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Vanguard and the casual gamer
anarchyart
Member Posts: 5,378
This is a long post by Brad Mcquaid about the direction they are choosing to go with Vanguard. I thought it was interesting and a good read so I'm re-posting it here. Hope you like it!
I've posted several times in the past over the whole casual vs core vs raid issue -- if you haven't read those posts, please try to.
Now, I'm going to go somewhere I don't like going, and that's being critical or a competitor (or at least, what could be construed that way -- I certainly have nothing but respect for the guys at Blizzard, and I also truly think that, based on what WoW was meant to do, that it's a great game).
Blizzard targeted more casual gamers, and one of the ways they did this was to design the game with very fast character advancement. Looking at their success, this most certainly worked (although this is one of several factors, all of which IMHO were brilliant planning on their part assuming the business model I think they were going after).
Along with very quick leveling, they also knew they had to make a lot of content because that content would be devoured quickly, even by more casual games.
The question is, how long did they mean for the average player to subscribe? What if they were looking at things more from a single player perspective, that people will quit after some time, and then buy the next expansion even if that means there is a gap?
It works with single player games. You finish the game and if it was good and the game did well, you look forward to buying the expansion or sequel and in the meantime play other new games that are coming out.
I don't know how MMOG players will react, though. I think a lot of people want to keep playing contiguously with new content being added at a decent frequency. Sure, the power gamers always run out of content too early, but the priority is to expand the game not too often, nor too late, and to keep your core playerbase happy.
Or at least this is what we tried to do with EQ, and what most MMOGs have done.
This all leads to just how quickly advancement should be. The easy answer is a sweet spot between tedious and too easy and quick. The difficulty lies in the fact that that sweet spot varies depending on the player. This is why I think it's so important to identify your target audience and then stick to your guns. You can't please everyone all of the time, but I do think you can keep most of your players relatively happy.
With WoW I really see a different approach. I don't know if it's a big concern on their end if some percentage of gamers are running out of content. One could even argue that if someone quits before they are too attached to an MMOG, they leave much happier and much more likely to buy your next product. Conversely, many who leave an MMOG after several years don't leave so happy because regardless of what made them finally leave, they still feel an attachment to the game because of how long they played it. If this is true, than I don't see why many WoW players wouldn't just move on to another game for a while and then buy the expansion whenever it comes out.
Again, this is speculation, and it's also not criticism. How to make a game for the more casual player has been a problem MMOG developers have been faced with for quite some time. Many of the retention mechanisms that work with core and hard core gamers seem to turn off some casuals. It's a bit of a catch-22. So time will tell if Blizzard's different strategy is a good one. Certainly they deserve credit for reaching out to so many people and growing this gamespace immensely. They are also, to my knowledge, the first to bridge the gap between the West and Asia. MMOG developers on both sides of the pond have been struggling with how to design a game that is appealing in both regions. We've failed. The Koreans have failed. But now look at Blizzard... they're even getting a foothold into China.
Obviously, we're not making WoW and nor did we have similar goals and a similar business plan when it comes to Vanguard. Some people call WoW and EQ-clone, but look carefully at the differences that do exist. I think they're very key.
We feel that our target audience wants a more challenging game, and one that will keep them interested for months and years. Jeff's quote also indicates that this is also more so the type of game that we personally want to play (although I know for a fact that he had a blast leveling up to max in WoW (and CoH for that matter)).
Now comes the controversial stuff, if I've not already gone past that line in the sand.
How does the developer design a game to keep people around for months and years. I will tell you as fact, even though we've been accused otherwise, we don't put in time sinks and boring grinds just to frustrate people but still somehow keep them around. Nobody here, both personally and professionally, wants to frustrate people, much less implement mechanics or content just to annoy.
The solution is to make the journey through the levels fun. It shouldn't feel like a treadmill. You shouldn't feel you have to grind, or have no choice but to grind. But that's much easier said than done. I think we have some great ideas and so far, at least for myself, I don't feel a treadmill or grind at all. But then I'm not everybody, and I know that. This is why we've committed to having casual, group and raid content, even though we are open about Vanguard being more challenging relative to most recently released MMOGs.
One of the big things is content. The faster the character advances, the faster content is devoured. I've heard accounts from several people that they only saw some major dungeons in WoW a couple of times before they out leveled the area. That said, I think they put a lot of effort into making sure there was a lot of content and rewards, compensating pretty well for the quicker advancement.
We are committed to making the game as fun as possible and for people to enjoy leveling up and not feel like they just need to grind to see the end game. That means a lot of work and also some hopefully innovative ideas. I honesty believe we're pulling it off, though.
But here's my last controversial blab:
Some people simply demand character advancement to be at a certain pace. I don't criticize them at all (although they criticize us, and call other players catasses). I'll be blunt: not sure if Vanguard will be for them, though we'll try nonetheless. The term casual gamer can mean so many things. It can mean my grandma who is not really a gamer at all. It can mean someone who loves these games but only has so much time to spend in-game. It can mean people who prefer to solo and don't care as much for grouping. It can mean those who do not enjoy playing a game with others who have more time or commitment and watching them level more quickly, experience more areas, acquire more loot, etc. This latter group demands to experience it all too, just as much as the power gamer does.
Vanguard, as I've said countless times, is primarily targeting the core gamer. We can argue about what that means, but to me it's the people who really enjoyed playing games like EQ, and enjoyed playing them for a long time. some assert that these people no longer exist, and that EQ was only so successful because they had no other choices and perhaps didn't yet realize that they were not really having fun. Obviously, we disagree.
But we are also targeting more casual gamers (and raiders). But not my grandma, and probably not the type of person who simply cannot tolerate watching others achieve more quickly than them. Those who prefer to solo, yes, you'll be able to solo or play in smaller groups and still achieve. Those who don't have as much time, especially long contiguous chunks of time, Vanguard will hopefully be for you as well. Long epic tasks don't have to be contiguous. They can be broken up. I think MMOGs can do a lot better here.
So that's it. We think we can make a game that is compelling for years without making it seem too much like a treadmill or a grind. will we execute flawlessly? I doubt it, but we've learned a lot, especially identifying mechanics or other situations that are time sinks but really don't add anything to the game. In the past, we've made mistakes in this area. As I've posted before, there are a lot of areas where we had downtime that was excessive and/or unnecessary. There were also situations where people felt compelled to do the more boring thing to advance more quickly instead of what would have been more fun. We VERY much want to avoid this with Vanguard and learn from our mistakes and the mistakes of others.
I covered a lot. Please don't hesitate to ask questions, especially if I wasn't clear on something. The danger of making these posts is that they can be misunderstood or taken out of content. Especially, say, when bits and pieces of what I say are posted on other boards whose readers either know very little about Vanguard or nothing. Add to that those who blame me for some of the problems in the past (and some of that blame I deserve). My fear is that they would take some of this stuff the wrong way (and I've seen it happen already).
Not sure what to do there except keep posting and also reaching out to other communities. Some of you already do that and I appreciate it.
Comments
After tryind to talk to them about certain annyoing points like corpse runs, which is a time waste tedious non fun game system. Other points aswel, i've given up on the game
It's the EQ team, expect a shitty product tbh
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Don't click here...no2
I have no real problems with the game itself. From what I heard it sounds very intriguing. But the community has alot to be desired. A game's community is 50% of the success or failure. And they seem to encourage elitest additudes over at VG. I think its this additude from the community as a whole that will relegate VG to mediocre status.
Kai
It sounds like the guy knows what he is talking about and the EQ background is a plus...the game was called evercrack once upon a time....But i wouldn't pre-order or anything...so far the game sounds like its fixing all the mistakes of EQ...if WoW was polished EQ-lite this is starting to sound like Polished EQ-core
Vanguard,i am waiting for this game a long time already and slowly i get the feeling,i waited for the right game
I'm anxiously waiting for Vanguard, especially since I am more or less what Brad's describing as a core player.
At http://www.silkyvenom.com/ you can read a lot of details in their FAQ and forums about Vanguard. Their strategic and complex combat system (read Oloh's posts on that), the diplomacy sphere and other tidbits make me really look forward to this game.
Currently playing:
* City of Heroes: Deggial, Assault Rifle/Devices Blaster. Server: Defiant.
* City of Villains: Snakeroot, Plant/Thorns Dominator. Server: Defiant.
I can already tell I wount be playing the game, since Brad Mcquaid think levels as sort of tool to keep players busy and paying. Doesn't matter how much he say "we will make leveling fun yada yada" there simply is no way to make leveling fun enough. Worst thing you can make is make it slow.
Brad Mcquaid is old school mmorpg dev, so he and many other like him seem to fear their players getting to end game and compare it to single player game like it was game over and players quit. They should focus more on making the end game fun instead making leveling fun.
When I got my 7xgm(like maxed level) in UO I didnt quit and run out of content, because it was players providing that content constanly.
This is a Vanguard specific thread and belongs in that forum.
Vanguard is a raiding centric game, not a game that will be solo or small group friendly, regardless of wether you are a casual or hardcore soloer/small group oriented player. Brad's being honest about that and defines his "core player" as a mostly grouping raiding loving type.
Personally I think raiding is a boring unimaginative aspect used for so called end game content and should fall the way of the Dodo, but to each their own.
"We feel gold selling and websites that promote it damage games like Vanguard and will do everything possible to combat it."
Brad McQuaid
Chairman & CEO, Sigil Games Online, Inc.
Executive Producer, Vanguard: Saga of Heroes
www.vanguardsoh
What SOE and Blizzard have done is look at an area of gameplay that players find boring and either trivialise it or simply remove it. For example an NPC in your home town offers you a quest with a good reward in which you must kill 10 of X mob. Those mobs lie in an area 6 zones away, all of the zones low level and not challenging to the player, so you must spend 30 minutes, essentially downtime, just travelling through those zones to reach your objective, then another 30 back.
SOE and Blizzard decided that players found the long travel through lowbie areas boring so they removed it, giving you a way to skip over it. In the past long travel time, however boring, was a mechanism to slow your advancement through the game, but EQ2 and WoW removed it, making advancement faster. The same occurred with many other time sinks. They were boring so Blizzard removed them.
The old EQ veterans want those tedious timesinks to be brought back, telling each other long tales about the good 'ol days, and seem to think that they represented a challenge or a form of difficulty, which the did not. They simply suffer from nostalgia.
Sigil claim to be able to bring back the timesinks, such as long travel times, large XP requirements to level up, but this time make them fun. Time will tell if they succeed.
I would disagree. They built worlds back then -- large, expansive places that we could explore, and with enough landscape to make the raw act of exploration fun. What happened to the "gotta see what's around the next corner?" curiosity? Instead, we get nowadays games that have "gotten rid of the long travel times" -- aka, shrunk the worlds and made them less "explorable", because they're catering to the little whiners in the world who don't see a value in exploration and want their content spoon-fed to them. What I miss is setting out into the world WITHOUT a quest compelling me to do so, just to go find that farmer in the middle of a place I haven't been who's having a problem with giant spiders from a cave "somewhere out to the east" (he couldn't be more specific, since he's not a warrior and would have died if he'd tried following them around). Did they put a big flashing dot on the map to get rid of the player's involvement of his BRAIN in figuring things out for himself? Nope. "Somewhere out east", which is a more realistic clue from an illiterate farmer in the middle of a vast plain. YOU, the player, get to go find more clues where that location is, or go explore. And so forth. I want vast, stretching worlds, continents to explore, and content that's out there but not spoon-fed. And yes, travel times? They're there because they have to be. If you want a world to explore, you have to EXPLORE it, not fly over it or "port" from place to place.
Of course, I'm outnumbered by all the satisfy-me-now-I-don't-want-to-have-to-think-or-spend-more-than-two-seconds-without-fighting twits. And ironically, I also don't think that Vanguard's approach is going to be something that works for me. I think a world should be as expansive as EQ1 was (if even out of the box, which was three huge continents and many huge cities), and quest-givers placed believably -- so cities will be crawling with things to do, but who knows? If you set out on the road from Queynos to Freeport (in EQ1, which was quite an adventure, particularly if you weren't high-enough level to do it safely), you should find places, things, people that set off further adventures. LIke the farmer in the example above -- who YOU, the player, have to find, since no one is going to tell you in the city about the farmer. Hence, exploration. Anyway. I want a vast world built in a consistent fashion. I want to explore. I want the thrill of exploration. I want the thrill of finding the odd and the unusual for myself, instead of having it spoon-fed to me in a very linear fashion (aka the bulk of the very repetitive WoW). Yes, there should be horses, and they should be available at level 1 -- it's ridiculous that there should be a "level limit" on your ability to get a horse. You should be able to buy one, if you can put the money together; or you should be able to hit the wilderness and use your animal-handling skills to befriend one. There should be boats between continents and islands; or airships, if the world supports them. There should be "trains" (aka Ironforge-Stormwind), where applicable. Whatever the methods, they should be there -- but they shouldn't be ways to get you instantly "into the middle of things".
I guess what's missing in things like WoW, to me, is summed up in an old saying, which I can't recall word-for-word, but whose spirit is basically: the fun is in the journey, not reaching the end of it.
Posters like you really frustrate me. You read the post like everyone else but see only what you want to see. Mcquaid stated quite clearly that Vanguard is aimed at the "core" player, which he identifies as someone that wants a challenge.
I quote: "Vanguard, as I've said countless times, is primarily targeting the core gamer. We can argue about what that means, but to me it's the people who really enjoyed playing games like EQ, and enjoyed playing them for a long time." and "We feel that our target audience wants a more challenging game, and one that will keep them interested for months and years."
How did you manage to read that as challenge= raiding, or core = raiding? I assume because you see EQ as a raiding game. It became a hardcore raiding game when SOE kept releasing high end raiding content, long after Brad had left. I played EQ for 2 years, rarely raided, but mostly solo'd, duo'd or small grouped, reached lvl 61 with my Ranger.
And this discussion is not just about Vanguard, but the role of the casual gamer in MMORPGs, so it belongs here.
*sigh* I really, really hate this kind of elitism. Not all players share the same idea of what's fun and, apparently, WoW or EQ2 aims at a different target audience that doesn't include your personal taste.
Unfortunately, it's not just a minority of MMOG players who have this mentality. Endless, meaningless talks about what a "real artist" is on music forums and how my music beats your music, same for movies, etc, etc. Quite depressing.
Currently playing:
* City of Heroes: Deggial, Assault Rifle/Devices Blaster. Server: Defiant.
* City of Villains: Snakeroot, Plant/Thorns Dominator. Server: Defiant.
Posters like you really frustrate me. You read the post like everyone else but see only what you want to see. Mcquaid stated quite clearly that Vanguard is aimed at the "core" player, which he identifies as someone that wants a challenge.
I quote: "Vanguard, as I've said countless times, is primarily targeting the core gamer. We can argue about what that means, but to me it's the people who really enjoyed playing games like EQ, and enjoyed playing them for a long time." and "We feel that our target audience wants a more challenging game, and one that will keep them interested for months and years."
How did you manage to read that as challenge= raiding, or core = raiding? I assume because you see EQ as a raiding game. It became a hardcore raiding game when SOE kept releasing high end raiding content, long after Brad had left. I played EQ for 2 years, rarely raided, but mostly solo'd, duo'd or small grouped, reached lvl 61 with my Ranger.
And this discussion is not just about Vanguard, but the role of the casual gamer in MMORPGs, so it belongs here.
I played EQ for over 3 years since first day of launch and loved it until Planes of Power expansion which ruined the game for soloers by making crafting group/raid dependent necessary. Starting with that expansion, SOE focused more and more on raiding and ruined the game for anyone who didn't care for raiding.
I like the challenging aspects of old school EQ when Brad was in charge, and it was not a raiding oriented game when it was first released as there was not a single Plane in existence. The first 3 Planes were added after release, still under Brad's vision though. Even then, old school EQ had plenty of content for all types of players yet Sigil staff have made it quite clear that Vanguard though technically soloable, will not be solo or small group friendly and will be heavily group/raid oriented. You need to read and participate in the discussions on their site more if you don't realize this.
I have no idea why he is deviating from the original old school EQ formula of inclusion, but the fact is that Vanguard will be raiding centric, and crafting in Vanguard is impossible as a soloer because of it's structure. I am all about seeking challenge and playing a difficult game, and I am the last person who believes raiding to be difficult or challenging which it is not because using masses to accomplish something is much easier than challenging yourself as an individual with limited skills at your disposal.
The OP was not trying to evoke a discussion about casual gamers in the marketplace. He was simply plugging his next infatuation, which if you have spent any time reading these forums, you would realize that AA is a fickle yet fanatic follower of every new game to be released
"We feel gold selling and websites that promote it damage games like Vanguard and will do everything possible to combat it."
Brad McQuaid
Chairman & CEO, Sigil Games Online, Inc.
Executive Producer, Vanguard: Saga of Heroes
www.vanguardsoh
The bit about Vanguard being raid-centric is pretty inaccurate. Here are two quotes from Brad made on the VG forums:
"Vanguard is primarily going after the Core Gamer: the MMOG gamer that enjoyed games like EQ for months and years. There will be 'casual', 'group', and 'raid' content. The majority will be 'group'. Casual could mean solo, but grouping always helps."
and
"Agreed. Personally what I described above is my favorite part of MMOGs. I'm not much of a soloer, as you guys know. I love being in a good group and taking on a challenge for an evening. The interaction, cooperation, comradery, etc. I do enjoy raiding, but not constantly. And when I do raid I need to be part of a very solid guild who really knows what they're doing (I was part of Crimson Sigil on Sojourn/Toril which was VERY well run and had a lot of skilled players, so I'm spoiled)."
Even Brad himself states that he doesn't enjoy a raid-centric game, so I highly doubt he will be making one. EQ didn't become raid centric until Brad left, and unless Brad leaves VG, then I think you can count on VG staying as a more group-centric game.
[quote]Originally posted by Finduilas
The old EQ veterans want those tedious timesinks to be brought back, telling each other long tales about the good 'ol days, and seem to think that they represented a challenge or a form of difficulty, which the did not. They simply suffer from nostalgia.
Sigil claim to be able to bring back the timesinks, such as long travel times, large XP requirements to level up, but this time make them fun. Time will tell if they succeed.[/b][/quote]
i was in that mold of "man i miss eq" then i got invited into WoW CB and now i never want to go through EQ again.
*sigh* I really, really hate this kind of elitism. Not all players share the same idea of what's fun and, apparently, WoW or EQ2 aims at a different target audience that doesn't include your personal taste.
Unfortunately, it's not just a minority of MMOG players who have this mentality. Endless, meaningless talks about what a "real artist" is on music forums and how my music beats your music, same for movies, etc, etc. Quite depressing.
thats the exact elitest attitude someone earlier was referring to that goes on in the VG forums. you see it in every post. the "im better then you becuase i think time=difficulty" crap.
If you aren't the type of person who will let yourself enjoy the ride and instead insist on being at the end of the journey right now, then I think that not only will Vanguard not be for you, but maybe the entire MMORPG genre is wrong for you. If leveling can't be fun, why have it at all, and if there is no leveling, isn't it really more of an FPS than an RPG anyway?
[quote]Originally posted by lsutig
[b][quote]Originally posted by Finduilas
The old EQ veterans want those tedious timesinks to be brought back, telling each other long tales about the good 'ol days, and seem to think that they represented a challenge or a form of difficulty, which the did not. They simply suffer from nostalgia.
Sigil claim to be able to bring back the timesinks, such as long travel times, large XP requirements to level up, but this time make them fun. Time will tell if they succeed.[/b][/quote]
i was in that mold of "man i miss eq" then i got invited into WoW CB and now i never want to go through EQ again.
*sigh* I really, really hate this kind of elitism. Not all players share the same idea of what's fun and, apparently, WoW or EQ2 aims at a different target audience that doesn't include your personal taste.
Unfortunately, it's not just a minority of MMOG players who have this mentality. Endless, meaningless talks about what a "real artist" is on music forums and how my music beats your music, same for movies, etc, etc. Quite depressing.
thats the exact elitest attitude someone earlier was referring to that goes on in the VG forums. you see it in every post. the "im better then you becuase i think time=difficulty" crap.[/b][/quote]
Versus the eletist attitude that anything that takes time is boring, we want everything right now, and anyone who wants a game that is about the journey instead of the destination is wrong?
"The old EQ veterans want those tedious timesinks to be brought back, telling each other long tales about the good 'ol days, and seem to think that they represented a challenge or a form of difficulty, which the did not. They simply suffer from nostalgia."
While no one wants boring downtime constantly runing worthless zones, neither do they want dumbed down transport like PoK or flight paths. Solution ? I dunno honestly.. but its somewhere in the middle /shrug.
As far as the game goes id like to see it be mostly group centered with some solo content and small raid content like 18-20 players instead of 40-50+. I dont see why 18 people (typical guild) shouldnt be able to take down any given target.
Mass size raids (40 players+) just lead to far to many problems
* ninja looters (not so much in WoW but ive seen it alot in EQ raids)
* unfair loot systems (even the best dkp systems are abused by officers/gm)
* alienating smaller guilds and soloers (usually casual gamers)
* insane downtime with wipes/buffs (more of an EQ issue)
* rewards power gamers (you know that guy who plays 90 hours a week)
* lagfest (they arnt using instances means more lag)
* makes the game to social as far as cliques
* contested spawns, once again no instances (race to spawns is well...annoying at best)
* class dependancy (having to have 8 priests/5 druids every raid)
* draging out content.. raids with limited re-spawns are lame attempts at content. (MC comes to mind)
I dont really have a problem myself with 40 person raid content, but what pisses me off is long wait times like 1 week respawns and limited drops per clearing. Lets avoid "Groundhog Day" shall we?
Id rather see 20 zones like "molten core" that are ALWAYS available to raid, THATS CONTENT..instead of just the 1 zone thats limited to once a week.
It's not the opinion that's a sign of elitism. Some people do prefer time sinks as it adds some sense of achievement after completing a strenuous task, others think that MMORPGs are better without time sinks. That's fine, people have different tastes and they search for different things in games.
However, belittling anyone who does not share your opinion, much like spydermr2 is calling anyone who prefers WoW or EQ2 or whatever as a "satisfy-me-now-I-don't-want-to-have-to-think-or-spend-more-than-two-seconds-without-fighting twit", that's elitism.
Currently playing:
* City of Heroes: Deggial, Assault Rifle/Devices Blaster. Server: Defiant.
* City of Villains: Snakeroot, Plant/Thorns Dominator. Server: Defiant.
If you aren't the type of person who will let yourself enjoy the ride and instead insist on being at the end of the journey right now, then I think that not only will Vanguard not be for you, but maybe the entire MMORPG genre is wrong for you. If leveling can't be fun, why have it at all, and if there is no leveling, isn't it really more of an FPS than an RPG anyway?
Guess that's why I used to play UO and now playing eve-online where player interraction matters most without leveling grinding.
Oddly enough, I found Eve to be more of a grind than anything else I played, and gaining skills while I was sleeping just wasn't enough to give me any sense of accomplishment.
Vanguard is pretty much my only hope right now for an upcomming mmorpg. Vanguard soh, bring back the magic.. Brad and the team can do this.
You were probably grinding isk, but if you play smart you can minimalize it like going in small group doing 0.0 complexes is far more profitable than mission running, mining or ratting in empire space. Also doing stuff like that in group is more fun than soloing in empire space. On top of that my corp got lot of support when it comes to ship loses in corp ops as we got T2 production that brings quite nice amount of isk almost passively.
There is different sense of accomplishment in eve than in most leveling games. Band together with others form corp, alliance, collect isk and buy T2 bpo and start t2 production, build outpost in deep space, defend said outpost from hostile forces that try take over it, build titan first (no one have one yet far as I know), take over nme outpost, etc etc. I feel its faar more rewarding when you have just successfully defended your outpost from hostile forces than when you reach level 54 in leveling games.
I like the challenging aspects of old school EQ when Brad was in charge, and it was not a raiding oriented game when it was first released as there was not a single Plane in existence.
If I recall correctly the Ruins of Kunark Expansion was created by Verant and included epic weapons that at the time required a raid-sized groups to complete. Scars of Velious, still under Brad's direction, add a serious amount of raiding. Shadow's of Luclin and MASSIVE raids, 70 mans jobs, and Brad had a big hand in it's design even though SOE were now boss, and he would soon depart.
However there still a lot of solo content too.
Brad has CLEARLY stated, several times, that the best gear will require end game raids, be it quest drop, or crafted, but the end game will still have content for soloers and groups.
You need to read and participate in the discussions on their site more if you don't realize this.
Hmm, I have posted over that under the same user name, Finduilas, and have read much about the game. Many fans want a raiding endgame, true, but Sigil have frequently stated that all play styles will be viable, even if the best gear is raid centred.
I suggest you quote where Sigil have stated that Vanguard will be raid centric. And don't miss quote like you did with Brad's post in the OP.
The OP was not trying to evoke a discussion about casual gamers in the marketplace. He was simply plugging his next infatuation, which if you have spent any time reading these forums, you would realize that AA is a fickle yet fanatic follower of every new game to be released
Can't argue with that. However AA didn't write the post only quoted it. The actually article is on Brads own site.
You two should try Settlers of Gannereth, no content but one HUGE world to explore.
You like time sinks? Why? You like spending 10 minutes doing something interesting, like killing a named mob, and 6 hours camping the mob? Why?
You like exploring? Great. What about AFTER you've explored a zone? Do you like being made to travel across large areas of land, already familiar and unchallenging to you, just to get to the place where you can start exploring again?
And answer this. Where or when in WoW were you able to travel from one place to another, very quickly, without first exploring? Aside from the boat rides. Did you hack the game, open up ALL griffons? When I played it you had to DISCOVER each griffon NPC, before you could ride the griffon to that spot. Riding the griffon back did not spoil exploration, since you've already explored the your destination and places in between.
There needs to be a balance. If devs made games just to suit you, who'd buy them? Look at Horizons, large seemless world to explore, but almost dead on it's feet. It costs $20-50 million to make an mmorpg, it needs to sell.