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MMOs and Single Player Games
AlBQuirky
Member EpicPosts: 7,432
Over on the Bethesda Skyrim Forums, there is a topic about how long people have logged on Skyrim. Since you HAVE to go through Steam, keeping track is pretty easy 
The game is 15 months old now and many people have well over 1000 hours played, myself included. I look at this and shake my head at MMOs today.
My latest MMO delvings have been far less than 500 hours. The last being GW2 for about 350 hours.
MMOs are supposed to be the games that keep players playing for a long time. They constantly update their games and introduce new content and patches. They are supposed to be "works in progress" that keep players interested in logging back in day after day.
I put in well over 1000 hours each playing EQ, CoH, WoW, and Wizard101. I just don't find the longevity in new MMOs anymore.
For $60 US I can buy an MMO that I will more than likely play for 300-400 hours (aka: maybe a month or two) if it is any good and be done with it, having personally saved the world (to no visible effect) and seeing all the vanilla content I desire to experience.
OR...
I can pay $60 US and buy a single player RPG that will last me years of playing and entertainment.
Yes there is DLC in SP games and expacs for MMOs. There are patches for both types. There are sometimes mods for SP games, but I usually do not do those unless they are graphical improvements (like widescreen Morrowind and Oblivion playability).
Single Player games I still play:
SW:KotOR I and II (2003 and 2004, respectively)
Morrowind (2002)
Oblivion (2006) (I keep trying to get into this one )
Neverwinter Nights I (2002) (I do have some player made mods for that one)
Anyone else finding they are turning to single player RPGs for their long term game play when they could be looking towards MMOs for that? (For those players that look for long term enjoyment from games, that is.)
- Al
Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse.- FARGIN_WAR
Comments
Yep. I find myself buying more single player RPG's, etc. And sadly...they last in the entertainment and replayability sectors far better than any current MMORPG.
Part of me can't help but wonder if one of the reasons (though obviously not the only reason) that MMOs seem to suffer a lack of longetivity is because of a need to "Keep up with the Jones", the "Jones" in this case being other people. I mean think about it; a lot of people have had points where they are feeling urges of competitiveness, so they go out of their way to compete with other people that they see in an MMO, to the point of total burnout. They eventually give up as a result and the next time they want to consider going against someone again, they remember the feeling of burnout due to never feeling like they ever actually caught up with "the Jones" and quit while they feel they are ahead, thus leading to less longetivity.
Sorry if this is hard to understand.
But to answer the topic, I have been playing more Single Player Games.
I can see the "Keeping up with the Jones'" kind of thinking being more prevalent in MMOs. I've never been one to do this, but I understand.
I think a lot of it is due to other players. In a single player game, I am free to role play my character and have a concept for them. In MMOs, if one does not have the FotM build and the best gear, they are ostracized by a goodly number of other players. Either directly be declining group play outright, or indirectly in map chat with the criteria/prerequisites required to join their group. Not EVERY player is this way, but I run into these types much more often than players seeking a fun adventure instead of an ultra-intense experience 90-100% of the time.
Still, the MMOs themselves just do not offer what they used to, for me. The RPG is sadly gone from the MMORPG genre. The majority of players do not want that aspect in their MMOs. I cannot blame the developers for their choices.
- Al
Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse.- FARGIN_WAR
Quite often, although I don't have the hours lately.
GF and I did a full to end including xpac in classic unreal (coop shooter RPG) a while ago. Great fun, better than any stale MMO gameplay today.
Morrowind is a personal favorite. Ob is okay, but some parts feel a bit too plastic in places. MW is quite gritty and moody. I like that in gameplay.
Correction: they are meant to make you play a long while only when they require a subscription fee. I finished Skyrim in something like 30-40 hours and that is pretty much the standard. All Bioware's games are played through within that. For example, KotOR 2 was 28 hours for me. Neverwinter Nights 2, was less than 30 hours. Some of the exapacs of NWN 1 were in the signel digits. Those that I can remember. None really have made me play hundreds of hours. Likely none will without PvP.
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been -Wayne Gretzky
i play alot of games to have my fix :<
i play moba for that rush, i play mmo for that multiplayer instance run, and i play fps just so i can kill alot kekeke xD
i love playing rpg coz i play at my own pace and there is no outside pressure from anyone
but yeah, i havent really played much mmo for the past 2 years and it makes me sad because i was soooo addicted to it sniff
There are people who play games and then there are gamers.
http://alzplz.blogspot.com
Yes it is very sad.
What seems to have evolved is a system where players rush through the content in order to reach the "End Game" what comes befor the "End Game" is then seen as a pointless grind that needs to be "FIXED" in order to improve their "Quality of Life".
But what you actually have in this "End Game" is some default location acting as a virtual lobby for some instanced activity that they repeat in order to get the gear they need to move onto the next instance that they will also repeat in order to get the gear to .... well you get the idea.
Role playing gone.
Virtual worlds disappearing as they are "grind" that lacks "Quality of Life".
Sort of the PvE equivalent to a MOBA, Everquest players predicted this happening when SOE introduced the instanced raid. It has taken much longer than they (and I) predicted but it has come to pass.
To make a Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game we need to get rid of the instances both raids and groups. We also need to get rid of the "Boss Fight" and move to giving players other objectives and opportunities that take time. I know some of you are saying "Sandbox" at this time, but too often "Sandbox" is taken to mean full on FFA PvP and that is not what I mean at all. If such a game needs PvP at all (and I suspect it does) then there should be real penalties for killing players. Perhaps a faction rating that as it lowers means that NPC's start buying from you at lower and lower prices and selling to you at higher prices until finally they stop. As well as similar penalties (at a lower rate) for dealing in "stolen goods" or consorting with bandits.
There should also be a faction that effects your mana regeneration, getting a bad reputation with your God should mean you find spells harder and harder to cast particularly as a Priest or Cleric.
...and Zune was intended to compete with (or atleast offer a alternative to) iPod.
The discrepancy of the goals and intentions versus the (percieved) reality is what the OP talks about, not about the goals themselves.
(You are keeping statistics of your game time as back as 2005?
)
Flame on!
"If I offended you, you needed it" -Corey Taylor
i have to say i play them equally as long, in the last year, i spent an equal amount of time on each, about two weeks, Rift, SwTor, GW2, Tera, The Secret World, and im sure im forgetting something, so thats the MMOs. Single player, Dead Island, Far Cry 3, Skyrim, Bulletstorm, Borderlands, and im sure im forgetting some of those.
now there is a simple reason i alternate between the two, i can play an MMO until i have to grind gear, or grind levels, or anything that becomes less fun, it maybe that relationships in the guild become grinding, I.E to many demands put on me to participate, group, raid, etc. somewhere around that point i find i need to unplug from MMOs and do my own thing.
So im in my Singleplayer game, doing my thing, enjoying the vast array of cool things, most recently it was Far Cry 3, game is going great having fun sneaking into outposts, doing the story, hang gliding across an area or racing my dune buggy along the beach, then i finish the story. Now i am at that point in the single player game where there really isnt anything i haven't done already, and there is nothing about it that i really want to replay yet, since i just finished it ysterday. the idea of deleting my game and starting over is too hard to do, to "erase the slate" so to speak.
no one game has encompassed both for me, and i can almost visualize it. a FPS with great combat system like in Far cry 3, like sneaking, and little melee but alot of long range weapons, with vehicles galore, smart AI, but you gotta have friends in it and it has to be vast which i think is were the MMO side of it comes in. singleplayer games are one offs, unless it has decent online multiplayer, yet that is limited too, so you play through once and your done. MMOs are too big too grand to general, the world should be large, but not available to all, GW2 i think lost me when i realized as a human that char, asura and everyone else got to see my beautiful city, and all races was the same, all zones were the same, same same same, blah. they got there char in my human personal space!
so probably no right answer on which is better, i like them both. depends on my mood that month. the playability in the singleplayers is better, better combat, better graphics, better gameplay and story. but MMOs obviously win the "play with your friends" argument.
for long term enjoyment, i have always defualting to playing a singleplayer turn-based strategy game, one in particular created by D&D, called Birthright: Gorgon's Alliance. i would consider it a D&D version of the board game risk yet this was a windows 95 game. wish someone would remake it with new engine and graphics and gameplay. if i could only play one game for rest of my life it owuld probably be that one. and it's close to 20 years old.
No I don't keep statistics
I remember KotOR2 only because they promised around 40 hours of gameplay and I finished it in 28. And I completed every single quest I could find. It tracked the time played in the save game. Dark Side was seriously OP.
But generally, I don't fuck around in games much.
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been -Wayne Gretzky
MMO design was turned on its head years ago. Now they are just solo rpg's online. The main drive in MMO design in the last five or more years has been to keep up with solo graphics. This has led to every other design principle being thrown overboard in a desperate attempt to keep up. Remaking MMO's in an image solo gamers want to play started before that, well over five years ago, but that process is still moulding MMO gameplay to mimic a solo games today. These two factors are the main reasons we are at this point.
RP Tools, housing, meaningful crafting, raids, grouping led PvE, large scale PvP etc, have all taken a hit and been ditched or watered down to being meaningless.
I don't see why i "should be" looking towards MMOs. MMOs are just games, like other games. If it is fun, i play it longer.
If you look at my gaming history, i spent probably most time in WOW because i played that for a few years. EQ for 1 year. But recently, most of my time is in ARPG like D3 and single player games. I have some hours in STO, but not as much as these other games.
I don't treat MMO differently ... they are just online games. I will go to the game i want to play at the moment whatever my mood calls for. Like last night, i play Dead Space 3 because it is new and fun.
So what about people like me who don't give a damn about the Jones'? I don't compete with anyone, in fact, I find that competition with other people in games is utterly pointless. I play the game to win. When I win, or it gets boring, I move on. Most games just aren't interesting enough to invest 1000 hours into.
That's mostly what I play and even in those games where multiplayer is a large component, I don't play it. After I finished the campaign mode in Halo 4, I put it on the shelf and will never play it live with anyone.
Played: UO, EQ, WoW, DDO, SWG, AO, CoH, EvE, TR, AoC, GW, GA, Aion, Allods, lots more
Relatively Recently (Re)Played: HL2 (all), Halo (PC, all), Batman:AA; AC, ME, BS, DA, FO3, DS, Doom (all), LFD1&2, KOTOR, Portal 1&2, Blink, Elder Scrolls (all), lots more
Now Playing: None
Hope: None
That's part of my point to be frank: To me, no one, not even the most sportsmanly person on the planet wants to be the loser. They don't want to be left behind the "Jones." So they "compete" in hopes that they can be better than the "Jones" so they can grind their awesomeness into the face of the "losers." If they can't do that however, they begin to lose interest/hope because it's obvious they will never catch up/be superior. Thus they leave.
So essentially, you quote me out of context and then make it out to be saying something that I was clear, in the same post, I find absurd and pointless?
I play a game to win. In an MMO, the point of the game is to level up, gain loot and kill monsters. That's what I do. I don't give a damn what anyone else has, what anyone else looks like, or even, to be honest, if there's anyone else playing the damn game most of the time. I am totally unconcerned with what most other people are doing. I'm not keeping up with the Jones', for all I care, the Jones' can leap off the nearest tall building. I would neither notice nor care.
Played: UO, EQ, WoW, DDO, SWG, AO, CoH, EvE, TR, AoC, GW, GA, Aion, Allods, lots more
Relatively Recently (Re)Played: HL2 (all), Halo (PC, all), Batman:AA; AC, ME, BS, DA, FO3, DS, Doom (all), LFD1&2, KOTOR, Portal 1&2, Blink, Elder Scrolls (all), lots more
Now Playing: None
Hope: None
- Al
Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse.- FARGIN_WAR
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
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