instance (plural instances) 1. A happening or occurring; an occurrence; an occasion. This has happened in three instances. 2. A case occurring; a case offered as an exemplification or a precedent; an example; a token. It was the only instance in which a direct copy, even to matters of detail, appeared to have been made. 3. (obsolete) A piece of evidence; proof.
4. (computing) In object-oriented programming: a created object, one that has had memory allocated for local data storage; an instantiation of a class
An instance is nothing more than a closed off section of a program for memory reduction. Eve sectors of space are instances broken down into the same shard or server. It is broken down this way to reduce memory allocation and strain on a server. 0.0 - 1.0 sectors of space are all instances of the shard the entire populous eve play on. Just stop typing Ras please.
In MMORPGs, and object oriented programming, and instance is an replica of another INSTANCE with a set of variables that can change. In programming those are called instance variables, in MMORPGs that can be anything from the players to the mobs inside. However, in both cases, they are fundamentally the same. A zone in Eve is NOT like that, they are fundamentally different (security settings, what missions there are, what asteroid fields there are, what space stations and so on).
That isn't entirely correct. An object is an instance of a class, which is just a blue-print for making objects. The data in an object can make it completely different from another object of the same type. Just take your "Eve sector" example. Couldn't I have a "Sector" object that has variables called "Security setting", "Missions", "Asteroid fields", and "Space stations"? Every object created would be an instance of the "Sector" class, but the data inside would make it completely different than other instances of the class.
Tried: LotR, CoH, AoC, WAR, Jumpgate Classic Played: SWG, Guild Wars, WoW Playing: Eve Online, Counter-strike Loved: Star Wars Galaxies Waiting for: Earthrise, Guild Wars 2, anything sandbox.
I forgot to respond to the OP, yes I feel that Guild Wars is under rated. Just look at this thread, it has devolved into an inane argument about the definition of an mmo.
Exactly, and I for one am tired of doing it.
Ras has been wrong in every post he has made, even trying to point out to others the definitions to things he doesn't know the answer to himself.
Trying to tell me I don't know what an Instance is. I do that shit for a living. I know the definition of Instance in the computing world and it isn't a WoW dungeon.
Sigh, just let him go on for 20 more pages of retarded bullshit all he wants.
He doesn't know what an MMO is, He doesn't even know the difference between Counterstrike an FPS and Guild Wars an RPG and then tries to tell someone they do not know what an instance is, when he himself doesn't know what an instance is.
I for one am just tired of looking at the special ed text he types.
But anyway, yes op guild wars is under-rated and a very good MMORPG!!!!
Later guys, time for me to head home from work.
You know what? I do that shit for a living myself. C++ programmer here.
He meant zones. Who cares? WoW has instances too. Not an MMO? AoC is all instanced, must not be an MMO either. If it has instances it isn't an MMO everyone! It's been officially decided by the ruler of what things shall be, Rasputin. All hail.
It's not semantics, it is common sense. By your definition any game that has a public social hub for connecting people to start multiplayer sessions would be MMORPGs, because that is all GW is. There is no instanced world but rather tons of multiplayer sessions tied together by social hubs.
Warcraft 2 had that with BNET. So is that an MMORPG?
No, because Warcraft 2 was an RTS, not an RPG.
Anyways, Warcraft 2 had a completely graphical social hub? I really don't know, nor honestly care.
I underlined the important parts of your post. Tons, meaning massive... Multiplayer... Online sessions tied together. Sounds like an MMO to me.
The discussion is not about the RPG part but rather about the MMO part. Warcraft 2 would then be a MMORTS, which it was not. And yes, BNet was a graphical hub, not as pretty as GWs, but still a graphical hub.
Also the sessions in GW are NOT tied together, they are run completely independant of each other and the only things that are persistant are your characters and their equipment. So they are persistant but NOT the world itself and hence that makes it fail at beeing an MMORPG.
Exactly.
Modern FPS'es like Battlefield2 has that kind of character persistance, but you would never call that an MMO.
GW simply can't be called an MMO in any shape or form - 3D lobby does not an MMO make.
He meant zones. Who cares? WoW has instances too. Not an MMO? AoC is all instanced, must not be an MMO either. If it has instances it isn't an MMO everyone! It's been officially decided by the ruler of what things shall be, Rasputin. All hail.
It's not semantics, it is common sense. By your definition any game that has a public social hub for connecting people to start multiplayer sessions would be MMORPGs, because that is all GW is. There is no instanced world but rather tons of multiplayer sessions tied together by social hubs.
Warcraft 2 had that with BNET. So is that an MMORPG?
No, because Warcraft 2 was an RTS, not an RPG.
Anyways, Warcraft 2 had a completely graphical social hub? I really don't know, nor honestly care.
I underlined the important parts of your post. Tons, meaning massive... Multiplayer... Online sessions tied together. Sounds like an MMO to me.
The discussion is not about the RPG part but rather about the MMO part. Warcraft 2 would then be a MMORTS, which it was not. And yes, BNet was a graphical hub, not as pretty as GWs, but still a graphical hub.
Also the sessions in GW are NOT tied together, they are run completely independant of each other and the only things that are persistant are your characters and their equipment. So they are persistant but NOT the world itself and hence that makes it fail at beeing an MMORPG.
Again I ask, where is it defined that an MMORPG must have a persistant world? It isn't. It must have a world, which GW does, but it doesn't have to be persistant. Just looking at the name, it needs to be massive, multi-player, online, and an RPG. The only term in question is the massive. Where is the "Massively" in the title MMORPG rigidly defined? It isn't. Guild Wars having Massive amounts of people on a single shard makes it massive. Guild Wars having 3 fairly large continents make it massive. Persistance is no where in the definition of massive.
Tried: LotR, CoH, AoC, WAR, Jumpgate Classic Played: SWG, Guild Wars, WoW Playing: Eve Online, Counter-strike Loved: Star Wars Galaxies Waiting for: Earthrise, Guild Wars 2, anything sandbox.
instance (plural instances) 1. A happening or occurring; an occurrence; an occasion. This has happened in three instances. 2. A case occurring; a case offered as an exemplification or a precedent; an example; a token. It was the only instance in which a direct copy, even to matters of detail, appeared to have been made. 3. (obsolete) A piece of evidence; proof.
4. (computing) In object-oriented programming: a created object, one that has had memory allocated for local data storage; an instantiation of a class
An instance is nothing more than a closed off section of a program for memory reduction. Eve sectors of space are instances broken down into the same shard or server. It is broken down this way to reduce memory allocation and strain on a server. 0.0 - 1.0 sectors of space are all instances of the shard the entire populous eve play on. Just stop typing Ras please.
In MMORPGs, and object oriented programming, and instance is an replica of another INSTANCE with a set of variables that can change. In programming those are called instance variables, in MMORPGs that can be anything from the players to the mobs inside. However, in both cases, they are fundamentally the same. A zone in Eve is NOT like that, they are fundamentally different (security settings, what missions there are, what asteroid fields there are, what space stations and so on).
That isn't entirely correct. An object is an instance of a class, which is just a blue-print for making objects. The data in an object can make it completely different from another object of the same type. Just take your "Eve sector" example. Couldn't I have a "Sector" object that has variables called "Security setting", "Missions", "Asteroid fields", and "Space stations"? Every object created would be an instance of the "Sector" class, but the data inside would make it completely different than other instances of the class.
Could you please stop with pushing the programming definition of instancing onto the Gaming definition?
It should be basic knowledge what instancing is in gaming terms. Anyone who doesn't know that, doesn't belong in this discussion - they should go educate themselves first.
That isn't entirely correct. An object is an instance of a class, which is just a blue-print for making objects. The data in an object can make it completely different from another object of the same type. Just take your "Eve sector" example. Couldn't I have a "Sector" object that has variables called "Security setting", "Missions", "Asteroid fields", and "Space stations"? Every object created would be an instance of the "Sector" class, but the data inside would make it completely different than other instances of the class.
Which part is not correct? As you pointed out, the blueprint (class) is the same and the only thing that is different are the variables. The constants of an instance are those that do not change, like the location of space stations (which do change in Eve) but do NOT change in instances such as WoW or GW.
Furthermore this is a comparison that does not hold true when translating to MMORPGs. In MMORPGs an instance is an EXACT replica of another and the only differences are the players and mobs inside.
Also instances are short lived, they get created and destroyed (as I previously mentioned) where as a sector in Eve has never got destroyed to this date and only created ONCE. This is again similar to instances in OO programming (unless they are Singletons, which again shows that they cannot be freely translated from MMORPGs to OO programming).
But if you truly believe that an instance, in MMORPG therms, is the same as a zone then you are completely misstaken. There are fundamental differences, most important being that zones are persistant, where as instances are not (for any given server).
He meant zones. Who cares? WoW has instances too. Not an MMO? AoC is all instanced, must not be an MMO either. If it has instances it isn't an MMO everyone! It's been officially decided by the ruler of what things shall be, Rasputin. All hail.
It's not semantics, it is common sense. By your definition any game that has a public social hub for connecting people to start multiplayer sessions would be MMORPGs, because that is all GW is. There is no instanced world but rather tons of multiplayer sessions tied together by social hubs.
Warcraft 2 had that with BNET. So is that an MMORPG?
No, because Warcraft 2 was an RTS, not an RPG.
Anyways, Warcraft 2 had a completely graphical social hub? I really don't know, nor honestly care.
I underlined the important parts of your post. Tons, meaning massive... Multiplayer... Online sessions tied together. Sounds like an MMO to me.
The discussion is not about the RPG part but rather about the MMO part. Warcraft 2 would then be a MMORTS, which it was not. And yes, BNet was a graphical hub, not as pretty as GWs, but still a graphical hub.
Also the sessions in GW are NOT tied together, they are run completely independant of each other and the only things that are persistant are your characters and their equipment. So they are persistant but NOT the world itself and hence that makes it fail at beeing an MMORPG.
Again I ask, where is it defined that an MMORPG must have a persistant world? It isn't. It must have a world, which GW does, but it doesn't have to be persistant. Just looking at the name, it needs to be massive, multi-player, online, and an RPG. The only term in question is the massive. Where is the "Massively" in the title MMORPG rigidly defined? It isn't. Guild Wars having Massive amounts of people on a single shard makes it massive. Guild Wars having 3 fairly large continents make it massive. Persistance is no where in the definition of massive.
16v16 is not massive and you know that.
If you talk about massive in the lobby, then there is alot of other games that you would not usually think of as MMOs, that needs adding to this site. CS and BF2 comes to mind.
instance (plural instances) 1. A happening or occurring; an occurrence; an occasion. This has happened in three instances. 2. A case occurring; a case offered as an exemplification or a precedent; an example; a token. It was the only instance in which a direct copy, even to matters of detail, appeared to have been made. 3. (obsolete) A piece of evidence; proof.
4. (computing) In object-oriented programming: a created object, one that has had memory allocated for local data storage; an instantiation of a class
An instance is nothing more than a closed off section of a program for memory reduction. Eve sectors of space are instances broken down into the same shard or server. It is broken down this way to reduce memory allocation and strain on a server. 0.0 - 1.0 sectors of space are all instances of the shard the entire populous eve play on. Just stop typing Ras please.
In MMORPGs, and object oriented programming, and instance is an replica of another INSTANCE with a set of variables that can change. In programming those are called instance variables, in MMORPGs that can be anything from the players to the mobs inside. However, in both cases, they are fundamentally the same. A zone in Eve is NOT like that, they are fundamentally different (security settings, what missions there are, what asteroid fields there are, what space stations and so on).
That isn't entirely correct. An object is an instance of a class, which is just a blue-print for making objects. The data in an object can make it completely different from another object of the same type. Just take your "Eve sector" example. Couldn't I have a "Sector" object that has variables called "Security setting", "Missions", "Asteroid fields", and "Space stations"? Every object created would be an instance of the "Sector" class, but the data inside would make it completely different than other instances of the class.
Could you please stop with pushing the programming definition of instancing onto the Gaming definition?
It should be basic knowledge what instancing is in gaming terms. Anyone who doesn't know that, doesn't belong in this discussion - they should go educate themselves first.
I wasn't even talking about games, I was just correcting the fallacies in his post.
Tried: LotR, CoH, AoC, WAR, Jumpgate Classic Played: SWG, Guild Wars, WoW Playing: Eve Online, Counter-strike Loved: Star Wars Galaxies Waiting for: Earthrise, Guild Wars 2, anything sandbox.
I forgot to respond to the OP, yes I feel that Guild Wars is under rated. Just look at this thread, it has devolved into an inane argument about the definition of an mmo.
Exactly, and I for one am tired of doing it.
Ras has been wrong in every post he has made, even trying to point out to others the definitions to things he doesn't know the answer to himself.
Trying to tell me I don't know what an Instance is. I do that shit for a living. I know the definition of Instance in the computing world and it isn't a WoW dungeon.
Sigh, just let him go on for 20 more pages of retarded bullshit all he wants.
He doesn't know what an MMO is, He doesn't even know the difference between Counterstrike an FPS and Guild Wars an RPG and then tries to tell someone they do not know what an instance is, when he himself doesn't know what an instance is.
I for one am just tired of looking at the special ed text he types.
But anyway, yes op guild wars is under-rated and a very good MMORPG!!!!
Later guys, time for me to head home from work.
You know what? I do that shit for a living myself. C++ programmer here.
And if you do not know what I am talking about, I am trying to figure out what crazy ass company hired you. Must be on the verge of going bankrupt by now.
An instance CAN be a copy of something OR it can be a sector subdivided into a larger section of storage.
A " ZONE" is nothing more than a gamer term for an "INSTANCE" that was passed down ages ago like leet and noob.
ZONE refers to a section on a map.
INSTANCE in the programming sense is ANY SUBSECTION of the MAIN DATA STORAGE.
Example.
EvE Universe, meaning the ENTIRE MAP OF EVE. Is the MAIN DATA STORAGE. Think of it as your main database.
Each section of space inside of said database is a smaller closed off section of space. Think of it as a database INSIDE a database.
DATABASE MAIN - EVE SPACE
| | | | | |
Sub1 Sub2 Sub3 Sub4 Sub5 Sub6 (Instances)
0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0
Anyway it really doesn't matter, like you and one other guys are the only ones not considering it an MMO. Who cares really.
EDIT - I do know this, If I went into my bosses office before I left, and said "Sir, I am going to go create some new zones on the data server...." I would be looking for a new job tomorrow.
"MMOGs create a persistent universe where the game continues playing regardless of whether or not anyone else is."
GW does not have a persistent world. Any part of the world can die at a given point in time. The cities, the adventuring areas, all. At one point or another, they will die - even when other instances of the areas do survive. The only persistance whatsoever to GW is the character. And if that is enough to qualify it to be an MMO, then we need alot of standard multiplayer games added.
""Most MMOGs also share other characteristics that make them different from other multiplayer online games. MMOGs host a large number of players in a single game world, and all of those players can interact with each other at any given time. Popular MMOGs might have thousands of players online at any given time, ...".
The players in GW CANNOT interact with each other at any given time. If an instance is full, you cannot enter, if your arch enemy is in there, and you want to kill him. You cannot just traverse the world, and happen upon any other player. You have to make an explicit appointment with someone to meet him in the same instance.
The GW system is completely fragmented, only held together by the cities, that have little other function than a standard lobby. This, IMO, disqualifies it from being an MMO.
Nice try at discrediting GW, but the fact is... It does continue to play even when you aren't there. 1) Other players are in the towns, doing events, leveing up. 2) Even if instances "die" off the towns will always be there and have events going on ect. 3) You can still talk with other players in an instance which is a form of interaction. There is the pvt chat as well as the guild and alliance.
I forgot to respond to the OP, yes I feel that Guild Wars is under rated. Just look at this thread, it has devolved into an inane argument about the definition of an mmo.
Exactly, and I for one am tired of doing it.
Ras has been wrong in every post he has made, even trying to point out to others the definitions to things he doesn't know the answer to himself.
Trying to tell me I don't know what an Instance is. I do that shit for a living. I know the definition of Instance in the computing world and it isn't a WoW dungeon.
Sigh, just let him go on for 20 more pages of retarded bullshit all he wants.
He doesn't know what an MMO is, He doesn't even know the difference between Counterstrike an FPS and Guild Wars an RPG and then tries to tell someone they do not know what an instance is, when he himself doesn't know what an instance is.
I for one am just tired of looking at the special ed text he types.
But anyway, yes op guild wars is under-rated and a very good MMORPG!!!!
Later guys, time for me to head home from work.
You know what? I do that shit for a living myself. C++ programmer here.
And if you do not know what I am talking about, I am trying to figure out what crazy ass company hired you. Must be on the verge of going bankrupt by now.
An instance CAN be a copy of something OR it can be a sector subdivided into a larger section of storage.
A " ZONE" is nothing more than a gamer term for an "INSTANCE" that was passed down ages ago like leet and noob.
ZONE refers to a section on a map.
INSTANCE in the programming sense is ANY SUBSECTION of the MAIN DATA STORAGE.
Example.
EvE Universe, meaning the ENTIRE MAP OF EVE. Is the MAIN DATA STORAGE. Think of it as your main database.
Each section of space inside of said database is a smaller closed off section of space. Think of it as a database INSIDE a database.
DATABASE MAIN - EVE SPACE
| | | | | |
Sub1 Sub2 Sub3 Sub4 Sub5 Sub6 (Instances)
0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0
Anyway it really doesn't matter, like you and one other guys are the only ones not considering it an MMO. Who cares really.
I think you are just twisting things to fit your argument. An instance in MMORPG is like a normal instance in OO programming, a zone in MMORPGs is a a special kind of instance called a Singleton instance which there can only exist one instance of.
A zone can never be destroyed and only created once. An instance can be destroyed and created infinite number of times.
A zone has a much higher limit of people that can access it (virtuall making it unrestricted) an instance has a low fixed number of people that can access it and are often private for a small group.
So instance and zones are definetely not the same, in MMORPGs, and that is not debatable, that is a fact.
However GW being an MMORPG or not is debatable and based on my definition and how original MMORPGs were designed (such as UO, EQ etc) it is not. Why? Only max 16 people (or something like that) can simultaneously interact with each other (towns do not count since all you can do there is chat). In traditional MMORPGs that number is well over 100 with some games like DF, boasting several houndred.
The majority of the world in most MMORPGs are persistant, only a small percentage of the area in GW are persistant, the rest are private instances. Which makes most of GW instanced and private. Two things that I find defining for MMORPGs (persistant and non-private).
Nice try at discrediting GW, but the fact is... It does continue to play even when you aren't there. 1) Other players are in the towns, doing events, leveing up. 2) Even if instances "die" off the towns will always be there and have events going on ect. 3) You can still talk with other players in an instance which is a form of interaction. There is the pvt chat as well as the guild and alliance. Nice try though.
Im not trying to discredit GW. Not at all. It is no better or worse than so many other games.
All I want is to properly label it. What is wrong with that? Does GW suddenly become a worse game because it is not labeled an MMO? Does the label make the game?
Nice try at discrediting GW, but the fact is... It does continue to play even when you aren't there. 1) Other players are in the towns, doing events, leveing up. 2) Even if instances "die" off the towns will always be there and have events going on ect. 3) You can still talk with other players in an instance which is a form of interaction. There is the pvt chat as well as the guild and alliance. Nice try though.
So does BNET and CS chat servers. So they are MMOs aswell?
Of the several online games I've played -- WoW, GW, LotRO, EQ2, TR, and CoX (plus a couple of others that I absolutely hated) -- I would have to say that GW was far and away the best of the lot.
--I loved the use of instancing --I loved the story progression/story missions --I loved the graphics --I loved (loved, loved!) the option to use henchmen/heroes --I loved the lore --I loved the map travel --I loved the writing and quests (some of the content was unbelievably humorous) --I loved the creativity shown by GW's designers --I loved that getting a set of "uber" matched armor was accessible to everyone
Unfortunately, there has been nothing new in GW for quite some time, and I've done just about everything I can do in that game.
So I am playing WoW now, and it's, well, OK. But I do keep hoping someone will make another game like Guild Wars. Sadly, even Guild Wars 2 does not sound like it'll be much like Guild Wars 1, but, hopefully, it'll still be fun to play.
Any MMO that lets me play virtually all of the content with either other players OR on my own with NPCs is a total win, in my opinion.
I forgot to respond to the OP, yes I feel that Guild Wars is under rated. Just look at this thread, it has devolved into an inane argument about the definition of an mmo.
Exactly, and I for one am tired of doing it.
Ras has been wrong in every post he has made, even trying to point out to others the definitions to things he doesn't know the answer to himself.
Trying to tell me I don't know what an Instance is. I do that shit for a living. I know the definition of Instance in the computing world and it isn't a WoW dungeon.
Sigh, just let him go on for 20 more pages of retarded bullshit all he wants.
He doesn't know what an MMO is, He doesn't even know the difference between Counterstrike an FPS and Guild Wars an RPG and then tries to tell someone they do not know what an instance is, when he himself doesn't know what an instance is.
I for one am just tired of looking at the special ed text he types.
But anyway, yes op guild wars is under-rated and a very good MMORPG!!!!
Later guys, time for me to head home from work.
You know what? I do that shit for a living myself. C++ programmer here.
And if you do not know what I am talking about, I am trying to figure out what crazy ass company hired you. Must be on the verge of going bankrupt by now.
An instance CAN be a copy of something OR it can be a sector subdivided into a larger section of storage.
A " ZONE" is nothing more than a gamer term for an "INSTANCE" that was passed down ages ago like leet and noob.
ZONE refers to a section on a map.
INSTANCE in the programming sense is ANY SUBSECTION of the MAIN DATA STORAGE.
Example.
EvE Universe, meaning the ENTIRE MAP OF EVE. Is the MAIN DATA STORAGE. Think of it as your main database.
Each section of space inside of said database is a smaller closed off section of space. Think of it as a database INSIDE a database.
DATABASE MAIN - EVE SPACE
| | | | | |
Sub1 Sub2 Sub3 Sub4 Sub5 Sub6 (Instances)
0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0
Anyway it really doesn't matter, like you and one other guys are the only ones not considering it an MMO. Who cares really.
I think you are just twisting things to fit your argument. An instance in MMORPG is like a normal instance in OO programming, a zone in MMORPGs is a a special kind of instance called a Singleton instance which there can only exist one instance of.
A zone can never be destroyed and only created once. An instance can be destroyed and created infinite number of times.
A zone has a much higher limit of people that can access it (virtuall making it unrestricted) an instance has a low fixed number of people that can access it and are often private for a small group.
So instance and zones are definetely not the same, in MMORPGs, and that is not debatable, that is a fact.
However GW being an MMORPG or not is debatable and based on my definition and how original MMORPGs were designed (such as UO, EQ etc) it is not. Why? Only max 16 people (or something like that) can simultaneously interact with each other (towns do not count since all you can do there is chat). In traditional MMORPGs that number is well over 100 with some games like DF, boasting several houndred.
The majority of the world in most MMORPGs are persistant, only a small percentage of the area in GW are persistant, the rest are private instances. Which makes most of GW instanced and private. Two things that I find defining for MMORPGs (persistant and non-private).
Yamota, it is not worth it. The definitions are different, we can't compare the definition of Game Instances with Programming Instances.
He is just trying to drag you to his field of expertise and in a silly attempt beat you with a programming term that happens to have the same name.
Any MMO player worth his salt knows exactly what an instance is in gaming terms.
Im not trying to discredit GW. Not at all. It is no better or worse than so many other games. All I want is to properly label it. What is wrong with that? Does GW suddenly become a worse game because it is not labeled an MMO? Does the label make the game?
Perhaps you should make your own thread about it, your derailment has nothing to do with the topic.
The finest PvP combat based on a RPG model bar none (at least for the opening 1.5 years I played). It was a hell of a balancing act with the large variety of builds on offer but it worked, mixed in with some twitch requirements on top of the tactical element of working with skills, nothing can touch it. Some people may like PvE empowered PvP (imo the most retarded form of PvP) or extreme political/tactical PvP (ala EvE, great but in a total different manner), this however holds the crown for true FPS ethos of player skill vs skill in a RPG.
The question is not if its a MMORPG or not. The question is: "Is it a fun game". The anwser is: "Yes". At least for me.
Played it for almost 4 years, both PvE and PvP. I would say that the game WAS underrated. With almost no new content or improvement then it starts feeling old compared to (other) MMO's.
It still feels and look right: Not cartoonish like WoW, and the visual effects and weapon size are not exaggerated like they are in many Asian MMO.
I think many players would return if they knew what bonus they will get in GW2 for the titles they get in GW1.
Well, everyone defines thing as they like, tho the main contention here seems to be over the instancing and if that somehow invalidates GW as an MMO. Personally, I don't think it does.
Its true even towns and outposts are districted, and I think the limit is 100 players per district. However, I think its generally understood this is a limit imposed by the devs for graphics reasons, rather than server issues. If I load into even a moderately full district, it can take some time to load all the character models (not the latest, but I have a 8800 GTS w/ 640mb). Most MMOs seem to have graphics lag trying to get 100 player models into one area (character models being the most detailed polygons in most games). 40 v 40 in WAR was pushing it, even after using a number of optimizations. Anet is rather performance obsessed, so they limited the number of players in the towns/outposts.
Towns are also more than just glorified lobbies. There's no AH, but the traders for common and rare materials, runes & insignias, dyes, and the scroll trader act as a sort of middlemen dealers in these resources and commodities. The values of the items varies with the buy/sell ratios of each. Even the player to player economy tends to use the values on the traders as guidelines for pricing (Deldrimor steel often being sold at the average of the traders' buy/sell value). When an update made perma-Shadow Form farming of the Underworld possible, the priciest material, Ectoplasm, went into a nose dive. Players with a large investment in ecto starting selling as the supply increase drove down trader prices, trying to limit their losses - which in turn drove ecto prices further down. (a later nerf slowly brought ecto prices back up). Recently, when Nicholas the Traveler's weekly collection turned to parchment, parchment prices spiked for the week (wood briefly as well, but it was far more profitable to turn your wood into parchment). So, towns do serve more than just as a meeting place, and incidently, there is a global, persistent economy which is effected by players in the GW world.
There are other persistent global effects, tho not necessarily of earth shattering import (but how many games could claim that anyway). Favor of the Gods (dependent on players achieving certain title tracks) determines if you can enter Mists high level zones without having an appropriate scroll (again, a globally traded resource). Guilds grind Kurzick/Luxon faction to determine the control of numerous outposts in the Jade Sea and Echovald forests - of course, this is more for prestige - yet they do reap the benefit of gaining access to the discount merchants, which creates another subsection of the player economy, which is lockpick selling. Also, a minor inconvience, but if a player has more Luxon faction in a Kurz controlled outpost, you'll have to map travel to another outpost to use the merchant or any other NPC service.
Also, about the CS vs GW analogy...something I'm surprised no one has mentioned. CS "zones" - game servers, are setup by individuals, like with most team FPS games. All instances are run off Anet's servers. Trust me, my oh so wonderful ISP has show me many times that things will keep happening in my instance (luckily my heroes are usually good enough at keeping up the fight on their own) even when I'm getting updates on the action only every 10 seconds
But, if the instancing really gets you, you probably don't care that GW fits every other generally accepted definition of an MMO, or that it shares pretty much all the traits common to games called MMOs. How much you solo it or try to play socially is really up to you. Some say heroes killed the social aspect. But, with the daily Zaishen quests, I see plenty of players gathering in that day's mission outpost to PUG. Me, I usually just put a "lf discord partner" up and have a quick, one mission stand with another player and our 6 necro heroes spamming Discord. Sometimes the partner is chatty, sometimes just all buisness. Its not even that hard of build to put together, yet I still see lots of players PUGing it up (tho now that the Z quests are repeating and I suspect many people have their guardian title tracks, its beginning to drop off).
Originally posted by Joiry Also, about the CS vs GW analogy...something I'm surprised no one has mentioned. CS "zones" - game servers, are setup by individuals, like with most team FPS games.
What hardware the game is running on is not relevant. You could easily make a real MMO that utilizes the client machines (though cheats would probably prevent you from doing this).
As for the rest of your post: Im not against GW as such, and I agree that it has some borderline elements to it, but IMO it is not enough to qualify it. The game is simply too fragmented and in-persistent to be called an MMO IMO.
Originally posted by Joiry Also, about the CS vs GW analogy...something I'm surprised no one has mentioned. CS "zones" - game servers, are setup by individuals, like with most team FPS games.
What hardware the game is running is not relevant. You could easily make a real MMO that utilizes the client machines (though cheats would probably prevent you from doing this).
As for the rest of your post: Im not against GW as such, and I agree that it has some borderline elements to it, but IMO it is not enough to qualify it. The game is simply too fragmented and in-persistent to be called an MMO IMO.
Certain hardware specifics don't matter (which specific cpu, memory, etc, etc), but the fact GW is run off a large server infrastructure which is all interconnected is a substantial difference from lots of personal servers which are merely connected by a phonebook-like listing service from the central server. I'm willing to bet the server code for GW is far more complex than that for online FPS match games server.
I'm curious what constitutes too fragmented and in-persistent for you. The persistence of most games is fairly static, nothing ever happens except mobs respawn. Certain games you can say have a continuing, on going dynamic state of the world. Port control and PvP zone creation in PotBS, or the shifting of the high level zone control in WAR to push to the enemy captial. Or, in the dearly departed Shadowbane, the fact player cities could be built and destroyed. A lot of games called MMOs may be "persistent", but its a very static persistence and might as well be an instance anyway (in that whatever mobs are killed will respawn shortly anyway).
Originally posted by Joiry Also, about the CS vs GW analogy...something I'm surprised no one has mentioned. CS "zones" - game servers, are setup by individuals, like with most team FPS games.
What hardware the game is running is not relevant. You could easily make a real MMO that utilizes the client machines (though cheats would probably prevent you from doing this).
As for the rest of your post: Im not against GW as such, and I agree that it has some borderline elements to it, but IMO it is not enough to qualify it. The game is simply too fragmented and in-persistent to be called an MMO IMO.
Certain hardware specifics don't matter (which specific cpu, memory, etc, etc), but the fact GW is run off a large server infrastructure which is all interconnected is a substantial difference from lots of personal servers which are merely connected by a phonebook-like listing service from the central server. I'm willing to bet the server code for GW is far more complex than that for online FPS match games server.
I'm curious what constitutes too fragmented and in-persistent for you. The persistence of most games is fairly static, nothing ever happens except mobs respawn. Certain games you can say have a continuing, on going dynamic state of the world. Port control and PvP zone creation in PotBS, or the shifting of the high level zone control in WAR to push to the enemy captial. Or, in the dearly departed Shadowbane, the fact player cities could be built and destroyed. A lot of games called MMOs may be "persistent", but its a very static persistence and might as well be an instance anyway (in that whatever mobs are killed will respawn shortly anyway).
But, like anything, YMMV.
You are right, and that is also why I hate many themepark games. They seriously don't even try to be more than standard games.
But even a game like WoW - which is very static - has a coherent world, that persists - meaning it will always exist. The area will never die, and it exists uniquely. That is the very least you can expect from an MMO IMO.
UO with it's housing, Shadowbane with it's player cities, EVE with it's guild bases (as far as I understand?) etc. are much more MMO than for instance WoW, which is only a few degrees over GW. The more there is to persist, implicitly the more the players own of the world, the more of an MMO it becomes IMO. Second Life is probably the highest degree we have seen to date. If it just had some gameplay
Sadly I need to introduce the term "degree of MMO-ness". The development of the genre and lack of an agreed-upon definition forces me to do that.
Guild Wars is an awesome mmo well co op mmo... ive played trhough all 3 of the stand alones (i have yet to try EoN) every time i log in im constantly impressed with how well the game is maintaining it self.
Comments
In MMORPGs, and object oriented programming, and instance is an replica of another INSTANCE with a set of variables that can change. In programming those are called instance variables, in MMORPGs that can be anything from the players to the mobs inside. However, in both cases, they are fundamentally the same. A zone in Eve is NOT like that, they are fundamentally different (security settings, what missions there are, what asteroid fields there are, what space stations and so on).
That isn't entirely correct. An object is an instance of a class, which is just a blue-print for making objects. The data in an object can make it completely different from another object of the same type. Just take your "Eve sector" example. Couldn't I have a "Sector" object that has variables called "Security setting", "Missions", "Asteroid fields", and "Space stations"? Every object created would be an instance of the "Sector" class, but the data inside would make it completely different than other instances of the class.
Tried: LotR, CoH, AoC, WAR, Jumpgate Classic
Played: SWG, Guild Wars, WoW
Playing: Eve Online, Counter-strike
Loved: Star Wars Galaxies
Waiting for: Earthrise, Guild Wars 2, anything sandbox.
Exactly, and I for one am tired of doing it.
Ras has been wrong in every post he has made, even trying to point out to others the definitions to things he doesn't know the answer to himself.
Trying to tell me I don't know what an Instance is. I do that shit for a living. I know the definition of Instance in the computing world and it isn't a WoW dungeon.
Sigh, just let him go on for 20 more pages of retarded bullshit all he wants.
He doesn't know what an MMO is, He doesn't even know the difference between Counterstrike an FPS and Guild Wars an RPG and then tries to tell someone they do not know what an instance is, when he himself doesn't know what an instance is.
I for one am just tired of looking at the special ed text he types.
But anyway, yes op guild wars is under-rated and a very good MMORPG!!!!
Later guys, time for me to head home from work.
You know what? I do that shit for a living myself. C++ programmer here.
OMG SEMANTICS!
He meant zones. Who cares? WoW has instances too. Not an MMO? AoC is all instanced, must not be an MMO either. If it has instances it isn't an MMO everyone! It's been officially decided by the ruler of what things shall be, Rasputin. All hail.
It's not semantics, it is common sense. By your definition any game that has a public social hub for connecting people to start multiplayer sessions would be MMORPGs, because that is all GW is. There is no instanced world but rather tons of multiplayer sessions tied together by social hubs.
Warcraft 2 had that with BNET. So is that an MMORPG?
No, because Warcraft 2 was an RTS, not an RPG.
Anyways, Warcraft 2 had a completely graphical social hub? I really don't know, nor honestly care.
I underlined the important parts of your post. Tons, meaning massive... Multiplayer... Online sessions tied together. Sounds like an MMO to me.
The discussion is not about the RPG part but rather about the MMO part. Warcraft 2 would then be a MMORTS, which it was not. And yes, BNet was a graphical hub, not as pretty as GWs, but still a graphical hub.
Also the sessions in GW are NOT tied together, they are run completely independant of each other and the only things that are persistant are your characters and their equipment. So they are persistant but NOT the world itself and hence that makes it fail at beeing an MMORPG.
Exactly.
Modern FPS'es like Battlefield2 has that kind of character persistance, but you would never call that an MMO.
GW simply can't be called an MMO in any shape or form - 3D lobby does not an MMO make.
OMG SEMANTICS!
He meant zones. Who cares? WoW has instances too. Not an MMO? AoC is all instanced, must not be an MMO either. If it has instances it isn't an MMO everyone! It's been officially decided by the ruler of what things shall be, Rasputin. All hail.
It's not semantics, it is common sense. By your definition any game that has a public social hub for connecting people to start multiplayer sessions would be MMORPGs, because that is all GW is. There is no instanced world but rather tons of multiplayer sessions tied together by social hubs.
Warcraft 2 had that with BNET. So is that an MMORPG?
No, because Warcraft 2 was an RTS, not an RPG.
Anyways, Warcraft 2 had a completely graphical social hub? I really don't know, nor honestly care.
I underlined the important parts of your post. Tons, meaning massive... Multiplayer... Online sessions tied together. Sounds like an MMO to me.
The discussion is not about the RPG part but rather about the MMO part. Warcraft 2 would then be a MMORTS, which it was not. And yes, BNet was a graphical hub, not as pretty as GWs, but still a graphical hub.
Also the sessions in GW are NOT tied together, they are run completely independant of each other and the only things that are persistant are your characters and their equipment. So they are persistant but NOT the world itself and hence that makes it fail at beeing an MMORPG.
Again I ask, where is it defined that an MMORPG must have a persistant world? It isn't. It must have a world, which GW does, but it doesn't have to be persistant. Just looking at the name, it needs to be massive, multi-player, online, and an RPG. The only term in question is the massive. Where is the "Massively" in the title MMORPG rigidly defined? It isn't. Guild Wars having Massive amounts of people on a single shard makes it massive. Guild Wars having 3 fairly large continents make it massive. Persistance is no where in the definition of massive.
Tried: LotR, CoH, AoC, WAR, Jumpgate Classic
Played: SWG, Guild Wars, WoW
Playing: Eve Online, Counter-strike
Loved: Star Wars Galaxies
Waiting for: Earthrise, Guild Wars 2, anything sandbox.
In MMORPGs, and object oriented programming, and instance is an replica of another INSTANCE with a set of variables that can change. In programming those are called instance variables, in MMORPGs that can be anything from the players to the mobs inside. However, in both cases, they are fundamentally the same. A zone in Eve is NOT like that, they are fundamentally different (security settings, what missions there are, what asteroid fields there are, what space stations and so on).
That isn't entirely correct. An object is an instance of a class, which is just a blue-print for making objects. The data in an object can make it completely different from another object of the same type. Just take your "Eve sector" example. Couldn't I have a "Sector" object that has variables called "Security setting", "Missions", "Asteroid fields", and "Space stations"? Every object created would be an instance of the "Sector" class, but the data inside would make it completely different than other instances of the class.
Could you please stop with pushing the programming definition of instancing onto the Gaming definition?
It should be basic knowledge what instancing is in gaming terms. Anyone who doesn't know that, doesn't belong in this discussion - they should go educate themselves first.
Which part is not correct? As you pointed out, the blueprint (class) is the same and the only thing that is different are the variables. The constants of an instance are those that do not change, like the location of space stations (which do change in Eve) but do NOT change in instances such as WoW or GW.
Furthermore this is a comparison that does not hold true when translating to MMORPGs. In MMORPGs an instance is an EXACT replica of another and the only differences are the players and mobs inside.
Also instances are short lived, they get created and destroyed (as I previously mentioned) where as a sector in Eve has never got destroyed to this date and only created ONCE. This is again similar to instances in OO programming (unless they are Singletons, which again shows that they cannot be freely translated from MMORPGs to OO programming).
But if you truly believe that an instance, in MMORPG therms, is the same as a zone then you are completely misstaken. There are fundamental differences, most important being that zones are persistant, where as instances are not (for any given server).
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OMG SEMANTICS!
He meant zones. Who cares? WoW has instances too. Not an MMO? AoC is all instanced, must not be an MMO either. If it has instances it isn't an MMO everyone! It's been officially decided by the ruler of what things shall be, Rasputin. All hail.
It's not semantics, it is common sense. By your definition any game that has a public social hub for connecting people to start multiplayer sessions would be MMORPGs, because that is all GW is. There is no instanced world but rather tons of multiplayer sessions tied together by social hubs.
Warcraft 2 had that with BNET. So is that an MMORPG?
No, because Warcraft 2 was an RTS, not an RPG.
Anyways, Warcraft 2 had a completely graphical social hub? I really don't know, nor honestly care.
I underlined the important parts of your post. Tons, meaning massive... Multiplayer... Online sessions tied together. Sounds like an MMO to me.
The discussion is not about the RPG part but rather about the MMO part. Warcraft 2 would then be a MMORTS, which it was not. And yes, BNet was a graphical hub, not as pretty as GWs, but still a graphical hub.
Also the sessions in GW are NOT tied together, they are run completely independant of each other and the only things that are persistant are your characters and their equipment. So they are persistant but NOT the world itself and hence that makes it fail at beeing an MMORPG.
Again I ask, where is it defined that an MMORPG must have a persistant world? It isn't. It must have a world, which GW does, but it doesn't have to be persistant. Just looking at the name, it needs to be massive, multi-player, online, and an RPG. The only term in question is the massive. Where is the "Massively" in the title MMORPG rigidly defined? It isn't. Guild Wars having Massive amounts of people on a single shard makes it massive. Guild Wars having 3 fairly large continents make it massive. Persistance is no where in the definition of massive.
16v16 is not massive and you know that.
If you talk about massive in the lobby, then there is alot of other games that you would not usually think of as MMOs, that needs adding to this site. CS and BF2 comes to mind.
In MMORPGs, and object oriented programming, and instance is an replica of another INSTANCE with a set of variables that can change. In programming those are called instance variables, in MMORPGs that can be anything from the players to the mobs inside. However, in both cases, they are fundamentally the same. A zone in Eve is NOT like that, they are fundamentally different (security settings, what missions there are, what asteroid fields there are, what space stations and so on).
That isn't entirely correct. An object is an instance of a class, which is just a blue-print for making objects. The data in an object can make it completely different from another object of the same type. Just take your "Eve sector" example. Couldn't I have a "Sector" object that has variables called "Security setting", "Missions", "Asteroid fields", and "Space stations"? Every object created would be an instance of the "Sector" class, but the data inside would make it completely different than other instances of the class.
Could you please stop with pushing the programming definition of instancing onto the Gaming definition?
It should be basic knowledge what instancing is in gaming terms. Anyone who doesn't know that, doesn't belong in this discussion - they should go educate themselves first.
I wasn't even talking about games, I was just correcting the fallacies in his post.
Tried: LotR, CoH, AoC, WAR, Jumpgate Classic
Played: SWG, Guild Wars, WoW
Playing: Eve Online, Counter-strike
Loved: Star Wars Galaxies
Waiting for: Earthrise, Guild Wars 2, anything sandbox.
Exactly, and I for one am tired of doing it.
Ras has been wrong in every post he has made, even trying to point out to others the definitions to things he doesn't know the answer to himself.
Trying to tell me I don't know what an Instance is. I do that shit for a living. I know the definition of Instance in the computing world and it isn't a WoW dungeon.
Sigh, just let him go on for 20 more pages of retarded bullshit all he wants.
He doesn't know what an MMO is, He doesn't even know the difference between Counterstrike an FPS and Guild Wars an RPG and then tries to tell someone they do not know what an instance is, when he himself doesn't know what an instance is.
I for one am just tired of looking at the special ed text he types.
But anyway, yes op guild wars is under-rated and a very good MMORPG!!!!
Later guys, time for me to head home from work.
You know what? I do that shit for a living myself. C++ programmer here.
And if you do not know what I am talking about, I am trying to figure out what crazy ass company hired you. Must be on the verge of going bankrupt by now.
An instance CAN be a copy of something OR it can be a sector subdivided into a larger section of storage.
A " ZONE" is nothing more than a gamer term for an "INSTANCE" that was passed down ages ago like leet and noob.
ZONE refers to a section on a map.
INSTANCE in the programming sense is ANY SUBSECTION of the MAIN DATA STORAGE.
Example.
EvE Universe, meaning the ENTIRE MAP OF EVE. Is the MAIN DATA STORAGE. Think of it as your main database.
Each section of space inside of said database is a smaller closed off section of space. Think of it as a database INSIDE a database.
DATABASE MAIN - EVE SPACE
| | | | | |
Sub1 Sub2 Sub3 Sub4 Sub5 Sub6 (Instances)
0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0
Anyway it really doesn't matter, like you and one other guys are the only ones not considering it an MMO. Who cares really.
EDIT - I do know this, If I went into my bosses office before I left, and said "Sir, I am going to go create some new zones on the data server...." I would be looking for a new job tomorrow.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massively_multiplayer_online_game
"MMOGs create a persistent universe where the game continues playing regardless of whether or not anyone else is."
GW does not have a persistent world. Any part of the world can die at a given point in time. The cities, the adventuring areas, all. At one point or another, they will die - even when other instances of the areas do survive. The only persistance whatsoever to GW is the character. And if that is enough to qualify it to be an MMO, then we need alot of standard multiplayer games added.
""Most MMOGs also share other characteristics that make them different from other multiplayer online games. MMOGs host a large number of players in a single game world, and all of those players can interact with each other at any given time. Popular MMOGs might have thousands of players online at any given time, ...".
The players in GW CANNOT interact with each other at any given time. If an instance is full, you cannot enter, if your arch enemy is in there, and you want to kill him. You cannot just traverse the world, and happen upon any other player. You have to make an explicit appointment with someone to meet him in the same instance.
The GW system is completely fragmented, only held together by the cities, that have little other function than a standard lobby. This, IMO, disqualifies it from being an MMO.
Nice try at discrediting GW, but the fact is... It does continue to play even when you aren't there. 1) Other players are in the towns, doing events, leveing up. 2) Even if instances "die" off the towns will always be there and have events going on ect. 3) You can still talk with other players in an instance which is a form of interaction. There is the pvt chat as well as the guild and alliance.
Nice try though.
Rasputin, do you consider Golf to be a sport? How about auto racing?
Exactly, and I for one am tired of doing it.
Ras has been wrong in every post he has made, even trying to point out to others the definitions to things he doesn't know the answer to himself.
Trying to tell me I don't know what an Instance is. I do that shit for a living. I know the definition of Instance in the computing world and it isn't a WoW dungeon.
Sigh, just let him go on for 20 more pages of retarded bullshit all he wants.
He doesn't know what an MMO is, He doesn't even know the difference between Counterstrike an FPS and Guild Wars an RPG and then tries to tell someone they do not know what an instance is, when he himself doesn't know what an instance is.
I for one am just tired of looking at the special ed text he types.
But anyway, yes op guild wars is under-rated and a very good MMORPG!!!!
Later guys, time for me to head home from work.
You know what? I do that shit for a living myself. C++ programmer here.
And if you do not know what I am talking about, I am trying to figure out what crazy ass company hired you. Must be on the verge of going bankrupt by now.
An instance CAN be a copy of something OR it can be a sector subdivided into a larger section of storage.
A " ZONE" is nothing more than a gamer term for an "INSTANCE" that was passed down ages ago like leet and noob.
ZONE refers to a section on a map.
INSTANCE in the programming sense is ANY SUBSECTION of the MAIN DATA STORAGE.
Example.
EvE Universe, meaning the ENTIRE MAP OF EVE. Is the MAIN DATA STORAGE. Think of it as your main database.
Each section of space inside of said database is a smaller closed off section of space. Think of it as a database INSIDE a database.
DATABASE MAIN - EVE SPACE
| | | | | |
Sub1 Sub2 Sub3 Sub4 Sub5 Sub6 (Instances)
0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0
Anyway it really doesn't matter, like you and one other guys are the only ones not considering it an MMO. Who cares really.
I think you are just twisting things to fit your argument. An instance in MMORPG is like a normal instance in OO programming, a zone in MMORPGs is a a special kind of instance called a Singleton instance which there can only exist one instance of.
A zone can never be destroyed and only created once. An instance can be destroyed and created infinite number of times.
A zone has a much higher limit of people that can access it (virtuall making it unrestricted) an instance has a low fixed number of people that can access it and are often private for a small group.
So instance and zones are definetely not the same, in MMORPGs, and that is not debatable, that is a fact.
However GW being an MMORPG or not is debatable and based on my definition and how original MMORPGs were designed (such as UO, EQ etc) it is not. Why? Only max 16 people (or something like that) can simultaneously interact with each other (towns do not count since all you can do there is chat). In traditional MMORPGs that number is well over 100 with some games like DF, boasting several houndred.
The majority of the world in most MMORPGs are persistant, only a small percentage of the area in GW are persistant, the rest are private instances. Which makes most of GW instanced and private. Two things that I find defining for MMORPGs (persistant and non-private).
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Im not trying to discredit GW. Not at all. It is no better or worse than so many other games.
All I want is to properly label it. What is wrong with that? Does GW suddenly become a worse game because it is not labeled an MMO? Does the label make the game?
So does BNET and CS chat servers. So they are MMOs aswell?
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My 2¢...
Of the several online games I've played -- WoW, GW, LotRO, EQ2, TR, and CoX (plus a couple of others that I absolutely hated) -- I would have to say that GW was far and away the best of the lot.
--I loved the use of instancing
--I loved the story progression/story missions
--I loved the graphics
--I loved (loved, loved!) the option to use henchmen/heroes
--I loved the lore
--I loved the map travel
--I loved the writing and quests (some of the content was unbelievably humorous)
--I loved the creativity shown by GW's designers
--I loved that getting a set of "uber" matched armor was accessible to everyone
Unfortunately, there has been nothing new in GW for quite some time, and I've done just about everything I can do in that game.
So I am playing WoW now, and it's, well, OK. But I do keep hoping someone will make another game like Guild Wars. Sadly, even Guild Wars 2 does not sound like it'll be much like Guild Wars 1, but, hopefully, it'll still be fun to play.
Any MMO that lets me play virtually all of the content with either other players OR on my own with NPCs is a total win, in my opinion.
Exactly, and I for one am tired of doing it.
Ras has been wrong in every post he has made, even trying to point out to others the definitions to things he doesn't know the answer to himself.
Trying to tell me I don't know what an Instance is. I do that shit for a living. I know the definition of Instance in the computing world and it isn't a WoW dungeon.
Sigh, just let him go on for 20 more pages of retarded bullshit all he wants.
He doesn't know what an MMO is, He doesn't even know the difference between Counterstrike an FPS and Guild Wars an RPG and then tries to tell someone they do not know what an instance is, when he himself doesn't know what an instance is.
I for one am just tired of looking at the special ed text he types.
But anyway, yes op guild wars is under-rated and a very good MMORPG!!!!
Later guys, time for me to head home from work.
You know what? I do that shit for a living myself. C++ programmer here.
And if you do not know what I am talking about, I am trying to figure out what crazy ass company hired you. Must be on the verge of going bankrupt by now.
An instance CAN be a copy of something OR it can be a sector subdivided into a larger section of storage.
A " ZONE" is nothing more than a gamer term for an "INSTANCE" that was passed down ages ago like leet and noob.
ZONE refers to a section on a map.
INSTANCE in the programming sense is ANY SUBSECTION of the MAIN DATA STORAGE.
Example.
EvE Universe, meaning the ENTIRE MAP OF EVE. Is the MAIN DATA STORAGE. Think of it as your main database.
Each section of space inside of said database is a smaller closed off section of space. Think of it as a database INSIDE a database.
DATABASE MAIN - EVE SPACE
| | | | | |
Sub1 Sub2 Sub3 Sub4 Sub5 Sub6 (Instances)
0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0
Anyway it really doesn't matter, like you and one other guys are the only ones not considering it an MMO. Who cares really.
I think you are just twisting things to fit your argument. An instance in MMORPG is like a normal instance in OO programming, a zone in MMORPGs is a a special kind of instance called a Singleton instance which there can only exist one instance of.
A zone can never be destroyed and only created once. An instance can be destroyed and created infinite number of times.
A zone has a much higher limit of people that can access it (virtuall making it unrestricted) an instance has a low fixed number of people that can access it and are often private for a small group.
So instance and zones are definetely not the same, in MMORPGs, and that is not debatable, that is a fact.
However GW being an MMORPG or not is debatable and based on my definition and how original MMORPGs were designed (such as UO, EQ etc) it is not. Why? Only max 16 people (or something like that) can simultaneously interact with each other (towns do not count since all you can do there is chat). In traditional MMORPGs that number is well over 100 with some games like DF, boasting several houndred.
The majority of the world in most MMORPGs are persistant, only a small percentage of the area in GW are persistant, the rest are private instances. Which makes most of GW instanced and private. Two things that I find defining for MMORPGs (persistant and non-private).
Yamota, it is not worth it. The definitions are different, we can't compare the definition of Game Instances with Programming Instances.
He is just trying to drag you to his field of expertise and in a silly attempt beat you with a programming term that happens to have the same name.
Any MMO player worth his salt knows exactly what an instance is in gaming terms.
Perhaps you should make your own thread about it, your derailment has nothing to do with the topic.
The question is not if its a MMORPG or not. The question is: "Is it a fun game". The anwser is: "Yes". At least for me.
Played it for almost 4 years, both PvE and PvP. I would say that the game WAS underrated. With almost no new content or improvement then it starts feeling old compared to (other) MMO's.
It still feels and look right: Not cartoonish like WoW, and the visual effects and weapon size are not exaggerated like they are in many Asian MMO.
I think many players would return if they knew what bonus they will get in GW2 for the titles they get in GW1.
Well, everyone defines thing as they like, tho the main contention here seems to be over the instancing and if that somehow invalidates GW as an MMO. Personally, I don't think it does.
Its true even towns and outposts are districted, and I think the limit is 100 players per district. However, I think its generally understood this is a limit imposed by the devs for graphics reasons, rather than server issues. If I load into even a moderately full district, it can take some time to load all the character models (not the latest, but I have a 8800 GTS w/ 640mb). Most MMOs seem to have graphics lag trying to get 100 player models into one area (character models being the most detailed polygons in most games). 40 v 40 in WAR was pushing it, even after using a number of optimizations. Anet is rather performance obsessed, so they limited the number of players in the towns/outposts.
Towns are also more than just glorified lobbies. There's no AH, but the traders for common and rare materials, runes & insignias, dyes, and the scroll trader act as a sort of middlemen dealers in these resources and commodities. The values of the items varies with the buy/sell ratios of each. Even the player to player economy tends to use the values on the traders as guidelines for pricing (Deldrimor steel often being sold at the average of the traders' buy/sell value). When an update made perma-Shadow Form farming of the Underworld possible, the priciest material, Ectoplasm, went into a nose dive. Players with a large investment in ecto starting selling as the supply increase drove down trader prices, trying to limit their losses - which in turn drove ecto prices further down. (a later nerf slowly brought ecto prices back up). Recently, when Nicholas the Traveler's weekly collection turned to parchment, parchment prices spiked for the week (wood briefly as well, but it was far more profitable to turn your wood into parchment). So, towns do serve more than just as a meeting place, and incidently, there is a global, persistent economy which is effected by players in the GW world.
There are other persistent global effects, tho not necessarily of earth shattering import (but how many games could claim that anyway). Favor of the Gods (dependent on players achieving certain title tracks) determines if you can enter Mists high level zones without having an appropriate scroll (again, a globally traded resource). Guilds grind Kurzick/Luxon faction to determine the control of numerous outposts in the Jade Sea and Echovald forests - of course, this is more for prestige - yet they do reap the benefit of gaining access to the discount merchants, which creates another subsection of the player economy, which is lockpick selling. Also, a minor inconvience, but if a player has more Luxon faction in a Kurz controlled outpost, you'll have to map travel to another outpost to use the merchant or any other NPC service.
Also, about the CS vs GW analogy...something I'm surprised no one has mentioned. CS "zones" - game servers, are setup by individuals, like with most team FPS games. All instances are run off Anet's servers. Trust me, my oh so wonderful ISP has show me many times that things will keep happening in my instance (luckily my heroes are usually good enough at keeping up the fight on their own) even when I'm getting updates on the action only every 10 seconds
But, if the instancing really gets you, you probably don't care that GW fits every other generally accepted definition of an MMO, or that it shares pretty much all the traits common to games called MMOs. How much you solo it or try to play socially is really up to you. Some say heroes killed the social aspect. But, with the daily Zaishen quests, I see plenty of players gathering in that day's mission outpost to PUG. Me, I usually just put a "lf discord partner" up and have a quick, one mission stand with another player and our 6 necro heroes spamming Discord. Sometimes the partner is chatty, sometimes just all buisness. Its not even that hard of build to put together, yet I still see lots of players PUGing it up (tho now that the Z quests are repeating and I suspect many people have their guardian title tracks, its beginning to drop off).
What hardware the game is running on is not relevant. You could easily make a real MMO that utilizes the client machines (though cheats would probably prevent you from doing this).
As for the rest of your post: Im not against GW as such, and I agree that it has some borderline elements to it, but IMO it is not enough to qualify it. The game is simply too fragmented and in-persistent to be called an MMO IMO.
What hardware the game is running is not relevant. You could easily make a real MMO that utilizes the client machines (though cheats would probably prevent you from doing this).
As for the rest of your post: Im not against GW as such, and I agree that it has some borderline elements to it, but IMO it is not enough to qualify it. The game is simply too fragmented and in-persistent to be called an MMO IMO.
Certain hardware specifics don't matter (which specific cpu, memory, etc, etc), but the fact GW is run off a large server infrastructure which is all interconnected is a substantial difference from lots of personal servers which are merely connected by a phonebook-like listing service from the central server. I'm willing to bet the server code for GW is far more complex than that for online FPS match games server.
I'm curious what constitutes too fragmented and in-persistent for you. The persistence of most games is fairly static, nothing ever happens except mobs respawn. Certain games you can say have a continuing, on going dynamic state of the world. Port control and PvP zone creation in PotBS, or the shifting of the high level zone control in WAR to push to the enemy captial. Or, in the dearly departed Shadowbane, the fact player cities could be built and destroyed. A lot of games called MMOs may be "persistent", but its a very static persistence and might as well be an instance anyway (in that whatever mobs are killed will respawn shortly anyway).
But, like anything, YMMV.
What hardware the game is running is not relevant. You could easily make a real MMO that utilizes the client machines (though cheats would probably prevent you from doing this).
As for the rest of your post: Im not against GW as such, and I agree that it has some borderline elements to it, but IMO it is not enough to qualify it. The game is simply too fragmented and in-persistent to be called an MMO IMO.
Certain hardware specifics don't matter (which specific cpu, memory, etc, etc), but the fact GW is run off a large server infrastructure which is all interconnected is a substantial difference from lots of personal servers which are merely connected by a phonebook-like listing service from the central server. I'm willing to bet the server code for GW is far more complex than that for online FPS match games server.
I'm curious what constitutes too fragmented and in-persistent for you. The persistence of most games is fairly static, nothing ever happens except mobs respawn. Certain games you can say have a continuing, on going dynamic state of the world. Port control and PvP zone creation in PotBS, or the shifting of the high level zone control in WAR to push to the enemy captial. Or, in the dearly departed Shadowbane, the fact player cities could be built and destroyed. A lot of games called MMOs may be "persistent", but its a very static persistence and might as well be an instance anyway (in that whatever mobs are killed will respawn shortly anyway).
But, like anything, YMMV.
You are right, and that is also why I hate many themepark games. They seriously don't even try to be more than standard games.
But even a game like WoW - which is very static - has a coherent world, that persists - meaning it will always exist. The area will never die, and it exists uniquely. That is the very least you can expect from an MMO IMO.
UO with it's housing, Shadowbane with it's player cities, EVE with it's guild bases (as far as I understand?) etc. are much more MMO than for instance WoW, which is only a few degrees over GW. The more there is to persist, implicitly the more the players own of the world, the more of an MMO it becomes IMO. Second Life is probably the highest degree we have seen to date. If it just had some gameplay
Sadly I need to introduce the term "degree of MMO-ness". The development of the genre and lack of an agreed-upon definition forces me to do that.
PS: What does YMMV stand for?
Guild Wars is an awesome mmo well co op mmo... ive played trhough all 3 of the stand alones (i have yet to try EoN) every time i log in im constantly impressed with how well the game is maintaining it self.