Many players do have things they can add to the sandbox experience as well though. Building things together with other players for example is actually very fun.
The problem with most sandboxes is that they look far too much on UO instead of thinking for themselves and try out new ideas the players can build things together. Eve got this right and did something rather different from the rest small sandbox games with full loot and free for all PvP around, a model that worked in UO but never amounted anything since.
Stuff like making a large group of players building a fortified town together is very rewarding in itself and sandboxes should focus more on stuff like that and less on robbing noobs of their tiny belongings which is only fun for a rather small group of players that tend to become rather alone in an empty game after a while.
The real problem is frankly that the focus in single player sandboxes tend to be about you building stuff while the MMO sandboxes focus on you tearing things down which tend to be far less popular. I am not saying sandbox MMOs need to be about happy deers kissing fairies or some care bear stuff but the main point still should be creating stuff together instead of just being about tearing others S#¤%& down.
It is true that it is more expensive to make a MMO sandbox then a single player sandbox, but the rewards are greater as well if you get it right. Eve got it right, SWG was on the right track but botched it up during the way.
I think someone will do it far better in the future, long term is empire building generally more fun than scripted games. They just need to think outside the box (yeah, bad pun).
Building things together is fun. Absolutely!
The problem is the severe diminishing returns on adding players.
Adding the first player transforms the experience. It was once singleplayer, and now it's multiplayer!
Adding the fourth player improves the experience. Now all 5 of us can perform specialized tasks, working together to improve our project!
Adding the tenth player incurs diminishing returns. What exactly did the 10th player adding that you weren't already getting from the previous 9?
Adding the 65th player means you're an MMO, but that 65th player has added almost nothing to the game.
And of course throughout this process, the player's authorship has gradually eroded. Player authorship is the point of a sandbox, and in a solo experience you're the author, whereas in a 2-player game you're only half of the authors, and in EVE you're basically irrelevant.
So the problem is the justification for making it MMO. You get the vast majority of benefits in a small-scale multiplayer game, while avoiding the significant costs associated with programming MMO architecture that works.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
Let me finish before you jump to conclusions. Please !
You have yet to begin. But, alright...
Vanilla WoW did it right, and they did it wayyyy back in 2004. It's 2015. How could mmos have gone backwards, I would have never expected that in a million years.
Did what right? How exactly? I know what year it is. Gone backwards from what (that thing you didn't elaborate on)?
At first I would have thought stupidity, close mindedness, but no. Something else happened that none of us expected. Greed profit margin, bloated cost, and simply do the most you can with as little as possible and let marketing and advertisement sell the game ( remember pre-warhammer ).
I think you may have very well been the only one who did not expect a corporation to meet its purpose (which is to increase profit exponentially year to year). And, in fact the first game to self identify as an MMORPG was created by one such corporation that had been around since 1983. I can't imagine (so good thing it is demonstrated for me) the kind of uniformed and delusional purview which holds that MMORPG were created to do anything but make a massive profit. And had some alternate motivation that was not just a byproduct of that goal at any point in their history.
The time of Vanguard was the change over point. It's the exact time where things began to go wrong for the players !
How did things go wrong for Vanguard players? And, how is that relevant (how does it translate to affecting) to the whole of the genre?
Developers and programmers started off with a vision. GOOD GAME OR NOT IS NOT THE POINT. This is about the "vision" not the game. It's not about a few screwball coding practices, but about the 'vision".
You cannot know how 'they' started out or what 'their' purview was.
Vanguard was to be the Ultimate world. It was to take EverQuest and World of Warcraft and take it to the next level for everyone. With a huge world, crafting so deep and beyond its time, and diplomacy for something to distract players from everything else if the player chose. It had the largest world ever, with several unique starting zones. It was to be seamless, bad coding but seamless none the less. Lets not forget both PvP and PvE servers.
Every other MMORPG that had released after WoW was intended to be the mold breaker. And, most have touted a similar line to that in advertising it.
This was the "vision". The vision was to be released with the full complement. The full complement at release deserves to be mentioned twice, and its own paragraph because it's that important.
Your vision perhaps. And, did you just quote yourself non-referentially? Also, it actually deserves an unordered list with a header title (since you have moved us into the realm of talking about what merits what in literary representation in a web based venue).
But NO. Development was stopped and the game was released. It was not done, period !!......It's like buying half a car !.....Then crazy politics took over in the background that were not in the players interest for further development. Nothing what's-so-ever for the player. Implosion would be the best way to describe it.
This tends to happen (a lot actually) when development over runs their budget and the patience of their publisher. Which in turn happens when a publisher does not have one of it's own as senior staff on development. And when a development team has no focus. And, only dreams of being a special snowflake. Sucks, when it does happen. But it is part of the industry. And, it is norm that was established long before this game.
******** Every mmo after changed, subtracting the fighting between the developers and Investers. INVESTERS simply took full control. The arguing ended, it was set in stone. Developers were to shut up and program.
Citation? Because seriously that is a big accusation of ethical misconduct on both ends that could be the downfall of an entire invest capitalist venture. And, when making such accusations you need to come to the table with backing evidence.
Now going back to World of Warcraft. It almost seems Blizzard not only had good developers, programmers and a large money pool. But they had the best foresight ever in the history of gamming.
Their foresight was in good timing and being able to predict a market. They had two massive franchises backing them with funding, A preexisting fan-base ready to enter their game on opening. merchandizing deals in place and celebrity endorsement. It was a perfect storm event in online gaming. And, had it not been them it would have been someone else (because a perfect storm needs a ship). What they had/have was/is a company that knows how to make money. Because it's goal is to make money.
Foresight ?.....What the hell is this guy even talking about, you ask yourself !.....It's the ability to sit back and think of what players of all kinds would want in there mmo. REALLY REALLY THINK. It's almost like Blizzard had social workers and philosophers on the payroll. Now your saying this guy is crazy, a real loon ....But think about that game back in 2004. It' was fun for everyone. WoW was soooo deep you can be 8 years old, create a character and have some simple fun. Yet you can be an MIT or Harvard Graduate and deeply develop your character to be the ultimate fighter for the hardest Raids.
That is not what foresight is in respect to gaming or otherwise. Foresight is the ability to predict something based on future need. And it isn't magic. Example: If you have 100 employess, who go through 100 pens a month, and you are at the middle of the month and only have 25 pens left. You know you need to order new pens to keep your employees from running out (and possibly fire someone for stealing). That is foresight. And, your making it into some mystical quality. Trying to quantify it as the "it" factor. The "It" factor being something investors have been trying to figure out since investment became a thing. 1000's of years and they have yet to coherently describe it in a way that lets them consistently see returns by applying the definition of what is and is not "it". And, only investing in what is "it". Your not the person with the big reveal. Who finally hit the nail on the head.
You can play around with the fetch four apples for Maggie's famous apple pies in Goldshire, or take on Deadmines at level 17 with only 3 players if you had the right, well thought out plan......Or you can simply hang out in the safety of Ironforge.
Now you can say this about any mmo but WoW took easy to hard and something for everyone to a higher degree. And yes, back in 2004. You can't have F2P in an mmo. This changes the fair playing field. Foresight is replaced by greed.
You realize that none of these assertions are supportive of each other or even related to each other? And MMORPG's were doing this before WoW. What Wow did (as a game as apposed to it's parent company) was rehash EQ with a few new features. And, themed it after warcraft. A series of RTS that had been popular since their first iteration in 1994. That had fans who wanted an MMORPG based on it. Fans that proved they could and would pay, and exactly by how much. because of all those warcraft games they bought. Games that were the first to use an authentication key (so Blizzard had a realistic outlook on it's player base and what they were spending). It was a calculated investment
Games with Foresight :
- World of Warcraft
- Vanguard
- EverQuest 2
- A few I missed.
If something is missing from the list, add it to the list. Don't put the equivalent of X=? to bolster the list.
Games without Foresight:
- The Secret World ( forced story driven )
- FF14 ( forced story driven )
- Elders Scrolls Online ( forced story driven )
- Wildstar( only for the silly )
-StarWars The Old Republic (forced story driven )
- And most every other mmo beyond 2009.
Again ambiguous place holders have no place on a listing of specific things. And one or two of these I would say lacked competence. But all of them had to have foresight in order to function at all or they wouldn't be able to predict their own needs to any degree (like vanguard...which actually lacked foresight but has still managed to find it's place on your list of games that supposedly had what you seem to think is fairy dust.)
Important :
I better add this......An mmo would have to be very large to have something for everyone. Earlier mmos' seem to have been larger.
Not true, Runescape has offerings for all player types and is a relatively small game by area.
I don't think you know what your own point is (I surely don't anyway). And, that is why you have been unable to make an actual argument towards it (because the stance is either heavily flawed or non existent). I believe this caused by a complete lack of understanding for what you are talking about...almost a willful defiance to make an effort to understand beyond introspection and actually read up on MMORPG history (instead of just defining it by your own terms and what I suspect is limited breadth of experience).
OP ought to explain what is the point of claiming that games "could and should be for everyone", because afaik games are for everyone, all one need to do is to try something new and different, so OP's title doesn't really make any sense.
You should probably educate yourself on basics like target market.
You could also argue that Braille books are "for everyone", but the reality is that they're an entertainment/education product designed for a specific niche, and not useful at all to those who can't read braille (which includes the vast majority of those of us who aren't blind.)
Games are the same way (just not as extreme.) Each appeals to a certain subset of players.
He is also cherry picking parts from different games. These parts do not have a uniform cost and could represent a major resource cost for the game they are from. Taking expensive parts from many games and putting them into a single game makes for a very expensive game.
Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what
it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience
because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in
the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you
playing an MMORPG?"
Let me finish before you jump to conclusions. Please !
You have yet to begin. But, alright...
Vanilla WoW did it right, and they did it wayyyy back in 2004. It's 2015. How could mmos have gone backwards, I would have never expected that in a million years.
Did what right? How exactly? I know what year it is. Gone backwards from what (that thing you didn't elaborate on)?
At first I would have thought stupidity, close mindedness, but no. Something else happened that none of us expected. Greed profit margin, bloated cost, and simply do the most you can with as little as possible and let marketing and advertisement sell the game ( remember pre-warhammer ).
I think you may have very well been the only one who did not expect a corporation to meet its purpose (which is to increase profit exponentially year to year). And, in fact the first game to self identify as an MMORPG was created by one such corporation that had been around since 1983. I can't imagine (so good thing it is demonstrated for me) the kind of uniformed and delusional purview which holds that MMORPG were created to do anything but make a massive profit. And had some alternate motivation that was not just a byproduct of that goal at any point in their history.
The time of Vanguard was the change over point. It's the exact time where things began to go wrong for the players !
How did things go wrong for Vanguard players? And, how is that relevant (how does it translate to affecting) to the whole of the genre?
Developers and programmers started off with a vision. GOOD GAME OR NOT IS NOT THE POINT. This is about the "vision" not the game. It's not about a few screwball coding practices, but about the 'vision".
You cannot know how 'they' started out or what 'their' purview was.
Vanguard was to be the Ultimate world. It was to take EverQuest and World of Warcraft and take it to the next level for everyone. With a huge world, crafting so deep and beyond its time, and diplomacy for something to distract players from everything else if the player chose. It had the largest world ever, with several unique starting zones. It was to be seamless, bad coding but seamless none the less. Lets not forget both PvP and PvE servers.
Every other MMORPG that had released after WoW was intended to be the mold breaker. And, most have touted a similar line to that in advertising it.
This was the "vision". The vision was to be released with the full complement. The full complement at release deserves to be mentioned twice, and its own paragraph because it's that important.
Your vision perhaps. And, did you just quote yourself non-referentially? Also, it actually deserves an unordered list with a header title (since you have moved us into the realm of talking about what merits what in literary representation in a web based venue).
But NO. Development was stopped and the game was released. It was not done, period !!......It's like buying half a car !.....Then crazy politics took over in the background that were not in the players interest for further development. Nothing what's-so-ever for the player. Implosion would be the best way to describe it.
This tends to happen (a lot actually) when development over runs their budget and the patience of their publisher. Which in turn happens when a publisher does not have one of it's own as senior staff on development. And when a development team has no focus. And, only dreams of being a special snowflake. Sucks, when it does happen. But it is part of the industry. And, it is norm that was established long before this game.
******** Every mmo after changed, subtracting the fighting between the developers and Investers. INVESTERS simply took full control. The arguing ended, it was set in stone. Developers were to shut up and program.
Citation? Because seriously that is a big accusation of ethical misconduct on both ends that could be the downfall of an entire invest capitalist venture. And, when making such accusations you need to come to the table with backing evidence.
Now going back to World of Warcraft. It almost seems Blizzard not only had good developers, programmers and a large money pool. But they had the best foresight ever in the history of gamming.
Their foresight was in good timing and being able to predict a market. They had two massive franchises backing them with funding, A preexisting fan-base ready to enter their game on opening. merchandizing deals in place and celebrity endorsement. It was a perfect storm event in online gaming. And, had it not been them it would have been someone else (because a perfect storm needs a ship). What they had/have was/is a company that knows how to make money. Because it's goal is to make money.
Foresight ?.....What the hell is this guy even talking about, you ask yourself !.....It's the ability to sit back and think of what players of all kinds would want in there mmo. REALLY REALLY THINK. It's almost like Blizzard had social workers and philosophers on the payroll. Now your saying this guy is crazy, a real loon ....But think about that game back in 2004. It' was fun for everyone. WoW was soooo deep you can be 8 years old, create a character and have some simple fun. Yet you can be an MIT or Harvard Graduate and deeply develop your character to be the ultimate fighter for the hardest Raids.
That is not what foresight is in respect to gaming or otherwise. Foresight is the ability to predict something based on future need. And it isn't magic. Example: If you have 100 employess, who go through 100 pens a month, and you are at the middle of the month and only have 25 pens left. You know you need to order new pens to keep your employees from running out (and possibly fire someone for stealing). That is foresight. And, your making it into some mystical quality. Trying to quantify it as the "it" factor. The "It" factor being something investors have been trying to figure out since investment became a thing. 1000's of years and they have yet to coherently describe it in a way that lets them consistently see returns by applying the definition of what is and is not "it". And, only investing in what is "it". Your not the person with the big reveal. Who finally hit the nail on the head.
You can play around with the fetch four apples for Maggie's famous apple pies in Goldshire, or take on Deadmines at level 17 with only 3 players if you had the right, well thought out plan......Or you can simply hang out in the safety of Ironforge.
Now you can say this about any mmo but WoW took easy to hard and something for everyone to a higher degree. And yes, back in 2004. You can't have F2P in an mmo. This changes the fair playing field. Foresight is replaced by greed.
You realize that none of these assertions are supportive of each other or even related to each other? And MMORPG's were doing this before WoW. What Wow did (as a game as apposed to it's parent company) was rehash EQ with a few new features. And, themed it after warcraft. A series of RTS that had been popular since their first iteration in 1994. That had fans who wanted an MMORPG based on it. Fans that proved they could and would pay, and exactly by how much. because of all those warcraft games they bought. Games that were the first to use an authentication key (so Blizzard had a realistic outlook on it's player base and what they were spending). It was a calculated investment
Games with Foresight :
- World of Warcraft
- Vanguard
- EverQuest 2
- A few I missed.
If something is missing from the list, add it to the list. Don't put the equivalent of X=? to bolster the list.
Games without Foresight:
- The Secret World ( forced story driven )
- FF14 ( forced story driven )
- Elders Scrolls Online ( forced story driven )
- Wildstar( only for the silly )
-StarWars The Old Republic (forced story driven )
- And most every other mmo beyond 2009.
Again ambiguous place holders have no place on a listing of specific things. And one or two of these I would say lacked competence. But all of them had to have foresight in order to function at all or they wouldn't be able to predict their own needs to any degree (like vanguard...which actually lacked foresight but has still managed to find it's place on your list of games that supposedly had what you seem to think is fairy dust.)
Important :
I better add this......An mmo would have to be very large to have something for everyone. Earlier mmos' seem to have been larger.
Not true, Runescape has offerings for all player types and is a relatively small game by area.
I don't think you know what your own point is (I surely don't anyway). And, that is why you have been unable to make an actual argument towards it (because the stance is either heavily flawed or non existent). I believe this caused by a complete lack of understanding for what you are talking about...almost a willful defiance to make an effort to understand beyond introspection and actually read up on MMORPG history (instead of just defining it by your own terms and what I suspect is limited breadth of experience).
Everything in blue is crap ..........Just saying, and I'll not waste any more time on this.
Let me finish before you jump to conclusions. Please !
You have yet to begin. But, alright...
Vanilla WoW did it right, and they did it wayyyy back in 2004. It's 2015. How could mmos have gone backwards, I would have never expected that in a million years.
Did what right? How exactly? I know what year it is. Gone backwards from what (that thing you didn't elaborate on)?
At first I would have thought stupidity, close mindedness, but no. Something else happened that none of us expected. Greed profit margin, bloated cost, and simply do the most you can with as little as possible and let marketing and advertisement sell the game ( remember pre-warhammer ).
I think you may have very well been the only one who did not expect a corporation to meet its purpose (which is to increase profit exponentially year to year). And, in fact the first game to self identify as an MMORPG was created by one such corporation that had been around since 1983. I can't imagine (so good thing it is demonstrated for me) the kind of uniformed and delusional purview which holds that MMORPG were created to do anything but make a massive profit. And had some alternate motivation that was not just a byproduct of that goal at any point in their history.
The time of Vanguard was the change over point. It's the exact time where things began to go wrong for the players !
How did things go wrong for Vanguard players? And, how is that relevant (how does it translate to affecting) to the whole of the genre?
Developers and programmers started off with a vision. GOOD GAME OR NOT IS NOT THE POINT. This is about the "vision" not the game. It's not about a few screwball coding practices, but about the 'vision".
You cannot know how 'they' started out or what 'their' purview was.
Vanguard was to be the Ultimate world. It was to take EverQuest and World of Warcraft and take it to the next level for everyone. With a huge world, crafting so deep and beyond its time, and diplomacy for something to distract players from everything else if the player chose. It had the largest world ever, with several unique starting zones. It was to be seamless, bad coding but seamless none the less. Lets not forget both PvP and PvE servers.
Every other MMORPG that had released after WoW was intended to be the mold breaker. And, most have touted a similar line to that in advertising it.
This was the "vision". The vision was to be released with the full complement. The full complement at release deserves to be mentioned twice, and its own paragraph because it's that important.
Your vision perhaps. And, did you just quote yourself non-referentially? Also, it actually deserves an unordered list with a header title (since you have moved us into the realm of talking about what merits what in literary representation in a web based venue).
But NO. Development was stopped and the game was released. It was not done, period !!......It's like buying half a car !.....Then crazy politics took over in the background that were not in the players interest for further development. Nothing what's-so-ever for the player. Implosion would be the best way to describe it.
This tends to happen (a lot actually) when development over runs their budget and the patience of their publisher. Which in turn happens when a publisher does not have one of it's own as senior staff on development. And when a development team has no focus. And, only dreams of being a special snowflake. Sucks, when it does happen. But it is part of the industry. And, it is norm that was established long before this game.
******** Every mmo after changed, subtracting the fighting between the developers and Investers. INVESTERS simply took full control. The arguing ended, it was set in stone. Developers were to shut up and program.
Citation? Because seriously that is a big accusation of ethical misconduct on both ends that could be the downfall of an entire invest capitalist venture. And, when making such accusations you need to come to the table with backing evidence.
Now going back to World of Warcraft. It almost seems Blizzard not only had good developers, programmers and a large money pool. But they had the best foresight ever in the history of gamming.
Their foresight was in good timing and being able to predict a market. They had two massive franchises backing them with funding, A preexisting fan-base ready to enter their game on opening. merchandizing deals in place and celebrity endorsement. It was a perfect storm event in online gaming. And, had it not been them it would have been someone else (because a perfect storm needs a ship). What they had/have was/is a company that knows how to make money. Because it's goal is to make money.
Foresight ?.....What the hell is this guy even talking about, you ask yourself !.....It's the ability to sit back and think of what players of all kinds would want in there mmo. REALLY REALLY THINK. It's almost like Blizzard had social workers and philosophers on the payroll. Now your saying this guy is crazy, a real loon ....But think about that game back in 2004. It' was fun for everyone. WoW was soooo deep you can be 8 years old, create a character and have some simple fun. Yet you can be an MIT or Harvard Graduate and deeply develop your character to be the ultimate fighter for the hardest Raids.
That is not what foresight is in respect to gaming or otherwise. Foresight is the ability to predict something based on future need. And it isn't magic. Example: If you have 100 employess, who go through 100 pens a month, and you are at the middle of the month and only have 25 pens left. You know you need to order new pens to keep your employees from running out (and possibly fire someone for stealing). That is foresight. And, your making it into some mystical quality. Trying to quantify it as the "it" factor. The "It" factor being something investors have been trying to figure out since investment became a thing. 1000's of years and they have yet to coherently describe it in a way that lets them consistently see returns by applying the definition of what is and is not "it". And, only investing in what is "it". Your not the person with the big reveal. Who finally hit the nail on the head.
You can play around with the fetch four apples for Maggie's famous apple pies in Goldshire, or take on Deadmines at level 17 with only 3 players if you had the right, well thought out plan......Or you can simply hang out in the safety of Ironforge.
Now you can say this about any mmo but WoW took easy to hard and something for everyone to a higher degree. And yes, back in 2004. You can't have F2P in an mmo. This changes the fair playing field. Foresight is replaced by greed.
You realize that none of these assertions are supportive of each other or even related to each other? And MMORPG's were doing this before WoW. What Wow did (as a game as apposed to it's parent company) was rehash EQ with a few new features. And, themed it after warcraft. A series of RTS that had been popular since their first iteration in 1994. That had fans who wanted an MMORPG based on it. Fans that proved they could and would pay, and exactly by how much. because of all those warcraft games they bought. Games that were the first to use an authentication key (so Blizzard had a realistic outlook on it's player base and what they were spending). It was a calculated investment
Games with Foresight :
- World of Warcraft
- Vanguard
- EverQuest 2
- A few I missed.
If something is missing from the list, add it to the list. Don't put the equivalent of X=? to bolster the list.
Games without Foresight:
- The Secret World ( forced story driven )
- FF14 ( forced story driven )
- Elders Scrolls Online ( forced story driven )
- Wildstar( only for the silly )
-StarWars The Old Republic (forced story driven )
- And most every other mmo beyond 2009.
Again ambiguous place holders have no place on a listing of specific things. And one or two of these I would say lacked competence. But all of them had to have foresight in order to function at all or they wouldn't be able to predict their own needs to any degree (like vanguard...which actually lacked foresight but has still managed to find it's place on your list of games that supposedly had what you seem to think is fairy dust.)
Important :
I better add this......An mmo would have to be very large to have something for everyone. Earlier mmos' seem to have been larger.
Not true, Runescape has offerings for all player types and is a relatively small game by area.
I don't think you know what your own point is (I surely don't anyway). And, that is why you have been unable to make an actual argument towards it (because the stance is either heavily flawed or non existent). I believe this caused by a complete lack of understanding for what you are talking about...almost a willful defiance to make an effort to understand beyond introspection and actually read up on MMORPG history (instead of just defining it by your own terms and what I suspect is limited breadth of experience).
Everything in blue is crap ..........Just saying, and I'll not waste any more time on this.
I think you forgot to say "La la la la la! I can't hear you!"
I did take the time to address each and every one of your concerns individually. But, apparently one line is sufficient in responding to that level of depth. I am being flippant, of course. And in-so-much once again meeting you on your own ground (something you are failing to reciprocate).
Let me finish before you jump to conclusions. Please !
You have yet to begin. But, alright...
Vanilla WoW did it right, and they did it wayyyy back in 2004. It's 2015. How could mmos have gone backwards, I would have never expected that in a million years.
Did what right? How exactly? I know what year it is. Gone backwards from what (that thing you didn't elaborate on)?
At first I would have thought stupidity, close mindedness, but no. Something else happened that none of us expected. Greed profit margin, bloated cost, and simply do the most you can with as little as possible and let marketing and advertisement sell the game ( remember pre-warhammer ).
I think you may have very well been the only one who did not expect a corporation to meet its purpose (which is to increase profit exponentially year to year). And, in fact the first game to self identify as an MMORPG was created by one such corporation that had been around since 1983. I can't imagine (so good thing it is demonstrated for me) the kind of uniformed and delusional purview which holds that MMORPG were created to do anything but make a massive profit. And had some alternate motivation that was not just a byproduct of that goal at any point in their history.
The time of Vanguard was the change over point. It's the exact time where things began to go wrong for the players !
How did things go wrong for Vanguard players? And, how is that relevant (how does it translate to affecting) to the whole of the genre?
Developers and programmers started off with a vision. GOOD GAME OR NOT IS NOT THE POINT. This is about the "vision" not the game. It's not about a few screwball coding practices, but about the 'vision".
You cannot know how 'they' started out or what 'their' purview was.
Vanguard was to be the Ultimate world. It was to take EverQuest and World of Warcraft and take it to the next level for everyone. With a huge world, crafting so deep and beyond its time, and diplomacy for something to distract players from everything else if the player chose. It had the largest world ever, with several unique starting zones. It was to be seamless, bad coding but seamless none the less. Lets not forget both PvP and PvE servers.
Every other MMORPG that had released after WoW was intended to be the mold breaker. And, most have touted a similar line to that in advertising it.
This was the "vision". The vision was to be released with the full complement. The full complement at release deserves to be mentioned twice, and its own paragraph because it's that important.
Your vision perhaps. And, did you just quote yourself non-referentially? Also, it actually deserves an unordered list with a header title (since you have moved us into the realm of talking about what merits what in literary representation in a web based venue).
But NO. Development was stopped and the game was released. It was not done, period !!......It's like buying half a car !.....Then crazy politics took over in the background that were not in the players interest for further development. Nothing what's-so-ever for the player. Implosion would be the best way to describe it.
This tends to happen (a lot actually) when development over runs their budget and the patience of their publisher. Which in turn happens when a publisher does not have one of it's own as senior staff on development. And when a development team has no focus. And, only dreams of being a special snowflake. Sucks, when it does happen. But it is part of the industry. And, it is norm that was established long before this game.
******** Every mmo after changed, subtracting the fighting between the developers and Investers. INVESTERS simply took full control. The arguing ended, it was set in stone. Developers were to shut up and program.
Citation? Because seriously that is a big accusation of ethical misconduct on both ends that could be the downfall of an entire invest capitalist venture. And, when making such accusations you need to come to the table with backing evidence.
Now going back to World of Warcraft. It almost seems Blizzard not only had good developers, programmers and a large money pool. But they had the best foresight ever in the history of gamming.
Their foresight was in good timing and being able to predict a market. They had two massive franchises backing them with funding, A preexisting fan-base ready to enter their game on opening. merchandizing deals in place and celebrity endorsement. It was a perfect storm event in online gaming. And, had it not been them it would have been someone else (because a perfect storm needs a ship). What they had/have was/is a company that knows how to make money. Because it's goal is to make money.
Foresight ?.....What the hell is this guy even talking about, you ask yourself !.....It's the ability to sit back and think of what players of all kinds would want in there mmo. REALLY REALLY THINK. It's almost like Blizzard had social workers and philosophers on the payroll. Now your saying this guy is crazy, a real loon ....But think about that game back in 2004. It' was fun for everyone. WoW was soooo deep you can be 8 years old, create a character and have some simple fun. Yet you can be an MIT or Harvard Graduate and deeply develop your character to be the ultimate fighter for the hardest Raids.
That is not what foresight is in respect to gaming or otherwise. Foresight is the ability to predict something based on future need. And it isn't magic. Example: If you have 100 employess, who go through 100 pens a month, and you are at the middle of the month and only have 25 pens left. You know you need to order new pens to keep your employees from running out (and possibly fire someone for stealing). That is foresight. And, your making it into some mystical quality. Trying to quantify it as the "it" factor. The "It" factor being something investors have been trying to figure out since investment became a thing. 1000's of years and they have yet to coherently describe it in a way that lets them consistently see returns by applying the definition of what is and is not "it". And, only investing in what is "it". Your not the person with the big reveal. Who finally hit the nail on the head.
You can play around with the fetch four apples for Maggie's famous apple pies in Goldshire, or take on Deadmines at level 17 with only 3 players if you had the right, well thought out plan......Or you can simply hang out in the safety of Ironforge.
Now you can say this about any mmo but WoW took easy to hard and something for everyone to a higher degree. And yes, back in 2004. You can't have F2P in an mmo. This changes the fair playing field. Foresight is replaced by greed.
You realize that none of these assertions are supportive of each other or even related to each other? And MMORPG's were doing this before WoW. What Wow did (as a game as apposed to it's parent company) was rehash EQ with a few new features. And, themed it after warcraft. A series of RTS that had been popular since their first iteration in 1994. That had fans who wanted an MMORPG based on it. Fans that proved they could and would pay, and exactly by how much. because of all those warcraft games they bought. Games that were the first to use an authentication key (so Blizzard had a realistic outlook on it's player base and what they were spending). It was a calculated investment
Games with Foresight :
- World of Warcraft
- Vanguard
- EverQuest 2
- A few I missed.
If something is missing from the list, add it to the list. Don't put the equivalent of X=? to bolster the list.
Games without Foresight:
- The Secret World ( forced story driven )
- FF14 ( forced story driven )
- Elders Scrolls Online ( forced story driven )
- Wildstar( only for the silly )
-StarWars The Old Republic (forced story driven )
- And most every other mmo beyond 2009.
Again ambiguous place holders have no place on a listing of specific things. And one or two of these I would say lacked competence. But all of them had to have foresight in order to function at all or they wouldn't be able to predict their own needs to any degree (like vanguard...which actually lacked foresight but has still managed to find it's place on your list of games that supposedly had what you seem to think is fairy dust.)
Important :
I better add this......An mmo would have to be very large to have something for everyone. Earlier mmos' seem to have been larger.
Not true, Runescape has offerings for all player types and is a relatively small game by area.
I don't think you know what your own point is (I surely don't anyway). And, that is why you have been unable to make an actual argument towards it (because the stance is either heavily flawed or non existent). I believe this caused by a complete lack of understanding for what you are talking about...almost a willful defiance to make an effort to understand beyond introspection and actually read up on MMORPG history (instead of just defining it by your own terms and what I suspect is limited breadth of experience).
Everything in blue is crap ..........Just saying, and I'll not waste any more time on this.
I think you forgot to say "La la la la la! I can't hear you!"
I did take the time to address each and every one of your concerns individually. But, apparently one line is sufficient in responding to that level of depth. I am being flippant, of course. And in-so-much once again meeting you on your own ground (something you are failing to reciprocate).
The only reason I'm responding to this is to explain WHY everything in blue is crap.
It's useless and unfitting........... and I would not sink low enough to respond to un-thought out rebuttals.
I've responded to seven pages of pro's and con's of this topic. Many disagree with me, possibly more disagree than not. However they deserved responses. I'll even admit many drive home a very good point that I can't dispute.
" But this in blue ", seems like a poor attempt to simply have the urge to break down paragraphs.
It's just not that good !......So here I'll give you the attention your craving and respond with "La la la la la ! I can't hear you!". Do you feel better ?
Developers need to have foresight in many capacities like:
To think about the story and how the current events will limit or expand the potential for future development
To think about how current game systems will interact with future planned systems
To think about how a growing or dwindling player base will impact the experience for all players.
I understand your main point is that an ideal mmorpg developer would have consideration and insight as to what all types of people would like when designing their game. But, consider this point also: If a game is like a work of art, what if the experience they want to provide is one that focuses a strong narrative? What if attempting to provide for all types of players would undermine their vision?
Anyone ever noticed how many people like to type out huge amounts of texts like they are developers for an mmorpg? I mean holy crap how do you expect people to waste time reading so much nonfaction in a forum? This has to be an ego thing ive never seen a forum where people have used so many words in one message before. I mean really im sure you can simply and explain what your talking about, where not that daft we can read.
If developers wanted to make games that were fun for everyone then they would make games with robust non-combat elements that would be able to draw in players that were not interested primarily in combat, yet WoW by and large heralded the death of non-combat elements in MMORPGs.
So I assume when the OP says fun for everyone he means fun for himself and judging from his list he doesn't find story elements fun, which is fine, but just the OP's personal preference.
One problem with mmo's is that it has gotten to the point where we all feel that an mmo should launch with problems and bugs, hell even I think that...but why? A mistake can happen, but the problems and bugs that mmo's launch with are insane...the first year of an mmo launch is spent fixing the broken game.
Another problem is that mmo's are trying to cater to everyone on one server...pvers, rpers, pvpers...it just doesn't work. Either pick one group you want to cater to and do it, or make a server type for each type of player, you try to cater to all on one server and in the end no one is happy.
Incognito www.incognito-gaming.us "You're either with us or against us"
Let me finish before you jump to conclusions. Please !
You have yet to begin. But, alright...
You have 901 posts as of my writing this and as such you should understand why the post was opened with this statement.
Vanilla WoW did it right, and they did it wayyyy back in 2004. It's 2015. How could mmos have gone backwards, I would have never expected that in a million years.
Did what right? How exactly? I know what year it is. Gone backwards from what (that thing you didn't elaborate on)?
I guess you need a novel unless you just feel the need to type. Remember this is a forum and not a blog or a scientific paper, and if you didn't know the year you would have bigger issues.
I do not agree with the OP about WoW doing it right but that is my opinion just as the original statement.
At first I would have thought stupidity, close mindedness, but no. Something else happened that none of us expected. Greed profit margin, bloated cost, and simply do the most you can with as little as possible and let marketing and advertisement sell the game ( remember pre-warhammer ).
I think you may have very well been the only one who did not expect a corporation to meet its purpose (which is to increase profit exponentially year to year). And, in fact the first game to self identify as an MMORPG was created by one such corporation that had been around since 1983. I can't imagine (so good thing it is demonstrated for me) the kind of uniformed and delusional purview which holds that MMORPG were created to do anything but make a massive profit. And had some alternate motivation that was not just a byproduct of that goal at any point in their history.
Agreed.
The time of Vanguard was the change over point. It's the exact time where things began to go wrong for the players !
How did things go wrong for Vanguard players? And, how is that relevant (how does it translate to affecting) to the whole of the genre?
You typed too soon. His opinion of where Vanguard went wrong is below, but he misses the main reason and didn't organize his opinions to your liking. A little research would allow the OP to at least read the history and that may have shed light on the lack of Brad's leadership and management abilities. He did and still does have vision though.
Developers and programmers started off with a vision. GOOD GAME OR NOT IS NOT THE POINT. This is about the "vision" not the game. It's not about a few screwball coding practices, but about the 'vision".
You cannot know how 'they' started out or what 'their' purview was.
Remember, you wrote this. It is important later.
Again, Brad did have a vision but the issues was deeper than just "screwball coding practices" as I touched on above.
Vanguard was to be the Ultimate world. It was to take EverQuest and World of Warcraft and take it to the next level for everyone. With a huge world, crafting so deep and beyond its time, and diplomacy for something to distract players from everything else if the player chose. It had the largest world ever, with several unique starting zones. It was to be seamless, bad coding but seamless none the less. Lets not forget both PvP and PvE servers.
Every other MMORPG that had released after WoW was intended to be the mold breaker. And, most have touted a similar line to that in advertising it.
That's a pretty wide brush you're painting with isn't it? How do you know what every development company's intent or purview was? Where are your sources for every MMO released? Besides, above you say they all want to make massive profits. So, which was it? Profits or mold breaker? Both? Again where is your proof that no game was released since 2004 solely to make a quick profit?
This was the "vision". The vision was to be released with the full complement. The full complement at release deserves to be mentioned twice, and its own paragraph because it's that important.
Your vision perhaps. And, did you just quote yourself non-referentially? Also, it actually deserves an unordered list with a header title (since you have moved us into the realm of talking about what merits what in literary representation in a web based venue).
Perhaps the OPs vision, but the rest of your statement serves no purpose. Do you have any legitimate arguement said to refute the claim that the vision of Vanguard was to be released with the full complement?
But NO. Development was stopped and the game was released. It was not done, period !!......It's like buying half a car !.....Then crazy politics took over in the background that were not in the players interest for further development. Nothing what's-so-ever for the player. Implosion would be the best way to describe it.
This tends to happen (a lot actually) when development over runs their budget and the patience of their publisher. Which in turn happens when a publisher does not have one of it's own as senior staff on development. And when a development team has no focus. And, only dreams of being a special snowflake. Sucks, when it does happen. But it is part of the industry. And, it is norm that was established long before this game.
Completely agree.
******** Every mmo after changed, subtracting the fighting between the developers and Investers. INVESTERS simply took full control. The arguing ended, it was set in stone. Developers were to shut up and program.
Citation? Because seriously that is a big accusation of ethical misconduct on both ends that could be the downfall of an entire invest capitalist venture. And, when making such accusations you need to come to the table with backing evidence.
Your point of view is diminished when you ask for a citation yet a few points above you do the same type of thing. Every MMO since WoW sound familiar? It is bad debating form to ask for something when you are guilty of the same thing.
Now going back to World of Warcraft. It almost seems Blizzard not only had good developers, programmers and a large money pool. But they had the best foresight ever in the history of gamming.
Their foresight was in good timing and being able to predict a market. They had two massive franchises backing them with funding, A preexisting fan-base ready to enter their game on opening. merchandizing deals in place and celebrity endorsement. It was a perfect storm event in online gaming. And, had it not been them it would have been someone else (because a perfect storm needs a ship). What they had/have was/is a company that knows how to make money. Because it's goal is to make money.
You missed a few key points. The art style was chosen so to "age better", lower system requirements at launch to allow for a larger audience that did not need to buy a new rig such as EQ2 caused for some, and they had the foresight to know there was a huge group of gamers that EQ didn't capture. Those were the casual gamers. A lot of people didn't have 40 hours a week to spend in front of a computer. Oh the poor EQ Widows, those were sad times for wives and girlfriends.
Foresight ?.....What the hell is this guy even talking about, you ask yourself !.....It's the ability to sit back and think of what players of all kinds would want in there mmo. REALLY REALLY THINK. It's almost like Blizzard had social workers and philosophers on the payroll. Now your saying this guy is crazy, a real loon ....But think about that game back in 2004. It' was fun for everyone. WoW was soooo deep you can be 8 years old, create a character and have some simple fun. Yet you can be an MIT or Harvard Graduate and deeply develop your character to be the ultimate fighter for the hardest Raids.
That is not what foresight is in respect to gaming or otherwise. Foresight is the ability to predict something based on future need. And it isn't magic. Example: If you have 100 employess, who go through 100 pens a month, and you are at the middle of the month and only have 25 pens left. You know you need to order new pens to keep your employees from running out (and possibly fire someone for stealing). That is foresight. And, your making it into some mystical quality. Trying to quantify it as the "it" factor. The "It" factor being something investors have been trying to figure out since investment became a thing. 1000's of years and they have yet to coherently describe it in a way that lets them consistently see returns by applying the definition of what is and is not "it". And, only investing in what is "it". Your not the person with the big reveal. Who finally hit the nail on the head.
Nice analogy but missed a golden opportunity to pint out that WOW was fun for everyone. Besides, there is no reason to personally attack the OP. How do you know he isn't the one to finally hit the nail on the head. I'm going to go out on a limb and say none of us here are all knowing Mystics and aren't that guy.
You can play around with the fetch four apples for Maggie's famous apple pies in Goldshire, or take on Deadmines at level 17 with only 3 players if you had the right, well thought out plan......Or you can simply hang out in the safety of Ironforge.
Ya missed one.
Now you can say this about any mmo but WoW took easy to hard and something for everyone to a higher degree. And yes, back in 2004. You can't have F2P in an mmo. This changes the fair playing field. Foresight is replaced by greed.
You realize that none of these assertions are supportive of each other or even related to each other? And MMORPG's were doing this before WoW. What Wow did (as a game as apposed to it's parent company) was rehash EQ with a few new features. And, themed it after warcraft. A series of RTS that had been popular since their first iteration in 1994. That had fans who wanted an MMORPG based on it. Fans that proved they could and would pay, and exactly by how much. because of all those warcraft games they bought. Games that were the first to use an authentication key (so Blizzard had a realistic outlook on it's player base and what they were spending). It was a calculated investment
Really? You know what is going on within the OPs mind? The assertions do support each other and are completely related to each other if only in the OPs own mind and perception. If he perceives these to be true then they absolutely are to him. That perception will change as the OP learns more and gains more experiences.
Games with Foresight :
- World of Warcraft
- Vanguard
- EverQuest 2
- A few I missed.
If something is missing from the list, add it to the list. Don't put the equivalent of X=? to bolster the list.
Again you pretend to know what the OPs intents are? Don't make a statement to add more blue type.
OP, EQ2 failed miserably in the foresight arena IMHO. They guessed wrong with the engine used and expected the CPU speeds to keep climbing and based everything on the CPU clock speeds and not so much the GPU. SOE did try to capture the casuals though, but history shows how they missed the mark.
Games without Foresight:
- The Secret World ( forced story driven )
- FF14 ( forced story driven )
- Elders Scrolls Online ( forced story driven )
- Wildstar( only for the silly )
-StarWars The Old Republic (forced story driven )
- And most every other mmo beyond 2009.
Again ambiguous place holders have no place on a listing of specific things. And one or two of these I would say lacked competence. But all of them had to have foresight in order to function at all or they wouldn't be able to predict their own needs to any degree (like vanguard...which actually lacked foresight but has still managed to find it's place on your list of games that supposedly had what you seem to think is fairy dust.)
Again typing to add more blue? You must have issue with differing opinions than yours. These are his lists and neither of our opinions have any more or less merit than his.
Important :
I better add this......An mmo would have to be very large to have something for everyone. Earlier mmos' seem to have been larger.
Not true, Runescape has offerings for all player types and is a relatively small game by area.
Oh yes it is to the OP. Again, his perception is his and does not need to conform to yours.
I don't think you know what your own point is (I surely don't anyway). And, that is why you have been unable to make an actual argument towards it (because the stance is either heavily flawed or non existent). I believe this caused by a complete lack of understanding for what you are talking about...almost a willful defiance to make an effort to understand beyond introspection and actually read up on MMORPG history (instead of just defining it by your own terms and what I suspect is limited breadth of experience).
So, you have no idea what the OPs point is but you obviously knew enough of it to take offense or they hit a nerve. Either way The fact that you admit you do not know what the point is proves your points and arguments are heavily flawed or non existent because they cannot apply if you do not comprehend the original points made. Put another way, you cannot make intelligent counterpoints if you never knew the original points in the first place.
We all define things based on our own experiences and use introspection to form our own original ideas. I do not agree with the OP, but at least he came here and stated his points and opinions in his own way. You don't have to like it or agree either, but you are not the one special snowflake that determines which opinions are deserving of merit.
One problem with mmo's is that it has gotten to the point where we all feel that an mmo should launch with problems and bugs, hell even I think that...but why? A mistake can happen, but the problems and bugs that mmo's launch with are insane...the first year of an mmo launch is spent fixing the broken game.
Another problem is that mmo's are trying to cater to everyone on one server...pvers, rpers, pvpers...it just doesn't work. Either pick one group you want to cater to and do it, or make a server type for each type of player, you try to cater to all on one server and in the end no one is happy.
Another problem is taking forums posts as representative of any games general overall player moral. It's simply reinforcing your own thoughts, it doesn't really give an overall clear picture. I never heard many complaints from Dancers, Musicians, Crafters, etc.. referencing "waiter there's PVP in my soup". The mix of play styles seemed to be quite welcome in that environment. So to say "it doesn't work" or " no one is happy seems quite odd to me". At least judging that based on how folks acted in game. Compared to forums like this.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Comments
Building things together is fun. Absolutely!
The problem is the severe diminishing returns on adding players.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
I don't think you know what your own point is (I surely don't anyway). And, that is why you have been unable to make an actual argument towards it (because the stance is either heavily flawed or non existent). I believe this caused by a complete lack of understanding for what you are talking about...almost a willful defiance to make an effort to understand beyond introspection and actually read up on MMORPG history (instead of just defining it by your own terms and what I suspect is limited breadth of experience).
He is also cherry picking parts from different games. These parts do not have a uniform cost and could represent a major resource cost for the game they are from. Taking expensive parts from many games and putting them into a single game makes for a very expensive game.
Epic Music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAigCvelkhQ&list=PLo9FRw1AkDuQLEz7Gvvaz3ideB2NpFtT1
https://archive.org/details/softwarelibrary_msdos?&sort=-downloads&page=1
Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you playing an MMORPG?"
Revival
Star Citizen
Those are really the only two you need to watch.
Everything in blue is crap
..........Just saying, and I'll not waste any more time on this.
I think you forgot to say "La la la la la! I can't hear you!"
I did take the time to address each and every one of your concerns individually. But, apparently one line is sufficient in responding to that level of depth. I am being flippant, of course. And in-so-much once again meeting you on your own ground (something you are failing to reciprocate).
The only reason I'm responding to this is to explain WHY everything in blue is crap.
It's useless and unfitting........... and I would not sink low enough to respond to un-thought out rebuttals.
I've responded to seven pages of pro's and con's of this topic. Many disagree with me, possibly more disagree than not. However they deserved responses. I'll even admit many drive home a very good point that I can't dispute.
" But this in blue ", seems like a poor attempt to simply have the urge to break down paragraphs.
It's just not that good !......So here I'll give you the attention your craving and respond with "La la la la la ! I can't hear you!". Do you feel better ?
If developers wanted to make games that were fun for everyone then they would make games with robust non-combat elements that would be able to draw in players that were not interested primarily in combat, yet WoW by and large heralded the death of non-combat elements in MMORPGs.
So I assume when the OP says fun for everyone he means fun for himself and judging from his list he doesn't find story elements fun, which is fine, but just the OP's personal preference.
An mmo catering for everyone is actually an mmo catering for no one
One problem with mmo's is that it has gotten to the point where we all feel that an mmo should launch with problems and bugs, hell even I think that...but why? A mistake can happen, but the problems and bugs that mmo's launch with are insane...the first year of an mmo launch is spent fixing the broken game.
Another problem is that mmo's are trying to cater to everyone on one server...pvers, rpers, pvpers...it just doesn't work. Either pick one group you want to cater to and do it, or make a server type for each type of player, you try to cater to all on one server and in the end no one is happy.
Incognito
www.incognito-gaming.us
"You're either with us or against us"
So, you have no idea what the OPs point is but you obviously knew enough of it to take offense or they hit a nerve. Either way The fact that you admit you do not know what the point is proves your points and arguments are heavily flawed or non existent because they cannot apply if you do not comprehend the original points made. Put another way, you cannot make intelligent counterpoints if you never knew the original points in the first place.
We all define things based on our own experiences and use introspection to form our own original ideas. I do not agree with the OP, but at least he came here and stated his points and opinions in his own way. You don't have to like it or agree either, but you are not the one special snowflake that determines which opinions are deserving of merit.
Another problem is taking forums posts as representative of any games general overall player moral. It's simply reinforcing your own thoughts, it doesn't really give an overall clear picture. I never heard many complaints from Dancers, Musicians, Crafters, etc.. referencing "waiter there's PVP in my soup". The mix of play styles seemed to be quite welcome in that environment. So to say "it doesn't work" or " no one is happy seems quite odd to me". At least judging that based on how folks acted in game. Compared to forums like this.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson