I have kind of mentioned local universes before and I wanted to see what everyone was looking forward to when it came to the local universes. For me, the one true only super huge item I love about them is if they give us the ability to make our own MMO universe much like the one we have now. If we have that ability it would totally allow us to keep the game alive on our own versus having reliance on Wonderstruck and their servers.
My worries are this may splinter off the community some as a few have already said they would play more single-player. I also feel people would tweak these servers in some ways that would totally change the game. Some tweaking is great like fueling portals to allow more fuel in them would be greatā¦ but changing too much to me would break the experience I love.
What are you looking forward to and worry about from the local universes when implemented?
I am here for MMO experience.
But there are a lot of people that would try local ones (maybe even myself), not as replacement of MMO but additional mode of play.
More importantly if local gameplay can make more people buy the game (namely players who want to play local only), then itās good overall, as it will fund Boundless for all of us to play it nay way we want it.
Players who initially buy Boundless for local play only, can eventually try MMO anyway or they might make their friends to buy too and they might be into MMO.
So, I see it as a good direction and positive change.
@boundmore I donāt think I ever considered it a bad thing as it could introduce new players to the game. If it were me and this was my project, Iād be doing a huge marketing push when and if 249 comes to fruition.
To me that could introduce a lot of new players to the game much like you mentioned. I am also here for the MMO experience, but totally understand that some people prefer solo play.
Honestly when local universe is released. That is where I am going to. BUT I wonāt have it as āLocalā onlyā¦I will do a dedicated host for a few planets to have a few friends stop by.
Iām looking forward to being able to actually play in my own custom worlds with my own instances, biomes, etc. I also plan to essentially have an admin shop that should allow for coins to actually still be useful but im making oort only 1c so that there can be lots of exploration and easy portals for access across the universe
Yea this is what I was sort of concerned about that would take you and your friends away from the MMO ā¦ and the MMO side is already suffering. I suppose that doesnāt mean you wonāt still play the MMO though I suppose.
Local in your case would just mimic what you have in CV.
I like the idea of your own custom worlds, instances and biomes but having an admin shop and 5 people on the server the economy wonāt be too exciting and malls will become non-existent. Granted you could have 50 people on the server maybe (not sure of the limitations) and that would give you the economy and the ability for malls and shops to actually work.
Do you think having oort at 1c would allow for millions of portals everywhere? Especially with say 25-30 people on a server.
Edit: In the instance of no economy it reminds a bit of Minecraft in a way where I ran a few vanilla servers and while they did have 30-40 people on them it never offered what Boundless did when it came to economy and the whole MMO immersion. Modded Minecraft allowed for some of that to happen but not as elegantly as Boundless has.
I think a lot people playing locally would create local universe to play with some friends and not alone as pure single player mode.
Nevertheless all those local universes will count as opposite to MMO as whoever play this way is not available for MMO at the same time, so when considering impact that local universes might have on global MMO population, it doesnāt really matter whether a locally playing person plays alone or with a group of friends
Iām not saying it to dismiss your post @ardele, and itās not a direct response to you. I am just using your post to point out that everyone going 100% local is simply not available for MMO. Thus for a discussion about how players will split between the 2 modes the actual number of people using a single local universe is irrelevant (they all have to be counted as local mode users and not a part of MMO population).
In general all active Boundless owners will split into 3 main groups, I guess:
MMO universe players
local universes players
players sharing their time between the two.
To imagine/predict the effect of local mode on population of the globally shared MMO universe, we would have to create a poll that would need a lot of participants to even get close to an idea how the players will split between the 3 groups.
Letās say 500 users currently playing Boundless take part in such a poll, and 200 land in both MMO and local modes, while 100 state they will share their time between the two.
That would mean you could count post-local-universe-introduction MMO population of Boundless as 250, which is a significant decrease of course (although hypothetical - it can be better or worse than that)
Introduction of local universes will deplete MMO universe for sure, at least short term. After that we will have to wait and see how much more people buy Boundless and how many new users join MMO.
Or how many players initially excited about the local mode and leaving the global universe, start going back to MMO.
My guess is local universes wonāt be chosen as a preferred mode for its player economy feature.
People will want to play locally when they are focused on different aspects of game and donāt want to be bothered by unpredictable random players and/or grind and such.
Those who enjoy player based economy and other interesting aspects of playing within a larger community will either stay in MMO or play both MMO and local modes.
This was always my concern. I mean in my eyes ā¦ think that making the game have a single player mode would help out the MMO, but in my eyes if the game hasnāt sold that well with the MMO I canāt imagine it will sell much better just by adding local universes.
I used to be the opposite when it came to sandbox games as I always wanted my own personal server and really Boundless was one of the few games to actually change that for me. The main benefit for me with other games was there was a lot of PVP and griefing in other games that were just annoying or uncontrollable, but with my own server say in 7 Days to Die I could just invite my friends and because we didnāt do PVP only PVE we didnāt have to worry about someone randomly shooting us and taking stuff.
As a fan of playing MMOs I look at Boundless losing so much on a local server unless it has 50 or so people. You would have a lack of planets, a lack of economy, a lack of exploration and numerous other things you would lose or lack in the translation. Of course without trying it out totally I suppose this is all just speculation.
They should have focused on the MMO, that is the unique thing about Boundless. I personally think its a waste of time pushing the Local Universes (I also donāt like sovereign planets either). Boundless isnāt unique because its a survival game. Nor is it unique because its a building game. Its unique because its a Survival Building MMO, they had/have something really special but neglected the MMO aspect in my opinion
You are not wrong but as a miner who would LOVE to go after lucent gems but between ALL of the real life events going on.
Wedding Planning
Fianceeās work schedule and her not being able to drive
Timezone difference in when Lucents go live vs when I can play
Fianceeās familyās needy attention schedule
My own family to get around toā¦
I canāt play for 20+ hours anymore and by the time I can get around to playing at 8:30 eastern and afterā¦The lucent planets released 8-10 hours prior are swiss cheese and not worth it for me to fight over the leftovers
The MMO aspect for going for the best has been a challenge for me. So me focusing on gathering Metals/Ores/Coal/gems is at the point where its no longer fun. Shops are not buying as much material and I have to run around 2+ hours to different shops just to make some coin. Going local for me is going to suite me just fine.
I totally understand. Having a full-time job, married and 2 kids along with a side job doing websites has made my game time a challenge Working from home has helped with that some but I do find myself AFK a bit more than Iād like.
I know it is too late, but I would have been more than happy to mine lucents for you and would have done that for free knowing how it was hard for you. I donāt go for the lucents as much anymore mainly because they arenāt very useful for me other than for decorative blocks.
I hate to lose more people from the MMO, but Iād be happy to visit locals from time to time ā¦ just dont feel like I can split much time between a local and the main universe. We shall seeā¦
I was interested in Boundless because it reminded me of the other open world voxel games that I loved to play (Cv, PK, MC, Tr, etc). I initially didnāt care much about the MMO part and tried to avoid it. In most games, even MMORPGs, I generally played solo. However, I almost instantly fell in love with the whole Boundless/Oort thing and the MMO aspect. It actually ruined the other games for me. It made them all seem like they were missing something that only Boundless had.
With that said, James has mentioned privately hosted planets for quite some time. For at least 2 years before the official release. Some OG players/backers have been waiting for this feature. Boundless has also recād a lot of flack on Steam for not offering the ability for players to host private/local worlds. A lot of people said they wonāt buy Boundless without it. Private/local worlds also appeal to parents of younger children, for numerous reasons.
If you look at other games, some private server iterations have flourished and become quite popular. Roblox has/had a popular mining game/server & that was the only reason I played it. Hypixel was nothing but a popular custom/private MC server and look at it now. MC isnāt an MMO, but some of the private servers are. Players did that. It could happen here too.
For these reasons, I donāt see any problem with BL fulfilling their initial vision by adding the ability for players to host worlds on private servers. James has always wanted players to be able to play in as many ways as they want to. This is part of that. The sandbox.
In response to this @majorvex I totally agree with you. I am not saying I donāt want the local universes Iām just very torn and mostly in the same boat as you. Having played many games solo at times like WoW my 2nd playthrough and running various servers for nearly every sandbox/survival games that I played it makes me concerned as the Boundless is the first game I can say I donāt really care to run my own server unless ā¦ that offers me the ability to connect it to a bigger universe or the ability to create our own MMO as a community.
Adding private servers will allow Boundless to flourish, but in what way will remain to be seen. From this post alone I can see a few people already leaning towards their own server. That is not a big negative in my eyes as it allows more choices and could bring a wider audience, but with that the main MMO universe will suffer.
I honestly hope that the MMO and the main universe remain popular, but the main argument I am always given is that the more people playing single player means more carryover into the main MMO and I feel that may not be the case. As I mentioned I donāt see the game sales picking up that much with just the addition of local universes ā¦ I say that because many new people will not have had the pleasure we have all had in knowing how the MMO really is having been in it this long.
I think that is why I was apprehensive in trying to try Boundless (even though it was gifted) as the first thing I looked for before playing it was if I could run it locallyā¦ as that is all I have ever done in many games like this. I am glad that was there as I probably would have never tried it or even looked at the forums.
I remain torn, but hopeful the game deserves a lot more than what it has gotten so far as does this community.
I really tried to get a local universe portal just like we have the creative portalā¦ but I fear we might only be stuck with a menu system. Maybe if others push for it we can have a more integrated game feel to locals instead of loosing emersion to press a menu button. Plus I feel it really helps show who has what ā¦
If it canāt be done via portals, maybe it could be done via their website or in-game menu UI? Maybe you can favorite private planets, select one from the UI, and travel to them in the way you can travel home.
I assume the world abilities/rules/economies on private servers will be vastly different from those on Known Worlds. I think most players are used to this concept though. If you go to a different server, you have a different character, abilities, items, home, rules, etc.
Iām sure the devs have already considered how these worlds will or wonāt connect to what we have now. Iām curious what theyāve decided.
@Redlotus I donāt know if players that have private servers will join the main MMO. It might help, it might not. If someone isnāt playing because they donāt want to be part of the current MMO, thereās no way to force them to like it or participate in it. I do think those players might be more apt to stream/post about their fun shenanigans, massive builds, etc on their servers. That might help spread awareness of the game. Maybe not, I dunno.
The thing with these popular private servers on games like Minecraft and Roblox is that they that games were firmly situated before these things flourished. Iām not saying tassels like local universes and private worlds donāt have a place in Boundless, just that they were WAY down on the priority list in many peoples eyes.
They may have recād a lot of flack about the inability to play privately, but Iām sure theyāve received flack for a lot of things, like all games have. Such as the trailer including a bunch of things that arenāt in the game. Being able to play solo like minecraft or cv, isnāt gonna bring in new people, unless Boundless offers something those games do not, or people get fed up with them (which I canāt see happening), so focusing on the MMO will be that niche people will want to explore, not just āanother building/survival gameā.
