2004 Web and Downloadable Games White Paper 

IGDA Online Games SIG 

different  abilities  in  order  to  solve  numerous  challenges.  This  would  emphasize  the  concept  of 

 parties  in the main game. 

Because of the nature of online gaming, the game design needed to be kept simple in terms of 

control  and  complexity  in  order  to  stir  the  interest  of  the  casual  browser  without  scaring  them 

away. You also have to contend with a huge range of different machine specs, and so trying to 

create something with as broad an appeal as possible can be a challenge. To reach the low end 

range  of  machines  we  decided  to  focus  the  design  away  from  anything  too  arcade like  and 

instead onto something more cerebral. 

The game design is influenced by block games such as 

Sokoban

 and especially 

Catrap

 on the 

Game Boy. These games are perfect examples of how a few simple rules can create incredibly 

complex puzzles. They are very easy to pick up initially but provide a great deal of depth   perfect 

for a web game. Elements of these games were combined with elements from other teamwork 

centric games (such as swapping between characters) to create the game design used on the 

site  now.  Initial  versions  featured  more  character  types  with  different  abilities,  increasing  the 

number  of  rules  in  the  game,  but  in  order to make the game more accessible, these were cut 

down to a minimum. 

In  order  to  recreate  the  open ended  nature  of  the  PS2  game,  the  natural  solution  was  to  give 

people  the  ability  to  contribute  to  the  site  itself.  While  we  could  have  regularly  produced  new 

levels  for  the  web  game,  it  would  have  been  time  consuming  for  us,  and  by  empowering  the 

users of the site with a decent level editor, the potential for new content was much greater. Plus 

with a wider audience you are guaranteed to get people creating levels and puzzles in ways you 

never would have thought about yourself if you are close to the project during its evolution.  

EQOA  on  the  PS2  has  a  large  emphasis  on  community.  Your  social  standing  and  the  level  of 

power  and  strength  you  have  place  you  in  a  natural  ranking  system.  In  order  to  showcase 

people's abilities within the site, we added the census, allowing you to see how far you are from 

the top, and browse the real champions of the site as well as playing their quests. The scoring 

structure took a lot of consideration to make fair, and in the end it comprised three elements: The 

popularity  of  the  quests  you  create,  your  total  score on all the other quests available, and your 

score on the predefined (legendary) quests. This also meant that in order to stay at the top of the 

census you had to continually play all the quests on the site, which tied in nicely with the same 

notion in 

EverQuest

 of needing to play the game frequently to stay on top. 

Translating the PS2 Game Art Direction to the Online Game Engine 

The assets within the game engine were driven by the assets used in the PS2 version. We were 

fortunate enough to be able to request assets from the game's developers. As a result we were 

able to obtain textured Maya models for the different character types within the game as well as a 

number of environment models and textures. 

At  one  stage  we  were  going  to  have  the  players  represented  as  static   pieces   on  a  playing 

board, to abstract the game so that it felt more like you were playing chess, and take it away from 

representing a realistic environment. It can be dangerous trying to recreate assets from within the 

game as they can look like poor imitations and hence represent the artwork poorly. If you do not 

have assets available, it's much better to try and produce stylized versions of the original graphics 

rather  than  exact  duplicates.  With  access  to  the  original  assets,  however,  we  felt  comfortable 

translating them to the web. 

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