AddOns are an important part of many MMOs, including Carbine’s SF-MMO WildStar. But what if an AddOn threatens to cause trouble?
Carbine was prepared for players to completely distort the interface
In an interview with mmorpg.com, Lead Client Engineer Jon Wiesman explained his view on AddOns. Under the former president Jeremy Gaffney, it was made clear early on that the community would be allowed to experiment massively with AddOns and completely change the look of their interface. WildStar aimed to go further than other MMOs. These usually place great value on maintaining their “framework” and allow fewer changes to the user interface.
Wiesman had already explained to the colleagues before the release that screenshots or videos from players who had completely remodeled their interface would likely come soon. Viewers would scream: “Oh my God, is this what WildStar looks like?” But that was okay with him. He wanted to enjoy this chaos and these craziness.
Klepto AddOn led to a shift in thinking at WildStar
In the beta, there was a particularly creative case of “weird AddOn.” A player named Scelestic designed an AddOn that allegedly allowed players to view other characters like in World of Warcraft.
However, what the AddOn actually did was: as soon as a player was near a mailbox, it emptied his pockets and sent everything to Scelestic. He didn’t do this with bad intentions, but out of pure curiosity. The developers also chuckled about this creative use of criminal energy. But of course, something like that should never go live. This klepto AddOn ultimately led to the introduction of some restrictions on AddOns.
Slowly filling bars, security checks, certain limits, or tool-tips that clearly state what something actually does – all of this is owed to WildStar players because of that one klepto AddOn.
Frost is to blame again
The only thing Wiesman regrets at the moment is that he has not yet been able to write as many documentation, tutorials, and videos as he originally planned to help the community create and modify AddOns. That was all originally intended, but then Stephan Frost’s dev-speak videos became so popular that they opted to focus media resources on that instead.
Mein MMO says: Especially in WildStar, the “AddOn” friendliness of the MMO also leads to difficulties. For instance, one AddOn allows players to bypass “puzzle” mini-games, another indicates more clearly where the weapon that was thrown out of hand lies, and others are so strong that they have almost become mandatory for players who want to push their character to the limits and fear disadvantages without them. This forces players to use certain AddOns even if they would rather not.
Currently, there is again trouble in WildStar because of an AddOn. In PvP, one is circulating that automatically marks healers on the head, so everyone can see from a kilometer away who should be the first to fall. The AddOn was once disabled and has started working again recently. An extreme case where the enjoyment of the game for the user comes at the expense of other players. While the puzzle AddOn only devalues certain titles that only puzzle experts with the reaction speed of a hummingbird on a Red Bull diet could achieve, this “I kill healers” AddOn is significantly more annoying.
There have been similar AddOns in other games that negatively affected the gaming experience of others. The one in WoW was aptly named “Healers have to die”.
In this article Cortyn presents her favorite WildStar AddOns our topic page.
