Carmack Considers Cell Phone MMOG 78
fistfullast33l writes "John Carmack's new cell phone game Orcs and Elves, which debuted at E3 to some fanfare, has led the famous developer to think about expanding his mobile gaming presence. Carmack said in an interview with CNN that he is interested in a massively multiplayer sequel. 'I have absolutely no interest in going and competing with Blizzard in the high end of that market, but a cell phone version might be interesting,' Carmack is quoted as saying. Even more interesting is his comment in the interview that game engines really overlook security. The article indirectly quotes him as saying 'while id Software is especially careful to lock down its game engines, companies that license and make changes to those engines often aren't as focused, which could open the door to disaster.'"
Data Cost? (Score:5, Interesting)
A cell phone MMO is great and all but what about the cost of data?
Last time I checked it cost a small fortune per KB. I know you can get unlimited bandwith for a price, but that would be a price ontop of the monthly subscription price...Re:Data Cost? (Score:2, Interesting)
Hmm, one world many systems? (Score:5, Interesting)
Would you like to mash a few cell phone buttons to craft yourself something nifty for your return home?
How about an opportunity to influence factors that aren't controllable through the PC, like beasts or items? For example, play a beast vs. beast minigame against other cell phone users, and the winner will recieve more power or loot in the PC world or something like that.
As an alternative input device, the cell phone has some interesting possibilities. If you consider cell phones equipped with GPS, you could conceivably have a very interesting dynamic to the gameplay based on actual location. I see many possibilities for making this a fun gaming tool rather than the minesweeper handheld it is today.
Re:Data Cost? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Is is any good? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Hmm, one world many systems? (Score:3, Interesting)
But along a related line, I've played with a GPS unit with some built in games, and one of them was basically a maze that you navigated through by actually walking around. So your specific location on the earth didn't matter, but your position relative to where you were when you started the game was what mattered. It was kind of fun for a few minutes. But really only because of the novelty of it. Although there was a very specific and unique relationship between what was displayed on the screen, and what you were experiencing in reality, there were also a lot of significant differences. (IE, the maze would happily lead you into a street full of traffic if you weren't paying attention).
But that's not to say that phones can't be a really unique platform.