Content Destruction/Alteration: Good or Bad?

[irongamer]

With the release of World of Warcraft: Cataclysm on the horizon, I want to discuss content destruction/alteration in MMORPGs, which has been going on since the genre began.

First of all, what I mean by "content destruction/alteration" is when static content within a game, such as quests, items, or even entire zones, are either removed from the game or vastly altered. I am not talking about mere balance changes, but closer to complete overhauls. This is what Cataclysm is doing for WoW, with many of the game's areas being changed completely, never to be the same again. This has happened with other games, like EverQuest II's newbie experience (it was totally changed twice now that I know of).

• Old content can never be experienced again, so new players cannot ever go through it.
• Loss of the nostalgia from visiting the old content.
• Resources could be applied to purely new content, which adds more to the game as a whole.
• Loss of items/titles/rewards that were unique to the old content.

I was not able to come up with as many negatives, but I think some of these are quite powerful.

I interrupt these negatives a bit differently I guess.

Old content can never be experienced again, so new players cannot ever go through it.
I'll give you that one.

On a more physiological note...if they didn't know about the content in the first place (they are new) does this really affect them? Or is just projection on the new player by those that have completed the content?

Loss of the nostalgia from visiting the old content.
I can see this, although I do like the idea of visiting a location and remember what it used to be like. If you don't ever leave I can never miss you.

Resources could be applied to purely new content, which adds more to the game as a whole.
True, I think a lot of people that play these game would rather have that. I lean more toward seeing the world change, I've played enough static worlds.

Loss of items/titles/rewards that were unique to the old content.
I would think that characters already with those things would keep them. However, if you like to complete everything with all of your characters this could cause some serious hair pulling.

[Grickes]

I like the idea of retooling old zones.Its something I always thought EQ could benefit from considering alot of the old zones were ghost towns.I loved being able to revisit them with an alt but I think it would have been better to retool them into higher level zones so they got more traffic.

[Nightscar]

I like the idea of redoing old content as long as it's within the context of the storyline and plausible, not just a major change with nothing behind it.

- I think it DOES add to the lore and depth of a game that older players will have experiences to share that can't be just blown through with a high lvl char or twinking, adds to the sense of how it was. Newer players will then get the feeling of the new things they are doing NOW will eventually be gone and then THEY will have experiences to share.

- A major change to a place can possibly be accompanied by 'state shifting'. So lets say a town in todays game is different, well have newer character go through some sort of quest line where they can see the city of old but it gets changed by events? This may be difficult to do but would be worthwhile.

- In short I hope that Rift is a very dynamic world, and yes while 'add content, not take it away' is viable its only half viable, as the changes they make are adding content. Sure maybe all their guys could go towards completely new things but 90% of a world being dead doesn't exactly appeal. And I'm sure with a AAA MMO they will (hopefully) be in the position to keep going on both.

[AyameArai]

I don't mind redoing of old content provided that the reason for doing so goes beyond simply removing content from one bracket and putting it in another. But for example, I wouldn't mind at all if some content is altered to match the situation there further ahead in the timeline than the original version, or if some zone which is neglected by players (due to poor quality/no fun factor/etc.) is revamped for the better.

[Hanlo]

Why I like the revamp of old zones is because, like mentioned before, you don't get ghost zones. Sure the content is lost, but there's new stuff there and newer players will never know. On a side note, I think there should be a zone in Rift called the Wasteland. This is the spot in Telara where the ward is the weakest and many invasions occur. Every few months, a new plane pushes hard and takes over the zone, giving it a unique look and new quests according to which party took it over.

[Thalan]

I'd just like to see more in the way of dynamic stuff to keep old areas fresh, as opposed to redesigning them. It may be a slight technological leap, but I want to see trees/plants that grow and then die with time (slowing changing the landscape automatically). A crafter might be able to plant/harvest things on their own also, like having your own garden. With dynamic weather, maybe it doesn't rain in zone A for 2 months and all the plants start to wilt. Also, player built/destroyed things like houses, roads, bridges, etc is always a plus for dynamics. Oh, and snow accumulation in winter months, floods in the summer, etc, with their own impacts on the land and npcs.

Yeah I'm dreaming, but if you really want a dynamic MMO this is the direction to be thinking, IMO :P