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Why is the community so terrible these days?
Xorian7
Member UncommonPosts: 212
Such fond memories of eq1 and its community and im currently playing on an rp server in stor online and its insane you get attacked just for asking questions.
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1999: internet was new. less that 300 million people worldwide had it. The concept of playing a video game with someone over the internet was new and exciting. no online game guides. no google. no youtube. no spoilers.
2015: internet is everywhere. over 3 billion people have it now. if a video game does not have an online aspect, it is considered out of the norm. all info about every game from the past, present and future is laid out in full detail. years before an mmo even launches, we can already know just about everything about it down to the way a character's foot rests at an angle.
the internet just isnt very special anymore. so the novelty has worn off. you have to find new ways to enjoy mmos other than just the thrill of talking to someone over an internet connection.
You can still have great experiences and meet cool folks. Just dont be surprised that the ice breaker is no longer, "isnt this amazing? im playing with someone from across the country right now!"
Could also have something to do with the fact that massively multiplayer games actually required multiple players to accomplish most content, and pissing people off in a smaller single server (as opposed to cross server) community meant making a bad name for yourself, and eventually being blacklisted and being forced to reroll anonymously.
Honestly, I think it's psychological. A side effect of spending life in a Skinner Box.
I still remember the first hardcore asshat I ran into in an MMORPG. His attack on me was completely unprovoked, yet to him, it was justified. How dare I stand in the wrong place when he was trying loot.
Pfft... he could have just said, "can you move a bit, I can't click that to loot it".
That was 2005-ish.
Bottom line is there is only ONE thing that's important in there. Pushing the button to get the reward.
See the Skinner Box connection?
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Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
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"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
There actually isn't a percentage difference in terms of asshats, it's a sheer volume effect.
"The good old days" as you like to think of them were different because the haystacks you had to go through to find needles were haystacks and not football fields.
This effect is slightly increased by the MOBA direction things are headed.
You also might want to consider you were less of a wuss back then.
The gaming community hasn't changed a whole lot, it has just grown massive.
I really hope that *insert game name here* will be the first game to ever live up to all of its pre-release promises, maintain a manageable hype level and have a clean release. Just don't expect me to hold my breath.
I hate this " it isn't new anymore" argument. I will give you that we have more people playing them, but the fact is the games themselves have in fact changed. In every old school MMO you NEEDED the community, and if you were a jerk you either hung out with like-minded people, or you were shunned as an outcast and would not get anywhere. Now we have megaservers, 99% solo play, you can craft everything, auction houses to avoid socializing, etc. You don't really get to know anyone outside of your circle because there is no need to, therefore everyone acts as though they are anon all the time.
What about the atari generation, commodore, nes, super nes, ps1, p2 eras?
What is specific about that generation that changed the course of gaming history?
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Don't meddle Commodore into it, please
What's so specific, the numbers. There were konsole kiddiez back then too, but those weren't the vast majority of gaming (boards, tabletops, heck even the arcades were also on the field).
And Commodore (plus even Atari for a short while before your '83 over there, and years later with ST) was not a game console, it was a home computer so its place is not among those craps... you don't put PC in the same bracket as the X-ed Bone and PS4 either, right?
edit, OP if you want good community, come to one of LotRO's RP servers
The community is a direct result of game design.
Design a game like Everquest with grouping as it's central form of progression, where you see the same people over and over on your server, and you have actual accountability.
Design a game like WoW where you solo the whole way up, never see the same person twice, and you have zero accountability.
Encouraging and providing the avenues for the community to socialize and interact is all down to game design.
That being said, I guess my conclusion is that game design is pretty terrible these days.
How about making a virtual world MMORPG where you see the same people, have accountability and reputation? Design systems to encourage socialization and grouping. Make people become life long friends by playing your game. Guess that's asking for to much?
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
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Try a MUD today at http://www.mudconnect.com/"terrible" is a matter of perspective. Not everyone cares about seeing the same people in the same game everyday. Heck, many may not even play one single game day after day.
It is asking too much if there is not a big enough market for dev to invest in. What you are asking is not cheap, you know.
Tons of reasons.
Very little barrier of entry and growing anonymity because nobody cares who you are on a massive megaserver anymore.
Back in my DAoC days you made one character and you stuck to that one for 25 days played and more. Getting into a prestigious guild was something to be desired and not the other way around (nameless guilds constantly spamming the region chat for advertising).
With the very slow levelcurve and downtimes you had plenty of time to socialize without sacrificing precious progression like we see these days. People are actually still nice today if you take the time to talk to them in a friendly manner. I've had good experiences in FFXIV but you have to be the person to start the conversation because nobody expects it anymore.
Of course everything was a bit more unexplored and meeting new people was exciting at a young age. I probably juggled 50-100 friends on DAoC, I couldn't come close to that these days and prefer to keep a few good friends.
That being said, not everything was unicorns and roses back in the day, there was a ton of infighting between factions, groups and players on the forums and IRC. That just happens when you play or get to the portion of the game that was is very competitive. Nowadays everything is a competition.
Nilden makes some great points in his post. Somehow over the years PVE has turned into a boring grind up to cap level and then a massively challenging stressful experience where less experienced players get shit on and turned away from the game.
DAoC PVE was incredibly forgiving and didn't scale with the amount of players. The more players you brought, the easier it got, giving the weaker players a chance to participate without risking wiping the group. It was not uncommon to do most of the "raids" with 200 and more players. Now raids are designed with a precise group composition, gear level and skillset in mind, which leaves no room for newbies. Of course a big part of the current MMO population does want this type of content.
The perception of what an MMO is has changed over the years and with it the playerbase. Pretty much all of my old DAoC friends don't even touch new MMOs anymore and these used to be players who put in 10000 hours and more into DAoC.
In conclusion: Egofocused content where everyone is just trying to get ahead with a high level of competitiveness breeds and draws out the worst in humans. This is especially obvious in MOBAs which are the most competitive and where it is incredibly easy to blame someone for the entire defeat.
Its still the same community as in EQ..
Except EQ made people feel like they needed eachother to get anywhere, you required the help of others, which made people behave differently
there where enough fracking azes in EQ1, that trained you on purpose and such things... but they where cast out by community rather fast and had to addapt or qiuit the game..
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Look, I understand the power of nostalgia. I can relate to that. I played old MMOs as well. But forced grouping making good communities? I like it how it is now better. When I socialize in an mmo today its because we want to, not because we have to. And that crucial difference makes is genuine. And yes the social interactions are more rare these days but at least they are voluntary.
Wow, what a jaded way of looking at things. I guess the friends I made in early EQ, some of which I still talk to to this day, were just sucking my ass for loot. All this time, I thought they were decent, civil people.
Wait, old school mmos had better communities because it was harder to be a jerk? How are you not seeing the crater sized hole in that argument? SO basically you were surrounded by people who were forced to kiss your ass because of the rules of the game and you just drank it up like everybody was being sincere. lol no my friend. Those people were the worst kind of assholes, the ones who acted like your best friend so they could get their digital toys. At least the dbags in todays mmos are being transparent about it.
Wow, what a jaded way of looking at things. I guess the friends I made in early EQ, some of which I still talk to to this day, were just sucking my ass for loot. All this time, I thought they were decent, civil people.
Not jaded. I amended my post to reflect that. Besides its not any less jaded than of claiming all modern mmo communities as garbage just because you aren't forced to interact.
Modern mmo communities are made of primarily kids (age and attitude) who feel entitled because the games hold their hands and make them feel important w/o effort. They don't need to interact because they the games are solo-able. All of them are. If the games were designed like they used to be, requiring users to depend on each other to advance then we can assume 2 things. The users attitudes would straighten up and they would actually try to get along, or they wouldn't play and we'd all be better off anyway. A subscription would be required for that last part, however, as "kids" these days will log into a F2P game they don't like just to trash talk it and try to troll.
So an mmo where people can choose to be social or not based on their mood is for kids. But an mmo that forces you to participate and behave a certain way or suffer possible alienation and stunted progression is for adults?
For the record, I think people are responsible for their own social interactions and I've been part of both good and bad communities in all types of mmo structures.
I think it is silly to think that a video game mechanic is required for people to be social or not. I also think its silly to think that forcing someone to be nice makes them "social". Forcing people to behave a certain way is most certainly an anti social behavior. Forced grouping does not create healthy social environments and neither does a group finding tool.
Every thread like this has people with many different points of view on the subject and they are all correct because social interaction is a personal experience. It is 100% subjective and 100% valid at the same time. Maybe we should stop trying to dictate how others should behave and be mature enough to take responsibility for our own actions.