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Exciting times for MMORPG!
aSynchro
Member UncommonPosts: 194
Starting with WoW in 2004, we had a full decade of themeparks clones: AoC, WO, LOTRO, Rift, TSW, SWTOR, GW2, Wildstar, ToS... Sure they all tried to have their own thematic but basically it was always about combat in a very static world: AoC was WoW mixed with Conan, SWTOR was WoW with a Star Wars skin and a focus on storytelling, ToS was WoW with Skyrim lore etc. even GW2 and TSW, who imho were the two that tryed the hardest to innovate, failed into the same themepark trap. That is: players are only fighters and they wait for devs to feed them with stuff to kill and grind.
But times are changing my friends! We may indeed be at the start of a very innovative area for our loved genre.
EQN seems doomed but look at all those others projects (in no particular order): Chronicles of Elyria, Revival, The Repopulation, Project Gorgon, Gloria Victis, Wild Terra, Camelot Unchained, Shards Online, Albion Online, Sword Coast Legends (though technicaly not a mmo) and many more!
Ok they're not from big AAA studios, but they all have something in common: the will to break the mold created by WoW! They are trying to be innovative and to rediscover the true meaning of a MMORPG: creating a living, breathing world for the players to enjoy.
Re-inventing how crafting is done, adding features (diplomacy, family, arts...) that aren't just raw combat, trying to create a real economy, a dynamic world, players-driven content, emergent gameplay, destructible environment, etc. etc.
Most of them probably either won't make it (Pantheon...) or won't be as exciting as expected, but I can't help feeling optimistic about the upcoming years: it's like devs finaly understand themeparks aren't satisfy and therefor are trying something... new.
But times are changing my friends! We may indeed be at the start of a very innovative area for our loved genre.
EQN seems doomed but look at all those others projects (in no particular order): Chronicles of Elyria, Revival, The Repopulation, Project Gorgon, Gloria Victis, Wild Terra, Camelot Unchained, Shards Online, Albion Online, Sword Coast Legends (though technicaly not a mmo) and many more!
Ok they're not from big AAA studios, but they all have something in common: the will to break the mold created by WoW! They are trying to be innovative and to rediscover the true meaning of a MMORPG: creating a living, breathing world for the players to enjoy.
Re-inventing how crafting is done, adding features (diplomacy, family, arts...) that aren't just raw combat, trying to create a real economy, a dynamic world, players-driven content, emergent gameplay, destructible environment, etc. etc.
Most of them probably either won't make it (Pantheon...) or won't be as exciting as expected, but I can't help feeling optimistic about the upcoming years: it's like devs finaly understand themeparks aren't satisfy and therefor are trying something... new.
Comments
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Certainly we can be excited about the many indie games being produced, but MMORGPs?
As I see it, the AAA devs have pretty much dropped out of the MMORPG market. The Indies step in with a "games for gamers" mindset, pushing back against the streamlined convenient formula of quest hub hopping, rush to cap and then raid or PVP.
Where my mixed feelings come into play is that I'm not convinced that the mainstream market will bite at the new offerings (uncomfortable with the gameplay), which could leave the publishers in an uncomfortable financial position.
Also, I feel that indie games make great sense as niche games when production and operation costs are low. But I question whether or not a low budget game can hit player expectations on aesthetics, polish and presentation.
As I see it, if there is going to be a major hit, it will need to be great for gamers, great (or at least reasonable) for mainstream, nicely polished and be sufficiently well presented graphically so as to not turn away a large portion of the potential playerbase.
That's one tough order for any company, let alone one struggling against funding limitations.
I do think someone is going to pull it off. If the doomers are right and nobody can achieve a hit, that'll be a sad era for the MMORPG genre.
All there has to be is a game that can satisfy its customers and do well. Of course it's going to have to be from a small team if it is to stay afloat. Can't have a team of 90+ employees and do well with less than 200k players. Let alone what? 90k? 50k or less?
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
I'm cautiously optimistic about Pantheon. I think it's a game that the genre needs and has tremendous potential. Whether this game can be fully realized with the funding struggles that the devs have faced will remain to be seen.
I ask myself if, when and if those games will release, will we be telling eachother how much it was worth the waiting or will we still be looking down the road for the next big hit, beause even them (those games) didn't manage to scratch that hitch.
As a gamer I'm looking forward for Mount and Balde 2, which is at least 1 year down the road; "scratches his head" what am I supposed to do meanwhile?
Pantheon is my hope.
There are so much entertainment out there that I really pity those who cannot enjoy anything but a small slice of what this world has to offer.
I can also say for certain that any new MMO's coming out in the future will have good and bad things about it just like the games out now.
"We all do the best we can based on life experience, point of view, and our ability to believe in ourselves." - Naropa "We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are." SR Covey
Also sandbox typically don't need as much update than themepark: for exemple why spend months creating new quests for your players when the said players are already doing it by themself ? Why spend months imagining ONE story for your world (for example Grommash going nuts and killing everyone) if you let your players/guilds become leader of cities and manage the politics themself ?
In this regard, Revival has one feature quite interesting: you can pay for live storytelling! ie: their gm will play with you like in a p&p session. So this kind of games, where the world is just a tool for custom stories may not need thousand and thousand of players to make a profit.
Those other games are all cheap knockoffs,they don't look very impressive at all.There is one more game i am awaiting the Brad McQuaid game "Pantheon",other than that i only see a few possibilities.
I don't need to see big change i just need to see gaming or a RPG done right.Linear questing is NOT doing it right,that is just a laid out system to gain levels,wtf does that have to do with role playing...NOTHING.It is called clueless devs.
You should gain ALL your experience by doing what your character does,by healing or killing or crafting.There should be skills and no you shoudl NOT be putting numbers or spending sklill pts that is unrealistic ideals.
When you do something in real life you become better at it through repetition and by someone showing you a few things related to your skill.You don't after 3 weeks of practicing it say "OH wow i feel more skilled,where are my points to alot" it is just a silly retarded idea.Basically devs need to quit making games look like games with leveling systems,make them look like a world with plausible ideas.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
In fact, most stuff in games are not plausible. Tell me how is a system to learn about MAGIC is plausible when there is no such thing in the real world? How do you know there are no magic little spreadsheet in thin air for apprentices to allocate their "magical points" in an alternate universe?
But I don't see how getting better at something over time as you do it is implausible. In fact it's probably a better abstraction of the way people actually learn and improve than levels and XP.
So what if a char suddenly finds a WW2 tank in a fantasy world .. just do some alternate universe mumbo jumbo. In fact, there is a japanese anime does EXACTLY that (the self defense force went thru a portal to fight fantasy creatures).
If you put in fantasy & magic, NOTHING is implausible. Who says magical experience cannot be stored and suddenly turned into large jump in skill power?
The fact that some are played much longer than others (WoW, Eve ... ) is also no different than other games. Look at how long Diablo 2, or Starcraft (first one) have been played.
I don't think players are treating MMOs very different than other online games.
I'm talking about games like World of Warcraft, Elder Scrolls Online, Knights of the Old Republic, EQ1/2, UO ,etc. At some point those games should just be taken offline and something new be put in to replace them.
Perhaps remove the need for a server so that those games are not longer dependent on them. Let people host the games on their own PCs.
I believe part of the reason these games remain online is greed and the other is the servers. You can't play these games without the servers.
Single player games with some multiplayer mode are becoming increasingly online. Diablo 3, Starcraft 2 are good examples. The fact that D3 can be offline on console is proof that technological-wise, it can be an offline game. But online offers better patching & more secure gameplay (i.e. cheating less difficult) and other benefits like ladders.
I disagree that it is greed ... cause D3 is basically charged as a single player game .. in fact, with free CONTENT patches.
WoW didn't make the mold - EQ did. WoW merely refined it, but it is, itself, an EQ clone, (right down to core combat mechanics that are ultimately reminiscent of dikuMUD).
I can't say I have a ton of hope for any of the games in your list. MMO development doesn't really lend itself to independent/small studios. Most of them seem to be employing some sort of crowdfunding/prepayment model, and the success rate there isn't really overwhelming (that's pretty much what you do when you can't talk actual, savvy investors into funding you).
It's a really long walk from, "Someone wrote some interesting sounding mechanics into a FAQ and published it on a website," to, "Here's a well-executed playable game."
Making a game involves giving the player decisions to make. To date, we've barely touched the surface of simulating a world. We've seen combat/magic and combat resolution systems almost all based on a dwindling number of HPs. We've seen a variety of ways to craft items. We have static canned animations that vary from game to game. And we have a chat box. (We saw a diplomacy mini-game, but it's gone).
But where are other types of decisions? Social, Religious and Political are three major areas that have been completely ignored. What about Ritualistic / Communal magic requiring multiple casters to invoke a single spell? The in-game economies regularly ignore basic principles, with Merchant Lunan buying every bit of trash (wolf spleens) your character picks up off some non-completely-decayed critter. Worse yet, Merchant Lunan also will purchase every single Wolf-Hide Jerkin that you make, using his inexhaustible money pouch and having no clue where he's gonna store those jerkins or how he's going to get rid of the things. Where are natural disasters in the game? A major forest fire threatens a city, how does a character help extinguish the fire? What about plagues that might infect a region, causing altered needs throughout a region? Just let me get in the Mayor's Celebration, just once.
Even the basic conventions haven't been questioned. What is a HP? How does mana regenerate at this rate, but HPs regenerate at a different rate? Why does all that happen automatically? What about a combat system that makes avoiding combat a 'good thing'? Why would any sane character engage in 100 fights-to-the-death in a single day? What about a reliance on natural healing rather than in-combat magical effects spammed to keep a tank upright and functional?
I really hope you are right, and that the games on the horizon are moving outside the Combat and Crafting confines that we find ourselves stuck in. The industry needs an injection of NEW.
Logic, my dear, merely enables one to be wrong with great authority.
But not all of the games OP listed are PvP based, Shards and Pantheon are PvE games. Shards is interesting because players can make their own servers, both creating original content and changing basics in the game (want slow leveling, that is easy. But you could basically add a different combat system if you are good enough on coding).
Pantheon is more a flirt with oldschool Everquest made by the same guy. it should offer some gameplay we havn't seen in a long time.
And there are other interesting games as well. Sadly do all of them have rather shoddy budgets and more than a few of them could have more experienced coders but I do think things will be pretty interesting the next 5 years.
I wouldn't call the last 10 years wasted or anything but far too few devs have tried thinking out of the box.
"The most dynamic and immersive MMO to date"
Doesn't that title belong to Embers of Caerus?
Really, what possesses people to write this dreck? This will be lucky to ever see an alpha release, but it's "The most dynamic and immersive MMO to date"?
No one says the new stuff needs to be MMORPGs.