You might as well be asking "Will we have players like in the 2004 and prior games?"
The games have changed but the players have changed even more.
I was reading a recent thread in the ESO forums about fake tanks in PUGs. It's a thing in that game because the builds are open and there is no simple way for the group finder to validate roles. It IS a trinity game but the role selection when you queue is done on the honor system.
The system gets routinely gamed by DPSers who want an instant queue pop selecting "tank." Sometimes it works regardless if the random dungeon is an easy one and sometimes it's an annoying mess.
I saw many people post in that thread saying that they are providing a public service because there are not enough real tanks so when they fake it they make the queue faster for everyone. They didn't get laughed out of the thread. They got agrees and insightful reactions instead.
That's who you're playing with in 2020.
In situations where it can work they are essentially correct. If the content doesn't need a real tank to complete it shouldn't require one to begin with. In this case it is essentially a work around for a flawed system. That such can be done in ESO and have a reasonable chance of success validates the agreements and insightful reactions the assertions resulted in.
Which misses the whole point about honesty when you're imposing your no tank PUG style on 3 strangers who queued honorably.
Look... I've been at max CP for a long time and I have soloed many of those group dungeons. If I can solo them I can also carry 3 others who can just do nothing but follow me. I have also been in premade groups with no tank and no healer doing even the dungeons I can't solo, but when I queue in the group finder I don't game it and impose my play style on anyone for a "reasonable chance of success" no matter how uber I am because it's both dishonest and inconsiderate.
You're putting mechanics and metagaming ahead of honesty and consideration which is exactly the problem with the modern MMO communities.
PUGs are a social interaction too. Going into one of those lying about who you are, even if you complete the basic game play task, is the actual point here.
It's not my "tank not always required" policy to impose or prevent. Rather, it is a recognition on the part of the players that the system as is imposes an arbitrary party structure that is sometimes not needed and then finding a way around it.
What did you expect would happen? That people would just deal with the inadequacies of the system in place and trot along in formation like good little soldiers? Some would, the honourable ones I suppose, but those more concerned with pragmatism won't.
Perhaps it would be best if the system itself was redesigned such that players wouldn't have to work around the absence of a tank when one isn't needed. Then everyone could join in completely honestly and honourably and get on with playing.
I'm putting the functionality of the system over the abidance of the flaws of it.
My view is that Ashes of Creation seems to be the last hope. It's not pre 2004 but it at least is aiming to be about MMO side of things instead of just a single player RPG with others.
Apparently its going to be the best of all things for all people.
It may be for some people, and those will be better off than now. That's about the most one can hope for with a reasonable chance of realization.
It's not my "tank not always required" policy to impose or prevent. Rather, it is a recognition on the part of the players that the system as is imposes an arbitrary party structure that is sometimes not needed and then finding a way around it.
What did you expect would happen? That people would just deal with the inadequacies of the system in place and trot along in formation like good little soldiers? Some would, the honourable ones I suppose, but those more concerned with pragmatism won't.
Perhaps it would be best if the system itself was redesigned such that players wouldn't have to work around the absence of a tank when one isn't needed. Then everyone could join in completely honestly and honourably and get on with playing.
I'm putting the functionality of the system over the abidance of the flaws of it.
I am going to say, I don't play ESO, so I have no idea how their system works.
But, in DDO, we as the players can write in what we are looking for, IE: Tank, Healer, etc. We can even select what classes we will and will not accept.
Going to be honest, if we put up an LFM for a Tank, we wanted a Tank, not another DPS. Joining and then telling us that we don't need a tank is a great way to get kicked.
Again, not sure how ESO or some other games work, so it might be a whole different system in there.
The next point I would like to bring up is, if you wanted to proxy fill tank roles.. why not just make a tank and go about it correctly?
Egotism is the anesthetic that dullens the pain of stupidity, this is why when I try to beat my head against the stupidity of other people, I only hurt myself.
It's not my "tank not always required" policy to impose or prevent. Rather, it is a recognition on the part of the players that the system as is imposes an arbitrary party structure that is sometimes not needed and then finding a way around it.
What did you expect would happen? That people would just deal with the inadequacies of the system in place and trot along in formation like good little soldiers? Some would, the honourable ones I suppose, but those more concerned with pragmatism won't.
Perhaps it would be best if the system itself was redesigned such that players wouldn't have to work around the absence of a tank when one isn't needed. Then everyone could join in completely honestly and honourably and get on with playing.
I'm putting the functionality of the system over the abidance of the flaws of it.
I am going to say, I don't play ESO, so I have no idea how their system works.
But, in DDO, we as the players can write in what we are looking for, IE: Tank, Healer, etc. We can even select what classes we will and will not accept.
Going to be honest, if we put up an LFM for a Tank, we wanted a Tank, not another DPS. Joining and then telling us that we don't need a tank is a great way to get kicked.
Again, not sure how ESO or some other games work, so it might be a whole different system in there.
The next point I would like to bring up is, if you wanted to proxy fill tank roles.. why not just make a tank and go about it correctly?
They are talking about the auto-queue system. I can't remember if DDO had something like it, but its pretty common in other mmos. The thing with ESO is that any class can be a tank/healer or dps, so when you "auto-queue" for a dungeon you manually select what role you will play (healer/tank/dps)-which means you can pick the "tank" role even if you are built for dps. The system then picks two dps, one tank and one healer from the pool of players queued and teleports you to the dungeon.
People also LFM in chat or bring friends/guildies, which side-steps the whole problem.
You might as well be asking "Will we have players like in the 2004 and prior games?"
The games have changed but the players have changed even more.
I was reading a recent thread in the ESO forums about fake tanks in PUGs. It's a thing in that game because the builds are open and there is no simple way for the group finder to validate roles. It IS a trinity game but the role selection when you queue is done on the honor system.
The system gets routinely gamed by DPSers who want an instant queue pop selecting "tank." Sometimes it works regardless if the random dungeon is an easy one and sometimes it's an annoying mess.
I saw many people post in that thread saying that they are providing a public service because there are not enough real tanks so when they fake it they make the queue faster for everyone. They didn't get laughed out of the thread. They got agrees and insightful reactions instead.
That's who you're playing with in 2020.
In situations where it can work they are essentially correct. If the content doesn't need a real tank to complete it shouldn't require one to begin with. In this case it is essentially a work around for a flawed system. That such can be done in ESO and have a reasonable chance of success validates the agreements and insightful reactions the assertions resulted in.
Which misses the whole point about honesty when you're imposing your no tank PUG style on 3 strangers who queued honorably.
Look... I've been at max CP for a long time and I have soloed many of those group dungeons. If I can solo them I can also carry 3 others who can just do nothing but follow me. I have also been in premade groups with no tank and no healer doing even the dungeons I can't solo, but when I queue in the group finder I don't game it and impose my play style on anyone for a "reasonable chance of success" no matter how uber I am because it's both dishonest and inconsiderate.
You're putting mechanics and metagaming ahead of honesty and consideration which is exactly the problem with the modern MMO communities.
PUGs are a social interaction too. Going into one of those lying about who you are, even if you complete the basic game play task, is the actual point here.
It's not my "tank not always required" policy to impose or prevent. Rather, it is a recognition on the part of the players that the system as is imposes an arbitrary party structure that is sometimes not needed and then finding a way around it.
What did you expect would happen? That people would just deal with the inadequacies of the system in place and trot along in formation like good little soldiers? Some would, the honourable ones I suppose, but those more concerned with pragmatism won't.
Perhaps it would be best if the system itself was redesigned such that players wouldn't have to work around the absence of a tank when one isn't needed. Then everyone could join in completely honestly and honourably and get on with playing.
I'm putting the functionality of the system over the abidance of the flaws of it.
You're still missing the point and why I used that as an example.
You and many others these days seem to be willing to extend pragmatism and problem solving to include lying to others about your role.
It's not about systems imposing arbitrary party structures it's about people lying using the party structure that they consider arbitrary as an excuse to behave in a self-entitled way and even go so far as look down as those who honor it with idiotic statements like "trot along in formation like a good little soldier."
My point is about communities and gamer behavior differences now vs. pre 2004 and you have done nothing but further illustrate the problem with the current crop of players who are just too sexy for their shirt to deal with others honestly.
Your replies are a great illustration actually of why current gamer communities are so toxic.
"Social media gives legions of idiots the right to speak when they once only spoke at a bar after a glass of wine, without harming the community ... but now they have the same right to speak as a Nobel Prize winner. It's the invasion of the idiots”
― Umberto Eco
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?” ― CD PROJEKT RED
It's not my "tank not always required" policy to impose or prevent. Rather, it is a recognition on the part of the players that the system as is imposes an arbitrary party structure that is sometimes not needed and then finding a way around it.
What did you expect would happen? That people would just deal with the inadequacies of the system in place and trot along in formation like good little soldiers? Some would, the honourable ones I suppose, but those more concerned with pragmatism won't.
Perhaps it would be best if the system itself was redesigned such that players wouldn't have to work around the absence of a tank when one isn't needed. Then everyone could join in completely honestly and honourably and get on with playing.
I'm putting the functionality of the system over the abidance of the flaws of it.
I am going to say, I don't play ESO, so I have no idea how their system works.
But, in DDO, we as the players can write in what we are looking for, IE: Tank, Healer, etc. We can even select what classes we will and will not accept.
Going to be honest, if we put up an LFM for a Tank, we wanted a Tank, not another DPS. Joining and then telling us that we don't need a tank is a great way to get kicked.
Again, not sure how ESO or some other games work, so it might be a whole different system in there.
The next point I would like to bring up is, if you wanted to proxy fill tank roles.. why not just make a tank and go about it correctly?
They are talking about the auto-queue system. I can't remember if DDO had something like it, but its pretty common in other mmos. The thing with ESO is that any class can be a tank/healer or dps, so when you "auto-queue" for a dungeon you manually select what role you will play (healer/tank/dps)-which means you can pick the "tank" role even if you are built for dps. The system then picks two dps, one tank and one healer from the pool of players queued and teleports you to the dungeon.
People also LFM in chat or bring friends/guildies, which side-steps the whole problem.
Yah.. DDO didn't have anything like that, in fact I have never played a single game that had anything remotely like that Auto-Queue system you are talking about.
Or, in the off chance I did, which I very well may have, I never played it long enough to realize it had a system like that, and truth be told, it makes my nuts shrivel just thinking of what a clusterfuck that kind of system must be.
Like what do you do? Just Click a Queue for a specific dungeon?
With that said, even with a system that seems that messed up, why would you lie about what you can do? If you didn't build a tank, and can't tank, why click the tank option?
Would you do that with a player made LFM?
I mean that is like not being able to heal and clicking the healer option, I bet people love that.
In any case, I suppose also the larger question to me is, If you know being a tank will get you into a group, why not just make a Tank, or at the very least, make something that CAN tank.
And yah, I can see how that whole, auto-queue system would drive people to run static/pre-made groups only.
I know I personally would not touch something like that, even if that meant I had to shortman the content with my static, and I like to random pug.
Egotism is the anesthetic that dullens the pain of stupidity, this is why when I try to beat my head against the stupidity of other people, I only hurt myself.
You cannot regain your MMORPG virginity. Our first was always something special.
I would like to expand on this quote.
This will be true for many generations going forward to a degree. What is brand new is wonderful to the virgin gamer. (Until VR releases chemical injections into us while playing )
But, those of us who live in the "First Age" of video games,Atari, mmos, mmorpgs... it was the wild west. We are the 1st Generation.
Publishers didn't know, "communities" was a new term... we just logged in an didn't know what would happen. We didn't know each other. THE INTERNET WAS RELATIVELY NEW. SOCIAL INTERACTION WAS NEW. WE WERE BOLD. NERDS PAVED THE WAY!
Heck I had a $600 phone bill from my dial up in one month on ultima online because I called long distance (modems).
We can never revisit those crazy days. However, I do adore them!
You cannot regain your MMORPG virginity. Our first was always something special.
Disagreed . the First wasn't always something good to remember .
For example for me , best mmorpgs wasn't around 1998~2005 but around 2006 to 2012. 2006 to 2012 graphic was much better than before 2005 , while still acceptable even at 2020
It was something medium , not too raw , but not over cooked with greed
MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game) Can't be a MOVW (Massively Online Virtual World). MOVW will require something different to be capable of delivering a realistic experience and it will be costly to create. Where it needs to go is into a different realm of player built and controlled environment where things change over time and be so massive in size it would take years of exploring to see it all.
umm didn't you just contradict yourself or did I misunderstand you?
These are of course virtual worlds the yare not real but what I aim to see is exactly what you want and that is a vast open world that feels realistic etc etc. The problem is that I already have something like that in Atlas,the majority of people don't want the entire package,all they want is pvp.
They don't want to roam around vast ,massive landscapes they want pvp and if there is loot to boot all the better,they really couldn't care less what the game is behind the face.
Then on the topic of cost,it is not that costly to make,Atlas for example was a budget mod like game derived from Ark and with a rag tag small team.
What it does involve is LESS profits because you need a lot of server space and MANY realms to handle millions of players so eventually it is over corwded.
Just think of our real world,it is massive,nobody will have travelled the entire Earth by time the yare dead,yet we still have tons of places with over crowding.However my point is that YES it is very much doable,it just means less profit,something the greedy CEO's and investors want no part of.
This is the POINT i have been drilling across forever now,these are "businesses" FIRST and game designers a very distant second and that is why we likely never see a true AAA game.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
You see I USED to be very naive,i thought back in the 80's>>>90's and onwards that we were leading into something amazing.After all these years I finally woke up and realized that none of these studios really care about making that one great game,they care about how to monetize and get a game out as fast as possible and how to market it and how to BS people. I gave up on mmorpg's for good reason,i do not see a single glimpse of a AAA game anywhere in the near future.All I see are "seasons"and copy cat trends that when one dev strikes it lucky several others jump on the bandwagon.
if before I am gone I see a glimmer of hope,you can be sure I will be the first to let you know.I know some have the mentality,well if that game never comes you won't be playing any games.
Wrong,i will still play the games I grew up playing because at one time they were headed in the right direction and deserved to be supported,I just won't support anymore devs going backwards in game design. I am not just seeing BACKWARDS game design I am seeing like 2 decades backwards,games that look to be made in the 80's..90's like wtf,they are trying to sell me aged crap in 2020.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
You cannot regain your MMORPG virginity. Our first was always something special.
Disagreed . the First wasn't always something good to remember .
For example for me , best mmorpgs wasn't around 1998~2005 but around 2006 to 2012. 2006 to 2012 graphic was much better than before 2005 , while still acceptable even at 2020
It was something medium , not too raw , but not over cooked with greed
But did keep playing that terrible first MMO until the next one came out in 2006? Did you enjoy it? Have any fond memories at all?
That first one does not have to be great, just special
- Al
Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse. - FARGIN_WAR
You cannot regain your MMORPG virginity. Our first was always something special.
Disagreed . the First wasn't always something good to remember .
For example for me , best mmorpgs wasn't around 1998~2005 but around 2006 to 2012. 2006 to 2012 graphic was much better than before 2005 , while still acceptable even at 2020
It was something medium , not too raw , but not over cooked with greed
But did keep playing that terrible first MMO until the next one came out in 2006? Did you enjoy it? Have any fond memories at all?
That first one does not have to be great, just special
Yes , because the before 2008 , internet wasn't cheap and you had to inverst a lots to play MMORPG . So i normally playing one game for 2 years , then rage quit because some stupid change . Game developers always get high when they have a little success .
i think the next one that i heavy inverested was around 2007
I do have my fond memories about that time. For example when i said something about the gameplay lacking (too heavy grind need some repeatable quests to distract) on the official forum and get bash off by the white knights , then later they add what i had said . But i had quit it before thing happen .
As for the special ,I don't think the first "always" special. some did special , but some wasn't and you kind of forget it as time passed .
I think people saying other wear rose color glass never think about the logic .
Some keep saying something like 3D master race , 2D trash , grind is bad , raider are superial elite ect... they seem like never think about why something work and some wasn't.
I myself don't ready care about this and that , i only care if it work or not , why it worked and the logic behind why something make me enjoy able while some make me sick and quit .
umm didn't you just contradict yourself or did I misunderstand you?
These are of course virtual worlds the yare not real but what I aim to see is exactly what you want and that is a vast open world that feels realistic etc etc. The problem is that I already have something like that in Atlas,the majority of people don't want the entire package,all they want is pvp.
They don't want to roam around vast ,massive landscapes they want pvp and if there is loot to boot all the better,they really couldn't care less what the game is behind the face.
Then on the topic of cost,it is not that costly to make,Atlas for example was a budget mod like game derived from Ark and with a rag tag small team.
What it does involve is LESS profits because you need a lot of server space and MANY realms to handle millions of players so eventually it is over corwded.
Just think of our real world,it is massive,nobody will have travelled the entire Earth by time the yare dead,yet we still have tons of places with over crowding.However my point is that YES it is very much doable,it just means less profit,something the greedy CEO's and investors want no part of.
This is the POINT i have been drilling across forever now,these are "businesses" FIRST and game designers a very distant second and that is why we likely never see a true AAA game.
I'm not really contradicting myself. Well, I guess sort of.
The MMO engine need to be redone from the ground up in order to be capable of massive worlds for one thing. Current game engines follow a specific design which has been the staple of most MMO development.
MMO servers need to be more enterprise level clustered in order to run the entire world under one system instead of sectors and zones.
I made a video of what is different in Multiverse engine and why I believe it is a next gen engine. It just needs some additional programming to tie it to the enterprise level. I been playing around with it off and on for about 15 years and now with the source code I'm doing some experimenting.
I do agree with you on the fact it is better from cost standpoint to keep the world small and player count low. Given that it cost cores to run a server with any sort of stability.
I dunno, while we are on the topic, I will agree that the first one, will always be special. But that does not mean it was any good.
Like being in a relationship, and it's your first time, so you don't want to just quit, but, it is not working out.
When you finally leave, you realize how bad it was for you. And while of course you will walk away with some fond memories, you will also walk away with some scars.
Some people never leave. They just stay with their first.
The thing is, over time, we tend to forget the bad, but they don't forget us. We bring that baggage to our next game, and next game, and we become far less willing to put up with the negative for that bit of positive, like we were in the past.
The thing is, we can feel the negative in many MMO's as we play, and we tend to forget how much they hurt in our first MMO, because we just left our last one for the same damn reasons, but we still have that memory of great times with our first MMO,... Hence the Rose Colored Glasses.
Personally, I think, the abundance of MMO's on the market today, along with them being free to play, so we have no investment walking in, makes people a lot less willing to put up with the scars for the happy memories that might along with it.
Egotism is the anesthetic that dullens the pain of stupidity, this is why when I try to beat my head against the stupidity of other people, I only hurt myself.
Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse. - FARGIN_WAR
People have changed too. Back in 2000, nobody had a mobile phone except a selected few professionals in their cars. People were more used to take their time, while today it's all faster, faster, now, now ! And that also reflects in the way people play MMORPGs, back then it was more about wonder and adventure than today, where it's all about maxing out XP, DPS and gear. Sad but true.
I don't think that people have changed, it's just a different set of people who are being catered to. There's no doubt that this current fast-now-damnit crowd is larger than the old style adventurer, but there are a lot of people out there and most do not play MMORPGs.
I'd be willing to bet that if someone made a true quality MMORPG based on farming and the business of buying, selling, and transport of, in said game style, it would rival WoW's heyday.
Or fish tanks, catching, growing, proper mixes, water types, plant types, buying and selling, all to make a perfect aquarium.
That's not what WE want, of course. But my point is that there are a lot of things directly related to what we like that would have a huge affect on an MMORPG, and money means greater support and expansion. Including what WE like.
Hell, some of those things we might discover that we like too. Just as an aside, maybe, or even as a target for play along with the basic wants.
People have changed too. Back in 2000, nobody had a mobile phone except a selected few professionals in their cars. People were more used to take their time, while today it's all faster, faster, now, now ! And that also reflects in the way people play MMORPGs, back then it was more about wonder and adventure than today, where it's all about maxing out XP, DPS and gear. Sad but true.
Actually you are off by a decade, describing 1990 when cell phones came in a bag.
I got my first Motorola Startec flip phone in 1996 or so but by 2002 was even buying my 10 year old son a cell and paying on 5 phones.
Text messaging was huge that decade, can recall being stunned with a $400+ phone bill due to eldest daughter sending 4000+ texts and deciding it was time to get everyone an unlimited texting plan.
What really changed everything was 2007 and the Apple iphone / Smartphone. Too expensive at first for my family to switch over but I recall getting everyone Samsung 3s in 2012 when we finally did. ( I had a Smartphone a few years earlier than the others but not sure when, I was late to the party)
So yes, social media changed everything starting later in the 2000s, first on computers and then on cell phones, which perhaps not coincidentally is when the MMORPG genre really started to wane into insignificance in the overall scheme of the gaming universe.
Oh yes, the eldest daughter I mentioned earlier, still setting cell phone records these days, recently "won" the race in my family with 81 hours of talk, (yes, more than two full time jobs) 4500 texts, and 4GBs of data in a single monthly billing cycle.
Only my son eeked past her with 5GB of data but a family low of 200 minutes of talk proving what we all knew, he never really calls anyone.... except his mother once in a while as her talk numbers aren't much higher...
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
People have changed too. Back in 2000, nobody had a mobile phone except a selected few professionals in their cars. People were more used to take their time, while today it's all faster, faster, now, now ! And that also reflects in the way people play MMORPGs, back then it was more about wonder and adventure than today, where it's all about maxing out XP, DPS and gear. Sad but true.
Actually you are off by a decade, describing 1990 when cell phones came in a bag.
I got my first Motorola Startec flip phone in 1996 or so but by 2002 was even buying my 10 year old son a cell and paying on 5 phones.
Text messaging was huge that decade, can recall being stunned with a $400+ phone bill due to eldest daughter sending 4000+ texts and deciding it was time to get everyone an unlimited texting plan.
What really changed everything was 2007 and the Apple iphone / Smartphone. Too expensive at first for my family to switch over but I recall getting everyone Samsung 3s in 2012 when we finally did. ( I had a Smartphone a few years earlier than the others but not sure when, I was late to the party)
So yes, social media changed everything starting later in the 2000s, first on computers and then on cell phones, which perhaps not coincidentally is when the MMORPG genre really started to wane into insignificance in the overall scheme of the gaming universe.
Oh yes, the eldest daughter I mentioned earlier, still setting cell phone records these days, recently "won" the race in my family with 81 hours of talk, (yes, more than two full time jobs) 4500 texts, and 4GBs of data in a single monthly billing cycle.
Only my son eeked past her with 5GB of data but a family low of 200 minutes of talk proving what we all knew, he never really calls anyone.... except his mother once in a while as her talk numbers aren't much higher...
I remember pagers still being the rage when EQ1 came out, not cell phones directly, with things like a Blackberry being the apex of pagers, because you would send a text message via the pager to another pager.
In fact, Cell Phones were mainly only an urban thing in the early 2000's, and even then, there were black out areas even in the major cities where you could be driving along and your service would get cut out. Hence the "Can you hear me now" adds by Nextel/Verizon.
But yah, around 2010-ish, was when Cell Phones really took off.
Egotism is the anesthetic that dullens the pain of stupidity, this is why when I try to beat my head against the stupidity of other people, I only hurt myself.
People have changed too. Back in 2000, nobody had a mobile phone except a selected few professionals in their cars. People were more used to take their time, while today it's all faster, faster, now, now ! And that also reflects in the way people play MMORPGs, back then it was more about wonder and adventure than today, where it's all about maxing out XP, DPS and gear. Sad but true.
I don't think that people have changed, it's just a different set of people who are being catered to. There's no doubt that this current fast-now-damnit crowd is larger than the old style adventurer, but there are a lot of people out there and most do not play MMORPGs.
I'd be willing to bet that if someone made a true quality MMORPG based on farming and the business of buying, selling, and transport of, in said game style, it would rival WoW's heyday.
Or fish tanks, catching, growing, proper mixes, water types, plant types, buying and selling, all to make a perfect aquarium.
That's not what WE want, of course. But my point is that there are a lot of things directly related to what we like that would have a huge affect on an MMORPG, and money means greater support and expansion. Including what WE like.
Hell, some of those things we might discover that we like too. Just as an aside, maybe, or even as a target for play along with the basic wants.
People HAVE changed. Also, with more people with mobile devices, more people are gaming, but these are the ones who will pay to play and want to be uber as fast as possible.
I haven't played one for more than the initial trial since 2004 with WoW being the last, but I quit that in 2006 as I hated changes Blizzard were making to dumb it down. Since WoW there was only one mechanically that impressed me, that was SWTOR.... sadly the world design was not there an so it felt like a mix between a crap Single Player RPG and a crap MMO, appealing to no one.
I've just not wanted to be in an MMO world since those days, and when I look back it was mostly SOE delivering MMOs I loved, but then destroying them soon after with stupid changes like Blizzard did to WoW, only with less quality. Now SOE do not exist, there are no MMO developers any more You have the small indie ones, but they're making all the same mistakes again that we've seen over the years... I can see they will flop, why can't they?
I was hoping someone could come in and make a VR MMORPG, because funnily enough you need less fidelity like Rec Room... it's manageable to smaller developers. You'd think it would be the other way around and it would require a massive budget, but your brain fills in the gaps in VR graphically and the immersion is what is important. I always thought if someone took Rec Room and turned it into a SWG type game it would be a huge hit.... no one is pulling it off yet though. For me that's probably the only way you can capture that feeling everyone got playing WoW with a small budget. Someone like Valve or Blizzard could probably pull off a WoW 2, but it will require hundreds of millions.
I really want a world to be lost in again, I mean not even single player RPGs have done it for me since Skyrim. Bethesda flopped with Fallout 4 and I hated The Witcher 3, I thought the world looks out of proportion, like everything was too small compare to your character model.
I knew the writing was on the wall for SOE in Planetside 2 Alpha, I played it an told the developer it felt like Battlefield, not Planetside. They wanted that slice of the pie thinking people would love it, but it was just boring..... they did the same with EverQuest Next wanting the Minecraft audience and the game wasn't fun.
You keep seeing this, developers like SOE become blind, none of them seem to understand what we want. I look at SWTOR and mechanically it felt so good, I was really surprised as Bioware have never been good at that part. However you got to Tatooine and could sum up the whole problem with how the Cities were split off from the questing area, with a mandatory Griffon like ride. Why? We want worlds that feel like worlds, not game levels, which make it feel like a single player game. They had one really cool thing and that was a Balloon ride for a Holocron or something, where everyone was PVPing over it. That was so good I bet they got rid of that at some point lol, but that is what we want from an MMO, interaction with other players.
I sure hope not they were long drawn out and boring
Before you knew what you liked, you played and enjoyed what was offered. You explored things, and that let you find things that you liked, or didn't like.
Games like UO and EQ were the first real mainstream tastes of the genre, (yes, I'm intentionally not naming every game ever made...) but they let people get an idea of what PvP was, or what PvE dungeons and grinding could be. Then the genre hit a new step with WoW.....and people had choices...
Were the early days great because of the community, or because you didn't have experience enough to know better? As your taste became more refined, and defined, is that when the genre really changed?
For me? I loved the early days of UO, and I enjoyed the early times of WoW, but when I step back, I admit that I don't have time to sit and play for hours on end anymore, that what I liked then is not what I like now. So do I see a renaissance again? No, because back then we didn't know what was possible, it was all new. These days we all have ideas of what a game or the genre needs, and we are more fractured as a community. 2004 won't happen again, but that doesn't mean that there isn't something out there that doesn't scratch an itch. Of course back then, one solution may have scratched an itch for years, these days....a couple of months or more seems far more reasonable...
Comments
It's not my "tank not always required" policy to impose or prevent. Rather, it is a recognition on the part of the players that the system as is imposes an arbitrary party structure that is sometimes not needed and then finding a way around it.
What did you expect would happen? That people would just deal with the inadequacies of the system in place and trot along in formation like good little soldiers? Some would, the honourable ones I suppose, but those more concerned with pragmatism won't.
Perhaps it would be best if the system itself was redesigned such that players wouldn't have to work around the absence of a tank when one isn't needed. Then everyone could join in completely honestly and honourably and get on with playing.
I'm putting the functionality of the system over the abidance of the flaws of it.
It may be for some people, and those will be better off than now. That's about the most one can hope for with a reasonable chance of realization.
But, in DDO, we as the players can write in what we are looking for, IE: Tank, Healer, etc.
We can even select what classes we will and will not accept.
Going to be honest, if we put up an LFM for a Tank, we wanted a Tank, not another DPS. Joining and then telling us that we don't need a tank is a great way to get kicked.
Again, not sure how ESO or some other games work, so it might be a whole different system in there.
The next point I would like to bring up is, if you wanted to proxy fill tank roles.. why not just make a tank and go about it correctly?
They are talking about the auto-queue system. I can't remember if DDO had something like it, but its pretty common in other mmos. The thing with ESO is that any class can be a tank/healer or dps, so when you "auto-queue" for a dungeon you manually select what role you will play (healer/tank/dps)-which means you can pick the "tank" role even if you are built for dps. The system then picks two dps, one tank and one healer from the pool of players queued and teleports you to the dungeon.
People also LFM in chat or bring friends/guildies, which side-steps the whole problem.
You and many others these days seem to be willing to extend pragmatism and problem solving to include lying to others about your role.
It's not about systems imposing arbitrary party structures it's about people lying using the party structure that they consider arbitrary as an excuse to behave in a self-entitled way and even go so far as look down as those who honor it with idiotic statements like "trot along in formation like a good little soldier."
My point is about communities and gamer behavior differences now vs. pre 2004 and you have done nothing but further illustrate the problem with the current crop of players who are just too sexy for their shirt to deal with others honestly.
Your replies are a great illustration actually of why current gamer communities are so toxic.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
Or, in the off chance I did, which I very well may have, I never played it long enough to realize it had a system like that, and truth be told, it makes my nuts shrivel just thinking of what a clusterfuck that kind of system must be.
Like what do you do? Just Click a Queue for a specific dungeon?
With that said, even with a system that seems that messed up, why would you lie about what you can do? If you didn't build a tank, and can't tank, why click the tank option?
Would you do that with a player made LFM?
I mean that is like not being able to heal and clicking the healer option, I bet people love that.
In any case, I suppose also the larger question to me is, If you know being a tank will get you into a group, why not just make a Tank, or at the very least, make something that CAN tank.
And yah, I can see how that whole, auto-queue system would drive people to run static/pre-made groups only.
I know I personally would not touch something like that, even if that meant I had to shortman the content with my static, and I like to random pug.
This will be true for many generations going forward to a degree. What is brand new is wonderful to the virgin gamer. (Until VR releases chemical injections into us while playing
But, those of us who live in the "First Age" of video games,Atari, mmos, mmorpgs... it was the wild west. We are the 1st Generation.
Publishers didn't know, "communities" was a new term... we just logged in an didn't know what would happen. We didn't know each other. THE INTERNET WAS RELATIVELY NEW. SOCIAL INTERACTION WAS NEW. WE WERE BOLD. NERDS PAVED THE WAY!
Heck I had a $600 phone bill from my dial up in one month on ultima online because I called long distance (modems).
We can never revisit those crazy days. However, I do adore them!
These are of course virtual worlds the yare not real but what I aim to see is exactly what you want and that is a vast open world that feels realistic etc etc.
The problem is that I already have something like that in Atlas,the majority of people don't want the entire package,all they want is pvp.
They don't want to roam around vast ,massive landscapes they want pvp and if there is loot to boot all the better,they really couldn't care less what the game is behind the face.
Then on the topic of cost,it is not that costly to make,Atlas for example was a budget mod like game derived from Ark and with a rag tag small team.
What it does involve is LESS profits because you need a lot of server space and MANY realms to handle millions of players so eventually it is over corwded.
Just think of our real world,it is massive,nobody will have travelled the entire Earth by time the yare dead,yet we still have tons of places with over crowding.However my point is that YES it is very much doable,it just means less profit,something the greedy CEO's and investors want no part of.
This is the POINT i have been drilling across forever now,these are "businesses" FIRST and game designers a very distant second and that is why we likely never see a true AAA game.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
I gave up on mmorpg's for good reason,i do not see a single glimpse of a AAA game anywhere in the near future.All I see are "seasons"and copy cat trends that when one dev strikes it lucky several others jump on the bandwagon.
if before I am gone I see a glimmer of hope,you can be sure I will be the first to let you know.I know some have the mentality,well if that game never comes you won't be playing any games.
Wrong,i will still play the games I grew up playing because at one time they were headed in the right direction and deserved to be supported,I just won't support anymore devs going backwards in game design.
I am not just seeing BACKWARDS game design I am seeing like 2 decades backwards,games that look to be made in the 80's..90's like wtf,they are trying to sell me aged crap in 2020.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
That first one does not have to be great, just special
- Al
Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse.- FARGIN_WAR
The MMO engine need to be redone from the ground up in order to be capable of massive worlds for one thing. Current game engines follow a specific design which has been the staple of most MMO development.
MMO servers need to be more enterprise level clustered in order to run the entire world under one system instead of sectors and zones.
I made a video of what is different in Multiverse engine and why I believe it is a next gen engine. It just needs some additional programming to tie it to the enterprise level. I been playing around with it off and on for about 15 years and now with the source code I'm doing some experimenting.
I do agree with you on the fact it is better from cost standpoint to keep the world small and player count low. Given that it cost cores to run a server with any sort of stability.
If you are interested in making a MMO maybe visit my page to get a free open source engine.
Like being in a relationship, and it's your first time, so you don't want to just quit, but, it is not working out.
When you finally leave, you realize how bad it was for you. And while of course you will walk away with some fond memories, you will also walk away with some scars.
Some people never leave. They just stay with their first.
The thing is, over time, we tend to forget the bad, but they don't forget us. We bring that baggage to our next game, and next game, and we become far less willing to put up with the negative for that bit of positive, like we were in the past.
The thing is, we can feel the negative in many MMO's as we play, and we tend to forget how much they hurt in our first MMO, because we just left our last one for the same damn reasons, but we still have that memory of great times with our first MMO,... Hence the Rose Colored Glasses.
Personally, I think, the abundance of MMO's on the market today, along with them being free to play, so we have no investment walking in, makes people a lot less willing to put up with the scars for the happy memories that might along with it.
If you are holding out for the perfect game, the only game you play will be the waiting one.
- Al
Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse.- FARGIN_WAR
Full quote 'No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river and he's not the same man.'
This isn't a signature, you just think it is.
There's no doubt that this current fast-now-damnit crowd is larger than the old style adventurer, but there are a lot of people out there and most do not play MMORPGs.
I'd be willing to bet that if someone made a true quality MMORPG based on farming and the business of buying, selling, and transport of, in said game style, it would rival WoW's heyday.
Or fish tanks, catching, growing, proper mixes, water types, plant types, buying and selling, all to make a perfect aquarium.
That's not what WE want, of course. But my point is that there are a lot of things directly related to what we like that would have a huge affect on an MMORPG, and money means greater support and expansion. Including what WE like.
Hell, some of those things we might discover that we like too. Just as an aside, maybe, or even as a target for play along with the basic wants.
Once upon a time....
I got my first Motorola Startec flip phone in 1996 or so but by 2002 was even buying my 10 year old son a cell and paying on 5 phones.
Text messaging was huge that decade, can recall being stunned with a $400+ phone bill due to eldest daughter sending 4000+ texts and deciding it was time to get everyone an unlimited texting plan.
What really changed everything was 2007 and the Apple iphone / Smartphone. Too expensive at first for my family to switch over but I recall getting everyone Samsung 3s in 2012 when we finally did. ( I had a Smartphone a few years earlier than the others but not sure when, I was late to the party)
So yes, social media changed everything starting later in the 2000s, first on computers and then on cell phones, which perhaps not coincidentally is when the MMORPG genre really started to wane into insignificance in the overall scheme of the gaming universe.
Oh yes, the eldest daughter I mentioned earlier, still setting cell phone records these days, recently "won" the race in my family with 81 hours of talk, (yes, more than two full time jobs) 4500 texts, and 4GBs of data in a single monthly billing cycle.
Only my son eeked past her with 5GB of data but a family low of 200 minutes of talk proving what we all knew, he never really calls anyone.... except his mother once in a while as her talk numbers aren't much higher...
"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
In fact, Cell Phones were mainly only an urban thing in the early 2000's, and even then, there were black out areas even in the major cities where you could be driving along and your service would get cut out. Hence the "Can you hear me now" adds by Nextel/Verizon.
But yah, around 2010-ish, was when Cell Phones really took off.
Games like UO and EQ were the first real mainstream tastes of the genre, (yes, I'm intentionally not naming every game ever made...) but they let people get an idea of what PvP was, or what PvE dungeons and grinding could be. Then the genre hit a new step with WoW.....and people had choices...
Were the early days great because of the community, or because you didn't have experience enough to know better? As your taste became more refined, and defined, is that when the genre really changed?
For me? I loved the early days of UO, and I enjoyed the early times of WoW, but when I step back, I admit that I don't have time to sit and play for hours on end anymore, that what I liked then is not what I like now. So do I see a renaissance again? No, because back then we didn't know what was possible, it was all new. These days we all have ideas of what a game or the genre needs, and we are more fractured as a community. 2004 won't happen again, but that doesn't mean that there isn't something out there that doesn't scratch an itch. Of course back then, one solution may have scratched an itch for years, these days....a couple of months or more seems far more reasonable...