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So what is so bad about instancing?
BioNut
Member Posts: 414
I don't really understand why so many people seem to avoid games with instances or hate on new games they think will be instanced.
First off the word instance in the MMO space seems to mean different things. In LoTRO an instance is either a small private or public dungion like area that is kept seperate from the game world. This needs to be done to show varied scenery, contain story quests and for technological reasons. So what is the problem with this form of instancing? Virtually every MMO out there uses it.
The second form of instancing is were a new zone (very large instance) gets created when the old zone reaches a certain population. AoC uses this method as well as the upcoming Champions Online. This is done for technological reasons as our current internet structure cannot handle 7000 people fighting in one area at the same time. Honestly I have been playing AoC and I don't even notice it in effect. I always see other players and have ample opportunity to PvP. It is also handy to switch instances if I am getting griefed.
I assume people don't like instancing because it divides the player base but is having 7000 nubs fighting over the same sewer rats an immersive experience? Honestly, I wish we could split the population up more so my friends and I could get more immersed in the world and not have it ruined by ass hats and spawn camping.
But then again I am still wishing for a MORPG along the lines of a 6 player fallout 3/oblivion or a co-op mass effect. I wonder if I will ever get one of those? SW:TOR seems like the closest thing for the next few years.
Playing: Tera, BF3, ME3
Waiting on: Guild Wars 2
Comments
For myself personally I dislike instancing because I'm looking for a sandbox type game. Some games are worse than others. Like Guild Wars for example is something I stay away from. That game to me isn't even a MMORPG (I don't want to fight about if it is or isn't I've done enough of that when the game came out).
I suppose I have no real reason to hate instancing other than the more developers use it, the smaller the world becomes. Before you know it you have 2x2' worlds with 12 different instances. I'm probably not the best one to argue on the side of anti-instance though, haha.
Good post. I agree 100% with Bionut
I for one like instances. Less compatition for drops or quest Items. I love D&DO & Guild Wars.
I didn't use to dislike instances, infact the concept of instances isn't bad, having played through post trammel in UO fighting over every single spawn. What I dislike they direction they have gone. Instead of being tools to spread people out without having to create tons of world space they have become micro raids. Where to be able to expand your character beyond max level, which doesn't main shit anymore, you are force into them. But I guess I'm from a time with mmo were ment to be played not schedules, when the quality of the player was based on his skill not his ability to schedule and farm the phat loot.
Nothing is wrong with instancing.
I personally prefer an open world but I also enjoy games like GW so I've seen instancing done right.
Playing: EvE, Ryzom
I would have loved guild wars if all of the classes didn't feel the same
edit: I wasn't aware that sandbox games were by definition "non-instanced". I always assumed the term sandbox applied to a classless skill based system with a great emphasis placed a player crafted economy.
Playing: Tera, BF3, ME3
Waiting on: Guild Wars 2
Good Post. Personally, I do not have a problem at all with instancing in any of its current itterations. I think intstancing is a good idea for special quests and dungeons especially so that a story arch can advance more smoothly and you actually get the feel you impacted something.
I wonder if people noticed that Aion is using instancing too. They have zones and they have channels (for population overflow like AOC).
Anyway, I just want a great game experience with our without instances. I have personally not found this to be a detractor for me.
Instancing destroys the feeling of a virtual world. I don't like instancing, but I will put up with it in the case of an excellent game(ala Guild Wars), but it just adds to the shit list in crappy games(ala AoC).
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.
Bionut: I know of a game that's not a mmo, but it has MMO-like co-op features and a loot system like Diablo. It's called Borderlands and is due out in October. Maybe that's something you can try.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borderlands_(video_game)
Technically, how is instancing, like that used in CO and AOC, any different than having additional servers?
Technically, how is it anything like additional servers?
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 do not like instances. However, I also do not like waiting with a dozen other people for the same boss in a dungeon. So dungeons are about the only time I don't seem to mind instances. Hell, even some non-instanced dungeons are fine, who says you have to make it all one thing or another
Heavily-instanced outdoor areas really annoy me though and it has to be one of my biggest complaints with AoC (in addition to the large amount of inaccessible terrain).
In either instance (har har), outside or in dungeons, instancing does hurt immersion for me, but it hurts it MUCH more when done in an outdoor zone for some reason. I guess over the years I've gotten conditioned to have a load screen and an instance for dungeons so it somehow doesn't bother me so much. At least some upcoming games don't plan to follow in AoC's footsteps and instance the whole bloody world.
Ningen wa ningen da.
----
http://twitter.com/Ciovala
I am curious how it destroys the virtual world because I have had a different experience in AoC.
I guess I need to explain. When I think of fantasy (and I am an avid reader of it) I never think of large amounts of people doing medial tasks together. In good fantasy books the lead character may have to go kill some rabbits for food but I'll be damned if he is doing that with 100 other people. When I play MMOs I play to get immersed in my own book so to speak. If there are a lot of people around waking at boars with me it just reminds me that I am not special in any way and brings me out of the story.
Now when I meet 5-10 people out in the world it feels more real to me. After all, lead characters in books usually run into a lot of people.
Now in PvP areas I expect the population to be very high because that is supposed to simulate war. Also markets and large cities should be very populated areas.
To me the virtual world is more the environmental surroundings and not the player characters in it.
Playing: Tera, BF3, ME3
Waiting on: Guild Wars 2
I don't like instancing because it goes against the principlies, of what I think, makes an MMORPG. That is a persistant world where you can meet anyone at any time. The more instances you create the more the game becomes a multiplayer game instead of a massive multiplayer game because you are effectively cutting down the number if people you can interact with.
Furthmore it destroys the immersion as it is hard to accept the fact that there are 20 identical clones of zones running and in some cases you can jump between them.
I understand that there are technical limitations on how many people can be in any given confined area but instancing is an ugly sollution to the problem. It would be much better to have a sollution in the context of an MMORPG world. For example you could have computer generated wilderness areas that are like instances, where only a few can enter, but look different and then you can explain the fact that it is private with the explanation that the wilderness is vast and the chances of running into someone else is so small so to make it private.
Or you can shut down certain zones if there are too many in there with some explanation in the context of the MMORPG world, such as the magical gate to XXX zone is currently closed or guarded by a very strong beast.
There can be tons of sollutions for this, just use your imagination. Creating identical clones just seems the most easy one and probably why it is implemented.
My gaming blog
Yeah I know about boarderlands and I will be buying it. Looks fun but I wish it was third person. I prefer tps to fps.
Playing: Tera, BF3, ME3
Waiting on: Guild Wars 2
I would have loved guild wars if all of the classes didn't feel the same
edit: I wasn't aware that sandbox games were by definition "non-instanced". I always assumed the term sandbox applied to a classless skill based system with a great emphasis placed a player crafted economy.
sandbox means something different to everyone.
A sandbox normally has a persistent world with no instances. With the lack of instances you have open zone pvp and oprn world dungeons and stuff. it gives you more freedom something sandboxes are about.
Playing: EvE, Ryzom
I am curious how it destroys the virtual world because I have had a different experience in AoC.
I guess I need to explain. When I think of fantasy (and I am an avid reader of it) I never think of large amounts of people doing medial tasks together. In good fantasy books the lead character may have to go kill some rabbits for food but I'll be damned if he is doing that with 100 other people. When I play MMOs I play to get immersed in my own book so to speak. If there are a lot of people around waking at boars with me it just reminds me that I am not special in any way and brings me out of the story.
Now when I meet 5-10 people out in the world it feels more real to me. After all, lead characters in books usually run into a lot of people.
Now in PvP areas I expect the population to be very high because that is supposed to simulate war. Also markets and large cities should be very populated areas.
To me the virtual world is more the environmental surroundings and not the player characters in it.
Because with instancing, there is no virtual world, there are many segregated copies of the world running at once. If I go to the saloon in some town, I should see everyone that is at that saloon, not everyone that is in my version of that saloon. If I tell someone to meet me at the saloon, we shouldn't have to figure out which version to go to.
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 am curious how it destroys the virtual world because I have had a different experience in AoC.
I guess I need to explain. When I think of fantasy (and I am an avid reader of it) I never think of large amounts of people doing medial tasks together. In good fantasy books the lead character may have to go kill some rabbits for food but I'll be damned if he is doing that with 100 other people. When I play MMOs I play to get immersed in my own book so to speak. If there are a lot of people around waking at boars with me it just reminds me that I am not special in any way and brings me out of the story.
Now when I meet 5-10 people out in the world it feels more real to me. After all, lead characters in books usually run into a lot of people.
Now in PvP areas I expect the population to be very high because that is supposed to simulate war. Also markets and large cities should be very populated areas.
To me the virtual world is more the environmental surroundings and not the player characters in it.
Imagining reading that book and it says that in instance #1 of SarumansTower he is battling the Ents but at the same time in instance #2 of Sarumans tower he is battling Frodo and the hobbits and then in instance #3 of Sarumans Tower he is happily building an army and noone is attacking it.
What you are talking about "being immeresed in your OWN book" is a single player game or a multiplayer game. Massive multiplayer games are different in the sense that there is not one book for you and another book for some other person. It is the same book for the both of you and what one does can affect the other. That is anyway how MMORPGs used to be but that has sadly changed to the "one book per person" as you describe it.
Some people call it evolution but I call it devolution. I.e. turning a massive multiplayer experience into a multiplayer, or even singleplayer, experience.
My gaming blog
WoW is a good example of how to do instancing both right and wrong.
Where WoW gets it right is in PvE.
Dungeons and Raids, You don't have to fight over Boss Mobs.
Where WoW Gets it wrong is in PvP.
Battlegrounds and Arenas has killed any kinda of real World PvP.
I hate instancing, I will agree with many people here that it detracts from the immersive world that you want to be a part of. There are more creative ways to handle people in one place then simply spawning a new version of that same place. Competition is gone this way as well, and I really think that instances are more of a way to make the games less difficult then they used to be. Yea you read that right instances IMO make games less difficult then they once were.
You might be asking how I came up with that last statment, well it is simple, look at WOW alot of people cried that the game was to difficult because they couldn't compete in 40 man raids to get the "uber" equipment, so they made them easier to attain. When in reality making it a challenge in some way to get that "uber" equipment is what the game is supposed to be otherwise we are all just playing CounterStrike. You might as well give everyone everything and never have the ultra uber people out there that can show off there "Uber" weapons. Back in the day I remember hearing about people in EQ waiting for a creature to spawn for hours and hours on end just to have that chance of getting the kill so they can get that one item they want, then having a group show up at the wrong time and the creature spawns and the group kills it before that one guy can and poof he looses out on that item. Most people now adays would scream blood blue murder if this was the mechanic in MMO's but in reality it was things like that, that showed others on the server who wanted to put the time in to get the truely "Epic" items. Asheron's Call was the one I played back when EQ was out and they never had any instancing. If you went to the BDC (I think it was called) you competed with everyone else for the 3 Noble Olthoi that were in the dungeon, if you were the one that killed them you got great loot and possibly the best of something. Was it instanced? Nope, everyone was in the same dungeon and everyone competed for the same kills, was it fair, Yes because everyone had the ability to get there and try and kill things just like everyone else. AC delt with this in a different way, they gave you content so you could go do other things, and achieve close to the best things in the game. If to many people gathered in town there would be a random portal storm and you would be found teleported out of town running for your life from some critter. To me the world not having any places I can't get to or see is not a world I wish to be a part of, maybe that is why I am not playing most of the new MMO's out there.
I only played Guild Wars for a week, but the instancing was my favourite feature in the game. For the same reason you mentioned. It's no fun trying to farm crafting mats or gather quest items when others are farming them too.
Instancing solves a lot of problems.
"" Voice acting isn't an RPG element....it's just a production value." - grumpymel2
You make some good points and have good ideas but really you are just sugar coating the same idea. You have your immersion broken not because the game is instanced but because you are not really immersed in the first place. If you have any imagination at ll you should be able to ignore the instancing part. Esspecially if the games story or environment has pulled you in, has really immersed you.
I always find it funny when people have there immersion by a game mechanic that can easily be ignored. Waiting to kill mobs is another story though.
Playing: Tera, BF3, ME3
Waiting on: Guild Wars 2
? that's a new one, never heard of that complaint about GW classes.
I don't have a problem with instancing depending on what game it is. In Guild Wars it works great. In AoC and Warhammer I feel constrained by it. Still I don't think it's as bad in those games as everyone says it is, it just makes the worlds feel a little smaller than what they are.
I have been following this game and while it is not an MMO it is going to be awesome.
Playing: EvE, Ryzom
Not seeing the problem, frankly. Open World PvP is only fun when the numbers and levels are close to even. WoW's open PvP is a gank-fest.
"" Voice acting isn't an RPG element....it's just a production value." - grumpymel2