And me who pretentiously thought I killed this thread by digging so deep in the non-sense department, that I would find the ultimate Balrog of absurdities closing all mouths, shutting all keyboards down, removing the intelligence from all brains, leaving the readers in the most stupid state of mind emptiness!...
But, this is time to reveal the untold and sinister truth:
I was wrong. I strongly underestimated the competition!
I think the discussion might be more fruitful if we specified ages. I am nearing 40 now and I certainly do not play poor MMORPGs. As a matter of fact it is unlikely I will ever play one again. The funny thing about MMORPGs is that they appeal to different people, and some in strange ways that are completely out of keeping with what the developers intend for the game (i.e. easy, 'democratic' or leveled off, low effort, hyper-violent types of games). Having lived this long I have had the good fortune to experience situations in in my life in which I am challenged, and to realise that in that regard these MMORPGs or so-called virtual worlds are quite the opposite. They are patently unrealistic, bumbling, disgraceful efforts to simulate a world, and yet as you say people play them. Persons as myself, even at my age, have shown occasional interest in them, because they are worlds, or bear some resemblance to them at least. Of course that is a patent fraud, they are anything but. Nevertheless through some twisted and perverse logic one might actually, if he tried enough, be able even to get a character rolled up, off the ground and running with some vague semblance of a backstory, and even though no one in his party role-played, the world made little sense, and the only thing to do was stand around in a group killing things for hours on end, he could at least actualise his character at least a short while in a virtual, graphical world, without needing to go to text or find a group to play D&D with (who would all end up playing the Latest Edition, of course).
So age is important (fewer discriminating 20 year olds than 40 year olds).In my case it is senseless to lump 40 year old me in with 20 year old me; I would play anything back then. Go back to 10 and I was like a sponge, just doing what other people did. Anyway it is probably all senseless, just an exercise in writing at this point. Pantheon, you say? X new MMORPG, etc.? I can't imagine how much money they blow on graphics on these games, but one look at them gives definite low-brow 'vibes', as if they are popular televised marketing, which is another thing that doesn't fly at my age. People play D&D--no graphics--but I guess not MMORPG players. Thus they're aiming at another audience. Sound familiar? Haven't we seen this before? They're trying to sell to people that don't role-play. It seems to me that the end result of any such venture will always be the same. And the definition of insanity, as they say, would be to expect different results from this than the hundreds that the past has furnished. Which of the best MMORPGs of the past is still around? Which of the 'great' MMORPGs, if such an epithet is right for these things, had not within a year or two been reduced to a shambling caricature of its original self? When I see a game willing to dial down the graphics to something reasonable then I may take note. 2-D is an excellent platform for an MMORPG. How many MMORPGs are 2-D? Tibia (of 1998) may be one of the better MMORPGs out there, but--no sound, and it was never intended for enforced role-playing, nor does it have character death in the game. Role-players need strong systems that encourage this, as those that are presently on RPI MUDs.
Frankly what an MMORPG is and what an MMORPG should be are so grossly at odds that I do not know it can be overcome through a populous effort. A small team needs to do their own thing, for the love of the creation alone, and this is plainly not forthcoming. I would liken the present MMORPG game and its following to something like a nudist colony. They are so far removed from what is proper that it is hopeless to try to change it. Anyway it is still an open question whether a virtual world can truly thrive without a representative sample of diverse people; that is the other side of the coin, and a number of writers have written and thought upon this very difficulty. So I won't hold my breath. But garbage? I'm not so judgmental. A good graphica online role-playing game will likely never happen, what people do with their own free time is their own business. All kinds of people make the world go round, and this may be no less true outside of virtual worlds than it is inside of them, hence perhaps why virtual worlds have been struggling (to say the least) for many years, and generally do not exist outside of text. The userbase has stagnated. Online gaming is no longer principally for enthusiasts. A lot of people like Everquest and World of Warcraft. These people have moved on. Virtual worlds become small and insular and hence very unrealistic. Everquest and World of Warcraft get right to the point--unsheathe one's sword and kill things. It appeals to an ordinary nature. And so these virtual worlds tend to lack ordinary people. Sounds pretty problematic to me...
Comments
So age is important (fewer discriminating 20 year olds than 40 year olds).In my case it is senseless to lump 40 year old me in with 20 year old me; I would play anything back then. Go back to 10 and I was like a sponge, just doing what other people did. Anyway it is probably all senseless, just an exercise in writing at this point. Pantheon, you say? X new MMORPG, etc.? I can't imagine how much money they blow on graphics on these games, but one look at them gives definite low-brow 'vibes', as if they are popular televised marketing, which is another thing that doesn't fly at my age. People play D&D--no graphics--but I guess not MMORPG players. Thus they're aiming at another audience. Sound familiar? Haven't we seen this before? They're trying to sell to people that don't role-play. It seems to me that the end result of any such venture will always be the same. And the definition of insanity, as they say, would be to expect different results from this than the hundreds that the past has furnished. Which of the best MMORPGs of the past is still around? Which of the 'great' MMORPGs, if such an epithet is right for these things, had not within a year or two been reduced to a shambling caricature of its original self? When I see a game willing to dial down the graphics to something reasonable then I may take note. 2-D is an excellent platform for an MMORPG. How many MMORPGs are 2-D? Tibia (of 1998) may be one of the better MMORPGs out there, but--no sound, and it was never intended for enforced role-playing, nor does it have character death in the game. Role-players need strong systems that encourage this, as those that are presently on RPI MUDs.
Frankly what an MMORPG is and what an MMORPG should be are so grossly at odds that I do not know it can be overcome through a populous effort. A small team needs to do their own thing, for the love of the creation alone, and this is plainly not forthcoming. I would liken the present MMORPG game and its following to something like a nudist colony. They are so far removed from what is proper that it is hopeless to try to change it. Anyway it is still an open question whether a virtual world can truly thrive without a representative sample of diverse people; that is the other side of the coin, and a number of writers have written and thought upon this very difficulty. So I won't hold my breath. But garbage? I'm not so judgmental. A good graphica online role-playing game will likely never happen, what people do with their own free time is their own business. All kinds of people make the world go round, and this may be no less true outside of virtual worlds than it is inside of them, hence perhaps why virtual worlds have been struggling (to say the least) for many years, and generally do not exist outside of text. The userbase has stagnated. Online gaming is no longer principally for enthusiasts. A lot of people like Everquest and World of Warcraft. These people have moved on. Virtual worlds become small and insular and hence very unrealistic. Everquest and World of Warcraft get right to the point--unsheathe one's sword and kill things. It appeals to an ordinary nature. And so these virtual worlds tend to lack ordinary people. Sounds pretty problematic to me...