You can blather on how people have different tastes, which can be true. But that doesn't mean there are many people that just don't even care. This can be in any area, whether its burgers, women/men, MMO's, clothes, art, cars, you name it. Sometimes people just don't care about certain things, their standards are low/zero.
Some of these people have the honesty to even admit it.
I know there are areas, that I don't care about. But I don't try to lecture people about what is good or bad if I know I don't even care.
So please spare me your lectures.
You gave two examples and then followed with this gem:
If you have no standards, I guess you can say its a great time to be
alive because MMO's are certainly living up to the no standards mark.
They are certainly racing to the bottom.
That pretty much says that people who don't like a certain thing have no standards over having different tastes.
If you don't see that then "whatever."
Also, if people like what's going on in gaming then it's a great time to be alive.
So you are just going to have to accept that while some people might say they don't care others say they do care and they like what's going on in gaming.
Maybe they say they have high standards and they still like today's games.
In which case it's a great time to be alive for games.
So you think all these mobile rollouts are making games better? You don't think industries are lowering their standards to capture phone users?
50% of the world population has phones, most of which cant afford a PC. Its pretty obvious why these companies are moving to mobile.
But are you really sitting here saying that this makes the genre better for someone who can afford a PC?
They can in genres suited to the medium, and what is suited continues to expand as technology improves. In the case of those that can't afford a PC mobile games are incontestably better due to accessibility alone.
Even those with a PC will find mobile games better if they happen to enjoy playing games when they can't lug their computer around with them.
It's obvious why for profit companies do anything. It is literally in their descriptor.
I think the main "mmorpgs are dead" argument come from vets of the genre who don't like the way the games have evolved...
it's not a reflection of the state of gaming in the mmo genre, it's a reflection of them as people missing the way mmo's used to be and not liking the new form they have taken.
As someone who is also a vet, but has evovled with the genre, i can generally find a good experience in any new mmorpg as long as i'm playing with friends, because at the end of the day thats why i started playing mmo's back in text based muds.. because i enjoyed sharing an experience with my friends.
All games, be it old school mmorpgs, new mmorpgs, online shooters, text based muds, action, adventure etc... are fun until they aren't so i make the most of the games i play with my friends until we no longer play them and move onto the next thing.
Now there are a few titles we have been playing for years and still continue to play, games that as long as the servers are running we will probably continue to play and have new experiences with.
But i think the whole mmorps are dead because i don't like how they are now is just bitter and change fearing. Sure the older ones can be challenging to play solo, but why should anyone be forced to play a game (even an mmorpg) with other people. Just because you feel thats how it should be doesn't mean an experience should be taken away from someone who doesn't want too but still wants to experience the world and nearly all these games have content you are forced to group todo if you want to do it, but letting players have a little bit of choice in how they recieve their content isnt a terrible thing.
at the end of the day i don't see the genre going anywhere as a whole, new studios will keep forming and trying to push the boundaries to deliver experiences that cater to either niche or huge market subsets because there is money in it.... even some of the subjectivley worst mmorpgs to launch like bless for example end up making a heap of money before they shut down the servers... and like the original Bless wasn't anything fantastic, but my friends and i had an amazing time while we were playing it.
MMO's haven't "evolved", they've devolved. Into SP games. We expected them to EVOLVE into greater massively multiplayer, "one world" experiences. They haven't and instead went the other way.
You: "Sure the older ones can be challenging to play solo, but why should anyone be forced to play a game (even an mmorpg) with other people."
Refer to my first comment. This point is all about the social aspects of "Massively Multiplayer." There is none left (or hardly any) in these devolved games. Sure, you can play with others, but there's really no need to (and most don't) until you get to "End Game." And "End Game" is not the game as a whole, it's the END of the game. So much for "World."
I think the main "mmorpgs are dead" argument come from vets of the genre who don't like the way the games have evolved...
it's not a reflection of the state of gaming in the mmo genre, it's a reflection of them as people missing the way mmo's used to be and not liking the new form they have taken.
As someone who is also a vet, but has evovled with the genre, i can generally find a good experience in any new mmorpg as long as i'm playing with friends, because at the end of the day thats why i started playing mmo's back in text based muds.. because i enjoyed sharing an experience with my friends.
All games, be it old school mmorpgs, new mmorpgs, online shooters, text based muds, action, adventure etc... are fun until they aren't so i make the most of the games i play with my friends until we no longer play them and move onto the next thing.
Now there are a few titles we have been playing for years and still continue to play, games that as long as the servers are running we will probably continue to play and have new experiences with.
But i think the whole mmorps are dead because i don't like how they are now is just bitter and change fearing. Sure the older ones can be challenging to play solo, but why should anyone be forced to play a game (even an mmorpg) with other people. Just because you feel thats how it should be doesn't mean an experience should be taken away from someone who doesn't want too but still wants to experience the world and nearly all these games have content you are forced to group todo if you want to do it, but letting players have a little bit of choice in how they recieve their content isnt a terrible thing.
at the end of the day i don't see the genre going anywhere as a whole, new studios will keep forming and trying to push the boundaries to deliver experiences that cater to either niche or huge market subsets because there is money in it.... even some of the subjectivley worst mmorpgs to launch like bless for example end up making a heap of money before they shut down the servers... and like the original Bless wasn't anything fantastic, but my friends and i had an amazing time while we were playing it.
MMO's haven't "evolved", they've devolved. Into SP games. We expected them to EVOLVE into greater massively multiplayer, "one world" experiences. They haven't and instead went the other way.
You: "Sure the older ones can be challenging to play solo, but why should anyone be forced to play a game (even an mmorpg) with other people."
Refer to my first comment. This point is all about the social aspects of "Massively Multiplayer." There is none left (or hardly any) in these devolved games. Sure, you can play with others, but there's really no need to (and most don't) until you get to "End Game." And "End Game" is not the game as a whole, it's the END of the game. So much for "World."
it's your opionion they have devolved, thats the whole point of my post, thankyou for proving my point.
just because it's not your idea of what it should have evolved into you count it as devolving and bad.
Massively Multiplayer does not equal huge social game. massively multiplayer just means a bunch of people are playing it.
Forcing social aspects / group play does not always make a better game, removing player agency isn't always a good thing. Some people are new to the game / genre and how bad of an experience would it be for them being unable to do anything because they are late to a new game / genre and the content to level alone is too hard to solo.
you are placing your own label on an mmorpg that a requirement is social / group play, but it's not even in the name, it's just an aspect veterans have placed on the genre as some pinnacle pillar of the genre. It isn't people should be able to enjoy games they way they want.
I think the main "mmorpgs are dead" argument come from vets of the genre who don't like the way the games have evolved...
it's not a reflection of the state of gaming in the mmo genre, it's a reflection of them as people missing the way mmo's used to be and not liking the new form they have taken.
As someone who is also a vet, but has evovled with the genre, i can generally find a good experience in any new mmorpg as long as i'm playing with friends, because at the end of the day thats why i started playing mmo's back in text based muds.. because i enjoyed sharing an experience with my friends.
All games, be it old school mmorpgs, new mmorpgs, online shooters, text based muds, action, adventure etc... are fun until they aren't so i make the most of the games i play with my friends until we no longer play them and move onto the next thing.
Now there are a few titles we have been playing for years and still continue to play, games that as long as the servers are running we will probably continue to play and have new experiences with.
But i think the whole mmorps are dead because i don't like how they are now is just bitter and change fearing. Sure the older ones can be challenging to play solo, but why should anyone be forced to play a game (even an mmorpg) with other people. Just because you feel thats how it should be doesn't mean an experience should be taken away from someone who doesn't want too but still wants to experience the world and nearly all these games have content you are forced to group todo if you want to do it, but letting players have a little bit of choice in how they recieve their content isnt a terrible thing.
at the end of the day i don't see the genre going anywhere as a whole, new studios will keep forming and trying to push the boundaries to deliver experiences that cater to either niche or huge market subsets because there is money in it.... even some of the subjectivley worst mmorpgs to launch like bless for example end up making a heap of money before they shut down the servers... and like the original Bless wasn't anything fantastic, but my friends and i had an amazing time while we were playing it.
MMO's haven't "evolved", they've devolved. Into SP games. We expected them to EVOLVE into greater massively multiplayer, "one world" experiences. They haven't and instead went the other way.
You: "Sure the older ones can be challenging to play solo, but why should anyone be forced to play a game (even an mmorpg) with other people."
Refer to my first comment. This point is all about the social aspects of "Massively Multiplayer." There is none left (or hardly any) in these devolved games. Sure, you can play with others, but there's really no need to (and most don't) until you get to "End Game." And "End Game" is not the game as a whole, it's the END of the game. So much for "World."
it's your opionion they have devolved, thats the whole point of my post, thankyou for proving my point.
just because it's not your idea of what it should have evolved into you count it as devolving and bad.
Massively Multiplayer does not equal huge social game. massively multiplayer just means a bunch of people are playing it.
Forcing social aspects / group play does not always make a better game, removing player agency isn't always a good thing. Some people are new to the game / genre and how bad of an experience would it be for them being unable to do anything because they are late to a new game / genre and the content to level alone is too hard to solo.
you are placing your own label on an mmorpg that a requirement is social / group play, but it's not even in the name, it's just an aspect veterans have placed on the genre as some pinnacle pillar of the genre. It isn't people should be able to enjoy games they way they want.
I'm sorry, but I have to call Bullshjt. We had SP games. MMO was a revolution in gaming evolution. And they've gone back to SP by design. Or you can say they went back to Multiplayer (a step between). Either way, it's devolved.
When i see ONE developer put in the basic core effort a WORLD game should have,i'll make note of it for certain. As of now and for the past 15 years even with the tech to do better studios just want to give us fake looking lazy design worlds.
Name ONE<<<<pretty simple right,name one MMO with an ECO system?
Name MMO's with building housing.i mean we do have living characters right,or are all our characters robots? VERY generic worlds,core design features missing,yep very lazy game designs.
Here is another laughable one,how do you have GUILDS with no guildhalls?It is like a church group with no church lol or a hockey team with no arena or a football team with no field.Geesus even a simple Euchre club or chess club will have a meeting place.
cant believe Im responding to a Wizardry post, but. . .
but ARK: Survival Evolved has everything you asked people to name one of. . . . . .took like 5 seconds of thought.
I guess 70 or less players on a server qualifies as an MMO nowadays? 70 is Massive?
one can server hop at will, this is why you will see videos on youtube about clan spys, mega clans eradicating servers, and tutorials on how to stop mega clans from invading your server.
in Ark servers are more like persistent instances players can move though at will (the official ones at least)
When i see ONE developer put in the basic core effort a WORLD game should have,i'll make note of it for certain. As of now and for the past 15 years even with the tech to do better studios just want to give us fake looking lazy design worlds.
Name ONE<<<<pretty simple right,name one MMO with an ECO system?
Name MMO's with building housing.i mean we do have living characters right,or are all our characters robots? VERY generic worlds,core design features missing,yep very lazy game designs.
Here is another laughable one,how do you have GUILDS with no guildhalls?It is like a church group with no church lol or a hockey team with no arena or a football team with no field.Geesus even a simple Euchre club or chess club will have a meeting place.
cant believe Im responding to a Wizardry post, but. . .
but ARK: Survival Evolved has everything you asked people to name one of. . . . . .took like 5 seconds of thought.
I guess 70 or less players on a server qualifies as an MMO nowadays? 70 is Massive?
Maybe for a player who has only played "couch console" games for "up to 4 players?" Massive is a descriptor, not a set number.
or maybe you should realize that due to the "server hop" mechanic in a server cluster a player can interact with thousands of different people if they wish. .
here is a link where you can see capacity for the different official clusters by game type and region.
Maybe for a player who has only played "couch console" games for "up to 4 players?" Massive is a descriptor, not a set number.
or maybe you should realize that due to the "server hop" mechanic in a server cluster a player can interact with thousands of different people if they wish. .
here is a link where you can see capacity for the different official clusters by game type and region.
I think the main "mmorpgs are dead" argument come from vets of the genre who don't like the way the games have evolved...
it's not a reflection of the state of gaming in the mmo genre, it's a reflection of them as people missing the way mmo's used to be and not liking the new form they have taken.
As someone who is also a vet, but has evovled with the genre, i can generally find a good experience in any new mmorpg as long as i'm playing with friends, because at the end of the day thats why i started playing mmo's back in text based muds.. because i enjoyed sharing an experience with my friends.
All games, be it old school mmorpgs, new mmorpgs, online shooters, text based muds, action, adventure etc... are fun until they aren't so i make the most of the games i play with my friends until we no longer play them and move onto the next thing.
Now there are a few titles we have been playing for years and still continue to play, games that as long as the servers are running we will probably continue to play and have new experiences with.
But i think the whole mmorps are dead because i don't like how they are now is just bitter and change fearing. Sure the older ones can be challenging to play solo, but why should anyone be forced to play a game (even an mmorpg) with other people. Just because you feel thats how it should be doesn't mean an experience should be taken away from someone who doesn't want too but still wants to experience the world and nearly all these games have content you are forced to group todo if you want to do it, but letting players have a little bit of choice in how they recieve their content isnt a terrible thing.
at the end of the day i don't see the genre going anywhere as a whole, new studios will keep forming and trying to push the boundaries to deliver experiences that cater to either niche or huge market subsets because there is money in it.... even some of the subjectivley worst mmorpgs to launch like bless for example end up making a heap of money before they shut down the servers... and like the original Bless wasn't anything fantastic, but my friends and i had an amazing time while we were playing it.
MMO's haven't "evolved", they've devolved. Into SP games. We expected them to EVOLVE into greater massively multiplayer, "one world" experiences. They haven't and instead went the other way.
You: "Sure the older ones can be challenging to play solo, but why should anyone be forced to play a game (even an mmorpg) with other people."
Refer to my first comment. This point is all about the social aspects of "Massively Multiplayer." There is none left (or hardly any) in these devolved games. Sure, you can play with others, but there's really no need to (and most don't) until you get to "End Game." And "End Game" is not the game as a whole, it's the END of the game. So much for "World."
it's your opionion they have devolved, thats the whole point of my post, thankyou for proving my point.
just because it's not your idea of what it should have evolved into you count it as devolving and bad.
Massively Multiplayer does not equal huge social game. massively multiplayer just means a bunch of people are playing it.
Forcing social aspects / group play does not always make a better game, removing player agency isn't always a good thing. Some people are new to the game / genre and how bad of an experience would it be for them being unable to do anything because they are late to a new game / genre and the content to level alone is too hard to solo.
you are placing your own label on an mmorpg that a requirement is social / group play, but it's not even in the name, it's just an aspect veterans have placed on the genre as some pinnacle pillar of the genre. It isn't people should be able to enjoy games they way they want.
I'm sorry, but I have to call Bullshjt. We had SP games. MMO was a revolution in gaming evolution. And they've gone back to SP by design. Or you can say they went back to Multiplayer (a step between). Either way, it's devolved.
it's not bullshit.. we had SP games and then mmos game around allowing massive amounts of players to be in the same game at the same time.
that doesn't mean forced group play is a pillar....
it's your point of view that it's a core part of mmos, do you understand what i'm saying.. it's your percieved notion that mmorpgs should be forced multiplayer and social aspects.
He never even mention forced group play but that's not even the main issue with the devolving of MMOs.
It literally is single player design. Solo dungeons, solo instances, solo raids, those are all things in MMOs.
However I would say some games really take advantage of the MM part, like Guild Wars 2 where it feels like the whole server is in your party anyway. Also Planetside 2 can pull of some huge 3 way fights.
It's a basic design principle.
You can design a quest/event to be single player or multiplayer. Some MMOs fail at the basic design of being the very thing they are supposed to be.
I mean imagine if single player games required you to be online and connect to other people and have them in your game to play.
"You CAN'T buy ships for RL money." - MaxBacon
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
I mean imagine if single player games required you to be online and connect to other people and have them in your game to play.
The problem is, they wouldn't call it a single player game, they would call it an MMO. Apparently some people think anything with more than 1 person is an MMO.
I'm sorry, but I have to call Bullshjt. We had SP games. MMO was a revolution in gaming evolution. And they've gone back to SP by design. Or you can say they went back to Multiplayer (a step between). Either way, it's devolved.
Not all of them. And the ones who have did not devolve, just cater to different tastes. And successfully so, judging by their popularity. And they are not multiplayer, they still have some level of interaction on a massive scale (economy, world bosses and events, raids etc.)
Your going to pull out the exceptions as opposed to the general situation of game play?
I'll give you that dealing with 10% of the game population of a server (by level) can be "massively" in the economic game play. But it doesn't have that "One World" aspect. The players are divided into groupings, by levels, and not dealing with the world at large. That just doesn't have that Massively Multiplayer feel to it, despite the numbers.
I'm sure there are exceptions in parts of any game design, but over all, what do we have? SP games.
Your going to pull out the exceptions as opposed to the general situation of game play?
I'll give you that dealing with 10% of the game population of a server (by level) can be "massively" in the economic game play. But it doesn't have that "One World" aspect. The players are divided into groupings, by levels, and not dealing with the world at large. That just doesn't have that Massively Multiplayer feel to it, despite the numbers.
I'm sure there are exceptions in parts of any game design, but over all, what do we have? SP games.
The "exceptions" as you say are enough for someone that wants this style of gameplay (I am one and I actually play those "exceptions" for that reason). The general situation is simply the popular situation. To say that this is a devolution is a very narrow way of seeing things and to want the majority of games to revolve around your taste is selfish.
Even for more popular games that have lots of soloable game loops there are massive activities. All themeparks have big world bosses that need lots of players to take down. GW2 has lots of huge bosses, meta events and WvW. ESO has Cyrodiil, etc.
It is what it is. It's that simple. How often do these huge boss events happen? A few of you are trying hard to defend your games, but I don't think you are being honest with yourselves, me, or the rest of us about it. Exceptions don't make the rule.
It is what it is. It's that simple. How often do these huge boss events happen? A few of you are trying hard to defend your games, but I don't think you are being honest with yourselves, me, or the rest of us about it. Exceptions don't make the rule.
In GW2 that I know of, all the time. There are constantly maps where either a boss fight or a large-scale meta event takes place. To the point that, since launch, there are event and boss "trains" doing one after the other.
You thinking that I try hard or am not being honest, when I can produce proof so easily, is silly.
So you're saying that this creates a social atmosphere in Guilds? Like what I was talking about? It sounds boringly repetitive, to be honest. And definitely not your normal, world wide, game play. It sounds like End Game moved forwards into the level grind. That's fine, if so and that's what you want.
And you've mentioned ONE GAME out there that has that social glue, if that's the case. What's that say about the MMO gaming in general?
But that doesn't say anything about other elements of that game. Isn't that the game with a bunch of complaints about scaling?
So you're saying that this creates a social atmosphere in Guilds? Like what I was talking about? It sounds boringly repetitive, to be honest. And definitely not your normal, world wide, game play. It sounds like End Game moved forwards into the level grind. That's fine, if so and that's what you want.
And you've mentioned ONE GAME out there that has that social glue, if that's the case. What's that say about the MMO gaming in general?
But that doesn't say anything about other elements of that game. Isn't that the game with a bunch of complaints about scaling?
I mentioned one of the popular ones, and many more in the follow-up post (some niche, some not so much such as EVE, Albion). I also mentioned ESO Cyrodiil but don't know much more to comment on.
GW2 Guilds have guild halls, guild missions, lots of organized WvW activity happens in guilds, mastery point trains to help new members, event trains, static raid groups etc. I made real-life friends that I travelled to meet in person out of mine.
Also, goal post moving.
Isn't "less power scaling" what you were asking for just above?
I'll give you that dealing with 10% of the game population of a server (by level) can be "massively" in the economic game play. But it doesn't have that "One World" aspect. The players are divided into groupings, by levels, and not dealing with the world at large. That just doesn't have that Massively Multiplayer feel to it, despite the numbers.
I see a huge difference in "gamey" design that enforces community and social aspects like these games you mentioned, and a "worldly" design that nudges players towards cooperative play, and thus a social environment, through a more realistic approach as in "the way of the world." That's probably the key difference between you and me on this topic.
On scaling, I don't want it at all. I see problems from it, as do many others. So, I don't want it, and I asked if scaling wasn't a big problem in that game (GW2). I guess I don't understand your question on that.
Regarding scaling, yes, GW2 has downscaling, no there are no problems with it. On the contrary I personally love it and see significant benefits, like keeping the whole world map relevant, and letting higher level players group up with their friends that just joined the game. Plus the more the game ages, the less relevant this point becomes because more and more zones are "top level" and the progression changes to getting mastery and hero points etc.
There are no complaints about issues with the scaling, just people that do not like the scaling and don't play the game because of that, because they want to be able to out-level a zone and one-shoot the critters in it. That's just preference, nothing wrong with either viewpoint.
I do not like scaling because it trivializes content making much of it to easy and also feels the same thruout ..
The challenge is lacking in scaling games and the games that have adopted it ,ESO , GW2 did it to attract a more casual audience they have stated this exactly .. Now good for them they have accomplished exactly what they wanted to do , but some people do not like scaling for the exact opposite reason you give ..
I dont wanna 1 shot anything , i do however want combat to feel different and challenging from an encounter to encounter .. Scaling takes away from that IMO in a very big way ..
Ill also add , another reason i like UO so much is because for ex..
1 Dragon may be very different than the next, Spawned with different variables in Str,Hitpoints attack/skills etc.. Keeps you on yer toes for sure ..
Why other games do not do this escapes me .. Its such a great feature
Regarding scaling, yes, GW2 has downscaling, no there are no problems with it. On the contrary I personally love it and see significant benefits, like keeping the whole world map relevant, and letting higher level players group up with their friends that just joined the game. Plus the more the game ages, the less relevant this point becomes because more and more zones are "top level" and the progression changes to getting mastery and hero points etc.
There are no complaints about issues with the scaling, just people that do not like the scaling and don't play the game because of that, because they want to be able to out-level a zone and one-shoot the critters in it. That's just preference, nothing wrong with either viewpoint.
I do not like scaling because it trivializes content making much of it to easy and also feels the same thruout ..
The challenge is lacking in scaling games and the games that have adopted it ,ESO , GW2 did it to attract a more casual audience they have stated this exactly .. Now good for them they have accomplished exactly what they wanted to do , but some people do not like scaling for the exact opposite reason you give ..
I dont wanna 1 shot anything , i do however want combat to feel different and challenging from an encounter to encounter .. Scaling takes away from that IMO in a very big way ..
Ill also add , another reason i like UO so much is because for ex..
1 Dragon may be very different than the next, Spawned with different variables in Str,Hitpoints attack/skills etc.. Keeps you on yer toes for sure ..
Why other games do not do this escapes me .. Its such a great feature
In ESO I attribute declining difficult more to the CP system than scaling. My first character had more trouble than those after. While these new characters can't yet generate CP themselves until max level they can allocate those points already earned, making them start out much stronger than the default.
Regardless, the game is more difficult earlier in any character's life than later due to the limited number of abilities available. You can't respond to challenges with one bar and a couple of abilities and next to no passives as you can with two full bars, numerous passives, set abilities, and so forth. Character progression remains a factor.
Aside from that there is content of varied difficulty available. There is no need to confine play to the comparatively trivial for those that seek greater challenge.
The dragon world bosses in ESO do vary a good deal one to the other, but are themselves constant. Dragons don't spawn randomly in the game.
1 Dragon may be very different than the next, Spawned with different variables in Str,Hitpoints attack/skills etc.. Keeps you on yer toes for sure ..
Why other games do not do this escapes me .. Its such a great feature
Yeah this is a great point. Why would games not expand on this. This is what kept things exciting.
I also agree, scaling seems to have trivialized content. They have made content so the below average gamer can beat the encounter, so therefore people above average will always outmatch the mobs.
Only way to fix this would be to allow people to throttle the scale differently to their tastes like Diablo 3.
However even with changing scales it would get boring if every monster was exactly the same difficulty. You would still need some huge randomness included like you suggested above. That's what keeps the game engaging.
I see a huge difference in "gamey" design that enforces community and social aspects like these games you mentioned, and a "worldly" design that nudges players towards cooperative play, and thus a social environment, through a more realistic approach as in "the way of the world." That's probably the key difference between you and me on this topic.
Note also how the conversation switched from "MMOs are like single-player games, everything is soloable, there is no grouping/socialization" to "That's an exception" and "I don't like that particular way of grouping/socialization". Which is why I say goalpost moving and why when you say I am not being honest I roll my eyes.
So we're up to 4 games now that have some sort of "socializing" aspect to the design. 4 games now. FOUR.
We're talking about the MMORPG genre, are we not?
And I still would debate that those are specific content, and not the game design as a whole.
It is what it is. It's that simple. How often do these huge boss events happen? A few of you are trying hard to defend your games, but I don't think you are being honest with yourselves, me, or the rest of us about it. Exceptions don't make the rule.
In GW2 that I know of, all the time. There are constantly maps where either a boss fight or a large-scale meta event takes place. To the point that, since launch, there are event and boss "trains" doing one after the other.
You thinking that I try hard or am not being honest, when I can produce proof so easily, is silly.
So you're saying that this creates a social atmosphere in Guilds? Like what I was talking about? It sounds boringly repetitive, to be honest. And definitely not your normal, world wide, game play. It sounds like End Game moved forwards into the level grind. That's fine, if so and that's what you want.
And you've mentioned ONE GAME out there that has that social glue, if that's the case. What's that say about the MMO gaming in general?
But that doesn't say anything about other elements of that game. Isn't that the game with a bunch of complaints about scaling?
Alright, not gonna lie, GW2 changed my whole feel on MMO's, it really was as they said, the MMO for everyone else (Just Core, not the Expansions)
In GW2, there were world bosses of various levels, like Shadow Behemoth and MAW, in the Starter zone that players as low as level 10, could be able to engage in, and with GW2's level scaling, 80 level (Max) and Newbs, could be standing shoulder to shoulder and engaging in these boss fights, helping, buffing, healing, reviving, each other in a very organic and dynamic way, giving a huge feeling of population and other people being there WITH you playing the game, even if you were all not required to be in some fixed group organization.
A great example of this is also in side quests, things like Legendary Journeys, or Mount Quests and the like, where you as a player can see someone else doing the very quests that you also need to do, and you can just help them, or they can help you, and you both progress on your quests.
To use an actual example of this, I was doing a part of the Sky Scale (Mount) quest where I needed to kill an undead boss mob, and it was kicking my ass, the adds and the boss itself, were really knocking me about, and as I was downed, 2 other players showed, revived me, and we worked together to kill the boss, after the fight, was waved at each other and wished each other good luck on getting your mount, as we all knew that was why were there facing this obscure and out of the way boss mob to start with.
And that is, surpassingly very common in the Open World aspect of GW2.
Their instance content is still plagued with all the typical elitism of instance content of other games, so that is kinda a shit stain in GW2, but, it is what it is..
as you said, something along the lines of, Outside some really annoying as fuck feature that makes this game into a huge giant turd, it's really good, and GW2 is the same. It has it shit sammich features, and some really great parts of the game.
Egotism is the anesthetic that dullens the pain of stupidity, this is why when I try to beat my head against the stupidity of other people, I only hurt myself.
I see a huge difference in "gamey" design that enforces community and social aspects like these games you mentioned, and a "worldly" design that nudges players towards cooperative play, and thus a social environment, through a more realistic approach as in "the way of the world." That's probably the key difference between you and me on this topic.
Note also how the conversation switched from "MMOs are like single-player games, everything is soloable, there is no grouping/socialization" to "That's an exception" and "I don't like that particular way of grouping/socialization". Which is why I say goalpost moving and why when you say I am not being honest I roll my eyes.
So we're up to 4 games now that have some sort of "socializing" aspect to the design. 4 games now. FOUR.
We're talking about the MMORPG genre, are we not?
And I still would debate that those are specific content, and not the game design as a whole.
MMORPGs generally provide abundant support for socializing by default. Virtually all of them provide chat systems. The vast majority provide guild systems. Some of them even provide their own voice chat. A few even go so far as to encourage players to group with others by enhancing play rewards for those that do.
Players themselves frequently advertise their guilds in chat ad nauseam making a point of how open their guilds are to new and veteran players alike, essentially bending over to convince others to join them.
There is no shortage of socialization opportunities in modern MMORPGs.
It's not just an issue of players not needing to group with others in much of the content that counters the social aspect of MMORPGs. Many simply don't want to, even when the game outright bribes them to do so.
I see a huge difference in "gamey" design that enforces community and social aspects like these games you mentioned, and a "worldly" design that nudges players towards cooperative play, and thus a social environment, through a more realistic approach as in "the way of the world." That's probably the key difference between you and me on this topic.
Note also how the conversation switched from "MMOs are like single-player games, everything is soloable, there is no grouping/socialization" to "That's an exception" and "I don't like that particular way of grouping/socialization". Which is why I say goalpost moving and why when you say I am not being honest I roll my eyes.
So we're up to 4 games now that have some sort of "socializing" aspect to the design. 4 games now. FOUR.
We're talking about the MMORPG genre, are we not?
And I still would debate that those are specific content, and not the game design as a whole.
MMORPGs generally provide abundant support for socializing by default. Virtually all of them provide chat systems. The vast majority provide guild systems. Some of them even provide their own voice chat. A few even go so far as to encourage players to group with others by enhancing play rewards for those that do.
Players themselves frequently advertise their guilds in chat ad nauseam making a point of how open their guilds are to new and veteran players alike, essentially bending over to convince others to join them.
There is no shortage of socialization opportunities in modern MMORPGs.
It's not just an issue of players not needing to group with others in much of the content that counters the social aspect of MMORPGs. Many simply don't want to, even when the game outright bribes them to do so.
You guys are not getting what I'm trying to say. And I'm having trouble putting it into words. I also fell into the trap of discussing just what you have said, and that leaves out "the rest of the story", as it were.
About social interaction, it's not just about inside a guild. It's about a game wide design that causes guilds to be attractive and beneficial, PLUS socializing the rest of the world into the mix. A simulation of real life dropped into a game world, "creating worlds" instead of chunks of content.
Eve has it. You interact in your guild, and you interact with the rest of the game through contracts and alliances and such. UO had it too.
PvP was the driver for that in Eve and UO. There was some of that sort of world wide social interaction too, but not enough yet, in my opinion. That doesn't mean a game can't be made for wide ranging interactions of the entire player base, and without PvP as the driver. That's the sort of evolution some (evidently very few) of us expected.
There are problems with scaling content that some of you want to ignore because you don't consider them problems when so many others do. But they are still problems, and that's not just opinion. It's real.
I wouldn't describe the genre as doing VERY well simply because there's not much incentive to make new AAA MMOs. It's just existing MMOs putting out expansions of various sizes.
Just like to add, personally I never had a problem socializing and grouping in almost all MMOs I played since 2011 (that's when I started MMOs so I am the perfect target for you "old-skoolers", but I've been gaming since 1984 so I am not your typical "you youngsters" pinata) - to the point of making real-life friends and travelling to meet in person (GW2).
Maybe the problem is you guys and you are not as social as you want to think you are?
Wall of text incoming, so TLDR is, "Guess you had to be there."
The early days of MMORPGs were more "social" (for better or worse) than anything you've experienced regardless whether or not a game had forced grouping or what not.
Multiple reasons for this, in general games "forced" players to interact with one another using a variety of mechanisms outside of grouping.
In some crafting required cooperation with others to build a complete item, while SWG went full Monty at launch requiring players to regularly visit cantinas and medics.
It wasn't uncommon to see players role playing dancers or see lines at the doctor's door of players waiting to be healed.
What did folks do when waiting around? Talk to each other, via text chat no less, primitive days they were, barely past using semaphore or Morse code.
There was forced downtime between fights as groups rested up before going out in the next challenge.
In DAOC the more serious 8 mans would often sit in town chatting waiting for their PVP cool down timers to come up before heading out, anywhere from 10 to 30 minutes even.
There was no voice chat, so text ruled, guild chat, zone, realm, global, crafting channels all busy with conversations. These days some games don't even bother to include text chat or make sure it is working properly at launch.
Recall I said earlier for better or worse? By accident or design players could "interact" in a variety of negative ways, not just by full loot PVP either.
EQs famous "trains to zone", in DAOC we would train mob packs into other groups in our own faction who were "hogging" the best camps.
Yes, there actually were unwritten player "rules of order," social behaviors agreed to or enforced by the community.
My first MMO was Lineage 1 had a loot pinata drop system, was totally luck of the draw and since all drops were valuable for resale the concept of need before greed didn't exist.
So then my friend and I are running our first DAOC dungeons and after a few fights someone says they "need" one of the armor pieces.
The other players (random strangers) in the group had to spend about 5 minutes to convince us this was a real thing and not some attempt to scam us.
Since death had some real sting to it in terms of gear or experience loss, especially if the corpse couldn't be recovered it wasn't uncommon in many MMOS for healers and even entire groups to go out of their way to rez random strangers in the open world or dungeons.
How about this, in Shadowbane if the group wiped, all gear except what was equipped and all gold dropped on the ground and anyone could loot it.
Upon running back if someone in your Pug got to your corpse first more often than not they would return it all to you, not just laugh in your face and log off.
Even in L1 where gear was insanely expensive and hard to, more than once someone returned my gear that had dropped after being killed and I did the same.
Trust me on this, early MMOs provided far more opportunities for interaction and socialization than anything out today, even those still open have toned or removed this interdependence for "reasons."
You are spot on when you said some of us are not very social, I have a very low opinion of humanity in general (most of you would be turned away at the gate of my complex in a zombie Apocalypse) and modern gamers certainly haven't improved my outlook any.
These social mechanics helped me connect better with others, giving me a reason to care whether or not I interacted as they were "needed." (Or could not be avoided)
Always said I don't really set out when I game to "make friends" but it's always kind of nice when I do.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
I think my most important point is: yes, games today definitely offer more options for the less social players. But I believe there are definitely options and games for people to be as social as they want (very or not at all). And I see this as a good thing.
Ok my wall of text was smaller. But I am told that size doesn't matter.
I don't agree with this. When points of game play come along, where there are possible social interactions or not (a choice), people will make a quick decision on that based on their primary goals at that time. You know... Should I interact or do that thing that I'm doing (going to the market to sell off loot, or whatever). With no incentive to interact, they won't. It's choosing to do what's best for yourself. Nothing wrong there. But it removes interaction with other players.
Note that interaction is a social thing, but it's not necessarily the same thing as being "social". This is an important aspect, in my mind. Once a player starts interacting, the "social" comes out more often, because that's just the way we are (mostly). Especially if you start to "know" (not speaking Biblically) the other through repeated contact.
Comments
Even those with a PC will find mobile games better if they happen to enjoy playing games when they can't lug their computer around with them.
It's obvious why for profit companies do anything. It is literally in their descriptor.
Into SP games.
We expected them to EVOLVE into greater massively multiplayer, "one world" experiences. They haven't and instead went the other way.
You:
"Sure the older ones can be challenging to play solo, but why should anyone be forced to play a game (even an mmorpg) with other people."
Refer to my first comment. This point is all about the social aspects of "Massively Multiplayer." There is none left (or hardly any) in these devolved games.
Sure, you can play with others, but there's really no need to (and most don't) until you get to "End Game."
And "End Game" is not the game as a whole, it's the END of the game. So much for "World."
Once upon a time....
just because it's not your idea of what it should have evolved into you count it as devolving and bad.
Massively Multiplayer does not equal huge social game. massively multiplayer just means a bunch of people are playing it.
Forcing social aspects / group play does not always make a better game, removing player agency isn't always a good thing. Some people are new to the game / genre and how bad of an experience would it be for them being unable to do anything because they are late to a new game / genre and the content to level alone is too hard to solo.
you are placing your own label on an mmorpg that a requirement is social / group play, but it's not even in the name, it's just an aspect veterans have placed on the genre as some pinnacle pillar of the genre. It isn't people should be able to enjoy games they way they want.
We had SP games. MMO was a revolution in gaming evolution. And they've gone back to SP by design.
Or you can say they went back to Multiplayer (a step between).
Either way, it's devolved.
Once upon a time....
in Ark servers are more like persistent instances players can move though at will (the official ones at least)
here is a link where you can see capacity for the different official clusters by game type and region.
https://arkbrowser.com/clusters
So now 4 people is massive as long as they are all online? I guess you will put Diablo into the MMO catagory.
This is how you know MMO's are dieing, when people have to stretch what they call an MMO because there is not enough games to qualify.
If there was so many real MMO's people would be trying to divide the genre into sub areas, not combine them into a single entity.
that doesn't mean forced group play is a pillar....
it's your point of view that it's a core part of mmos, do you understand what i'm saying.. it's your percieved notion that mmorpgs should be forced multiplayer and social aspects.
It literally is single player design. Solo dungeons, solo instances, solo raids, those are all things in MMOs.
However I would say some games really take advantage of the MM part, like Guild Wars 2 where it feels like the whole server is in your party anyway. Also Planetside 2 can pull of some huge 3 way fights.
It's a basic design principle.
You can design a quest/event to be single player or multiplayer. Some MMOs fail at the basic design of being the very thing they are supposed to be.
I mean imagine if single player games required you to be online and connect to other people and have them in your game to play.
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
Love Minecraft. And check out my Youtube channel OhCanadaGamer
Try a MUD today at http://www.mudconnect.com/I'll give you that dealing with 10% of the game population of a server (by level) can be "massively" in the economic game play. But it doesn't have that "One World" aspect.
The players are divided into groupings, by levels, and not dealing with the world at large.
That just doesn't have that Massively Multiplayer feel to it, despite the numbers.
I'm sure there are exceptions in parts of any game design, but over all, what do we have? SP games.
Once upon a time....
How often do these huge boss events happen?
A few of you are trying hard to defend your games, but I don't think you are being honest with yourselves, me, or the rest of us about it.
Exceptions don't make the rule.
Once upon a time....
It sounds boringly repetitive, to be honest. And definitely not your normal, world wide, game play. It sounds like End Game moved forwards into the level grind.
That's fine, if so and that's what you want.
And you've mentioned ONE GAME out there that has that social glue, if that's the case. What's that say about the MMO gaming in general?
But that doesn't say anything about other elements of that game. Isn't that the game with a bunch of complaints about scaling?
Once upon a time....
That's probably the key difference between you and me on this topic.
On scaling, I don't want it at all. I see problems from it, as do many others.
So, I don't want it, and I asked if scaling wasn't a big problem in that game (GW2). I guess I don't understand your question on that.
Once upon a time....
In ESO I attribute declining difficult more to the CP system than scaling. My first character had more trouble than those after. While these new characters can't yet generate CP themselves until max level they can allocate those points already earned, making them start out much stronger than the default.
Regardless, the game is more difficult earlier in any character's life than later due to the limited number of abilities available. You can't respond to challenges with one bar and a couple of abilities and next to no passives as you can with two full bars, numerous passives, set abilities, and so forth. Character progression remains a factor.
Aside from that there is content of varied difficulty available. There is no need to confine play to the comparatively trivial for those that seek greater challenge.
The dragon world bosses in ESO do vary a good deal one to the other, but are themselves constant. Dragons don't spawn randomly in the game.
Yeah this is a great point. Why would games not expand on this. This is what kept things exciting.
I also agree, scaling seems to have trivialized content. They have made content so the below average gamer can beat the encounter, so therefore people above average will always outmatch the mobs.
Only way to fix this would be to allow people to throttle the scale differently to their tastes like Diablo 3.
However even with changing scales it would get boring if every monster was exactly the same difficulty. You would still need some huge randomness included like you suggested above. That's what keeps the game engaging.
4 games now.
FOUR.
We're talking about the MMORPG genre, are we not?
And I still would debate that those are specific content, and not the game design as a whole.
Once upon a time....
In GW2, there were world bosses of various levels, like Shadow Behemoth and MAW, in the Starter zone that players as low as level 10, could be able to engage in, and with GW2's level scaling, 80 level (Max) and Newbs, could be standing shoulder to shoulder and engaging in these boss fights, helping, buffing, healing, reviving, each other in a very organic and dynamic way, giving a huge feeling of population and other people being there WITH you playing the game, even if you were all not required to be in some fixed group organization.
A great example of this is also in side quests, things like Legendary Journeys, or Mount Quests and the like, where you as a player can see someone else doing the very quests that you also need to do, and you can just help them, or they can help you, and you both progress on your quests.
To use an actual example of this, I was doing a part of the Sky Scale (Mount) quest where I needed to kill an undead boss mob, and it was kicking my ass, the adds and the boss itself, were really knocking me about, and as I was downed, 2 other players showed, revived me, and we worked together to kill the boss, after the fight, was waved at each other and wished each other good luck on getting your mount, as we all knew that was why were there facing this obscure and out of the way boss mob to start with.
And that is, surpassingly very common in the Open World aspect of GW2.
Their instance content is still plagued with all the typical elitism of instance content of other games, so that is kinda a shit stain in GW2, but, it is what it is..
as you said, something along the lines of, Outside some really annoying as fuck feature that makes this game into a huge giant turd, it's really good, and GW2 is the same. It has it shit sammich features, and some really great parts of the game.
MMORPGs generally provide abundant support for socializing by default. Virtually all of them provide chat systems. The vast majority provide guild systems. Some of them even provide their own voice chat. A few even go so far as to encourage players to group with others by enhancing play rewards for those that do.
Players themselves frequently advertise their guilds in chat ad nauseam making a point of how open their guilds are to new and veteran players alike, essentially bending over to convince others to join them.
There is no shortage of socialization opportunities in modern MMORPGs.
It's not just an issue of players not needing to group with others in much of the content that counters the social aspect of MMORPGs. Many simply don't want to, even when the game outright bribes them to do so.
And I'm having trouble putting it into words.
I also fell into the trap of discussing just what you have said, and that leaves out "the rest of the story", as it were.
About social interaction, it's not just about inside a guild. It's about a game wide design that causes guilds to be attractive and beneficial, PLUS socializing the rest of the world into the mix. A simulation of real life dropped into a game world, "creating worlds" instead of chunks of content.
Eve has it. You interact in your guild, and you interact with the rest of the game through contracts and alliances and such.
UO had it too.
PvP was the driver for that in Eve and UO.
There was some of that sort of world wide social interaction too, but not enough yet, in my opinion.
That doesn't mean a game can't be made for wide ranging interactions of the entire player base, and without PvP as the driver.
That's the sort of evolution some (evidently very few) of us expected.
There are problems with scaling content that some of you want to ignore because you don't consider them problems when so many others do. But they are still problems, and that's not just opinion. It's real.
Once upon a time....
The early days of MMORPGs were more "social" (for better or worse) than anything you've experienced regardless whether or not a game had forced grouping or what not.
Multiple reasons for this, in general games "forced" players to interact with one another using a variety of mechanisms outside of grouping.
In some crafting required cooperation with others to build a complete item, while SWG went full Monty at launch requiring players to regularly visit cantinas and medics.
It wasn't uncommon to see players role playing dancers or see lines at the doctor's door of players waiting to be healed.
What did folks do when waiting around? Talk to each other, via text chat no less, primitive days they were, barely past using semaphore or Morse code.
There was forced downtime between fights as groups rested up before going out in the next challenge.
In DAOC the more serious 8 mans would often sit in town chatting waiting for their PVP cool down timers to come up before heading out, anywhere from 10 to 30 minutes even.
There was no voice chat, so text ruled, guild chat, zone, realm, global, crafting channels all busy with conversations. These days some games don't even bother to include text chat or make sure it is working properly at launch.
Recall I said earlier for better or worse? By accident or design players could "interact" in a variety of negative ways, not just by full loot PVP either.
EQs famous "trains to zone", in DAOC we would train mob packs into other groups in our own faction who were "hogging" the best camps.
Yes, there actually were unwritten player "rules of order," social behaviors agreed to or enforced by the community.
My first MMO was Lineage 1 had a loot pinata drop system, was totally luck of the draw and since all drops were valuable for resale the concept of need before greed didn't exist.
So then my friend and I are running our first DAOC dungeons and after a few fights someone says they "need" one of the armor pieces.
The other players (random strangers) in the group had to spend about 5 minutes to convince us this was a real thing and not some attempt to scam us.
Since death had some real sting to it in terms of gear or experience loss, especially if the corpse couldn't be recovered it wasn't uncommon in many MMOS for healers and even entire groups to go out of their way to rez random strangers in the open world or dungeons.
How about this, in Shadowbane if the group wiped, all gear except what was equipped and all gold dropped on the ground and anyone could loot it.
Upon running back if someone in your Pug got to your corpse first more often than not they would return it all to you, not just laugh in your face and log off.
Even in L1 where gear was insanely expensive and hard to, more than once someone returned my gear that had dropped after being killed and I did the same.
Trust me on this, early MMOs provided far more opportunities for interaction and socialization than anything out today, even those still open have toned or removed this interdependence for "reasons."
You are spot on when you said some of us are not very social, I have a very low opinion of humanity in general (most of you would be turned away at the gate of my complex in a zombie Apocalypse)
These social mechanics helped me connect better with others, giving me a reason to care whether or not I interacted as they were "needed." (Or could not be avoided)
Always said I don't really set out when I game to "make friends" but it's always kind of nice when I do.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
When points of game play come along, where there are possible social interactions or not (a choice), people will make a quick decision on that based on their primary goals at that time.
You know... Should I interact or do that thing that I'm doing (going to the market to sell off loot, or whatever).
With no incentive to interact, they won't. It's choosing to do what's best for yourself. Nothing wrong there. But it removes interaction with other players.
Note that interaction is a social thing, but it's not necessarily the same thing as being "social". This is an important aspect, in my mind.
Once a player starts interacting, the "social" comes out more often, because that's just the way we are (mostly). Especially if you start to "know" (not speaking Biblically) the other through repeated contact.
Once upon a time....