That is not really what you were saying in the post I commented on. You were claiming that most people could be put in their own private instance and would not notice the difference. This is not the same thing as a large zone instance in the world were you have hundreds of people interacting and competing with each other.
There are so few truly open worlds, I can only really think of one and that is Vanguard's world. It still has zones and you still have minor transitions. It is just easier for computers to handle that. Besides, I believe that the OP was saying take away all world areas and have just a lobby game with instanced dungeons, which means large zone instances would get nixxed...
First off, if the instances were done well, and the waits for the public instances were short enough, most people wouldn't notice at this point. It's not like the world changes enough anymore for anyone to really notice if it's technically persistant or not. Add in the ability to invite or have friends randomly join you, and that's all most people need. Most folks in the gaming community as a whole don't really care if there are 100 other people in the same zone, they really don't, and for pve, they generally want less competition, not more, so having smaller instances would actually have a fair amount of support. Add in an increasing ignoring of strangers while in the open world, and the need for the open world disappears, which, like it or not, means the devs are going to be less and less willing to devote precious resources to it. I'm not saying that this is a good thing, or something that I would want to play personally, but to deny that it is one of the major trends in the market is foolish.
For the second point, the original OP was simply to turn the "world" into an instance that would have random people join periodically to maintain the sense of massiveness. That blends perfectly well with the type and common uses of "open world" that already exist in most games. I'm not saying that no one would care if the world was taken away, just not most, because at this point, the open world in many of the larger games is little more than a glorified instance some people take advantage of while waiting for a group to form for the dungeons. Again, I am not saying this to advocate this development or to say it needs to be encouraged, but rather to point out that the OP is not all that farfetched because we're already almost there in function if not quite yet in form.
For the second point, the original OP was simply to turn the "world" into an instance that would have random people join periodically to maintain the sense of massiveness. That blends perfectly well with the type and common uses of "open world" that already exist in most games. I'm not saying that no one would care if the world was taken away, just not most, because at this point, the open world in many of the larger games is little more than a glorified instance some people take advantage of while waiting for a group to form for the dungeons. Again, I am not saying this to advocate this development or to say it needs to be encouraged, but rather to point out that the OP is not all that farfetched because we're already almost there in function if not quite yet in form.
I think the key is gameplay experiences. If a large instanced zone plays like a large persistent zone, people wouldn't really care. In fact, if they are not told, how can they even tell?
Let's do a thought experients. Let's say there is an online version of SKYRIM. So you play SKYRIM in the open world, and sometimes you meet some other human players. How would you know if it is an instanced where random players are put into the same one, or the world is actually persistent? There is no way to know.
This argument extends all the way down to small instances.
The ONLY reason why you know it is an instanced, and not a persistent dungeon, when you go into a D3 game with 3 other players are
a) You know there are way more than 3 other players playing this game, and for the size of the dungeon, it is not likely you only meet 3 others, and
b) you actually are told by blizz that it is an instanced.
If you are not told, and if the dungeon is big enough that meeting only 3 other is a probabilisticly likely occurance, the experience will be the same as that in a persistent world.
But why pick GW2 to discuss... it cost nothing to play and was meant to be all YOU wanted. Imagine of that open area had not lookout points, no safety and you were left to explore without harbor.
Because it is one of the successful MMOs released recently.
Are you a seer...?
You don't get it kid, you are making an assumption.... because, GuildWars2 is not 10 years old yet, is it..? So how do you know it's success?? Is it because EVERYTHING you base all your inane posting on, is soley based of off World of Warcraft.. & the stitistica u put together?
I don't think you even understand the larger game, or even played these MMORPG's throughout. Ur just a lobby queen w/shinny armor...! Afraid..
Lastly, GW2 has had a succesful release... but it is not even a year old.
Coincidentally, I have not logged into my collector's edition account in nearly 2 months... One of the greatest intial experiences I ever had, phenominal even.., but boring as hell. I know why it failed, as it did. Because if done differrent, nobody would be remembering WoW right now. It had that much potential difference..
"No they are not charity. That is where the whales come in. (I play for free. Whales pays.) Devs get a business. That is how it works."
You're changing the OP now. If the intent is to mimic a "virtual world" that the player is oblivious to then it's not really taking it away, is it. Your point was that a virtual world is not needed for "today's gamer" based upon what you think is thier pattern of play. If you no longer think do then great but changing the angle mid stream is a little disingenuous.
But why pick GW2 to discuss... it cost nothing to play and was meant to be all YOU wanted. Imagine of that open area had not lookout points, no safety and you were left to explore without harbor.
Because it is one of the successful MMOs released recently.
Are you a seer...?
You don't get it kid, you are making an assumption.... because, GuildWars2 is not 10 years old yet, is it..? So how do you know it's success?? Is it because EVERYTHING you base all your inane posting on, is soley based of off World of Warcraft.. & the stitistica u put together?
I don't think you even understand the larger game, or even played these MMORPG's throughout. Ur just a lobby queen w/shinny armor...! Afraid..
Lastly, GW2 has had a succesful release... but it is not even a year old.
Coincidentally, I have not logged into my collector's edition account in nearly 2 months... One of the greatest intial experiences I ever had, phenominal even.., but boring as hell. I know why it failed, as it did. Because if done differrent, nobody would be remembering WoW right now. It had that much potential difference..
uh? It sold 2M copies, and it is consistently high (#5 now) on xfire. If that is not a successful online game, what is?
Originally posted by Aelious You're changing the OP now. If the intent is to mimic a "virtual world" that the player is oblivious to then it's not really taking it away, is it. Your point was that a virtual world is not needed for "today's gamer" based upon what you think is thier pattern of play. If you no longer think do then great but changing the angle mid stream is a little disingenuous.
uh? I am just broadening the discussion, and also exploring what consistent a virtual world.
In fact, it is pretty obviously that a virtual world does not have to be truly persistent, because in some situations (like discussed before), people may not even be able to detect that persistency.
Originally posted by bunnyhopper Yes they will. Next!
How? When? Certainly not when they are in a city waiting for a dungeon to pop, or in that dungeon doing a 5-man run.
The majority of casual gamers are not sitting in cities, waiting for timers to pop. They are out there exploring, adventuring, crafting, roleplaying. What you're pointing at are the hardcores who probably raced through the leveling content in order to get to the real rewards from raiding and hardcore dungeons. They're the type of people who could care less about a virtual world and don't mind lobby based games.
That is not really what you were saying in the post I commented on. You were claiming that most people could be put in their own private instance and would not notice the difference. This is not the same thing as a large zone instance in the world were you have hundreds of people interacting and competing with each other.
There are so few truly open worlds, I can only really think of one and that is Vanguard's world. It still has zones and you still have minor transitions. It is just easier for computers to handle that. Besides, I believe that the OP was saying take away all world areas and have just a lobby game with instanced dungeons, which means large zone instances would get nixxed...
First off, if the instances were done well, and the waits for the public instances were short enough, most people wouldn't notice at this point. It's not like the world changes enough anymore for anyone to really notice if it's technically persistant or not. Add in the ability to invite or have friends randomly join you, and that's all most people need. Most folks in the gaming community as a whole don't really care if there are 100 other people in the same zone, they really don't, and for pve, they generally want less competition, not more, so having smaller instances would actually have a fair amount of support. Add in an increasing ignoring of strangers while in the open world, and the need for the open world disappears, which, like it or not, means the devs are going to be less and less willing to devote precious resources to it. I'm not saying that this is a good thing, or something that I would want to play personally, but to deny that it is one of the major trends in the market is foolish.
For the second point, the original OP was simply to turn the "world" into an instance that would have random people join periodically to maintain the sense of massiveness. That blends perfectly well with the type and common uses of "open world" that already exist in most games. I'm not saying that no one would care if the world was taken away, just not most, because at this point, the open world in many of the larger games is little more than a glorified instance some people take advantage of while waiting for a group to form for the dungeons. Again, I am not saying this to advocate this development or to say it needs to be encouraged, but rather to point out that the OP is not all that farfetched because we're already almost there in function if not quite yet in form.
Then why aren't games like D&DO, STO, CO, DCUO and the late CoH the huge successes they should be since they meet all the criteria for these instance, lobby games you proclaim should be the future of online gaming? Something tells me that the very mechanics you laud as the future of gaming are the very reason why they lack the popularity of games like EQ, EQ2, WoW and even less popular games like AO, DAoC, AoC, LoTRO and TSW. How would you explain the wildly popular Planetside 2? Why are first person shooters, which have traditionally been about lobby gaming since they went online are now shooting for a more virtual world feel and doing great as a result?
People do notice and while they may not voice it specifically, they show it by not playing games that embrace it. Sure, they have niche numbers for their player bases, but I've yet to see a lobby based MMO that has garnered even half as much attention as the ones with persistant and more open worlds.
Originally posted by bunnyhopper Yes they will. Next!
How? When? Certainly not when they are in a city waiting for a dungeon to pop, or in that dungeon doing a 5-man run.
The majority of casual gamers are not sitting in cities, waiting for timers to pop. They are out there exploring, adventuring, crafting, roleplaying. What you're pointing at are the hardcores who probably raced through the leveling content in order to get to the real rewards from raiding and hardcore dungeons. They're the type of people who could care less about a virtual world and don't mind lobby based games.
Exactly. It's also why those types don't mind or care about jumping from one game to the next when they've exhausted all that content within a month or two. They have nothing invested in there character or the game world...it's all about rewards and being #1 and little else.
Originally posted by Onomas Um....... some of you are getting persistant worlds and virtual worlds mixed up. Yes there is a difference, a pretty big one.
A persistant lobby is not a persistant world. A persistant world doesn't have to be a virtual world, but the more virtual world charactersitics, the better they are.
Originally posted by Onomas Um....... some of you are getting persistant worlds and virtual worlds mixed up. Yes there is a difference, a pretty big one.
LOL .. i agree with you. Now there is more to discuss. I suppose even SKYRIM has a virtual world, but it is not persistent.
Now the question is what defined a "world". I don't think you will think that a persistent AH is a world. But how about just a city? Or a large zone?
Then why aren't games like D&DO, STO, CO, DCUO and the late CoH the huge successes they should be since they meet all the criteria for these instance, lobby games you proclaim should be the future of online gaming? Something tells me that the very mechanics you laud as the future of gaming are the very reason why they lack the popularity of games like EQ, EQ2, WoW and even less popular games like AO, DAoC, AoC, LoTRO and TSW. How would you explain the wildly popular Planetside 2? Why are first person shooters, which have traditionally been about lobby gaming since they went online are now shooting for a more virtual world feel and doing great as a result?
People do notice and while they may not voice it specifically, they show it by not playing games that embrace it. Sure, they have niche numbers for their player bases, but I've yet to see a lobby based MMO that has garnered even half as much attention as the ones with persistant and more open worlds.
I personally am not lauding them (I don't play most of the new MMOs in part because of this trend), I am simply acknowledging the fact that we are closer to the OP than many here want to admit. Like I said before, we are already largely there in function, with most of the dev focus being on new instances and raids rather than the world as a whole; if the trend continues, which it may or may not, than a change in popular form is not that far behind, at which point, a lot of those games you mentioned as failures will end up being seen as simply ahead of their time. And people may notice now, but if the trend continues much farther or longer, less and less people are going to notice the difference. You don't have to like that fact, and I personally don't, but it is what it is. I don't agree with many of the OP's conclusions, but many of his arguments about the current state of the game are actually hard to ignore when looked at objectively.
First off, if the instances were done well, and the waits for the public instances were short enough, most people wouldn't notice at this point. It's not like the world changes enough anymore for anyone to really notice if it's technically persistant or not. Add in the ability to invite or have friends randomly join you, and that's all most people need. Most folks in the gaming community as a whole don't really care if there are 100 other people in the same zone, they really don't, and for pve, they generally want less competition, not more, so having smaller instances would actually have a fair amount of support. Add in an increasing ignoring of strangers while in the open world, and the need for the open world disappears, which, like it or not, means the devs are going to be less and less willing to devote precious resources to it. I'm not saying that this is a good thing, or something that I would want to play personally, but to deny that it is one of the major trends in the market is foolish.
For the second point, the original OP was simply to turn the "world" into an instance that would have random people join periodically to maintain the sense of massiveness. That blends perfectly well with the type and common uses of "open world" that already exist in most games. I'm not saying that no one would care if the world was taken away, just not most, because at this point, the open world in many of the larger games is little more than a glorified instance some people take advantage of while waiting for a group to form for the dungeons. Again, I am not saying this to advocate this development or to say it needs to be encouraged, but rather to point out that the OP is not all that farfetched because we're already almost there in function if not quite yet in form.
Again, underlined, you keep claiming that most people would not notice removal of all massively multiplayer world zones, for the benefit of essentially a mainly single player instanced lobby game. Where is your proof ? You keep claiming it as if it were fact, then show some hard numbers !
From playing WoW, ToR, and GW2, I don't see what you are talking about. I see plenty of players out in the world zones, except for GW2 at midrange. Yes, there are people in the main congregating points of the game and I am sure some of them are waiting in queues, but that is not all that they do. And how about a game like EVE that is popular and has 0 instances ?
MMORPGs are really much more open and require the interaction of many, many players. What you are talking about is a game that is essentially not an MMORPG.
I take it virtual means different things to different folks. To me it reminds me of a Batman animation I saw once where kids in an Arcade were becoming junkies to these virtual world game machine body encasing capsules. Since that tech hasn't yet been completely developed (discounting flight instruction simulations for NASA) I'm thinking more present day definition in which virtual means, well, "on the internet" - or what I commonly call:
First off, if the instances were done well, and the waits for the public instances were short enough, most people wouldn't notice at this point. It's not like the world changes enough anymore for anyone to really notice if it's technically persistant or not. Add in the ability to invite or have friends randomly join you, and that's all most people need. Most folks in the gaming community as a whole don't really care if there are 100 other people in the same zone, they really don't, and for pve, they generally want less competition, not more, so having smaller instances would actually have a fair amount of support. Add in an increasing ignoring of strangers while in the open world, and the need for the open world disappears, which, like it or not, means the devs are going to be less and less willing to devote precious resources to it. I'm not saying that this is a good thing, or something that I would want to play personally, but to deny that it is one of the major trends in the market is foolish.
For the second point, the original OP was simply to turn the "world" into an instance that would have random people join periodically to maintain the sense of massiveness. That blends perfectly well with the type and common uses of "open world" that already exist in most games. I'm not saying that no one would care if the world was taken away, just not most, because at this point, the open world in many of the larger games is little more than a glorified instance some people take advantage of while waiting for a group to form for the dungeons. Again, I am not saying this to advocate this development or to say it needs to be encouraged, but rather to point out that the OP is not all that farfetched because we're already almost there in function if not quite yet in form.
Again, underlined, you keep claiming that most people would not notice removal of all massively multiplayer world zones, for the benefit of essentially a mainly single player instanced lobby game. Where is your proof ? You keep claiming it as if it were fact, then show some hard numbers !
From playing WoW, ToR, and GW2, I don't see what you are talking about. I see plenty of players out in the world zones, except for GW2 at midrange. Yes, there are people in the main congregating points of the game and I am sure some of them are waiting in queues, but that is not all that they do. And how about a game like EVE that is popular and has 0 instances ?
MMORPGs are really much more open and require the interaction of many, many players. What you are talking about is a game that is essentially not an MMORPG.
I have been careful, quite deliberately, to point out that many people right now would still notice a change in form. However, the shift has already started in a major segment of the MMOs being released, and while I don't think we are to the point where devs could get away with the changing the form that drastically, in function, it has already largely occurred. The world matters all of once as you level, and once you hit max level, it's dungeons and repeating the same dailies over and over; the only other option is to move on to the next game. In that time frame, nothing in the world changes, you're doing the exact same thing that thousands of people did before you, and thousands of people will do after you, and your impact on the world is zero. You can run around in it all you want, but in the end, that great open world tends to be either a hallway or a lobby itself; almost never is it designed to be a proper room that serves as an end destination itself. There are exceptions to this, to be certain, but not as many as there used to be, and most the time someone tries anything new and different, it's get shot down as not good enough, reducing the chances of devs and publishers in the future being willing to buck the greater trend.
Guild Wars has already proven that while people will scream and shout about having their world taken away, they will still play the game, and give that game their money, if it is well executed. All it would take to really push the trend is for one or two well executed game to copy that specific aspect, ignoring the initial angst about losing the world, and you'll find a lot of devs trying to jump on the band wagon of getting rid ot the open world. I'm not saying that this is a good thing, or something that is likely to happen immediately, but the fact is, we are a lot closer to it being a reality than many people here really want to admit. Functionally, a lot of games are designed in a way that an persistant open world really isn't a requirement except to appease expectations of the players; as soon as those expectations change, and that kind of change has happened before, often with startling speed, the devs aren't going to be nearly as nostalgic as the few remaining players who actually care about the world.
Again, I would like to point out that I do not agree with the trend, nor do I believe that all games are following it blindly, nor am I trying to push the OP's conclusions, but the unwillingness to acknowledge that his arguments are not as farfetched as many here are comfortable with simply speeds up the process as people avoid having the conversation when there is still time to have it.
As for your last point, that is entirely a different conversation, and I am inclined to agree with it, but that doesn't change the fact that the definition of MMO has already changed on a major scale at least half a dozen times since it was first coined, and it will most certainly change again. Trying to say that gamers will never accept a truly lobby based game just because they don't right now is very dangerous. We are already to the point where changing the definition would not be all that hard if attempted by someone with sufficient clout and gamer cred, as the underlying structure already supports that particular change. If Blizzard, for example, were to implement something like that, I could safely bet that a large portion of the community would follow right along without even blinking.
But why pick GW2 to discuss... it cost nothing to play and was meant to be all YOU wanted. Imagine of that open area had not lookout points, no safety and you were left to explore without harbor.
Because it is one of the successful MMOs released recently.
Are you a seer...?
You don't get it kid, you are making an assumption.... because, GuildWars2 is not 10 years old yet, is it..? So how do you know it's success?? Is it because EVERYTHING you base all your inane posting on, is soley based of off World of Warcraft.. & the stitistica u put together?
I don't think you even understand the larger game, or even played these MMORPG's throughout. Ur just a lobby queen w/shinny armor...! Afraid..
Lastly, GW2 has had a succesful release... but it is not even a year old.
Coincidentally, I have not logged into my collector's edition account in nearly 2 months... One of the greatest intial experiences I ever had, phenominal even.., but boring as hell. I know why it failed, as it did. Because if done differrent, nobody would be remembering WoW right now. It had that much potential difference..
uh? It sold 2M copies, and it is consistently high (#5 now) on xfire. If that is not a successful online game, what is?
You still don't get it kid, do you....? Are you playing GuildWars2 daily..?
Me & a dozen lifers I know are not... (& three of us bought the GW2 Collector's Editions), so no.. at the moment when looking back at this moment it really isn't a success, now is it? Yes.. It had great sales, but over 90% of the people who purchased the game, don't play daily.. or even weekly.
Secondly, we here on these forums are players/connoisseur/end-user of these MMORPG's. A game's "success" is not rated on it's financials, or sales records, it is on how the players like, or dislike the game.
Don't discount the numbers, of swaths of people that get sucked into the intital marketing.. (ie millions), this can be seen and notated (behind close doors), for the next shinny thingy, these buinesstards want to dangle in front of the endless millions of WoWtards who've come to want a more sophisticated fix. But are just learning to understand 1st you play WoW, then you graduate (into an adult MMO). Not a free to play/freemium, etc.
Problem is, there are so many shinny things.. that these children (yes children) cannot help themselves and must get suckered into them, one after another... making & purpetuating the "WoW clone". Every old school player has seen this trend since Meridian59, etc..
It is people like YOU Narius... that purpetuate all these shoddy half-assed games that have come out over the past 6 years. Your generation doesn't know what they want, and nevered learned a thing about social science in your public schools, to be taught (at an early age) what Marketing is and to understand commercials, & it's effects, etc.
So understand... even if YOU just spend $30 bucks, p(lus a few months subs) on something like Conan/Aion/Allods/WAR/TERA, etc over the past few years, along with the seemingly other 10~12 million WoWtards are just "trying" out these new games, "to see whats up..", ...
But you feign ignorance on those numbers, don't you.
Do understand that before WoW, it took a real game to be developed, cuz there was only less than 1 million people online playing these games. During WoW's internet explosion.. 14 million people where playing online games...
So, Narius when YOU and fellow WoW'tardz/refugee's* get suckered into some of these clones over the past 6 years.. Understand that if just 3% of the people who play WoW, decide to try AION.... you now have a success! (lol)
It is simply math, but you don't understand it. You try to speak like a business man, but don't get it..
Simply due to the massive amount of hungry kids that want to quench their MMORPG thirst and will try any pop that comes along. Thus meaning instant success for anyone who can fool just a fraction of these newbies attention, to have them buy/sub/e-item their game = instant success. (lol)
3% of WoW's sub base is 360,000 players !!
Enterily different story back when EverQuest was released^...
Very few people even knew about the internet, let-alone have a constant connection to it. It took EQ several years to get to 400k players. Most prior to 2002 were both playing EQ and weekend PvP with our UO accounts ($30'ish/month for both games). Point is that wasn't even 2 million playing MMORPG's and yet both Everquest & Ultima Online & Ashron's call were all succesful. But those games EARNED their customers one by one.
They^ were not handed hundreds of thousands of endless swaths of nerotic kids looking to get their next fix...
So please understand, that "Success" is a relative term Narius. If I was an unscupulous business man, I would hire a bunch of programmers and pay to get talent and spend 3 years fuddling an MMO together, have a quicky upbeat community manager and fool 5% of the WoW refugee's out there circle any new MMo like sharks and BINGO... their doing interview for Forbes.. 2 years later..? Free to Play..
Get it dude..? You speak like a marketer, not a gamer.
So, (again) do you still play GuildWars2... ?
To me... an end-user and a gamer... they game was OK. But I don't consider it a success, just another game that didn't fail. But it seems any MMO that stays afloat, considered a "success" to you...?
Because you don't know a grass roots project from a Marketed one... you are commeercialized.
But, I see now, that you think you're a business man now... and that you are soley remarking on the bisness success of the game (financials), but not as a player who base games off a completly different metric such as success on the longevity and quality and playability of the game.
Narius.. don't colorcoat a reply... you post history is definable, you cannot go against what you've said already, anymore dude. You're changling exposed...!
"No they are not charity. That is where the whales come in. (I play for free. Whales pays.) Devs get a business. That is how it works."
Take WOW as an example. What are the pve gameplay? Solo-quest, 5-man instanced dungeons and raids. In between dungeons, players waited in a city.
So what if there is no virtual world? Just a city lobby. Will they even notice the difference?
You may say .. what about meeting other players when you solo quest? Well, that also don't need a persistent virtual world. You can use an instanced and match random players into it. You will never be seeing 10000 others outside of a city anyway. In fact, most questing players won't want 10000 others to share their quest mobs.
In DDO, most of the gameplay is in the dungeons. There isn't much of even the open world solo-questing like in WOW.
LOTRO is similar to WOW.
In STO, most mission/pve content is in instanced. I do see lots of other players (space ships) in sector space. However, i doubt i would even notice if the sector space is not persistent, or if some of the space ships are NPCs (in fact, some of them are).
In fact, didn't GW1 tried this idea and was very successful.
That was called Guild Wars, you mention it in your very post...
That Guild Wars 2 login screen knocked up my wife. Must be the second coming!
Me & a dozen lifers I know are not... (& three of us bought the GW2 Collector's Editions), so no.. at the moment when looking back at this moment it really isn't a success, now is it? Yes.. It had great sales, but over 90% of the people who purchased the game, don't play daily.. or even weekly.
So? I don't play Dishonored weekly or daily .. it is a great game. I don't play LOL daily or weekly, don't tell me it is not a great success.
You have no data. The 90% number is just bogus. It boils down to "you don't like it".
Again, underlined, you keep claiming that most people would not notice removal of all massively multiplayer world zones, for the benefit of essentially a mainly single player instanced lobby game. Where is your proof ? You keep claiming it as if it were fact, then show some hard numbers !
From playing WoW, ToR, and GW2, I don't see what you are talking about. I see plenty of players out in the world zones, except for GW2 at midrange. Yes, there are people in the main congregating points of the game and I am sure some of them are waiting in queues, but that is not all that they do. And how about a game like EVE that is popular and has 0 instances ?
MMORPGs are really much more open and require the interaction of many, many players. What you are talking about is a game that is essentially not an MMORPG.
Now where is your proof that Eve is popular. It has only 500k users. It is #24 on xfire game ranking .. and that is the best for a non-instanced open world MMO.
Look at the top 10 games. Even if you don't count online FPS, they are LOL, PoE, WoW, GW2, DOTA2, D3, WOT and minecraft. Persistent virtual world is not anywhere in sight .. except may be GW2 and WOW. guil
And i played WOW too. Are you blind to all the people in SW and Org waiting for queues. ANd how do you know that is not what they do? Do you talk to all of them? I, for sure, that is what my guild does .. because we chat till dungeons pop.
And for a person asking for proof, you are spewing a lot of stuff without a shred of evidence.
But why pick GW2 to discuss... it cost nothing to play and was meant to be all YOU wanted. Imagine of that open area had not lookout points, no safety and you were left to explore without harbor.
Because it is one of the successful MMOs released recently.
Are you a seer...?
You don't get it kid, you are making an assumption.... because, GuildWars2 is not 10 years old yet, is it..? So how do you know it's success?? Is it because EVERYTHING you base all your inane posting on, is soley based of off World of Warcraft.. & the stitistica u put together?
I don't think you even understand the larger game, or even played these MMORPG's throughout. Ur just a lobby queen w/shinny armor...! Afraid..
Lastly, GW2 has had a succesful release... but it is not even a year old.
Coincidentally, I have not logged into my collector's edition account in nearly 2 months... One of the greatest intial experiences I ever had, phenominal even.., but boring as hell. I know why it failed, as it did. Because if done differrent, nobody would be remembering WoW right now. It had that much potential difference..
uh? It sold 2M copies, and it is consistently high (#5 now) on xfire. If that is not a successful online game, what is?
You still don't get it kid, do you....? Are you playing GuildWars2 daily..?
Me & a dozen lifers I know are not... (& three of us bought the GW2 Collector's Editions), so no.. at the moment when looking back at this moment it really isn't a success, now is it? Yes.. It had great sales, but over 90% of the people who purchased the game, don't play daily.. or even weekly.
Secondly, we here on these forums are players/connoisseur/end-user of these MMORPG's. A game's "success" is not rated on it's financials, or sales records, it is on how the players like, or dislike the game.
Don't discount the numbers, of swaths of people that get sucked into the intital marketing.. (ie millions), this can be seen and notated (behind close doors), for the next shinny thingy, these buinesstards want to dangle in front of the endless millions of WoWtards who've come to want a more sophisticated fix. But are just learning to understand 1st you play WoW, then you graduate (into an adult MMO). Not a free to play/freemium, etc.
Problem is, there are so many shinny things.. that these children (yes children) cannot help themselves and must get suckered into them, one after another... making & purpetuating the "WoW clone". Every old school player has seen this trend since Meridian59, etc..
It is people like YOU Narius... that purpetuate all these shoddy half-assed games that have come out over the past 6 years. Your generation doesn't know what they want, and nevered learned a thing about social science in your public schools, to be taught (at an early age) what Marketing is and to understand commercials, & it's effects, etc.
So understand... even if YOU just spend $30 bucks, p(lus a few months subs) on something like Conan/Aion/Allods/WAR/TERA, etc over the past few years, along with the seemingly other 10~12 million WoWtards are just "trying" out these new games, "to see whats up..", ...
But you feign ignorance on those numbers, don't you.
Do understand that before WoW, it took a real game to be developed, cuz there was only less than 1 million people online playing these games. During WoW's internet explosion.. 14 million people where playing online games...
So, Narius when YOU and fellow WoW'tardz/refugee's* get suckered into some of these clones over the past 6 years.. Understand that if just 3% of the people who play WoW, decide to try AION.... you now have a success! (lol)
It is simply math, but you don't understand it. You try to speak like a business man, but don't get it..
Simply due to the massive amount of hungry kids that want to quench their MMORPG thirst and will try any pop that comes along. Thus meaning instant success for anyone who can fool just a fraction of these newbies attention, to have them buy/sub/e-item their game = instant success. (lol)
3% of WoW's sub base is 360,000 players !!
Enterily different story back when EverQuest was released^...
Very few people even knew about the internet, let-alone have a constant connection to it. It took EQ several years to get to 400k players. Most prior to 2002 were both playing EQ and weekend PvP with our UO accounts ($30'ish/month for both games). Point is that wasn't even 2 million playing MMORPG's and yet both Everquest & Ultima Online & Ashron's call were all succesful. But those games EARNED their customers one by one.
They^ were not handed hundreds of thousands of endless swaths of nerotic kids looking to get their next fix...
So please understand, that "Success" is a relative term Narius. If I was an unscupulous business man, I would hire a bunch of programmers and pay to get talent and spend 3 years fuddling an MMO together, have a quicky upbeat community manager and fool 5% of the WoW refugee's out there circle any new MMo like sharks and BINGO... their doing interview for Forbes.. 2 years later..? Free to Play..
Get it dude..? You speak like a marketer, not a gamer.
So, (again) do you still play GuildWars2... ?
To me... an end-user and a gamer... they game was OK. But I don't consider it a success, just another game that didn't fail. But it seems any MMO that stays afloat, considered a "success" to you...?
Because you don't know a grass roots project from a Marketed one... you are commeercialized.
But, I see now, that you think you're a business man now... and that you are soley remarking on the bisness success of the game (financials), but not as a player who base games off a completly different metric such as success on the longevity and quality and playability of the game.
Narius.. don't colorcoat a reply... you post history is definable, you cannot go against what you've said already, anymore dude. You're changling exposed...!
How do you know 90% of the people who bought GW2 don't play it anymore? I wouldn't base it on the player base form this forum - people here are too important to play GW2 (or so they think).
Doesn't matter what YOU think it is all the players together that is the important part and guess what, based on sales it is a success - sorry to burst your Prima Donna bubble.
Without CRZ and the Starter Edition, the World of Warcraft is indeed an empty place. Don't fool yourself into thinking otherwise. Consider that those 10 people you see out in the world are most likely from entirely different servers... so that would normally be one lone soul out in the wilderness from each server... out of 11 million subscribers... 1 player out in the world per server. That's like only one person living in the state of Montana. There are more NPCs roaming about out in the world than actual players... except during expansion release.
Expansion release, you're stacked on top of each other... two months after expansion release, you almost have the entire world to yourself... if it weren't for CRZ and Starter Edition.
Would people notice if the world disappeared? Probably. Would they care. Not really.
Now, if you erased Orgrimmar and Stormwind, they would notice and get peaved that they have to park their toons in another city with access to an AH, bank, and the like. Eventually they will have forgotten about both cities... much like they did when Outlands and WotLK came out. Players are more leary of losing the bank and AH than they are about a parcel of land that they never travel upon.
Without CRZ and the Starter Edition, the World of Warcraft is indeed an empty place. Don't fool yourself into thinking otherwise. Consider that those 10 people you see out in the world are most likely from entirely different servers... so that would normally be one lone soul out in the wilderness from each server... out of 11 million subscribers... 1 player out in the world per server. That's like only one person living in the state of Montana. There are more NPCs roaming about out in the world than actual players... except during expansion release.
Expansion release, you're stacked on top of each other... two months after expansion release, you almost have the entire world to yourself... if it weren't for CRZ and Starter Edition.
Would people notice if the world disappeared? Probably. Would they care. Not really.
Now, if you erased Orgrimmar and Stormwind, they would notice and get peaved that they have to park their toons in another city with access to an AH, bank, and the like. Eventually they will have forgotten about both cities... much like they did when Outlands and WotLK came out. Players are more leary of losing the bank and AH than they are about a parcel of land that they never travel upon.
That is what i see too. And not just in WOW. Take STO as an example .. if you do group content, you hit the 'pve' or go to the pvp zone.
Surely there are others in sector space but most don't chat/talk/care .. they may as well be NPCs.
Comments
First off, if the instances were done well, and the waits for the public instances were short enough, most people wouldn't notice at this point. It's not like the world changes enough anymore for anyone to really notice if it's technically persistant or not. Add in the ability to invite or have friends randomly join you, and that's all most people need. Most folks in the gaming community as a whole don't really care if there are 100 other people in the same zone, they really don't, and for pve, they generally want less competition, not more, so having smaller instances would actually have a fair amount of support. Add in an increasing ignoring of strangers while in the open world, and the need for the open world disappears, which, like it or not, means the devs are going to be less and less willing to devote precious resources to it. I'm not saying that this is a good thing, or something that I would want to play personally, but to deny that it is one of the major trends in the market is foolish.
For the second point, the original OP was simply to turn the "world" into an instance that would have random people join periodically to maintain the sense of massiveness. That blends perfectly well with the type and common uses of "open world" that already exist in most games. I'm not saying that no one would care if the world was taken away, just not most, because at this point, the open world in many of the larger games is little more than a glorified instance some people take advantage of while waiting for a group to form for the dungeons. Again, I am not saying this to advocate this development or to say it needs to be encouraged, but rather to point out that the OP is not all that farfetched because we're already almost there in function if not quite yet in form.
Actually, thats a folk tale. ^^ Its meant to be a cautionary tale, but has little or no basis in reality (in terms of frogs, that is...^^).
http://www.snopes.com/critters/wild/frogboil.asp
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling_frog
I think the key is gameplay experiences. If a large instanced zone plays like a large persistent zone, people wouldn't really care. In fact, if they are not told, how can they even tell?
Let's do a thought experients. Let's say there is an online version of SKYRIM. So you play SKYRIM in the open world, and sometimes you meet some other human players. How would you know if it is an instanced where random players are put into the same one, or the world is actually persistent? There is no way to know.
This argument extends all the way down to small instances.
The ONLY reason why you know it is an instanced, and not a persistent dungeon, when you go into a D3 game with 3 other players are
a) You know there are way more than 3 other players playing this game, and for the size of the dungeon, it is not likely you only meet 3 others, and
b) you actually are told by blizz that it is an instanced.
If you are not told, and if the dungeon is big enough that meeting only 3 other is a probabilisticly likely occurance, the experience will be the same as that in a persistent world.
Are you a seer...?
You don't get it kid, you are making an assumption.... because, GuildWars2 is not 10 years old yet, is it..? So how do you know it's success?? Is it because EVERYTHING you base all your inane posting on, is soley based of off World of Warcraft.. & the stitistica u put together?
I don't think you even understand the larger game, or even played these MMORPG's throughout. Ur just a lobby queen w/shinny armor...! Afraid..
Lastly, GW2 has had a succesful release... but it is not even a year old.
Coincidentally, I have not logged into my collector's edition account in nearly 2 months... One of the greatest intial experiences I ever had, phenominal even.., but boring as hell. I know why it failed, as it did. Because if done differrent, nobody would be remembering WoW right now. It had that much potential difference..
"No they are not charity. That is where the whales come in. (I play for free. Whales pays.) Devs get a business. That is how it works."
-Nariusseldon
uh? It sold 2M copies, and it is consistently high (#5 now) on xfire. If that is not a successful online game, what is?
uh? I am just broadening the discussion, and also exploring what consistent a virtual world.
In fact, it is pretty obviously that a virtual world does not have to be truly persistent, because in some situations (like discussed before), people may not even be able to detect that persistency.
The majority of casual gamers are not sitting in cities, waiting for timers to pop. They are out there exploring, adventuring, crafting, roleplaying. What you're pointing at are the hardcores who probably raced through the leveling content in order to get to the real rewards from raiding and hardcore dungeons. They're the type of people who could care less about a virtual world and don't mind lobby based games.
Then why aren't games like D&DO, STO, CO, DCUO and the late CoH the huge successes they should be since they meet all the criteria for these instance, lobby games you proclaim should be the future of online gaming? Something tells me that the very mechanics you laud as the future of gaming are the very reason why they lack the popularity of games like EQ, EQ2, WoW and even less popular games like AO, DAoC, AoC, LoTRO and TSW. How would you explain the wildly popular Planetside 2? Why are first person shooters, which have traditionally been about lobby gaming since they went online are now shooting for a more virtual world feel and doing great as a result?
People do notice and while they may not voice it specifically, they show it by not playing games that embrace it. Sure, they have niche numbers for their player bases, but I've yet to see a lobby based MMO that has garnered even half as much attention as the ones with persistant and more open worlds.
Exactly. It's also why those types don't mind or care about jumping from one game to the next when they've exhausted all that content within a month or two. They have nothing invested in there character or the game world...it's all about rewards and being #1 and little else.
A persistant lobby is not a persistant world. A persistant world doesn't have to be a virtual world, but the more virtual world charactersitics, the better they are.
LOL .. i agree with you. Now there is more to discuss. I suppose even SKYRIM has a virtual world, but it is not persistent.
Now the question is what defined a "world". I don't think you will think that a persistent AH is a world. But how about just a city? Or a large zone?
I personally am not lauding them (I don't play most of the new MMOs in part because of this trend), I am simply acknowledging the fact that we are closer to the OP than many here want to admit. Like I said before, we are already largely there in function, with most of the dev focus being on new instances and raids rather than the world as a whole; if the trend continues, which it may or may not, than a change in popular form is not that far behind, at which point, a lot of those games you mentioned as failures will end up being seen as simply ahead of their time. And people may notice now, but if the trend continues much farther or longer, less and less people are going to notice the difference. You don't have to like that fact, and I personally don't, but it is what it is. I don't agree with many of the OP's conclusions, but many of his arguments about the current state of the game are actually hard to ignore when looked at objectively.
Again, underlined, you keep claiming that most people would not notice removal of all massively multiplayer world zones, for the benefit of essentially a mainly single player instanced lobby game. Where is your proof ? You keep claiming it as if it were fact, then show some hard numbers !
From playing WoW, ToR, and GW2, I don't see what you are talking about. I see plenty of players out in the world zones, except for GW2 at midrange. Yes, there are people in the main congregating points of the game and I am sure some of them are waiting in queues, but that is not all that they do. And how about a game like EVE that is popular and has 0 instances ?
MMORPGs are really much more open and require the interaction of many, many players. What you are talking about is a game that is essentially not an MMORPG.
Playing MUDs and MMOs since 1994.
Okay, looks like we need to define virtual.
I take it virtual means different things to different folks. To me it reminds me of a Batman animation I saw once where kids in an Arcade were becoming junkies to these virtual world game machine body encasing capsules. Since that tech hasn't yet been completely developed (discounting flight instruction simulations for NASA) I'm thinking more present day definition in which virtual means, well, "on the internet" - or what I commonly call:
C S
Y P
B A
E C
R E !
See definition 4 http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/virtual
"Virtual World" means a world that exists only in cyber space not in real life.
I have been careful, quite deliberately, to point out that many people right now would still notice a change in form. However, the shift has already started in a major segment of the MMOs being released, and while I don't think we are to the point where devs could get away with the changing the form that drastically, in function, it has already largely occurred. The world matters all of once as you level, and once you hit max level, it's dungeons and repeating the same dailies over and over; the only other option is to move on to the next game. In that time frame, nothing in the world changes, you're doing the exact same thing that thousands of people did before you, and thousands of people will do after you, and your impact on the world is zero. You can run around in it all you want, but in the end, that great open world tends to be either a hallway or a lobby itself; almost never is it designed to be a proper room that serves as an end destination itself. There are exceptions to this, to be certain, but not as many as there used to be, and most the time someone tries anything new and different, it's get shot down as not good enough, reducing the chances of devs and publishers in the future being willing to buck the greater trend.
Guild Wars has already proven that while people will scream and shout about having their world taken away, they will still play the game, and give that game their money, if it is well executed. All it would take to really push the trend is for one or two well executed game to copy that specific aspect, ignoring the initial angst about losing the world, and you'll find a lot of devs trying to jump on the band wagon of getting rid ot the open world. I'm not saying that this is a good thing, or something that is likely to happen immediately, but the fact is, we are a lot closer to it being a reality than many people here really want to admit. Functionally, a lot of games are designed in a way that an persistant open world really isn't a requirement except to appease expectations of the players; as soon as those expectations change, and that kind of change has happened before, often with startling speed, the devs aren't going to be nearly as nostalgic as the few remaining players who actually care about the world.
Again, I would like to point out that I do not agree with the trend, nor do I believe that all games are following it blindly, nor am I trying to push the OP's conclusions, but the unwillingness to acknowledge that his arguments are not as farfetched as many here are comfortable with simply speeds up the process as people avoid having the conversation when there is still time to have it.
As for your last point, that is entirely a different conversation, and I am inclined to agree with it, but that doesn't change the fact that the definition of MMO has already changed on a major scale at least half a dozen times since it was first coined, and it will most certainly change again. Trying to say that gamers will never accept a truly lobby based game just because they don't right now is very dangerous. We are already to the point where changing the definition would not be all that hard if attempted by someone with sufficient clout and gamer cred, as the underlying structure already supports that particular change. If Blizzard, for example, were to implement something like that, I could safely bet that a large portion of the community would follow right along without even blinking.
You still don't get it kid, do you....? Are you playing GuildWars2 daily..?
Me & a dozen lifers I know are not... (& three of us bought the GW2 Collector's Editions), so no.. at the moment when looking back at this moment it really isn't a success, now is it? Yes.. It had great sales, but over 90% of the people who purchased the game, don't play daily.. or even weekly.
Secondly, we here on these forums are players/connoisseur/end-user of these MMORPG's. A game's "success" is not rated on it's financials, or sales records, it is on how the players like, or dislike the game.
Don't discount the numbers, of swaths of people that get sucked into the intital marketing.. (ie millions), this can be seen and notated (behind close doors), for the next shinny thingy, these buinesstards want to dangle in front of the endless millions of WoWtards who've come to want a more sophisticated fix. But are just learning to understand 1st you play WoW, then you graduate (into an adult MMO). Not a free to play/freemium, etc.
Problem is, there are so many shinny things.. that these children (yes children) cannot help themselves and must get suckered into them, one after another... making & purpetuating the "WoW clone". Every old school player has seen this trend since Meridian59, etc..
It is people like YOU Narius... that purpetuate all these shoddy half-assed games that have come out over the past 6 years. Your generation doesn't know what they want, and nevered learned a thing about social science in your public schools, to be taught (at an early age) what Marketing is and to understand commercials, & it's effects, etc.
So understand... even if YOU just spend $30 bucks, p(lus a few months subs) on something like Conan/Aion/Allods/WAR/TERA, etc over the past few years, along with the seemingly other 10~12 million WoWtards are just "trying" out these new games, "to see whats up..", ...
But you feign ignorance on those numbers, don't you.
Do understand that before WoW, it took a real game to be developed, cuz there was only less than 1 million people online playing these games. During WoW's internet explosion.. 14 million people where playing online games...
So, Narius when YOU and fellow WoW'tardz/refugee's* get suckered into some of these clones over the past 6 years.. Understand that if just 3% of the people who play WoW, decide to try AION.... you now have a success! (lol)
It is simply math, but you don't understand it. You try to speak like a business man, but don't get it..
Simply due to the massive amount of hungry kids that want to quench their MMORPG thirst and will try any pop that comes along. Thus meaning instant success for anyone who can fool just a fraction of these newbies attention, to have them buy/sub/e-item their game = instant success. (lol)
3% of WoW's sub base is 360,000 players !!
Enterily different story back when EverQuest was released^...
Very few people even knew about the internet, let-alone have a constant connection to it. It took EQ several years to get to 400k players. Most prior to 2002 were both playing EQ and weekend PvP with our UO accounts ($30'ish/month for both games). Point is that wasn't even 2 million playing MMORPG's and yet both Everquest & Ultima Online & Ashron's call were all succesful. But those games EARNED their customers one by one.
They^ were not handed hundreds of thousands of endless swaths of nerotic kids looking to get their next fix...
So please understand, that "Success" is a relative term Narius. If I was an unscupulous business man, I would hire a bunch of programmers and pay to get talent and spend 3 years fuddling an MMO together, have a quicky upbeat community manager and fool 5% of the WoW refugee's out there circle any new MMo like sharks and BINGO... their doing interview for Forbes.. 2 years later..? Free to Play..
Get it dude..? You speak like a marketer, not a gamer.
So, (again) do you still play GuildWars2... ?
To me... an end-user and a gamer... they game was OK. But I don't consider it a success, just another game that didn't fail. But it seems any MMO that stays afloat, considered a "success" to you...?
Because you don't know a grass roots project from a Marketed one... you are commeercialized.
But, I see now, that you think you're a business man now... and that you are soley remarking on the bisness success of the game (financials), but not as a player who base games off a completly different metric such as success on the longevity and quality and playability of the game.
Narius.. don't colorcoat a reply... you post history is definable, you cannot go against what you've said already, anymore dude. You're changling exposed...!
"No they are not charity. That is where the whales come in. (I play for free. Whales pays.) Devs get a business. That is how it works."
-Nariusseldon
That was called Guild Wars, you mention it in your very post...
That Guild Wars 2 login screen knocked up my wife. Must be the second coming!
So? I don't play Dishonored weekly or daily .. it is a great game. I don't play LOL daily or weekly, don't tell me it is not a great success.
You have no data. The 90% number is just bogus. It boils down to "you don't like it".
Now where is your proof that Eve is popular. It has only 500k users. It is #24 on xfire game ranking .. and that is the best for a non-instanced open world MMO.
Look at the top 10 games. Even if you don't count online FPS, they are LOL, PoE, WoW, GW2, DOTA2, D3, WOT and minecraft. Persistent virtual world is not anywhere in sight .. except may be GW2 and WOW. guil
And i played WOW too. Are you blind to all the people in SW and Org waiting for queues. ANd how do you know that is not what they do? Do you talk to all of them? I, for sure, that is what my guild does .. because we chat till dungeons pop.
And for a person asking for proof, you are spewing a lot of stuff without a shred of evidence.
How do you know 90% of the people who bought GW2 don't play it anymore? I wouldn't base it on the player base form this forum - people here are too important to play GW2 (or so they think).
Doesn't matter what YOU think it is all the players together that is the important part and guess what, based on sales it is a success - sorry to burst your Prima Donna bubble.
Without CRZ and the Starter Edition, the World of Warcraft is indeed an empty place. Don't fool yourself into thinking otherwise. Consider that those 10 people you see out in the world are most likely from entirely different servers... so that would normally be one lone soul out in the wilderness from each server... out of 11 million subscribers... 1 player out in the world per server. That's like only one person living in the state of Montana. There are more NPCs roaming about out in the world than actual players... except during expansion release.
Expansion release, you're stacked on top of each other... two months after expansion release, you almost have the entire world to yourself... if it weren't for CRZ and Starter Edition.
Would people notice if the world disappeared? Probably. Would they care. Not really.
Now, if you erased Orgrimmar and Stormwind, they would notice and get peaved that they have to park their toons in another city with access to an AH, bank, and the like. Eventually they will have forgotten about both cities... much like they did when Outlands and WotLK came out. Players are more leary of losing the bank and AH than they are about a parcel of land that they never travel upon.
That is what i see too. And not just in WOW. Take STO as an example .. if you do group content, you hit the 'pve' or go to the pvp zone.
Surely there are others in sector space but most don't chat/talk/care .. they may as well be NPCs.
The gameplay is all in instances.