Wow i go back to the first days of Everquest. Where you ran every where and if you died had to run back to your corps to get your stuff back. Or how much fun...Not camping for hours or days for on boss or one mob. Only to have someone run in last minute and steal it. Or killing stuff in a dungeon and hear someone scream train to exit get out of the way or get ran over. LoL or begging folks for SoW=Speed of Wolf because you had to run every where. Ah the good old days of Evercamp brings back fond memories.
Yes, games like that were frustrating. When I was playing old Anarchy Online there were times I wanted to throw my keyboard due to things like that. As a doctor I remember everyone begging me for IC (Iron Circle str/stam buff) so they could boost their stats to twink on new gear.
However, when you finally did accomplish something after much frustration and difficulty it felt really good :awesome:
Making things easier is a double edged sword. Sure, it does eliminate much of the frustration but accomplishments feel empty and unearned.
For example, here are two scenarios. Which are you more likely to remember? Which would make you feel like you really accomplished something??: A.) Autopathing to a really easy dungeon to effortlessly solo super easy mobs and get a guaranteed 'rare' item drop (which everyone else has) -or- B.) Waiting hours or even days to have a fully prepared party to find your own way to a really hard dungeon where you have to kill the trains of mobs brought to you by people running to the exit so you and your party can continue fighting difficult mobs up to the boss room where you have to spawn camp it and occasionally outdamage the random kill stealing parties to finally win a roll on that truly rare drop you've been after for months (one hardly anyone has because of how hard it is to get)
Hardship makes rewards more rewarding and memories more memorable. Easy games are less frustrating but boring.
It will be interesting to see how a game like Pantheon does when it releases. People now choose to do other things than games. They fill up their own schedules. They don't have to do this. Many seem to indicate it is a requirement. In reality, it is not. I'm willing to bet most people will not spend as much time playing as they did with games like Everquest. I plan to play Pantheon and already donated to the game, but I care little for raiding and doubt I would ever sit there for 8 hours a day playing the game like I did at times with Everquest. Mostly because I am more aware of the issues that can result, health wise and how much energy it drains from you. Still, it would be a nostalgic trip down memory lane playing a game that doesn't have all the convenience features and requires you to really earn what you get in game.
The Truth of the matter is people who say they don't have time because of real life, and people that feel they need something everytime that want it are honestly the problem in MMORPGs. The reason why is obvious and they do have valid points however they are too self centered. MMORPGs take a massive budget for the most part and take very long development cycles, they are not games like Dragon Age or neverwinter nights which can be developed in a year or 2 on cheap budgets. MMORPGs take 5+ years to design and develop and constantly need bug fixes, and work to keep customers playing. They cannot cater to the players who want fast convenient content, it just cannot be done because the amount of development work that goes into MMORPGs. The reason why back before easy fast paced MMORPGs were so successful AND very profitable (Before WOW and WOW) was because you were expected to spend a lot of time to achieve something. You were not on a Treadmill like you are today.
"too self centered"? It is entertainment. I have no qualms being self-centered in my entertainment. If it does not cater to me, i can find something else to do, there are plenty.
I don't care less if MMORPGs are expensive. If i want fast convenient content, I want fast convenient content. It is a free market. They don't have to cater to me, and i don't have to play their games.
I only use entertainment that fits my schedule, and my preference, not the other way around. Given that I have plenty (from games, to novels, to anime, to movies ..), i don't have to play MMORPGs at all.
Is probably the same problem we have always had with mmos...
mmo's are becoming increasingly solo centric, to the point that other players just create an obstacle. mmo's need to start taking on some of the popular characteristics of solo games.
In short, if mmos are going to survive and thrive they need to get rid of other players.
Please share your thoughts...
MMOs have always and will likely always be give or take 90:10 for Solo:Group. As it should be.
It has changed over time there is no denying that. The question is whether it is worse.
Some things are worse, others are better. The problem is more that the gameplay really havn't improved as much as it should have.
The average MMO actually offer less freedom today then 15-20 years ago instead of more, both in combat and activity wise.
Time consument of a game can certainly be discussed but that matters just on personal preferences.
Same thing could be said about difficulty even if I think they have lowered things a bit too far, making things simple in the open world for even the worst players kinda makes people too lazy to bother learning to play instead of challenging people enough to encourage them to improve themselves.
That there generally are fewer skills you use is not a bad thing, using 30 skills is not really more interesting then 10 but far too many players rotate skills, just like far too many did in the old times. The games should encourage timing and using the right skill for the right opportunity more /there are and have always been some of it but not nearly enough).
So anyways, I think MMOs need to improve gameplay more. The new games have improved short time fun a lot but lost most of the long term fun instead. Both are really needed to make the genre like at least I want it.
Some things (and not just graphics) are better, some are even far better but we also lost some things that were really fun as well. For instance is soloing more fun while group play lost some of it instead.
To quote Sisters of mercy: "I want more".
(and yeah, all is my personal opinions of course, I been playing MMOs for 20 years but while that have given me some perspective on both old and new games it certainly don't make me an expert and I know other people who played just as long that disagree. I have also missed a lot of games, particularly smaller indie games during that time)
Lets face it the gamer of 2017 is different from the gamer of 2000....They want it solo, easy, and instant
YIKES !!!
Talk about yourself.
I want the exact same thing 2017 as I wanted 2000. Challenge and complexity.
I want MMOs I can play longtime. I want maxlevel to be basically unreachable, I want complex challenging classes that are hard to master, I want dynamic combat that keeps you thinking what ability to use next.
When people make these statements, they are speaking in general. No one can claim to know every single MMORPG player, so it's the most "sane" assumption. To reaction a personal manner, is rather "insane," if one is to agree with that. And honest, to disagree with it requires a certain high level of intellectual dishonesty.
Trying to frame the argument as personal in an attempt to use your personal opinion to discredit a statement that is, in general, factual does not win you that argument.
The fact is that many of the players who played MMORPGs in 2000 do NOT play MMORPGs today. You are such a small minority that you basically don't exist. This is why publishers who want to publish games for your market have to Kickstarter their games; no one wants to invest in a costly project with such low profit forecasts.
This is why cash shops are a thing. They are easy to implement, easy to populate, and have high profit margins. People are basically paying money for cosmetic pixels, that artists can cheaply churn out at will.
Games like Pantheon are bringing all of the bad things from EQ into a modern market full of people who simply DISLIKE the things that EQ had, and who do not have the same social outlook on gaming as the players did in EQ's era.
The fact that a few thousand people want that does not discount the fact that the market is 10+ million strong and the very vast majority do not.
The current player market is heavily biased to fast progression, low risk, high reward, hyper competitive gaming. If you can't get a World First on that raid boss within a week, the communities will deem it overturned at best, and at worst they will accuse the developers or deliberately doing this to cock block the raiders, etc.
You may not have noticed it, but gaming communities are rife with activism, and have been for the past decade or so. The same types of behaviors we see in the real world (radical feminism, etc.) are basically mirrored into these virtual words, and their online communities (forum communities, etc.).
This is precisely why these forum topics become so contentious, and why people like you are apt to use these types of tactics in an attempt to discredit the opinions of others.
Is probably the same problem we have always had with mmos...
mmo's are becoming increasingly solo centric, to the point that other players just create an obstacle. mmo's need to start taking on some of the popular characteristics of solo games.
In short, if mmos are going to survive and thrive they need to get rid of other players.
Please share your thoughts...
The solution is easy, don't produce MMOs, just single player game. Problem solved.
No wait! Single player games already flood the market... they need to add an online hub, so that they can solve the "MMO" issue.
Is probably the same problem we have always had with mmos...
mmo's are becoming increasingly solo centric, to the point that other players just create an obstacle. mmo's need to start taking on some of the popular characteristics of solo games.
In short, if mmos are going to survive and thrive they need to get rid of other players.
Please share your thoughts...
What instances of other players actually being an "obstacle" have you seen in solo-centric MMOs?
This smells of sarcasm just to see how long the thread will last before the next identical one is created
Edit: Since this has become another solo/group debate I'll add my 2cp. Perfect system would be: Long, but incrementally awarding progression and a world large enough to have pockets of solo and group content. The soloable content wouldn't be faceroll easy but can get one to max level. Group play would have a slightly higher rate of leveling but not to an exorbitant extent. The rationale is that it takes more time and effort to get and maintain group.
Not every game should make everyone happy and it is impossible to do so. Add to that Yes MMORPGs are broken, if you dont like grouping with people you dont belong playing them. I dont care if that pisses you off or not, the social aspect of MMORPGs is WHAT built the entire genera. Not WOW with LFD/LFR and easy feed content. During Vanilla WOW they didnt have to market the game because the game was so good, it required people to group to accomplish certain content and you didnt have automated grouping tools. It was people like myself that brought friends and new people to the game because the game was good.
The problem is the misguided players of today that think that everything today is just great and you need LFD/LFR tools in every game, and content that is /follow easy, and players who think everything should be soloed. These players keep thinking that EVERYTHING is better since old MMORPGs required time and social skills.
OH YEAH, social skills were needed for older MMO's . 'AYUP, I am a TANK, LFG. IAM A HEAL, LFG. I am a pew pew, LFG.' OH yeah, that is really social. *sarcasm off*
Sounds like you never played any other game than WOW. Did you ever have to take on a player run base that wound only go vulnerable on a random day and time and need to organize 18 guilds to help take out the Imp Base? What about making sure the players going have the best weapons (rocket launchers for my Commando Team) and Armor? O wait you wouldnt know that you just think in WOW terms of dungeons because thats all you know.
What about all of the people who did nothing but Join automated solo groups for grinding, used automated dancers/docs for buffs, shopped through the bazaar's item locater, spent most of their endgame at the Nightsister stronghold, Fort Tusken, or other POIs. Never pvp'd, never did a vette, warren or deathwatch run, never used vent or ts, joined guilds only for the purpose of selling their loot and joining a city? I could go on here.
Solo players have always been in the genre, especially in games like SWG, we had plenty of them in our Guild/city and we were a hardcore PVP guild for the most part. They were an excellent source for loot like mind fire pikes, gaderffii batons etc... Your way isn't the only way...
SWG was a fairly niche MMORPG. It took them 2+ years to sell 1M boxed copies, and by the time 2006 rolled around they had less subscribers than EverQuest.
I wouldn't use SWG as some example of what is normal in the realm of MMORPG gaming communities.
Soloers have always been around, but the issue has nothing to do with their existence. It has to do with the focus of MMORPG gaming flipping from Group-Oriented Content largely to Solo-Oriented Content.
And We're not talking about just Dungeons and Raids. We're talking about the overall leveling and character advancement experience in these games. Back in 2003 most games would see you grouping just to get decent gear. If you were a solar, your character was horrible unless you bought grouped gear from other players, or you multi-quested quested gear from groupers/raiders (which often required items dropped in group or raid zones).
What this did was severely decrease the willingness of players to group up with other players, and change the social dynamics within the game. Instead of being respectful players, because they knew they'd probably need to group up with some of these players eventually... people started acting differently to each other because the other players were fairly "disposable." In many games today, player reputation doesn't count for much. The only games where this continues to be important, is those with heavy, group-oriented leveling curves (EQ, Lineage II, etc.) where players know bad behavior will have a material impact on their progression and play experience. In games like WoW, most people just deal with it for the 20 minute dungeon and then go about their business.
Players that preferred this type of gameplay have always existed. However, the design of older MMORPGs have largely limited their effect on communities. It wasn't until WoW was released, and the Quest-Based Leveling became "foundational" (via it's popularity) that other games started to emulate it. EQ2 was, originally, not like WoW; however, WoW's success put tons of pressure on SoE and they were practically forced to revamp a number of game systems to emulate WoW. Now, EQ2 is very similar to WoW, IMO (I've played both extensively, at the progression raiding level - and not just "cause my guild say we're 'progression'").
I think Blizzard made a brilliance decision with the design of WoW. They clearly saw a huge market that was locked out of the genre largely by the inherent demands of the genre on the average player, and they benefitted from it. What happened after WoW, is that people just started emulating this to try to capture "sustainable" pieces of Blizzard's pie, and this resulted in a market full of "more of the same."
By the time 2008/9 rolled around, it became incredibly hard to push any other type of game, because players had already been "brought up" on a specific flavor, and anything else was seen as generally too "difficult" or "time consuming" to bother.
This is why WoW always gets huge subscription spikes at the release of an expansion. People keep going back to "what they know" and only leave (largely temporarily, but many who leave for good do so by exiting the MMORPG community completely) because they are bored or find themselves with "nothing to do."
Comments
I don't care less if MMORPGs are expensive. If i want fast convenient content, I want fast convenient content. It is a free market. They don't have to cater to me, and i don't have to play their games.
I only use entertainment that fits my schedule, and my preference, not the other way around. Given that I have plenty (from games, to novels, to anime, to movies ..), i don't have to play MMORPGs at all.
The average MMO actually offer less freedom today then 15-20 years ago instead of more, both in combat and activity wise.
Time consument of a game can certainly be discussed but that matters just on personal preferences.
Same thing could be said about difficulty even if I think they have lowered things a bit too far, making things simple in the open world for even the worst players kinda makes people too lazy to bother learning to play instead of challenging people enough to encourage them to improve themselves.
That there generally are fewer skills you use is not a bad thing, using 30 skills is not really more interesting then 10 but far too many players rotate skills, just like far too many did in the old times. The games should encourage timing and using the right skill for the right opportunity more /there are and have always been some of it but not nearly enough).
So anyways, I think MMOs need to improve gameplay more. The new games have improved short time fun a lot but lost most of the long term fun instead. Both are really needed to make the genre like at least I want it.
Some things (and not just graphics) are better, some are even far better but we also lost some things that were really fun as well. For instance is soloing more fun while group play lost some of it instead.
To quote Sisters of mercy: "I want more".
(and yeah, all is my personal opinions of course, I been playing MMOs for 20 years but while that have given me some perspective on both old and new games it certainly don't make me an expert and I know other people who played just as long that disagree. I have also missed a lot of games, particularly smaller indie games during that time)
Trying to frame the argument as personal in an attempt to use your personal opinion to discredit a statement that is, in general, factual does not win you that argument.
The fact is that many of the players who played MMORPGs in 2000 do NOT play MMORPGs today. You are such a small minority that you basically don't exist. This is why publishers who want to publish games for your market have to Kickstarter their games; no one wants to invest in a costly project with such low profit forecasts.
This is why cash shops are a thing. They are easy to implement, easy to populate, and have high profit margins. People are basically paying money for cosmetic pixels, that artists can cheaply churn out at will.
Games like Pantheon are bringing all of the bad things from EQ into a modern market full of people who simply DISLIKE the things that EQ had, and who do not have the same social outlook on gaming as the players did in EQ's era.
The fact that a few thousand people want that does not discount the fact that the market is 10+ million strong and the very vast majority do not.
The current player market is heavily biased to fast progression, low risk, high reward, hyper competitive gaming. If you can't get a World First on that raid boss within a week, the communities will deem it overturned at best, and at worst they will accuse the developers or deliberately doing this to cock block the raiders, etc.
You may not have noticed it, but gaming communities are rife with activism, and have been for the past decade or so. The same types of behaviors we see in the real world (radical feminism, etc.) are basically mirrored into these virtual words, and their online communities (forum communities, etc.).
This is precisely why these forum topics become so contentious, and why people like you are apt to use these types of tactics in an attempt to discredit the opinions of others.
No wait! Single player games already flood the market... they need to add an online hub, so that they can solve the "MMO" issue.
This smells of sarcasm just to see how long the thread will last before the next identical one is created
Edit: Since this has become another solo/group debate I'll add my 2cp. Perfect system would be: Long, but incrementally awarding progression and a world large enough to have pockets of solo and group content. The soloable content wouldn't be faceroll easy but can get one to max level. Group play would have a slightly higher rate of leveling but not to an exorbitant extent. The rationale is that it takes more time and effort to get and maintain group.
I wouldn't use SWG as some example of what is normal in the realm of MMORPG gaming communities.
Soloers have always been around, but the issue has nothing to do with their existence. It has to do with the focus of MMORPG gaming flipping from Group-Oriented Content largely to Solo-Oriented Content.
And We're not talking about just Dungeons and Raids. We're talking about the overall leveling and character advancement experience in these games. Back in 2003 most games would see you grouping just to get decent gear. If you were a solar, your character was horrible unless you bought grouped gear from other players, or you multi-quested quested gear from groupers/raiders (which often required items dropped in group or raid zones).
What this did was severely decrease the willingness of players to group up with other players, and change the social dynamics within the game. Instead of being respectful players, because they knew they'd probably need to group up with some of these players eventually... people started acting differently to each other because the other players were fairly "disposable." In many games today, player reputation doesn't count for much. The only games where this continues to be important, is those with heavy, group-oriented leveling curves (EQ, Lineage II, etc.) where players know bad behavior will have a material impact on their progression and play experience. In games like WoW, most people just deal with it for the 20 minute dungeon and then go about their business.
Players that preferred this type of gameplay have always existed. However, the design of older MMORPGs have largely limited their effect on communities. It wasn't until WoW was released, and the Quest-Based Leveling became "foundational" (via it's popularity) that other games started to emulate it. EQ2 was, originally, not like WoW; however, WoW's success put tons of pressure on SoE and they were practically forced to revamp a number of game systems to emulate WoW. Now, EQ2 is very similar to WoW, IMO (I've played both extensively, at the progression raiding level - and not just "cause my guild say we're 'progression'").
I think Blizzard made a brilliance decision with the design of WoW. They clearly saw a huge market that was locked out of the genre largely by the inherent demands of the genre on the average player, and they benefitted from it. What happened after WoW, is that people just started emulating this to try to capture "sustainable" pieces of Blizzard's pie, and this resulted in a market full of "more of the same."
By the time 2008/9 rolled around, it became incredibly hard to push any other type of game, because players had already been "brought up" on a specific flavor, and anything else was seen as generally too "difficult" or "time consuming" to bother.