', except maybe the headshot while using a Snipe.
- TEAMWORK - Revive Partners [using Gears of War 2 as the main example]
Each action that could be defined as being ''TEAMWORK'' must reward the players during a match and must also be consider when analyzing what makes a player Great. Also giving ''skill points''
NOTE: I don't remember if it is possible to ''deliver a partner'' from being hold as a human shield... but is must also be considered as being an act of Teamwork.
LEVELS AND GRADES
Halo 3 did have a good design decision that was adding Grades that defines exclusively the time spend on the game. That was totally one of the best decision to reward the time spend on the game. The other ones are to unlock stuff... or get free maps
?
Levels or Grades should not be taken into considerations of the Skill Points.
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HOWEVER...
Host is part of the consequences of using internet. It's there, I'm sorry, but we must deal with that. It's better to have a great Host [in terms of internet issues] than having a worst players have a worst internet connection.
A decision to change a system, because the game is using internet is like the idea to add Auto-Aim on a Console game because we do assume that because we are bad with thumbsticks makes the Thumbsticks less precise, what is a false statement due to inexperience and frustration. Thumbsticks are harder to master than a mouse VS keyboard, but it is exactly why it is so great to have a better gap between Rookies & Pros. Mouse & keyboards are so easy the the mass starts already very high in the Skill Ladder on any PC shooter games. At the opposite on Console, a game that doesn't use a complex health system and also have auto-aim will give the same result [Call of Duty 4]. Fortunately, the great amount of items, gametypes and weapons is what makes the game good.
The final words... we should just keep being careful before making HUGE Design Decisions. It may help to not throw our Games Industry down to hell for another 7 years...
CHEERS!!!
