Noah's Heart is an MMO card fusion RPG mobile game featuring seamless Big World Squad adventures. In the game, players will embark on a mysterious virtual otherworldly adventure on an otherworldly planet with a realistic ecosystem.
Recently, we had the pleasure of interviewing Mr. Yufei, the producer of Noah's Heart. In the interview, he shared with us the design ideas of the game in the exploration, combat and other systems, and explained in detail the innovative design of the "card + MMO" gameplay, as well as expressing gratitude to the players who have been following the game.
Here are the details of this interview:
Q: We see that "Noah's Heart" integrates a "phantom system" similar to the card cultivation on the basis of the MMO gameplay, what innovative designs have been made in the combination of the gameplay of the two?
A: It's also the first time we've tried to incorporate card gameplay on the basis of MMORPG.
I think it may be that the pace of life in reality has changed, resulting in less and less interaction between people. In such a case, we want to use the "phantom system" as a basis, so that players and phantoms can combine with each other and venture together, which is also an attempt to replace the player with an illusion, so that all players can experience the fun of socialization as much as possible.
In terms of gameplay innovation, compared with the traditional MMORPG, we mainly abandon the traditional class setting and pay more attention to the "free combat" setting. In the game, there is no so-called class division, and the character positioning depends entirely on the weapon being equipped. The phantom has the ability to "possess", after which the player's character will gain the skills of the phantom. In this way, the weapons and phantoms are paired with each other, and the freedom of the battle system formed is very high.
Compared to traditional card games, we emphasize the strategic nature of the phantom team matching. The phantoms in the game have different class positions such as sages and rangers, in addition, the abilities of the phantoms themselves have elemental damage settings. When phantoms of different classes and attributes are combined into squads, the game Build is more extensible in terms of strategic dimensions, and can also bring players a more layered game experience.
Q: In addition to the combat aspect just mentioned, what kind of game experience do you want the Phantom System to bring to players?
A: In addition to combat, in other ways of playing, phantoms can also provide a lot of help to players. For example, in the game's home and life system, phantoms can be stationed to produce and obtain materials to help players grow. In general, the "phantom system" is a holistic experience, and we hope to make the player feel that the phantom is working, and we also hope to make the player feel that there is an interconnection between the phantom and the phantom in the game, and the two are closely bound.
Q: Nowadays, "punching in to work" is an inherent negative impression of traditional MMO gameplay, as a game that integrates MMO gameplay with card cultivation, how does Noah's Heart avoid this? Or how does the game tear down the player's labeled impression of traditional MMO gameplay?
A: We have been doing MMO for a long time, and we also want to avoid such a situation from many aspects to alleviate the pressure of players in terms of time, consumption and social interaction.
From the perspective of gameplay, we still adhere to the basic design concept of gameplay in the fine, and combine card cultivation to provide players with enough depth of gameplay, and try to make each gameplay have a stronger replay. On the other hand, there is the innovation at the social level, although we have retained the social function but try to avoid forcing players to experience social. For example, all the gameplay in the game can be experienced by one player, and players will not be forced to team up. Secondly, the union play is also relatively mild, and it is not emphasized that players are online at the same time.
Q: In the RPG mobile game that needs to extract characters, the character design more or less affects the player's "desire" to obtain the character, for this, is there any "special way" for the game to show the character settings of the phantoms?
A: On the "Phantom System", what we want to convey is to shape the phantom so that players can really love the phantom. Therefore, we have made a lot of efforts in the aspects of phantom standing painting, modeling, dubbing, etc., such as inviting well-known painters to create standing paintings, or asking professional voice actors such as Natsuki Hanae to give voice to the phantom, hoping to make the phantom plump from the appearance.
Internally, since the setting of the game is based on the destruction of the real world and then crosses to the tone of the salvation of the other world, the phantoms in the game are elites who have made some contribution to the world today in the long river of human history. For example, some phantoms will appear as a well-known identity to the public, but because of the other world, they will bring about different changes in human design. After learning about these phantoms through the background story, players will also feel the surprise of digging easter eggs.
In short, we hope to make the phantoms more vivid and warm, from the stand-up drawing to the model, to the dubbing, to the backstory, to the interaction with the player, to show the different personalities of the phantoms in a rich and all-round way.
Q: There is often a casual player in the MMO who retires in the game, so is there a suitable game mode for this kind of player "Noah's Heart"?
A: As mentioned in the introduction of the phantom just now, we hope that the phantom can help the player to do something. For example, the tedious and time-consuming things such as brushing copies and collecting materials can be easily solved by entrusting the phantom directly.
In addition, "Noah's Heart" also has some life-oriented leisure gameplay that is biased towards exploration and cultivation. In short, casual users can also have a very refreshing game experience in the game.
Q: "Otherworld Adventure" has been a relatively diversified subject in the field of RPGs, and it has been constantly evolving over the years and has produced many excellent works. Where do you think this kind of game appeals to players? How did Noah's Heart give it a whole new lease of life?
A: Many players, including ourselves, have a dream of a warrior slaying a dragon and saving a princess, but in reality there is no chance to realize such a dream, but "Otherworld" just shapes such a world that satisfies people's dreams. And I think the game has a strong immersive atmosphere that can make the dreams pursued by players seem more realistic. Like the "Otherworld Adventure" itself, because it has a lot of fantasy space, players can imagine different lives in it, so this means that it has a very big attraction.
In Noah's Heart, we're more about immersing players in other worlds from a realistic perspective. For example, the "Noah's Planet" in the game is completely built on the basis of the Earth. At the same time, we have also designed a day and night, weather change system to restore the real ecology of the earth, as far as possible in the virtual other world atmosphere to create, can have some differences from other games.
Q: Just now you also mentioned the characteristics of "realistic planet", how is this reflected in the actual gameplay process?
A: First of all, "Noah's Planet" has an ecosystem that a real planet should have, including basic topography such as deserts, rainforest volcanoes, and mountainous hills. On this basis, we matched the corresponding animal communities, such as the player encountering wandering wolves when they were in the grassland, seeing the ostrich running in the desert, and so on.
Secondly, we have designed a lot of content in the game for players to interact with the big world, such as players can feel the day and night rotation, weather changes and brilliant aurora in the world, or take trains, ferries and other means of transport, across the continent or the ocean, bring their friends to go on adventures.
In addition to these most basic interactions, the player also has some more realistic and open interactions with the creatures in it. For example, when you destroy the grass, the insects hiding in it will scatter as they do in reality.
In addition to ecological fiction, the game also contains a variety of humanistic cultures similar to those arising from geographical differences in reality. Throughout the planet Noah, we have designed eight different civilizations and tribes, all of whom have their own cultural heritage, as well as different religions and beliefs in the gods. In addition, we will also present a colorful other world in front of the player's eyes through gameplay such as regional missions.
Q: As far as we know, Noah's Heart is your first foray into open-world games, can you tell us a little bit about your understanding of the concept of "open world"?
A: Before I started doing Noah's Heart, I played a lot of open-world games. Zelda: Breath of the Wild, for example, is an open experience for players by creating rules. Products like RollIng Five, it is by building an open world on the plot, bringing players a sense of immersion in the overall world. And the Ubisoft-style open world, it is more about arranging some content to be explored in the scene in advance.
In fact, the open world proposition is still a bit big, in my opinion, compared with the traditional world, the open world may be more diverse, players can choose different ways to achieve the goal of adventure. Second, the development world will be richer than the traditional experience. For players, in the open world, the game content experienced by each player in the same world is different.
Q: So what kind of novel experience do you think the "spherical seamless map" in the world of Noah's Heart will bring to players?
A: What we first considered was how to convey the concept of "big" to users, and after careful discussion, we finally felt that the concept of "planet" could meet everyone's design needs. We think players will experience a richer amount of things on a map without borders. For example, if you imagine being able to travel around the planet for a week in a game like you did on a real Earth until you return to your origin, it's actually a novelty.
At the end of the day, we want to bring a more realistic and immersive world to everyone in the game.
Q: At present, the "Strange Fate Test" of "Noah's Heart" has been underway for some time, do you have a specific evaluation of this test?
A: First of all, thank you very much to the players who came to this test. We do feel the enthusiasm of the players, who have given us some valuable comments and suggestions after experiencing the game. At the same time, they also helped us find some of the problems that were missed when there were fewer internal testers, so we are still very grateful to the vast number of users who participated in the test.
Now that the test has just been conducted for a week, it has been going very smoothly so far, the server is quite stable, and no interruption problems have been found. So far, the overall data is very good, if there are no other accidents, we should soon meet the majority of players officially.
Q: From the players' mouths, we know that "Noah's Heart" still has some problems that need to be improved or perfected in this test, can you reveal the direction of the game's next focus.
A: First of all, in terms of combat, we will further improve the feel of the character operation. The second is to refine the concept of "Phantom Squad", in the test, the player's feedback on the Phantom system is also very positive. We'll also be enhancing the skill fit between phantom characters in recent releases, providing players with a richer choice in build-ups.
The third point we hope to find a better balance between performance and graphics, because the open world is more stringent for the performance requirements of mobile phones, and these tests are not allowed to reduce the effect of some screens in order to meet the experience needs of some players.
The fourth point is that we need to enrich the form of the big world exploration game and continue to improve the fun of big world exploration. Finally, we will make some adjustments to some unreasonable settings that players care about, such as the probability of equipment drops, the way to obtain phantoms, etc., to try to meet the needs of players. We also hope that under the continuous and long-term operation, "Noah's Heart" can let players have a sense of purpose to continue to experience.
Q: Finally, would you like to disclose noah's official online arrangements, and do you have anything to say about the majority of players who have been looking forward to the launch of the game?
A: Thank you to the players who participated in the "Noah's Heart" test before or not, thank you for your attention, all the students in our project team are looking forward to the product can meet you as quickly as possible. You are also welcome to experience "Noah's Heart" after the game is officially launched, to fight with the phantoms in the game or with your friends, and start your adventure in another world.