Personally, I don't know that the communities have ever been all that great. Back in my UO days, I was probably more tolerant of asshattery than I am today. When the worlds become larger, the groups of idiots become more clear than just having a serious moron or two that you can avoid if you wish.
As I've said, I used to hang around and craft for people, didn't charge a penny for it so long as they brought me the components. I got to watch a lot of really annoying, entitlement-happy assholes who demanded I did things for them for free because they deserved it. Never got a thank you out of a lot of them either. It was all part of the game experience.
I always subscibed to the 'self sorting' theory of communities forming in MMORPGs. Over time people with similar interests, playstyles and temperments will join up to form communities of like minded individuals. Players who do not fit in will be 'sorted out' and outsiders who fit in will be 'sorted in'. People who insist on an entire server forming one big community always strike me as unrealistic ideologists.
So my take on someone complaining on how horrible the 'community' in a game is that the person simply failed to 'sort themselves in' to the right group or insist on being part of a group that has already 'sorted them out'. It might be that their interestes simply do not match their playstyle and/or temperment and as such teh game might not be for them.
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I always subscibed to the 'self sorting' theory of communities forming in MMORPGs. Over time people with similar interests, playstyles and temperments will join up to form communities of like minded individuals. Players who do not fit in will be 'sorted out' and outsiders who fit in will be 'sorted in'. People who insist on an entire server forming one big community always strike me as unrealistic ideologists.
So my take on someone complaining on how horrible the 'community' in a game is that the person simply failed to 'sort themselves in' to the right group or insist on being part of a group that has already 'sorted them out'. It might be that their interestes simply do not match their playstyle and/or temperment and as such teh game might not be for them.