ID:151810
 
In your opinion, is there anything wrong with having NPCs live up to the same standards as a player character in a persistent RP world? In other words, should they be required to eat, drink, and sleep -- quite like the players they emulate?
It makes it seem like the NPCs have a life of their own, and more to do than just sit around waiting for the player(s). It makes the setting seem more alive.
Will make game to seem more popular, as more mobs will be moving, and it will look like big, populated city/world. Also it will be fair when NPCs will have same restrictions in combat and other stuff as players. As in some games I saw poorly programmed AI which kept attacking after it's dead - FailCoder
If it can be programmed well, then yes. If you're going to try to do something like high-functioning AI then be sure you don't half-ass it.
It might be kind of hard for NPCs to participate in a game economy the same way players do. And on top of that, what happens when these NPCs die? Will new NPCs "immigrate" into the game world?
In response to D4RK3 54B3R
I don't see how having them participate in a game economy the same way players do is a problem as long as they do it on a small scale.

But the death is what scares me. Having life-like NPCs means enabling death for NPCs and I've thought deeply about this... and yet still I'm at a loss for how to handle it efficiently. If someone irreplacable dies, like a shopkeeper, or bartender, do you think I should make their place go up for sale?
In response to ManDroid13
There can always be a secret cloning conspiracy ;)
In response to Jeff8500
Not in the setting of this RPG world. =p
In response to ManDroid13
In that case, what if they have relatives? Bartender Bob may have a cousin named Joe who may have a sister named Jill who may have a cousin named Jack who may know a guy whose brother's girlfriend's cousin owns a bar and wishes to expand.
In response to Jeff8500
I think I may just go with my idea a few posts back. Should they die their business will get closed down...
The more elaborate the NPC AI in a RPG-style game, the more computer power that will be required to operate each AI. The more computer power required, the slower the game will run. Plus people won't want to host for you because your game eats up all their computer power and they'd have to have a dedicated computer for it.

In the end, I doubt it ads much more to the gaming experience than what could be gained by just having the NPCs wander around, maybe pretend to buy stuff once in a while, and close their shops at night.
In response to ManDroid13
ManDroid13 wrote:
If someone irreplaceable dies, like a shopkeeper, or bartender, do you think I should make their place go up for sale?

Replace death with incapacitation and have them be down-and-out for a few days until they recover. Same goes for players, if that's what you're after. I'm assuming you were considering having permadeath, otherwise this isn't an issue. If players die and respawn somewhere, so would NPCs.
In response to Foomer
You don't find it at all immersive when NPCs operate under the same conditions as player characters?
In response to ManDroid13
ManDroid13 wrote:
You don't find it at all immersive when NPCs operate under the same conditions as player characters?

If all I, as a player, am interested in, is getting what I want from the NPCs, then what difference does it make to me what the NPCs are doing while I'm not around? It might be interesting to have them move around if they're not attached to a particular shop, such as a traveling adventurer who goes from inn to inn and will give you hints about where you can find interesting things in the world. But it doesn't matter to me whether the NPC has actually been to those places or not.
In response to Foomer
This.

Also, I'd say NPC AIs that wander around doing stuff in an attempt at being "immersive" just does not work. A good example of this is Oblivion, apparently NPCs in it would eat, sleep and so on. I did not notice this unless I was looking for an NPC, at which point it became annoying because I could not find the NPC I was looking for, or they were in bed, which meant I had to wait for them to wake up.
It got annoying, fast. And it added absolutely nothing to the game.
In response to Foomer
Foomer wrote:
The more computer power required, the slower the game will run.

The biggest bottleneck I've found with BYOND games is always the bandwidth. Until its using so much computer power that its slowed to the same degree as it is limited by bandwidth its unlikely you'd notice any difference.

~Ease~
In response to The Magic Man
The Magic Man wrote:
This.

Also, I'd say NPC AIs that wander around doing stuff in an attempt at being "immersive" just does not work. A good example of this is Oblivion, apparently NPCs in it would eat, sleep and so on. I did not notice this unless I was looking for an NPC, at which point it became annoying because I could not find the NPC I was looking for, or they were in bed, which meant I had to wait for them to wake up.
It got annoying, fast. And it added absolutely nothing to the game.

The key thing here is going back to fundamental game design principles:

Don't add a feature just to have it. Add it if it serves a purpose. Immersion is not a purpose in and of itself, immersion is a consequence of atmosphere and other things working together.

If key NPCs (such as shop keepers) are moving from their usual spots, then finding NPCs becomes a part of the gameplay. That might be what you want, it might not. But under no circumstance should you fool yourself into thinking that likening a game to reality will provide immersion.
In response to ManDroid13
ManDroid13 wrote:
I think I may just go with my idea a few posts back. Should they die their business will get closed down...

I think you have to be careful with what lengths you go to for "realism"; my wanting to buy a +7 axe shouldn't be scavenger hunt for the nearest shopkeep that's still alive. To make this kind of system work nicely, you'd have to keep a somewhat static amount of irreplaceable NPCs about and have the rest keep the player in the loop about deaths and openings of new, similar businesses somehow. In the end though, you're still operating on a different version of the NPC cloning conspiracy, since letting every innkeeper on the continent die and never be replaced is simply cruel as a gameplay element and would certainly make me stop playing.
In response to The Magic Man
That, I think, is just an opinion. That made Oblivion for me. It adds another state of realism to the game. I also loved Fable for that same reason.
In response to Bakasensei
I agree. Having people actually wandering around living their daily lives (and actually behaving similarly to people! or even your player character, for that matter) feels much more natural and improves immersion, instead of having everyone always stay fixed in the same spot all day (and year) like statues, which, of course, clearly makes no sense as you're led to believe they're people, not statues.
Naturally, one may come to dislike such a feature because he doesn't like the determent of not being able to find a person in the exact same space every time, but you can easily take it as an added gameplay feature <small>(which the developer could also expand)</small> and appreciate the extra challenge, as Alathon said.
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