I put my finger on it today while playing my current game. I have yet to find myself in a pulse pounding, gut wrenching situation. That's what really made me enjoy sitting in front of my computer monitor for hours on end and not getting bored one bit. I go back to EQ again and again because it is still the only one which succeeded for me in that area and so many others. I remember there were times when I literally got butterflies in my stomach because I found myself in situations that made me nervous. First and foremost was the prospect of dying. I was so afraid of dying that my top priority was avoiding it at all costs. Now, it seems like if I die, no big deal, I just go back in and start scrappin' all over again. Nothing is really lost anyway, so I have no fear of death. But it's so much more than that as well. I also remember venturing deep into the bowels of dungeon with a group and finding myself lost and cut off from my teammates at times. How scary was that? Man, my heart started racing, I was worried about turning every corner because I didn't know what I might run into. Today's MMOs hardly ever let you even get into that situation. Most dungeons that I enter into these days are so superficial that fear never becomes a possibility. Finally, another element of fear was your performance. Doing your job the way it was supposed to be done. I was afraid that if I screwed up too bad, it might lead to the total loss of my party. I'll never forget when I invited of friend of mine to join a group in a dungeon she had never been to. She shared with me how nervous she was because she was worried she might wipe us all out. She played and chanter and her primary job was crowd control. No pressure. Todays new gamers probably don't even know the meaning of crowd control.
Well, I was going to agree with you until I read your post.
Listen, I've said this before and I'll say it again, not everyone wants a pulse pounding, adrenaline pumping joyride.
I remember reading a post once where someone was saying how he was in a match and his heart was pounding so hard he could feel it and he was sweating and his eyes were blurring and how great it was and another person replied back that it sounded like he was having a heart attack.
As far as the title of your post, YES there needs to be a bit more danger in these worlds.
My first week of Lineage 2 brought me into a swampy (and foggy... not like it is now) area of dark elf village where there was this demonic tree like monster that would roam the swamp. Because of the fog it was sometimes not noticeable until it was upon you.
I remember my first big group was trying to take this thing down and we got wiped. Of course, it is a quest monster for the Spellhowler's lvl 40 class change (which means you can kill it in 2 or 3 tries) so the dev's made it a "quest mob" put a sign over its head that indicated it was a quest mob (because the nc dev's don't have a lot of imagination when it comes to these things) and made it so it wasn't aggro anymore.
Then they flattened out some of the areas of the swamp and made it less foggy.
All and all, not the fun scary place it used to be.
They need to learn that it's ok to have monsters or encounters that are way above players so that they have to be aware of them to avoid them.
In LOTRO there used to be these trolls that patrolled the road when you headed to rivendell. Well, they aren't there anymore it seems.
This is a shame. But again, there are people who just don't want such a world. For instance, a very nice guy (think it was a guy) in my LOTRO guild made the remark that he hated the old forest because it was confusing and you get lost. This was the reason I LIKED it! And it was even more confusing and dangerous in beta. But Turbine made it easier.
These are the real problems in my opinion.
As far as pulse pounding, heart throbbing, eye gouging fun? Well, not everyone is an adrenaline junky. There is a difference between being in a world with danger and being in a world where you experience hyper physical changes.
as far as death penalty, again, you guys are judging things in a very personal way. Makes sense of course but to be more blunt, the death penalty in WoW is more of an issue for me than the death penalty in Lineage 2. In Lineage 2 I lose a bit of xp and can get back to playing. In WoW I have to waste time by running back to my corpse. Very mundane, very boring and a time waster. In fact, if I die in WoW one too many times I just find something else to do. In Lineage 2 I would just get back to playing.
So one person's easy in another person's extremem annoyance.
I do agree that people need to be made accountable for playing badly as otherwise it does take a bit out of the reward. However, there has been talk about better buffs or even more xp the longer you stay alive and if you die then you have to start over gaining these buffs. That could be a method used by designers.
However, as another said, the idea is not to really "punish' players but to give them an incentive to play well or to try harder if they fail.
Punish too much and it ceases to become a game or even fun and it becomes something that players will uninstall.
And as more and more players are playing these games it seems that there is also a wider range of people that devs have to keep happy. That is probably the real issue in the end.
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Not to mention being effected by darkness, dealing with faction, working on trade skills, quest without chat bubble responses, traveling by boat or huffing it on foot. Maintain your food and water supply, managing your inventory, being aware of your weight, meditating and not only meditating, but having your view obscured with a book. New Gen players would be outraged and full of contempt. This would just be their first few minutes in the game, they wouldn't make it through the first 45 minutes without have a complete mental collapse.
I never played EQ, but these are the types of features that I could appreciate from the game. These never make it into newer MMOs because either: A) they're just considered "fluff", which isn't vital to the game and can be sacrificed to save time and resources certain portions of the player base bitch about the features, because they're not "convenient".
Attention to details. I really believe that the little things can make all the difference in the world.
I'm guessing OP that your first MMO was EQ1. You remember it fondly because of the infamous "first kiss" scenario. For me it was SWG and Anarchy Online. Thinking of those brings back the same kind of memories. I agree that removing ANY kind of noticable death mechanic from an MMO can have an adverse effect on how people react in such situations, I think some of the death mechanics of previous games can be a little *too* harsh. Personally, I'm all for item decay, temporary stat reduction, but only to a certain degree. Full level loss is just too much in my opinion. Fears of letting down your group mates are not necessarily tied exclusively to death mechanics though. That is purely down the to individual. As for crowd control. I know it well. I try to make it a specialty of mine in every MMO I play.
I actually thought that old-school AO had a good system. Lose all XP gained since last "clone" (save), and temporary "cloning sickness" (stat loss).
Lower levels...it was an inconvenience. Higher levels, when you should know wtf you are doing....well, it could make you want to puke if you died.
Of course, they ended up nerfing that so that your lost XP goes into a pool now, and can be regained..so it's not even the same kind of feeling.
And I also remember old-school Neocron 1.....if you died, you would randomly drop one item. And let me tell you...it SUCKED when it was your quest-reward profession-scpecific 1/4 million credit armor.
I remember going way out in the middle of nowhere to get a new set of armor after losing mine in PVP, only to have a cyborg snipe me off my bike on the way back and drop my armor AGAIN.
These days, I still try as hard as I can to not die....but the fear isn't there, and it's just not the same.
I remember back in 1999, folks kept asking me if I was stockpiling food. I always answered, "No, I'm stockpiling ammo and making a list of people who are stockpiling food"
It's not that the others here or I want to turn all games into the "pulse poiunding, eye gouging, sweat fest". All we're really trying to say is that all the new games are catering to the "convenience" of the other people and we're getting the shaft.
A good chunk of these debates could be solved by giving us one, just ONE game that has this. Thing is as much as other people want their games to be easy, or straight forward, there are thoese out here that want the oposite. People keep saying that they're trying to cater to wider audience yet somehow I feel left out.
No required quests! And if I decide I want to be an assassin-cartographer-dancer-pastry chef who lives only to stalk and kill interior decorators, then that's who I want to be, even if it takes me four years to max all the skills and everyone else thinks I'm freaking nuts. -Madimorga-
It's not that the others here or I want to turn all games into the "pulse poiunding, eye gouging, sweat fest". All we're really trying to say is that all the new games are catering to the "convenience" of the other people and we're getting the shaft. A good chunk of these debates could be solved by giving us one, just ONE game that has this. Thing is as much as other people want their games to be easy, or straight forward, there are thoese out here that want the oposite. People keep saying that they're trying to cater to wider audience yet somehow I feel left out.
The problem is that it's too risky to give you just one game that has this.
Let's take Darkfall for example.
Now, I don't want to turn this thread into a Darkfall thread but it is a good example.
It touts a variety of features which many players find refreshing as it clearly does not fall into the majority of games that have come out in recent years.
However, the reality is going to drastically clash with what people have in their minds.
Some will love it, some will hate it and some will say that they didn't do anything right, etc.
so then players conveniently cancel their subs, flame it on boards "they could have made it so great but they lied"/"They said it had x but x is not balanced, therefore I'll come back in a year when they fix it" etc, and then go elsewhere.
So now you have a game where a lot of money, time and effort was put into it all with the hope that it will attract and maintain a certain amount of subs.
Just because a game touts a certain type of gameplay doesn't mean that it will be implemented well, bug free, or to the way a specific playerbase wants.
And mmo players are so picky that if a game even tries to be different and doesn't hit it quite on the head, they will just fail.
And yes, it is the player's right not to play something that they don't like but the game development for these games takes so much time and effort that it really is getting to the point (as another poster on these forums pointed out) that it just won't be worth it to try.
Heck, the few times an indy game is announced on this forum you find people flaming it because it looks like something that only the commodore 64 could handle.
For some reason game players have it in their heads that these games are made by people who have nothing to do but make games, do it for the love it it, and can do it on shoestring budgets in their basements without little care in the world for anything else. It's like they think it has to be like Carmack and Romero making Doom.
But it's not like that. It takes huge resources and very well trained people who probably want some job security, money for families and other pursuits, retirement, etc.
So it's a fine line that game companies have to cross because it's just too difficult to make a game and invest time into somethign that won't work, people won't like (except for perhaps a hardcore few) and then they have to close down.
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Originally posted by Sovrath Listen, I've said this before and I'll say it again, not everyone wants a pulse pounding, adrenaline pumping joyride.
In other words, they don't want to have fun? Why play then? I would be curious to find out what the shelf life is of most MMOs today as compared to some of the older ones like EQ and SWG. It seems like most gamers today try a new game, get bored of it within the one month free subscription period and then move on to the next one.
I played EQ for two years and there were a lot of people who played it longer than that. The next longest period of time I any MMO was 3 months.
Now, I don't mean that every moment of a game has to take you to the edge of the cliff and threaten to throw you off. I myself like a certain ebb and flow. I like relaxing periods too when I can just sit and chat with other gamers. But when I rush into the mix, if it doesn't give me rush, I think to myself, "What am I playing this for?"
I get it, heck I'm 9 years older and don't have time for every time sink that was my beloved EQ1either.
That's not the point though..The point is we've gone from one extreme (UO, EQ1 AC, DAOC) to the other.( WOW LOTRO etc). Not to say that those two are bad games quite the contrary. The problem is they've been so succesfull no one has guts to do something different.
There's no happy medium for those of us who want a bit more challenge. EQII could of been the one but they hosed it in a feeble attempt to attract WOW's audience.
They always say things come back around, next year will be 10 th aniversary since EQ1's launch. Perhaps were due. Something with oldschool challenge minus the timesinks would be nice.
Classic EQ has nothing to do with EVE. It's not the same experience at all. There is no game that can compare to what EQ was. It's not the rush you feel when you are going to be killed by another player which is probably a nerd, I don't like that feeling. It was something else, it was the respect for the environment, and the need of other's help, in a living world.
Hell the OP must be playing some mainstream game because in EVE I have felt fear a many night. I still remember some treks through 0.0 in my Myrm solo, afraid some pirate would popup out of nowhere and end me
Other day was out ratting in 0.0 in my Alliance space. Intel was quiet. Next thing I know, some reds are reported in a nearby system about 4 jumps out. My CEO yells on vent these pirates mean business and to get safe or come help fight. So I fly through the gate to meet up at the rally point and what do you know- the hostile was sitting infront of the gate. My heart leaps into my chest and we just stare at each other before opening fire. Anyway soon my corpmates arrive and we chased the hostiles away (no loot that night grrr)
Death in EVE is always heart pumping and ruin is always one step away.
There is no PVE MMO anything like this. Even if it is intense the first time I promise it will get dull eventually. PVE MMOs are wayyyyyy toooo static
Hoping for a dynamic PvE game one day. Until then there is PVP
If you want to add some fear into the game instead of having a rule system designed to incite fear and excitement through punishment you could try and improve the immersion of the game. A big part of what makes something exciting or fearful for me is the atmosphere, the controls and my ability to be immersed into it, risk doesn't really factor in, I mean I am pretty much garunteed to die in game so I just resign myself to it, losing XP or gear is more of an annoyance than a source of fear. There are plenty of single and multiplayer games that that do the whole fear and excitement thing much better than any MMOG I have ever played and they do not have any death penalty.
Ya like when survival horror games like resident evil first came out.
You guys forget single player games, like horror movies, normally lose their thrill after the first or two playthroughs.
Also most single player games employ checkpoints and save points. So they invoke fear through the consequences that are incurred from failure
SP games often have death penalties. In which equals lost time. Was playing an SP RPG last night that got really intense after 1 hour of playing I couldn't find the save point was afraid I'd lose all that time
I put my finger on it today while playing my current game. I have yet to find myself in a pulse pounding, gut wrenching situation. That's what really made me enjoy sitting in front of my computer monitor for hours on end and not getting bored one bit. I go back to EQ again and again because it is still the only one which succeeded for me in that area and so many others. I remember there were times when I literally got butterflies in my stomach because I found myself in situations that made me nervous. First and foremost was the prospect of dying. I was so afraid of dying that my top priority was avoiding it at all costs. Now, it seems like if I die, no big deal, I just go back in and start scrappin' all over again. Nothing is really lost anyway, so I have no fear of death. ...
Yeah I feel ya. You are saying MMOs of today are like FPS games where you die and respawn like nothing happened.
There should always be something on the line. Like if your group fails to kill a boss perhaps he will come into the city and wreck it. People should at least be inconveinced. "Omg all of our quest givers have been slain! We better fight to keep these guys alive!"
Nope, devs wont even give us that much tension. Mobs stay outside of town and stick to their patrols.
WAR is so fake too me. Im trying to get into it. But its so fake. I spawn in the starter town and yeah WAR is everywhere but its an illusion. The NPCs never overrun the town. They stick to their patrols and wait to die.
Lame. Boring PVE. At least get some death penalties in there to spice it up a little.
I put my finger on it today while playing my current game. I have yet to find myself in a pulse pounding, gut wrenching situation. That's what really made me enjoy sitting in front of my computer monitor for hours on end and not getting bored one bit. I go back to EQ again and again because it is still the only one which succeeded for me in that area and so many others. I remember there were times when I literally got butterflies in my stomach because I found myself in situations that made me nervous. First and foremost was the prospect of dying. I was so afraid of dying that my top priority was avoiding it at all costs. Now, it seems like if I die, no big deal, I just go back in and start scrappin' all over again. Nothing is really lost anyway, so I have no fear of death. But it's so much more than that as well. I also remember venturing deep into the bowels of dungeon with a group and finding myself lost and cut off from my teammates at times. How scary was that? Man, my heart started racing, I was worried about turning every corner because I didn't know what I might run into. Today's MMOs hardly ever let you even get into that situation. Most dungeons that I enter into these days are so superficial that fear never becomes a possibility. Finally, another element of fear was your performance. Doing your job the way it was supposed to be done. I was afraid that if I screwed up too bad, it might lead to the total loss of my party. I'll never forget when I invited of friend of mine to join a group in a dungeon she had never been to. She shared with me how nervous she was because she was worried she might wipe us all out. She played and chanter and her primary job was crowd control. No pressure. Todays new gamers probably don't even know the meaning of crowd control.
You can have good fun without perma death, corpse runs, or even without any sort of death penalty at all. I know because I do it all the time. Having said that, it doesn't mean that people shouldn't have games like that. I'm all for diversity. It would be really nice if some of the big name development companies who have giant fat wallets were for diversity, too.
I was a student of the EQ1 school. I remember fights where I knew one false move could set be back five or six hours of gameplay in later levels (Perma) and one hour just to run back and get the body. "Has anyone here seen my corpse?" When I hear that...it just takes me back.
I can recall staying over at my friends house earlier on, and watching him bind to the docks in Oasis. Lockjaw was on a rampage that day and when he spawned he kept being insta-killed. I think he died about six times between that and Spectre/SG trains. I remember him crying (we were young). A painful, I just lost my dog-esque cry. I felt so bad, I almost lost it.
That's what games need now. Pure agony and frustration. And that GREAT feeling when you take on something on conquer it in the face of uncertain odds.
Originally posted by Sovrath Listen, I've said this before and I'll say it again, not everyone wants a pulse pounding, adrenaline pumping joyride.
In other words, they don't want to have fun? Why play then? I would be curious to find out what the shelf life is of most MMOs today as compared to some of the older ones like EQ and SWG. It seems like most gamers today try a new game, get bored of it within the one month free subscription period and then move on to the next one.
I played EQ for two years and there were a lot of people who played it longer than that. The next longest period of time I any MMO was 3 months.
Now, I don't mean that every moment of a game has to take you to the edge of the cliff and threaten to throw you off. I myself like a certain ebb and flow. I like relaxing periods too when I can just sit and chat with other gamers. But when I rush into the mix, if it doesn't give me rush, I think to myself, "What am I playing this for?"
Again, you just don't get it.
You are trying to define what makes a game "fun" by your very standards of what makes a game fun. And of course that is fine for you. But not everyone is "you".
I don't know any other way to put this.
There are people who can listen to the works of Palestrina (sorry it's obscure but I have to prove a point:
you can go 26 seconds in for the start...) all day long and it's just transcendant.
There are people who couldn't sit through it for 5 minutes.
they experience things differently. It's an actuall difference in perception.
So to one person, the pulse pounding, exciting fight is just horrid to another. It's like the changes from Morrowind to Oblviion where you got people who were angry that the fighitng in Oblvion was so "involved" (for lack of a better word).
So yes, they do want to have fun. They just have a different opinion as to what "fun" is.
Oh, don't thank me for the Palestrina. It was my pleasure.
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well... it's not fair then to give all the games to the "melow" people. Nobody even expresses interest in making games like the once were.
.... I just want one....just...one... And even if one came around I have a feeling that it would be turned into something else once again leaving me with nothing.
No required quests! And if I decide I want to be an assassin-cartographer-dancer-pastry chef who lives only to stalk and kill interior decorators, then that's who I want to be, even if it takes me four years to max all the skills and everyone else thinks I'm freaking nuts. -Madimorga-
Oh, don't thank me for the Palestrina. It was my pleasure.
Anyway thanks
By the way i agree with what you said, it's sad some people seem to be unable to understand such a easy thing. Some people like oranges some other like peaches. Its an orange better than a peach? are people that like oranges more intelligent, higher, sage,... than the others?
Back on topic, I know I'm never to going to experience the fear and adrenalin rush i experienced in Diablo II. Your level 70+ unconditional sorc is in the Chaos Sanctuary. Suddenly half of your party make portal goes town and declares hostility, you know they are back in seconds...I think no way i'll get the same feelings in any MMORPG.
well... it's not fair then to give all the games to the "melow" people. Nobody even expresses interest in making games like the once were. .... I just want one....just...one... And even if one came around I have a feeling that it would be turned into something else once again leaving me with nothing.
Oh, I can't disagree with you.
We need games that push the envelope.
The problem is that if I write a book or create a piece (meaning musical "piece") that is edgy or skirts the bounds for what is acceptable, and it doesn't do well then no harm no foul.
But if a game in today's enviornment does this then it's million upon millions of dollars in the hole and people could lose their jobs.
Not to mention that if it is a publicly traded company they can get sued by their investors.
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
Some people like oranges some other like peaches. Its an orange better than a peach? are people that like oranges more intelligent, higher, sage,... than the others?
Lets for the sake of argument say that you like peaches and I like oranges. Now lets assume that for whatever reason people start eating more peaches, and some of the orange loving people decided to switch to peaches as well and pretty soon the farmers with all the orchards say well you know peaches seem to sell better, we're going to switch to peaches. Now I've never liked peaches, I loves me some oranges but now nobody wants to grow oranges. I go to the supermarket and spend a good long time looking for oranges but can't find any. All I can see is mounds of peaches everywhere! What am I to do. I don't like peaches. Perhaps I'm allergic to them and would like to get my daily fruit intake but I can't. Now what?
No required quests! And if I decide I want to be an assassin-cartographer-dancer-pastry chef who lives only to stalk and kill interior decorators, then that's who I want to be, even if it takes me four years to max all the skills and everyone else thinks I'm freaking nuts. -Madimorga-
HELL YEAH, Stumbled across your thread here and Holy crap are you right... Long live the waiting in line to camp something so long that you take shifts keeping camp.. and corpse runs at the bottom of the ocean ....lmfao... or down a seemingly bottomless pit, Long live the anguish of hearing the cry " TRAIN!!!" in the bowels of Blackburrow. Man I love you guys........
Rest In Peace... SILVERTIP WOLVES
Old gamers never die...we just respawn. MMO's Played Everquest,Everquest2, Anarchy online, City of heroes/ City of villains, Vanguard, Dungeon runners( beta ), Fury ( beta ), Maplestory, Runescape, Silkroad, Tabula Rasa, Lotro...
It was NEVER about fun. It was about challege, and frustration. When I played EQ1 I felt like I was in the pits on Wall Street selling short in a Bull Market. I felt like I was in Office Space and was Peter Gibbons. I felt like every day someone saw my troll shaman, it was a little worse than before, technically making every second worse than the one before that; Every day was the worst of my life. I hated Fippy Darkpaw, I hated Blackburrow, I hated Splitpaw, I hated Permafrost and most of all, I hated losing hours of my life for one error.
In short, it was a job. One that I needed no degree to do, no MBA to move up in, and no suit to show up at. It was a merciless job that required nothing....nothing except the two most valuable resources on earth. Mountain Dew and Time. Time, the destroyer of things, but the conquerer of EQ.
But I loved every single moment of it and it is the essential benchmark for every single MMO that will ever come out in the entire historical universe of gaming for all time, forever. It's clunky interface, clunkier graphics, and players charging 5 gold for a SOW at the tunnel because running would cost you an hour of your life you'd never get back....and you knew....* getting choked up* you knew 5 gold.....was.....worth it. *crying*
To all new schoolers, I hate your MMO's, I hate your rape of a language we created. I hate the way it's become mainstream. You are the My Chemical Romance's of Rock and Roll, and you are the modern reality show. You are the "vote by calling this number now" 's and lastly, you are the "texting on the walk, sipping a starbucks, wearing oversized sunglasses, oblivious to the world surrounding you, wanting everyone and everything to be done for you at this very absolute second" 's.
Long live EQ and long live the men who picked up a 12 sided die and dared to dream. The true patriots of MMO's.
It was NEVER about fun. It was about challege, and frustration. When I played EQ1 I felt like I was in the pits on Wall Street selling short in a Bull Market. I felt like I was in Office Space and was Peter Gibbons. I felt like every day someone saw my troll shaman, it was a little worse than before, technically making every second worse than the one before that; Every day was the worst of my life. I hated Fippy Darkpaw, I hated Blackburrow, I hated Splitpaw, I hated Permafrost and most of all, I hated losing hours of my life for one error. In short, it was a job. One that I needed no degree to do, no MBA to move up in, and no suit to show up at. It was a merciless job that required nothing....nothing except the two most valuable resources on earth. Mountain Dew and Time. Time, the destroyer of things, but the conquerer of EQ. But I loved every single moment of it and it is the essential benchmark for every single MMO that will ever come out in the entire historical universe of gaming for all time, forever. It's clunky interface, clunkier graphics, and players charging 5 gold for a SOW at the tunnel because running would cost you an hour of your life you'd never get back....and you knew....* getting choked up* you knew 5 gold.....was.....worth it. *crying* To all new schoolers, I hate your MMO's, I hate your rape of a language we created. I hate the way it's become mainstream. You are the My Chemical Romance's of Rock and Roll, and you are the modern reality show. You are the "vote by calling this number now" 's and lastly, you are the "texting on the walk, sipping a starbucks, wearing oversized sunglasses, oblivious to the world surrounding you, wanting everyone and everything to be done for you at this very absolute second" 's. Long live EQ and long live the men who picked up a 12 sided die and dared to dream. The true patriots of MMO's.
What about the 20, 10, 8, 6, and 4 sided dice? I always hated the 12 sided, it didn't roll well for me.
We've debated this subject many times.......It still seems that thsoe that came from the old school games (EQ, UO, SWG, etc etc) want a tougher death penalty while those from the newer school games (WoW, LoTRO, WAR, etc etc) want no death penalty.....As for me I agree with the OP that the fear of dying and having a strong penalty for it creates emotions that are not there when there is no death penalty..... I hear people talk about WoW and how they think it is tougher than EQ raids used to be but I guarantee none of them were there when we wiped in Plane of Fear or when our group would wipe deep down in a dungeon with what looked like little to no hope to get your corpse back anytime soon....... The problem is that the no death penalty people have won....Even EQ itself went away from the tough death penalty and gave into the demands of gamers that want everything easy......You have to understand that the new philosophy is just about having fun, there is no challenge or cponsequences anymore.........
Comments
Well, I was going to agree with you until I read your post.
Listen, I've said this before and I'll say it again, not everyone wants a pulse pounding, adrenaline pumping joyride.
I remember reading a post once where someone was saying how he was in a match and his heart was pounding so hard he could feel it and he was sweating and his eyes were blurring and how great it was and another person replied back that it sounded like he was having a heart attack.
As far as the title of your post, YES there needs to be a bit more danger in these worlds.
My first week of Lineage 2 brought me into a swampy (and foggy... not like it is now) area of dark elf village where there was this demonic tree like monster that would roam the swamp. Because of the fog it was sometimes not noticeable until it was upon you.
I remember my first big group was trying to take this thing down and we got wiped. Of course, it is a quest monster for the Spellhowler's lvl 40 class change (which means you can kill it in 2 or 3 tries) so the dev's made it a "quest mob" put a sign over its head that indicated it was a quest mob (because the nc dev's don't have a lot of imagination when it comes to these things) and made it so it wasn't aggro anymore.
Then they flattened out some of the areas of the swamp and made it less foggy.
All and all, not the fun scary place it used to be.
They need to learn that it's ok to have monsters or encounters that are way above players so that they have to be aware of them to avoid them.
In LOTRO there used to be these trolls that patrolled the road when you headed to rivendell. Well, they aren't there anymore it seems.
This is a shame. But again, there are people who just don't want such a world. For instance, a very nice guy (think it was a guy) in my LOTRO guild made the remark that he hated the old forest because it was confusing and you get lost. This was the reason I LIKED it! And it was even more confusing and dangerous in beta. But Turbine made it easier.
These are the real problems in my opinion.
As far as pulse pounding, heart throbbing, eye gouging fun? Well, not everyone is an adrenaline junky. There is a difference between being in a world with danger and being in a world where you experience hyper physical changes.
as far as death penalty, again, you guys are judging things in a very personal way. Makes sense of course but to be more blunt, the death penalty in WoW is more of an issue for me than the death penalty in Lineage 2. In Lineage 2 I lose a bit of xp and can get back to playing. In WoW I have to waste time by running back to my corpse. Very mundane, very boring and a time waster. In fact, if I die in WoW one too many times I just find something else to do. In Lineage 2 I would just get back to playing.
So one person's easy in another person's extremem annoyance.
I do agree that people need to be made accountable for playing badly as otherwise it does take a bit out of the reward. However, there has been talk about better buffs or even more xp the longer you stay alive and if you die then you have to start over gaining these buffs. That could be a method used by designers.
However, as another said, the idea is not to really "punish' players but to give them an incentive to play well or to try harder if they fail.
Punish too much and it ceases to become a game or even fun and it becomes something that players will uninstall.
And as more and more players are playing these games it seems that there is also a wider range of people that devs have to keep happy. That is probably the real issue in the end.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
I never played EQ, but these are the types of features that I could appreciate from the game. These never make it into newer MMOs because either: A) they're just considered "fluff", which isn't vital to the game and can be sacrificed to save time and resources
certain portions of the player base bitch about the features, because they're not "convenient".
Attention to details. I really believe that the little things can make all the difference in the world.
I actually thought that old-school AO had a good system. Lose all XP gained since last "clone" (save), and temporary "cloning sickness" (stat loss).
Lower levels...it was an inconvenience. Higher levels, when you should know wtf you are doing....well, it could make you want to puke if you died.
Of course, they ended up nerfing that so that your lost XP goes into a pool now, and can be regained..so it's not even the same kind of feeling.
And I also remember old-school Neocron 1.....if you died, you would randomly drop one item. And let me tell you...it SUCKED when it was your quest-reward profession-scpecific 1/4 million credit armor.
I remember going way out in the middle of nowhere to get a new set of armor after losing mine in PVP, only to have a cyborg snipe me off my bike on the way back and drop my armor AGAIN.
These days, I still try as hard as I can to not die....but the fear isn't there, and it's just not the same.
I remember back in 1999, folks kept asking me if I was stockpiling food. I always answered, "No, I'm stockpiling ammo and making a list of people who are stockpiling food"
It's not that the others here or I want to turn all games into the "pulse poiunding, eye gouging, sweat fest". All we're really trying to say is that all the new games are catering to the "convenience" of the other people and we're getting the shaft.
A good chunk of these debates could be solved by giving us one, just ONE game that has this. Thing is as much as other people want their games to be easy, or straight forward, there are thoese out here that want the oposite. People keep saying that they're trying to cater to wider audience yet somehow I feel left out.
No required quests! And if I decide I want to be an assassin-cartographer-dancer-pastry chef who lives only to stalk and kill interior decorators, then that's who I want to be, even if it takes me four years to max all the skills and everyone else thinks I'm freaking nuts. -Madimorga-
The problem is that it's too risky to give you just one game that has this.
Let's take Darkfall for example.
Now, I don't want to turn this thread into a Darkfall thread but it is a good example.
It touts a variety of features which many players find refreshing as it clearly does not fall into the majority of games that have come out in recent years.
However, the reality is going to drastically clash with what people have in their minds.
Some will love it, some will hate it and some will say that they didn't do anything right, etc.
so then players conveniently cancel their subs, flame it on boards "they could have made it so great but they lied"/"They said it had x but x is not balanced, therefore I'll come back in a year when they fix it" etc, and then go elsewhere.
So now you have a game where a lot of money, time and effort was put into it all with the hope that it will attract and maintain a certain amount of subs.
Just because a game touts a certain type of gameplay doesn't mean that it will be implemented well, bug free, or to the way a specific playerbase wants.
And mmo players are so picky that if a game even tries to be different and doesn't hit it quite on the head, they will just fail.
And yes, it is the player's right not to play something that they don't like but the game development for these games takes so much time and effort that it really is getting to the point (as another poster on these forums pointed out) that it just won't be worth it to try.
Heck, the few times an indy game is announced on this forum you find people flaming it because it looks like something that only the commodore 64 could handle.
For some reason game players have it in their heads that these games are made by people who have nothing to do but make games, do it for the love it it, and can do it on shoestring budgets in their basements without little care in the world for anything else. It's like they think it has to be like Carmack and Romero making Doom.
But it's not like that. It takes huge resources and very well trained people who probably want some job security, money for families and other pursuits, retirement, etc.
So it's a fine line that game companies have to cross because it's just too difficult to make a game and invest time into somethign that won't work, people won't like (except for perhaps a hardcore few) and then they have to close down.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
The majority of todays MMO playerbase Isn't into death penalties and really Hard pve.
Hell just the mention of FFA pvp and people freak out saying they woouldn't even try the game out.
Imagine if a game had harsh death penalties and reall crazy ass pve mobs that would own your face.
I played Ryzom recently and those mobs were hardcore (not as bad as EQ or FFXI but tough).
You had to play smart or you were toast, Watch mob behavior, be aware of time of day and season and pull mobs one by one or you got totally owned.
Playing: Nothing
Looking forward to: Nothing
In other words, they don't want to have fun? Why play then? I would be curious to find out what the shelf life is of most MMOs today as compared to some of the older ones like EQ and SWG. It seems like most gamers today try a new game, get bored of it within the one month free subscription period and then move on to the next one.
I played EQ for two years and there were a lot of people who played it longer than that. The next longest period of time I any MMO was 3 months.
Now, I don't mean that every moment of a game has to take you to the edge of the cliff and threaten to throw you off. I myself like a certain ebb and flow. I like relaxing periods too when I can just sit and chat with other gamers. But when I rush into the mix, if it doesn't give me rush, I think to myself, "What am I playing this for?"
I get it, heck I'm 9 years older and don't have time for every time sink that was my beloved EQ1either.
That's not the point though..The point is we've gone from one extreme (UO, EQ1 AC, DAOC) to the other.( WOW LOTRO etc). Not to say that those two are bad games quite the contrary. The problem is they've been so succesfull no one has guts to do something different.
There's no happy medium for those of us who want a bit more challenge. EQII could of been the one but they hosed it in a feeble attempt to attract WOW's audience.
They always say things come back around, next year will be 10 th aniversary since EQ1's launch. Perhaps were due. Something with oldschool challenge minus the timesinks would be nice.
Dutchess Zarraa Voltayre
Reborn/Zero Sum/Ancient Legacy/Jagged Legion/Feared/Nuke & Pave.
Classic EQ has nothing to do with EVE. It's not the same experience at all. There is no game that can compare to what EQ was. It's not the rush you feel when you are going to be killed by another player which is probably a nerd, I don't like that feeling. It was something else, it was the respect for the environment, and the need of other's help, in a living world.
Hell the OP must be playing some mainstream game because in EVE I have felt fear a many night. I still remember some treks through 0.0 in my Myrm solo, afraid some pirate would popup out of nowhere and end me
Other day was out ratting in 0.0 in my Alliance space. Intel was quiet. Next thing I know, some reds are reported in a nearby system about 4 jumps out. My CEO yells on vent these pirates mean business and to get safe or come help fight. So I fly through the gate to meet up at the rally point and what do you know- the hostile was sitting infront of the gate. My heart leaps into my chest and we just stare at each other before opening fire. Anyway soon my corpmates arrive and we chased the hostiles away (no loot that night grrr)
Death in EVE is always heart pumping and ruin is always one step away.
There is no PVE MMO anything like this. Even if it is intense the first time I promise it will get dull eventually. PVE MMOs are wayyyyyy toooo static
Hoping for a dynamic PvE game one day. Until then there is PVP
Ya like when survival horror games like resident evil first came out.
You guys forget single player games, like horror movies, normally lose their thrill after the first or two playthroughs.
Also most single player games employ checkpoints and save points. So they invoke fear through the consequences that are incurred from failure
SP games often have death penalties. In which equals lost time. Was playing an SP RPG last night that got really intense after 1 hour of playing I couldn't find the save point was afraid I'd lose all that time
Yeah I feel ya. You are saying MMOs of today are like FPS games where you die and respawn like nothing happened.
There should always be something on the line. Like if your group fails to kill a boss perhaps he will come into the city and wreck it. People should at least be inconveinced. "Omg all of our quest givers have been slain! We better fight to keep these guys alive!"
Nope, devs wont even give us that much tension. Mobs stay outside of town and stick to their patrols.
WAR is so fake too me. Im trying to get into it. But its so fake. I spawn in the starter town and yeah WAR is everywhere but its an illusion. The NPCs never overrun the town. They stick to their patrols and wait to die.
Lame. Boring PVE. At least get some death penalties in there to spice it up a little.
Yep they all lackin CHALLENGE
You can have good fun without perma death, corpse runs, or even without any sort of death penalty at all. I know because I do it all the time. Having said that, it doesn't mean that people shouldn't have games like that. I'm all for diversity. It would be really nice if some of the big name development companies who have giant fat wallets were for diversity, too.
I feel EXACTLY the same way the OP does.
I was a student of the EQ1 school. I remember fights where I knew one false move could set be back five or six hours of gameplay in later levels (Perma) and one hour just to run back and get the body. "Has anyone here seen my corpse?" When I hear that...it just takes me back.
I can recall staying over at my friends house earlier on, and watching him bind to the docks in Oasis. Lockjaw was on a rampage that day and when he spawned he kept being insta-killed. I think he died about six times between that and Spectre/SG trains. I remember him crying (we were young). A painful, I just lost my dog-esque cry. I felt so bad, I almost lost it.
That's what games need now. Pure agony and frustration. And that GREAT feeling when you take on something on conquer it in the face of uncertain odds.
"Woah....Wait......Dude, am I driving right now?"
In other words, they don't want to have fun? Why play then? I would be curious to find out what the shelf life is of most MMOs today as compared to some of the older ones like EQ and SWG. It seems like most gamers today try a new game, get bored of it within the one month free subscription period and then move on to the next one.
I played EQ for two years and there were a lot of people who played it longer than that. The next longest period of time I any MMO was 3 months.
Now, I don't mean that every moment of a game has to take you to the edge of the cliff and threaten to throw you off. I myself like a certain ebb and flow. I like relaxing periods too when I can just sit and chat with other gamers. But when I rush into the mix, if it doesn't give me rush, I think to myself, "What am I playing this for?"
Again, you just don't get it.
You are trying to define what makes a game "fun" by your very standards of what makes a game fun. And of course that is fine for you. But not everyone is "you".
I don't know any other way to put this.
There are people who can listen to the works of Palestrina (sorry it's obscure but I have to prove a point:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i4VoKso5ERI
you can go 26 seconds in for the start...) all day long and it's just transcendant.
There are people who couldn't sit through it for 5 minutes.
they experience things differently. It's an actuall difference in perception.
So to one person, the pulse pounding, exciting fight is just horrid to another. It's like the changes from Morrowind to Oblviion where you got people who were angry that the fighitng in Oblvion was so "involved" (for lack of a better word).
So yes, they do want to have fun. They just have a different opinion as to what "fun" is.
Oh, don't thank me for the Palestrina. It was my pleasure.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
well... it's not fair then to give all the games to the "melow" people. Nobody even expresses interest in making games like the once were.
.... I just want one....just...one... And even if one came around I have a feeling that it would be turned into something else once again leaving me with nothing.
No required quests! And if I decide I want to be an assassin-cartographer-dancer-pastry chef who lives only to stalk and kill interior decorators, then that's who I want to be, even if it takes me four years to max all the skills and everyone else thinks I'm freaking nuts. -Madimorga-
Anyway thanks
By the way i agree with what you said, it's sad some people seem to be unable to understand such a easy thing. Some people like oranges some other like peaches. Its an orange better than a peach? are people that like oranges more intelligent, higher, sage,... than the others?
Back on topic, I know I'm never to going to experience the fear and adrenalin rush i experienced in Diablo II. Your level 70+ unconditional sorc is in the Chaos Sanctuary. Suddenly half of your party make portal goes town and declares hostility, you know they are back in seconds...I think no way i'll get the same feelings in any MMORPG.
Oh, I can't disagree with you.
We need games that push the envelope.
The problem is that if I write a book or create a piece (meaning musical "piece") that is edgy or skirts the bounds for what is acceptable, and it doesn't do well then no harm no foul.
But if a game in today's enviornment does this then it's million upon millions of dollars in the hole and people could lose their jobs.
Not to mention that if it is a publicly traded company they can get sued by their investors.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
Lets for the sake of argument say that you like peaches and I like oranges. Now lets assume that for whatever reason people start eating more peaches, and some of the orange loving people decided to switch to peaches as well and pretty soon the farmers with all the orchards say well you know peaches seem to sell better, we're going to switch to peaches. Now I've never liked peaches, I loves me some oranges but now nobody wants to grow oranges. I go to the supermarket and spend a good long time looking for oranges but can't find any. All I can see is mounds of peaches everywhere! What am I to do. I don't like peaches. Perhaps I'm allergic to them and would like to get my daily fruit intake but I can't. Now what?
No required quests! And if I decide I want to be an assassin-cartographer-dancer-pastry chef who lives only to stalk and kill interior decorators, then that's who I want to be, even if it takes me four years to max all the skills and everyone else thinks I'm freaking nuts. -Madimorga-
It's not about fun, can't you get it?
HELL YEAH, Stumbled across your thread here and Holy crap are you right... Long live the waiting in line to camp something so long that you take shifts keeping camp.. and corpse runs at the bottom of the ocean ....lmfao... or down a seemingly bottomless pit, Long live the anguish of hearing the cry " TRAIN!!!" in the bowels of Blackburrow. Man I love you guys........
Rest In Peace... SILVERTIP WOLVES
Old gamers never die...we just respawn. MMO's Played Everquest,Everquest2, Anarchy online, City of heroes/ City of villains, Vanguard, Dungeon runners( beta ), Fury ( beta ), Maplestory, Runescape, Silkroad, Tabula Rasa, Lotro...
It was NEVER about fun. It was about challege, and frustration. When I played EQ1 I felt like I was in the pits on Wall Street selling short in a Bull Market. I felt like I was in Office Space and was Peter Gibbons. I felt like every day someone saw my troll shaman, it was a little worse than before, technically making every second worse than the one before that; Every day was the worst of my life. I hated Fippy Darkpaw, I hated Blackburrow, I hated Splitpaw, I hated Permafrost and most of all, I hated losing hours of my life for one error.
In short, it was a job. One that I needed no degree to do, no MBA to move up in, and no suit to show up at. It was a merciless job that required nothing....nothing except the two most valuable resources on earth. Mountain Dew and Time. Time, the destroyer of things, but the conquerer of EQ.
But I loved every single moment of it and it is the essential benchmark for every single MMO that will ever come out in the entire historical universe of gaming for all time, forever. It's clunky interface, clunkier graphics, and players charging 5 gold for a SOW at the tunnel because running would cost you an hour of your life you'd never get back....and you knew....* getting choked up* you knew 5 gold.....was.....worth it. *crying*
To all new schoolers, I hate your MMO's, I hate your rape of a language we created. I hate the way it's become mainstream. You are the My Chemical Romance's of Rock and Roll, and you are the modern reality show. You are the "vote by calling this number now" 's and lastly, you are the "texting on the walk, sipping a starbucks, wearing oversized sunglasses, oblivious to the world surrounding you, wanting everyone and everything to be done for you at this very absolute second" 's.
Long live EQ and long live the men who picked up a 12 sided die and dared to dream. The true patriots of MMO's.
"Woah....Wait......Dude, am I driving right now?"
What about the 20, 10, 8, 6, and 4 sided dice? I always hated the 12 sided, it didn't roll well for me.
We've debated this subject many times.......It still seems that thsoe that came from the old school games (EQ, UO, SWG, etc etc) want a tougher death penalty while those from the newer school games (WoW, LoTRO, WAR, etc etc) want no death penalty.....As for me I agree with the OP that the fear of dying and having a strong penalty for it creates emotions that are not there when there is no death penalty..... I hear people talk about WoW and how they think it is tougher than EQ raids used to be but I guarantee none of them were there when we wiped in Plane of Fear or when our group would wipe deep down in a dungeon with what looked like little to no hope to get your corpse back anytime soon....... The problem is that the no death penalty people have won....Even EQ itself went away from the tough death penalty and gave into the demands of gamers that want everything easy......You have to understand that the new philosophy is just about having fun, there is no challenge or cponsequences anymore.........