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The state of MMORPGS my experience and views
greg4096
Member UncommonPosts: 9
Ok, so a brief background on my perspective. Age 41, very techy, love MMORPGS but not as hardcore as others though it depended on the game and my personal life.
Started with Ultima Online. 1997
UO: I enjoyed it immensely, it was 2d but in those days it was revolutionary. The dungeons were dynamic so it did not always have the same content unlike the instanced dungeons of today. You trained and trained and grinded on skills using them repetively to increase your % skill in that particular skill. If you did not use a skill the % started to drop in %. So in that respect it was a horizontal progression. You could be amazing at crafting or swords or bows at the expense of other things and there were lots of skills. The world was huge - the exploring was amazing, but most importantly it was a DANGEROUS WORLD not only because of the monsters but OPEN WORLD PVP. You can all get along but invidually someone might decide to go into PvP mode - they turn red and attack ! You can run like the wind to the guards or fight it out. It was exciting. If you died to monsters your body is left there with your gear on the body ! You were a ghost needing ressurection and then had to run back naked to get your gear from your body. Your heart was pumping, you were desperate to get there - again it was exciting. Because of the Open World PvP dungeons were full of danger - you are fighting against monsters, helping each other to get through it because it was not soloable but at any time someone could go rogue.
EverQuest. 1999
I recall my first experience as a low level newbie exploring this excited 3d world. I was in the middle of nowhere and ran to some group of 4 or 5 people. There were waves of monsters all around and we fought together fending them off. It was exhilirating.
Asherons Call: 1999
I vaguely remember a lot of running around, but nothing compelling about the experience - very similar to EQ but still fun.
Star Wars Galaxies: 2003
This was an amazing MMO. It was exciting, had housing, you could focus on different skills and professions. There was a strong socialization aspect to the game.
Ok I missed the WoW era I was busy
Aion: 2009
Open world PvP aka ganking - I loved ganking. Because one-on-one pvp gave me points towards the ultimate PvP armor. And if you had that armor you could own people. I like everyone else went through the long hard progression of being owned to eventually owning others. But when I ganked I only won perhaps 70% of the time because assassins were weak - but they could stealth through enemy territory - that was EXCITING. Dungeons and quests were HARD and so grouping was important so not getting a bad reputation was important - so that encouraged socialization. I went through a few guilds over time and even had an online romance - how fun is that.
Rfit: 2011
Rift was fine but end game play was dull.
SWTOR: 2011
Nice overall feel - who doesnt love Star Wars, but the PvP was somewhat repetitive and the Open World PvP was a complete disaster.
GUILD WARS 2: 2012
I had high expectations, loved the design improvements but in the end there was no long term progression, so gold was near useless, PvP and WvW was repetitive with no long term goals or progression, just an even field. Restricting the skills to 5 attack and 5 utility was a big turn off.
So what is there for the future?
Honestly I am not sure the companies that are making the games know what they are doing. And I think I am getting picky in my old age.
Although I didn't play WoW I suspect they did something the others failed to do which is focus upon Game Design versus fluff.
Ultima Online was an amazing MMO - but it was not because of the beautiful world and amazing graphics - LOL NO - it was because of the depth and breadth of the gameplay, the skills and instead of being level based it was skill based. As I understand it Eve Online is similar.
SWTOR spent an enormous part of their budget on actors and cut scenes. And certainly it was novel and impressive for the first 30 levels. But after that it was annoying because it slowed down the game so I would space bar through it. If they had spent 1/2 that budget on an amazing Ilum and open world PvP for endgame they could have had a long term MMO that kept subscribers.
AION was amazing but it is showing its age and while I personally liked ganking, it alienated their PvE players. The faction PvP was unbalanced and their were bugs with mass combat - so it bled players.
GW2 could have been great but endgame was boring, the only progression was in skins so that was not worthwhile and there was no open world pvp, just zergs. They improved the levelling experience but end game died. Allowing people to be part of multiple guilds killed guilds being meaningful.
So, surely a design company can take the legacy and understand how to create something great. For me I would
a) Have no levels - make a large array of skills that balance each other and make it about choices and specialities.
b) No more instanced dungeons - make them persistant, evolving, dynamic, make it based around a monster economy.
c) No more personal story quests - make the world define the quests, make the change over time and give credit to players who complete them first. But make sure everyone has something to personalize
d) Spent time on character customization, we love our characters, they represent our avatar in this world.
e) Spend less time on voice acting and a beautiful world but it is a fine balance. Make the world huge for explorists.
f) Make the world dangerous. Ever watched Caprica the prequel series to Battlestar Galatica? Great series they had an online world where you died once you can never return. Obviously we dont want that but at the same time if you make death more significant then death because much more MEANINGFUL. Of course you have to balance that with more options to escape death.
g) Crafting needs to be worthwhile. You MUST make a profit, you must be able to sink time and energy into it if you want and see those efforts rewarded. Make crafted items more valuable than the stuff you pick up.
h) End game. Make the entire game the end game. Spend design efforts on minigames, exploration, crafting, story, PvP, dont spend all this effort on level specific areas that in the end people will never return to.
i) Open World PvP. Make it consensual, make zergs less rewarding than one-on-one PvP. Make it so each kill counts towards a long term improvement and bragging rights.
j) Socialization. Reward grouping, reward being part of a guild. This encourages relationships, make voice chat important.
k) Factions. Two factions is extremely hard to balance. Make it guild based, restrict the size of a guild so that it is competitive to be part of a guild.
l) Instanced PvP. Get rid of it. Design open world pvp to be the equivalent, be smart and make the world the single instance.
j) Sandbox. Allow players to design content - dungeons with restrictive guidelines to make them balanced. I want to build my guild hall, my dungeons, my custom skins and content.
k) Intellectual Property. Do not use existing IP you have to pay for - build your own world and release some books to promote it.
l) No class choices. Make those skills define our classes so you do not get pidgeon holed into a class later does not live up to your expectation.
Well those are my initial thoughts.
Comments
God, not another one of these...Dude, seriously, this has been hashed out six ways to Sunday in so many other threads that I'm not even going to bother posting links to them. Go looking for 5 minutes in the threads and you should find several.
And for such a UO lover, plus sandbox-open world PvP etc...I'm surprised you didn't have Eve Online on your list of experience.
Where's the any key?
I did try Eve Online and it was fun but I tried it after the population base dropped. So which post is more repetitive - mine or your reply....hmm...
I don't know why people complain about people posting what they want to post. Get off the bloody forums if you can't appreciate other peoples interests and opinion.. or at least don't read them and leave others to do what they want. Quit being so narcissistic! It's this guys first post, which he has put effort into, and you've just jumped down his throat.
OP, while I agree with some things you have wrote there, there are some I don't. I'm not going to troll or flame you. It's your opinion and I appreciate the effort you put into your post. It's good to see what led people to the frame of thought they are currently in. It's a shame everyone can't find a common ground when it comes to MMOs. That's the problem with the genre, it's massive.. with a massive mixture of different likes and opinions. Instead of catering to one area of opinion producers/developers are attempting to cater towards all of them at once for the big bucks. That problem didn't exist back in the day becuase the audience for MMOs back then were people who had been into fantasy and sci-fi for a long time already.. the kind that read novels about it and stuff. Loved it no matter form it came in. The majority of MMO players are not like that these days.
Remove F, I and K and you have Free Realms. Leave them in and you have Sociolotron.
Try both!
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein
"Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre