Legacy Characters in a 10 Year Franchise

by Harmanimus , Tuesday, February 26, 2013, 11:37 (4291 days ago) @ Kitekiller

How should legacy characters be handled in this new 10 year, multi-game franchise?

It is an interesting discussion. My curiosity of it stems from whether or not it will feel like a multi-game franchise or not. Given the structure put forth of Mainline games broken up by large DLC content with potential opportunity for smaller DLC in the interim, will we ever see progression really stop? Each game might have its own isolated expansion content (allowing you to continue to play through the main story bulk of earlier games) to allow it to be played even after direct support has ended.

I think the mass effect comparison is pretty apt for ways to deal with it, but another that comes to mind is the pen-and-paper Warhammer 40k Roleplaying system. The first 3 corebooks in that actually step up the power level (as is appropriate to the universe) of characters you create.

Assuming that the game has a large amount of gameplay impacting customization, and that it functions on a linear level system allowing legacy characters across all games (say 50 levels per game, total with expansion content) then perhaps newly made characters for each game would start at 50, 100, and 150 respectively. That allows for an even footing for all characters, progression-wise, with the obvious opportunity for carry-over gear for legacy characters. This could also be handled with a 50 from Destiny being equal to a 1 from Destiny 2.

I will admit, this suggested option would come off very strange if the core gameplay is not based around player ability but more on character ability, depending on how transparent the combat and stats are. Though I don't expect that to be the case. Additionally, how much customization comes to new characters after each game if it fits modern skill-tree-style character building could be abysmally daunting come Destiny 4 if they choose the route of full customization of new characters.

I am very interested in seeing how they choose to handle this, especially given their underscoring of each player being their own, unique character. Carryover seems like it would be important. But escalation for the sake of escalation has a high probability of making things unenjoyably complex. Which is obviously not the Bungie way. Well, except when we talk about the depth of their stories.