Scavengers is a new free-to-play multiplayer hardcore game with some serious face-punching action and hybrid gameplay (sandbox, PVE, PVP, etc). And while it might not seem so on the surface, it's something of a second cousin to Second Life. For one thing, it runs on Spatial OS, Improbable's platform for deploying massive single shard MMOs, and I'm told at least one of Improbable's top execs was a dedicated SLer back in the day.
Even more pertinent, a senior designer of Scavengers is Ben Batstone, a longtime Linden Lab veteran who got his start as a Second Life user known as Buhbuhcuh Fairchild. And he credits his work in SL for his design approach to Scavengers:
"I made my first shooter games in SL - those watermelon guns that griefers would use were using my scripts. Being able to iterate quickly and get instant community feedback was amazing as a novice designer.
"As far as what I am doing with [Scavenger developer] Midwinter, a lot of my efforts are around long term player engagement. I think I could view that very narrowly with a 'game designer' role: just game features, content and mechanics, but my time as a Linden made my belief that the stickiest content is other people, and the more we can get players interacting in positive ways, the more those players will return. So I'm pushing hard for driving social features and strong community programs, and trying to integrate that with gameplay. We're less than a week into Early Access so a lot of that is still in the foundational steps, but we've got some cool stuff on the way."
Their vision seems to be a game that makes a conceptual leap up hits like Fortnite and League of Legends, while incorporating virtual world-ish, persistent action:
"We're trying something kind of unique," as Ben puts it to me. "We're a single session game like a MOBA or Battle Royale, but we're trying to include gameplay progression. That means a brand new player might be put into a game against a veteran who has been grinding for 1000 hours.
"Usually progress in games is represented as power increase: Your ATK goes up so now you can hit harder. We're trying to avoid that, and instead progress by increasing the strategic options available to the player and their team.
"This is going to be a challenge to get right, and to communicate to players, but if we can do it justice, I think we'll have a really interesting game where you can feel progression but still be able to play with a friend who is just starting."
I first met Ben as BuhBuhCuh in SL, then hung out with him at various Linden Lab meetings and events. One time, for instance, he hosted an SL machinima festival, and bought out a whole Indian restaurant nearby, so every Linden could enjoy the videos over beer and curry. But hat was back when he was in his early 20s, and his gameplay approach has matured with him:
"I'm in a phase of my life right now where that is really appealing; I have 3 young kids and I struggle to find time to play with friends where progression matters.
"Or," he adds, after a long pause in our IM chat, "find time to answer questions for past colleagues it seems."
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