The League of Legends design draft that Chen Mo was working on could be divided into four parts.
The first part was the core fun and basic rules of the game.
The second part was the map and game mechanism.
The third part was the hero setting.
The fourth part was the summoner-related settings and other things.
MOBA games were actually very simple to create. They just had to fight on a map, unlike RPG and adventure games that required many levels.
However, MOBA games were very complex in terms of game mechanics and balance. From its appearance to its popularity, the game mechanics were constantly improved, finally making MOBA games the most popular PC game type in the world.
Chen Mo’s design draft was as follows.
In terms of game mechanics, there were four game modes: human-machine, matchmaking, ranking, and chaotic battle.
Players must go through beginner’s lessons and upgrade to Level 3 through the AI training before they can enter the matching mode.
As for the ranking competition, players had to have at least four heroes with proficient proficiency to participate.
There was a friend and merchant system. In the friend system, one could watch other players fight, while the merchant system allowed one to buy various skins and other value-added services.
In terms of Summoner-related settings, players could check their game records, ranks, hero list, talents, Summoner skills, equipment, and other game content.
The ranking was designed in a classic way, from bronze to King.
In the hero list, every hero had the concept of “proficiency”. Only when the proficiency reached a certain level could they be used for ranking.
In his current plan, proficiency was divided into six levels, namely apprentice, beginner, master, expert, master, and Grandmaster.
When players played in different modes, the proficiency of the current hero would be increased as a restriction.
Only the Champions with beginner proficiency could be used for matchmaking, and only those with master proficiency could be used for ranking matches. As for the experts, Masters, and grandmasters … They were only there to show off.
In terms of Summoner skills, they were still the more commonly used ones: sprint, heal, barrier, weaken, teleport, flash, purify, ignite, and smite. In a chaotic battle, there would be a marking (snowball) and a clarity spell.
The equipment was relatively more complicated. He would slowly research it during the development process. However, he would have some more classic equipment such as a hat, an Ice Staff, a hourglass, and so on. He could also consider adding back the underworld fire that he had lost.
In terms of the map, it still used the classic Summoner’s Rift, but it still followed the map mechanism of S6, including various explosive fruits, divination fruits, Elemental Dragons, and so on.
These new map mechanisms would make the entire map more diverse and add a lot of random fun, allowing players to speed up the game while fighting for map resources.
At the same time, Chen Mo considered slightly reducing the effects of wards in the game, including raising the price of wards, reducing the duration of wards, increasing the benefits of wards, and increasing items like the fog of trickery.
Due to the fixed strategies in League of Legends and the importance of vision, vision suppression made the game very boring in high-end games and professional competitions. It made the game lose its spirit to a certain extent, and it was almost impossible for the unorthodox to win again.
What Chen Mo wanted was more new strategies and more dramatic effects, not some team building a long dynasty with mechanical training.
And most importantly, Chen Mo wouldn’t make the heroes according to the original order in League of Legends, but would adjust the order according to his own needs.
Chen Mo planned to create around twenty-five heroes in the first patch, with a new one every two weeks. This was to keep the players fresh, and at the same time, it was a step-by-step process, so that they wouldn’t be completely dumbfounded by the number of heroes they’d come across.
……
After finishing the design document, Chen Mo called everyone for a meeting.
After a brief introduction of League of Legends, most of them understood Chen Mo’s design.
After all, with the two game prototypes of Chenghai 3c and COG, everyone could roughly imagine the final state of League of Legends after it was completed. They only had some doubts about the popularity and profitability of the game.
Qian Kun asked,”uh, manager, this game is completely free. It doesn’t sell any combat power. Even the heroes are given for free. Can the profits be supported by the skins alone?”
The others also had the same question.
Most of them knew about Chenghai 3c and COG, but they were still Warcraft maps and had no profit.
How to turn it into a complete game wasn’t just a problem for the gas, but also for the creators of Chen Mo’s team.
According to the traditional way of making games, the best way would be to buy out and add in the value of the game, so that the game would be delayed for a while. At least, they could earn back the production cost through sales, just like when they released Warcraft.
It was a risky move to pay for the skins. What if there were not enough players and they did not buy the skins?
Chen Mo explained,”regarding that, everyone needs to understand the goal of League of Legends.” It’s different from Warcraft, as Warcraft is made for RTS players, which is a small group of players, so we can only make money from sales. ”
“But League of Legends is different. This is a completely new game, and its goal is all the players. ”
Everyone was shocked. All the players?
Wasn’t this a little too exaggerated?
Does that mean that by then, whether it’s RPG or FPS players, they’ll all like League of Legends?
Everyone was in disbelief.
Of course, out of respect for their boss and their love for the bonus, everyone put on an expression that said,”yes, yes, yes, you’re right.”
Chen Zhao smiled and didn’t mind.
Indeed, when MOBA games first appeared, only a few people could see the potential behind them. Even some high-quality game designers in big companies didn’t have a proper understanding of their prospects.
Otherwise, the ice frog and Blizzard wouldn’t have parted ways.
Chen Mo didn’t want to say too much about the future development of League of Legends. After all, the time wasn’t right yet. Saying too much would be like bragging and making Chicken Soup for the Soul. There was no need to do so.
Only poor bosses would do that. Chen Zhao could totally buy the loyalty and passion of all his employees with money.
Chen Mo looked at everyone,’if there’s no more questions, let’s get to work. The research and development period for the first version is three months. We have to make the first version of League of Legends before the Spring Festival, including the completion of all 25 heroes. ”