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Please help, I need to know what the secret is
Guys, my whole mmo experience thing is about to come crashing down. I need to know what keeps you guys staying on one mmo and not switching to various others. I mean, you guys play 1 or 2 mmos for 2 years straght. I've played probly 300 different ones in the past 5 years. I have no job, very little life, besides a family that loves me, and I'm not in school. But the point is that some people can play them without getting bored, and I need to know how. I'm so bored of the mmos that I'm downloading new ones every day, even sometimes ones that I've played a while back. Even offline games, I've played and bought all the good ones, but I need to know how to stick with one game and not get bored and say well this sucks and start a new one only to do the same with it. I can remember 5 years ago when I got banned by the moderators from playing wurm online, I would then use a dial up connection to play because it resets your ip address each time you log on, but I was so into that game but then after about a month I quit because it blew. But I need to know how to stick with one game, please help and tell me your ideas, thank you very much.
Comments
Find a game that you enjoy and enjoy it, don't just rush to max level.
A game will keep me playing longer if I have a good social experience. Friends, guild mates, etc. is what kept me in WoW for as long as I was playing it. The raiding was just a past time to me that I enjoyed doing with everyone, chatting away in vent, shooting the shit, etc.
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Hopefully you're as dedicated to getting a school/job as you are to finding a good MMO.
Perhaps there are larger issues at work here.
First of all, can you stick with anything for a long time? Relatiionships? Do you have ADD? Is there a good reason you aren't working (you don't have to answer that just something to consider) and perhaps you could be spending your time on a career.
If you don't need a career then perhaps an actual hobby other than gaming.
Maybe you don't stick with them because they don't really offer anything substantial. Maybe your time would be better used in another capacity. Maybe you are exceptionally intelligent and your mind works in such a way that it needs a different type of simulus? Perhaps going after a degree or two?
There is no trick to playing an mmo for a long time. I played/play Lineage 2 for over 4 years.
But I also know deep down that it is an up and down affair. Not everything will be amazing at every moment but the entirely of hte experience can be. I don't have to be wowed every moment. I can be comfortable i the downtime, in the silences if you wiil.
Maybe you are wired in such a way that pushing through "the bad times" is difficult or you just don't have the paitence once you get to higher levels where the work is harder.
If you are the type of person who can see thing through the I suspect that gaming is not for you. at least in this capacity. If you can't stick with anything and you tend to drop projects and not see them through then perhaps there are other issues here.
I would seek professional help if that was the case because not being able to see anything through is only going to be a pitfall in the longer term.
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A good guild / friends and the challenge of beating raid encounters kept me playing EQ for years.
Relax.
You are suffering from burnout. At least one person a day posts the same as you.
Burnout is natures way of getting you to try new things.
Quit MMOs for a while. The longer the better.
Try real life golf or bowling. You can return to MMOs after your burnout fades away, maybe in a year or two?
Well shave my back and call me an elf! -- Oghren
Some people can and some cant. Same as some people can work on a job doing same thing 10 hours a day for 10 years. I am one that cant and I got same problem as you do. I think it has to do alot with perception of time, atleast that is the way it feels. I tend to get bored very easily. Play almost all mmo that has come out last 10 years. Some I stay with for longer time but most of them I dont play more than 1 day to 1 week since I really dont get that longtime attraction that I am looking for.
These are just thoughts around it tho, I beta test alot and I think its quite fun. One does not get into every single beta/alpha but if you hang in there and keep pushing you tend to get alot of invites. What I think is wrong with us is that we are too restless, and cant "live in the now" we always put one and one together which makes us soon see where the lines end up. And if we dont see any "goal" ahead we tend to give up ( one of the reasons I hate grinding mmos).
I found that if I play less games and read some book insted and watch some intressting programs (NOVA got some good ones, and so does discovery) since all I feel like I am doing is just waiting for games and not acually playing them.
You need to have EXTREMELY low standards. Thats the secret.
The secret is "Don't eat the yellow snow"
If you played Lineage 2 for 4 years then you know all about grinding that is for sure
My tresure hunter only got to level 70 and boj was I feed up with the grinding, 4 years wow ..respect to your patience
Have to add you got some good points, but have said that not many people can acually play lineage 2 for 4 years so I got a feel your kinda special on that part.
I'm with the other posters in this regard. I myself do admit like you that I have played majority if not all games available on the market today (FPS/RPG/MMO all together). I was unemployed for a while and really burned myself out quick in many games. Problem is if you play games non stop day to day you lose interest quick as you are burning through games and content and without a social aspect (guilds/in game friends) you see no more appeal after you achieve your content goals. Currently I'm just using my computer to play games I already own such as Left 4 Dead and the like, as I did recently get married I am focusing more on my relationship, as I am too in a burnout period (Again). But the point is I've been where you are, and it's only a period, it'll pass and you'll end up watching a movie or hear something one day/night that'll remind you of a game you once played and have a sudden drive to play it. Then after a few weeks/months/maybe a year or two you'll find another median to go to.
I know my reasoning for this is that my mind runs like that, I don't have ADD but I lose interest in things if they don't stimulate my mind or my knowledge. Which is a reason I keep going back to Anarchy Online sometimes because it requires planning and thought processes when you progress your character (Even though it's one of the oldest MMO's out there). For now, enjoy this downtime and get outside or maybe hit up some bars, I went bar hopping for a while and had a hell of a time, and guess what? I met my wife, It all works out in the end, it's just mother nature telling you to get your ass out of the chair and do something that will reward you in another way in the end.
Good luck
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In my opinion, when you have some stress in your life, mmos can be a nice escape. But if you have a lot of stress in your life, it's hard to enjoy any mmo because you can't get real life stuff off your mind. So my advice is, get some of the real life stuff under control and you will probably find mmos fun again.
EQ1, EQ2, SWG, SWTOR, GW, GW2 CoH, CoV, FFXI, WoW, CO, War,TSW and a slew of free trials and beta tests
Extremely good words of wisdom from Mr Sovrath. Basicly it sounds like you need to retrain the way your mind works. Try blanking games from your mind and have a go at some other activities.
Boredom comes from not fulfilling your true potential......and then you turn to games to try and get that feel good factor inside you because games are fun right? Except they arent really that much fun when you have that worrying feeling nagging away at you that you should be doing something else with your life. You will actually know what it is that you REALLY need to be doing with your time because when you think about it, it will probably make you feel excited and really pissed off at the same time. Excited because you can envision yourself in a better place in life doing something of value. Pissed off because you cant see any way of getting there and it all seems impossible to reach.........and so I expect you say to yourself "Oh fuck it! I dont care anyway" and then turn back to games again as its the easy option......and so the cycle repeats itself and the brain wires itself to keep functioning in the same way. It then gets harder to think of anything new as the only option the brain has trained itself to see is "games".
The strange thing is that at first you will probably hate doing the things that deep down you know will ultimately make you happy. Of course I'm saying all of this from experience. I have been jobless for a year as well and I fell into a very negative cycle. I have always had a real big problem with motivating myself to do the things that I know are important to me. I used to keep turning to computer games to hide from the challenges I always knew I needed to face. One of them was about getting fit and the other one was about getting into the habit of developing a creative and artistic skill that I could use to get a fun and creative job. I was sick to death of going to work 9 - 5 doing stuff I didnt care about for Mr Barry Business. I would occasionally have little break throughs......small spurts of creative positive energy and then I would just slump back down again. More recently though I have got into a good routine of going jogging every day and doing regular excercises lifting weights. It was horrible at first but now it has become easier and I even look forward to it now. On top of that I find that a few hours after excercising I feel a LOT more motivated to focus on practising with Maya to build 3d models which is something I really want to perfect. I'm always in absolute awe of a lot of stuff I see in games and films and wonder about how amazing it would be to be able to create stuff of such quality for a living. Its a hell of a lot more rewarding than playing games. Of course I still play and enjoy games but its more of a side dish to me now. I still quite often have some kind of game related thought running through my head mind you but then I never really wanted to totally kill the gamer geek inside me. Fortunately mmos have been really crap for a long time so it has been relatively easy to block them out. I fear that might change over the next few years though.
So yeah maybe try going jogging and see what thoughts pop into your head. It will probably suck at first but remember that your brain is NOT you. Its a seperate entity and you need to train it to think the correct thoughts that will lead you to a happier place.
Sorry for the rambling essay. Its just that when I read your original post I thought "Hmmm been there done that".
Don't force it.
If you don't like MMORPGs, you don't like MMORPGs.
Play something you do enjoy instead.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
There are several most important things that keeps you in one game.
1. You got to like the game a lot. Some get deep into game's lore, others like the world, or maybe the graphics, art style, or combat system, etc.. Find something that makes you adore the game.
2. Friends. Friends are what can keep you in one game for years. You can't make it alone. You won't last long alone.
3. Establish some goals. Long term ones. Like to become one of the best PvP'ers on a server with a chosen class. Or to get the best gear possible. Or to solo a raid boss
You must have the desire to become better at something.
For me its very simple - other players. All the games I've stuck with have good social structures and are very "player" orientated. Asheron's Call 1 (Darktide), Everquest 2 and Eve Online are the three I played for 5+ years each. The games I haven't stuck with have been the ones less player orientated.
In that aspect Eve is stunning - everything is player orientated and in fact the non player elements again are the tedious bits in my opinion. I've built up friendships I've had over years and in turn that motivated me go to the Evemeets in London to actually meet other players I was shooting on a regular basis and find out what made them tick. Nowadays I go to every meet I can and also alliance meets in Europe.
That investment emotionally and ties, whether as opponents or friends, is what keeps you interested because you're not interacting with a computer controlled character you're interacting with a player who is unpredictable and changeable. Someone with hopes and dreams that change and develop.
As another player I get to help them or fight them and that keeps the game fresh.
PS: Die Northern Coalition die.
Bjoern / Sir Prime
Habitual Euthanasia
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The secret is to play an MMO that isn't focused on the super casuals instant gratification. If you have an MMO that focuses heavy on the social aspects, and on long term reward, you'll play longer. Also, meaningful endgame is a plus, like DAoC's PvP system they invented, RvR. Raiding means very little when they just keep adding more loot making yours obsolete.
I have never played an MMORPG for 1 to 2 years straight. I don't plan to either. I will however, come back to certain games after they have patched new stuff or released expansion packs. I do that with WoW, Lotro, AoC, FFXI, EQ2 and will do it with FFXIV, SW:TOR, Rift and what ever other upcoming MMOs I find fun.
Basically play one until you get tired of it. Then unsub and move to another. Rinse repeat, and go back to the first one when they patch it or release an expack. If this doesn't work for you, perhaps MMORPGs aren't the genre you are looking for.
42, that explains it all...really!
A good reason to play a MMO, is playing with a "static group". A group of people that you know from real life, or other games and talk about your girldfriend, your job, maybe your childrens, etc... with ventrilo.
Can't be repeated enough, get a circle of friends. Join a guild, expand your horizons. Check the games' official forums for guild recruitment posts. Make your own "Looking for guild" post. Soloing is my prefered style of play, but I try to make friends along the way to have people to talk to when things get slow.
Also, you need to equip the ring.
"You'll never win an argument with an idiot because he is too stupid to recognize his own defeat." ~Anonymous
I say the opposite; rush to end level, and enjoy the end level life with the big boys instead of living a lonely noob life alone.
Make us care MORE about our faction & world pvp!
This.... is why games suck nowadays.
"You'll never win an argument with an idiot because he is too stupid to recognize his own defeat." ~Anonymous
Someone earlier was correct in that "there is no secret." You may have simply out-leveled MMOs (grown past them). It happens to most sooner or later. We leave, come back, and check things out from time to time, but in the long run if you have out-leveled it, there is very little possibility of finding immersion in them...and immersion is king.
Most MMOs on the market are nothing but grinds. Doesn't matter if it's sub, f2p, item shoppe, etc. Once you first "feel" the grind the honeymoon is frequently over. Some games have aspects that delay this feeling but most don't. There is absolutely nothing worse to start off a game with than, "Hello I am your trainer (insert goofy name here). go kill 10 skeletons and return to me for your next task."
Very very rarely is there any actual reason to continue on once you hit the wall you have described. Very few games out there have decent crafting systems, very few games have a LARGE amount of content so you dont feel like you're being led around by the grind system in place, very few games are actually what they are promised to be (just look at FE...), and IMO very few games have decent communities, as the grind system promotes solo play which results in way too many a$$hats.
Good luck in your future endeavors (game-related or otherwise)