Originally posted by pistolier absolutly incredible looks like people took quite a shine to my topictalk about attacks on personality and stuff and stuff. well to one person that thinks of me as an online buffoon get a life man, the problems with mmorpgs is, ok they are great fun, that they take up to much time and economically it is not really worth it because how much profit do they make ever think about that and then how about all the time you spending sitting infront of your screen turning into a mindless zombie, huhuhuhuh and for Dekoth first of all they are not your games, they belong to anyone who wants to have a good time playing them i have an iq of a 146 and can bench press 110 kilos you think that makes anyone else less of a person than i am you really need to change your attitude.
What the crap does any of this have to do with the topic? Can this guy possibly say something without degenerating into personal garbage? Who cares a whit about your IQ (for the record, mine was tested at 171, which, if we follow your logic, automatically makes me more qualified than you, except that no rational human being is going to equate raw intelligence with experience/wisdom) or how much you can bench-press? Neither thing gives you any more insight into anything.
Did we "ever think about how much profit they're making"? Sure. The rational posts in this forum have all already spelled all that out. Guess what? I don't care how much profit they make! Good lord, what a shocker! How dare he say that! here's a clue: if we enjoy the game, and it provides hundreds of hours of entertainment, then play it, and pay for it. How much did I spend on WoW, about $16/mo plus the initial $40 for the game? So, let's see 6 months is $96, so a total of $136 for six months and untold hours of enjoyment. At the average cost of movie/popcorn for two in Chicago, which is about $26, in six months I could only have gone to 5 movies. It ISN'T about how much profit the company is making, it IS about the fact that, at even the most expensive game's subscription fee, online gaming is, compared other forms of entertainment, CHEAP!
Originally posted by spydermr2 Originally posted by pistolier absolutly incredible looks like people took quite a shine to my topictalk about attacks on personality and stuff and stuff. well to one person that thinks of me as an online buffoon get a life man, the problems with mmorpgs is, ok they are great fun, that they take up to much time and economically it is not really worth it because how much profit do they make ever think about that and then how about all the time you spending sitting infront of your screen turning into a mindless zombie, huhuhuhuh and for Dekoth first of all they are not your games, they belong to anyone who wants to have a good time playing them i have an iq of a 146 and can bench press 110 kilos you think that makes anyone else less of a person than i am you really need to change your attitude.
What the crap does any of this have to do with the topic? Can this guy possibly say something without degenerating into personal garbage? Who cares a whit about your IQ (for the record, mine was tested at 171, which, if we follow your logic, automatically makes me more qualified than you, except that no rational human being is going to equate raw intelligence with experience/wisdom) or how much you can bench-press? Neither thing gives you any more insight into anything.
Did we "ever think about how much profit they're making"? Sure. The rational posts in this forum have all already spelled all that out. Guess what? I don't care how much profit they make! Good lord, what a shocker! How dare he say that! here's a clue: if we enjoy the game, and it provides hundreds of hours of entertainment, then play it, and pay for it. How much did I spend on WoW, about $16/mo plus the initial $40 for the game? So, let's see 6 months is $96, so a total of $136 for six months and untold hours of enjoyment. At the average cost of movie/popcorn for two in Chicago, which is about $26, in six months I could only have gone to 5 movies. It ISN'T about how much profit the company is making, it IS about the fact that, at even the most expensive game's subscription fee, online gaming is, compared other forms of entertainment, CHEAP!
Spyder you're missing the whole concept of supply and demand: MMO companies will charge whatever the market can bear. Alternate payment methods aren't introduced to lower the cost to the players of the game they're an effort to increase profitability by means other than raising prices.
Station All Access Pass, for example: It's $21.95 a month and allows a player access to 6 or 7 MMO's (currently). What does SOE really give up by doing this: Nothing They aren't going to have to provide any more bandwidth to that user because he can only play 1 title at a time Odds are that person isn't going to spend any more time gaming than they already do.
So they're getting more money for 1 game to allow the person access to more than one title when, odds are, they'll spend the vast majority of their time on their primary game and only occasionally hop on other titles (which is what I do typically, and 90% of other SOE All Access Pass folks do).
So: What does SOE GAIN? More money for providing the same level of service.
What does the Customer gain? Access to more than one title without having to pay full price.
Why is this good for the customer? Most people don't/wont pay for more than 1 title at a time. Thus SOE gets a little bit extra money where they otherwise wouldn't.
Why is this good for SOE? Well they get more mony because, otherwise, they'd only be getting about $14.95 from the person. So they net a tidy $7 profit for doing... you got it... .nothing special
Now look at RV's 'alternate pricing' method. They plan to sell in game cash and items to players in order to pay for the game. Players who don't buy such things will play for free.
Now why are they doing this? To lower the price of the game? No To make more money? Yes Instead of charging EVERYONE $15 a month or so they're going to charge those lunies who are willing to pay for it real cash for in game advantages. This could be a good or bad thing for customers in general depending on how they work this out. It could become a horrendous money sink where in order to keep up (remember, RV is going to be open PVP) you HAVE to spend cash. Or it could work out very well where a few players who just don't mind sinking hundreds of dollars a month into a game float the ship for the hundreds of people who don't want to spend anything.
Either way the pricing scheme is there so that RV can net MORE profits, not less.
The dynamic is this: Supply and Demand They have the supply We have the demand
MMO companies, all of them, will charge whatever they think the market can bear. And when the market reaches the point where they can't charge more they'll find creative ways of getting extra from you at minimal cost to themselves. RV Alternat Pricing, SOE All Access, Station Exchange, etc.
Currently Playing: Dungeons and Dragons Online. Sig image Pending Still in: A couple Betas
Originally posted by pistolier this is why the rest of the world hates americans. if your profile is right then you are a 26 year old gamer that my friend is messed up you should go out get drunk and get laid or just do something else than *try* to be an internet bully. but i guess that is the only place you feel safe from the rest of us real, frightening people, i mean what happened man, did someone do some great injustice to you in high school? in any case get a real life, a wife wouldn't hurt to but oh i'm sorry women are inferior..... peace sucka. V.
So again instead of an intelligent response you resort to more base assumptions and personal attacks on my private life that have utterly nothing to do with the original post and my response to it.
My profile is right, I am 26. So are you saying Games are only for kids? Well first at least I know what age group I am dealing with now so that assumption on my part is correct. Secondly The major companies such as Sony and Microsoft disagree with you and feel that adult gamers are a thriving and rapidly growing market.
Getting drunk is for the lesser intelligent to forget their problems. I have been drunk twice in my lifetime and neither experience was enjoyable. I do enjoy a drink here and there but I have better things to do then make an idiot out of myself while drunk.
I am married since you seem so terribly interested, I have been married since I was 19 and quite happily at that. We do not have children at this time. My wife is also 26 and guess what, She is a gamer as well...Same comments for her I suppose?
Where do you get this impression I am being a bully? What is with the playing the victim? I have yet to even throw anything beyond a mild insult yet you are making out like I held you down beat the crap out of you and took your lunch money in middle school. Give the "I am the Victim" stance a rest, its rather old and pathetic at this point.
Blanket statement about hating american's...nice you know if we wanted to get into blanket statements I really could very easily heap more mud about indian tech support on you then you care to deal with since I am in the IT industry. But honestly that really is completely irrelevant to the topic, I am american for whatever that is worth, my family is not from america however.
So all in all, another ignorant post with absolutely nothing to do with what was said. More smoke and mirrors, You know the solution to this is quite obvious it really is not that difficult unless you like maintaining the illusion that the rest of the world is in fact out to get you.
Ooooookkkkkkaaaaayyyyy. Let me bring us back on topic. Alot of you have stated that $15 gets you unlimited time in a month to play an MMORPG and that's a better value than paying $40-$50 for a single player game that will only last about 40-100 hours. You've also brought up the issue of maintaining a server and customer support staff that single player games don't have. Allow me to throw my two cents at both those arguements.
First, I DON'T HAVE TO BUY an offline game the minute it comes out. The really great thing about offline games is that they drop in price really, really quickly. In less than 3 months the PS2 version of Prince of Persia dropped from $50 new to around $40 new and you could pick up a used copy for $27 dollars. Also, there are more than a few offline and "one time pay" games that are infinately replayable. Tetris, Grand Turisimo, Soul Calibur, etc. Would you rather pay $180 a year to play a game or $15 dollars to play a game forever? Another thing to consider is that PC games have player made expansions. For $25 I can buy the platinum edition of Neverwinter Nights and play it for several years using player made modules and servers. Try playing through Morrowind and all it's official and player made expansion content and you would never get to see it all!
Now compare all that to MMORPGs. You have to buy the game in the first few months of it's release or else start out way behind the rest of the player community. The price of the original box drops slowly or not at all. And finally, player made content is totally verboten. How's that $180 a year look to you now?
As for the maintenance costs I have but one reply: What about all the free MMORPGs and "unoffical" servers? Freeworld, Conquer, Eternal Lands, Runescape, etc. The number of these free games is increasing all the time. They have the same server populations and problems as "mainstream" MMORPGs but somehow they manage, charging little or nothing at all. Yeah, these games are hard on the eyes, but most of the cost is in server maintenance and support staff. This has baffled me for a long time, perhaps someone can clarify why Conquer is free and UO is Not. I'm sure it will be very enlightening.
My last point is what you do with the time you spend playing. In EVERY SINGLE MMORPG that I've ever played, my time is divided between walking, restng and killing monesters for loot. I don't mind killing monsters for loot or crafting. It's walking for endless hours and resting between fights that turns most of these games into a giant snoozefest for me. You pay $15 a month to watch you character walk from one battle/quest to another in between watching your character stand/sit and regain HP/MP. Woohoo!! The typical MMOGer will play between 10 to 30 hours (the length of a part-time job) playing their favorite game and most of it is non-playable deadspace. Forgive me for feeling a little ripped off. There are exceptions to this. Guild Wars and City of Heroes spring directly to mind. Underlight and A Tale in The Desert also don't seem to fall into this trap. But the majority of MMORPGs just don't have enough going on to justify my paying $180+ a year.
I just don't get what the big deal is relating to costs.
$180 a year is $0.50 a day, roughly. It's not a lot of money, really for anyone other than the least fortunate members of society. Honestly I'm more than happy to pay @0.50 a day if something is moderately entertaining, even if I don't play it all that much. It's the cost of a daily newspaper! I think this argument is not really a sound one, from the financial perspective.
Originally posted by pistolier who in their right mind would pay fifteen dollars a month just to play an mmo for a couple of months shit i buy games for less than fifteen dollars
Well I guess apparently you would cause under where your avatar is or would be is this, "wisdom is the understanding of knowledge. And EVE-online trumps it all."- Pistolier And according www.mmorpg.com EVE Online costs 14.95 a month or 15$ and I guess you pay this.
Originally posted by Jimmy_Scythe Ooooookkkkkkaaaaayyyyy. Let me bring us back on topic. Alot of you have stated that $15 gets you unlimited time in a month to play an MMORPG and that's a better value than paying $40-$50 for a single player game that will only last about 40-100 hours. You've also brought up the issue of maintaining a server and customer support staff that single player games don't have. Allow me to throw my two cents at both those arguements. First, I DON'T HAVE TO BUY an offline game the minute it comes out. The really great thing about offline games is that they drop in price really, really quickly. In less than 3 months the PS2 version of Prince of Persia dropped from $50 new to around $40 new and you could pick up a used copy for $27 dollars. Also, there are more than a few offline and "one time pay" games that are infinately replayable. Tetris, Grand Turisimo, Soul Calibur, etc. Would you rather pay $180 a year to play a game or $15 dollars to play a game forever? Another thing to consider is that PC games have player made expansions. For $25 I can buy the platinum edition of Neverwinter Nights and play it for several years using player made modules and servers. Try playing through Morrowind and all it's official and player made expansion content and you would never get to see it all!Now compare all that to MMORPGs. You have to buy the game in the first few months of it's release or else start out way behind the rest of the player community. The price of the original box drops slowly or not at all. And finally, player made content is totally verboten. How's that $180 a year look to you now? As for the maintenance costs I have but one reply: What about all the free MMORPGs and "unoffical" servers? Freeworld, Conquer, Eternal Lands, Runescape, etc. The number of these free games is increasing all the time. They have the same server populations and problems as "mainstream" MMORPGs but somehow they manage, charging little or nothing at all. Yeah, these games are hard on the eyes, but most of the cost is in server maintenance and support staff. This has baffled me for a long time, perhaps someone can clarify why Conquer is free and UO is Not. I'm sure it will be very enlightening. My last point is what you do with the time you spend playing. In EVERY SINGLE MMORPG that I've ever played, my time is divided between walking, restng and killing monesters for loot. I don't mind killing monsters for loot or crafting. It's walking for endless hours and resting between fights that turns most of these games into a giant snoozefest for me. You pay $15 a month to watch you character walk from one battle/quest to another in between watching your character stand/sit and regain HP/MP. Woohoo!! The typical MMOGer will play between 10 to 30 hours (the length of a part-time job) playing their favorite game and most of it is non-playable deadspace. Forgive me for feeling a little ripped off. There are exceptions to this. Guild Wars and City of Heroes spring directly to mind. Underlight and A Tale in The Desert also don't seem to fall into this trap. But the majority of MMORPGs just don't have enough going on to justify my paying $180+ a year.
Look If you don't want to pay for them then DONT but don't try to imply that those who enjoy the genre are insane. It's you who are nuts thinking that QUALITY MMORPGs should be free. Yeah it'd be great if these corporations would operate all their games at a loss just so you can go have some fun but it just is NOT going to happen. So get over it already. Either pay for the really good MMO's that are out or go play a free one.
Making an MMO costs millions of dollars unless you are a programmer and do all the code yourself. Even then it costs thousands of dollars to buy the equipment to run it on and thousands more for the network equipment and bandwidth to allow people to play on it.
As to those 'free' MMO's out there? I suggest you go ask them how the hell they afford it.
As to your points: The box price of MMO's DOES drop, just slower because, well... supply and demand . Hell you can get the entire EQ game, including all but the most recent expansions for like $19.
DAOC has a similar pricetag for it's platinum package. UO is FREE to download now and, lets see... AC is cheap, SWG is cheap, $30 for SWG and all expansions now. EQ2 is already dropping in box price and WoW probably will be soon as well. What's your point? MMO's BOX price does go down over time just like any other game on the shelf. You CAN choose to wait to buy the game and many players do. In fact a lot of people wait up to a year to buy a game so that all the kinks will be ironed out. So WHAT if other players are "ahead" of you? It's not a competiton to see who can get to the 'end' first because there is no end.
Currently Playing: Dungeons and Dragons Online. Sig image Pending Still in: A couple Betas
Here's a thought, one of the reasons why i love mmorpgs, is the long lasting entertainment value i get for my 15 a month.
Example; bunco is popular here, folks get together put in a pot buy prices with pot money play a few hours, whoever is hosting it buys gifts food, and it goes round robin. Though a cheap form of enteratinment is for a few hours 2 times a month and runs about 25 a night.
Ceramics molds, paints oven time, getting there back again expensive for all the little parts
RC remote cars/trucks gesh each part can run 40 + or more and they always need parts
Every other hobby has working needed parts, gas time money,
Yet for 50 bucks plus 15 a month i get hours and hours of entertainment.
So rather we have a few mmorpgs for our family or just one, to us it is a cheap form of entertainment
and the flip side if get into beta submit bug reports, but also get to see if it's a "fit or not".......
i have no troubles with 15 a month for a game, esepcaily since everything else is so much more expensive
It is true that $180 a year is pretty cheap for a hobby. I think I spend more than that on art supplies and 3D editing software. However, $15 a month for the low quality of gameplay that these games deliver is totally ridiculous. I think that $5 to $10 per month is more than enough for the repetitive treadmill of most MMORPGs. For the same price I can get 12 good multiplayer and singleplayer games and be quite a bit more entertained. I don't believe that quality games should be free or that people that make GOOD games should not be rewarded monetarily. By that same token, PRICE DOES NOT EQUAL QUALITY!!!! Anyone remember Earth and Beyond? How about A World Called 10Six? I personally think that the monthly fee should be reduced or replaced with a one time pay pricing model. I have nothing against paying for GOOD games. I do have something about being GOUGED FOR AVERAGE OR BAD GAMES!!!
And again, the very exisitance of free / donation based MMORPGs pretty much proves that the cost of server and software maintenance and support has been wildly exagerated. It also doesn't take millions of dollars or a huge staff to make a good game. Here's an example: http://www.taleworlds.com/index.html
This game was made by two people in their spare time on chump change. The indie gaming scene isn't dead kids. Wishing it gone isn't going to make it go away or make the jobs of big name developement studios any more secure
I guess you meant to say half a dozen for the same price or similar price?
Well the answer is obvious. Quantity does not equal quality.
6 crappy games are not worth anything.
"We feel gold selling and websites that promote it damage games like Vanguard and will do everything possible to combat it." Brad McQuaid Chairman & CEO, Sigil Games Online, Inc. Executive Producer, Vanguard: Saga of Heroes www.vanguardsoh
I don't have a problem paying 15 dollars for a game so that the content can expand, but it seems to me that every MMOG I have played I am playing 15 so the developers can stroke their own egos as they play nerph ball.
Originally posted by Nathan@MMOC The real question is "why would you pay $15 a month for a single mmo when you could have access to half a dozen for price?
why should i waste about six dollars on a bunch of games i won't be playing. there is a post about that in here, if you are interested find it.
Why does it matter? If a person likes the games the games are worth the price to them. I just don't get why anyone actually cares? MMO's cost money to develop and make. Not saying there aren't free ones out there but I have yet to see a free one that comes anywhere close to the quality of the ones produced by major companies. Even most indie companies charge $15 a month.
Now, if really good MMO's start coming out that are free, yes of course people will stop paying $15 a month for them. But until that happens you aren't going to see subscription fees going away.
SOE offers an all access pass which, if you like more than 1 of their games, is very much worth getting because it saves you money over paying for two separate subscriptions. Personally I enjoy 3 of them enough to play them at least occasionally so it's a great value for me.
But the bottom line is: Why do you care? If someone wants to spend $15 a month on a game they enjoy then that's their business. If you don't want to then go play free MMO's or don't play MMO's at all.
Currently Playing: Dungeons and Dragons Online. Sig image Pending Still in: A couple Betas
Should we just give this up, it was a lousy topic to begin with and i have certainly been proved wrong. also my apologies to anyone i may have offended. and yes my grammar still needs work.
The real question is "why would you pay $15 a month for a single mmo when you could have access to half a dozen for a single, realistic price?
Ya, why the heck do we go to the movies, when we can go out and rent the DVD! Heck, Why by the DVD when we can rent it?
$9.00 for 2 hours of entertainment
$15.00 for a month of entertainment
your arguement is so persuasive, so filled with knowledge and insight. You back up your argument very articulately, with suggestions of improvements and raising examples to glorify your position....oh wait, you didn't
Originally posted by Sanctus_Mors Originally posted by Nathan@MMOC The real question is "why would you pay $15 a month for a single mmo when you could have access to half a dozen for a single, realistic price? Ya, why the heck do we go to the movies, when we can go out and rent the DVD! Heck, Why by the DVD when we can rent it? $9.00 for 2 hours of entertainment $15.00 for a month of entertainment
LOL! This says it all.
Matter of fact I'd be willing to bet that some of the folks posting here about how MMO's are too expensive have probably gone to see at least one movie or another more than once in the theatre...
Currently Playing: Dungeons and Dragons Online. Sig image Pending Still in: A couple Betas
most mmorpgs cost 14.99$ a month...thats rounded off to 50cents a day...thats not a lot...even working for 7.25 an hour, 8 hours a week, you can easily pay this fee.
Originally posted by strigoivii most mmorpgs cost 14.99$ a month...thats rounded off to 50cents a day...thats not a lot...even working for 7.25 an hour, 8 hours a week, you can easily pay this fee.
two hours of work for one month of gaming sounds about right to me.
Um, I bought Dungeon Siege for $10 at Wal-Mart and I've been playing it for several months now. There's a ton of user made content that extends the life of the game. I also downloaded Nethack for free several years ago and still play it regularly. It isn't the time you have for the price, it's what you do with the time you ger for the price. EQ, UO, AO, AC, DAoC, etc all give the player about 10 minutes of game artificially stretched out to several hours. Maybe it's the pace that makes them seem more tedious than their single player counterparts. Maybe it's the lack of depth in the basic functions of the game. Diablo was tedious but the pace made up for it. Final Fantasy games were tedious but the combat systems were compelling enough to keep you comming back for more. WoW shows that this genre is finally getting the pacing right and GW gives me hope that there may someday be a combat system that is compelling enough to keep me playing and paying month after month. Until then......
Depends on what style of game you want to play. If all you want to do is play solo/single player then MMO's aren't worth the money. If you want to be part of a bigger world where you have to interact with other players to accomplish goals and gather resources/equipment etc... then MMORPG's are very worth it.
Comparing single player games to MMORPG's is fairly pointless. They're totally different styles of play.
Currently Playing: Dungeons and Dragons Online. Sig image Pending Still in: A couple Betas
Actually, I'm thinking it's a design issue. Online multiplayer games always trump offline / solo games for me but I just haven't seen an MMORPG that delivers $180+ (yearly scale) of gameplay. This is odd so me since they have all the elements that go into a great online game. Those elements just don't seem to hang together in a compelling way however. Artificially extending gameplay by increasing downtime (traveling, healing, fighting every 2 feet) just really kills it for me. I like both Co-op and PvP style gameplay and these games give both as an option. But somehow it just doesn't feel as rewarding as going through Baldur's Gate or Neverwinter Nights with a bunch of friends. This is no small issue. This is about quality and, as far as I see it, MMORPGs are just really slow MORPGs stretched out into infinity.
you bring up the possibility of being part of a bigger world but no MMORPG has really given a world that seems real enough. I also find it amusing that you put gathering resources on your list since I've been talking about combining RTS elements into MMORPGs for awhile now. Maybe if they designed the world to be massively PvP to begin with and balanced the game so that players would be encouraged to join groups...... Oh wait, UO tried that at first but didn't add limited resources or huge death penalties so the whole thing turned into one big hyper-inflated gankfest. <sigh>
Actually, I'm thinking it's a design issue. Online multiplayer games always trump offline / solo games for me but I just haven't seen an MMORPG that delivers $180+ (yearly scale) of gameplay.
The scale is the same for stand alone RPGs. The avarage RPG takes 1-3 months to finnish. Then what? One has to buy a brand new game. Rinse and repeate. I am a big fan of Dungeon Siege. And I also purchased the recent $10.oo copy. One of my friends originally purchased it when it first came out. I originally first played the demo of it right before it first came out. DS is one of the best ever RPG games made. In many ways it is Diablo III.
Since the avarage new stand alone game costs $50.oo then that is easily $200.oo per year one has to spend to be entertained! Vs the $180.oo one pays for a MMORPG.
IF money is the main issue for you, I strongly suggest you concentrate on school, college, so you can later get a NICE career job then make more money, so it will not be such an issue. Did you know many mmorpg players play more than one mmorpg at the same time? Many even spend an extra 200.oo to 1,000.oo or more buying characters, in game items, more than 1 account in the same game, etc... So for the majority of mmorpg players, money is not such a big issue.... as long as they are having fun.
This is odd so me since they have all the elements that go into a great online game. Those elements just don't seem to hang together in a compelling way however. Artificially extending gameplay by increasing downtime (traveling, healing, fighting every 2 feet) just really kills it for me.
There is far, far, more you have not touched on. In online games, every time one logs on, one has a chance to have a 100% different and unique experience. In the in game economy, (player run economies are best like in SWG, EvE), mining resources. And yes, many players enjoy the unique traveling (space ships in SWG, AO), ships in EQ. What you see as "artificially extending gameplay", and "increasing downtime" is seen by others as fun. (again traveling by ships in EQ which I had loads of fun!).
Next, in the majority of current MMORPGs, there are many choices on how to travel - including instant, or near instant travel! BTW, Dungeon Siege has no claim on better traveling than mmorpgs. You seem more concerened about your monthly internet bill. If money is such an issue, perhaps mmorpgs are not for you.
I like both Co-op and PvP style gameplay and these games give both as an option. But somehow it just doesn't feel as rewarding as going through Baldur's Gate or Neverwinter Nights with a bunch of friends. This is no small issue. This is about quality and, as far as I see it, MMORPGs are just really slow MORPGs stretched out into infinity.
Can you get your RPG friends to play MMORPGs with you? How about trying even harder to make new friends online? Joining a guild?
you bring up the possibility of being part of a bigger world but no MMORPG has really given a world that seems real enough. I also find it amusing that you put gathering resources on your list since I've been talking about combining RTS elements into MMORPGs for awhile now.
Many MMORPGs have created very realistic worlds. Next, what is your definition of "real enough"? For some it is a better in game economy (like in SWG). For some it is a larger playable land surface (like in EQ, AC, SWG, WW2O). For some it is much more realistic swimming, or atmospheric flight (EQ, and AO repectivly.)
Based on your next post, it looks like you want more PvP......
Maybe if they designed the world to be massively PvP to begin with and balanced the game so that players would be encouraged to join groups...... Oh wait, UO tried that at first but didn't add limited resources or huge death penalties so the whole thing turned into one big hyper-inflated gankfest. <sigh>
So ultimatly , you are seeking a NICE PvP game. Guess what? Since mmorpgs are forever changeable, how about you list the problem.... which you have done. Then next you list in numerical order, your ideas for solutions? Then you will give the chance for mmorpgs to initiate the better PvP you are looking for.
xplorer you seem to be missing the point. Let me start off by saying something that I should have said two posts ago. All views expressed by me are mine and are in no way an effort to impose restrictions on other. They are my opinion, you can take them or leave them.
Firstly, the scale is quite different with single player games since I can sell them or trade them to Gamestop or EBgames or on ebay. Legally. You can't really do that with an MMORPG. Also, if I find that I can't shoehorn in that $15 to $30 a for a game one month, I can just go without and wait until I have the money. The same situation with an MMORPG would have your account suspended and character deleted. And as I've said before, alot of single player games are infinitely replayable without the need for new content. Case in point, I spent about 5 hours a couple of days ago playing Meteos on the DS and I play Soul Calibur 2 almost daily. I would say that I do spend quite a bit less on gaming than $180 a year but that's mostly due to the fact that I buy used and trade back once I'm done with a game. If the game is good and totally replayable, I keep it.
You talk about a 100% new experience everytime you log on. Really? Has the interface changed that much? Do they do a complete overhaul of the games artwork while you sleep? Does it magically change genres at the drop of the hat? Of course it doesn't. Basically you get a big chat room in a static environment, that's not unlike an empty movie lot, and occasionally you run out "hunt" braindead AI monsters or do a little PvP. Is this different than say Diablo or Neverwinter Nights? Not really, but Diablo and NWN aren't demanding that I shuck out money every month either. With all the player made content for NWN, Dungeon Siege, Baldur's Gate, etc, I can have unique experiences and content as well. And only pay once!!! You ask about which gives you more for your money, it's really no contest.
Then you ask if I ever get my friends to play MMORPGs with me or if I can make friends in-game. The answer is yes I've done both and the experience just isn't the same. In NWN or Baldur's Gate there are no respawning monsters (depending on the server). There are no campers. There are no annoying packs of griefers that follow your party around and steel all the drops and kills while not being in PvP mode. Their are no quests that require more than an hour and a half to play through. Slice it however you want too, the play in these games has traditionally been spread thin just to keep you glued to your keyboard, regardless of wether your character was doing anything or not. The point of games is to interact and these games have all that, just very, very slow interaction.
You ask what is real enough. I'll admit to having worded this wrong. The problem is not that it isn't real enough. The problem is that it all feels pointless. There's a lack of context for what's happening. You can get around this by joining a role-playing guild or by going into just PvP. These solutions just seem cheap to me however. The game needs to be designed so that the actions in the game have some overall goal that makes sense. Instead of just killing monsters so you can get more gold and XP so that you can get new abilities and equipment so that you can kill bigger monsters and get more gold and XP etc. Let me give you an example of what designing around the context would be like:
Let's make this a game set in the stone age. We'll have Weather patterns and animals will have specific behavior and migratory patterns. The goal of the game is to survive against starvation, exposure and predation. There will be some crafting since people would be able to gather resources and make impliments for hunting, shelter, and clothing. There would only be so much food available in the world and that would be affected by season, weather patterns and birth to death ratios. In such a game, players would have to work together to survive and compete for resources. Since the overall goal is to survive, every player could contribute something to their community in this regard. Killing would be less a matter or leveling up and more a matter of surviving another day. Since characters wouldn't just be walking weapons platforms, crafting would be an essential part of survival. The focus shifts from maxing your stats to keeping everyone alive. Mutually beneficial goals.
Now then, I have no solutions for the problems of this genre. Traveling isn't as much a problem as the quests that require a 4 hour walk there and back again to complete. Tighter Quests with a little more variety would go along way. I honestly think that games like WoW and GW are making strides in that direction. There's a lot more to do, but they give us a good start. I think that player run events and quests could also do alot to take the monotony and pointlessness out of these games. The best Co-op games I ever played were in UO with a live GM. Of course, Phantasy Star Online still sets the standard for Co-op RPGs in my book. I haven't played enough DAoC to know what really goes into their RvR combat but I think that an overall team game that had some of the characteristics or RTS games would be welcome. Each faction fighting for access to resources or legendary items and each player doing their part towards their factions goals. Gathering resources, crafting, buffing, building structures and fighting. Being able to destroy buildings would go a long way as well. Warfare has a nasty tendency to turn quite little towns into forests of burnt stakes growing out of scorched eath. Let's make those epic battles feel epic and create a semi-lasting impact on the environment.
These are all things that MMORPGs have promised since they took up that stupid acronym. They have, at best, delivered only a few of those things. Once this genre matures a bit more I might put my money down on a monthly basis. Until then I'll be playing NWN.
Comments
What the crap does any of this have to do with the topic? Can this guy possibly say something without degenerating into personal garbage? Who cares a whit about your IQ (for the record, mine was tested at 171, which, if we follow your logic, automatically makes me more qualified than you, except that no rational human being is going to equate raw intelligence with experience/wisdom) or how much you can bench-press? Neither thing gives you any more insight into anything.
Did we "ever think about how much profit they're making"? Sure. The rational posts in this forum have all already spelled all that out. Guess what? I don't care how much profit they make! Good lord, what a shocker! How dare he say that! here's a clue: if we enjoy the game, and it provides hundreds of hours of entertainment, then play it, and pay for it. How much did I spend on WoW, about $16/mo plus the initial $40 for the game? So, let's see 6 months is $96, so a total of $136 for six months and untold hours of enjoyment. At the average cost of movie/popcorn for two in Chicago, which is about $26, in six months I could only have gone to 5 movies. It ISN'T about how much profit the company is making, it IS about the fact that, at even the most expensive game's subscription fee, online gaming is, compared other forms of entertainment, CHEAP!
What the crap does any of this have to do with the topic? Can this guy possibly say something without degenerating into personal garbage? Who cares a whit about your IQ (for the record, mine was tested at 171, which, if we follow your logic, automatically makes me more qualified than you, except that no rational human being is going to equate raw intelligence with experience/wisdom) or how much you can bench-press? Neither thing gives you any more insight into anything.
Did we "ever think about how much profit they're making"? Sure. The rational posts in this forum have all already spelled all that out. Guess what? I don't care how much profit they make! Good lord, what a shocker! How dare he say that! here's a clue: if we enjoy the game, and it provides hundreds of hours of entertainment, then play it, and pay for it. How much did I spend on WoW, about $16/mo plus the initial $40 for the game? So, let's see 6 months is $96, so a total of $136 for six months and untold hours of enjoyment. At the average cost of movie/popcorn for two in Chicago, which is about $26, in six months I could only have gone to 5 movies. It ISN'T about how much profit the company is making, it IS about the fact that, at even the most expensive game's subscription fee, online gaming is, compared other forms of entertainment, CHEAP!
Spyder you're missing the whole concept of supply and demand:
MMO companies will charge whatever the market can bear. Alternate payment methods aren't introduced to lower the cost to the players of the game they're an effort to increase profitability by means other than raising prices.
Station All Access Pass, for example:
It's $21.95 a month and allows a player access to 6 or 7 MMO's (currently).
What does SOE really give up by doing this:
Nothing
They aren't going to have to provide any more bandwidth to that user because he can only play 1 title at a time
Odds are that person isn't going to spend any more time gaming than they already do.
So they're getting more money for 1 game to allow the person access to more than one title when, odds are, they'll spend the vast majority of their time on their primary game and only occasionally hop on other titles (which is what I do typically, and 90% of other SOE All Access Pass folks do).
So: What does SOE GAIN?
More money for providing the same level of service.
What does the Customer gain?
Access to more than one title without having to pay full price.
Why is this good for the customer?
Most people don't/wont pay for more than 1 title at a time. Thus SOE gets a little bit extra money where they otherwise wouldn't.
Why is this good for SOE?
Well they get more mony because, otherwise, they'd only be getting about $14.95 from the person. So they net a tidy $7 profit for doing... you got it... .nothing special
Now look at RV's 'alternate pricing' method.
They plan to sell in game cash and items to players in order to pay for the game. Players who don't buy such things will play for free.
Now why are they doing this? To lower the price of the game? No
To make more money? Yes
Instead of charging EVERYONE $15 a month or so they're going to charge those lunies who are willing to pay for it real cash for in game advantages. This could be a good or bad thing for customers in general depending on how they work this out. It could become a horrendous money sink where in order to keep up (remember, RV is going to be open PVP) you HAVE to spend cash. Or it could work out very well where a few players who just don't mind sinking hundreds of dollars a month into a game float the ship for the hundreds of people who don't want to spend anything.
Either way the pricing scheme is there so that RV can net MORE profits, not less.
The dynamic is this:
Supply and Demand
They have the supply
We have the demand
MMO companies, all of them, will charge whatever they think the market can bear. And when the market reaches the point where they can't charge more they'll find creative ways of getting extra from you at minimal cost to themselves. RV Alternat Pricing, SOE All Access, Station Exchange, etc.
Currently Playing: Dungeons and Dragons Online.
Sig image Pending
Still in: A couple Betas
So again instead of an intelligent response you resort to more base assumptions and personal attacks on my private life that have utterly nothing to do with the original post and my response to it.
My profile is right, I am 26. So are you saying Games are only for kids? Well first at least I know what age group I am dealing with now so that assumption on my part is correct. Secondly The major companies such as Sony and Microsoft disagree with you and feel that adult gamers are a thriving and rapidly growing market.
Getting drunk is for the lesser intelligent to forget their problems. I have been drunk twice in my lifetime and neither experience was enjoyable. I do enjoy a drink here and there but I have better things to do then make an idiot out of myself while drunk.
I am married since you seem so terribly interested, I have been married since I was 19 and quite happily at that. We do not have children at this time. My wife is also 26 and guess what, She is a gamer as well...Same comments for her I suppose?
Where do you get this impression I am being a bully? What is with the playing the victim? I have yet to even throw anything beyond a mild insult yet you are making out like I held you down beat the crap out of you and took your lunch money in middle school. Give the "I am the Victim" stance a rest, its rather old and pathetic at this point.
Blanket statement about hating american's...nice you know if we wanted to get into blanket statements I really could very easily heap more mud about indian tech support on you then you care to deal with since I am in the IT industry. But honestly that really is completely irrelevant to the topic, I am american for whatever that is worth, my family is not from america however.
So all in all, another ignorant post with absolutely nothing to do with what was said. More smoke and mirrors, You know the solution to this is quite obvious it really is not that difficult unless you like maintaining the illusion that the rest of the world is in fact out to get you.
Ooooookkkkkkaaaaayyyyy. Let me bring us back on topic. Alot of you have stated that $15 gets you unlimited time in a month to play an MMORPG and that's a better value than paying $40-$50 for a single player game that will only last about 40-100 hours. You've also brought up the issue of maintaining a server and customer support staff that single player games don't have. Allow me to throw my two cents at both those arguements.
First, I DON'T HAVE TO BUY an offline game the minute it comes out. The really great thing about offline games is that they drop in price really, really quickly. In less than 3 months the PS2 version of Prince of Persia dropped from $50 new to around $40 new and you could pick up a used copy for $27 dollars. Also, there are more than a few offline and "one time pay" games that are infinately replayable. Tetris, Grand Turisimo, Soul Calibur, etc. Would you rather pay $180 a year to play a game or $15 dollars to play a game forever? Another thing to consider is that PC games have player made expansions. For $25 I can buy the platinum edition of Neverwinter Nights and play it for several years using player made modules and servers. Try playing through Morrowind and all it's official and player made expansion content and you would never get to see it all!
Now compare all that to MMORPGs. You have to buy the game in the first few months of it's release or else start out way behind the rest of the player community. The price of the original box drops slowly or not at all. And finally, player made content is totally verboten. How's that $180 a year look to you now?
As for the maintenance costs I have but one reply: What about all the free MMORPGs and "unoffical" servers? Freeworld, Conquer, Eternal Lands, Runescape, etc. The number of these free games is increasing all the time. They have the same server populations and problems as "mainstream" MMORPGs but somehow they manage, charging little or nothing at all. Yeah, these games are hard on the eyes, but most of the cost is in server maintenance and support staff. This has baffled me for a long time, perhaps someone can clarify why Conquer is free and UO is Not. I'm sure it will be very enlightening.
My last point is what you do with the time you spend playing. In EVERY SINGLE MMORPG that I've ever played, my time is divided between walking, restng and killing monesters for loot. I don't mind killing monsters for loot or crafting. It's walking for endless hours and resting between fights that turns most of these games into a giant snoozefest for me. You pay $15 a month to watch you character walk from one battle/quest to another in between watching your character stand/sit and regain HP/MP. Woohoo!! The typical MMOGer will play between 10 to 30 hours (the length of a part-time job) playing their favorite game and most of it is non-playable deadspace. Forgive me for feeling a little ripped off. There are exceptions to this. Guild Wars and City of Heroes spring directly to mind. Underlight and A Tale in The Desert also don't seem to fall into this trap. But the majority of MMORPGs just don't have enough going on to justify my paying $180+ a year.
I just don't get what the big deal is relating to costs.
$180 a year is $0.50 a day, roughly. It's not a lot of money, really for anyone other than the least fortunate members of society. Honestly I'm more than happy to pay @0.50 a day if something is moderately entertaining, even if I don't play it all that much. It's the cost of a daily newspaper! I think this argument is not really a sound one, from the financial perspective.
Well I guess apparently you would cause under where your avatar is or would be is this, "wisdom is the understanding of knowledge. And EVE-online trumps it all."- Pistolier And according www.mmorpg.com EVE Online costs 14.95 a month or 15$ and I guess you pay this.
Look
If you don't want to pay for them then DONT but don't try to imply that those who enjoy the genre are insane. It's you who are nuts thinking that QUALITY MMORPGs should be free. Yeah it'd be great if these corporations would operate all their games at a loss just so you can go have some fun but it just is NOT going to happen. So get over it already. Either pay for the really good MMO's that are out or go play a free one.
Making an MMO costs millions of dollars unless you are a programmer and do all the code yourself. Even then it costs thousands of dollars to buy the equipment to run it on and thousands more for the network equipment and bandwidth to allow people to play on it.
As to those 'free' MMO's out there? I suggest you go ask them how the hell they afford it.
As to your points:
. Hell you can get the entire EQ game, including all but the most recent expansions for like $19.
The box price of MMO's DOES drop, just slower because, well... supply and demand
DAOC has a similar pricetag for it's platinum package. UO is FREE to download now and, lets see... AC is cheap, SWG is cheap, $30 for SWG and all expansions now. EQ2 is already dropping in box price and WoW probably will be soon as well. What's your point? MMO's BOX price does go down over time just like any other game on the shelf. You CAN choose to wait to buy the game and many players do. In fact a lot of people wait up to a year to buy a game so that all the kinks will be ironed out. So WHAT if other players are "ahead" of you? It's not a competiton to see who can get to the 'end' first because there is no end.
Currently Playing: Dungeons and Dragons Online.
Sig image Pending
Still in: A couple Betas
Here's a thought, one of the reasons why i love mmorpgs, is the long lasting entertainment value i get for my 15 a month.
Example; bunco is popular here, folks get together put in a pot buy prices with pot money play a few hours, whoever is hosting it buys gifts food, and it goes round robin. Though a cheap form of enteratinment is for a few hours 2 times a month and runs about 25 a night.
Ceramics molds, paints oven time, getting there back again expensive for all the little parts
RC remote cars/trucks gesh each part can run 40 + or more and they always need parts
Every other hobby has working needed parts, gas time money,
Yet for 50 bucks plus 15 a month i get hours and hours of entertainment.
So rather we have a few mmorpgs for our family or just one, to us it is a cheap form of entertainment
and the flip side if get into beta submit bug reports, but also get to see if it's a "fit or not".......
i have no troubles with 15 a month for a game, esepcaily since everything else is so much more expensive
It is true that $180 a year is pretty cheap for a hobby. I think I spend more than that on art supplies and 3D editing software. However, $15 a month for the low quality of gameplay that these games deliver is totally ridiculous. I think that $5 to $10 per month is more than enough for the repetitive treadmill of most MMORPGs. For the same price I can get 12 good multiplayer and singleplayer games and be quite a bit more entertained. I don't believe that quality games should be free or that people that make GOOD games should not be rewarded monetarily. By that same token, PRICE DOES NOT EQUAL QUALITY!!!! Anyone remember Earth and Beyond? How about A World Called 10Six? I personally think that the monthly fee should be reduced or replaced with a one time pay pricing model. I have nothing against paying for GOOD games. I do have something about being GOUGED FOR AVERAGE OR BAD GAMES!!!
And again, the very exisitance of free / donation based MMORPGs pretty much proves that the cost of server and software maintenance and support has been wildly exagerated. It also doesn't take millions of dollars or a huge staff to make a good game. Here's an example: http://www.taleworlds.com/index.html
This game was made by two people in their spare time on chump change. The indie gaming scene isn't dead kids. Wishing it gone isn't going to make it go away or make the jobs of big name developement studios any more secure
The real question is "why would you pay $15 a month for a single mmo when you could have access to half a dozen for a single, realistic price?
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Visit MMO Center today to discover the future of subscription MMORPGs! Brought to you by Rapid Reality.
I guess you meant to say half a dozen for the same price or similar price?
Well the answer is obvious. Quantity does not equal quality.
6 crappy games are not worth anything.
"We feel gold selling and websites that promote it damage games like Vanguard and will do everything possible to combat it."
Brad McQuaid
Chairman & CEO, Sigil Games Online, Inc.
Executive Producer, Vanguard: Saga of Heroes
www.vanguardsoh
The real question is "why would you pay $15 a month for a single mmo when you could have access to half a dozen for price?
why should i waste about six dollars on a bunch of games i won't be playing. there is a post about that in here, if you are interested find it.
Why does it matter? If a person likes the games the games are worth the price to them. I just don't get why anyone actually cares? MMO's cost money to develop and make. Not saying there aren't free ones out there but I have yet to see a free one that comes anywhere close to the quality of the ones produced by major companies. Even most indie companies charge $15 a month.
Now, if really good MMO's start coming out that are free, yes of course people will stop paying $15 a month for them. But until that happens you aren't going to see subscription fees going away.
SOE offers an all access pass which, if you like more than 1 of their games, is very much worth getting because it saves you money over paying for two separate subscriptions. Personally I enjoy 3 of them enough to play them at least occasionally so it's a great value for me.
But the bottom line is:
Why do you care? If someone wants to spend $15 a month on a game they enjoy then that's their business. If you don't want to then go play free MMO's or don't play MMO's at all.
Currently Playing: Dungeons and Dragons Online.
Sig image Pending
Still in: A couple Betas
Should we just give this up, it was a lousy topic to begin with and i have certainly been proved wrong.
also my apologies to anyone i may have offended. and yes my grammar still needs work.
Ya, why the heck do we go to the movies, when we can go out and rent the DVD! Heck, Why by the DVD when we can rent it?
$9.00 for 2 hours of entertainment
$15.00 for a month of entertainment
your arguement is so persuasive, so filled with knowledge and insight. You back up your argument very articulately, with suggestions of improvements and raising examples to glorify your position....oh wait, you didn't
LOL! This says it all.
Matter of fact I'd be willing to bet that some of the folks posting here about how MMO's are too expensive have probably gone to see at least one movie or another more than once in the theatre...
Currently Playing: Dungeons and Dragons Online.
Sig image Pending
Still in: A couple Betas
most mmorpgs cost 14.99$ a month...thats rounded off to 50cents a day...thats not a lot...even working for 7.25 an hour, 8 hours a week, you can easily pay this fee.
two hours of work for one month of gaming sounds about right to me.
i am saying this cause i have been proven wrong.
Um, I bought Dungeon Siege for $10 at Wal-Mart and I've been playing it for several months now. There's a ton of user made content that extends the life of the game. I also downloaded Nethack for free several years ago and still play it regularly. It isn't the time you have for the price, it's what you do with the time you ger for the price. EQ, UO, AO, AC, DAoC, etc all give the player about 10 minutes of game artificially stretched out to several hours. Maybe it's the pace that makes them seem more tedious than their single player counterparts. Maybe it's the lack of depth in the basic functions of the game. Diablo was tedious but the pace made up for it. Final Fantasy games were tedious but the combat systems were compelling enough to keep you comming back for more. WoW shows that this genre is finally getting the pacing right and GW gives me hope that there may someday be a combat system that is compelling enough to keep me playing and paying month after month. Until then......
Depends on what style of game you want to play. If all you want to do is play solo/single player then MMO's aren't worth the money. If you want to be part of a bigger world where you have to interact with other players to accomplish goals and gather resources/equipment etc... then MMORPG's are very worth it.
Comparing single player games to MMORPG's is fairly pointless. They're totally different styles of play.
Currently Playing: Dungeons and Dragons Online.
Sig image Pending
Still in: A couple Betas
Actually, I'm thinking it's a design issue. Online multiplayer games always trump offline / solo games for me but I just haven't seen an MMORPG that delivers $180+ (yearly scale) of gameplay. This is odd so me since they have all the elements that go into a great online game. Those elements just don't seem to hang together in a compelling way however. Artificially extending gameplay by increasing downtime (traveling, healing, fighting every 2 feet) just really kills it for me. I like both Co-op and PvP style gameplay and these games give both as an option. But somehow it just doesn't feel as rewarding as going through Baldur's Gate or Neverwinter Nights with a bunch of friends. This is no small issue. This is about quality and, as far as I see it, MMORPGs are just really slow MORPGs stretched out into infinity.
you bring up the possibility of being part of a bigger world but no MMORPG has really given a world that seems real enough. I also find it amusing that you put gathering resources on your list since I've been talking about combining RTS elements into MMORPGs for awhile now. Maybe if they designed the world to be massively PvP to begin with and balanced the game so that players would be encouraged to join groups......
Oh wait, UO tried that at first but didn't add limited resources or huge death penalties so the whole thing turned into one big hyper-inflated gankfest. <sigh>
xplorer you seem to be missing the point. Let me start off by saying something that I should have said two posts ago. All views expressed by me are mine and are in no way an effort to impose restrictions on other. They are my opinion, you can take them or leave them.
Firstly, the scale is quite different with single player games since I can sell them or trade them to Gamestop or EBgames or on ebay. Legally. You can't really do that with an MMORPG. Also, if I find that I can't shoehorn in that $15 to $30 a for a game one month, I can just go without and wait until I have the money. The same situation with an MMORPG would have your account suspended and character deleted. And as I've said before, alot of single player games are infinitely replayable without the need for new content. Case in point, I spent about 5 hours a couple of days ago playing Meteos on the DS and I play Soul Calibur 2 almost daily. I would say that I do spend quite a bit less on gaming than $180 a year but that's mostly due to the fact that I buy used and trade back once I'm done with a game. If the game is good and totally replayable, I keep it.
You talk about a 100% new experience everytime you log on. Really? Has the interface changed that much? Do they do a complete overhaul of the games artwork while you sleep? Does it magically change genres at the drop of the hat? Of course it doesn't. Basically you get a big chat room in a static environment, that's not unlike an empty movie lot, and occasionally you run out "hunt" braindead AI monsters or do a little PvP. Is this different than say Diablo or Neverwinter Nights? Not really, but Diablo and NWN aren't demanding that I shuck out money every month either. With all the player made content for NWN, Dungeon Siege, Baldur's Gate, etc, I can have unique experiences and content as well. And only pay once!!! You ask about which gives you more for your money, it's really no contest.
Then you ask if I ever get my friends to play MMORPGs with me or if I can make friends in-game. The answer is yes I've done both and the experience just isn't the same. In NWN or Baldur's Gate there are no respawning monsters (depending on the server). There are no campers. There are no annoying packs of griefers that follow your party around and steel all the drops and kills while not being in PvP mode. Their are no quests that require more than an hour and a half to play through. Slice it however you want too, the play in these games has traditionally been spread thin just to keep you glued to your keyboard, regardless of wether your character was doing anything or not. The point of games is to interact and these games have all that, just very, very slow interaction.
You ask what is real enough. I'll admit to having worded this wrong. The problem is not that it isn't real enough. The problem is that it all feels pointless. There's a lack of context for what's happening. You can get around this by joining a role-playing guild or by going into just PvP. These solutions just seem cheap to me however. The game needs to be designed so that the actions in the game have some overall goal that makes sense. Instead of just killing monsters so you can get more gold and XP so that you can get new abilities and equipment so that you can kill bigger monsters and get more gold and XP etc. Let me give you an example of what designing around the context would be like:
Let's make this a game set in the stone age. We'll have Weather patterns and animals will have specific behavior and migratory patterns. The goal of the game is to survive against starvation, exposure and predation. There will be some crafting since people would be able to gather resources and make impliments for hunting, shelter, and clothing. There would only be so much food available in the world and that would be affected by season, weather patterns and birth to death ratios. In such a game, players would have to work together to survive and compete for resources. Since the overall goal is to survive, every player could contribute something to their community in this regard. Killing would be less a matter or leveling up and more a matter of surviving another day. Since characters wouldn't just be walking weapons platforms, crafting would be an essential part of survival. The focus shifts from maxing your stats to keeping everyone alive. Mutually beneficial goals.
Now then, I have no solutions for the problems of this genre. Traveling isn't as much a problem as the quests that require a 4 hour walk there and back again to complete. Tighter Quests with a little more variety would go along way. I honestly think that games like WoW and GW are making strides in that direction. There's a lot more to do, but they give us a good start. I think that player run events and quests could also do alot to take the monotony and pointlessness out of these games. The best Co-op games I ever played were in UO with a live GM. Of course, Phantasy Star Online still sets the standard for Co-op RPGs in my book. I haven't played enough DAoC to know what really goes into their RvR combat but I think that an overall team game that had some of the characteristics or RTS games would be welcome. Each faction fighting for access to resources or legendary items and each player doing their part towards their factions goals. Gathering resources, crafting, buffing, building structures and fighting. Being able to destroy buildings would go a long way as well. Warfare has a nasty tendency to turn quite little towns into forests of burnt stakes growing out of scorched eath. Let's make those epic battles feel epic and create a semi-lasting impact on the environment.
These are all things that MMORPGs have promised since they took up that stupid acronym. They have, at best, delivered only a few of those things. Once this genre matures a bit more I might put my money down on a monthly basis. Until then I'll be playing NWN.