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Where are the MMOs?
ICastIntegerValue
Member Posts: 8
Seriously, I'm at a loss here. I've been looking and I've not been able to find a single game post-EverQuest that I would define as Massively Multiplayer Online.
Where are the huge sprawling dungeons where you can come across other player groups? Where's the social interaction? Where's the actual socialisation and playing with others?
Why have MMOs became "Statistics Grinding Online" without even the veneer of living in a virtual world?
What the hell happened?
Comments
*counts down till the flamewars begin*
Be the Ultimate Ninja! Play Billy Vs. SNAKEMAN today!
Pledge now and get into Repopulation alpha on Nov 21st. It has potential and it might just be good, or fail miserably, i for once wish it all the best.
Also, if you're into it and have uber internet connection, try out korean cbt,opb mmos like Kritika online and others you might find fun trying. [altho it does require actual research and effort, just a thing when you're completely out of games to play].
Did you want the short answer or the long answer? Short answer, people don't want to play that kind of game because it always ends up being boring and you never feel like you're really progressing or getting any place. People have this whole, "What's the point?" mentality towards MMOs now.
Crazkanuk
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First, I actually played EverQuest when it hit Luclin, as well as a certain thing based off original EverQuest which must not be named.
Second, they're all signs of bad game design choices, not of those particular elements being bad design.
Third, how is that worse than grinding out dungeons in WoW and it's various spawn?
Evidence?
Another thing that happened was that we grew old. Or at least that is my case.
7 years ago I had no problems staying up all night doing a raid or dungeon, I could have lived in a fantasy world because I had the time for it. If it took hours to find a group, and then more hours organizing, and even more doing the content I was happy and perfectly fine with that.
Fast forward to today. I'm married, have a child, full time job and going back to college to finish my degree. I consider myself lucky if I get 2 hours of gameplay in a day, and even more lucky if out of that time, I can get 30 minutes of uninterrupted game play where I don't have to get AFK for a couple of minutes to check on my son when he's sleeping, check if the clothes my wife is washing are done to put on the drying machine (she usually falls asleep much earlier than me) and a million other little things.
And I'm sure I'm not alone in that case.
What can men do against such reckless hate?
What I am saying is that open dungeons and team focused gameplay do not have those problems as a necessary design flaw.
That's a particular design flaw of EverQuest, not of the elements that I'm a proponent of. An open dungeon doesn't need long spawn timers and the like. Instanced dungeons make for a truly vapid experience, especially when it's a matter of running down a single long corridor for half an hour and nothing else.
On top of that, there's nothing wrong with offering some sort of solo gameplay or an LFG tool. Just don't make it the pure focus of the game.
And? Having team-based gameplay doesn't necessarily mean there's no solo gameplay or that there's no gameplay you can just drop in to.
My issue is that there's nothing that appeals to me in any way, shape or form. There are no open dungeons or team based gameplay or something me and a few friends can waste a few hours exploring in an open world.
Do you have evidence of that?
The same was said of old school RPGs but Divinity: Original Sin, Pillars of Eternity, Torment: Tides of Numenera and Shadowrun Returns have all sold VERY well, and I'd say their gameplay styles are arguably more dated than old-school style MMOs.
I do have evidence of that, plenty in fact. All you need to do is look at the market. The old-school style, hardcore mmo's rarely go beyond niche status, while the casual modern mmo's get the most subscribers. And that casual playstyle has been branching out even further with the advent of MOBA's.
Finally someone who gets it. People clamor for the "good ol' days", but they really weren't that good. They had lots of annoyances, such as mob-tagging, camp-spawning, true grinds, etc. There's a reason developers evolved from it, because it wasn't fun. If people think open-world raids are so great, just go to GW2, or even AA, and you'll see how bad it really is with the zerging. There's a reason why instanced content became more desirable.
The days of the mmo's are slowly over....It's all the same all over again.
My hope and i think the future is single player games, with a little multiplayer feature in it.
Like Dragon Age: Inquisition
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before.
Edgar Allan Poe
Sadly I have to agree, Archage was my final hope for an open world long term mmo (FAIL).
Have gone back to solo rpg's .
Using sales of todays garbage is not proof of what ppl want if there are no Choices.
Look at the market?
Give me an example of an old-school AAA MMO that has failed horribly.
You can't, because none have been made.
- Albert Einstein
Because there's no widespread demand for them, and the developers know this. If there was, then games like Darkfall would be bustling with players. But it's not, it's practically a ghost town. Look, you asked a question, and you've been given the answer. I can't help it if you don't like the answer, but it's the truth.
May be because those MMOS are not worth it anymore? given the time and money investment that goes into making these kind of games can you blame the companies to not bother with these MMOS anymore which will only appease a tiny minority?
I think you have to look at indie games to find what you are looking for OP. And you may have to look fast because if they fail, you might not being seeing much else besides what we have now, IMO. So far there haven't been any runaway succeses there either. ( except maybe minecraft )
And as far the social aspect and grouping , I don't think that is the games' fault. I just think the whole MMO playerbase has evolved, and everyone is now split into PvP, raiding, hardcore, casual, PvE, you name it camps. Everyone has their own goals when it comes to games, and the hassle of finding like minded players to play with has become much less easy than it was back in the day when everyone wanted to play with everybody. Just because you put an LFG feature in your MMO, it does not mean that people will be rushing to use it. People have to want to group in a game. Just giving them content that forces you to do it, is actually making players do something they may not want to. Especially when grouping seems to be for competitive reasons these days. Not so much for the fun of hanging with regular folk for the fun of it.
Time moves on and the MMO has too.
FFA Nonconsentual Full Loot PvP ...You know you want it!!
V:SoH was released as a broken mess. Not really AAA quality.
If they'd've released it in the same way that it was before it was closed down (although, of course, with some actual content patches, instead of SOE stringing it up for the dogs), then I genuinely think it would've got a decent playerbase.
Just like no old-school RPGs were made until Kickstarter came around and gave game developers the chance to prove investors and major companies wrong.
Funny, isn't it? Investors and publishers are inherently conservative and careful and try not to take ANY sort of risk (even if it's a risk with a potential large pay off).
Essentially, what I'm saying here is that you're unbelievably wrong and ignoring a mountain of evidence proving you wrong.
In case you didn't get the memo: Your ship is boarding. It's headed to the far shores of Felucca, where old-school gamers who can't move on go to die.
Now you're just trolling and I feel silly for wasting my time answering your question. To the block list you go.
I totally agree with the OP, except about Vanguard. It was old school and failed, and hurt the whole MMO market.
I don't ever dislike Devs, but the Vanguard devs I have some hatred for. That was the chance to turn MMO's in a good direction and they trashed the whole concept.
Eventually the game was OK, that's the one time I think SoE did something good for a game, but you can't go back and fixing it then was too late. Even VG wasn't the game I wanted.
I think CU is looking to re-make the good MMO, but that games going to be almost purely RvR or crafter sandbox type game.
I did every mob, every dungeon in EQ right up until I quit after the Luclin expansion and I never camped for even a few hours. The horror stories you hear about camping were people driven to complete quests or people that didn't want to explore because they might die, not the core people that played the game.
Asdar