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mmorpg's how have they improved last 5-10 years
oaim
Member Posts: 4
in the last 5-10 years what improvements in mmorpg's have you seen? to me not much except the graphics, they are stuck in a creative rut. all the recent failures of war aoc, and countless others are well deserved becuase they are no fun to play and lack substance. i resub wow every 6 months/year thinking it will be fun, and at the back of my mind is the constant once i get this peice of gear/weaponwry then i can have fun. but the mechanicss of mmorpg's are generally not fun, you cant be an individual you end up being a cog in a machine, mmorpg are juts spreadsheets with shiny graphics overlayed. each year the graphics get a little shinier and more gimmiks are piled on but the gameplay is still bad.
you hear game developers go on about content and story choices etc, this is no content in these games, i played wotlk 70-80, this so called content is an insult to everysingle gamers intelligence. they are time sinks simple as that to slow your progress and keep you playing, go here collect 10 of these etc this is not content, this is not elavating computer games to an art form. and the pinnacle of these games, high end raiding, but the life is all sapped out of these games by dps metres add ons etc. i play as a rouge my job is to dps, but its boring theres no mystery or work involved to anything i just go to forums and find best template and go cookie cutter . you try a different template guess what the game is so badly designed theres only 1 or 2 different viable templates so your stuck spamming the same attacks on the same dumb npc's.
pvp wise, first mmorpg was swg, and i was hooked becuase the players given chance to create own storys and content through pvp, battles to defend citys attack bases guild wars etc. the combat was a bit borked, but playable mostly, it was dynamic and not scripted this was exciting, not the same dumb pve encounters. except game developers scrapped this type of sandbox gameplay for instanced garbage pvp gamplay ala wow. its meaningless, arena etc has no bearing on the game world , and not from same servers. wintergrasp was fun first battles, but this is as good as it gets, its the same battle over and over, and get over 30 playersa a side lags badly.
the future are games like eve. i tried but just spaceships is too dull for me, i can see the attraction though, the players create the content through corportions and fighting for territory and resources. and its too bogged down in numbers and endless technical drivel that you have to read up on forums to just to start playing game, and lets not confuse good deep meaningful gamplay with just incomprehensible techno babble.
war aoc failed for reason, the so called 'content' of these games suck, companys have been rushing unfinished games trying to chase a part of the market. i look at the current formula of mmorpgs and see they arent sustainable, they take 3-4 years to produce a game with all this 'content' aka convulated collect and delivery quests, and watch them fail. so games have simply got better looking that it, better art design but no substance behind them no thought no dyanism its all static. i hope this changes maybe it will take more cpu power for intelligent ai, better internet connections for bigger scale pvp battles and no lag and more immediate gameplay. this whole idea of 'raiding' you arent raiding anything theres no excitement or mystery to the gamplay its a done deal you read the guides seen the youtube video guide and will be fighting boss for the gazzillionth time for 1/50 drop, all designed to keep you paying sub, sometimes i think its just a very subtle form of gambling.
Comments
We kinda know this alrdy but the wording in your post explains it perfectly.
Yep. The MMO genre is the only one to move backwards in the last 5 years or so. Heck the graphics haven't even improved much(except for AoC.. WAR's look like crap). I basically just waiting for a "Tredmills Online" MMO and skip all the fluff.
Tried: LotR, CoH, AoC, WAR, Jumpgate Classic
Played: SWG, Guild Wars, WoW
Playing: Eve Online, Counter-strike
Loved: Star Wars Galaxies
Waiting for: Earthrise, Guild Wars 2, anything sandbox.
There is definitely an increasingly large group of likeminded people who are looking for the same types of games that you are. I'm sure that eventually when the amount of people playing online games is large enough to guarantee an audience that devs will be more attracted to make these kinds of games and they will become more numerous. Unfortunately the masses like it simple so thats what is being produced.
Treadmills online sounds kinda fun. A workout MMORPG. Good way to motivate people..
Improvements:
Speed of combat
Polish and animations
Simplicity of Design
Steps backwards:
Adoption of linear storyline theme-parks.
Overabundance of frivolous quests.
No significant penalty for failure, making all rewards meaningless and taking all fear out of the games.
Improvements? none, it's all being going down hill since the golden age of MMOS. it's all gone now.
To be fair...I believe MMO's have made leaps and bounds in some critical areas.
1) Graphics
2) Elimination of useless time sinks (camping, 30 minute boat rides)
3) Game Speed.
4) Audio
The problem is things have gone too far in the opposite direction to the point that in depth knowledge of class strategy and skill are rewarded only in raids. Instead of devs creating separate (slower) paths for soloist to achieve group goals the majority of newer titles rarely require grouping. Then you add market stalls, teleports, etc and you've all but eliminated the need to interact with others. IMO it's a bloody shame too robbing many younger players of the coolist aspect of MMO's. Because of this IMHO we've seen a dramatic step backwards in the following areas.
1) AI
2) Character development
3) Quests
4) Critical thinking
5) Community & Social interaction
Just an old timmers opinion it's quite possible I'm just too old for MMO's now.
Dutchess Zarraa Voltayre
Reborn/Zero Sum/Ancient Legacy/Jagged Legion/Feared/Nuke & Pave.
its this whole everyone gets a badge everyone is special attitude, even if you lose heres a badge heres a token, heres something shiny to look at nevermind game sucks. i as a gamer buy into the hype each game release, on swg they got it right mostly, i was never an mmo player before that and at first i found the whole dice roll and auto lock on targeting hokey and no skill, but saw the scope of the game and potential drew me in. and now it seems like games are going towards the item mall attitude more and more, bad news, gameplay is going out the window, creativity depth etc, now its shiny baubles and pokemon collections.
anyway i know those 11 million wow subs, they arent satisfied either its just nothing else better they may protest but come on running the same instances over and over, what moron could possibly find quests such as go and collect 10 so and so from here entertaining or stimulating. they should be paying me to do that not other way round. and dungeons etc, once you kill it thats it it should be dead finished, he doesnt come back next day with different loot, its done next dungeon plz.. i know its pretty damn easy to pick apart the cliches of mmos, too easy, maybe its just about cpu power, ai will be key bringing games to life and having large scale pvp.
Long trips can actually work, for example your ship gets bombarded with enemies and you have to survive until you reach your destination.
But, currently, you are correct; they simply require you to just stand around for 30 minutes and afk.
OK, now to say no improvements have been made in the MMO world isn't true, let us remember that EQ wasn't the first MMO, this was:
Neverwinter Nights
This game cost $6.00/hr to play.....$6.00 an hour!!, it had no crafting system to speak of , it did have PvP (which to be honest sounds better than what we have now), and next to nothing could be done without a party....this was old-school D&D at it's finest my friends....and hoo boy! the restrictions it had on playtime...think that undead dragon up there was a solo character?
Has it changed? you better believe it!
Has it improved? Considering where it came from up to now, yes i do...by leaps and bounds, some MMO's don't quite hit the mark with some folks and that's to be expected in this over-saturated market.
That was an online game, but not an mmo. The first MMO was Meridian 59, though you could go farther back into MUDs if you really want to get into the first online rpgs.
Bullshit. Darkfall will revolutionize the MMORPG industry.
That was an online game, but not an mmo. The first MMO was Meridian 59, though you could go farther back into MUDs if you really want to get into the first online rpgs.
Massive-back then it was, yes
multiplayer-check
online-check
roleplaying-.....it's D&D -check
game-check
I may have been incorrect that Neverwinter Nights was the first MMO, but it was a MMO
http://www.mcvuk.com/press-releases/34298/Stormfront-Studios-Honored-At-59th-Annual-Emmy-Technology-Awards-For-Creating-First-Graphical-Online-Role-Playing-Game
Las Vegas - January 8, 2008 - The National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS) honored Stormfront Studios at the 59th Annual Technology&Engineering Emmy Awards ceremony for creating Neverwinter Nights, the first graphical Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game (MMORPG).
Edit: You're also incorrect on Meridian 59, NWN was released in 1991 and ran until 1997, Meridian 59 out in 1995...four years after NWN.
Games now look and sound better but certainly don’t play better.
Bullshit. Darkfall will revolutionize the MMORPG industry.
lol post like this make df fanboys look bad we will see ok
MMO's have improved in certain area's and stayed pretty much the same in other area's. The largest thing that has changed in the last 5 years of MMO's is the players attitudes and expectations.
There is nothing wrong with being demanding and having high expectations but we might be going a bit far. I rememer reading an article where the writer said if WoW was released today they would probably struggle as well.
I support Belgiums efforts to get noticed ... at all.
although OP has a good point that MMO's haven't been very innovative lately and all are created around the same idea (kill monster, loot, level up) you can't deny that technology hasn't kept up with our ideas. Ideally you would want a "world" where all players are on the same server and branched in different parts of this "world". Monsters would think like humans and be completely unpredictable every single time you would confront them and even cooperate with each other intelligently comparable to people. A self-evolving world that literally has no "end-game" and can be played forever. We haven't advanced far enough in our own intelligence or hardware to create something like this. And until some really smart people are able to understand human neurology enough to replicate the intelligence of a human being or find ways to connect and communicate with each other faster than cable lines so we can all have 0ms ping, this won't happen.
The OP very well describe the current problem with MMOs. They started out as small niche products and as such experimented with their content for good and bad.
WoW changed it all. They had a winner that was so successful that it blew away anything else in terms of financial value. A lot of investors then tried to put massive amount into the genre in the hope that someone else could create a success like wow. But no one can outblizard blizard.
Now after years with the WoW model and all new major games trying to copy it instead creating their own quality product things look grim and at the same time a lot of people are getting tired of the WoW model.
I think the time is ripe for a change in how MMOs are made and launched. There is no reason to try and outblizard blizard and there is no one who know what alternative could attract the same kind of income as wow does. So its time to bite the bitter apple and face reality.
Future MMOs need to be made from the bottom up targeted towards specific subsections of the potential MMO audience and then they need to stick to that target audience. Instead of all chasing the illusiory next big thing, the MMO developers must learn to carve up the autience betweem them through presenting different products.
Then each type of MMO fan can choose the game that fit his individual taste a game that caters to the things he wants to se happen in the game he plays.
If this does not happen, then more and more people will leave this genre behind.
"You are the hero our legends have foretold will save our tribe, therefore please go kill 10 pigs."