Minority was typed as it was in mind for something else. 2001 ish they were close to them numbers. And you are great at trying to drag people into fight. Rules on this forum say I can't and you will go off reporting me. I'll solve my problem that is you with the block feature.
Minority was typed as it was in mind for something else. 2001 ish they were close to them numbers. And you are great at trying to drag people into fight. Rules on this forum say I can't and you will go off reporting me. I'll solve my problem that is you with the block feature.
All I did was cite a data source. If you consider that "dragging" you into a fight, perhaps this reveals precisely how concrete your side of the argument is.
If you want discussion, provide evidence of your subscription claim.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
I fully agree. UO should of been our future. Instead we end up waiting 13 years for something good to come out (Darkfall) while hundreds of EQ clones, like WoW, live and die.
The definition of insanity: doing the same thing over and over expecting different results.
Marcus- wrote: "I don't doubt that people want an "easier" enviorment for there free time, and thats why WoW has 11 million uasers, and Darkfall has a whole lot less. Makes sense." It's less about difficulty. Even WOW players want gameplay that challenges them. It's more about accessibility, and game mechanics which encourage players to play and have fun rather than punish them harshly for failure.
I understand your point, however...
I honestly think people over-exagerate the punishment for failure in a game like UO. If you die to a red, you can recall to one of hundreds of player vendors, grab yourself a new set of armor, and be back in business just as fast as you can make a corpse run in just about any other game. Thats if you don't have your own armorsmith. Its honestly, not that harsh.
Me personally, i think its more about the punishment of a real person beating them, and taking their "personal stuff".. Get beat by a designers AI, "most" people barely sweat it, and chance are, given two or three more tries, said person can beat that NPC, and in a case like UO, get your stuff back. Easy.
The thought of going back to fight that PC, and losing your stuff again however, would probably not cross most peoples mind..
To me, it makes no difference if I die to red, its the game. Trust me, that red has died before, and will die again. I've yet to see an MMO where someone is undefeated in everything they do.
-edit-
So in my opinion, the harshness of the death penalty is more made up by the players ego, than the mechanics of the game.
I recall in '01 playing Ultima Onlne thinking this is great and I can't imagine what great games this will spawn. Back then I thought we would see games developed that would offer complex house building, farming lands and herding wild animals into pens to sheer and slaughter. Games with balance in pve and pvp where both aren't game makers or breakers but both are fun. Content that is player created and supported by the company and vice versa. Imagine what gaming would be like if gaming went with the UO style rather than the EQ style. I for one think it sounds better than hitting level 9000 and raiding to gain super sayain gear with flames.
Nah .. i was in UO beta and thought that it was a horrible game. Clicking nonstop to level mining. Everyone a tank mage. Pk is rampant. You can't move 10 feet without being killed. Any place with any resources is camped to the hilt.
I jumped ship once EQ came out. Never look back. Despite with all the problems (down-time, camping ..), EQ is 10x the game UO is. And i am glad that the industry moved AWAY from the UO model. And by the maximum subscription rate of this two games, a lot more people like the EQ model than the UO model.
Even though I love the UO concept, this guy is right.
Until the masses will fall in love with the UO concept, it is the EQ concept that will prevail. And to be honest, I really don't blame them.
See, the 'concept' of UO is great. They way it works out in the end is horrible. Theoretically the game is great, in practice it is a disaster. Only very few masochistic people among us like to be PK camped for the little time they can dedicate on an MMORPG. The majority however wants to spend their time having 'fun' and be entertained. And unfortunately, the 'elite' or 'hardcore' players are a very tiny little group compared to the mainstream players. As a result, any MMORPG company will be more inclined to cater to the mainstream folks, to be assured of a certain revenue, as opposed to the other smallish group, that will not generate a whole lot of revenue.
Don't feel too sad about it though. Once people will get bored with the mainstream concept, which they will inevitably, you'll see that several UO style games will be made to offer veriety. But until then, it's the EQ models that will dominate the MMORPG market.
Open PvP and sandbox are no synonyms. I've played UO a long time, especially when I had lots of time (student) did hard core roleplay. Why did I stop and move to EQ2, Horizons, Vanguard ect (retired on the later ones)?
Because ...
- I'm in love with 3D and the UO 3D client is crap
- There is no german localized server and roleplay in a foreign language is plain bad
- certain technical compromises to make sure you can have your house as a casual player too in a useful place )instead of cluttering huge areas with ghost towns) are just reasonable AND do not collide with sand box games
- I like quests every now and than but UO ... hm and it is bad to have almost only player generated content when player are casual and thus in little contact with each other, chatting long distance with a guild - nope, so how do I feel part of a community if I have little time to play?
In EQ2 we have the guild hall to "concentrate" my guildies and chat channels, even as a casual I have enough to do and rewards from it and can still have a reasonable apartment with lots of decoration and be a good crafter. Events are timed in a way I can take part too even as casual and doesn't need to adhere to player events time points. In UO because the gameplay is totally unrestricted or almost nothing done to soften the need of competition between long-hour player and casual player I'm plain left behind. And while now many might scream "but this is just fair" - it might be FAIR but it doesn't mean I PAYING for it.
I'm very much looking for another sandbox game, would even accept a certain PvP danger there (I'm not into PvP and die, I don't complain). But Hz had an insane grind for level up and housing. I will never ever harvest a single piece of Kenaf in my life again (:P). Vanguard had a big grind too after a short time, nothing else happening and little one could do to run player events except ... scavenger hunts, world was not interactive and much too big for those few people. Ryzom was awesome in terms of world design but ... the world was just a background scenery, you could not interact with it, mobs and ressource nodes (which you spawn yourself by searching for them) yes, but apart from that? SWG ... erm ... I've never been in a game that felt as sterile and artificial and generic optical wise. I've spent many hours running around but nobody there, as in UO ghost towns. Wanted to be a beast breeder and finally learned that it needs extremly expensive machines to do that and massive trial-and-error grind to find working cross overs. Plain impossible for a casual.
My understanding of "sandbox" means: bottom-to-top programming. Now in my opinion a sandbox game still needs a certain amount of quests - which are top-to-bottom. The mix of both can be difficult. Restricted/regulated PvP, mix of instancing for housing (found a village/city non-instanced by many player working on the center functions/building but make appartments/housing itself instanced in center buildings for example). The thing I miss is a good mix of all the ideas we have meanwhile seen in a MMO to make a new kind of hybrid. That one would be successful I believe.
Edit: Oh I forgot AtitD, why did I leave that one after some month? Because ... it ENDS. I tried to get used to the idea of what I built there is just destroyed when AtitD is restarted from scratch as it does every few years. But I could not get used to it this idea and a few month it was supposed to be over. So this killed AtitD for me. And I loved it, even though it was a huge and mostly life devoid world where a little bit more plants and people could have made a big difference.
Played: Pretty much any fantasy MMO, some did not even make it to release ... Favorites: UO, EQ2, Vanguard, Wurm Online, Salem, ESO, Creativerse Playing: ESO, Creativerse, Guild Wars 2 Anticipating: (sigh) ... maybe Ashes of Creation
I don't consider EQ1 a theme park MMO personally. It had alot of depth. You had a ton of freedoms that we do not see in todays games. Freedom to do stupid things and pay the price, freedom to explore, freedom to hunt and group in different zones/area's. No I do not consider EQ1 a theme park MMO, it had no hand holding (in the begining).
I think that WoW started the true theme park MMO. WoW does not allow you to make mistakes and pay the price. You are always marching forward with nothing to stop your progress but time and yourself. I think that is what a theme park MMO really is. A game that does not have anything in place to stop your progress other then time.
UO was a fun game, not my cup of tea but a fun game non the less. The freedom and depth of UO was amazing and we can see that in EvE online. EvE online is a fun game, PvE is boring to me but the PvP is fun, the freedom is great.
I am hoping to see more "sandbox" games but as of right now the "money makers" are theme park casual MMOs. Look people I agree with most of you, UO and EQ1 were way more fun then anything we see today minus EvE but money talks the loudest in business and WoW showed that a theme park, casual game makes the most money. Game companies have not figured out that they cannot just clone WoW and be successful. The first game company to understand that they need to make a unique game will be successful. That game does not have to be a sandbox game nor does it have to be a theme park game but it has to be unique and bring something new to the genre.
I think that is the biggest problem. Sure alot of us Hardcore gamers hate these new games and think they ruined the genre. Sure I can see that but in all fairness, what has really ruined the genre is the lack of creativity from developers. Until we get a developer willing to take risk and come up with something new and fresh we will keep seeing the same rehashed theme park games over and over again. Darkfall tried but in my opinion failed. It failed because it did not live up to its developers own hype. I can show many examples of Darkfall Developers talking about features that are simply not in game at this time.
Nothing is going to bring back our days in games like OU and EQ. I have learned to live with that fact but I will not accept the lack of creativity in a genre that should be all about creativity. Like I said, the first company to create a fresh, unique game will be successful. Each new game needs to bring something new to the genre or it is bound to fail.
A great example of this can be found in todays business world. Look at Windows. Sure not everyone likes Windows but each new version of windows brings new features. Not all are good but they are new and fresh features. That is what drives products. Same with the Car industry, new cars have new features, some are good and some are bad but they have new and fresh features with each new model. We simply do not see that in todays MMO industry. They keep rehashing the same features over and over again with new skins.
Because it's a 12-year old game with appropriate graphics (Including their new client, which is in my opinoin, not much better) run by a skeleton crew of developers with questionable experience, attempting to finangle code developed in the last century and no real vision for it's future, dealing with mistakes to gameplay made over the course of a decade that can't be changed without alienating it's already fractured veteran player base, while at the same time doing nothing to appeal to new players?
I recall in '01 playing Ultima Onlne thinking this is great and I can't imagine what great games this will spawn. Back then I thought we would see games developed that would offer complex house building, farming lands and herding wild animals into pens to sheer and slaughter. Games with balance in pve and pvp where both aren't game makers or breakers but both are fun. Content that is player created and supported by the company and vice versa. Imagine what gaming would be like if gaming went with the UO style rather than the EQ style. I for one think it sounds better than hitting level 9000 and raiding to gain super sayain gear with flames.
You mean hardcore gaming style? i am sorry but since MMOs became mainstream its casual players who earn these companies there bread and butter. UO was never mean to be played casually. If i had no life and 12 hours a day to burn i would play games like UO.
You've obviously never played UO then. The whole point in UO was you could do whatever you wanted, some things took longer, some not so much. It's ironic that the raids in a lot of these "casual" games consume more time than any one thing in most sandbox games.
Until some jerk who thinks he's the Terminator with a keyboard comes and takes all that stuff you worked for, and you are back to square one feeling like you just wasted the last few days.
Then you get friends to mine and hunt with you. Maybe pay a warrior with some crafted gear for their time protecting? Maybe you get in a guild with people that will help you?
Instead of crying about getting your butt handed to you in a 1v1, players are forced to either improve their game or interact with other players. Not a bad thing in a MMO in my opinion......also not to mention that doing something as simple as minning was 100x more exciting in UO than it is in games like WOW.
I think a big problem with original UO was the unlimited open world pvp/complete loot model. Games like that always attract the absolute dregs of the internet.
I agree. Not on UO specifically, just saying that any "sandbox" MMO will have to ditch the FFA PvP idea to be really successful. RvR, faction vs faction, frontier zones, any of these would be a better choice for the large majority of players out there.
Like most MMOs, UO received some unfavorable patches that drove the majority away. Checkout wikipedia on the Age of Shadows expansion
Rare is there an MMO that's run by devs smart enough to stick to their original vision and not drive away the bulk of their fanbase with crappy expansions, sadly
edit- what some posters fail to mention, the UO they speak of is either UO pre-AoS or UO pre-Trammel. For example, the UO I played was pre-AoS. I don';t anything about the post-Age of Shadows / post-Trammel UO. To make matters even more confusing, let's just say UO has a lot of incarnations out there. I personally played UO a few yrs ago before jumping off to EVE Online
I haven't read all the posts but most seem to mention the money issue (which is true)
Another main reason I believe many of the recent developers have gone the "Theme Park" route is the control over the content that developers have vs. a sandbox game that is puts much of the "endgame" experience in the hands of the players.
The developers (and investors) feel more comfortable with the experience of the players to be in control of the developers. Doing so allows the developers to be PROACTIVE in content releases, and more importantly for investors, more PREDICTABLE.
In a sandbox enviornment, developers are forced to take a more REACTIVE approach to the released content based on what the playerbase does with it. If it does not achieve the intended experience, then things have to be reworked and tweaked. Reworks are present in all games....but sandbox games lends itself to more work for the dev team.
With all that said, I fully support more Sandbox games. I just wish that someone will stop screwing with the UO formula by making radical changes like 1st Person POV only, no skill caps, space ship only combat. Just take UO's system as was (top to bottom) before they turned it into a 2D version of WOW in the Age of Shadows expansion and create it in a 3D environment much like WOW is. BAM....your done!
One other thing regarding Sandbox vs. Theme Park (or more specifically.....an environment that is dangerous vs. environment with training wheels)
Say what you want about how A-Hole PKers ruined the game and created a bad community......
BECAUSE of the PKers, and the higher risk involved in playing the game......players were more aware of their environment and knew how to play their characters better than what you see in "safer" games because it was a necessity for survival.
If you were an idiot who didn't pay attention to your surroundings, you died alot in UO and either quit the game or got better at it.
If you didn't know anything about your character other than 2 buttons, you died alot in UO and either quit the game or learned to play your toon better.
If you were an a-hole to random people, you got dealt with in UO because of its FFA system....
If you couldn't manage to get things done by yourself, you made friends in UO and socialied with other people and progressed in a community environment....
People joined guilds early in their characters life and built long lasting relationships with people and guilds through their entire progression process......not AFTER you've hit level cap and got the required gear like in WOW.
All of these things (IMO) create a better community than what you typically find in many Theme Park (or risk adverse) MMOs. Not saying that there aren't good people and good experiences to be had with the community in games like WOW.....its just that the sink or swim / tough love system in many sandboxes do a better job at weeding out the idiots, crybabies, and antisocialites that plague much of the community we see today.
Bad for game publishers because idiots, crybabies and antisocialites pay the same 12-15 bucks a month as the rest of the people.
Good for the players who don't have to deal with a level of idiocy on a daily basis that makes you question the public education system.
I haven't read all the posts but most seem to mention the money issue (which is true) Another main reason I believe many of the recent developers have gone the "Theme Park" route is the control over the content that developers have vs. a sandbox game that is puts much of the "endgame" experience in the hands of the players. The developers (and investors) feel more comfortable with the experience of the players to be in control of the developers. Doing so allows the developers to be PROACTIVE in content releases, and more importantly for investors, more PREDICTABLE. In a sandbox enviornment, developers are forced to take a more REACTIVE approach to the released content based on what the playerbase does with it. If it does not achieve the intended experience, then things have to be reworked and tweaked. Reworks are present in all games....but sandbox games lends itself to more work for the dev team.
With all that said, I fully support more Sandbox games. I just wish that someone will stop screwing with the UO formula by making radical changes like 1st Person POV only, no skill caps, space ship only combat. Just take UO's system as was (top to bottom) before they turned it into a 2D version of WOW in the Age of Shadows expansion and create it in a 3D environment much like WOW is. BAM....your done!
I recall in '01 playing Ultima Onlne thinking this is great and I can't imagine what great games this will spawn. Back then I thought we would see games developed that would offer complex house building, farming lands and herding wild animals into pens to sheer and slaughter. Games with balance in pve and pvp where both aren't game makers or breakers but both are fun. Content that is player created and supported by the company and vice versa. Imagine what gaming would be like if gaming went with the UO style rather than the EQ style. I for one think it sounds better than hitting level 9000 and raiding to gain super sayain gear with flames.
You mean hardcore gaming style? i am sorry but since MMOs became mainstream its casual players who earn these companies there bread and butter. UO was never mean to be played casually. If i had no life and 12 hours a day to burn i would play games like UO.
You've obviously never played UO then. The whole point in UO was you could do whatever you wanted, some things took longer, some not so much. It's ironic that the raids in a lot of these "casual" games consume more time than any one thing in most sandbox games.
Until some jerk who thinks he's the Terminator with a keyboard comes and takes all that stuff you worked for, and you are back to square one feeling like you just wasted the last few days.
Then you get friends to mine and hunt with you. Maybe pay a warrior with some crafted gear for their time protecting? Maybe you get in a guild with people that will help you?
Instead of crying about getting your butt handed to you in a 1v1, players are forced to either improve their game or interact with other players. Not a bad thing in a MMO in my opinion......also not to mention that doing something as simple as minning was 100x more exciting in UO than it is in games like WOW.
"Forced to"??? in a game? LOL .. that is why people are NOT playing it. NO one likes to be forced to do anything. People play games to have FUN, not to be forced to do anything. WOW is 100x more successful because it provides CHOICE. If you don't want to participate in PvP, you don't have to. If you don't want to raid, you can just do 5-man dungeons.
And whoever said mining is fun in UO is delusional. I have done it .. standing there, clicking and clicking with 50 other guys standing next to me. I would much rather go kill 10 wolves instead ... at least i get to KILL some stuff and MOVE my toon.
But even after 3 pages of discussion, it is quite moot. The market will not go back to UO. It is not that big of a success, compared to EQ and WOW.
Originally posted by nariusseldon "Forced to"??? in a game? LOL .. that is why people are NOT playing it. NO one likes to be forced to do anything. People play games to have FUN, not to be forced to do anything. WOW is 100x more successful because it provides CHOICE. If you don't want to participate in PvP, you don't have to. If you don't want to raid, you can just do 5-man dungeons. And whoever said mining is fun in UO is delusional. I have done it .. standing there, clicking and clicking with 50 other guys standing next to me. I would much rather go kill 10 wolves instead ... at least i get to KILL some stuff and MOVE my toon. But even after 3 pages of discussion, it is quite moot. The market will not go back to UO. It is not that big of a success, compared to EQ and WOW.
I always considered the 'forced' aspects of MMOs to be as anti-sandbox as you can get. I have always been fascinated by EVE but the PvP in it pretty much kills off any sandbox appeal that game has for me. Sandbox games to me are about bulding stuff and PvP kills any joy that brings to me. WoW might lack the range of options that EVE has but at least in that game what I build sticks around.
I recall in '01 playing Ultima Onlne thinking this is great and I can't imagine what great games this will spawn. Back then I thought we would see games developed that would offer complex house building, farming lands and herding wild animals into pens to sheer and slaughter. Games with balance in pve and pvp where both aren't game makers or breakers but both are fun. Content that is player created and supported by the company and vice versa. Imagine what gaming would be like if gaming went with the UO style rather than the EQ style. I for one think it sounds better than hitting level 9000 and raiding to gain super sayain gear with flames.
You mean hardcore gaming style? i am sorry but since MMOs became mainstream its casual players who earn these companies there bread and butter. UO was never mean to be played casually. If i had no life and 12 hours a day to burn i would play games like UO.
You've obviously never played UO then. The whole point in UO was you could do whatever you wanted, some things took longer, some not so much. It's ironic that the raids in a lot of these "casual" games consume more time than any one thing in most sandbox games.
Until some jerk who thinks he's the Terminator with a keyboard comes and takes all that stuff you worked for, and you are back to square one feeling like you just wasted the last few days.
Then you get friends to mine and hunt with you. Maybe pay a warrior with some crafted gear for their time protecting? Maybe you get in a guild with people that will help you?
Instead of crying about getting your butt handed to you in a 1v1, players are forced to either improve their game or interact with other players. Not a bad thing in a MMO in my opinion......also not to mention that doing something as simple as minning was 100x more exciting in UO than it is in games like WOW.
"Forced to"??? in a game? LOL .. that is why people are NOT playing it. NO one likes to be forced to do anything. People play games to have FUN, not to be forced to do anything. WOW is 100x more successful because it provides CHOICE. If you don't want to participate in PvP, you don't have to. If you don't want to raid, you can just do 5-man dungeons.
And whoever said mining is fun in UO is delusional. I have done it .. standing there, clicking and clicking with 50 other guys standing next to me. I would much rather go kill 10 wolves instead ... at least i get to KILL some stuff and MOVE my toon.
But even after 3 pages of discussion, it is quite moot. The market will not go back to UO. It is not that big of a success, compared to EQ and WOW.
So when playing those games, and you don't succeed in those raids, or those 5-mans, arent you once again forced to improve your game, or interact with others to help?
Like most MMOs, UO received some unfavorable patches that drove the majority away. Checkout wikipedia on the Age of Shadows expansion
Rare is there an MMO that's run by devs smart enough to stick to their original vision and not drive away the bulk of their fanbase with crappy expansions, sadly
edit- what some posters fail to mention, the UO they speak of is either UO pre-AoS or UO pre-Trammel. For example, the UO I played was pre-AoS. I don';t anything about the post-Age of Shadows / post-Trammel UO. To make matters even more confusing, let's just say UO has a lot of incarnations out there. I personally played UO a few yrs ago before jumping off to EVE Online
That's a good answer. I also played UO a long time. My point is that UO was great, yes, but not as great as some seem to recall - we as gamers were not nearly as fickle and picky as we are now.
EDIT: Look at Darkfall. It IS UO in 3D. Yet all I read about the whole time I played was whinign about how grindy it was.. from ex-UO players! UO was equally as grindy, but folk seem to forget that part.
I recall in '01 playing Ultima Onlne thinking this is great and I can't imagine what great games this will spawn. Back then I thought we would see games developed that would offer complex house building, farming lands and herding wild animals into pens to sheer and slaughter. Games with balance in pve and pvp where both aren't game makers or breakers but both are fun. Content that is player created and supported by the company and vice versa. Imagine what gaming would be like if gaming went with the UO style rather than the EQ style. I for one think it sounds better than hitting level 9000 and raiding to gain super sayain gear with flames.
You mean hardcore gaming style? i am sorry but since MMOs became mainstream its casual players who earn these companies there bread and butter. UO was never mean to be played casually. If i had no life and 12 hours a day to burn i would play games like UO.
You've obviously never played UO then. The whole point in UO was you could do whatever you wanted, some things took longer, some not so much. It's ironic that the raids in a lot of these "casual" games consume more time than any one thing in most sandbox games.
Until some jerk who thinks he's the Terminator with a keyboard comes and takes all that stuff you worked for, and you are back to square one feeling like you just wasted the last few days.
Then you get friends to mine and hunt with you. Maybe pay a warrior with some crafted gear for their time protecting? Maybe you get in a guild with people that will help you?
Instead of crying about getting your butt handed to you in a 1v1, players are forced to either improve their game or interact with other players. Not a bad thing in a MMO in my opinion......also not to mention that doing something as simple as minning was 100x more exciting in UO than it is in games like WOW.
"Forced to"??? in a game? LOL .. that is why people are NOT playing it. NO one likes to be forced to do anything. People play games to have FUN, not to be forced to do anything. WOW is 100x more successful because it provides CHOICE. If you don't want to participate in PvP, you don't have to. If you don't want to raid, you can just do 5-man dungeons.
And whoever said mining is fun in UO is delusional. I have done it .. standing there, clicking and clicking with 50 other guys standing next to me. I would much rather go kill 10 wolves instead ... at least i get to KILL some stuff and MOVE my toon.
But even after 3 pages of discussion, it is quite moot. The market will not go back to UO. It is not that big of a success, compared to EQ and WOW.
So when playing those games, and you don't succeed in those raids, or those 5-mans, arent you once again forced to improve your game, or interact with others to help?
Your argument is silly.
No. Because I can always go back to solo-play. And they make it EASY enough so that anyone can be successful in 5-man. You have no such difficulty adjusting options in PvP. Even raids have different levels of difficulties.
I recall in '01 playing Ultima Onlne thinking this is great and I can't imagine what great games this will spawn. Back then I thought we would see games developed that would offer complex house building, farming lands and herding wild animals into pens to sheer and slaughter. Games with balance in pve and pvp where both aren't game makers or breakers but both are fun. Content that is player created and supported by the company and vice versa. Imagine what gaming would be like if gaming went with the UO style rather than the EQ style. I for one think it sounds better than hitting level 9000 and raiding to gain super sayain gear with flames.
You mean hardcore gaming style? i am sorry but since MMOs became mainstream its casual players who earn these companies there bread and butter. UO was never mean to be played casually. If i had no life and 12 hours a day to burn i would play games like UO.
You've obviously never played UO then. The whole point in UO was you could do whatever you wanted, some things took longer, some not so much. It's ironic that the raids in a lot of these "casual" games consume more time than any one thing in most sandbox games.
Until some jerk who thinks he's the Terminator with a keyboard comes and takes all that stuff you worked for, and you are back to square one feeling like you just wasted the last few days.
Then you get friends to mine and hunt with you. Maybe pay a warrior with some crafted gear for their time protecting? Maybe you get in a guild with people that will help you?
Instead of crying about getting your butt handed to you in a 1v1, players are forced to either improve their game or interact with other players. Not a bad thing in a MMO in my opinion......also not to mention that doing something as simple as minning was 100x more exciting in UO than it is in games like WOW.
"Forced to"??? in a game? LOL .. that is why people are NOT playing it. NO one likes to be forced to do anything. People play games to have FUN, not to be forced to do anything. WOW is 100x more successful because it provides CHOICE. If you don't want to participate in PvP, you don't have to. If you don't want to raid, you can just do 5-man dungeons.
And whoever said mining is fun in UO is delusional. I have done it .. standing there, clicking and clicking with 50 other guys standing next to me. I would much rather go kill 10 wolves instead ... at least i get to KILL some stuff and MOVE my toon.
But even after 3 pages of discussion, it is quite moot. The market will not go back to UO. It is not that big of a success, compared to EQ and WOW.
So when playing those games, and you don't succeed in those raids, or those 5-mans, arent you once again forced to improve your game, or interact with others to help?
Your argument is silly.
No. Because I can always go back to solo-play. And they make it EASY enough so that anyone can be successful in 5-man. You have no such difficulty adjusting options in PvP. Even raids have different levels of difficulties.
Can you say the same about ganging pk-fest?
And once you get bored with EASY?
Because for me at least, it doesnt hold my attention long.
edit
Just constantly adjusting the game till i win seems, well.... cheap.. I'd rather be forced to better my game
Then you get friends to mine and hunt with you. Maybe pay a warrior with some crafted gear for their time protecting? Maybe you get in a guild with people that will help you? Instead of crying about getting your butt handed to you in a 1v1, players are forced to either improve their game or interact with other players. Not a bad thing in a MMO in my opinion......also not to mention that doing something as simple as minning was 100x more exciting in UO than it is in games like WOW.
"Forced to"??? in a game? LOL .. that is why people are NOT playing it. NO one likes to be forced to do anything. People play games to have FUN, not to be forced to do anything. WOW is 100x more successful because it provides CHOICE. If you don't want to participate in PvP, you don't have to. If you don't want to raid, you can just do 5-man dungeons.
And whoever said mining is fun in UO is delusional. I have done it .. standing there, clicking and clicking with 50 other guys standing next to me. I would much rather go kill 10 wolves instead ... at least i get to KILL some stuff and MOVE my toon.
But even after 3 pages of discussion, it is quite moot. The market will not go back to UO. It is not that big of a success, compared to EQ and WOW.
Yea...forced to. Playing the "Its just a Game" card doesn't work for this argument. WOW "gently forces" you to explore new regions because quests tell you to go there. WOW "gently forces" you to run 5 mans if you want to have gear good enough to kill anything more challenging than random world monsters. WOW "gently forces" you to run raids if you want to experience anything somewhat challenging in the game. When's the last time someone in quest greens got picked for an endgame raid?
EVERY game, from jump rope to professional Football (at its most basic function) is about overcoming a challenge. People realize FUN by progression and ultimately overcoming the challenge. MOST people don't have a lot of fun Failing and Failing and Failing because they refuse to do what it takes to progress and/or overcome the challenge.
The secret to WOW is that they set the bar so low that any person over the age of 3 and has command over their motor skills can play the game. No problem with that other than the people who want something more meaningful and a bit more challenging are FORCED into the rat race that is Endgame Raiding and/or Arena.
Secondly, never said mining in UO was fun for everyone (some people enjoy accumulating lots of resources). I just said that mining in UO is 100x more exciting than mining in WOW. That statement says more about mining in WOW more than it says anything about mining in UO. At the very least in UO, you had to watch your back with a hightened sence of awareness due to PKers.
Like most MMOs, UO received some unfavorable patches that drove the majority away. Checkout wikipedia on the Age of Shadows expansion
Rare is there an MMO that's run by devs smart enough to stick to their original vision and not drive away the bulk of their fanbase with crappy expansions, sadly
edit- what some posters fail to mention, the UO they speak of is either UO pre-AoS or UO pre-Trammel. For example, the UO I played was pre-AoS. I don';t anything about the post-Age of Shadows / post-Trammel UO. To make matters even more confusing, let's just say UO has a lot of incarnations out there. I personally played UO a few yrs ago before jumping off to EVE Online
That's a good answer. I also played UO a long time. My point is that UO was great, yes, but not as great as some seem to recall - we as gamers were not nearly as fickle and picky as we are now.
EDIT: Look at Darkfall. It IS UO in 3D. Yet all I read about the whole time I played was whinign about how grindy it was.. from ex-UO players! UO was equally as grindy, but folk seem to forget that part.
Darkfall (while very similar) had some pretty key differences from UO. Part of the "fickle" dynamic from then to now had a lot to do with the availability of alternatives.
If you didn't like the way things went in UO, your only other option for a while was EQ. Considering it was such a big difference alot of people dealt with the harsh and unforgiving environment and I argue that the community benefited from it. Kind of like taking your bad tasting medicine.....it sucks going down, but ultimately serves a greater cause.
If you ask any person if they liked losing all their crap everytime they died....most wil ltell you NO. Yet because of the full loot system, PvP combat was more meaningful, hearts thumping, adreneline pumping and the majority of the playerbase knew their toons better and was more aware of their surroundings as a result.
And yes.....old UO players that have been playing games that have much faster rewards for effort over the last 10 years will experience some "grind" shock when playing a game that isn't driven by quests.
I recall in '01 playing Ultima Onlne thinking this is great and I can't imagine what great games this will spawn. Back then I thought we would see games developed that would offer complex house building, farming lands and herding wild animals into pens to sheer and slaughter. Games with balance in pve and pvp where both aren't game makers or breakers but both are fun. Content that is player created and supported by the company and vice versa. Imagine what gaming would be like if gaming went with the UO style rather than the EQ style. I for one think it sounds better than hitting level 9000 and raiding to gain super sayain gear with flames.
You mean hardcore gaming style? i am sorry but since MMOs became mainstream its casual players who earn these companies there bread and butter. UO was never mean to be played casually. If i had no life and 12 hours a day to burn i would play games like UO.
You've obviously never played UO then. The whole point in UO was you could do whatever you wanted, some things took longer, some not so much. It's ironic that the raids in a lot of these "casual" games consume more time than any one thing in most sandbox games.
Until some jerk who thinks he's the Terminator with a keyboard comes and takes all that stuff you worked for, and you are back to square one feeling like you just wasted the last few days.
Then you get friends to mine and hunt with you. Maybe pay a warrior with some crafted gear for their time protecting? Maybe you get in a guild with people that will help you?
Instead of crying about getting your butt handed to you in a 1v1, players are forced to either improve their game or interact with other players. Not a bad thing in a MMO in my opinion......also not to mention that doing something as simple as minning was 100x more exciting in UO than it is in games like WOW.
"Forced to"??? in a game? LOL .. that is why people are NOT playing it. NO one likes to be forced to do anything. People play games to have FUN, not to be forced to do anything. WOW is 100x more successful because it provides CHOICE. If you don't want to participate in PvP, you don't have to. If you don't want to raid, you can just do 5-man dungeons.
And whoever said mining is fun in UO is delusional. I have done it .. standing there, clicking and clicking with 50 other guys standing next to me. I would much rather go kill 10 wolves instead ... at least i get to KILL some stuff and MOVE my toon.
But even after 3 pages of discussion, it is quite moot. The market will not go back to UO. It is not that big of a success, compared to EQ and WOW.
So when playing those games, and you don't succeed in those raids, or those 5-mans, arent you once again forced to improve your game, or interact with others to help?
Your argument is silly.
No. Because I can always go back to solo-play. And they make it EASY enough so that anyone can be successful in 5-man. You have no such difficulty adjusting options in PvP. Even raids have different levels of difficulties.
Can you say the same about ganging pk-fest?
And once you get bored with EASY?
Because for me at least, it doesnt hold my attention long.
edit
Just constantly adjusting the game till i win seems, well.... cheap.. I'd rather be forced to better my game
AGREED with this guy. Hard to reach your potential if you can just knock the bar down instead of stepping up your game. The victory is oooh sooo much more sweeter.
Comments
Minority was typed as it was in mind for something else. 2001 ish they were close to them numbers. And you are great at trying to drag people into fight. Rules on this forum say I can't and you will go off reporting me. I'll solve my problem that is you with the block feature.
All I did was cite a data source. If you consider that "dragging" you into a fight, perhaps this reveals precisely how concrete your side of the argument is.
If you want discussion, provide evidence of your subscription claim.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
I fully agree. UO should of been our future. Instead we end up waiting 13 years for something good to come out (Darkfall) while hundreds of EQ clones, like WoW, live and die.
The definition of insanity: doing the same thing over and over expecting different results.
I understand your point, however...
I honestly think people over-exagerate the punishment for failure in a game like UO. If you die to a red, you can recall to one of hundreds of player vendors, grab yourself a new set of armor, and be back in business just as fast as you can make a corpse run in just about any other game. Thats if you don't have your own armorsmith. Its honestly, not that harsh.
Me personally, i think its more about the punishment of a real person beating them, and taking their "personal stuff".. Get beat by a designers AI, "most" people barely sweat it, and chance are, given two or three more tries, said person can beat that NPC, and in a case like UO, get your stuff back. Easy.
The thought of going back to fight that PC, and losing your stuff again however, would probably not cross most peoples mind..
To me, it makes no difference if I die to red, its the game. Trust me, that red has died before, and will die again. I've yet to see an MMO where someone is undefeated in everything they do.
-edit-
So in my opinion, the harshness of the death penalty is more made up by the players ego, than the mechanics of the game.
/shrug
Nah .. i was in UO beta and thought that it was a horrible game. Clicking nonstop to level mining. Everyone a tank mage. Pk is rampant. You can't move 10 feet without being killed. Any place with any resources is camped to the hilt.
I jumped ship once EQ came out. Never look back. Despite with all the problems (down-time, camping ..), EQ is 10x the game UO is. And i am glad that the industry moved AWAY from the UO model. And by the maximum subscription rate of this two games, a lot more people like the EQ model than the UO model.
Even though I love the UO concept, this guy is right.
Until the masses will fall in love with the UO concept, it is the EQ concept that will prevail. And to be honest, I really don't blame them.
See, the 'concept' of UO is great. They way it works out in the end is horrible. Theoretically the game is great, in practice it is a disaster. Only very few masochistic people among us like to be PK camped for the little time they can dedicate on an MMORPG. The majority however wants to spend their time having 'fun' and be entertained. And unfortunately, the 'elite' or 'hardcore' players are a very tiny little group compared to the mainstream players. As a result, any MMORPG company will be more inclined to cater to the mainstream folks, to be assured of a certain revenue, as opposed to the other smallish group, that will not generate a whole lot of revenue.
Don't feel too sad about it though. Once people will get bored with the mainstream concept, which they will inevitably, you'll see that several UO style games will be made to offer veriety. But until then, it's the EQ models that will dominate the MMORPG market.
Open PvP and sandbox are no synonyms. I've played UO a long time, especially when I had lots of time (student) did hard core roleplay. Why did I stop and move to EQ2, Horizons, Vanguard ect (retired on the later ones)?
Because ...
- I'm in love with 3D and the UO 3D client is crap
- There is no german localized server and roleplay in a foreign language is plain bad
- certain technical compromises to make sure you can have your house as a casual player too in a useful place )instead of cluttering huge areas with ghost towns) are just reasonable AND do not collide with sand box games
- I like quests every now and than but UO ... hm and it is bad to have almost only player generated content when player are casual and thus in little contact with each other, chatting long distance with a guild - nope, so how do I feel part of a community if I have little time to play?
In EQ2 we have the guild hall to "concentrate" my guildies and chat channels, even as a casual I have enough to do and rewards from it and can still have a reasonable apartment with lots of decoration and be a good crafter. Events are timed in a way I can take part too even as casual and doesn't need to adhere to player events time points. In UO because the gameplay is totally unrestricted or almost nothing done to soften the need of competition between long-hour player and casual player I'm plain left behind. And while now many might scream "but this is just fair" - it might be FAIR but it doesn't mean I PAYING for it.
I'm very much looking for another sandbox game, would even accept a certain PvP danger there (I'm not into PvP and die, I don't complain). But Hz had an insane grind for level up and housing. I will never ever harvest a single piece of Kenaf in my life again (:P). Vanguard had a big grind too after a short time, nothing else happening and little one could do to run player events except ... scavenger hunts, world was not interactive and much too big for those few people. Ryzom was awesome in terms of world design but ... the world was just a background scenery, you could not interact with it, mobs and ressource nodes (which you spawn yourself by searching for them) yes, but apart from that? SWG ... erm ... I've never been in a game that felt as sterile and artificial and generic optical wise. I've spent many hours running around but nobody there, as in UO ghost towns. Wanted to be a beast breeder and finally learned that it needs extremly expensive machines to do that and massive trial-and-error grind to find working cross overs. Plain impossible for a casual.
My understanding of "sandbox" means: bottom-to-top programming. Now in my opinion a sandbox game still needs a certain amount of quests - which are top-to-bottom. The mix of both can be difficult. Restricted/regulated PvP, mix of instancing for housing (found a village/city non-instanced by many player working on the center functions/building but make appartments/housing itself instanced in center buildings for example). The thing I miss is a good mix of all the ideas we have meanwhile seen in a MMO to make a new kind of hybrid. That one would be successful I believe.
Edit: Oh I forgot AtitD, why did I leave that one after some month? Because ... it ENDS. I tried to get used to the idea of what I built there is just destroyed when AtitD is restarted from scratch as it does every few years. But I could not get used to it this idea and a few month it was supposed to be over. So this killed AtitD for me. And I loved it, even though it was a huge and mostly life devoid world where a little bit more plants and people could have made a big difference.
Played: Pretty much any fantasy MMO, some did not even make it to release ...
Favorites: UO, EQ2, Vanguard, Wurm Online, Salem, ESO, Creativerse
Playing: ESO, Creativerse, Guild Wars 2
Anticipating: (sigh) ... maybe Ashes of Creation
I don't consider EQ1 a theme park MMO personally. It had alot of depth. You had a ton of freedoms that we do not see in todays games. Freedom to do stupid things and pay the price, freedom to explore, freedom to hunt and group in different zones/area's. No I do not consider EQ1 a theme park MMO, it had no hand holding (in the begining).
I think that WoW started the true theme park MMO. WoW does not allow you to make mistakes and pay the price. You are always marching forward with nothing to stop your progress but time and yourself. I think that is what a theme park MMO really is. A game that does not have anything in place to stop your progress other then time.
UO was a fun game, not my cup of tea but a fun game non the less. The freedom and depth of UO was amazing and we can see that in EvE online. EvE online is a fun game, PvE is boring to me but the PvP is fun, the freedom is great.
I am hoping to see more "sandbox" games but as of right now the "money makers" are theme park casual MMOs. Look people I agree with most of you, UO and EQ1 were way more fun then anything we see today minus EvE but money talks the loudest in business and WoW showed that a theme park, casual game makes the most money. Game companies have not figured out that they cannot just clone WoW and be successful. The first game company to understand that they need to make a unique game will be successful. That game does not have to be a sandbox game nor does it have to be a theme park game but it has to be unique and bring something new to the genre.
I think that is the biggest problem. Sure alot of us Hardcore gamers hate these new games and think they ruined the genre. Sure I can see that but in all fairness, what has really ruined the genre is the lack of creativity from developers. Until we get a developer willing to take risk and come up with something new and fresh we will keep seeing the same rehashed theme park games over and over again. Darkfall tried but in my opinion failed. It failed because it did not live up to its developers own hype. I can show many examples of Darkfall Developers talking about features that are simply not in game at this time.
Nothing is going to bring back our days in games like OU and EQ. I have learned to live with that fact but I will not accept the lack of creativity in a genre that should be all about creativity. Like I said, the first company to create a fresh, unique game will be successful. Each new game needs to bring something new to the genre or it is bound to fail.
A great example of this can be found in todays business world. Look at Windows. Sure not everyone likes Windows but each new version of windows brings new features. Not all are good but they are new and fresh features. That is what drives products. Same with the Car industry, new cars have new features, some are good and some are bad but they have new and fresh features with each new model. We simply do not see that in todays MMO industry. They keep rehashing the same features over and over again with new skins.
Sooner or Later
If UO is so great, howcome you're not playing it?
Because it's a 12-year old game with appropriate graphics (Including their new client, which is in my opinoin, not much better) run by a skeleton crew of developers with questionable experience, attempting to finangle code developed in the last century and no real vision for it's future, dealing with mistakes to gameplay made over the course of a decade that can't be changed without alienating it's already fractured veteran player base, while at the same time doing nothing to appeal to new players?
Other than that, I guess there is no good reason.
You mean hardcore gaming style? i am sorry but since MMOs became mainstream its casual players who earn these companies there bread and butter. UO was never mean to be played casually. If i had no life and 12 hours a day to burn i would play games like UO.
You've obviously never played UO then. The whole point in UO was you could do whatever you wanted, some things took longer, some not so much. It's ironic that the raids in a lot of these "casual" games consume more time than any one thing in most sandbox games.
Until some jerk who thinks he's the Terminator with a keyboard comes and takes all that stuff you worked for, and you are back to square one feeling like you just wasted the last few days.
Then you get friends to mine and hunt with you. Maybe pay a warrior with some crafted gear for their time protecting? Maybe you get in a guild with people that will help you?
Instead of crying about getting your butt handed to you in a 1v1, players are forced to either improve their game or interact with other players. Not a bad thing in a MMO in my opinion......also not to mention that doing something as simple as minning was 100x more exciting in UO than it is in games like WOW.
I agree. Not on UO specifically, just saying that any "sandbox" MMO will have to ditch the FFA PvP idea to be really successful. RvR, faction vs faction, frontier zones, any of these would be a better choice for the large majority of players out there.
<cough> EVE Online begs to differ here.
Because I am playing EQ1 and WoW (Yes I know, my roommate is playing so it is fun to group with him and quest).
Sooner or Later
Like most MMOs, UO received some unfavorable patches that drove the majority away. Checkout wikipedia on the Age of Shadows expansion
Rare is there an MMO that's run by devs smart enough to stick to their original vision and not drive away the bulk of their fanbase with crappy expansions, sadly
edit- what some posters fail to mention, the UO they speak of is either UO pre-AoS or UO pre-Trammel. For example, the UO I played was pre-AoS. I don';t anything about the post-Age of Shadows / post-Trammel UO. To make matters even more confusing, let's just say UO has a lot of incarnations out there. I personally played UO a few yrs ago before jumping off to EVE Online
I haven't read all the posts but most seem to mention the money issue (which is true)
Another main reason I believe many of the recent developers have gone the "Theme Park" route is the control over the content that developers have vs. a sandbox game that is puts much of the "endgame" experience in the hands of the players.
The developers (and investors) feel more comfortable with the experience of the players to be in control of the developers. Doing so allows the developers to be PROACTIVE in content releases, and more importantly for investors, more PREDICTABLE.
In a sandbox enviornment, developers are forced to take a more REACTIVE approach to the released content based on what the playerbase does with it. If it does not achieve the intended experience, then things have to be reworked and tweaked. Reworks are present in all games....but sandbox games lends itself to more work for the dev team.
With all that said, I fully support more Sandbox games. I just wish that someone will stop screwing with the UO formula by making radical changes like 1st Person POV only, no skill caps, space ship only combat. Just take UO's system as was (top to bottom) before they turned it into a 2D version of WOW in the Age of Shadows expansion and create it in a 3D environment much like WOW is. BAM....your done!
One other thing regarding Sandbox vs. Theme Park (or more specifically.....an environment that is dangerous vs. environment with training wheels)
Say what you want about how A-Hole PKers ruined the game and created a bad community......
BECAUSE of the PKers, and the higher risk involved in playing the game......players were more aware of their environment and knew how to play their characters better than what you see in "safer" games because it was a necessity for survival.
If you were an idiot who didn't pay attention to your surroundings, you died alot in UO and either quit the game or got better at it.
If you didn't know anything about your character other than 2 buttons, you died alot in UO and either quit the game or learned to play your toon better.
If you were an a-hole to random people, you got dealt with in UO because of its FFA system....
If you couldn't manage to get things done by yourself, you made friends in UO and socialied with other people and progressed in a community environment....
People joined guilds early in their characters life and built long lasting relationships with people and guilds through their entire progression process......not AFTER you've hit level cap and got the required gear like in WOW.
All of these things (IMO) create a better community than what you typically find in many Theme Park (or risk adverse) MMOs. Not saying that there aren't good people and good experiences to be had with the community in games like WOW.....its just that the sink or swim / tough love system in many sandboxes do a better job at weeding out the idiots, crybabies, and antisocialites that plague much of the community we see today.
Bad for game publishers because idiots, crybabies and antisocialites pay the same 12-15 bucks a month as the rest of the people.
Good for the players who don't have to deal with a level of idiocy on a daily basis that makes you question the public education system.
<cough> Linkrealms
You mean hardcore gaming style? i am sorry but since MMOs became mainstream its casual players who earn these companies there bread and butter. UO was never mean to be played casually. If i had no life and 12 hours a day to burn i would play games like UO.
You've obviously never played UO then. The whole point in UO was you could do whatever you wanted, some things took longer, some not so much. It's ironic that the raids in a lot of these "casual" games consume more time than any one thing in most sandbox games.
Until some jerk who thinks he's the Terminator with a keyboard comes and takes all that stuff you worked for, and you are back to square one feeling like you just wasted the last few days.
Then you get friends to mine and hunt with you. Maybe pay a warrior with some crafted gear for their time protecting? Maybe you get in a guild with people that will help you?
Instead of crying about getting your butt handed to you in a 1v1, players are forced to either improve their game or interact with other players. Not a bad thing in a MMO in my opinion......also not to mention that doing something as simple as minning was 100x more exciting in UO than it is in games like WOW.
"Forced to"??? in a game? LOL .. that is why people are NOT playing it. NO one likes to be forced to do anything. People play games to have FUN, not to be forced to do anything. WOW is 100x more successful because it provides CHOICE. If you don't want to participate in PvP, you don't have to. If you don't want to raid, you can just do 5-man dungeons.
And whoever said mining is fun in UO is delusional. I have done it .. standing there, clicking and clicking with 50 other guys standing next to me. I would much rather go kill 10 wolves instead ... at least i get to KILL some stuff and MOVE my toon.
But even after 3 pages of discussion, it is quite moot. The market will not go back to UO. It is not that big of a success, compared to EQ and WOW.
I always considered the 'forced' aspects of MMOs to be as anti-sandbox as you can get. I have always been fascinated by EVE but the PvP in it pretty much kills off any sandbox appeal that game has for me. Sandbox games to me are about bulding stuff and PvP kills any joy that brings to me. WoW might lack the range of options that EVE has but at least in that game what I build sticks around.
You mean hardcore gaming style? i am sorry but since MMOs became mainstream its casual players who earn these companies there bread and butter. UO was never mean to be played casually. If i had no life and 12 hours a day to burn i would play games like UO.
You've obviously never played UO then. The whole point in UO was you could do whatever you wanted, some things took longer, some not so much. It's ironic that the raids in a lot of these "casual" games consume more time than any one thing in most sandbox games.
Until some jerk who thinks he's the Terminator with a keyboard comes and takes all that stuff you worked for, and you are back to square one feeling like you just wasted the last few days.
Then you get friends to mine and hunt with you. Maybe pay a warrior with some crafted gear for their time protecting? Maybe you get in a guild with people that will help you?
Instead of crying about getting your butt handed to you in a 1v1, players are forced to either improve their game or interact with other players. Not a bad thing in a MMO in my opinion......also not to mention that doing something as simple as minning was 100x more exciting in UO than it is in games like WOW.
"Forced to"??? in a game? LOL .. that is why people are NOT playing it. NO one likes to be forced to do anything. People play games to have FUN, not to be forced to do anything. WOW is 100x more successful because it provides CHOICE. If you don't want to participate in PvP, you don't have to. If you don't want to raid, you can just do 5-man dungeons.
And whoever said mining is fun in UO is delusional. I have done it .. standing there, clicking and clicking with 50 other guys standing next to me. I would much rather go kill 10 wolves instead ... at least i get to KILL some stuff and MOVE my toon.
But even after 3 pages of discussion, it is quite moot. The market will not go back to UO. It is not that big of a success, compared to EQ and WOW.
So when playing those games, and you don't succeed in those raids, or those 5-mans, arent you once again forced to improve your game, or interact with others to help?
Your argument is silly.
Like most MMOs, UO received some unfavorable patches that drove the majority away. Checkout wikipedia on the Age of Shadows expansion
Rare is there an MMO that's run by devs smart enough to stick to their original vision and not drive away the bulk of their fanbase with crappy expansions, sadly
edit- what some posters fail to mention, the UO they speak of is either UO pre-AoS or UO pre-Trammel. For example, the UO I played was pre-AoS. I don';t anything about the post-Age of Shadows / post-Trammel UO. To make matters even more confusing, let's just say UO has a lot of incarnations out there. I personally played UO a few yrs ago before jumping off to EVE Online
That's a good answer. I also played UO a long time. My point is that UO was great, yes, but not as great as some seem to recall - we as gamers were not nearly as fickle and picky as we are now.
EDIT: Look at Darkfall. It IS UO in 3D. Yet all I read about the whole time I played was whinign about how grindy it was.. from ex-UO players! UO was equally as grindy, but folk seem to forget that part.
You mean hardcore gaming style? i am sorry but since MMOs became mainstream its casual players who earn these companies there bread and butter. UO was never mean to be played casually. If i had no life and 12 hours a day to burn i would play games like UO.
You've obviously never played UO then. The whole point in UO was you could do whatever you wanted, some things took longer, some not so much. It's ironic that the raids in a lot of these "casual" games consume more time than any one thing in most sandbox games.
Until some jerk who thinks he's the Terminator with a keyboard comes and takes all that stuff you worked for, and you are back to square one feeling like you just wasted the last few days.
Then you get friends to mine and hunt with you. Maybe pay a warrior with some crafted gear for their time protecting? Maybe you get in a guild with people that will help you?
Instead of crying about getting your butt handed to you in a 1v1, players are forced to either improve their game or interact with other players. Not a bad thing in a MMO in my opinion......also not to mention that doing something as simple as minning was 100x more exciting in UO than it is in games like WOW.
"Forced to"??? in a game? LOL .. that is why people are NOT playing it. NO one likes to be forced to do anything. People play games to have FUN, not to be forced to do anything. WOW is 100x more successful because it provides CHOICE. If you don't want to participate in PvP, you don't have to. If you don't want to raid, you can just do 5-man dungeons.
And whoever said mining is fun in UO is delusional. I have done it .. standing there, clicking and clicking with 50 other guys standing next to me. I would much rather go kill 10 wolves instead ... at least i get to KILL some stuff and MOVE my toon.
But even after 3 pages of discussion, it is quite moot. The market will not go back to UO. It is not that big of a success, compared to EQ and WOW.
So when playing those games, and you don't succeed in those raids, or those 5-mans, arent you once again forced to improve your game, or interact with others to help?
Your argument is silly.
No. Because I can always go back to solo-play. And they make it EASY enough so that anyone can be successful in 5-man. You have no such difficulty adjusting options in PvP. Even raids have different levels of difficulties.
Can you say the same about ganging pk-fest?
You mean hardcore gaming style? i am sorry but since MMOs became mainstream its casual players who earn these companies there bread and butter. UO was never mean to be played casually. If i had no life and 12 hours a day to burn i would play games like UO.
You've obviously never played UO then. The whole point in UO was you could do whatever you wanted, some things took longer, some not so much. It's ironic that the raids in a lot of these "casual" games consume more time than any one thing in most sandbox games.
Until some jerk who thinks he's the Terminator with a keyboard comes and takes all that stuff you worked for, and you are back to square one feeling like you just wasted the last few days.
Then you get friends to mine and hunt with you. Maybe pay a warrior with some crafted gear for their time protecting? Maybe you get in a guild with people that will help you?
Instead of crying about getting your butt handed to you in a 1v1, players are forced to either improve their game or interact with other players. Not a bad thing in a MMO in my opinion......also not to mention that doing something as simple as minning was 100x more exciting in UO than it is in games like WOW.
"Forced to"??? in a game? LOL .. that is why people are NOT playing it. NO one likes to be forced to do anything. People play games to have FUN, not to be forced to do anything. WOW is 100x more successful because it provides CHOICE. If you don't want to participate in PvP, you don't have to. If you don't want to raid, you can just do 5-man dungeons.
And whoever said mining is fun in UO is delusional. I have done it .. standing there, clicking and clicking with 50 other guys standing next to me. I would much rather go kill 10 wolves instead ... at least i get to KILL some stuff and MOVE my toon.
But even after 3 pages of discussion, it is quite moot. The market will not go back to UO. It is not that big of a success, compared to EQ and WOW.
So when playing those games, and you don't succeed in those raids, or those 5-mans, arent you once again forced to improve your game, or interact with others to help?
Your argument is silly.
No. Because I can always go back to solo-play. And they make it EASY enough so that anyone can be successful in 5-man. You have no such difficulty adjusting options in PvP. Even raids have different levels of difficulties.
Can you say the same about ganging pk-fest?
And once you get bored with EASY?
Because for me at least, it doesnt hold my attention long.
edit
Just constantly adjusting the game till i win seems, well.... cheap.. I'd rather be forced to better my game
"Forced to"??? in a game? LOL .. that is why people are NOT playing it. NO one likes to be forced to do anything. People play games to have FUN, not to be forced to do anything. WOW is 100x more successful because it provides CHOICE. If you don't want to participate in PvP, you don't have to. If you don't want to raid, you can just do 5-man dungeons.
And whoever said mining is fun in UO is delusional. I have done it .. standing there, clicking and clicking with 50 other guys standing next to me. I would much rather go kill 10 wolves instead ... at least i get to KILL some stuff and MOVE my toon.
But even after 3 pages of discussion, it is quite moot. The market will not go back to UO. It is not that big of a success, compared to EQ and WOW.
Yea...forced to. Playing the "Its just a Game" card doesn't work for this argument. WOW "gently forces" you to explore new regions because quests tell you to go there. WOW "gently forces" you to run 5 mans if you want to have gear good enough to kill anything more challenging than random world monsters. WOW "gently forces" you to run raids if you want to experience anything somewhat challenging in the game. When's the last time someone in quest greens got picked for an endgame raid?
EVERY game, from jump rope to professional Football (at its most basic function) is about overcoming a challenge. People realize FUN by progression and ultimately overcoming the challenge. MOST people don't have a lot of fun Failing and Failing and Failing because they refuse to do what it takes to progress and/or overcome the challenge.
The secret to WOW is that they set the bar so low that any person over the age of 3 and has command over their motor skills can play the game. No problem with that other than the people who want something more meaningful and a bit more challenging are FORCED into the rat race that is Endgame Raiding and/or Arena.
Secondly, never said mining in UO was fun for everyone (some people enjoy accumulating lots of resources). I just said that mining in UO is 100x more exciting than mining in WOW. That statement says more about mining in WOW more than it says anything about mining in UO. At the very least in UO, you had to watch your back with a hightened sence of awareness due to PKers.
Like most MMOs, UO received some unfavorable patches that drove the majority away. Checkout wikipedia on the Age of Shadows expansion
Rare is there an MMO that's run by devs smart enough to stick to their original vision and not drive away the bulk of their fanbase with crappy expansions, sadly
edit- what some posters fail to mention, the UO they speak of is either UO pre-AoS or UO pre-Trammel. For example, the UO I played was pre-AoS. I don';t anything about the post-Age of Shadows / post-Trammel UO. To make matters even more confusing, let's just say UO has a lot of incarnations out there. I personally played UO a few yrs ago before jumping off to EVE Online
That's a good answer. I also played UO a long time. My point is that UO was great, yes, but not as great as some seem to recall - we as gamers were not nearly as fickle and picky as we are now.
EDIT: Look at Darkfall. It IS UO in 3D. Yet all I read about the whole time I played was whinign about how grindy it was.. from ex-UO players! UO was equally as grindy, but folk seem to forget that part.
Darkfall (while very similar) had some pretty key differences from UO. Part of the "fickle" dynamic from then to now had a lot to do with the availability of alternatives.
If you didn't like the way things went in UO, your only other option for a while was EQ. Considering it was such a big difference alot of people dealt with the harsh and unforgiving environment and I argue that the community benefited from it. Kind of like taking your bad tasting medicine.....it sucks going down, but ultimately serves a greater cause.
If you ask any person if they liked losing all their crap everytime they died....most wil ltell you NO. Yet because of the full loot system, PvP combat was more meaningful, hearts thumping, adreneline pumping and the majority of the playerbase knew their toons better and was more aware of their surroundings as a result.
And yes.....old UO players that have been playing games that have much faster rewards for effort over the last 10 years will experience some "grind" shock when playing a game that isn't driven by quests.
You mean hardcore gaming style? i am sorry but since MMOs became mainstream its casual players who earn these companies there bread and butter. UO was never mean to be played casually. If i had no life and 12 hours a day to burn i would play games like UO.
You've obviously never played UO then. The whole point in UO was you could do whatever you wanted, some things took longer, some not so much. It's ironic that the raids in a lot of these "casual" games consume more time than any one thing in most sandbox games.
Until some jerk who thinks he's the Terminator with a keyboard comes and takes all that stuff you worked for, and you are back to square one feeling like you just wasted the last few days.
Then you get friends to mine and hunt with you. Maybe pay a warrior with some crafted gear for their time protecting? Maybe you get in a guild with people that will help you?
Instead of crying about getting your butt handed to you in a 1v1, players are forced to either improve their game or interact with other players. Not a bad thing in a MMO in my opinion......also not to mention that doing something as simple as minning was 100x more exciting in UO than it is in games like WOW.
"Forced to"??? in a game? LOL .. that is why people are NOT playing it. NO one likes to be forced to do anything. People play games to have FUN, not to be forced to do anything. WOW is 100x more successful because it provides CHOICE. If you don't want to participate in PvP, you don't have to. If you don't want to raid, you can just do 5-man dungeons.
And whoever said mining is fun in UO is delusional. I have done it .. standing there, clicking and clicking with 50 other guys standing next to me. I would much rather go kill 10 wolves instead ... at least i get to KILL some stuff and MOVE my toon.
But even after 3 pages of discussion, it is quite moot. The market will not go back to UO. It is not that big of a success, compared to EQ and WOW.
So when playing those games, and you don't succeed in those raids, or those 5-mans, arent you once again forced to improve your game, or interact with others to help?
Your argument is silly.
No. Because I can always go back to solo-play. And they make it EASY enough so that anyone can be successful in 5-man. You have no such difficulty adjusting options in PvP. Even raids have different levels of difficulties.
Can you say the same about ganging pk-fest?
And once you get bored with EASY?
Because for me at least, it doesnt hold my attention long.
edit
Just constantly adjusting the game till i win seems, well.... cheap.. I'd rather be forced to better my game
AGREED with this guy. Hard to reach your potential if you can just knock the bar down instead of stepping up your game. The victory is oooh sooo much more sweeter.