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The degeneration of Game Websites
Elikal
Member UncommonPosts: 7,912
The degeneration of Game Websites
by
Elikal
I am playing Online Games (MMOs) now for three years, playing computer games for about 20 years. I am reading forums regularly, both of games I played and those I just wanted to follow what was going on. Often I subscribed to those forums, only to read them, posting maybe 1-2 threads in half a year. I use the Internet to get news about games for a fairly long time, practically since it exists as a public medium. As gaming is one of my mayor hobbies, I want to be up to date. But I must admit, that in the last year or so it got worse and worse to a degree I have a decreasing will to use the Internet as a reference for information on games any longer.
Why is that the case? And I wonder if I am alone in this changing view? First, it’s the deep change I feel that happened in the game forums. Game forums have always been a place of struggle between fanbois and hate-bois, the regular troll and much emotional, ideology burdened debates. However, it seems to me in the last year many forums have dropped under a level of minimal civility, that reading them has become unbearable.
I take one example, famous, which stands for many: the absolute decline of the Star Wars Galaxies (SWG) forum. I played SWG since the first days, and I played it for about 2 years, which is a pretty long time, given that I did play it daily a lot of hours. I loved the game, and even though I played half a dozen other MMOs, I still think it was the best MMO time I ever had. Then the game was changed by SOE with the so called “New Game Enhancements”. Like in every long running online game, some deeper cuts come to MMO’s from time to time. It wasn’t an ideal change, and likely one of the deepest any MMO had so far. For many SWG fans, this was like Armageddon had broken loose. I really don’t want to go into detail, I too lost pretty much. (I was a Creature Handler, and that entire profession was killed.) There were arguably things that didn’t go well. But I had watched the game very closely, and there was a constant decline in members far before NGE, but what the hate-bois claimed, that the NGE suddenly killed a perfect and well running game, is no less than a myth. I had seen the decline in my huge friend list and the guilds, only shortly reanimated by that space addon. People were loosing interest, and with each new MMO the numbers grew less. That is a most natural process of MMOs, and on the background of the huge success of WOW it is only logical to think of making a game easier accessible for new players by a company that in the end wants to make money.
No matter how justified the complains were or not – and I stand for my view that they were FAR over exaggerated, since SWG is still a pretty good game if you now start it anew – the flame war totally got out of hand and out of any civilized way to deal with other people. The SWG forum now practically lies in ruins, and no announcement, comment or explanation of the devs, no matter what they say, gain anything but instant flaming down. I know well there are reasons to be sceptic, but I thought every person should have so much decency, to keep the critic reasonable, with minimal emotional notes. The SWG forum is now practically useless, there just is no reasonable and fair debate anywhere.
What I saw in the SWG forum, has also happened to other forums, some of the MMORPG sub-forums, the English part of the “Dark and Light” forum and many others are on the pathway down. While venting off some steam is ok and necessary, it has begun to get a dynamics of it’s own, where people flame for the sake of the emotional thrill of doing it. The forums have gotten a weird dynamics, where people, who play any game, and despite some shortcomings somewhat enjoyed it, start to feel cheated and enraged because they are talked into a frenzy of over-criticism and anger. I have seen how in many cases, formerly objective, rational posters were dragged into anger and flaming, I experienced it on myself. Forums are now unleashed, and all civility is abandoned in more and more forums. It is not that I disagree with the complains per se, those people post. It is the way they do it, their aggression, sarcasm and anger dominating more and more postings, which make any discussion pointless. I always was against the use of sarcasm, though we live now in an age, where sarcastic and ironic comments are quite fashionable. Face it: they are discussion killers. A sarcastic or ironic comment only does one thing: it ends all debate, it is a killer for reason and objective conversation. No matter how funny or clever you feel, you only killed a debate, and in the long term shot yourself in the leg with sarcasm, because improvement lives from open and fair debates. Those aggressive, “funny” comments may win the day, but make us loose everything eventually.
Things are never perfect. The problem is, now that gaming and MMOs are getting older, we have more to compare. Back in Everquest 1 or Ultima Online, there was no competition, and since it was a long time ago since we played those, many start to see those “good old days” with pink glasses. That’s a very human thing, but in the end many claim that all new nowadays must be junk, because it is so bad compared to their good memories. Maybe we should put a little less trust in our memories, they are a fickle thing. In the oh-so-glorious days when SWG or WOW started, a lot of the crucial features weren’t installed and took far over half a year to be implemented. So why go into such a frenzy over everything not working now? None of the successful killer games had that perfection. And a MMO is not a solo game, it is a hell of a difficulty to get all together, when 10.000s of people with more of less freedom have their impact on the same world. When SWG started, it had so little. To this day, there never was any reasonable amount of quests, compared to the big load of quests EQ2 or WOW have, so what? We organized hunting, events, parties and whatnot. We were never bored, because we made that game ours! We didn’t wait for daddy-dev to pour sweet candy into our mouth, we did a lot ourselves.
Somehow I think the now young and new players expect everything to be ready made and easy led to them without much try and error. On the “Dark and Light” forum, only two days after launch, someone complains crafting is broken, because he can’t find a reagent. Well, after two days, he supposes to know everything. And even if it were really broken, every MMO took quite some time to have everything as is was supposed. When those good old MMOs started, we made what we had and enjoyed it. Housing only in half a year? So what, then let’s start making a city plan and get people together for the day housing is there! Really, some sound so much like spoilt little kids, who were used that mommy and daddy feed them with candy all day without the need to lift so much as a finger. They really should play some games of the 80ies, no journal, you had to write down heaps of papers with quests and conversations; no maps, other heaps of papers with hand drawn maps. Heck, I still have all those hand-made maps from Ultima IV on some chequered paper! Some really don’t know how much luxury they have today! When Wing Commander was new, it took me three weeks visiting all my distant friends to find a new mouse driver, so my 640 KB Ram had enough space left for the game! Now easy internet patch those days!
Reviews going down the drain?
A totally different topic, which surely has some connection to the first, is the side of Online Reviews. Back in the old days, we had paper magazines, which appeared each month, so the reviewer did have some time anyway. Often it took 2-3 months before a real review was published and there was some kind of codex, that reviews were made, if the author had played the game to the end.
Now we have dozens of Oblivion Reviews a few days after the game was in stores. Or take Heroes of Might and Magic V, same story. Both are decent games, which offer a lot. But in no way they deserved the 90% praises they got! You may love the awesome graphics of Oblivion, or the size of the world, but all people I know, who play RPG’s for ages, admitted, after being quite happy in the first days, their interest to keep Oblivion playing dwindled with each day. Only recently some reviews pointed out the week points of Oblivion. The total lack of choices which make zero replayability, the dream-like weird AI conversations, the dumbed down magic system, the overall feel to be taken at the hands like a 8 year old child, being told what to do, the total killing of any sense to explore on yourself, because loot and monsters are always bound to your level – and so forth. It may be a question of personal taste, how much that matters to you, but it surely gathers enough controversial points that Oblivion is not the killer game it was rated to be.
Since the reviews now appear so soon after a game hits the shelves, I greatly assume, most reviewers play a game a few days and then write their review. That many issues are only clear when you play a game a longer time is thus responsible for less and less reliable game reviews. I can understand, that under the pressure of competition a review must be published soon after a game is out; but the least any decent magazine should do, is make a new and altered review after the author has completed the game, or in case of an MMO played it for some months. I mean, how can a game like Heroes V get so many good reviews, while it has so many bugs and critical issues? The answer is, they become visible after you play a while, so I’d guess some amounts that all those 80%+ Reviewers never made it beyond the first Campaign.
I think there is a strong connection between the great hype many game reviews and mags make of a game, and the flame wars which erupt on forums with greater frequency and more destructive than ever. Great expectations are made by those hype magazine reports which naturally must be disappointed by reality. I have seen it happen in “Dark and Light”, which was quite hyped as the next big thing, and I really bet it will happen to “Vanguard” also. Of all the many previews I have seen so far, only a few admit, the rollback Vanguard aims to bring to MMOs is a highly risky thing, which may greatly disappoint a lot of people who are now deluded how perfect this game is supposed to be, and gaming companies do their own share to rise unrealistic expectation in their customers. Just take RF Online’s PR mumbo-jumbo, how revolutionary the game was supposed to be. Now like that game or not, there is hardly anything revolutionary in this most mindless grind we have seen a long time. But raising such expectations is a dangerous thing, because it can greatly backfire, as the mood on many forums nowadays shows. All those extreme emotions and flame wars make the gaming scene not really attractive, and my only advise to people who are new to gaming and MMO is not to visit forums overly, or better not at all, for the sake of their peace of mind. It remains to be seen if the gaming scene in the internet goes down that spiral of hate more in the coming years. Hopefully, for an otherwise great hobby, not.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
Comments
Good food for thought. A large problem with MMOs, on every level and for every issue, is the fact that we got what we wanted: everyone now plays some MMO or other.
Everyone. Including the majority of the people whom we don't like in real life, much less when they are anonymous and thus more inclined to a**-hattery than before. We said, "Oh, but MMO means massively multiplayer online, so that means the more people, the better!"
No. No. NO. "More" never guarenteed "better" in just about anything. More people means that an MMO customer service department get stretched the fracking limit; you may have a problem, so does 1,000 other guys, and most of those "problems" are just gripes about their own lack in some part of the game. More people also means more and more player factions forming to argue why they should get what they want even at the expense of other forms of gameplay... instead of a smaller, more tight-knit community that actually talks a lot about what could make the game even better for everyone, not just a few folks.
But worst of all, more people means that instead of hacking, cheating, and gold-farming being some occasional annoyance, they are now huge parts of any game with a sizable playerbase. You don't run into one every several months and think, "Thank God there's not more of them," you run into them every other day (or more often) and think, "It sure would be nice if there were people who just played the game as-is."
And the companies? Heh. They could expand their staff, use the money from all those extra players to provide them with the kind of support they need. But why bother? Instead of hiring X employees per Y players, you can just keep a dozen folks around, say that they are overworked when players complain, and just keep rolling in the profits. You pay those folks off so that they can ignore or even ridicule players with problems, and hey, even if one or two quit, there's surely ten more to take their place.
So, yeah. The community is dysfunctional as hell, but it really has no choice. MMO is like the world in microcosm for real now, with all the nastiness the real world has to offer.
And that's just so what I wanted in a f***ing hobby: the same crap I deal with in the rest of my life.
And Elikal, I completely sign your post, you wrote exactly what I had in mind.
*shrug*
I spend more time in Oblivion then in other Elder Scroll, I dunno what 'rank' it deserve, but it deserve better than older games of the serie.
Heroes of Might and Magic V: I am in looove with the game, I am still in the second campaign, but I play at the hardest difficulty setting and I will prolly have to restart my current mission. The extremely weak performance of Heroes of Might and Magic IV certainly increase the rating of the fifth, which is a great game! The lack of a Map Editor and the very few maps available is the strongest flaw I see in the game for now. I am still heading back in the game rather soon.
Is it perfect? Nope. Is it better than Heroes of Might and Magic III? Definitely, despite the lack of a Map Editor and having to few maps. If it is better than HoMM3, it is pretty hard to give a ranking under 90%, ain't it? The last time I got such a feeling, I was playing Sword of Aragon, maybe I am becoming dumber...or maybe the game is just that good COMPARE to what the market has to offer. See, the campaigns are LINKED, they are an ACHIEVEMENT, this alone is a huge improve over the clumsiness of the fourth, where they kill all achievement by making all campaigns available at start and only 4 creatures upgrades 
, now in the V, you have 7 creatures upgrade and the most wonderful part is that the core of your army is not your best creature, it is harder and more complex than before, yet not that much harder! The LINK between the campaigns matter.
I am a simple guy, if the game is FUN to me, it deserve a higher ranking...if the game is NOT fun, it deserve a lower ranking. Regardless of any 'objective' approach. Heroes of Might and Magic V and Oblivion are funnier then their predecessors. They are awesome games. The main reason I ain't playing Oblivion is because I am playing HoMM5.
I think Elikal change FAR more than what he claims has changed. You see a different angle that you use to ignore and you might not see an angle you use to see.
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
@Anofalye: Sure, for a customer a game simply comes down to fun or no fun, agreed. But if you review a game, you write for a lot of different people, so you have to explain things in detail, only then it is really helpful, because everyone enjoys different things. So for a review author I expect a totally different standart. I read reviews to decide, should I buy this game or not, and unless you are rich, this decision is important.
I find Oblivion and Heroes V ok, I dont hate them, but they are far overrated. They are ok 70%, but in no way 99% games. Often the mission target in Heroes V is unclear to me, what I have to do, the scripted events make stratetical preparation difficult, because all of a sudden events bring a total unforseeable turn, and many details. It is nothing a simple patch could not change, but again it is not the perfect game many reviews said.
The same is for Oblivion. Making red dots on the map, detailled pop up windows what to do next and even how my character feels is a little to much "take me at the hand". I prefer to find out things. Quests have little choices, you can only accept or not accept it, and in conversations there are no conversation trees, but you basically listen passive to the story. Not much roleplay in that. Again, it's a nice game, but I have seen many better, story-wise and in terms of immersity. I mean, I don't want to spoil it, but that "invasion" is a joke. A few lame mobs coming out of that gate, and thats all? As I said, a decend game, but overrated.
@BuzzKilgore: I assure you, I was mad at SOE often enough in SWG times. Then I post my complains and thats it. I see no reason making an entire forum a flame war that lasts months. If a game suck, well quit it. I am sorry, if that sounds heartless, I know well investment of time and money we don't want to give up, but it does not lead to anything to start flaming. SOE is now in a position, that those flamers would flame everything, no matter what sOE did. In the end, any game company has to keep a balace between income and investment, in terms of money, that is. Some changes cost more than a game pays off, it's simple as that. Do you really think they do not make a certain change, because they want to tease the players? Producing a MMO nowadays is a very, very expensive thing. A game company is after all no charity union. Please don't get this in the wrong tube, but that is the reality of all game companies, and it is simple unrealistic to think otherwise.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
I'll tell you why people give non-long winded answers anymore. Cause people have to read them and they end up reading a paragraph or two then writing whatever.
I agree too many games baby the character; but truly making somethings evident in a hidden sort of way takes alot of work. Like getting lighting right, or adding a script that rips up your clothing little by little so you can tell its getting damaged. Lots and Lots of work. Far easier to type it in the persons face "Go HERE" "Your armor is almost busted". I can see why alot of mmo's added this to the game. Mainly since alot of quests are not descriptive enough. Like "Go see what wrong with my pet" How are you suppose to know your suppose to feed it 369 Dark Crystal Fragments that are found in a dungeon on the opposite end of the world?
The challenge in Oblivion is trying not to let the Psychic Guards know you killed someone just because you accidently left the door open to thier private room in their house.
Very very nice article and nice thoughts. I fully agree! One game thas has this freedom where you can fight monsters at any LVL and actually the players are making the game (or server they play in) is Tibia. There is no LVL limit and to be high lvl is respect, as it should be.
WoW is a good game, but it lacks many important things for a RPG to be free, for example: It is so many lvl 60s, it is not so very cool to be lvl 60, and you can't easily see what person that is the best on your server and the PVP system doesn't give the freedom of RPGs.
Those kiddies you are talking about I guess are called Mainstreamers, which Blizzard made WoW to be.
MMOs are really simulating and exciting and as you say there are no perfect MMOs, but important as the MMO lovers might think is the freedom, too many MMOs are today bound to quests you have to make to lvl and Oblivion which was hyped quite much, looks cool, but as you say, it's getting quite bored for its bound quests, and that is not freedom if you ask me.
For MMO developers today should ask more people like you, to understand how the MMOs should be to attract many players. There are different kinds of players "Kiddies" which does play mainstream games like WoW and have never tested other RPGs because they don't search for it or just think the hyped and popular games are good. That's the type that many mainstream companies are trying to hit today, which Blizzard made well, and got many new players to play MMOs. Those "kiddies" however can be quite unserious and even bad and might be as you say spoilt people, which maybe aren't real "MMOers". There is also a second group of people that searches and plays many MMOs, which can be called "Hardcore gamers" or something simular. I think most unknown MMOs are hitting these players and it seems like if you want to hit both groups you need to give what they both want. What does a "kiddie" or "mainstreamer" want? Probably advanced graphics (which means 3D or even more advanced), but personally I think graphics can mean graphics that are nice for the eye and makes you glad. "Hardcore gamers" wants the right gameplay and community (kiddies might sometimes aswell) and the graphics are not likely so important, it's the gamestyle. So if that summaries what the both groups mostly wants then to make a game which fits both parts you need to make a game with advanced graphics and the nice gameplay. But many developers doesn't want to do that and many people like the other type of graphics avaible. So it is very hard to balance both of these. Personally I am a "hardcore gamer" which more like the gamestyle, community of the game rather than graphics, but sadly these "kiddies" are probably more. But, sometimes you don't need millions of people playing a game to have a nice gameplay and fun. A game can have a very small group of playing people that enjoys that game and I think that is most important for some developers, but for many big companies it is all about the money and the popularity. Another important thing for a MMO to grow is that it is avaible in English, which makes it easier for the whole world to play it. Today you can see many Asian MMOs, which surely are good but if they instead would make it english, surely more people would play the game, but probably sometimes the developers of the Asian games just want Asian people to play that game, which they of course decide. There will always be many MMOs for different styles and that is what's really about MMOs. You can find, if you search, the type of game you want, and that's why MMO websites like MMORPG.com and MPOGD.com are so nice resources for us MMO lovers, but as you mentioned there are many unserious people sometimes writing, and I don't know if the admins should ban them, or whatever they should do. I think the MMO developers should listen more to the players (actually don't know if they do it so much). A game where all the players can decide which features they want, is that a free game? Yes, but then it comes so many opinions that it might be hard for the developers to make all happy with the game, so, the developer must decide what features that should be in the game or not, and should look at the players' sugesstions and if they like it and think it is good for the game, add it.
Nice discussion, gladely wants to keep discuss these subjects!
Sincerly,
Mapleaf
*shrug*
If you gave 70% to a game like Oblivion or HoMM5, for me it means that NO game whatsover will ever deserve a 80%, because no game I ever experience has a clear 10% above those two titles. Name me 1 game, at any moment in history, that in your opinion deserve at least 10% higher than HoMM5 or Oblivion, I will pinpoint to you their flaws and why they doesn't deserve to be 10% higher. So, if all your ranking are under 80%, why not re-scale to actually have 1 title or two eventually coming close to 100%.
Is HoMM5 worth a 100%? Nope. Is it worth a 90%? At the very least.
I suggest you take a break of a few days, then go play the 'best game ever' and try to justify why it deserve 10% higher than either HoMM5 or Oblivion, in all honesty, if you are fair, you will easily realize that no game deserve such a better ranking.
A ranking is determined to differenciate many products, having too many or too little 90%+ is useless, it invalidate your system. Everything is done in comparaison.
Again, HoMM5 is worth at LEAST a good 90%, if not more. Same for Oblivion. They are both the best in their respective classroom, a best student always have at least 90%! Name me a GBT RECENT strategy game that outmatch HoMM5, I will nod politely if you bring CivIV(90%) or Galciv2(85%), Domination(80%) or Rome: Total War(75%), but I will disagree. Shattered Union was a very disappointing game, a game I would rank under the 60% mark, the tactical map is nice, but the strategy map is irrelevant and a complete waste of time.
Of course, me I ain't a reviewer, I give my opinion freely, but I think some players grow grumpier as they get older. See, go look to your FAVORITE cartoon from when you where a KID, listen to it for 2 hours non-stop, it will enlighten you a LOT. (I find it hard, nearly painful, to listen to Goldorak for 10 minutes...)
Been able to frown and complain is important (Hiya SoE, long time no chat!), but been able to pat on the shoulder and praise is equally important. If someone want to trash Nival over HoMM5, despite the fact they are silly Russians, I will defend them with all my heart!
PS: I may very well have given better 'results' to Civ4 and GalCivII, it was how I was feeling at the moment of the release, if a game bump them, they will go slightly down, the ranking still have to mean something, having too many or too few 90ish is bad...and HoMM5 beat them IMO, in a nice way.
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
While I have not played Oblivion... I do know that a ton of people played it at my work... said it was the greatest thing ever... and stopped playing after 3 days because it got boring. If a game cant hold ur interest for more then a month then it doesn't deserve 90%. IMO alot of those reviewers probably get kickbacks...
If your IGN and you give Oblivion 90% and call it the greatest game ever... On the gamebox and on the game website they are going to plaster everywhere "IGN says: Oblivion is the best game ever!", "Yahoo games: Its Spectacular!" ect...
Free advertising.
To the defense of games similar to Oblivion (read: hard), the problem isn't the game, it's the attention span of the players.
Take Kingdom Hearts. The first one was, to me, really good. Lots to explore, do, etc. There were shortcomings in the game here and there, but overall, there was always something interesting to discover. It was easy, sure, but I attributed that to the target audience it was made for: much younger human beings that old, wrinkled me.
But the second game? Linear as hell. You move in a crooked, but still relatively straight, line at every board. You might venture off the beaten track to find treasure, but for God's sake, they give you every kind of help to know what you have found and what you missed. There is almost nothing hard at all about that game, no challenge worth mentioning. It is a pretty action-adventure game with some RPG to it, and that's about it.
Oblivion, to get back to the topic, is hard. Not hard as in, "Oh, I've got to walk for so long to this place and spend all this time beating a boss." Hard as in, "Jesus Hubbard Christ! Where am I supposed to go, what am I supposed to do, and how am I supposed to do it?"
Most of the gamers now, if they can't figure it out or do it in a few seconds, or if there's not a 1-2-3 guide to explain precisely how to "win" the game, they give up. There are almost no real "hardcore" gamers; those who claim such a thing rarely deserve the title. The ones that actually wrote the guides, who figured stuff out on their own and experimented and all that, they deserve that title. Not some punk with an internet connection who plays the game's required 8-hour grind.
I really can't go into every detail of games (already being attacked for being too long winded), so I focus on my favourite genre: Role Playing Games (RPG). To play a role, I need freedom, choices, alternatives in the way I react to a NPC, choices what I answer, different endings resulting from my choices. A good game in general, and especially a RPG is all about freedom of choice. And of course it's a good bonus if your choice has some effect, changing the result in the end.
One of the best RPG's I ever played were the two Fallout games. I could really play any kind of character, good, bad, neutral; I could get involved or not, and every single decision of my actions had a direct impact on the end. THAT was freedom and choices. "Arcanum" was similar in that way, mostly being made by the same folks. Or take Baldurs Gate VS a game like Dugeon Siege. Dungeon Siege is a long tunnel. What people say in conversations, and what you answer does not really matter. Baldurs Gate was not much open ended, but you had a lot of choices to answer, a lot of different roles to play as a person. Or take "Planescape Torment", a kind of Holy Grail of RPG to me. You had a great impact on people and things, and you could greatly evolve your character in the way you desired.
Oblivion has a lot of good things, but many, many age old RPG fans lay it aside after a short time, so something must be quite wrong.
As for Heroes V, just brief: there are a lot of good strategy games which really had choices in strategy. It's freedom again. A very good strategy game was Myth, in terms of the many ways you could win a scenario. Or the entire Age of Empire series and spin-offs, the old Command and Conquer, you always had some choices. I played the first two Heroes V campaigns, and there is little choice. Every mission map has ONE small tunnel towards victory. If you go astray from the path the devs decided you end up dead, basically because every mission has "super hero X must not die" as a demand. Since you can not take over other heroes, like in the pervious Heroes installations, he is the only really useful hero, and trying out anything ends as said deadly. That's just a bit too narrow IMO.
Btw, I do hold Nival and Bethesda in great esteem, but they both can do better. And they need some real feedback to see it, not that blind praise many reviewers give them.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
You bring up several very different points. Perhaps it is not the quailty of reviews and fourms that are going down but your interest and hype in any one paticular genra?
The second part if a game is very popular then just by goggleing it you can find various fansites and guild sites that can promote good disscusion for your favorite game i be it a mmorpg or otherwise.
When a game goes through lots of changes and loses customers you can be sure fan sites that once were plentiful and nicely done are either bought out by gaminging comapines and or shut down as fans lose interest and or move on to something else.
Another happening is gamers have had their expectations of smooth release game play and polishing of a game with wow. If a game is released in poor condition and or much of what was promised is not inlcuded in the release folks will talk. Again where as before it was between friends now it's hundreds of gamers that let out their ideas of a said product.We have seen a few games that never made it to bat and or released and laughed at due to the poor condition of release.
While you may choose not to read not to explore about the next one, many of the folks here that use this site are waiting and watching for their next one. Many are more careful on what they buy into now verses before and blind faith. No longer do developers get a free pass on shoddy work , release of a product if it is not
in good condition upon release and or make steady progress. To me that is a good thing.
Interesting points worth making, Elikal. Thanks for taking the time to write those thoughts up.
I have a couple slightly different takes on the two main points you bring up.
1. The official SWG forum was full of complaints since Day One. (I've been there since six months before SWG even launched.) There was once a general-topic "Discussion" board, but attracted so many whines and complaints and flames that it was impossible to have a coherent discussion. Eventually it was locked and split into other boards.
And yet the tone and maturity level of the boards managed to drop even further as SOE continuously dumbed-down the actually very well-designed game that first shipped. With the exception of player cities and vehicles (in the same publish, interestingly) and Jump to Lightspeed, virtually every meaningful enhancement was to combat, and was either some new dungeon or a simplification of combat. The Combat Upgrade and the NGE just took this process to extremes.
(Incidentally, although there's a certain amount of subjectivity in my making this claim, it's not pure subjectivity. I actually took the time to collect every single change that that was publicly documented in the Publish Notes that SOE released for SWG, enter them into an Excel spreadsheet, and categorize all these changes in over 200 categories. While there was some amount of subjectivity in these categorizations, I actually gave the developers the benefit of the doubt on anything that was contentious. For example, I only categorized a change as a "bugfix" if that's how the developers themselves described the change. Once I was done with this categorization, I tabulated the results and concluded that over time, combat absolutely had received not only the vast majority of changes, but also got most of the significant new content. You can see these results for yourself in my Categorization of Every Change to SWG thread in the official SWG forum.)
As a result of this focus on combat, combat, and more combat, the non-combatants -- the people who, IMO, tended to be older, more articulate, better educated, and more willing to consider opinions other than their own -- stopped playing. (Why play when the developers obviously aren't interested enough in you to create significant new content for your playstyle?) And when they left the game, they left the forums. And the quality of discussion plummeted. Not to zero -- there are still a few people there who are capable of stringing words together in a coherent sentence -- but it's pretty bad these days.
This theory may not be correct. But it's plausible.
2. Concerning game review sites, here's my list (in no order) of what a good review site has:
The value I get out of a review site depends on how well that site's staff writers meet all of those criteria. By this standard, most review sites are OK -- not awful, but not great.
We need more great review sites.
--Flatfingers
Thanks for everyone answering, I really appreciate hearing everyone's opinion in that.
It's not that I am a disapointed fanboy or anything. I admit I am disappointed in Oblivion, because Daggerfall and Morrowind were so much deeper, but either way. No, I am in the internet and gaming forums for 10 years or so, since internet began to be common. But I never have seen a decline as in the last year or so. Some pages have always been worse than others, and it may be coincidence and not representative. I have fought against simplified views, trying to avoid love or hate and posting my views in that way. But I find myself less and less willing in the face of flame wars. Just try to visit the Vanguard forum and suggest an arbitrary feaure like automap, and see for yourself.
@Flatfinger: Very interesting points. I joined SWG about 4 months after release, shortly before cities and housing were implemented. I can't exactly recall the forum of SWG, but the current state is really poor. I find your explanation quite plausible. But on the other hand, I DO think the negative reaction towards the NGE was far overheated.
I had, for a time, a Master Pikeman. Sure, he had 2 dozen special moves, hit the head to nauseate, hit the legs to slow down, toss the enemy to the ground. Sure, it was nice. But 90% of the players clicked the most damage doing 6 attacks very fast over and over. It was not really any tactic in the hectic of battle, fighting eight of those Neanderthal-like guys on Dantooine (forgot their name). And that doctor buff we always need wasnt quite a brillian idea either. Later I played a Jedi, because it was the only melee left, and I always liked melee the most. I did not care it was more action and simplified. But I played Jedi Academy, and IF they want to make SWG more action, THAT would have been the way I would imagine a good action combat for a Jedi. I am sure you can find plenty other examples for the other combat professions. In the current state the action is far too clumsy, and the NGE cut was, if anything, not deep enough.
The end of the line, IMO for SWG is, that they just did not add content, things to do. The few, age old quests are STILL broken for some players, after goddamn 3 years.
On the other hand, I find the SOE bashing some practice, quite irrational. You may like it or not, but EQ2 is quite a good game. I played it 2 years, and now I quit because I just had seen the same world too long. The EQ2 devs did quite a good job, not perfect, but quite well, and since still Sigil creates Vanguard, why anyone would really should, he doesn't buy it because the servers are run by SOE is beyond me. Sounds more like a religious taboo than a rational decision.
(Ack, this white text on black background always makes my eyes burn. *__* )
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert