They are all the same in one way shape or form. They are all cookie cutter clones of the basic Everquest/Asherons Call model, yes even WoW.
99% of the MMORPGs out there, are not MMORPGs, they are MMOThemeParks.
There is NO end game for most of them, no risk vs reward. Not like the pen & paper roleplaying games, where you spent months if not years building up a character with a party of friends adventuring through what ever game world you played in.
Death was a BIG part of life in those times and games, if your character died, it was GONE, you erased the character sheet and started over. Currently I cant think of ONE MMO that has that feature, a real perma-death that is VERY real and can happen.
Sure there are a few token attempts, like in Face of Mankind, where if you run out of money and clones you perma-die, but it doesnt hurt you, you dont lose any skills or anything, because there are no skills, levels, or attributes. Everyone is the same in that game. But if you played Face of Mankind for more than a month you will have so much money you wont ever have to worry about perma-death.
Star Wars Galaxys had perma-death for one class, but removed it because a small vocal minority cried loud enough to have it removed. So the game became Jedi vs Bounty online.
Star Trek Online, went from having multiple people crew a massive starship, to a cheap bad knock off of Eve Online.
From my point of view, a person who has been playing online games since the days of Kesmai's Multi-player Battletech:Solaris VII (aka VGA Battletech). And later into Ultima Online. There hasnt been a game like either of those.
I have watched monster companies like EA, come out with great concepts only to can them before they are released. Like Motor City Online, or Multi-player Battletech:3025. Or that sham of a Shadowrun game, that came out a while back.
Need I meantion Matrix Online... oh god.
This is puzzling. Virtually ever MMO has perma death for anyone who desires to play with that in game. It seems simple to me. In our real life when you die you are finished, you leave your stuff to others (a will or estate). Then, based on your personal beliefs you go on to something else - or not.
In game if you die then you can "will" your stuff to someone, give it to strangers, however you want. Money, equip,items et al...then you delete your character and have the obvious option of either leaving the game or creating a new avatar - the equivilant of religious beliefs in the real world. Done. Real perma-death is there for you to use anytime.
So why is the forced option of perma death so attractive for you? It is not because you can't do it, you can. I think it is that you want to force other players to do it without a choice. I am no psychologist so I will leave conclusions to you and others. It was just that I have seen this perma death subject come up a few times in different game threads and was wondering why it existed at all since you already have it.
MMORPG. Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game. That can mean different things to different people. Examples are shown in many of the posts in this thread. What I originally thought was an On-Line role playing game that had a lot of players in it (Massive Multiplayer). What that becomes depends on the individual person. The many posts defining MMO or MMORPG meaning something else - well opinions are like, uh, well you know the rest. Mine included.
As an extra I thought of an idea (i know, big deal, we all have them). Levels in an online game are a method of control and basically designed for a type of gameplay and to keep players playing (and paying) as long as possible. Good enough, I happen to think that is a win-win for player and company. Perhaps a method could be devized that gives an element of at least surprise. Supposed you have leveling but no players know when, where, why it happens. Mabey even individual leveling for different stats/skills/abilities? Surprise and something good happens during game play. You find you have increased something, mabey in the middle of a boring mission or big combat, BOOM!, something good happens. Don't know if or when or about caps etc...gives an element of...well...difference. Just a thought.
It is really simple and it is amazing how almsot every poster is posting the same few things and yet for like almost 7 years not a single developer has taken note.
Are. You. Freaking. Serious.
Every poster is not posting the same few things. Take another look through this thread, but with your eyes wide open. People are calling for: more complex and challenging PvE content; a major focus on hardcore PvP; fewer restrictions and more freedom to try anything; gameplay that differs greatly from existing MMOs. These four requests are so incompatible that they are virtually at opposite corners. It is not possible to create a game that does all of these things.
For example, there's Dredphyre's post about player agency; he wants players to have much more control over how they develop their characters and what they can do with their abilities. This is incompatible with a request for complex and challenging PvE content; developers need to have a tight control over characters' power levels because if there is a creative combination of skills that makes the fight into a cakewalk, the content will be perceived as much too easy and boring. This is incompatible with a focus on PvP; if you allow players to develop characters however they want, all notions of balanced classes with built-in strengths and weaknesses gets completely thrown out the window. This is incompatible with wildly different gameplay, because if players are left to create their experience from scratch, they're going to fall back on the same tried-and-true PvE strats like tank-and-spank and kiting.
If Dredphyre's ideal game was made, 95% of you would point to it and say "Epic fail, boycott this company, this game is proof that they never listen to anyone." You all need to accept the fact that the overwhelming majority of MMO players would consider your dream MMO absolute trash. We are not all asking for the same thing.
What people are not calling for however, is more instanced dungeons with gear grinds. Coupled with Battlegrounds that are essentially the same as the MMO i am currently playing, crafting that has very little impact on the game, more quest hubs with kill and fedex quests that i am already doing, linear achievment to the point of naseum, more rep grinds than you shake a stick at.. etc.
But it seems, for a good portion of the games, thats what we keep getting...
Today's MMOs fail for one single reason - WoW. Designers, bean counters, and everyone involved in the project see WoW, think they can mimic its success by simply recreating it with minor differences, and they will be an overnight success. Let me break it to anyone thinking this makes any sense at all - no one is leaving WoW for a WoW clone. It simply won't happen. Guilds, groups of friends, and the millions of current and former subscribers will not jump to your game unless you supply a drastically superior experience to Blizzard's offering, which you can't do. It's not possible to out-WoW WoW.
Maybe if pathetic sites like this actually had some integrity or honesty in its review staff then developers could be held accountable for the crap that they deliver. As long as you endeavor to screw over the community by continually singing the praises of every piece of trivial fetid trash that cruises by then the state of our hobby will continue to diminish.
This site, along with every other one out there, does nothing but seek to curry favor with game company marketing departments so that you all can run their ads. Sever yourself from the marketing departments, grow a set of balls, and learn something about integrity and maybe things can turn around.
Not every game coming is going to be great, couldn't tell that from any previews on this site.
Not every game is going to make everyone happy. Again, can't tell from the previews that your schlubs "write".
The closest you come to a criticism on this site is, there are some minor issues but we are sure they will get worked out by launch. They never are, but they suddenly fail to be mentioned when you go to review the game. Even though the issue is not only there but up front and center. If it is an asian grinder that no one has ever heard of and will never play, then you can give it a 6.... a d....still passing.
Problem with game companies? None. The problem is you. If Consumer Reports rolled over like you do then we wouldn't have a population problem as everyone would probably have died out driving exploding effing pintos. As long as you give them a pass then people will buy them, which means they make money.
MMOs failed when they started. They became about extracting money under false promises for years to a gullible crowd. When developers were first questioned about such acts, they defaced their customers and labeled them. Customers "Defended" the games they loved while being turned into victims.
Today its even worse. I literally was asked in a Job Interview if I enjoy "MMORPGs" and long activities. I also do everything possible to prevent an employer or group from tracking my information online in any form as I am not a member to any social network site and the information people find about me are the information I feed them.
Truth of the matter is people are to blame for MMORPGs being bad and poor. They pay into the genre and then argue against it while giving their money away. Once you give them money it means you bought the product and agree with them, regardless any argument you make against it. To fight means to boycott and even actively go against a product without being succered into it.
"People get the X they deserve and X gets the people they deserve!"
My biggest turnoff is simply not knowing the game, i mean take darkfall. I have been rather disbelieving of that game since its release. I read the forums once, heard some stuff about it being buggy and decided that it was not for me. Boom there comes wow, advertising all over the world the tv the game stores... Everywhere, there is nowhere you can turn where you don't see wow. I start it, think its crap. However i keep on playing it because i got nothing better to do. Then one day (a week ago) I decided to finally test out this darkfall that sounded a bit awesome some time ago, i had also just been getting negative feedback from my friends. So it took some time until i opened up to it.
So when i finally logged into the game, the first thing i thought was. Everything they say is true, i died on some goblins with my leafsword obviously. Then after two days on i get pked by some people and then i am on the verge of quitting, at that point i met my first friend ingame. He helped me a bit, right after i met a pkk'er and he helped hunting down the bastards from before. It quickly escalated to the point where i am not in a guild hunting reds and practicing every day. I am on 3-9 hours a day. Its simply awesome, so basically where darkfall fails and what everyone thinks darkfall fails from is simply the advertisement, i mean it is not the game for everyone but if you like feeling the danger of loosing awesome stuff and love the rewards you get from killing other players. Then that game is for you. Its just as simple as there are too few people that know about it.
So if any game company reads this. THE GAMING COMMUNITY's FIRST TURNOFF IS NOT KNOWING ABOUT THE GAME! Advertise advertise and the players will come to you, the amount of players that are subconsciously affected by random commercials numbers to the population of eve, wow and guildwars. Why can't anyone see this even when the player community in the game agrees on this. I mean the entire darkfall community agrees on this, however it never happens:( The gm's are awesome tough because they make awesome events where the gm's play monsters, beat that you damned gorilla wow! However, i have to agree the only place wow excells in this world is advertisement even just the title is awesome advertising, i mean if you cut of the toenail of the world's most loved person, then there would be people willing to walk through a swamp to get it.
Thats how wow is, it flashes a known and loved name, puts up commercials everywhere still using the name. Then they make you walk through the game (swamp) to get to the thing you think it will bring you (the toenail) and then once you are through it and about to touch it, at that point you understand that it was all a hoax and that it wasnt even that game's loved content at all (famous persons toenail.) Then now that you have already put that much time into it then you just continue playing because you already wasted that much time.
1) IMO one of the best starter areas were LOTRO. You were instantly captured in the overall ongoings of the world and the place of your race in the world. It always gave me this epic feeling, fitting to the Tolkien world.
2) Foums... well they are venom indeed. I must know. Dunno how to better filter this, tho. Many people become jerks when being anonymous. I am just as sure that my ideas are the best, as anyone else is about his. No clue how to solve this. But I do have this feeling companies often develop games without having a real clue how to satisfy a diverse crowd. They seem to focus on ONE crowd's favourite thing and neglect the others. IMVPO one of the main reasons WOW is so succesful is, it has something for many different kind of people, and it isn't narrowed to one or two things.
3) As European it took me a moment to ponder what "other side of the Pacific" meant. Well yeah, haven't seen any Asia game really been to my liking. Let's see if TERA makes it better. ^^
You know, IMVPO, most fail issues of games could be forseen. I don't think it took an Einstein to know why games like Vanguard, WAR, AoC, CO, STO asf. failed to reach their goals. For me, the failures of these games were always clear as the day, and simple issues, nothing complicated. There were always many people who told you about these games's issues, when others still claimed them to be the WOW-killer. So *some* people apparently see the issues. It's just that nobody listens. *shrug* So as humans function, they are likely to experience the same over and over in any forseeable future.
EDIT: I also think reviews in general are too "forgiving"; downplaying the issues and giving WAY too generous ratings. As long as trash still gets a "mercy" rating like 7/10, when it actually deserves 4/10, nothing will change. And unfortunately we gamers are buying way too much trash in idle hope for the miracle patch to come.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
I'm not real good with words, but I'll give it a go.
One problem that I feel should be fixed is designing games around getting as much real money from the player as possible. Don't get me wrong here, I understand making a living and that it's a business and all, but enough is enough. And I think that's in part where they're failing.
If you design a game that is based on sucking your players wallets dry, then it's not gonna be fun to play. All I see in a game like that is, how the heil do I play this game affordably? And that throws the fun factor out the window for me.
Design games to be fun, Give players more than they need, alot more. Then put a price on it and be done with it, if it's a good fun game you'll make your money.
The other problem I don't care for is games that go nowhere, and by that I mean, I play and play and grind to build my skills to aquire other things that require better skills, and I'm ok with that, but after I get all the skills I need and have killed all the things I wanna kill, explored all of everything, what's left? Nothing really. So I want to build. That's really the only other thing left for me to do, as I'm not really a pvp player, never will be. But I love the MMO worlds (don't give me crap about going and playing single player games or whatever, because that's a load of malarky) I love being in the game with lot's of people and doing "my" own thing, and if we meet and get it on, cool:) If we don't, I'm cool with that too. But I like being in a game that has people in it, whether I interact with them or not.
So, because I'm really working to be "Top Nothing" because there's nothing left to do, it just makes the whole game boring. I want a reason to be putting in all this "Work" and it is work. I don't want it to be work, I want it to be fun.
Just make a fun game and quit ripping the players off.
2) Foums... well they are venom indeed. I must know. Dunno how to better filter this, tho. Many people become jerks when being anonymous. I am just as sure that my ideas are the best, as anyone else is about his. No clue how to solve this. But I do have this feeling companies often develop games without having a real clue how to satisfy a diverse crowd. They seem to focus on ONE crowd's favourite thing and neglect the others. IMVPO one of the main reasons WOW is so succesful is, it has something for many different kind of people, and it isn't narrowed to one or two things.
....
EDIT: I also think reviews in general are too "forgiving"; downplaying the issues and giving WAY too generous ratings. As long as trash still gets a "mercy" rating like 7/10, when it actually deserves 4/10, nothing will change. And unfortunately we gamers are buying way too much trash in idle hope for the miracle patch to come.
Forums and community.
I don't think MMO companies pay nearly enough attention to this. MMO means community and that means that Forums will become important (often as important as in game chat and often more so).
Also 'community' starts to form the instant your game is announced. Not at release. An MMO community often forms YEARS before release. And...surprise, surprise... the same community you have in your forum is the same community you have in your game! Developers need to consider this and understand that the standards you set and allow on your forum are the same standards you will get in game (and vice versa).
So, if you allow your forums to be over-run with Fanbois who flame every 'newbie' poster and tell them to "STFU and go back to WoW" you should not be surprised when your game goes live and the same people behave exactly the same way in game - ganking and driving 'noobs' from the game. (As an easy reference for this - look at PotBS at release)
First impressions do count - and in MMOs the first impression is often NOT the in game starting area - but the Forums. (As another reference - Darkfall's Community was well known to many long long before release).
As for reviews - covered this before.
But to re-hash - to 'ordinary' people the average score out of 10 should be 5. This is the score a so-so game should get.
To reviewers it seems the average score is 7/10. Reviewers seem to be scorring games out of 5 and adding 5.
Until reviewers start to write for their readers - they will continue to lose the respect of the games community.
In the end, the problem with mmo in general is = the Player! This aint a trolling attempt but a true fact. A certain product can't be problematic or have any kind of defect if the user base wich it was made for doesn't use it or better, exist. There is nothing wrong with a MMO as long as nobody as heard of it, played it and dumped it!
You forget one very important thing as well. Games in beta are often, if not always under a non-disclosure agreement that forbid discussing anything about the game, good or bad, except those releases that are provided by the marketing department or a company rep. That's why I always wait 2-6 months after release to even think about a game, even if I beta tested it.
I would like to point out something that I havent seen discussed yet. Well thats not entirely true, some earlier post used the term "Player Agency", and thats kind of what I want to touch on. I may not speak for everyone, but I know there are some that will agree with me when I say; I'm tired of so much content!
I think where MMORPG's fail is that they have no faith in thier own playerbase. They dont want to loosen the reigns and let the community evolve on thier own. A good example of this is quests. In just about any game, you will enqounter quests ( I cant think of a game without them). And you are already familiar with the different types, i.e. 'kill this', 'deliver that'. And for many of us, these quests have become a burden. Instead of enjoying our new game, we find that in order to succeed at all, we need to go on quests and missions for the equipment and levels we need to get anywhere in the game.
And no experience is ever unique, everyone before you has done the same epic quests, defeated the same evil foes, and walked away with the same phat loot.
Been there, done that, got the T-shirt.
I would like to see games with more systems, and less content. where each player could have a unique experience, and not because of the latest patch or expansion, but because the players themselves had the option to influence their own world.
Games try to be everything and please too many player preferences, and the result is poor quality features. Our game has great pvp, pve, questing, graphics, speech and everything, and our game can be enjoyed by casual aswell as hardcore gamers - Fail.
So what doesnt fit my preferences, but may be good for others:
Handholding, and linear game leading you through a well designed path of quests, stories, zones etc. I want to play a game where I can choose and my choices might have consequences; I dont want to watch a movie, where I can only choose how fast it should play to the ..
Endgame. Name says it, the end of the game. I raid to get better gear, which Im going to use to raid to get better gear. This is enforced by the effect of another problem...
Too little content. I dont care that a game has actor speech, amazing animations, and bigger boobs, if I run out of interesting things to do or cant improve my character anymore. I want to evolve my character for a long time and ..
Roleplay ? Or rather be involvement in my character, beeing my character for a little while. Taking pride in my achievements and your skills and beeing more than just another [insert class]. I should be able evolve my character and be unique because of playing style, graphics, gear and more. I dont want anymore ..
Balancing. Waawaa my dibbadab is not as good as a hibbadub. Ohnoes unhappy customer, clickediclick new patch where we try to please everyone. We have to please everyone, and so we must have a limited number of possibilites or we cant control it = dumbing down game.
PvP in PvE in the same sphere is a killer, because PvP will have to be balanced and PvE must then follow - Too many games try to be both. I want ..
Challange and beeing able to fail, and even likely to fail unless I play well. I want moments of frustration that challange me to try different tactics. And when I finally succeed I get a ..
Feeling of acomplishment. Stop handing me awards for spending another hour with the great game BLAHDIBLAH tm (thank you for paying). Easy comes easy goes, very simple.
Actually I think where MMOs go wrong the most is the end-game bait and switch.
You have a game that is soloable or even preferably soloable through 69 levels. You ding level 70 and then everything you can do solo is practically meaningless and you need to either group or preferably raid to advance.
You have huge expansive and constantly shifting areas to explore as you go up levels. You hit 70 and you have say 4 different dungeons which lead to 2 more dungeons then 1 dungeon in a linear fashion after that done over and over and over.
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Not all games do this but I find it the biggest widespread failing.
One game that had a lot of it right was everquest 1. The content was an upside-down pyramid and when you reached the maximum level the world opened up in general as opposed to closing. Some of the later expansions diminished this somewhat BUT at least there were AAs so if you wanted to solo, you could at least advance in some way.
Contrast this with everquest 2. EQ2 is emminently soloable from start to being in visible sight of the finish line -- then there is literally nothing to do. You can go the pvp way or the raid way. Even small upgrades require a small group.
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Another place games go wrong is the crafting wall. EQ2 suffers from this issue as well. Someone at level 29 in mastercrafted gear is doing really well -- Someone at 69 in mastercrafted gear is laughable. Crafting is a huge benefit at the lower levels and of negligable worth at the endgame.
What is funny is EQ1 also did this kind of right in that you could at least get say magnetic parts in OOW and make decent things out of it. Hard parts from hard areas at least made decent items.
It is really simple and it is amazing how almsot every poster is posting the same few things and yet for like almost 7 years not a single developer has taken note.
Are. You. Freaking. Serious.
Every poster is not posting the same few things. Take another look through this thread, but with your eyes wide open. People are calling for: more complex and challenging PvE content; a major focus on hardcore PvP; fewer restrictions and more freedom to try anything; gameplay that differs greatly from existing MMOs. These four requests are so incompatible that they are virtually at opposite corners. It is not possible to create a game that does all of these things.
For example, there's Dredphyre's post about player agency; he wants players to have much more control over how they develop their characters and what they can do with their abilities. This is incompatible with a request for complex and challenging PvE content; developers need to have a tight control over characters' power levels because if there is a creative combination of skills that makes the fight into a cakewalk, the content will be perceived as much too easy and boring. This is incompatible with a focus on PvP; if you allow players to develop characters however they want, all notions of balanced classes with built-in strengths and weaknesses gets completely thrown out the window. This is incompatible with wildly different gameplay, because if players are left to create their experience from scratch, they're going to fall back on the same tried-and-true PvE strats like tank-and-spank and kiting.
If Dredphyre's ideal game was made, 95% of you would point to it and say "Epic fail, boycott this company, this game is proof that they never listen to anyone." You all need to accept the fact that the overwhelming majority of MMO players would consider your dream MMO absolute trash. We are not all asking for the same thing.
no not really, you can choose to spec in pistols or rifles or crabines or melee weapons such as the original SWG pre-cu and that was fun because you did not know what a player was capable of until you fought them. nor should you.
There are plenty examples of games scaling to a players abilitys just scaling the same old content but, makes it a challenge who ever you are or how you template is set up. This does not have to hurt pvp as tatics and stradgy can win the day.
The only way it affect "balance" in pvp is for people that lack the ability to think and rather rush in there and know before they get there what they need to do by a glance at armor, that is just stupid and simple minded and people are tired of it.
They go wrong when they give the players what they want.
Too many to please, and never can please enough no matter what. So when you start throwing in mixtures of content, the design turns to garbage. Content fails, so they resort to making everything polished and shiny, and low end everything else.
A game is just that... a game, not an emotional crutch.
1. The Grind-grinding isn't fun. Nothing turns me off more than the repetition of grinding level after level. Also grinding for gear, there is nothing in this world more frustrating than knowing the way to make your character better is by grinding for a piece of gear that drops .01% of the time from a monster that spawns once an hour, and that you need a party of ten or more in order to even attempt to kill this monster… and then a quarter of the party is also looking for this drop.
2. Lack of Group Play-Seems more that not lately MMOS are leaning towards more solo play. Encourage group play with more social quests.
3. Support Your Player Base-there are legitimate problems such as account hacking and other issues that need addressed. If I drop $69 on a game and pay $15 a month to play then when my account gets hacked HELP ME.
I personally would like to see more of s storyline, in-depth character creation, pve content that allowed a player a choice in their fate, and repercussions of those choices. I totally agree with the majority of the opinions here and most of what we have all mentioned will eventually turn me completely off from the MMO world.
The biggest glaring problem I see with mmos is endgame being as big as it is. The journey should be just as big. If developers made each class 100% unique story via progression. The leveling process wouldn't be considered as just a hinderance to endgame. TOR is going to be the first mmo to do this and it is going to increase the replay value 10 fold.
The second is linearity. There should be different ways to progress your character to max and there should be different max character build varieties. Endgame shouldn't be linear treadmills either. FFXi Abyssea is an example of a non linear themepark endgame. There is multiple gear paths and a robust character merit system(Atma). All endgame shouldn't be themepark, but should be a mix of sandbox and themepark.
Thirdly is depth and reward. Every player should be rewarded accordingly. There should be challenging but accessible content for casuals. But for the player who really sinks their time into an mmo. There should be long term rewards. If you pay a sub and work steadily at a goal. You should be rewarded with a different sense of accomplishment.
Subscription based mmos need to offer depth and replayabliity from day one journey to endgame and on. Because there is so wide an array of different playstyles. The genre does need to innovate a bit more. But I assume developers are scared to push envelopes. Because the reward for innovating doesn't warrant the risk of failure in most cases. It's sad, because to me an mmo has so much more potential than offline games. but it is seldomly realized due to demands.
The biggest glaring problem I see with mmos is endgame being as big as it is. The journey should be just as big. If developers made each class 100% unique story via progression. The leveling process wouldn't be considered as just a hinderance to endgame. TOR is going to be the first mmo to do this and it is going to increase the replay value 10 fold.
The second is linearity. There should be different ways to progress your character to max and there should be different max character build varieties. Endgame shouldn't be linear treadmills either. FFXi Abyssea is an example of a non linear themepark endgame. There is multiple gear paths and a robust character merit system(Atma). All endgame shouldn't be themepark, but should be a mix of sandbox and themepark.
Thirdly is depth and reward. Every player should be rewarded accordingly. There should be challenging but accessible content for casuals. But for the player who really sinks their time into an mmo. There should be long term rewards. If you pay a sub and work steadily at a goal. You should be rewarded with a different sense of accomplishment.
Subscription based mmos need to offer depth and replayabliity from day one journey to endgame and on. Because there is so wide an array of different playstyles. The genre does need to innovate a bit more. But I assume developers are scared to push envelopes. Because the reward for innovating doesn't warrant the risk of failure in most cases. It's sad, because to me an mmo has so much more potential than offline games. but it is seldomly realized due to demands.
Agreed, but I actually think it is more about the journey than the goal. Maybe it is time to retire levels altogether and try some other way to simulate experience instead. I wish some old Runequest (P&P) player made a MMORG.
I don't really agree with the levelless systems around, they are either pretty bad, simplistic or like Eve makes it impossible to become as good as someone that played longer no matter if you are better. There are however many P&P games that have solved this in good ways.
A character should slowly become better for the entire time you play the game, not just for a week and then it is up to gear.
We need more devs that also play P&P RPGs, if Mythic would have played the P&P Warhammer fantasy RPG they could have actually made a game that would feel like a Warhammer game should and they would probably have more players today.
Comments
MMORPG. Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game. That can mean different things to different people. Examples are shown in many of the posts in this thread. What I originally thought was an On-Line role playing game that had a lot of players in it (Massive Multiplayer). What that becomes depends on the individual person. The many posts defining MMO or MMORPG meaning something else - well opinions are like, uh, well you know the rest. Mine included.
As an extra I thought of an idea (i know, big deal, we all have them). Levels in an online game are a method of control and basically designed for a type of gameplay and to keep players playing (and paying) as long as possible. Good enough, I happen to think that is a win-win for player and company. Perhaps a method could be devized that gives an element of at least surprise. Supposed you have leveling but no players know when, where, why it happens. Mabey even individual leveling for different stats/skills/abilities? Surprise and something good happens during game play. You find you have increased something, mabey in the middle of a boring mission or big combat, BOOM!, something good happens. Don't know if or when or about caps etc...gives an element of...well...difference. Just a thought.
What people are not calling for however, is more instanced dungeons with gear grinds. Coupled with Battlegrounds that are essentially the same as the MMO i am currently playing, crafting that has very little impact on the game, more quest hubs with kill and fedex quests that i am already doing, linear achievment to the point of naseum, more rep grinds than you shake a stick at.. etc.
But it seems, for a good portion of the games, thats what we keep getting...
Yawn.
Maybe if pathetic sites like this actually had some integrity or honesty in its review staff then developers could be held accountable for the crap that they deliver. As long as you endeavor to screw over the community by continually singing the praises of every piece of trivial fetid trash that cruises by then the state of our hobby will continue to diminish.
This site, along with every other one out there, does nothing but seek to curry favor with game company marketing departments so that you all can run their ads. Sever yourself from the marketing departments, grow a set of balls, and learn something about integrity and maybe things can turn around.
Not every game coming is going to be great, couldn't tell that from any previews on this site.
Not every game is going to make everyone happy. Again, can't tell from the previews that your schlubs "write".
The closest you come to a criticism on this site is, there are some minor issues but we are sure they will get worked out by launch. They never are, but they suddenly fail to be mentioned when you go to review the game. Even though the issue is not only there but up front and center. If it is an asian grinder that no one has ever heard of and will never play, then you can give it a 6.... a d....still passing.
Problem with game companies? None. The problem is you. If Consumer Reports rolled over like you do then we wouldn't have a population problem as everyone would probably have died out driving exploding effing pintos. As long as you give them a pass then people will buy them, which means they make money.
http://www.speedtest.net/result/7300033012
Number one fail in any MMO has to be: Lack of Consequences!
MMOs failed when they started. They became about extracting money under false promises for years to a gullible crowd. When developers were first questioned about such acts, they defaced their customers and labeled them. Customers "Defended" the games they loved while being turned into victims.
Today its even worse. I literally was asked in a Job Interview if I enjoy "MMORPGs" and long activities. I also do everything possible to prevent an employer or group from tracking my information online in any form as I am not a member to any social network site and the information people find about me are the information I feed them.
Truth of the matter is people are to blame for MMORPGs being bad and poor. They pay into the genre and then argue against it while giving their money away. Once you give them money it means you bought the product and agree with them, regardless any argument you make against it. To fight means to boycott and even actively go against a product without being succered into it.
"People get the X they deserve and X gets the people they deserve!"
My biggest turnoff is simply not knowing the game, i mean take darkfall. I have been rather disbelieving of that game since its release. I read the forums once, heard some stuff about it being buggy and decided that it was not for me. Boom there comes wow, advertising all over the world the tv the game stores... Everywhere, there is nowhere you can turn where you don't see wow. I start it, think its crap. However i keep on playing it because i got nothing better to do. Then one day (a week ago) I decided to finally test out this darkfall that sounded a bit awesome some time ago, i had also just been getting negative feedback from my friends. So it took some time until i opened up to it.
So when i finally logged into the game, the first thing i thought was. Everything they say is true, i died on some goblins with my leafsword obviously. Then after two days on i get pked by some people and then i am on the verge of quitting, at that point i met my first friend ingame. He helped me a bit, right after i met a pkk'er and he helped hunting down the bastards from before. It quickly escalated to the point where i am not in a guild hunting reds and practicing every day. I am on 3-9 hours a day. Its simply awesome, so basically where darkfall fails and what everyone thinks darkfall fails from is simply the advertisement, i mean it is not the game for everyone but if you like feeling the danger of loosing awesome stuff and love the rewards you get from killing other players. Then that game is for you. Its just as simple as there are too few people that know about it.
So if any game company reads this. THE GAMING COMMUNITY's FIRST TURNOFF IS NOT KNOWING ABOUT THE GAME! Advertise advertise and the players will come to you, the amount of players that are subconsciously affected by random commercials numbers to the population of eve, wow and guildwars. Why can't anyone see this even when the player community in the game agrees on this. I mean the entire darkfall community agrees on this, however it never happens:( The gm's are awesome tough because they make awesome events where the gm's play monsters, beat that you damned gorilla wow! However, i have to agree the only place wow excells in this world is advertisement even just the title is awesome advertising, i mean if you cut of the toenail of the world's most loved person, then there would be people willing to walk through a swamp to get it.
Thats how wow is, it flashes a known and loved name, puts up commercials everywhere still using the name. Then they make you walk through the game (swamp) to get to the thing you think it will bring you (the toenail) and then once you are through it and about to touch it, at that point you understand that it was all a hoax and that it wasnt even that game's loved content at all (famous persons toenail.) Then now that you have already put that much time into it then you just continue playing because you already wasted that much time.
Good read. Some insights from me:
1) IMO one of the best starter areas were LOTRO. You were instantly captured in the overall ongoings of the world and the place of your race in the world. It always gave me this epic feeling, fitting to the Tolkien world.
2) Foums... well they are venom indeed. I must know. Dunno how to better filter this, tho. Many people become jerks when being anonymous. I am just as sure that my ideas are the best, as anyone else is about his. No clue how to solve this. But I do have this feeling companies often develop games without having a real clue how to satisfy a diverse crowd. They seem to focus on ONE crowd's favourite thing and neglect the others. IMVPO one of the main reasons WOW is so succesful is, it has something for many different kind of people, and it isn't narrowed to one or two things.
3) As European it took me a moment to ponder what "other side of the Pacific" meant.
Well yeah, haven't seen any Asia game really been to my liking. Let's see if TERA makes it better. ^^
You know, IMVPO, most fail issues of games could be forseen. I don't think it took an Einstein to know why games like Vanguard, WAR, AoC, CO, STO asf. failed to reach their goals. For me, the failures of these games were always clear as the day, and simple issues, nothing complicated. There were always many people who told you about these games's issues, when others still claimed them to be the WOW-killer. So *some* people apparently see the issues. It's just that nobody listens. *shrug* So as humans function, they are likely to experience the same over and over in any forseeable future.
EDIT: I also think reviews in general are too "forgiving"; downplaying the issues and giving WAY too generous ratings. As long as trash still gets a "mercy" rating like 7/10, when it actually deserves 4/10, nothing will change. And unfortunately we gamers are buying way too much trash in idle hope for the miracle patch to come.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
I'm not real good with words, but I'll give it a go.
One problem that I feel should be fixed is designing games around getting as much real money from the player as possible. Don't get me wrong here, I understand making a living and that it's a business and all, but enough is enough. And I think that's in part where they're failing.
If you design a game that is based on sucking your players wallets dry, then it's not gonna be fun to play. All I see in a game like that is, how the heil do I play this game affordably? And that throws the fun factor out the window for me.
Design games to be fun, Give players more than they need, alot more. Then put a price on it and be done with it, if it's a good fun game you'll make your money.
The other problem I don't care for is games that go nowhere, and by that I mean, I play and play and grind to build my skills to aquire other things that require better skills, and I'm ok with that, but after I get all the skills I need and have killed all the things I wanna kill, explored all of everything, what's left? Nothing really. So I want to build. That's really the only other thing left for me to do, as I'm not really a pvp player, never will be. But I love the MMO worlds (don't give me crap about going and playing single player games or whatever, because that's a load of malarky) I love being in the game with lot's of people and doing "my" own thing, and if we meet and get it on, cool:) If we don't, I'm cool with that too. But I like being in a game that has people in it, whether I interact with them or not.
So, because I'm really working to be "Top Nothing" because there's nothing left to do, it just makes the whole game boring. I want a reason to be putting in all this "Work" and it is work. I don't want it to be work, I want it to be fun.
Just make a fun game and quit ripping the players off.
Check my blog for some concepts I came up with.
Godspeed my fellow gamer
Forums and community.
I don't think MMO companies pay nearly enough attention to this. MMO means community and that means that Forums will become important (often as important as in game chat and often more so).
Also 'community' starts to form the instant your game is announced. Not at release. An MMO community often forms YEARS before release. And...surprise, surprise... the same community you have in your forum is the same community you have in your game! Developers need to consider this and understand that the standards you set and allow on your forum are the same standards you will get in game (and vice versa).
So, if you allow your forums to be over-run with Fanbois who flame every 'newbie' poster and tell them to "STFU and go back to WoW" you should not be surprised when your game goes live and the same people behave exactly the same way in game - ganking and driving 'noobs' from the game. (As an easy reference for this - look at PotBS at release)
First impressions do count - and in MMOs the first impression is often NOT the in game starting area - but the Forums. (As another reference - Darkfall's Community was well known to many long long before release).
As for reviews - covered this before.
But to re-hash - to 'ordinary' people the average score out of 10 should be 5. This is the score a so-so game should get.
To reviewers it seems the average score is 7/10. Reviewers seem to be scorring games out of 5 and adding 5.
Until reviewers start to write for their readers - they will continue to lose the respect of the games community.
Nothing says irony like spelling ideot wrong.
In the end, the problem with mmo in general is = the Player! This aint a trolling attempt but a true fact. A certain product can't be problematic or have any kind of defect if the user base wich it was made for doesn't use it or better, exist. There is nothing wrong with a MMO as long as nobody as heard of it, played it and dumped it!
You forget one very important thing as well. Games in beta are often, if not always under a non-disclosure agreement that forbid discussing anything about the game, good or bad, except those releases that are provided by the marketing department or a company rep. That's why I always wait 2-6 months after release to even think about a game, even if I beta tested it.
I would like to point out something that I havent seen discussed yet. Well thats not entirely true, some earlier post used the term "Player Agency", and thats kind of what I want to touch on. I may not speak for everyone, but I know there are some that will agree with me when I say; I'm tired of so much content!
I think where MMORPG's fail is that they have no faith in thier own playerbase. They dont want to loosen the reigns and let the community evolve on thier own. A good example of this is quests. In just about any game, you will enqounter quests ( I cant think of a game without them). And you are already familiar with the different types, i.e. 'kill this', 'deliver that'. And for many of us, these quests have become a burden. Instead of enjoying our new game, we find that in order to succeed at all, we need to go on quests and missions for the equipment and levels we need to get anywhere in the game.
And no experience is ever unique, everyone before you has done the same epic quests, defeated the same evil foes, and walked away with the same phat loot.
Been there, done that, got the T-shirt.
I would like to see games with more systems, and less content. where each player could have a unique experience, and not because of the latest patch or expansion, but because the players themselves had the option to influence their own world.
Games try to be everything and please too many player preferences, and the result is poor quality features. Our game has great pvp, pve, questing, graphics, speech and everything, and our game can be enjoyed by casual aswell as hardcore gamers - Fail.
So what doesnt fit my preferences, but may be good for others:
Handholding, and linear game leading you through a well designed path of quests, stories, zones etc. I want to play a game where I can choose and my choices might have consequences; I dont want to watch a movie, where I can only choose how fast it should play to the ..
Endgame. Name says it, the end of the game. I raid to get better gear, which Im going to use to raid to get better gear. This is enforced by the effect of another problem...
Too little content. I dont care that a game has actor speech, amazing animations, and bigger boobs, if I run out of interesting things to do or cant improve my character anymore. I want to evolve my character for a long time and ..
Roleplay ? Or rather be involvement in my character, beeing my character for a little while. Taking pride in my achievements and your skills and beeing more than just another [insert class]. I should be able evolve my character and be unique because of playing style, graphics, gear and more. I dont want anymore ..
Balancing. Waawaa my dibbadab is not as good as a hibbadub. Ohnoes unhappy customer, clickediclick new patch where we try to please everyone. We have to please everyone, and so we must have a limited number of possibilites or we cant control it = dumbing down game.
PvP in PvE in the same sphere is a killer, because PvP will have to be balanced and PvE must then follow - Too many games try to be both. I want ..
Challange and beeing able to fail, and even likely to fail unless I play well. I want moments of frustration that challange me to try different tactics. And when I finally succeed I get a ..
Feeling of acomplishment. Stop handing me awards for spending another hour with the great game BLAHDIBLAH tm (thank you for paying). Easy comes easy goes, very simple.
Just to mention a few things.
"I am my connectome" https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HA7GwKXfJB0
Actually I think where MMOs go wrong the most is the end-game bait and switch.
You have a game that is soloable or even preferably soloable through 69 levels. You ding level 70 and then everything you can do solo is practically meaningless and you need to either group or preferably raid to advance.
You have huge expansive and constantly shifting areas to explore as you go up levels. You hit 70 and you have say 4 different dungeons which lead to 2 more dungeons then 1 dungeon in a linear fashion after that done over and over and over.
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Not all games do this but I find it the biggest widespread failing.
One game that had a lot of it right was everquest 1. The content was an upside-down pyramid and when you reached the maximum level the world opened up in general as opposed to closing. Some of the later expansions diminished this somewhat BUT at least there were AAs so if you wanted to solo, you could at least advance in some way.
Contrast this with everquest 2. EQ2 is emminently soloable from start to being in visible sight of the finish line -- then there is literally nothing to do. You can go the pvp way or the raid way. Even small upgrades require a small group.
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Another place games go wrong is the crafting wall. EQ2 suffers from this issue as well. Someone at level 29 in mastercrafted gear is doing really well -- Someone at 69 in mastercrafted gear is laughable. Crafting is a huge benefit at the lower levels and of negligable worth at the endgame.
What is funny is EQ1 also did this kind of right in that you could at least get say magnetic parts in OOW and make decent things out of it. Hard parts from hard areas at least made decent items.
no not really, you can choose to spec in pistols or rifles or crabines or melee weapons such as the original SWG pre-cu and that was fun because you did not know what a player was capable of until you fought them. nor should you.
There are plenty examples of games scaling to a players abilitys just scaling the same old content but, makes it a challenge who ever you are or how you template is set up. This does not have to hurt pvp as tatics and stradgy can win the day.
The only way it affect "balance" in pvp is for people that lack the ability to think and rather rush in there and know before they get there what they need to do by a glance at armor, that is just stupid and simple minded and people are tired of it.
when microprocessor tries t o handle my own imagination and creativity,there it goes wrong.
sadly the future looks more and more automated roleplaying so you can just relax and computer roleplays for you attitute.
Generation P
They go wrong when they give the players what they want.
Too many to please, and never can please enough no matter what. So when you start throwing in mixtures of content, the design turns to garbage. Content fails, so they resort to making everything polished and shiny, and low end everything else.
A game is just that... a game, not an emotional crutch.
Kadarius writes:
Stop being copies of copies as has been said many times.--
This sentence had me laughing my a$$ off. Pure win.
1. The Grind-grinding isn't fun. Nothing turns me off more than the repetition of grinding level after level. Also grinding for gear, there is nothing in this world more frustrating than knowing the way to make your character better is by grinding for a piece of gear that drops .01% of the time from a monster that spawns once an hour, and that you need a party of ten or more in order to even attempt to kill this monster… and then a quarter of the party is also looking for this drop.
2. Lack of Group Play-Seems more that not lately MMOS are leaning towards more solo play. Encourage group play with more social quests.
3. Support Your Player Base-there are legitimate problems such as account hacking and other issues that need addressed. If I drop $69 on a game and pay $15 a month to play then when my account gets hacked HELP ME.
I personally would like to see more of s storyline, in-depth character creation, pve content that allowed a player a choice in their fate, and repercussions of those choices. I totally agree with the majority of the opinions here and most of what we have all mentioned will eventually turn me completely off from the MMO world.
Wow, great points from everyone. This is exactly what I am talking about in terms of getting the message out there.
and yes, there are devs out there that are not soild gamers at heart....that is frustrating.
some devs are amazing though. I guess there is good and bad like anything else.
The biggest glaring problem I see with mmos is endgame being as big as it is. The journey should be just as big. If developers made each class 100% unique story via progression. The leveling process wouldn't be considered as just a hinderance to endgame. TOR is going to be the first mmo to do this and it is going to increase the replay value 10 fold.
The second is linearity. There should be different ways to progress your character to max and there should be different max character build varieties. Endgame shouldn't be linear treadmills either. FFXi Abyssea is an example of a non linear themepark endgame. There is multiple gear paths and a robust character merit system(Atma). All endgame shouldn't be themepark, but should be a mix of sandbox and themepark.
Thirdly is depth and reward. Every player should be rewarded accordingly. There should be challenging but accessible content for casuals. But for the player who really sinks their time into an mmo. There should be long term rewards. If you pay a sub and work steadily at a goal. You should be rewarded with a different sense of accomplishment.
Subscription based mmos need to offer depth and replayabliity from day one journey to endgame and on. Because there is so wide an array of different playstyles. The genre does need to innovate a bit more. But I assume developers are scared to push envelopes. Because the reward for innovating doesn't warrant the risk of failure in most cases. It's sad, because to me an mmo has so much more potential than offline games. but it is seldomly realized due to demands.
Agreed, but I actually think it is more about the journey than the goal. Maybe it is time to retire levels altogether and try some other way to simulate experience instead. I wish some old Runequest (P&P) player made a MMORG.
I don't really agree with the levelless systems around, they are either pretty bad, simplistic or like Eve makes it impossible to become as good as someone that played longer no matter if you are better. There are however many P&P games that have solved this in good ways.
A character should slowly become better for the entire time you play the game, not just for a week and then it is up to gear.
We need more devs that also play P&P RPGs, if Mythic would have played the P&P Warhammer fantasy RPG they could have actually made a game that would feel like a Warhammer game should and they would probably have more players today.
"A character should slowly become better for the entire time you play the game, not just for a week and then it is up to gear."
100% correct...WoW started this POS model and now all other MMO's do it too.
Sad that new MMO's refuse to innovate and instead "Imitate".