What's the motivation to play solo Online.

delete5230

Community is the sole reason I play mmorpgs.

When I say mmoprg's SUCK lately it seems to Infuriate people here.  Well because I'm looking for community (people to play with) and can't is the reason I say this.   

Mmorpgs are solo games for the last 10 years,

What's the drive or motivation to play them at all ?.....I seriously can't understand it.  Close to everyone admits single player games are better experiences. 

People often say, your not trying !...... I'm the KING of grouping, it maybe the only thing I'm good at. I don't need advice on how. I'm already good at it, they don't want to by design.  I spend a lot of time observing EVERYONE around me and their always alone, all the time. 

PEOPLE DON'T WANT TO, in modern games.

BY DESIGN….. It's 100% understandable.  Infact it holds you back to do so.

 

Please help me to understand the attraction of playing "Online Solo"?…. I'm not being a smart ass. Instead of saying here we go again, please help me understand so I don't have to keep repeating myself. 

anemo

There is more to "grouping" than just "combat grouping". 

Just logging in enjoying some nice memes, enjoying guild chat, or discussing the lore of the game.  Is pretty good "grouping" content, even if everyone is out in different parts of the world.  Especially in cases where you are hunting game secrets or lore bread crumbs, since you're likely to need more than one perspective to unlock them (RL knowledge, performed quests in different orders, and similar).

Derros

I'm fairly asocial, but I will enjoy doing pug content. I mainly just want social content on my terms when I feel like doing it and stop when I feel like it.

I mainly play for progression with a sense of permanence that you can't really get with a single-player game. Also, single-player games can be beaten, while you can't beat an MMO so it's more cost-effective to play an MMO/persistent game rather than buying a new single-player game every couple weeks. The social aspect doesn't really matter to me, but the psychological effect of know other people are still there playing the same game in the same areas does improve the game for me, 'alone together' is the term I've heard describe it before.

k61977

I play a lot of MMO's solo mostly.  I play the way I want when I want.  I don't have to wait for whoever to go to the bathroom, go let their dog out, take a smoke break ect...  I do group up when I feel like doing something that requires it, but to be honest I rather not group up with people I don't know anymore to be honest.  I have gotten older an dealing with elitest, just plain pricks, an asshats, just so I can run an instance or do group content is not an appealing thing. 

I look at games now an see people that just wanted to fly through things, lord forbid it is your first time an you want to take a second to watch that cut-scene.  Nope they want you to go to youtube instead of watching it in game.  I don't watch any videos on anything until after I have played it, I want to experience it firsthand, which is why I play the game.

One of the worse experiences in gaming I ever had was trying to get 40 man content going.  You have a better chance an herding cats.  Someone is going to be late, someone is going to have to leave, pray it didn't have an attunement an you find out half the group didn't do it after waiting an hour, you are going to start an hour or more late so you have people just sitting around which leads to people leaving.  It is those experiences that push people away from wanting to group up also. 

Overall grouping up should be a choice an never something someone is forced to do.  I enjoy seeing other people in games an often help them out if I see them struggling or they are asking questions.  Just because I enjoy solo play doesn't mean I don't want others in the world I just don't want to be forced to be in a group just to have fun.

Albatroes

delete5230 said:

Community is the sole reason I play mmorpgs.

When I say mmoprg's SUCK lately it seems to Infuriate people here.  Well because I'm looking for community (people to play with) and can't is the reason I say this.   

Mmorpgs are solo games for the last 10 years,

What's the drive or motivation to play them at all ?.....I seriously can't understand it.  Close to everyone admits single player games are better experiences. 

People often say, your not trying !...... I'm the KING of grouping, it maybe the only thing I'm good at. I don't need advice on how. I'm already good at it, they don't want to by design.  I spend a lot of time observing EVERYONE around me and their always alone, all the time. 

PEOPLE DON'T WANT TO, in modern games.

BY DESIGN….. It's 100% understandable.  Infact it holds you back to do so.

 

Please help me to understand the attraction of playing "Online Solo"?…. I'm not being a smart ass. Instead of saying here we go again, please help me understand so I don't have to keep repeating myself. 

Lets get something a bit clear about the 'golden age' off mmorpgs; no one WANTED to group back then, they simply HAD to if they didn't want to spend forever doing things. People were conditioned, like they are now, to exist in an environment in order to traverse it as efficiently as possible. Long the way, you might make friends/build up server 'rep' etc. You almost hit th nail on the head saying that it all comes down to design, which is does. These games aren't built around longevity or the love of the game. They are built around continuous monetization. In building games like that, you have companies trying to figure out how they can milk everyone, not just one aspect over the other. Thus is why mmorpgs work on 'seasons' now. Ultimately, everyone ends up within a set bracket developers want so no player gets too far ahead or behind regardless of how much you play, just as long as you play period.

At the end of the day, people think a true motivating factor derives from want instead of need, and for some this is true, but for most it is not. If you survive a heart attack, chances are you're not changing your lifestyle because you WANT to, but because you NEED to, assuming you like living. Same rules apply to most things. Communities didn't form in mmorpgs because everyone wanted to, they did because if they didn't nothing got done. There wasn't a well of knowledge in every place you looked back then like we have now and devs weren't nerfing things into the ground every 3-6 months like clockwork.

The main mind set EVERYONE should honestly have isn't if one type is better than the other. It should be how do we get both sides to co-exist. Classic servers, or whatever you want to call them, is definitely a valid idea, but there's no point in those if nothing new gets added. It also doesn't help that most companies dont just want a lot of money, they want ALL OF THE MONEY.

Derros

Albatroes said:

Lets get something a bit clear about the 'golden age' off mmorpgs; no one WANTED to group back then, they simply HAD to if they didn't want to spend forever doing things. 

I don't think it's fair to say no one wanted to group, there was certainly a contingent of people who liked the proto social media aspect of MMOs back then.

TEKK3N

I think Delete meant, why don’t you play single player games instead of MMORPGs.

Technically and content wise Single Player games are superior to MMORPGs, so why not stick with it?

Personally when I don’t want to interact with others I boot Fallout 4, Skyrim or one of the dozens RPGs I own.

So I would like to know why people don’t do the same instead of playing a Massive Online RPG if they are not really social.

Derros

TEKK3N said:

I think Delete meant, why don’t you play single player games instead of MMORPGs.

Technically and content wise Single Player games are superior to MMORPGs, so why not stick with it?

Personally when I don’t want to interact with others I boot Fallout 4, Skyrim or one of the dozens RPGs I own.

So I would like to know why people don’t do the same instead of playing a Massive Online RPG if they are not really social.

Once I beat a single player game, or have had enough of it, I have alot of trouble going back to it. Plus I start thinking about all the progress im missing out on in the MMOs I play. I start thinking could be doing my dalies or capping my weekly currency rather than playing this single player game. That is more a 'me' problem than anything, but its made single player games harder to stick with.

Cryomatrix

I prefer my npc's to not all be on scripts. The other players are a wonderful backdrop to the scenery for me.

Plus, in an MMO, the ability to group is there when i want it. 

Also, it is nice to trade with other humans and i like to see what other people come up with. 

Sovrath

delete5230 said:

What's the drive or motivation to play them at all ?.....I seriously can't understand it.  

I think this is the problem with most people. Not just in games but in life. They just don't take a step back and think.

If I said to you "I'll give you 1 million dollars if you can come up with 3 reasons why people enjoy playing "solo" in mmorpg's I highly doubt you would sit back and twiddle your thumbs and just say "I don't know!"

You'd actually come up with reasons.

But I'll play. For me, even though I do enjoy grouping, I don't like grouping with people who just suck the energy out of the experience. I don't have to deal with many poisonous people in my life and I don't feel the need to pay for the privilege of dealing with them in an online game.

Therefore I enjoy the "life" that other people can give to the world. Other players make the world feel more alive. I can enjoy that populated feel and still go about the game in my own way.

Since I'm more interested in the "world" aspect of mmorpg's than the "game" aspect, I tend to stay away from things in these games that I don't like. I rarely if ever finish quest lines because I, more often than not, come up to a point where I don't want to do a section. Therefore I might not have a specific bit of gear or have gotten specific access to a part of the game because it was part of a quest line I haven't done. usually better to just experience the game my way.

Kyleran

TEKK3N said:

I think Delete meant, why don’t you play single player games instead of MMORPGs.

Technically and content wise Single Player games are superior to MMORPGs, so why not stick with it?

Personally when I don’t want to interact with others I boot Fallout 4, Skyrim or one of the dozens RPGs I own.

So I would like to know why people don’t do the same instead of playing a Massive Online RPG if they are not really social.

Meh, I play mostly solo to accommodate my busy life and besides,  most other gamers suck, am I right? 

Take EVE for example, 80% of my time was spent doing solo PVE activities, ie mission running, mining, exploring etc.

I was always in a corporation though, to socialize,  take advantages of services, or have someone to PVP with when the mood suited me.

Rarely would I group in PVE as most times it only hampered my efficiency which I normally won't do unless I'm in a charitable mood.

I played FO76 for a few months at release entirely solo as I've already got 1500 hours in FO4 and there's not much new for me to do.

I recently returned to FO76 as a friend wanted to try it, and we unexpectedly made some new high level friends.

This new group centric approach has several benefits, but definitely some clear drawbacks such as our new friends all socialize too much in chat about non game related matters and there's times I just mute the channel so I can go off and kill stuff.

On an unrelated note, I am so in love with my two combat shotguns and found I am able to put to great use my freehand sniper skills (never used VATS) honed from all the practice I got in FONV / FO4.

delete5230

DMKano said:

The motivation is to not have to deal with other humans and their bullshit 

Having said that I play exclusively with my guild, so I don't solo

I don't want to make small talk and waste time - I try to use 100% of my time online for gains - be it gear, xp or character progression. 

My entire guild is like this- we know each other in real life so when we want to socialize we do that outside of the game.

Game time is to actually PLAY the game not waste time with chit chat - and many other players just dont have the same goals - they are there to socialize and talk and I have zero interest in that inside the game. 

I leave socializing and talk for get togethers

I admire your independent guild system of play.  Many could only hope for such a tight net group.


But your reason for out casting others in all reality is a catch-twenty-two. 

Modern games encourage solo play, therefor no reason to have "serious stick to the point of playing mentality"..... They encourage small talk, after all why talk about the game ? 

This is brought on by DESIGN.... If I go to a local park with our child, we small talk with other parents.  If I'm at work, we talk dead nuts serious.  It has a lot to do with environment ! 


In my experience, when mmorpg's are serious, the people talk serious and stay on point DEEPLY, ignoring the 40% gibberish or nonsense.... That is EASILY IGNORED. I'm playing Vanilla WoW and huge majority are focused.

Again, I would love a thigh group of friends, but its not a requirement as long as I'm playing the right game for my style.  

Finvega

Because I don't always like playing with people who don't mind their own business? Why would you care why I do what I  do?

delete5230

Finvega said:

Because I don't always like playing with people who don't mind their own business? Why would you care why I do what I  do?

Your not dangerous are you ?..... I'm just asking, you don't have to answer.  

alyndale

@Delete I'm not scolding you. It is obvious you have points to make for constant "grouping".

However, my friend, grouping constantly is NOT community building. MMO communities are more complex than that sir. There are times when a gamer comes home from a difficult day at work and just wants some peaceful time to him/herself. People, discussion, arguments, the ol' inside joke, gossip, and dealing with "that guy/gal" that is just n ear impossible to get along with surrounds you constantly. Your 8 to 10 hour day is packed with stress and people. You like many of your colleagues are asked on a daily basis to perform at peak proficiency. Deadlines. Meetings--boring long meetings. Thirty minutes lunches, if you're lucky. Traffic to and from work is almost always slow as hell. You are a mesh of nerves when you finally arrive home to your working wife who is as much of a jumbled mess as you are and rowdy or hyper kids hungry for different types of food. Peace. You  just want some peace!

Thus, Mr Delete, we often seek a bit of harmony and balance, Usually I find fishing, hunting for materials, or crafting as a great way yo unwind a bit. If, I'm a bit angry at the day I've had then some mindless "rep grinding" often  helps to ease the anger a bit. These are solo endeavors and I cherish them. Truly, I do.

I see the mmo community as many different types of human beings searching for their own type of peace and harmony. There are times when grouping is necessary and quite fun. However, let us not forget that soloing is a great way for you to unwind and let your mind restfully accept the fantasy world as YOU see it.

My take and my enjoyment here Delete. You go out and have a wonderful experience, but remember what you perceive is not what I always perceive and that's what makes for an interesting community.

delete5230

alyndale said:

@Delete I'm not scolding you. It is obvious you have points to make for constant "grouping".

However, my friend, grouping constantly is NOT community building. MMO communities are more complex than that sir. There are times when a gamer comes home from a difficult day at work and just wants some peaceful time to him/herself. People, discussion, arguments, the ol' inside joke, gossip, and dealing with "that guy/gal" that is just n ear impossible to get along with surrounds you constantly. Your 8 to 10 hour day is packed with stress and people. You like many of your colleagues are asked on a daily basis to perform at peak proficiency. Deadlines. Meetings--boring long meetings. Thirty minutes lunches, if you're lucky. Traffic to and from work is almost always slow as hell. You are a mesh of nerves when you finally arrive home to your working wife who is as much of a jumbled mess as you are and rowdy or hyper kids hungry for different types of food. Peace. You  just want some peace!

Thus, Mr Delete, we often seek a bit of harmony and balance, Usually I find fishing, hunting for materials, or crafting as a great way yo unwind a bit. If, I'm a bit angry at the day I've had then some mindless "rep grinding" often  helps to ease the anger a bit. These are solo endeavors and I cherish them. Truly, I do.

I see the mmo community as many different types of human beings searching for their own type of peace and harmony. There are times when grouping is necessary and quite fun. However, let us not forget that soloing is a great way for you to unwind and let your mind restfully accept the fantasy world as YOU see it.

My take and my enjoyment here Delete. You go out and have a wonderful experience, but remember what you perceive is not what I always perceive and that's what makes for an interesting community.

WoW..... This got to me, I don't take this as scolding at all, I'm trying to be open minded as to my normal self here as being stubborn and pig headed.... I really want to get to the root cause.

And bring up the stress in life and a relief from it is so far the best reason yet !
Good display of examples too.

However single players can offer the same, but I should understand the variances of to each their own.

Thanks

NorseGod

I mostly solo, but I do group up for guild functions.

I just don't like using voice comms. To me, nothing is worse than having a high-pitch, nasally voice in my ear. Thinking the whole time it's a 7 yr old playing with us and turns out he's 28.

Or hearing someone mash keys with their sausage fingers, huffing and puffing, grunting like they are running the iron man competition. Like dude, go see a doctor so you don't die from a heart attack or diabetes. 

Then, there's that special guy that everyone has to wait on to finish whatever it is he is doing before showing up, making us all wait.

Or the guy that has to leave halfway through a raid, who shouldn't have come if he knew he had to leave so soon.

Then there's the fighting over loot. Last few years, I don't stick around for the loot fights. Last boss is down, I leave.

Me: OK, fun run. Thx for the invite. 
Guild: We haven't passed out the loot yet. lol Don't you want any loot?
Me: Nah. <Norsegod leaves your channel>

I never get any of the loot anyways, so I don't even bother waiting around listening to them bicker over it.

Sovrath

One of my few friends who plays video games (most of my friends don't) plays World of Warcraft. It's the only mmorpg that he plays. 

He used to be part of a guild but no longer wants to spend time that way. When I asked him if he was going to play classic he told me that he wasn't interested (he came to the game later in its life) as all he wanted to do was come home, relax and unwind. Playing solo in the vast Warcraft open world was his way of doing this and he had no interest in grouping. Too much drama.

Utinni

For most I don't think its the fact that you're playing solo "online" but its the game systems/world/progression they enjoy. Sure there are single player RPG's but they aren't the same.

Hatefull

DMKano said:

The motivation is to not have to deal with other humans and their bullshit 

Having said that I play exclusively with my guild, so I don't solo

I don't want to make small talk and waste time - I try to use 100% of my time online for gains - be it gear, xp or character progression. 

My entire guild is like this- we know each other in real life so when we want to socialize we do that outside of the game.

Game time is to actually PLAY the game not waste time with chit chat - and many other players just dont have the same goals - they are there to socialize and talk and I have zero interest in that inside the game. 

I leave socializing and talk for get togethers

I agree 100%

When I was tanking in WoW...probaly one of the worst communities in gaming imo, I literally was told by a healer that she forgot to heal because he was reading a post on FB and got distracted. That was the final straw. Now, much like you, I play with RL friends, we progress and if we want to BS we meet outside the game.

Hariken

Finvega said:

Because I don't always like playing with people who don't mind their own business? Why would you care why I do what I  do?

Agreed
Why is it the people here don't want to believe that the communities in all the popular MMO's are filled with asses and that's why solo play is popular. Been playing MMO's since 99/2000 and I have seen the genre become mainstream post Wow. And once that happened it went downhill from there. You want a nice community play the older less popular MMO's.

Mendel

delete5230 said:

Community is the sole reason I play mmorpgs.

When I say mmoprg's SUCK lately it seems to Infuriate people here.  Well because I'm looking for community (people to play with) and can't is the reason I say this.   

Mmorpgs are solo games for the last 10 years,

What's the drive or motivation to play them at all ?.....I seriously can't understand it.  Close to everyone admits single player games are better experiences. 

People often say, your not trying !...... I'm the KING of grouping, it maybe the only thing I'm good at. I don't need advice on how. I'm already good at it, they don't want to by design.  I spend a lot of time observing EVERYONE around me and their always alone, all the time. 

PEOPLE DON'T WANT TO, in modern games.

BY DESIGN….. It's 100% understandable.  Infact it holds you back to do so.

 

Please help me to understand the attraction of playing "Online Solo"?…. I'm not being a smart ass. Instead of saying here we go again, please help me understand so I don't have to keep repeating myself. 

Good question, @delete5230.  Here's my take on how soloing took over.

I think there are two closely related issues here, community and grouping.  These are distinct things.  In early games, the community and groups were more necessary than in modern games.  Progression was tough, these type of games were new, and defeating the content was far easier in a group.  The lack of online resources to tell you the details of the game encouraged the community to grow, to share information.  You helped, because you never knew when you would need help.  Personal networks evolved as the need to group to progress was almost mandatory.  People were unfamiliar with the game.

As players became more familiar with a specific game, they found ways to play by themselves.  True, developers gradually modified their games to be more accommodating to the solo player, as it was frequently difficult to find people who wanted to do the same thing at the same time as you.  Players discovered many of a game's mechanical "secrets" (i.e., respawn rates, experience calculations, etc.) and learned to work around these by themselves.

The psychology of the player changed.  Players hit the maximum levels and created alternate characters.  This time through, they knew enough about the game to "do it myself".  They became less likely to wait on other people, either for forming a group, or waiting while someone went /afk.  Impatience took over, and players started having expectations about their time in-game.  No longer did people log-in just to "see what was going on"; instead, they had a specific purpose in mind -- get a hundred wolf pelts, or get to that next level.

Anyway, that's the way I see it.  I hope this helps.

Panther2103

I like the option of grouping if it's there but I don't want to always do that. Sometimes you just like to be in an online world and have people running around but not have to interact unless you want. 

I like doing content solo because I can go do something in real life if I need to, or go as quick or slow as I want, not have to wait for other players to show up or for them to get on. Not have to go out of my way to find a group for things or worry I'm somehow holding the group back. 

I tend to group still for PvP or group content, but forcing it sucks to me. 

Kajidourden

It's really quite simple.  A lot of the systems and gameplay mechanics present in MMOs just aren't present in any other type of game.  There are of course those that mimic them or have similarities but none of them (due to the nature of them being offline or of another genre) match 1:1 with MMOs in that regard.  They are also (for all intents and purposes) infinitely replayable/have infinite progression with constant additions, changes, etc that offline games just don't get.  On an unrelated note:  This is part of what makes MMOs so expensive:  Not just the initial content release but all of the new stuff you have to start working on in tandem with running the current content.

ChildoftheShadows

I liked playing solo, where I could, in Everquest 1 and LFG in scenarios where I couldn't. Solo in EQ was 100x more challenging than solo in any current MMO from WoW (even classic) forward hence I cannot play them.

So to answer the question I love to solo,but I don't like solo orientated games.

Utinni

ChildoftheShadows said:

I liked playing solo, where I could, in Everquest 1 and LFG in scenarios where I couldn't. Solo in EQ was 100x more challenging than solo in any current MMO from WoW (even classic) forward hence I cannot play them.

So to answer the question I love to solo,but I don't like solo orientated games.

Snaring something, then running a little bit and hitting an aoe.. is 100x more challenging than any current solo mmo? Even enchanter charm soloing is still extremely basic. Nothing about EQ is challenging.