"If ALL items in game are player made, salvageable, and highly customizable, you would also have to make many simple tools [emphasis added] and such you use as well. If you need a shovel - you make it. but you have to obtain the materials and expertise to do so. Mindless repetition isn't necessary. There are other ways to " learn" skills. , First you would have to find which dragon design you wished to put on it through exploration, locate the rubies, and also be taught [emphasis added] the skill to create it."
Your ideas about a crafting system I agree with whole-heartedly, but it is still a repetative task. Is it a mind-numbingly repetative task? Well, that depends on what you think it is fun in an MMO. But by searching, foraging, or salvaging for the ingredients and materials necessary to create the item (chances are the item would require multiple items or inredients) you would have to do this repeatedly to gain the items necessary to do so. But also, I can't agree with your concept of learning a skill by "watching" someone else do it, or to simply "be taught" the skill. There is alot of things that go into "being taught" a skill. By taking out the "work" involved in being taught a skill, you remove the value of it in the first place. This is the time vs reward that is so important in MMOs. The exmaple you point to, forging a samurai sword, requires "years" of practice (folding metal, metalurgy, forge techniques, and yes creating lots of swords, which for the majority of that time are not good). The point is, learning that skill requires you to make many many swords, before you can produce a quality end result. I know that you aren't directly advocating for a system that has instant wonderwaffen (wonder weapons), but I still think someone should have to invest a great amount of time to produce quality items. However, I am in total favor of allowing the weapons that you must create in order to improve to be useful in some way. Perhaps allowing them to be broken down, recycled. But if being taught a skill only entales talking to an NPC for a few minutes, that is a total devaluation of the time vs reward mechanic, and does not belong in an MMO. For those who don't like that, maybe you should go back to your PS3.
Sage thinking that is what this article is. I'm of the same opinion. Shoot, I pretty much burned out on all my MMOs and I'm not really an alt kind of guy. Fortunately I always buy LtS if possible so I dont feel any pressure to play but still....
There<s not a single MMOPRG out there that keeps me coming back. I ended up going back to DAoC last week, and i realised this game has what it needs to be popular. It has depth a huge variety of classes to play with, the best RvR ever. With all its flaws back then, DAoC was ahead of his time, and at first it was clear it was BY rpg players FOR rpg players. Mythic made mistakes, yup, can't deny that, but its when i tried many mmos after that, and then finally went back to DAoC that i realised how good it was/is.
What makes DAoC step up compared to other mmos is of course the rvr, but i have to admit, i think even the pve is better then my recent experience, WAR.
The game isnt "oooo Shiny" as more recent mmos, but the game itself is amazing.
About 10 years ago there was a company that was in alpha stage of development for a mmo that sounded REALLY promising...Ok it ended up being nothing more than talk, but i was more excited just to discuss the game on the forums than actually play most other mmos since then. I have to admit they had some "utopic" views for a mmo, wich many of them would probably never work, or they would have to be a gigantic team to make it work. Here's the link to their never-updated website ( now i think it was probably more a window to publicise their little browser game, but anyways) http://www.glitchless.com/dawn.html
I even kept somewhere one topic with all the replies (173 if i recall) from players, and it was great to participate to that.
If a company out there really want to make a different mmo and need some fresh, different ideas, instead of trying to copy others, this topic had MANY very interesting points. contact me and i'll gladly send it to you.
EA and other companies that are aiming for THE next MMO also has to think about something...those teenage WOW players that started many years ago will grow up eventually, and will want more depth, more fun, more strategy, more many things than just "oooh Shiny" games. if they dont realise that, we'll keep ending up w/o good mmos to play, or return to old ones we loved, true mmos.
I'll be 41 next month, played tabletop rpgs since i was 13, switched to MMORPG at around 30, and will probably be playing when i'll be 60, as long as there are some good stuff out there.
Stop thinking about making money like the author of this post said, think about giving PLAYERS fun, so hire PLAYERS to create the game, from the programmers to the guy in charge. Make different kind of servers like DAoC (PvP, RP, classic etc).
and damn i would even go as far as making "mature servers" and "kids/teens" servers. Part of what makes a good MMO is its community, a place to make online friends, etc. so try to regroup people that fits together, think human factor, not money factor, and the money will flow.
Bowbow (kob hunter) Infecto (kob cave shammy) and Thurka (troll warrior) on Merlin/Midgard DAoC Thurka on WAR
i agree it would be amazing if the developers could keep a continuousstream of new content every day but the would have to practically be computers themselves for that to happen. Lets face it,we need the grind for the shinies to be there for new content to arrive. Its the time it takes for players to get the shiny that allows the developers the time to make new quest and develop new gameplay. Basically its a double edged sword and we as gamers are precariously perched in the middle.
Wow 100% correct in my mind this is how i have always seen it WE ARE RATS....HAMSTERS....wotever u wanna call us were the ones that come to a game and we run around trying to level, quest, kill epic monsters and we have to pay to get that little bit of fun.
I cn tell u wen im a high level and it takes me at least a whole day to level up i get a buzz but when i find out i need to pay another $15 to continue i think wow i giv up.....but always....ALWAYS come bak because i know its worth it im like u William I LOVE SHINEY STUFF, glowing stuff ect....I just love walking round a city showing of the new armour i got from this super hard quest and then another $15 i dont want to do it but i just sucks me in......LET ME GOO!!
Excelent article. I agree although I don't think it's recent at all. It comes with the territory with MMOs. I remember the original EQ and it's horrible grind. In fact, I think devs try to do things to ease the grind but they're in a no-win situation which is the following:
1. A person playing an MMO regularly can go through hundreds of hours of content in a year. Some people go through thousands of hours a year.
2. There is no way with existing technology that any of the game companies out there can generate that much original content.
Therefore, they're pretty much FORCED to generate grinds. Whether it's redoing the same dungeon a hundred times, or killing the same monsters a thousand times, or redoing some battleground a hundred times. In some way or another devs are being forced to get players to do stuff over and over because they cannot create the huge amount of content needed to avoid that problem.
Maybe the solution is to change the business model as this writer seemed to imply -- if a game company's revenue is not tied to how long people play the game but just how many copies are sold (which has ALWAYS been the Guild Wars approach even in the original -- it was always buy the game and play for free). If they don't feel forced to keep people subscribed they might relax and just do a lot of content and not worry when people use it up and go on to something else (the company will get them again for the sequel).
Or maybe there's another approach. Whatever.
Until a solution is found, the people who like mind numbing repetitiveness will play MMOs and others will leave. Or they'll log on occasionally because something about the game attracts them but they won't play much because they can't stand the grind. Which makes me wonder if many so-called casual gamers are just people who can only stomach so much grind. It appears enough people are willing to put up with the situation and pay their monthly fees to keep MMOs going strong.
Some people LIKE doing the same task over and over thousands of times.
As for me, I'm starting to get fed up with the MMO genre.
"Maybe the solution is to change the business model as this writer seemed to imply -- if a game company's revenue is not tied to how long people play the game but just how many copies are sold (which has ALWAYS been the Guild Wars approach even in the original -- it was always buy the game and play for free). If they don't feel forced to keep people subscribed they might relax and just do a lot of content and not worry when people use it up and go on to something else (the company will get them again for the sequel)."
I agree with you in part, especially about developers not being able to generate tons of content. Originally MMOs were created as sandboxes to get around that problem. They were created in such a way that players were the masters of their own destiny. Because of that design philosophy (giving the players the tools to create their own world, and only stepping in when necessary) it allowed them more opportunity to make the game better and release better content, rather than trying to rush out content that players will run through in no time at all. I see that as the problem with modern themepark MMOs, the players depend on developer generated content, which is unpractical. They want the "heroic" single player game style of content, and that just doesn't work in an MMO. Eventually the content runs out and people will be forced to raid or endlessly kill the same creatures repeatedly.
But, if the developers changed the revenue model as you suggest, isn't that a single player game? Also, by paying that $15 per month you get constant updates and a persistent world. So far ArenaNet has pulled this off, but most people don't realize it has an item shop as well. It's not as robust as other games, but it does exist. So, they are generating revenue from other sources in addition to box sales. My point is that by changing the revenue model, you are essentially enforcing the single player game system of play. Because there is no need for people to subscribe, there is no incentive for them to publish those updates, and maintain the persistent world.
Either we have MMOs and pay the monthly subscription, or we can have single player games with the only associated cost being the purchase of the box or download. You can't have it both ways.
Now personally, I do agree that charging people for a box or download (including expansions), and then charging a monthly fee is inherently greedy. I prefer the free download and expansions with a monthly fee, or if you buy the box, the largest majority of that cost should incorporate the monthly subscription.
Thank goodness this article came about. I cannot recall anyone ever writing about why or what could have caused MMO's to become "unfun-anized".
I remember being a young buck at 16-17 years old (fuzzy memories from those ages) playing Asheron's Call. My oh my did this game get me hooked. At the time it wasn't about the graphics, or the "OH JEEZ HE HAS A HUGE SWORD PVP KILL RAID!" moments that made my want to play the game, rather the actual "COMMUNITY" and the developers who they themselves played alongside us that made it fun.
MMO's, and not trying to be biased here, should take a page from Asheron's Call and script something new from there. Why do we have to farm for "TIER 10 ARMOR" ? Could it be perhaps there really isn't anything out there that could be much better for your own type of playstyle? or perhaps that's the ONLY option one has? What I'm trying to say here is I still believe whole heartedly that a "skill" based MMO where one can pretty much create they're own character be it warmage, lifemage, anything warrior, archer-thing-a-ma-bob, is light years ahead of a pre-set with some customization type of character selection. This is simply because of the several options and choices one can make for their own gear. Do you need that special item that gives you +10 life but +5 magic? or perhaps you need more ATTACK but not that much defense? Whatever the need there are bountless of items you can choose from. You don't have to be funneled into just one armor/weapon that seems to cover all the bases for your character or anyone in general, that is BORING. I'd also like to mention a "collection of sets" that ultimately lead to an exciting type of weapon or armor, where one has to scour the world to collect small pieces and ultimately have it forged into something large and in charge. THAT's exciting!! Atleast for me it was.
Several factors play into the dumbing down of the MMO. How about make dying somewhat "FEARFUL", yes that's right, that it would actually be a 100 on the suckage to die instead of what it is nowadays where you simply get a negative tick that can be removed in one kill, this would actually spice things up a bit. Remove easy world travel? it IS rather "convenient" to travel from point A to point B, but hey come on, remember when you used to have to run for an hour to where you wanted to go to? Yes, it was long but you got to see so much more of the game and world, perhaps even discover something new on the way there! Questing that requires you to A+B=Cows x Spear of ultimate death. How simple and clear cut is that? Make questing as difficult as it used to be, make us THINK as to what it is needed for me to accomplish my deed, I want to feel like I EARNED IT ! LAstly, Crafting.
Crafting get's its own paragraph. Many a games tried to get it right, but failed and horribly so. In my humble opinion, the only game that got it right was SWG (Pre-anything). Yes, SWG had it perfectly done. I remember walking into someones weapons factory and waiting in a line to get my Scatter Blaster that was "Hand Made". This guy actually had factories set up, as well as collection points scattered across the world harvesting materials. I felt like this was actually a homemade weapon, an ORIGINAL. It also had "Made by so and so "quote". Genunie crafting that is always slightly better than the easy-to-get questing weapon, made crafting FUN, UNIQUE, and was available for those who wanted to wait a bit more just to get that weapon/armor (you had to wait a day for it to be fully completed by a player). Not only does the consumer get something out of this crafting style, but the prosumer as well. All I can say is, these guys although no on the battlefield killing killing killing, were building up their own playstyle and just all around rich rich rich.
In the end, I say bring back the "skill" based customization, bring back ACTUAL player driven economy and crafting (not the dumb downed crap we get, i hate that shit), bring back meaningfull questing and somewhat non existent convenient travel. MMO's have always had the same pattern of being dumb downed and turned into a kiddy game, for that I'll play Wizard School or whatever the hell that game is. I cannot recall when one of my friends didn't turn to me and say "Don't play so and so game because it has been turned into EASY MODE", and you can quote me quoting my friends on THAT!!
Thank you for your time and patience, bless you all and Happy Father's Day!
"In the end, I say bring back the "skill" based customization, bring back ACTUAL player driven economy and crafting... , ...bring back meaningfull questing and somewhat non existent convenient travel."
Finding ways to keep player chained and paying rather than finding ways to entertaining him, sure sounds like most (if not all) mmos nowadays. Isnt there a single game which has something other than loot, party, exp? Games are simple, so that anyone can play them, my point is that it also leads to downfall. As you play some game with some character you learn how to win, get what you want, etc. This is where you meet endgame where your only objective is to be shinier than the other guy.
The only thing that can never be mastered is playing against other players is a thing, which is know to developers as PvP. Caged inside some zone, battling other prisoners for some lousy points so you can become shinier. You make no impact on the mmo world, you might be shinier than the other guys, but you can never do something gamebreaking, like gathering a few guilds and founding your own town over that cliff in the cave where the trolls lived (until your dwarven comrades wiped them out for good). We get battlegrounds, instances, PvP zones and other zones/rooms where you are limited to do one thing or another... And no for those sandbox games, they have freedom, yet they lack everything else.
So, rather than playing with thousand of people, you are playing with a group of people, you play minigames called questing, pvp, shopping, you play them all with your avatar, alone, with other people "running" around, like some background image. This isnt much different from server chat channel of games like rakion or gunz, where you battle inside player hosted roomsl And in their turn, they are similar to almost any singleplayer game with multiplayer option. This is mass multiplayer online roleplaying game, this is what they want us to believe and pay them money for...
I enjoyed the first couple of years of LOTRO and then with every expansion came major changes to crafting, questing, and instancing. Instead of enjoying the story, exploring the world, and being creative with crafting, a lot of time had to be spent reading up on the changes. Crafting required new special ingredients that were so hard to get that you either had to grind certain creatures or take part in difficult instances. Those difficult instances required the best gear, which required hours spent in other instances to obtain. And as soon as you would figure out how to actually get through those difficult instance, they would change it and make it harder. I already have a job and don't need a game that requires all of my free time to obtain one item so I can move on to obtaining the next item. The only game that never turned into a grind, even after playing it for many years, was Ultima Online. Just too bad the graphics are so bad. I still consider it the best MMO ever created and hope there will be one like it someday with updated graphics.
My first experience with LA2 (also my 1st mmo experience) ended at lv14 with a thought "No way I'm doing that any longer!" (this wasn't my last experience with LA2 though...)
While LA2 isn't known for it's generosity in shiny rewards, what made me left is the process itself.
I've always been hard on the whole "cool high level content after several months of grind" concept. After the process stops being fun there's only so little grind i can endure.
I dunno why would I want an ogre slaying great sword of awesomeness if slaying ogres with it is the same as slaying badgers with my badger slaying dagger of harmlessness.
And you know what? It's damn hard to find an mmorpg with a vision like mine.
Concusions:
- The switch is the only known way to keep sufficient number of cage occupied at one time to keep the Massive machine operational. {Research indicates that smaller machines can be maintained by other methods since they don't require so many rats at the same time.}
- The switch itself provides so much rats that any other cage enhancements are not required.
- The rats are happy, since the switch appeals to them more then the unlocked exit.
Anyone remember the absolutely epic events in WoW, when GM's turned Onyxia or some other world boss loose on an unsuspecting player base? The resulting chaos and epic battles, with even level ones able to jump in as they took a hit and died, was awesome fun.
How about before WOTLK, when Alliance raiding a Horde city or vice versa, was an epic event? Making it an achievement somehow took something away from it...no one did it for any reward, it was just plain FUN! And for PVE'ers, who hate PVP, it was usually the one type of PVP they did enjoy.
Having an ACTIVE and INVOLVED team of devs and GM's would go much further, IMO, in bringing game life to a game, than adding a month's worth of grind fest quests.
Lay out the world basics. Throw in twists and turns that are unpredictable in quests. If you have the money to invest in developing grind fest quests, why not take the road less travelled and choose instead to build a good team of GM's who are actively involved in helping create a pseudo living gaming environment, where at any moment the city you are in will be hit by an invasion of marauding NPC's, or a world boss has broken free of his dungeon and is wreaking havoc through the country side, or a section of a city wall collapses and everyone has to pitch in and get it back up before some NPC boss attacks?
The linear model is, I think, part of the problem, going from level one to level whatever, with the same kill ten rats type quest redressed over and over in different ways getting you there. We love the fantasy setting, we love the story lines, we love the rich environment...but we absolutely HATE LOATHE AND DESPISE the grind fest quests.
How about...level expansions, not just level up? Make each level so fun you almost hate to leave it to go to the next level, instead of a necessary evil you endure just to get to endgame.
How about...experience points rewarded for defending your city from a random boss attack?
How about...gear that levels up with you and becomes epic through solving game lore based riddles and puzzles that change randomly, so that no one gets a cheat sheet on it?
All of which would require the devs/GM's/company actually caring enough about their player base to be actively involved with them, rather than treating them like a bunch of well trained monkeys that they toss in a maze and forget, until the next payment is due...
Kinda sad, really, isn't it? I mean, really, this whole environment was birthed by people who were rebels with pocket protectors, blazing new frontiers electronically through crazy experiments with just how far computers could go in creating virtual worlds...but once Wall Street got involved, the creativity and outside the box thinking was crushed beneath the weight of the bottom line.
I guess if we want to take the grind out of MMO's we'd have to know what sort of content we could replace it with to keep us paying and playing.
I know EVE's grind is in ISK (but even that can be avoided) and with its real time skill training it really doesn't feel much like a grind at all to me so I guess that's why its the only game that really appeals to me at the moment.
Changing the game world. I finally realized that's why I keep comparing games to old-school Planetside, even though it had terrible flaws. It's the only MMO I've ever played where the entire focus of the game was on getting together with your side to "move the map" for your side, and the leveling system really only let you decide what role you'd play in that. Kind of an interesting study on how simple could be better, actually - their technology limitations forced them to make the game that way, and it worked.
GW2 looks like their dynamic quest system will put some of the "move the map" out there, so although I'm REALLY not into another fantasy game, I will probably give it a shot just to see how my character's actions can change things in the world. I just hope it's not too gear-oriented though.
One of the key aspects involved in addiction is Denial. That point has been proven by some of the responses to this article. "Addiction the only mental disorder that convinces the afflicted that its everyone else who is ill, not himself. This is because of addictive denial. This is not a conscious act." <- http://www.csun.edu/~vcpsy00h/students/drugs.htm
There are plenty of other scientific studies about addiction but, this paper I found particularly interesting.
It's quite pointless to write articles like the OP because people are blinded to it. There are plenty of guides on how to break through this barrier. But, the truth is, only the person that has the problem can choose to help themselves. As for the people saying "it's a choice" to continue playing. The truth of the matter is that, in a lot of cases, there is no choice until they realize there's a problem. That's why it's so hard for a lot of people to stop drug addictions or obsessive behavior: It's not so much the chemical addiction as it is the mind unconciously denying there is any problem to begin with.
Do I blame the companies for this? Not at all. I would latch onto this piece of human nature as well if my business depended on it. I'd have to start attacking Fast Food and Cigarettes if I were going to rage about subscription gaming companies. Not to mention pretty much every other aspect of consumerism on the planet. Nearly everything today is built to keep use hooked. Medicine that only represses symptoms if you take it daily, computer parts designed to need constant upgrades or replacements, cars built to need constant maintenance, food that's built to make you hungrier, drinks designed to make you thirsty, other edibles designed to addict you to carbohydrates, rechargable batteries designed to only recharge for so long, video media designed to be fragile, light bulbs designed to burn out, etc. I could go on for months listing things. Let's face it, we live in a consumerism age where it's more economical to keep your customers paying than to worry about their long-term health or happiness.
Our economics are not sustainable without wear and tear products. Less jobs, less money, etc. We could not survive without killing ourselves. Funny how that works.
Comments
Originally posted by Deviliscious:
"If ALL items in game are player made, salvageable, and highly customizable, you would also have to make many simple tools [emphasis added] and such you use as well. If you need a shovel - you make it. but you have to obtain the materials and expertise to do so. Mindless repetition isn't necessary. There are other ways to " learn" skills. , First you would have to find which dragon design you wished to put on it through exploration, locate the rubies, and also be taught [emphasis added] the skill to create it."
Your ideas about a crafting system I agree with whole-heartedly, but it is still a repetative task. Is it a mind-numbingly repetative task? Well, that depends on what you think it is fun in an MMO. But by searching, foraging, or salvaging for the ingredients and materials necessary to create the item (chances are the item would require multiple items or inredients) you would have to do this repeatedly to gain the items necessary to do so. But also, I can't agree with your concept of learning a skill by "watching" someone else do it, or to simply "be taught" the skill. There is alot of things that go into "being taught" a skill. By taking out the "work" involved in being taught a skill, you remove the value of it in the first place. This is the time vs reward that is so important in MMOs. The exmaple you point to, forging a samurai sword, requires "years" of practice (folding metal, metalurgy, forge techniques, and yes creating lots of swords, which for the majority of that time are not good). The point is, learning that skill requires you to make many many swords, before you can produce a quality end result. I know that you aren't directly advocating for a system that has instant wonderwaffen (wonder weapons), but I still think someone should have to invest a great amount of time to produce quality items. However, I am in total favor of allowing the weapons that you must create in order to improve to be useful in some way. Perhaps allowing them to be broken down, recycled. But if being taught a skill only entales talking to an NPC for a few minutes, that is a total devaluation of the time vs reward mechanic, and does not belong in an MMO. For those who don't like that, maybe you should go back to your PS3.
Sage thinking that is what this article is. I'm of the same opinion. Shoot, I pretty much burned out on all my MMOs and I'm not really an alt kind of guy. Fortunately I always buy LtS if possible so I dont feel any pressure to play but still....
I have to agree.
There<s not a single MMOPRG out there that keeps me coming back. I ended up going back to DAoC last week, and i realised this game has what it needs to be popular. It has depth a huge variety of classes to play with, the best RvR ever. With all its flaws back then, DAoC was ahead of his time, and at first it was clear it was BY rpg players FOR rpg players. Mythic made mistakes, yup, can't deny that, but its when i tried many mmos after that, and then finally went back to DAoC that i realised how good it was/is.
What makes DAoC step up compared to other mmos is of course the rvr, but i have to admit, i think even the pve is better then my recent experience, WAR.
The game isnt "oooo Shiny" as more recent mmos, but the game itself is amazing.
About 10 years ago there was a company that was in alpha stage of development for a mmo that sounded REALLY promising...Ok it ended up being nothing more than talk, but i was more excited just to discuss the game on the forums than actually play most other mmos since then. I have to admit they had some "utopic" views for a mmo, wich many of them would probably never work, or they would have to be a gigantic team to make it work. Here's the link to their never-updated website ( now i think it was probably more a window to publicise their little browser game, but anyways) http://www.glitchless.com/dawn.html
I even kept somewhere one topic with all the replies (173 if i recall) from players, and it was great to participate to that.
If a company out there really want to make a different mmo and need some fresh, different ideas, instead of trying to copy others, this topic had MANY very interesting points. contact me and i'll gladly send it to you.
EA and other companies that are aiming for THE next MMO also has to think about something...those teenage WOW players that started many years ago will grow up eventually, and will want more depth, more fun, more strategy, more many things than just "oooh Shiny" games. if they dont realise that, we'll keep ending up w/o good mmos to play, or return to old ones we loved, true mmos.
I'll be 41 next month, played tabletop rpgs since i was 13, switched to MMORPG at around 30, and will probably be playing when i'll be 60, as long as there are some good stuff out there.
Stop thinking about making money like the author of this post said, think about giving PLAYERS fun, so hire PLAYERS to create the game, from the programmers to the guy in charge. Make different kind of servers like DAoC (PvP, RP, classic etc).
and damn i would even go as far as making "mature servers" and "kids/teens" servers. Part of what makes a good MMO is its community, a place to make online friends, etc. so try to regroup people that fits together, think human factor, not money factor, and the money will flow.
Bowbow (kob hunter) Infecto (kob cave shammy) and Thurka (troll warrior) on Merlin/Midgard DAoC
Thurka on WAR
i agree it would be amazing if the developers could keep a continuousstream of new content every day but the would have to practically be computers themselves for that to happen. Lets face it,we need the grind for the shinies to be there for new content to arrive. Its the time it takes for players to get the shiny that allows the developers the time to make new quest and develop new gameplay. Basically its a double edged sword and we as gamers are precariously perched in the middle.
Kaptain Khaos
Wow 100% correct in my mind this is how i have always seen it WE ARE RATS....HAMSTERS....wotever u wanna call us were the ones that come to a game and we run around trying to level, quest, kill epic monsters and we have to pay to get that little bit of fun.
I cn tell u wen im a high level and it takes me at least a whole day to level up i get a buzz but when i find out i need to pay another $15 to continue i think wow i giv up.....but always....ALWAYS come bak because i know its worth it im like u William I LOVE SHINEY STUFF, glowing stuff ect....I just love walking round a city showing of the new armour i got from this super hard quest and then another $15 i dont want to do it but i just sucks me in......LET ME GOO!!
Toughtful article.
Made me want to look after Guildwars 2 a little more.. even though i wasn't fan of the first at all.
Excelent article. I agree although I don't think it's recent at all. It comes with the territory with MMOs. I remember the original EQ and it's horrible grind. In fact, I think devs try to do things to ease the grind but they're in a no-win situation which is the following:
1. A person playing an MMO regularly can go through hundreds of hours of content in a year. Some people go through thousands of hours a year.
2. There is no way with existing technology that any of the game companies out there can generate that much original content.
Therefore, they're pretty much FORCED to generate grinds. Whether it's redoing the same dungeon a hundred times, or killing the same monsters a thousand times, or redoing some battleground a hundred times. In some way or another devs are being forced to get players to do stuff over and over because they cannot create the huge amount of content needed to avoid that problem.
Maybe the solution is to change the business model as this writer seemed to imply -- if a game company's revenue is not tied to how long people play the game but just how many copies are sold (which has ALWAYS been the Guild Wars approach even in the original -- it was always buy the game and play for free). If they don't feel forced to keep people subscribed they might relax and just do a lot of content and not worry when people use it up and go on to something else (the company will get them again for the sequel).
Or maybe there's another approach. Whatever.
Until a solution is found, the people who like mind numbing repetitiveness will play MMOs and others will leave. Or they'll log on occasionally because something about the game attracts them but they won't play much because they can't stand the grind. Which makes me wonder if many so-called casual gamers are just people who can only stomach so much grind. It appears enough people are willing to put up with the situation and pay their monthly fees to keep MMOs going strong.
Some people LIKE doing the same task over and over thousands of times.
As for me, I'm starting to get fed up with the MMO genre.
Originally posted by: Kerix
"Maybe the solution is to change the business model as this writer seemed to imply -- if a game company's revenue is not tied to how long people play the game but just how many copies are sold (which has ALWAYS been the Guild Wars approach even in the original -- it was always buy the game and play for free). If they don't feel forced to keep people subscribed they might relax and just do a lot of content and not worry when people use it up and go on to something else (the company will get them again for the sequel)."
I agree with you in part, especially about developers not being able to generate tons of content. Originally MMOs were created as sandboxes to get around that problem. They were created in such a way that players were the masters of their own destiny. Because of that design philosophy (giving the players the tools to create their own world, and only stepping in when necessary) it allowed them more opportunity to make the game better and release better content, rather than trying to rush out content that players will run through in no time at all. I see that as the problem with modern themepark MMOs, the players depend on developer generated content, which is unpractical. They want the "heroic" single player game style of content, and that just doesn't work in an MMO. Eventually the content runs out and people will be forced to raid or endlessly kill the same creatures repeatedly.
But, if the developers changed the revenue model as you suggest, isn't that a single player game? Also, by paying that $15 per month you get constant updates and a persistent world. So far ArenaNet has pulled this off, but most people don't realize it has an item shop as well. It's not as robust as other games, but it does exist. So, they are generating revenue from other sources in addition to box sales. My point is that by changing the revenue model, you are essentially enforcing the single player game system of play. Because there is no need for people to subscribe, there is no incentive for them to publish those updates, and maintain the persistent world.
Either we have MMOs and pay the monthly subscription, or we can have single player games with the only associated cost being the purchase of the box or download. You can't have it both ways.
Now personally, I do agree that charging people for a box or download (including expansions), and then charging a monthly fee is inherently greedy. I prefer the free download and expansions with a monthly fee, or if you buy the box, the largest majority of that cost should incorporate the monthly subscription.
Thank goodness this article came about. I cannot recall anyone ever writing about why or what could have caused MMO's to become "unfun-anized".
I remember being a young buck at 16-17 years old (fuzzy memories from those ages) playing Asheron's Call. My oh my did this game get me hooked. At the time it wasn't about the graphics, or the "OH JEEZ HE HAS A HUGE SWORD PVP KILL RAID!" moments that made my want to play the game, rather the actual "COMMUNITY" and the developers who they themselves played alongside us that made it fun.
MMO's, and not trying to be biased here, should take a page from Asheron's Call and script something new from there. Why do we have to farm for "TIER 10 ARMOR" ? Could it be perhaps there really isn't anything out there that could be much better for your own type of playstyle? or perhaps that's the ONLY option one has? What I'm trying to say here is I still believe whole heartedly that a "skill" based MMO where one can pretty much create they're own character be it warmage, lifemage, anything warrior, archer-thing-a-ma-bob, is light years ahead of a pre-set with some customization type of character selection. This is simply because of the several options and choices one can make for their own gear. Do you need that special item that gives you +10 life but +5 magic? or perhaps you need more ATTACK but not that much defense? Whatever the need there are bountless of items you can choose from. You don't have to be funneled into just one armor/weapon that seems to cover all the bases for your character or anyone in general, that is BORING. I'd also like to mention a "collection of sets" that ultimately lead to an exciting type of weapon or armor, where one has to scour the world to collect small pieces and ultimately have it forged into something large and in charge. THAT's exciting!! Atleast for me it was.
Several factors play into the dumbing down of the MMO. How about make dying somewhat "FEARFUL", yes that's right, that it would actually be a 100 on the suckage to die instead of what it is nowadays where you simply get a negative tick that can be removed in one kill, this would actually spice things up a bit. Remove easy world travel? it IS rather "convenient" to travel from point A to point B, but hey come on, remember when you used to have to run for an hour to where you wanted to go to? Yes, it was long but you got to see so much more of the game and world, perhaps even discover something new on the way there! Questing that requires you to A+B=Cows x Spear of ultimate death. How simple and clear cut is that? Make questing as difficult as it used to be, make us THINK as to what it is needed for me to accomplish my deed, I want to feel like I EARNED IT ! LAstly, Crafting.
Crafting get's its own paragraph. Many a games tried to get it right, but failed and horribly so. In my humble opinion, the only game that got it right was SWG (Pre-anything). Yes, SWG had it perfectly done. I remember walking into someones weapons factory and waiting in a line to get my Scatter Blaster that was "Hand Made". This guy actually had factories set up, as well as collection points scattered across the world harvesting materials. I felt like this was actually a homemade weapon, an ORIGINAL. It also had "Made by so and so "quote". Genunie crafting that is always slightly better than the easy-to-get questing weapon, made crafting FUN, UNIQUE, and was available for those who wanted to wait a bit more just to get that weapon/armor (you had to wait a day for it to be fully completed by a player). Not only does the consumer get something out of this crafting style, but the prosumer as well. All I can say is, these guys although no on the battlefield killing killing killing, were building up their own playstyle and just all around rich rich rich.
In the end, I say bring back the "skill" based customization, bring back ACTUAL player driven economy and crafting (not the dumb downed crap we get, i hate that shit), bring back meaningfull questing and somewhat non existent convenient travel. MMO's have always had the same pattern of being dumb downed and turned into a kiddy game, for that I'll play Wizard School or whatever the hell that game is. I cannot recall when one of my friends didn't turn to me and say "Don't play so and so game because it has been turned into EASY MODE", and you can quote me quoting my friends on THAT!!
Thank you for your time and patience, bless you all and Happy Father's Day!
Gah, Where's Waldo?!?! Waldo being the right link =p Oh and Happy Father's day!!
And Jlee, Extremely insightful. Good job, I admire you for your outlook on this.
Originally posted by Jlee001:
"In the end, I say bring back the "skill" based customization, bring back ACTUAL player driven economy and crafting... , ...bring back meaningfull questing and somewhat non existent convenient travel."
I could not agree more.
/signed
Finding ways to keep player chained and paying rather than finding ways to entertaining him, sure sounds like most (if not all) mmos nowadays. Isnt there a single game which has something other than loot, party, exp? Games are simple, so that anyone can play them, my point is that it also leads to downfall. As you play some game with some character you learn how to win, get what you want, etc. This is where you meet endgame where your only objective is to be shinier than the other guy.
The only thing that can never be mastered is playing against other players is a thing, which is know to developers as PvP. Caged inside some zone, battling other prisoners for some lousy points so you can become shinier. You make no impact on the mmo world, you might be shinier than the other guys, but you can never do something gamebreaking, like gathering a few guilds and founding your own town over that cliff in the cave where the trolls lived (until your dwarven comrades wiped them out for good). We get battlegrounds, instances, PvP zones and other zones/rooms where you are limited to do one thing or another... And no for those sandbox games, they have freedom, yet they lack everything else.
So, rather than playing with thousand of people, you are playing with a group of people, you play minigames called questing, pvp, shopping, you play them all with your avatar, alone, with other people "running" around, like some background image. This isnt much different from server chat channel of games like rakion or gunz, where you battle inside player hosted roomsl And in their turn, they are similar to almost any singleplayer game with multiplayer option. This is mass multiplayer online roleplaying game, this is what they want us to believe and pay them money for...
IZI MODO?! Ha-ha-ha!
I enjoyed the first couple of years of LOTRO and then with every expansion came major changes to crafting, questing, and instancing. Instead of enjoying the story, exploring the world, and being creative with crafting, a lot of time had to be spent reading up on the changes. Crafting required new special ingredients that were so hard to get that you either had to grind certain creatures or take part in difficult instances. Those difficult instances required the best gear, which required hours spent in other instances to obtain. And as soon as you would figure out how to actually get through those difficult instance, they would change it and make it harder. I already have a job and don't need a game that requires all of my free time to obtain one item so I can move on to obtaining the next item. The only game that never turned into a grind, even after playing it for many years, was Ultima Online. Just too bad the graphics are so bad. I still consider it the best MMO ever created and hope there will be one like it someday with updated graphics.
Well it just asimple point of perspective I guess. Nothing more than an advert for GW2!
Like this forum with it's white text on black
"@#$% MY EYES"
My first experience with LA2 (also my 1st mmo experience) ended at lv14 with a thought "No way I'm doing that any longer!" (this wasn't my last experience with LA2 though...)
While LA2 isn't known for it's generosity in shiny rewards, what made me left is the process itself.
I've always been hard on the whole "cool high level content after several months of grind" concept. After the process stops being fun there's only so little grind i can endure.
I dunno why would I want an ogre slaying great sword of awesomeness if slaying ogres with it is the same as slaying badgers with my badger slaying dagger of harmlessness.
And you know what? It's damn hard to find an mmorpg with a vision like mine.
Concusions:
- The switch is the only known way to keep sufficient number of cage occupied at one time to keep the Massive machine operational. {Research indicates that smaller machines can be maintained by other methods since they don't require so many rats at the same time.}
- The switch itself provides so much rats that any other cage enhancements are not required.
- The rats are happy, since the switch appeals to them more then the unlocked exit.
Anyone remember the absolutely epic events in WoW, when GM's turned Onyxia or some other world boss loose on an unsuspecting player base? The resulting chaos and epic battles, with even level ones able to jump in as they took a hit and died, was awesome fun.
How about before WOTLK, when Alliance raiding a Horde city or vice versa, was an epic event? Making it an achievement somehow took something away from it...no one did it for any reward, it was just plain FUN! And for PVE'ers, who hate PVP, it was usually the one type of PVP they did enjoy.
Having an ACTIVE and INVOLVED team of devs and GM's would go much further, IMO, in bringing game life to a game, than adding a month's worth of grind fest quests.
Lay out the world basics. Throw in twists and turns that are unpredictable in quests. If you have the money to invest in developing grind fest quests, why not take the road less travelled and choose instead to build a good team of GM's who are actively involved in helping create a pseudo living gaming environment, where at any moment the city you are in will be hit by an invasion of marauding NPC's, or a world boss has broken free of his dungeon and is wreaking havoc through the country side, or a section of a city wall collapses and everyone has to pitch in and get it back up before some NPC boss attacks?
The linear model is, I think, part of the problem, going from level one to level whatever, with the same kill ten rats type quest redressed over and over in different ways getting you there. We love the fantasy setting, we love the story lines, we love the rich environment...but we absolutely HATE LOATHE AND DESPISE the grind fest quests.
How about...level expansions, not just level up? Make each level so fun you almost hate to leave it to go to the next level, instead of a necessary evil you endure just to get to endgame.
How about...experience points rewarded for defending your city from a random boss attack?
How about...gear that levels up with you and becomes epic through solving game lore based riddles and puzzles that change randomly, so that no one gets a cheat sheet on it?
All of which would require the devs/GM's/company actually caring enough about their player base to be actively involved with them, rather than treating them like a bunch of well trained monkeys that they toss in a maze and forget, until the next payment is due...
Kinda sad, really, isn't it? I mean, really, this whole environment was birthed by people who were rebels with pocket protectors, blazing new frontiers electronically through crazy experiments with just how far computers could go in creating virtual worlds...but once Wall Street got involved, the creativity and outside the box thinking was crushed beneath the weight of the bottom line.
Changing the game world. I finally realized that's why I keep comparing games to old-school Planetside, even though it had terrible flaws. It's the only MMO I've ever played where the entire focus of the game was on getting together with your side to "move the map" for your side, and the leveling system really only let you decide what role you'd play in that. Kind of an interesting study on how simple could be better, actually - their technology limitations forced them to make the game that way, and it worked.
GW2 looks like their dynamic quest system will put some of the "move the map" out there, so although I'm REALLY not into another fantasy game, I will probably give it a shot just to see how my character's actions can change things in the world. I just hope it's not too gear-oriented though.
One of the key aspects involved in addiction is Denial. That point has been proven by some of the responses to this article. "Addiction the only mental disorder that convinces the afflicted that its everyone else who is ill, not himself. This is because of addictive denial. This is not a conscious act." <- http://www.csun.edu/~vcpsy00h/students/drugs.htm
There are plenty of other scientific studies about addiction but, this paper I found particularly interesting.
It's quite pointless to write articles like the OP because people are blinded to it. There are plenty of guides on how to break through this barrier. But, the truth is, only the person that has the problem can choose to help themselves. As for the people saying "it's a choice" to continue playing. The truth of the matter is that, in a lot of cases, there is no choice until they realize there's a problem. That's why it's so hard for a lot of people to stop drug addictions or obsessive behavior: It's not so much the chemical addiction as it is the mind unconciously denying there is any problem to begin with.
Do I blame the companies for this? Not at all. I would latch onto this piece of human nature as well if my business depended on it. I'd have to start attacking Fast Food and Cigarettes if I were going to rage about subscription gaming companies. Not to mention pretty much every other aspect of consumerism on the planet. Nearly everything today is built to keep use hooked. Medicine that only represses symptoms if you take it daily, computer parts designed to need constant upgrades or replacements, cars built to need constant maintenance, food that's built to make you hungrier, drinks designed to make you thirsty, other edibles designed to addict you to carbohydrates, rechargable batteries designed to only recharge for so long, video media designed to be fragile, light bulbs designed to burn out, etc. I could go on for months listing things. Let's face it, we live in a consumerism age where it's more economical to keep your customers paying than to worry about their long-term health or happiness.
Our economics are not sustainable without wear and tear products. Less jobs, less money, etc. We could not survive without killing ourselves. Funny how that works.