Krissa Lox
Active Member
Blue Protocol: Star Resonance is a new "free-to-play with optional in-game purchases" PC+Mobile (Steam/Epic/Android/Apple) MMO that just launched a month ago, and seems for the most part like a cross between old school fantasy adventure mmo (vanilla WoW, Guild Wars 1, Everquest era) and Japanese anime. So pretty niche and probably more likely to attract older, more laid-back gamers rather than young or intense powergamers.
I've just been playing a few days myself so I'm nowhere near being an expert and there's still a lot I haven't yet seen, but so far it's been enjoyable and I thought would be worth mentioning here because in addition to the timing component of it often being a fun thing to get in on a new game right at launch, I also found it had some features that made it more family-friendly than most mmo's tend to be.
- Support classes seem pretty versatile, allowing effective shielding and healing of party while still also having some offensive capability to not just have to be healing or shielding during fights (important when playing with kids or other inexperienced gamers where you want to be able to keep them up and running but also still want to be part of the fights)
- Some real old-school push button combat mechanics, where you can do a lot of more complicated player-skill based stuff with timing and combos, but less experienced gamers in your group can still be a good contribution by just pushing buttons when they light up
- Lots of places with non-aggressive monsters, so you can farm and get stuff done in a variety of areas where you can safely go afk at any time if out-of-game events might suddenly require attention
- There is a slider bar for choosing how many other players you want to display in your gameworld which can go all the way down to 1, so even though it's an mmo, you don't have be subjected to other players' behavior or fashion choices
- There are three character slots per account, but each has their own individual user id, so you can use different character slots to friend different gaming groups, so you don't have to worry about boundary issues or being interrupted if you want to dedicate time and focus to certain groups at different times than others
- It seems like pretty classic fantasy adventure content, which might come across as a little generic to a veteran gamer but also doesn't seem to have much risk of awkward or inappropriate dialog or plot twists that would be embarrassing around other family members
So I thought those particular features made it worth mentioning here in case anyone else might be interested. If anyone knows of other games with similar family-friendly features, I'd be interested to hear about them as well. A lot of stuff produced these days seems like it's either just for adults or just for kids rather than encouraging group play between different age groups.
I've just been playing a few days myself so I'm nowhere near being an expert and there's still a lot I haven't yet seen, but so far it's been enjoyable and I thought would be worth mentioning here because in addition to the timing component of it often being a fun thing to get in on a new game right at launch, I also found it had some features that made it more family-friendly than most mmo's tend to be.
- Support classes seem pretty versatile, allowing effective shielding and healing of party while still also having some offensive capability to not just have to be healing or shielding during fights (important when playing with kids or other inexperienced gamers where you want to be able to keep them up and running but also still want to be part of the fights)
- Some real old-school push button combat mechanics, where you can do a lot of more complicated player-skill based stuff with timing and combos, but less experienced gamers in your group can still be a good contribution by just pushing buttons when they light up
- Lots of places with non-aggressive monsters, so you can farm and get stuff done in a variety of areas where you can safely go afk at any time if out-of-game events might suddenly require attention
- There is a slider bar for choosing how many other players you want to display in your gameworld which can go all the way down to 1, so even though it's an mmo, you don't have be subjected to other players' behavior or fashion choices
- There are three character slots per account, but each has their own individual user id, so you can use different character slots to friend different gaming groups, so you don't have to worry about boundary issues or being interrupted if you want to dedicate time and focus to certain groups at different times than others
- It seems like pretty classic fantasy adventure content, which might come across as a little generic to a veteran gamer but also doesn't seem to have much risk of awkward or inappropriate dialog or plot twists that would be embarrassing around other family members
So I thought those particular features made it worth mentioning here in case anyone else might be interested. If anyone knows of other games with similar family-friendly features, I'd be interested to hear about them as well. A lot of stuff produced these days seems like it's either just for adults or just for kids rather than encouraging group play between different age groups.