What i miss about the old MMOs
Hearing Axehilt & Narius complaining about how there should be more solo content, should be able to level easier in less time, how it should be less grindy and less like a virtual world to play in and more of a game that can be mastered in short bursts.
(I don't miss anything about pre-WOW MMORPGs. They were the dullest games I'd ever played, and after playing them a couple weeks I would quickly return to whatever non-MMORPG I was playing at the time -- games which didn't try to hide the fun behind excessive timesinks and tedium.)
This is extremist drivel.
Label everything pre-WOW as dull.
There were many games with exciting and fun things to do. UO, EQ, DAOC just to name a few. Just look at all the things people miss from older games, this thread is full of them.
His point was that a great many people did not find those games fun they found them dull.
Actually most people who play and still play MMO's never tried them. Their first MMO was WoW.
Your probably right, which is why I didn't say most people.
I said many people. Many many people, millions actually tried everquest, UO, Daoc, Swg....
Many many people did not find those games fun.
Well it wasnt that some of us didnt find EQ fun....we just have no desire to go back to it, or something similar.
When you have spent all night waiting to get your bod back from a failed Hate PU raid, or 20 hrs waiting to get in on a Fabled mob, you start to realize just how demanding your video game "hobby" is.
I have all the time in the world due to disability, yet there is no way I would ever get involved with a game like Everquest again.
I tend to agree. I play games for entertainment only, so I don't care if something takes a little or a long time as long as it's fun. As soon as I'm waiting to have fun, it's time to leave the game. And CR or running for an hour, or waiting a day to be able to have fun, for me at least, wasn't fun. It was a waste of my time.
Yes I know entertainment is a waste of time, however there is precious little free time as it is, I don't want to waste my entertainment time waiting to be entertained - that would make the activity pointless.
Then I suppose you had better stick to playing coop lobby based games. Or as some people insist on calling them:
"Modern MMOs".
Well I believe it is up for the individual to decide what they want to do, and not be insulted for it.
I personally feel your "MMO to end all MMOs" is simply a pipedream, but who am I to tell ya to quit spamming the forums about it? It is what you want to do with your time, and there is no reason to be deragatory towards you for it.
Showing folks the same consideration would be a novel idea eh?
I didn't insult him. I simply indicated a genre of games that may be more to his taste. There is no reason to intepret that post as an insult.
I am not sure you understand what the word spams means btw.
Actually you did insult him. The context is very clear.
As far as your game....you bring it up on a consistent basis. Thus the equating it to spam. Like I indicated though....it is something you are passionate about, and so I wont mock you over it. Just like you could of done with your reply to the person.
Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget.
(I don't miss anything about pre-WOW MMORPGs. They were the dullest games I'd ever played, and after playing them a couple weeks I would quickly return to whatever non-MMORPG I was playing at the time -- games which didn't try to hide the fun behind excessive timesinks and tedium.)
This is extremist drivel.
Label everything pre-WOW as dull.
There were many games with exciting and fun things to do. UO, EQ, DAOC just to name a few. Just look at all the things people miss from older games, this thread is full of them.
His point was that a great many people did not find those games fun they found them dull.
Actually most people who play and still play MMO's never tried them. Their first MMO was WoW.
Your probably right, which is why I didn't say most people.
I said many people. Many many people, millions actually tried everquest, UO, Daoc, Swg....
Many many people did not find those games fun.
Well it wasnt that some of us didnt find EQ fun....we just have no desire to go back to it, or something similar.
When you have spent all night waiting to get your bod back from a failed Hate PU raid, or 20 hrs waiting to get in on a Fabled mob, you start to realize just how demanding your video game "hobby" is.
I have all the time in the world due to disability, yet there is no way I would ever get involved with a game like Everquest again.
I tend to agree. I play games for entertainment only, so I don't care if something takes a little or a long time as long as it's fun. As soon as I'm waiting to have fun, it's time to leave the game. And CR or running for an hour, or waiting a day to be able to have fun, for me at least, wasn't fun. It was a waste of my time.
Yes I know entertainment is a waste of time, however there is precious little free time as it is, I don't want to waste my entertainment time waiting to be entertained - that would make the activity pointless.
Then I suppose you had better stick to playing coop lobby based games. Or as some people insist on calling them:
"Modern MMOs".
Well I believe it is up for the individual to decide what they want to do, and not be insulted for it.
I personally feel your "MMO to end all MMOs" is simply a pipedream, but who am I to tell ya to quit spamming the forums about it? It is what you want to do with your time, and there is no reason to be deragatory towards you for it.
Showing folks the same consideration would be a novel idea eh?
I didn't insult him. I simply indicated a genre of games that may be more to his taste. There is no reason to intepret that post as an insult.
I am not sure you understand what the word spams means btw.
Actually you did insult him. The context is very clear.
As far as your game....you bring it up on a consistent basis. Thus the equating it to spam. Like I indicated though....it is something you are passionate about, and so I wont mock you over it. Just like you could of done with your reply to the person.
The imaginary context may be clear to you. That doesn't make it real context.
If someone said they didn't like to control more than one unit and I said maybe they shouldn't be playing tbs or rts games, would that be an insult? Didn't think so.
Spam is flooding the Internet with many copies of the same message, in an attempt to force the message on people who would not otherwise choose to receive it.
It would be spam if I posted identical posts constantly across several different forums. You have at most 1 or 2 of my threads on the first few pages at any one time, all of them having context outside of just my game. They contain discussions of general sandbox concepts.
(I don't miss anything about pre-WOW MMORPGs. They were the dullest games I'd ever played, and after playing them a couple weeks I would quickly return to whatever non-MMORPG I was playing at the time -- games which didn't try to hide the fun behind excessive timesinks and tedium.)
This is extremist drivel.
Label everything pre-WOW as dull.
There were many games with exciting and fun things to do. UO, EQ, DAOC just to name a few. Just look at all the things people miss from older games, this thread is full of them.
His point was that a great many people did not find those games fun they found them dull.
Actually most people who play and still play MMO's never tried them. Their first MMO was WoW.
Your probably right, which is why I didn't say most people.
I said many people. Many many people, millions actually tried everquest, UO, Daoc, Swg....
Many many people did not find those games fun.
Well it wasnt that some of us didnt find EQ fun....we just have no desire to go back to it, or something similar.
When you have spent all night waiting to get your bod back from a failed Hate PU raid, or 20 hrs waiting to get in on a Fabled mob, you start to realize just how demanding your video game "hobby" is.
I have all the time in the world due to disability, yet there is no way I would ever get involved with a game like Everquest again.
I tend to agree. I play games for entertainment only, so I don't care if something takes a little or a long time as long as it's fun. As soon as I'm waiting to have fun, it's time to leave the game. And CR or running for an hour, or waiting a day to be able to have fun, for me at least, wasn't fun. It was a waste of my time.
Yes I know entertainment is a waste of time, however there is precious little free time as it is, I don't want to waste my entertainment time waiting to be entertained - that would make the activity pointless.
Then I suppose you had better stick to playing coop lobby based games. Or as some people insist on calling them:
"Modern MMOs".
Why? Did you miss the part where I said, "I don't care if something takes a little or a long time as long as it's fun. As soon as I'm waiting to have fun, it's time to leave the game. "
There are many many many games, old, new, newschool, oldschool, sandbox, thempark that all let us play without something that prevents us from playing.
I repeat waiting to be able to play the game defeats the purpose of entertainment.
edit - it wasn't a valid point at all, in fact I don't think there was any point except to try and insult "modern games".
This is why in EQ I played monk, druid, and bard mostly - they allowed me to play the game in a way so I didn't have to wait to play. CR were no problem with them, very very little downtime, easy to group with. Those classes reduced a lot of needless tedium.
edit 2 - @cuathon, I generally think you are pretty intelligent, so why do you always feel the need to insult other people, swear at other people, and generally act like your raging simply because someone disagrees with you. These are not the hallmarks of an intelligent and/or rationale person. You know that It is possible to disagree with someone's point of view and not attack the person right?
Its very simple. Its easy for you to make constant tone trolling arguments, aka, why can't you be civil, when you are the one who is on the winning side. All the games coming out are themeparker anti virtual world anti persistance games. Why shouldn't you be happy when you are getting everything you want?
I never see you ask Narius why he comes in all of my threads or other sandbox threads to stir up drama. What because he is civil? Why shouldn't he be civil, he has everything he wants in games, he can do whatever he wants because nothing is at stake for him.
And the same for you. It should be noted that tone trolls are 95% likely to be on the side where everything is going their way.
In any case you are wrong. Emotion is entirely irrelevant to intellect. The smartest person I know has an IQ of 205 and he is angry and depressed all the time. In fact raw intelligence correlates pretty consistently with depression and anger and anxiety. Not every smart person is angry or depressed, but to say that perfect calm and civility is the hallmark of rationality is just straight up wrong.
Calm, civil and controlled are the hallmarks of POWER. People secure in their position and desires are calm and civil.
I am trying to be civil here but every time someone perpetuates the myth that you are perpetuating it makes me feel like life is pointless because I a moving against an unstoppable tide.
Academia is composed of those intellectuals in positions of power and privilege. Academia is the most common cited group for tone trolls because they can say, look how these brilliant men are calm and in control. But that is a product of their privilege and not their intellect.
I will explain this once in as calm a manner as possible. After this if you continue to propagate this ridiculous idea I will either force myself not to respond if I am in a more chilled mood or if I am in a bad mood I will react in a manner I cannot predict which may be to ignore you or to tear your head off, I couldn't say which until it happens.
Now that we have established that emotion is not relevant to intellect the reason I get angry is because virtual worlds are being crushed under neath the weight of not an inferior but a radically different kind of gamer flooding the MMO genre after WoW.
Before if a company saw a market where they could make a few tens of millions, such as the market for EQ or UO or EvE or SWG they would make a game. Now we have a market full of players that hop from game to game, even WoW has a limited hold on their interest.
It is financially more viable to make a themepark even if it has only a 10% retention rate than it is to make a virtual world. Eve has maybe 300k subscribers over, what is it, 8 years?
Their total gross product over 8 years is something like 432million dollars. But if you make one themepark that has 2million boxes sold at 60$ and then 2 years of an average of 1mil subs in 2 years of run time your game has made 384million dollars of gross profit. Which is pretty much as good as EvE in 4x as long.
And your costs are likely lower for various reasons. And we aren't even talking about cash shops and mounts and crap.
And because fewer games are made with my make or break features we don't have a lot of options of games with alternate ancillary features, and we have to play in space. Which is fine, but it would be nice to have the option not to.
Its very simple. Its easy for you to make constant tone trolling arguments, aka, why can't you be civil, when you are the one who is on the winning side. All the games coming out are themeparker anti virtual world anti persistance games. Why shouldn't you be happy when you are getting everything you want?
So your argument is that you cannot be civil because someone is not making a game for you, or giving you want you want - that is the height of childishness
I never see you ask Narius why he comes in all of my threads or other sandbox threads to stir up drama. What because he is civil? Why shouldn't he be civil, he has everything he wants in games, he can do whatever he wants because nothing is at stake for him.
And the same for you. It should be noted that tone trolls are 95% likely to be on the side where everything is going their way.
I think Narius does come on strong, is fairly rigid in his views and probably should not post on many threads but he very rarely insults other gamers and never outright swears or attacks an individual. Nor do I in fact I very very rarely ever tell anyone they are wrong unless it is something that can be objectively proved, and am very carefull to state that it is my opinion on many things. So no.
In any case you are wrong. Emotion is entirely irrelevant to intellect. The smartest person I know has an IQ of 205 and he is angry and depressed all the time. In fact raw intelligence correlates pretty consistently with depression and anger and anxiety. Not every smart person is angry or depressed, but to say that perfect calm and civility is the hallmark of rationality is just straight up wrong.
Your right, emotion is not just related to intellect, unless you are talking about emotional intelligence which many studies have shown is a greater indicator of success than IQ. Good thing I didn't just say intellect, I said rationale as well. Only an immature and irrational person thinks that just because someone disagrees with them that they are attacking them. That is actually one hallmark of teenages, possibly due to undeveloped frontal lobes. You are not a teenager, are intelligent and articulate. Why then do you "fly off the handle so many times"
Calm, civil and controlled are the hallmarks of POWER. People secure in their position and desires are calm and civil.
Again you are normally you are right. However regardless of your personal level of power, how you choose to act makes a bigger difference in how you are viewed.
I am trying to be civil here but every time someone perpetuates the myth that you are perpetuating it makes me feel like life is pointless because I a moving against an unstoppable tide.
I am not pepetuating any myths. Please feel free to point out the myth.
Academia is composed of those intellectuals in positions of power and privilege. Academia is the most common cited group for tone trolls because they can say, look how these brilliant men are calm and in control. But that is a product of their privilege and not their intellect.
Once again I did not mention academia. Academia is seperate from intelligence and rationality. That was a red herring.
I will explain this once in as calm a manner as possible. After this if you continue to propagate this ridiculous idea I will either force myself not to respond if I am in a more chilled mood or if I am in a bad mood I will react in a manner I cannot predict which may be to ignore you or to tear your head off, I couldn't say which until it happens.
This speak volumes. That you cannot reasonably predict how you would react if someone disagrees with you in a written forum is silly. If you are in a bad mood you still choose how you act.
Now that we have established that emotion is not relevant to intellect the reason I get angry is because virtual worlds are being crushed under neath the weight of not an inferior but a radically different kind of gamer flooding the MMO genre after WoW.
And getting angry is fine, however your inabiltiy to express yourself without resorting to personal attacks is another matter.
Before if a company saw a market where they could make a few tens of millions, such as the market for EQ or UO or EvE or SWG they would make a game. Now we have a market full of players that hop from game to game, even WoW has a limited hold on their interest.
It is financially more viable to make a themepark even if it has only a 10% retention rate than it is to make a virtual world. Eve has maybe 300k subscribers over, what is it, 8 years?
Their total gross product over 8 years is something like 432million dollars. But if you make one themepark that has 2million boxes sold at 60$ and then 2 years of an average of 1mil subs in 2 years of run time your game has made 384million dollars of gross profit. Which is pretty much as good as EvE in 4x as long.
And your costs are likely lower for various reasons. And we aren't even talking about cash shops and mounts and crap.
And because fewer games are made with my make or break features we don't have a lot of options of games with alternate ancillary features, and we have to play in space. Which is fine, but it would be nice to have the option not to.
Which is why are are doing what you can do, making your opinion known, trying to gather support and more importantly making your own game. great.
None of that has anything to do with the constant attacking , swearing and belitting of other players.
Agreed. +1
Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget.
I'm old school and basicly I miss an open world with open non instanced dugneons where we either /rolled on bosses or sorted out a round robin system all on a pvp full loot world without pvp'ing with each other. We made our own loot rules and there was no levels just an open skill system where any monster even the starting monsters could pose as a threat to you and gear was irrelevant. Like for example we got the chess board out and played chess with each other and who ever won that game got the spawns for 12 hours and any randoms which came in knew to respect. Most of all the community and the unwritten laws which gets ignored in this generation of gaming.
I miss crafting that requires research and understanding to get the most out of, but is simple enough to do for anyone who has the werewithal to run around and search for resources for ten or fifteen minutes. Accessible for most but with deep customization options and even more available for those who decide to do the research? Way cool.
I also miss economies that work. I like EVE Online a lot, and their efforts to have a working economy have been reasonably successful, but I'd like to see it in a context that feels more connected. EVE's combat and the combat in a game like TOR are worlds apart, and I like to feel like I'm fighting rather than fiddling with knobs and dials while the ship does my fighting for me. A step further would be Vindictus, but that's a lot to ask.
It seems like all modern crafting systems are dumb-kid math.
I'd like a crafting and economy system that are interesting. EVE's is great but their moment-to-moment crafting gameplay is a bit unsatisfying for me; no real differences in terms of materials used, no way to use research to make a better Thrasher. A Thrasher is always just a Thrasher. I have no love for that.
I never liked how newer games seem to center around how I'm the hero. Honestly I didn't like it. It doesn't feel like that kind of story fits with the Massively Multiplayer bit. It works perfectly in traditional RPGs though.
I much prefer being one of many troops. Should I rise to hero fame, whatever, but so many games now treat every player like they are the Chosen One.
We can't all be the the chosen one, otherwise it's just a constant kneeling circle. lol.
Spec'ing properly is a gateway drug. 12 Million People have been meter spammed in heroics.
Eww...that's one thing I don't miss Overpopulated server meant dodge the house all day long. Server dying meant ghost towns everywhere (SWG showed this off quite well)
I miss massive battles. Whether it's PVE raids that were 50-100 people and sometimes even more, or PVP in the 'frontiers' that sometimes had up to 1K people. Keep battles that lasted hours. BG's that sometimes lasted an entire weekend
OmaliMMO Business CorrespondentMemberUncommonPosts: 1,177
Originally posted by wrekognize
I miss player housing in the open world.
I miss said mechanic with decay, meaning coming across the house of someone you knew and hated and finding it decaying and lootable.
Hearing Axehilt & Narius complaining about how there should be more solo content, should be able to level easier in less time, how it should be less grindy and less like a virtual world to play in and more of a game that can be mastered in short bursts.
At first I thought they just couldn't fathom there being a market for games other than what they like, but the more I hear them rave on, plus the fact that they felt compelled to crash this completely innocuous thread that simply asked people what they missed about those days, leads me to believe they just can't stand anything else existing.
It only further proves that they plain and simply want every game to be all about their wants, and to hell with what anyone else may like. The selfishness of some people knows no bounds I guess.
Today's MMORPGs literally have players wear the same gear as everyone else. In Everquest, you would have different combinations of gear and even use different gear for different encounters or dungeons.
Today, everyone wearing the same Tier 1, Tier 2, Tier X gear. It is ridiculous, insipid, and creatively lazy.
Everyone looks the same. No individualism. No uniqueness. Surprised people pay money for that.
"The truth is EA lies." - Youtube User
Sim City. Everquest. Civilization. Dungeon Keeper. Vampire: The Masquerade. These are the games that I love and cherish.
The ability to create your own unique identity and thrive among a community of individual, non-cookie-cutter players that DON'T have to depend on "The One Build To Rule Them All".
I miss MMO's not treating me like a spoiled child.
They used to actually present a challenge, but WoW, Rift etc. are so obnoxiously unchallenging and kid friendly that nothing you do even matters. It's all routine, 'aw here's a happy meal lil guy' weirdness these days.
I don't play games to be less challenged than if I were opening a door or eating a sandwich.
The fact that so many people are satisfied with what amounts to glorified coloring books is no surprise, but it's dissapointing none-the-less.
I miss MMO's not treating me like a spoiled child.
They used to actually present a challenge, but WoW, Rift etc. are so obnoxiously unchallenging and kid friendly that nothing you do even matters. It's all routine, 'aw here's a happy meal lil guy' weirdness these days.
I don't play games to be less challenged than if I were opening a door or eating a sandwich.
The fact that so many people are satisfied with what amounts to glorified coloring books is no surprise, but it's dissapointing none-the-less.
I DL'ed and played Rift today for an hour or so since having done the Beta. Didn't go beyond that. I made lvl 9 without too much effort within the first 45 minutes, and no one grouped except for a few brief minutes to get what they were after and quickly disbanded and went on their way. I'd say hello when they joined and got not ONE response back. Everyone was rat racing around doing their quest hub mambo of medicority. Got boring fast. It is sad this is what the MMORPG genre has become....a hollow shell of it's once glorious self and differentiating qualities from any other genre.
Guess it needs put on the endangered species list...or probably more accurate...the extinction list.
Primarily due to GMs being a presence on our server, amongst earlier game design approaches: The feeling that almost anything was possible (to an extent) and my path wasn't so strictly pre-mapped. Today it seems most games clearly outline for you exactly what you'll be doing, where you'll be and what you'll be wearing next week, a month from now or any time down the road taking away any sense of surprise and mystery. There's no question after having played both linear and open ended games, I far prefer being able to choose my own path and carve my own unique trail to max level, and not knowing exactly what I'll be doing at any time in the future apart from perhaps one or two major long term goals.
Now you can see the carefully planned gear laid out for you on a token merchant in a totally plotted out linear zone that leads to zone #2 that you'll get to as you safely follow the path. Along with the carefully planned out spreadsheet progression, the (seemingly) smaller world sizes of recent years don't do much to convince me that there's any element of the unknown out there worth looking forward to either. It's not all just down to the availability of online databases either, as database sites such as Alakazam (Zam now I guess?) have existed for a very long time now, most recent games seem to present pre-explored maps as well as max level gear you can inspect on a merchant from level 1 in game anyway.
When what could be a vast unkown expanse of fantasy/sci-fi zones is instead stripped down and displayed openly on the table for me from the start, and there's no chance of luckily stumbling onto the unknown landscape/loot/mechanic/adventure I personally lose interest in plodding through it. What's the point? I see new movies because I haven't seen them, I read new books because I haven't read them, I used to be able to play through online fantasy worlds and watch my own story unfold as I bumbled my way around, so why would I now want a clearly detailed itinerary from day 1?
Once predictability is assured the wonder is gone. There is no 'Who knows what will happen when we next head out into the game world' only 'We'll complete these 7 tasks in zone A so we can get to zone B so we can purchase the zone B gear from the loot merchant, Oh boy, and then we'll safely advance to zone C to get on with our tasks safe in the knowledge that there will be no surprises'.
Primarily due to GMs being a presence on our server, amongst earlier game design approaches: The feeling that almost anything was possible (to an extent) and my path wasn't so strictly pre-mapped. Today it seems most games clearly outline for you exactly what you'll be doing, where you'll be and what you'll be wearing next week, a month from now or any time down the road taking away any sense of surprise and mystery. There's no question after having played both linear and open ended games, I far prefer being able to choose my own path and carve my own unique trail to max level, and not knowing exactly what I'll be doing at any time in the future apart from perhaps one or two major long term goals.
Now you can see the carefully planned gear laid out for you on a token merchant in a totally plotted out linear zone that leads to zone #2 that you'll get to as you safely follow the path. Along with the carefully planned out spreadsheet progression, the (seemingly) smaller world sizes of recent years don't do much to convince me that there's any element of the unknown out there worth looking forward to either. It's not all just down to the availability of online databases either, as database sites such as Alakazam (Zam now I guess?) have existed for a very long time now, most recent games seem to present pre-explored maps as well as max level gear you can inspect on a merchant from level 1 in game anyway.
When what could be a vast unkown expanse of fantasy/sci-fi zones is instead stripped down and displayed openly on the table for me from the start, and there's no chance of luckily stumbling onto the unknown landscape/loot/mechanic/adventure I personally lose interest in plodding through it. What's the point? I see new movies because I haven't seen them, I read new books because I haven't read them, I used to be able to play through online fantasy worlds and watch my own story unfold as I bumbled my way around, so why would I now want a clearly detailed itinerary from day 1?
Once predictability is assured the wonder is gone. There is no 'Who knows what will happen when we next head out into the game world' only 'We'll complete these 7 tasks in zone A so we can get to zone B so we can purchase the zone B gear from the loot merchant, Oh boy, and then we'll safely advance to zone C to get on with our tasks safe in the knowledge that there will be no surprises'.
Primarily due to GMs being a presence on our server, amongst earlier game design approaches: The feeling that almost anything was possible (to an extent) and my path wasn't so strictly pre-mapped. Today it seems most games clearly outline for you exactly what you'll be doing, where you'll be and what you'll be wearing next week, a month from now or any time down the road taking away any sense of surprise and mystery. There's no question after having played both linear and open ended games, I far prefer being able to choose my own path and carve my own unique trail to max level, and not knowing exactly what I'll be doing at any time in the future apart from perhaps one or two major long term goals.
Now you can see the carefully planned gear laid out for you on a token merchant in a totally plotted out linear zone that leads to zone #2 that you'll get to as you safely follow the path. Along with the carefully planned out spreadsheet progression, the (seemingly) smaller world sizes of recent years don't do much to convince me that there's any element of the unknown out there worth looking forward to either. It's not all just down to the availability of online databases either, as database sites such as Alakazam (Zam now I guess?) have existed for a very long time now, most recent games seem to present pre-explored maps as well as max level gear you can inspect on a merchant from level 1 in game anyway.
When what could be a vast unkown expanse of fantasy/sci-fi zones is instead stripped down and displayed openly on the table for me from the start, and there's no chance of luckily stumbling onto the unknown landscape/loot/mechanic/adventure I personally lose interest in plodding through it. What's the point? I see new movies because I haven't seen them, I read new books because I haven't read them, I used to be able to play through online fantasy worlds and watch my own story unfold as I bumbled my way around, so why would I now want a clearly detailed itinerary from day 1?
Once predictability is assured the wonder is gone. There is no 'Who knows what will happen when we next head out into the game world' only 'We'll complete these 7 tasks in zone A so we can get to zone B so we can purchase the zone B gear from the loot merchant, Oh boy, and then we'll safely advance to zone C to get on with our tasks safe in the knowledge that there will be no surprises'.
Hearing Axehilt & Narius complaining about how there should be more solo content, should be able to level easier in less time, how it should be less grindy and less like a virtual world to play in and more of a game that can be mastered in short bursts.
Stop putting words in peoples' mouths. You can't point to a post where I've complained that games need more solo content, or that they should be easy to level in less time. Nor have I said games should intentionally seek to be less like virtual worlds, except in cases where creating a virtual world causes sacrifices in gameplay.
However it's true that the removal of grind is good ("grind" is excessive repetition; who actually wants that?)
And it's also true that games should be more of a game, and players should feel like they can master that game, and that they can achieve meaningful progress without a 3+ hour ordeal.
But these aren't "complaints". They're observations of the traits people seem to appreciate in modern MMORPGs vs. the painful experiences of early MMORPGs.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
(I don't miss anything about pre-WOW MMORPGs. They were the dullest games I'd ever played, and after playing them a couple weeks I would quickly return to whatever non-MMORPG I was playing at the time -- games which didn't try to hide the fun behind excessive timesinks and tedium.)
This is extremist drivel.
Label everything pre-WOW as dull.
There were many games with exciting and fun things to do. UO, EQ, DAOC just to name a few. Just look at all the things people miss from older games, this thread is full of them.
The pre-WOW MMORPGs I played were indeed dull. DAOC, AO, AC, AC2, and probably a few eluding memory at the moment.
Non-MMORPG games released in the same timeframe provided more fun and required less time than those MMORPGs.
So by comparison, MMORPGs were indeed dreadfully dull.
You mean I have to walk 30 minutes to get to a farming spot where I repetitively use the same abilities to grind XP? Maybe slap on an additional 30 minutes to find a group to do the same thing?
The list of games during that timeframe which provided more fun in less time was immense (and this is only a fractional list):
Starcraft
AOE2
Tribes
Civ2
Max Payne
Metal Gear Solid 2
War3
NOLF 1/2
GalCiv
Diablo 2
C&C:Red Alert 2
Alice
I really wanted to like MMORPGs (or I wouldn't have tried the 6-7 that I did before WOW), but until WOW they never provided the baseline bang for the buck necessary to be worth my time.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
The pre-WOW MMORPGs I played were indeed dull. DAOC, AO, AC, AC2, and probably a few eluding memory at the moment.
Non-MMORPG games released in the same timeframe provided more fun and required less time than those MMORPGs.
So by comparison, MMORPGs were indeed dreadfully dull.
You mean I have to walk 30 minutes to get to a farming spot where I repetitively use the same abilities to grind XP? Maybe slap on an additional 30 minutes to find a group to do the same thing?
The list of games during that timeframe which provided more fun in less time was immense (and this is only a fractional list):
Starcraft
AOE2
Tribes
Civ2
Max Payne
Metal Gear Solid 2
War3
NOLF 1/2
GalCiv
Diablo 2
C&C:Red Alert 2
Alice
I really wanted to like MMORPGs (or I wouldn't have tried the 6-7 that I did before WOW), but until WOW they never provided the baseline bang for the buck necessary to be worth my time.
Games prior to WoW had individualism, they each had their different tastes (EQ, UO, DAOC, AO etc). Sure some people found them dull. But ironically after the continuous WoW reskins of the past 5-6 years and everyone trying to emulate that. I find that individuality amoung the older games beats playing basically the same game over and over again but in a different skin (and even games that started out different taking on that likeness). Sure WoW was decent at the start, but when i realized what direction they were going i saw the writing on the wall. If anything that stagnation has made them even more dull and far less memorable.
I prefer a good xp group where i get to talk with and hang out with friends over the wait for instance queue. The only talking that happens in instances nowadays i the rage of the immature gamers that complain that other people that think they know how to play the game better than everyone else (ironically if we found a poor player in games like EQ we accepted them and tried to help them improve their gameplay and not belittle them)
Besides its not that older games like EQ required you to group, it was much more efficient but hardly required (even as a cleric I knew many locations I could level on some light blue mobs (for instance lower guk undead side on pre kunark or the spectors outside of the fear entrance)
Comments
Feign death pulling, trains, death penalty and open dungeons. Basically I miss Everquests style but not its craptastic graphics.
"Its better to look ugly and win than pretty and lose"
Actually you did insult him. The context is very clear.
As far as your game....you bring it up on a consistent basis. Thus the equating it to spam. Like I indicated though....it is something you are passionate about, and so I wont mock you over it. Just like you could of done with your reply to the person.
Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget.
The imaginary context may be clear to you. That doesn't make it real context.
If someone said they didn't like to control more than one unit and I said maybe they shouldn't be playing tbs or rts games, would that be an insult? Didn't think so.
Also:
Spam is flooding the Internet with many copies of the same message, in an attempt to force the message on people who would not otherwise choose to receive it.
It would be spam if I posted identical posts constantly across several different forums. You have at most 1 or 2 of my threads on the first few pages at any one time, all of them having context outside of just my game. They contain discussions of general sandbox concepts.
Agreed. +1
Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget.
I'm old school and basicly I miss an open world with open non instanced dugneons where we either /rolled on bosses or sorted out a round robin system all on a pvp full loot world without pvp'ing with each other. We made our own loot rules and there was no levels just an open skill system where any monster even the starting monsters could pose as a threat to you and gear was irrelevant. Like for example we got the chess board out and played chess with each other and who ever won that game got the spawns for 12 hours and any randoms which came in knew to respect. Most of all the community and the unwritten laws which gets ignored in this generation of gaming.
This isn't a signature, you just think it is.
I miss crafting that requires research and understanding to get the most out of, but is simple enough to do for anyone who has the werewithal to run around and search for resources for ten or fifteen minutes. Accessible for most but with deep customization options and even more available for those who decide to do the research? Way cool.
I also miss economies that work. I like EVE Online a lot, and their efforts to have a working economy have been reasonably successful, but I'd like to see it in a context that feels more connected. EVE's combat and the combat in a game like TOR are worlds apart, and I like to feel like I'm fighting rather than fiddling with knobs and dials while the ship does my fighting for me. A step further would be Vindictus, but that's a lot to ask.
It seems like all modern crafting systems are dumb-kid math.
I'd like a crafting and economy system that are interesting. EVE's is great but their moment-to-moment crafting gameplay is a bit unsatisfying for me; no real differences in terms of materials used, no way to use research to make a better Thrasher. A Thrasher is always just a Thrasher. I have no love for that.
I miss player housing in the open world.
I never liked how newer games seem to center around how I'm the hero. Honestly I didn't like it. It doesn't feel like that kind of story fits with the Massively Multiplayer bit. It works perfectly in traditional RPGs though.
I much prefer being one of many troops. Should I rise to hero fame, whatever, but so many games now treat every player like they are the Chosen One.
We can't all be the the chosen one, otherwise it's just a constant kneeling circle. lol.
Spec'ing properly is a gateway drug.
12 Million People have been meter spammed in heroics.
Eww...that's one thing I don't miss
Overpopulated server meant dodge the house all day long. Server dying meant ghost towns everywhere (SWG showed this off quite well)
I miss massive battles. Whether it's PVE raids that were 50-100 people and sometimes even more, or PVP in the 'frontiers' that sometimes had up to 1K people. Keep battles that lasted hours. BG's that sometimes lasted an entire weekend
I miss said mechanic with decay, meaning coming across the house of someone you knew and hated and finding it decaying and lootable.
At first I thought they just couldn't fathom there being a market for games other than what they like, but the more I hear them rave on, plus the fact that they felt compelled to crash this completely innocuous thread that simply asked people what they missed about those days, leads me to believe they just can't stand anything else existing.
It only further proves that they plain and simply want every game to be all about their wants, and to hell with what anyone else may like. The selfishness of some people knows no bounds I guess.
- game revolving about something else than mindless ratrace after virtual carrots on sticks (geargrind in instances)
- no instances
- decay on gear
3 reasons, can't really leave any of them out; there're quite a few more, but this is a good start
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DStuff
Unique Player Characters
Today's MMORPGs literally have players wear the same gear as everyone else. In Everquest, you would have different combinations of gear and even use different gear for different encounters or dungeons.
Today, everyone wearing the same Tier 1, Tier 2, Tier X gear. It is ridiculous, insipid, and creatively lazy.
Everyone looks the same. No individualism. No uniqueness. Surprised people pay money for that.
"The truth is EA lies." - Youtube User
Sim City. Everquest. Civilization. Dungeon Keeper. Vampire: The Masquerade. These are the games that I love and cherish.
The ability to create your own unique identity and thrive among a community of individual, non-cookie-cutter players that DON'T have to depend on "The One Build To Rule Them All".
I miss MMO's not treating me like a spoiled child.
They used to actually present a challenge, but WoW, Rift etc. are so obnoxiously unchallenging and kid friendly that nothing you do even matters. It's all routine, 'aw here's a happy meal lil guy' weirdness these days.
I don't play games to be less challenged than if I were opening a door or eating a sandwich.
The fact that so many people are satisfied with what amounts to glorified coloring books is no surprise, but it's dissapointing none-the-less.
+1I DL'ed and played Rift today for an hour or so since having done the Beta. Didn't go beyond that. I made lvl 9 without too much effort within the first 45 minutes, and no one grouped except for a few brief minutes to get what they were after and quickly disbanded and went on their way. I'd say hello when they joined and got not ONE response back. Everyone was rat racing around doing their quest hub mambo of medicority. Got boring fast. It is sad this is what the MMORPG genre has become....a hollow shell of it's once glorious self and differentiating qualities from any other genre.
Guess it needs put on the endangered species list...or probably more accurate...the extinction list.
Primarily due to GMs being a presence on our server, amongst earlier game design approaches: The feeling that almost anything was possible (to an extent) and my path wasn't so strictly pre-mapped. Today it seems most games clearly outline for you exactly what you'll be doing, where you'll be and what you'll be wearing next week, a month from now or any time down the road taking away any sense of surprise and mystery. There's no question after having played both linear and open ended games, I far prefer being able to choose my own path and carve my own unique trail to max level, and not knowing exactly what I'll be doing at any time in the future apart from perhaps one or two major long term goals.
Now you can see the carefully planned gear laid out for you on a token merchant in a totally plotted out linear zone that leads to zone #2 that you'll get to as you safely follow the path. Along with the carefully planned out spreadsheet progression, the (seemingly) smaller world sizes of recent years don't do much to convince me that there's any element of the unknown out there worth looking forward to either. It's not all just down to the availability of online databases either, as database sites such as Alakazam (Zam now I guess?) have existed for a very long time now, most recent games seem to present pre-explored maps as well as max level gear you can inspect on a merchant from level 1 in game anyway.
When what could be a vast unkown expanse of fantasy/sci-fi zones is instead stripped down and displayed openly on the table for me from the start, and there's no chance of luckily stumbling onto the unknown landscape/loot/mechanic/adventure I personally lose interest in plodding through it. What's the point? I see new movies because I haven't seen them, I read new books because I haven't read them, I used to be able to play through online fantasy worlds and watch my own story unfold as I bumbled my way around, so why would I now want a clearly detailed itinerary from day 1?
Once predictability is assured the wonder is gone. There is no 'Who knows what will happen when we next head out into the game world' only 'We'll complete these 7 tasks in zone A so we can get to zone B so we can purchase the zone B gear from the loot merchant, Oh boy, and then we'll safely advance to zone C to get on with our tasks safe in the knowledge that there will be no surprises'.
+1
Make that a +2.
Stop putting words in peoples' mouths. You can't point to a post where I've complained that games need more solo content, or that they should be easy to level in less time. Nor have I said games should intentionally seek to be less like virtual worlds, except in cases where creating a virtual world causes sacrifices in gameplay.
However it's true that the removal of grind is good ("grind" is excessive repetition; who actually wants that?)
And it's also true that games should be more of a game, and players should feel like they can master that game, and that they can achieve meaningful progress without a 3+ hour ordeal.
But these aren't "complaints". They're observations of the traits people seem to appreciate in modern MMORPGs vs. the painful experiences of early MMORPGs.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
The pre-WOW MMORPGs I played were indeed dull. DAOC, AO, AC, AC2, and probably a few eluding memory at the moment.
Non-MMORPG games released in the same timeframe provided more fun and required less time than those MMORPGs.
So by comparison, MMORPGs were indeed dreadfully dull.
You mean I have to walk 30 minutes to get to a farming spot where I repetitively use the same abilities to grind XP? Maybe slap on an additional 30 minutes to find a group to do the same thing?
The list of games during that timeframe which provided more fun in less time was immense (and this is only a fractional list):
Starcraft
AOE2
Tribes
Civ2
Max Payne
Metal Gear Solid 2
War3
NOLF 1/2
GalCiv
Diablo 2
C&C:Red Alert 2
Alice
I really wanted to like MMORPGs (or I wouldn't have tried the 6-7 that I did before WOW), but until WOW they never provided the baseline bang for the buck necessary to be worth my time.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
Games prior to WoW had individualism, they each had their different tastes (EQ, UO, DAOC, AO etc). Sure some people found them dull. But ironically after the continuous WoW reskins of the past 5-6 years and everyone trying to emulate that. I find that individuality amoung the older games beats playing basically the same game over and over again but in a different skin (and even games that started out different taking on that likeness). Sure WoW was decent at the start, but when i realized what direction they were going i saw the writing on the wall. If anything that stagnation has made them even more dull and far less memorable.
I prefer a good xp group where i get to talk with and hang out with friends over the wait for instance queue. The only talking that happens in instances nowadays i the rage of the immature gamers that complain that other people that think they know how to play the game better than everyone else (ironically if we found a poor player in games like EQ we accepted them and tried to help them improve their gameplay and not belittle them)
Besides its not that older games like EQ required you to group, it was much more efficient but hardly required (even as a cleric I knew many locations I could level on some light blue mobs (for instance lower guk undead side on pre kunark or the spectors outside of the fear entrance)