While I do understand where you are coming from, I really don't think you understand the decade we are living in.
Games are being made exactly the way the majority of the player base wants, these features you list appeal to a much smaller niche which most larger developers are not interested in targeting.
If you want a Niche game then your going to have to wait for a niche developer to take up your cross so to speak. In today's MMO landscape there seems to be a niche development studio popping up every week so don't lose hope. I myself like my MMO like the majority so I have no reason to complain other then I want a spiritual successor to Asheron's Call but to say we aren't seeing limited market, niche games is a stretch. You have games like Camelot Unchained and Lord British's new games coming soon which espouse the old school philosophy. I think you're just wanting big studios to invest millions of dollars on games with NO, ZERO, ZILCH mainstream attraction. Aint gonna happen ever.
Sandbox means open world, non-linear gaming PERIOD!
Subscription Gaming, especially MMO gaming is a Cash grab bigger then the most P2W cash shop!
Bring Back Exploration and lengthy progression times. RPG's have always been about the Journey not the destination!!!
Lets face it.. looking ahead nothing going to revive it either.. EQ Next.. maybe? probably not.. for all i know the game might aswell release 2017.
Im tired of following things.. i need to be a Hero and build my own IKEA Furniture
Crafting- Overrated.
Im tired of noobs/10 year olds making the same gear as i have..same mount.. same status..
im tired of the no existant death penalties..
When will MMORPG make it hard leveling? when will they truly innovate..
The F2P modell is sickening.. its all about getting them millions of players/bots/goldsellers etc..
so they can put up on the website "XXXXX Game just reached 5mil players"
Enough of the whine.. here are my general tips for a great new mmorpg..fitting the decade we live in.
Leveling is hard.. levels get blocked if you dont defeat some bosses/time trials.. for every 5-10 levels you are faced with that Challenge.. one player can be stuck on lvl 40 for 3 weeks.. i dont give a f.. he better play better.
I think it might be time to get rid of the levels altogether and do something closer to pen and paper games like Runequest and Shadowrun. And lower the powergap so a vet don't have 50 times as many HPs as a noob (2-3 times is good). You are right that the difficulty needs to go up again.
Gear is extremly hard to get by.. but they look good.. and rewards you..
I kinda like how AoC does the thing with how gear look, the regular open world looks rather crappy, crafted gear looks more like something a soldier would wear while dungeon and raid gear looks a lot better. You can see who solos, craft or raids there with a look (or at least you used to, not sure how it is now). And yes, good gear should be hard to find and better, but not OP.
Politcal Parties.. yes you heard me.. tax issues/housing/war/sales etc.. you vote for what suits you best.
Nah, let the guilds tax it's members instead and build/rent houses to it's members.
I want new players to look like ordinary soldiers..i dont want them to be a Hero from lvl 1.. i.e WoW is like big friggin circus.. everyone has purple dragons.. and 2meter long swords.. there are actually 100 Heroes per like 1 NPC inhabitant.. logic much. (not just wow every game.. just a town with 100s of heroes)
maybe its the beer..or maybe its the boredom.. nothing to play.. maybe i just cheerish the golden years of MMORPG EQ1>WoW.. but that was that Decade.. why are we forced to play the old.. when we have all that takes to make it better&new.
I enjoy some games myself but I do have a problem with the difficulty (the general one, not the top raids). And whenever a game with good difficulty comes out to beta people whine until they lower it so a chimp could play (like GW2).
Please let the game be expensive, monthly aswell.. id rather have a fine community than circus..
I want to face Dragons... knowing that if i die i might not be able to ressurect 24h.. but if me and my mates manage to kill him we get the epic treasure chest behind him..which will enrich us. But you think thats all? you failed to kill the Dragon and you cant rez for a long time.. hell no.. that Dragon revenges and flies away to your house and burns it down.
A respawn timer as death penalty is good but 24h might work on an epic dragon, accidentaly falling to your death on the other hand would be just silly.
Having the dragon actually burning down someones house isn't super logical,a DE for it attacking the guilds city or castle would be better, or just give a chanse that the dragon fire could destroy a piece of your armor (20% would be good enough to put the fear of death into most players).
You do have a point, there are plenty of easy games with a good budget but nothing harder and there are enough players for a few hard games as well. Trying to make the game for everyone with super easy open world and hard raids is a bad compromize. Nothing against easy games but there really should be alternatives. And don't say there isn't players for them, the group that likes hard games might just be 20% of the PvEers but few games compete for those players so they are easier to get with a game aimed for them.
I don't think its dead persay to those that like the WoW model, just stagnant. Themeparks are what is causing the genre to slowly decay itself, however sandbox mmorpgs are starting to become mainstream again.
I like certain directions the genre has taken, graphics, action combat(Dcuo,AoC) and Fps combat(APB,DFO), however many things have devolved. Since WoW's debut we have gotten mmorpgs with more restrictions, each copying the WoW model with their slight variances whether IP, or some other trival thing. More and more features that were promised on launch are cut and many mmo gamers have become a maurading horde; nomading to and fro each new release in search of something that is actually unique, engaging and fun. This demograph mostly consists of those that tasted old school mmos or have become jaded with the current ones.
Sure we get some cool mmo ideas, but they always fail to deliver. Such as DCUO, APB, Planetside 2, DFO ect, ect. They generally have too many flaws and bad decisions. Indie developers don't have the money or manpower to make their game AAA, but AA A companies don't have the testicular fortitude to make a unique game so we are at a standstill.
Darkfall online is probably my favorite mmorpg since it has so many things I enjoy, full loot, Fps combat, clan warfare and territories, their mount system, housing, but it had some bad flaws as well which hurt the game. Then the company Aventurine decided to make a sequel that is completely inferior.
So many mmorpgs that diverted from the WoW mold could have been good but failed on too many levels. We have to put our faith in shit companies like SoE that ruins franchises and their mmos for an AAA company to make an AAA sandbox title. I don't have much faith in them, but I am still waiting on H1Z1 and EqNext as distant hopes along with others like Starcitizen.
A close to perfect mmo to me would be:
Darkfall online- FPS Combat, clan politics, territory control, mounting system and class system, full loot.
UO-Skills, community, sandbox features full loot. skill cap.
SWG- Community, sandbox features, housing, atmosphere, ability to be whatever you like, crafting.
EVE- Community, economy, full loot, clan battles.
EqNext- Voxel building.
Runescape- Quests, economy.
I wish mmo designers would make their features a little more intricate.
I don't think themeparks really are the problem here, Everquest and Asherons call where both themeparks. It is more the mix of almost all games using the same mechanics and the same difficulty. That makes the games rather similar and there are few games that actually feel different when you play.
All the feutures you list would work fine in one game but if all games had them it would suck as much as it does now if not more.
You do have a point, there are plenty of easy games with a good budget but nothing harder and there are enough players for a few hard games as well. Trying to make the game for everyone with super easy open world and hard raids is a bad compromize. Nothing against easy games but there really should be alternatives. And don't say there isn't players for them, the group that likes hard games might just be 20% of the PvEers but few games compete for those players so they are easier to get with a game aimed for them.
Diablo already solve the problem with a difficulty slider.
There should be no "too easy" games or "too hard" games with a difficulty slider, at least for pve gameplay.
Mmorpgs aren't dead...they are just littered with a new generation who feels they are entitled to everything. If they dont get their way they QQ on the game forums they QQ on sites like this. They post quitting threads and threads about lawsuits and petitions. The worst thing about mmos today are these people...
We were young... we were used to another kind of games and now we havent enought time to waste on playing videogames.
If you want a real mmorpg play eve... you will play a role in a player world.
The rest of the games are just like a work, you dont have freedom, just a clear path to earn levels and gear and some tedious farming via daily quest, daily dungeon ...
We want to be slaves of a world that reject us after the burning crusade. You will enjoy a game when you play it for fun, not for suffering.
MMORPG is not dead, this genre matured in a wrong way. It tries to attract you and bind you giving purple items, easy quests and dungeons so you have the feel of success in your life. But is a fake success. There is no more fun farming for fungus... now, you change your stuff everyday and it's because developers know your brain will release dopamine when you loot a mob and see a purple item. And that dopamine will make you an addict to the easy success and to the game.
i cant imagine wow players farming for three or more days for an item... they would quit or make a ticket to GM, and GM will give the item and a massage.
/bow
Great post.
The mere fact that newbies label most of todays games as MMO, or MMORPG is the big problem. When most games are clearly not role playing, or even challenging. It is merely walk thru content.
MMORPG.com is dead... not the genre.
The bad part of his post is it could be applied to just about any MMORPG. As they were all designed in a way to keep you working in game, the longer you work(dopamine release), the more you pay. Kinda funny when you think about it in those terms. The problem is it misses the forest for the trees as far as arguments go. As it's about what you find fun, old school mechanics where socialization and players serve as the main content. Modern games that focus on gameplay and scripted content like most genres do.
Arguments like the above are extremely short sighted as they only do one thing, attempt to elevate your own personal bias by taking the legitimacy away from a different approach. For every argument that could be made about the legitimacy of old school MMORPGs on a social level, there's an equally justifiable argument about their lack of such in game-play, content design, as well as standing as truly well developed video games. The more time spent on social features the less spent on game-play mechanics and tightness of control. It also works in reverse as far as content and gameplay development goes.
We can all live in a little bubble claiming ownership of the title "mmorpg/RPG gamer" that does not make it so. There are reasons games took the shift they did. Which have really nothing to do with removing the RPG from games, etc.. Most changes came to be to offer better games, not chat rooms.
You can RP in many current MMORPG's, ESO as one example is ripe with it, as was LOTRO in it's day, SWTOR to a lesser degree, yet it's there. Role-playing is acting out a role or character. Video-game RPGS, are not much unlike what you see in SWTOR or ESO. IN other words there are plenty of legitimate reasons to label them as RPG's.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Originally posted by Tasslehoff35 Mmorpgs aren't dead...they are just littered with a new generation who feels they are entitled to everything. If they dont get their way they QQ on the game forums they QQ on sites like this. They post quitting threads and threads about lawsuits and petitions. The worst thing about mmos today are these people...
Seems like OP and whoever agrees with him are the ones feeling self entitled to me. All I hear is the MMORGP is dead because it's not to my liking when it's not even close to the truth. MMORPGs are flourishing more than ever. So many games to play and choose from. Times are great. The worst thing about MMORPGs these days are people like the OP, instead of playing the games and having fun like the majority of people, all they do is whine on forums about the old times(bad archaic designs) instead of moving on. Stop living in the past when the present and future is so bright. lol
Originally posted by Tasslehoff35 Mmorpgs aren't dead...they are just littered with a new generation who feels they are entitled to everything. If they dont get their way they QQ on the game forums they QQ on sites like this. They post quitting threads and threads about lawsuits and petitions. The worst thing about mmos today are these people...
Not unlike those here who are ranting the lack of slow travel, the lack of community, the lack of death penalty, the lack of ffa pvp ... and so on.
The only difference is that they don't seem to get their way as much just because devs cater to different audiences.
You do have a point, there are plenty of easy games with a good budget but nothing harder and there are enough players for a few hard games as well. Trying to make the game for everyone with super easy open world and hard raids is a bad compromize. Nothing against easy games but there really should be alternatives. And don't say there isn't players for them, the group that likes hard games might just be 20% of the PvEers but few games compete for those players so they are easier to get with a game aimed for them.
Diablo already solve the problem with a difficulty slider.
There should be no "too easy" games or "too hard" games with a difficulty slider, at least for pve gameplay.
A Diablo styled slider works in dungeons and raids but not in the open world. If you want to have both high and low difficulty you would have to set the entire server to a certain difficulty. If you do it right (with good enough rewards to play on the hard server) it woukld work excellent.
Guildwars did intially have a good run with it's hardmode (until they nerfed the rewards so much that the only reason to play hardmode was for the challenge and maybe an achivement). Whenever something can be done the easy or the hard way the risk Vs reward setting needs to be right.
But you do have a point of course, a game can have several difficulties (3 would be perfect) to cateer to more players as long as it does it right. Diablo might not just be the perfect example on how to do it in a MMO.
Originally posted by Tasslehoff35 Mmorpgs aren't dead...they are just littered with a new generation who feels they are entitled to everything. If they dont get their way they QQ on the game forums they QQ on sites like this. They post quitting threads and threads about lawsuits and petitions. The worst thing about mmos today are these people...
Seems like OP and whoever agrees with him are the ones feeling self entitled to me. All I hear is the MMORGP is dead because it's not to my liking when it's not even close to the truth. MMORPGs are flourishing more than ever. So many games to play and choose from. Times are great.
Yeah, you are right of course. MMOs iaren't dead at all, but the games are far more similar to eachothers now then they were 12 years ago and that isn't a good thing. The potential players of MMOs are far more then the number who actually play right now because the variation of them is less and less.
Yes, the games are probably going for the largest groups of potential customers but when all games go for them you get a few nische games like Eve and a lot of players with nothing at all.
That doesn't mean all games should try to recreate Everquest, but we need a few new games with new ideas and who aim more for other players who don't fit in the group most games are made for today. It is the way to go if the genre want to grow more.
A Diablo styled slider works in dungeons and raids but not in the open world. If you want to have both high and low difficulty you would have to set the entire server to a certain difficulty. If you do it right (with good enough rewards to play on the hard server) it woukld work excellent.
Yeh .. and since in games like WoW, most of the gameplay is in instances anyway, there is no problem. The open world is more or less just as a lobby to queue stuff up, and quest leveling. Just put all the quest leveling insides instances, and a difficulty slider can be applied.
Or, just leave the open world gameplay as is, and use the difficulty slider in dungeons & raids.
I have to agree that the genre is far from dead. There have been major improvements over the years but we have also taken a couple steps back as well. The MMO scene has moved from the "Make your own Story" philosophy to "story driven content" philosophy. Rather than giving players worlds to make their own stories in they have moved to the worlds that have a story for the player to experience, much like single player RPG's. Now in the end, this is a good thing because diversification is great in large industries. As the saying goes, "Variety is the spice of life", but it's not diversification when you have 1-3 "token innovative systems" and 10 "standard" systems.
Meaning many games come out these days and while they may have 1-3 very innovative/different/unique systems, they have 10 more systems that are exactly or extremely near the same systems in other games. So once a player has tried those 1-3 systems, unless those are enough to keep them playing than they quit the game and move on. Now of course people play games not just for systems but also for friends and time invested but I think this is a pretty good general explanation on why the market currently feels stale to some players.
The other point is that these games were originally designed for players to be social. The point was to be a chat room with things to do and monsters to kill because us nerds in the 80's-90's wanted to talk with other people who liked the same stuff we did. Without having to deal with the jocks, preps, goths, drugie's etc etc. These days the design philosophy is to be in a world doing your own thing with other people in the world. It's not there to meet new people or anything like that. It's purely a solo form of entertainment unless you have friends you want to play with. This is the mindset that has taken over the industry cause now the jocks, preps, goths, drugie's etc, etc, all play as well. Not to mention the other kids that were young and watched us now play the same games we do and lord knows, they don't have time to play a game cause they gotta watch their twitter, facebook, cell phone etc etc.
So the climate of the genre has changed for sure and because of that the diversification of genre has gone to shit as well. The reason being is everyone is after that instant gratification crowd because that's what turned the industry into a couple billion/trillion dollar business and that's what publishers want, the $$$$$$. Gone were the days of Devs making games because of a vision and a publisher seeing value in that vision and backing them. It turned into the "chase the $" and that gave us more innovation with other downsides, specifically F2P games. F2P games are great, but the downside is they are the same games as before but now they nickel and dime us to death, and ask to be paid to test the games.
In the end, I think the genre is moving forward, we see more indie games being developed with the development of Kickstarter which is another great innovation. A platform that is literally built to allow folks with great ideas a way to pull money from the public with the strength of their idea. I believe this "Kickstarter generation" is really the beginning of seeing more unique games. It has already started as we all know but once one of these games is able to make AAA success purely through crowd funding/kickstarter than we will have even more devs trying out their game ideas without having to deal with publishers who are only interested with the most bang for the buck. In my opinion, we don't have the diversification the industry needs and that some players like the op and myself want so that we can have some games more aimed towards the old school style. Time will tell in all of this but I think these reasoning's make the most sense.
Originally posted by Cramit845 In the end, I think the genre is moving forward, we see more indie games being developed with the development of Kickstarter which is another great innovation. A platform that is literally built to allow folks with great ideas a way to pull money from the public with the strength of their idea. I believe this "Kickstarter generation" is really the beginning of seeing more unique games. It has already started as we all know but once one of these games is able to make AAA success purely through crowd funding/kickstarter than we will have even more devs trying out their game ideas without having to deal with publishers who are only interested with the most bang for the buck. In my opinion, we don't have the diversification the industry needs and that some players like the op and myself want so that we can have some games more aimed towards the old school style. Time will tell in all of this but I think these reasoning's make the most sense.
These Kickstarter are like throwing your money into the wind. Most of them are going to down right fail because the idea may be there the financial stat up cost is beyond Kickstarter.
The initial server clusters and network infrastructure is well and above 2 million bucks if you intend to support enough players to earn more than coffee money.
The weird thing about EQNext is that nothing at it's core is like EQ.
EQ Forced grouping...EQNext does not
EQ Trinity.....EQNext is not
EQ slow combat.......EQNext is action spam
EQ tab target....EQNext is not
EQ strictly defined class roles.........EQNext loosely defined multiclassing
It shouldn't even be called EQ. It's like calling a new Hello Kitty game, Ninja Gaiden Next, as if Ninja Gaiden fans are going to be happy with a Hello Kitty game.
The weird thing about EQNext is that nothing at it's core is like EQ.
EQ Forced grouping...EQNext does not
EQ Trinity.....EQNext is not
EQ slow combat.......EQNext is action spam
EQ tab target....EQNext is not
EQ strictly defined class roles.........EQNext loosely defined multiclassing
It shouldn't even be called EQ. It's like calling a new Hello Kitty game, Ninja Gaiden Next, as if Ninja Gaiden fans are going to be happy with a Hello Kitty game.
Everything you just said about EQN can be applied to WoW. And some people call WoW a EQ clone...
I could literally tank a mob, hold a private /tell conversation, chat with my group, and chat with my guild all at the same time. Can't do that in WoW.
Might have been because you were horrible at EQ and stayed in newbee zones.
You couldn't do a tipt trial "while holding private conversations", one proc form a noc could take out a group tank in a second, one snare from an ukun could wipe your group easily.
Breakdown in communication and the sewer trials was incredibly hard content that current MMO would never dream of implementing.
Cooling chambers wiped our raid tank in a split second, and it was supposed to be a group zone. We had the best equipped tank on the whole server, and he lasted less than a second. Think he was 80k buffed or something, the mob hit him for over 80k.
Most of the mmorpgs released in the last ten years have gone out of their way to coddle the players. It's pathetic.
The game environment shouldn't care about your precious self-esteem or long-term success. It should weed out and kill off the weak. It should deny entry to those not worthy. It should humble players into working together.
The game world should beat you down until you cry and give up and then only keep playing because you're ashamed to admit to your real life friends that you couldn't hack it. Bring back harsh death penalties, severe weather, dark nights, long travel times, food and drink, encumbrance and all the other difficulties that used to ground mmorpgs to realistic challenges. Players should have to think ahead and make strategic decisions.
I'm sick and tired of playing mmorpgs designed for whining babies and delicate debutantes. It is time for more substance and less superficiality!
Most of the mmorpgs released in the last ten years have gone out of their way to coddle the players. It's pathetic.
The game environment shouldn't care about your precious self-esteem or long-term success. It should weed out and kill off the weak. It should deny entry to those not worthy. It should humble players into working together.
The game world should beat you down until you cry and give up and then only keep playing because you're ashamed to admit to your real life friends that you couldn't hack it. Bring back harsh death penalties, severe weather, dark nights, long travel times, food and drink, encumbrance and all the other difficulties that used to ground mmorpgs to realistic challenges. Players should have to think ahead and make strategic decisions.
I'm sick and tired of playing mmorpgs designed for whining babies and delicate debutantes. It is time for more substance and less superficiality!
If only that game You described can sustain itself financaly . Players are casulas right now, You, so called hardcore gamers are minority.
The majority of people are just looking for a relaxed hour or two of downtime sometime between getting home from work/supper/kids/spouse and bed. That's it.
If it's too stressfull we're not interested. It goes against the idea of downtime. If it doesn't deliver what we want we'll just go do something else. Models, T.V...
Please note this has nothing to do with length of time to end game or really even challenge. It is about being able to do something fun and relaxing in a short period of time.
If the devs want us, and so far it seems they do, they will have the game cater to our needs. If they don't, their game won't. It's simple.
edit - I don't think most of us even see the point of the type of masochistic game you are describing. While I can understand the challenge level, if I'm going to develop that much time and effort into it, I'll do it in the real world where the pay off is more than just pixels or admiration from people I'll never meet.
Just because you don't like it doesn't mean it is bad.
Comments
If you want a Niche game then your going to have to wait for a niche developer to take up your cross so to speak. In today's MMO landscape there seems to be a niche development studio popping up every week so don't lose hope. I myself like my MMO like the majority so I have no reason to complain other then I want a spiritual successor to Asheron's Call but to say we aren't seeing limited market, niche games is a stretch. You have games like Camelot Unchained and Lord British's new games coming soon which espouse the old school philosophy. I think you're just wanting big studios to invest millions of dollars on games with NO, ZERO, ZILCH mainstream attraction. Aint gonna happen ever.
Sandbox means open world, non-linear gaming PERIOD!
Subscription Gaming, especially MMO gaming is a Cash grab bigger then the most P2W cash shop!
Bring Back Exploration and lengthy progression times. RPG's have always been about the Journey not the destination!!!
A respawn timer as death penalty is good but 24h might work on an epic dragon, accidentaly falling to your death on the other hand would be just silly.
Having the dragon actually burning down someones house isn't super logical,a DE for it attacking the guilds city or castle would be better, or just give a chanse that the dragon fire could destroy a piece of your armor (20% would be good enough to put the fear of death into most players).
You do have a point, there are plenty of easy games with a good budget but nothing harder and there are enough players for a few hard games as well. Trying to make the game for everyone with super easy open world and hard raids is a bad compromize. Nothing against easy games but there really should be alternatives. And don't say there isn't players for them, the group that likes hard games might just be 20% of the PvEers but few games compete for those players so they are easier to get with a game aimed for them.
I don't think themeparks really are the problem here, Everquest and Asherons call where both themeparks. It is more the mix of almost all games using the same mechanics and the same difficulty. That makes the games rather similar and there are few games that actually feel different when you play.
All the feutures you list would work fine in one game but if all games had them it would suck as much as it does now if not more.
Diablo already solve the problem with a difficulty slider.
There should be no "too easy" games or "too hard" games with a difficulty slider, at least for pve gameplay.
The bad part of his post is it could be applied to just about any MMORPG. As they were all designed in a way to keep you working in game, the longer you work(dopamine release), the more you pay. Kinda funny when you think about it in those terms. The problem is it misses the forest for the trees as far as arguments go. As it's about what you find fun, old school mechanics where socialization and players serve as the main content. Modern games that focus on gameplay and scripted content like most genres do.
Arguments like the above are extremely short sighted as they only do one thing, attempt to elevate your own personal bias by taking the legitimacy away from a different approach. For every argument that could be made about the legitimacy of old school MMORPGs on a social level, there's an equally justifiable argument about their lack of such in game-play, content design, as well as standing as truly well developed video games. The more time spent on social features the less spent on game-play mechanics and tightness of control. It also works in reverse as far as content and gameplay development goes.
We can all live in a little bubble claiming ownership of the title "mmorpg/RPG gamer" that does not make it so. There are reasons games took the shift they did. Which have really nothing to do with removing the RPG from games, etc.. Most changes came to be to offer better games, not chat rooms.
You can RP in many current MMORPG's, ESO as one example is ripe with it, as was LOTRO in it's day, SWTOR to a lesser degree, yet it's there. Role-playing is acting out a role or character. Video-game RPGS, are not much unlike what you see in SWTOR or ESO. IN other words there are plenty of legitimate reasons to label them as RPG's.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Seems like OP and whoever agrees with him are the ones feeling self entitled to me. All I hear is the MMORGP is dead because it's not to my liking when it's not even close to the truth. MMORPGs are flourishing more than ever. So many games to play and choose from. Times are great. The worst thing about MMORPGs these days are people like the OP, instead of playing the games and having fun like the majority of people, all they do is whine on forums about the old times(bad archaic designs) instead of moving on. Stop living in the past when the present and future is so bright. lol
Not unlike those here who are ranting the lack of slow travel, the lack of community, the lack of death penalty, the lack of ffa pvp ... and so on.
The only difference is that they don't seem to get their way as much just because devs cater to different audiences.
A Diablo styled slider works in dungeons and raids but not in the open world. If you want to have both high and low difficulty you would have to set the entire server to a certain difficulty. If you do it right (with good enough rewards to play on the hard server) it woukld work excellent.
Guildwars did intially have a good run with it's hardmode (until they nerfed the rewards so much that the only reason to play hardmode was for the challenge and maybe an achivement). Whenever something can be done the easy or the hard way the risk Vs reward setting needs to be right.
But you do have a point of course, a game can have several difficulties (3 would be perfect) to cateer to more players as long as it does it right. Diablo might not just be the perfect example on how to do it in a MMO.
Yeah, you are right of course. MMOs iaren't dead at all, but the games are far more similar to eachothers now then they were 12 years ago and that isn't a good thing. The potential players of MMOs are far more then the number who actually play right now because the variation of them is less and less.
Yes, the games are probably going for the largest groups of potential customers but when all games go for them you get a few nische games like Eve and a lot of players with nothing at all.
That doesn't mean all games should try to recreate Everquest, but we need a few new games with new ideas and who aim more for other players who don't fit in the group most games are made for today. It is the way to go if the genre want to grow more.
not dead
but most leave to play mobas
Why? all myth around word "grind"
MMOs without grind cant sustain content enough to make players happy
and MMO with grinds have lowplayerbase
Yeh .. and since in games like WoW, most of the gameplay is in instances anyway, there is no problem. The open world is more or less just as a lobby to queue stuff up, and quest leveling. Just put all the quest leveling insides instances, and a difficulty slider can be applied.
Or, just leave the open world gameplay as is, and use the difficulty slider in dungeons & raids.
I have to agree that the genre is far from dead. There have been major improvements over the years but we have also taken a couple steps back as well. The MMO scene has moved from the "Make your own Story" philosophy to "story driven content" philosophy. Rather than giving players worlds to make their own stories in they have moved to the worlds that have a story for the player to experience, much like single player RPG's. Now in the end, this is a good thing because diversification is great in large industries. As the saying goes, "Variety is the spice of life", but it's not diversification when you have 1-3 "token innovative systems" and 10 "standard" systems.
Meaning many games come out these days and while they may have 1-3 very innovative/different/unique systems, they have 10 more systems that are exactly or extremely near the same systems in other games. So once a player has tried those 1-3 systems, unless those are enough to keep them playing than they quit the game and move on. Now of course people play games not just for systems but also for friends and time invested but I think this is a pretty good general explanation on why the market currently feels stale to some players.
The other point is that these games were originally designed for players to be social. The point was to be a chat room with things to do and monsters to kill because us nerds in the 80's-90's wanted to talk with other people who liked the same stuff we did. Without having to deal with the jocks, preps, goths, drugie's etc etc. These days the design philosophy is to be in a world doing your own thing with other people in the world. It's not there to meet new people or anything like that. It's purely a solo form of entertainment unless you have friends you want to play with. This is the mindset that has taken over the industry cause now the jocks, preps, goths, drugie's etc, etc, all play as well. Not to mention the other kids that were young and watched us now play the same games we do and lord knows, they don't have time to play a game cause they gotta watch their twitter, facebook, cell phone etc etc.
So the climate of the genre has changed for sure and because of that the diversification of genre has gone to shit as well. The reason being is everyone is after that instant gratification crowd because that's what turned the industry into a couple billion/trillion dollar business and that's what publishers want, the $$$$$$. Gone were the days of Devs making games because of a vision and a publisher seeing value in that vision and backing them. It turned into the "chase the $" and that gave us more innovation with other downsides, specifically F2P games. F2P games are great, but the downside is they are the same games as before but now they nickel and dime us to death, and ask to be paid to test the games.
In the end, I think the genre is moving forward, we see more indie games being developed with the development of Kickstarter which is another great innovation. A platform that is literally built to allow folks with great ideas a way to pull money from the public with the strength of their idea. I believe this "Kickstarter generation" is really the beginning of seeing more unique games. It has already started as we all know but once one of these games is able to make AAA success purely through crowd funding/kickstarter than we will have even more devs trying out their game ideas without having to deal with publishers who are only interested with the most bang for the buck. In my opinion, we don't have the diversification the industry needs and that some players like the op and myself want so that we can have some games more aimed towards the old school style. Time will tell in all of this but I think these reasoning's make the most sense.
These Kickstarter are like throwing your money into the wind. Most of them are going to down right fail because the idea may be there the financial stat up cost is beyond Kickstarter.
The initial server clusters and network infrastructure is well and above 2 million bucks if you intend to support enough players to earn more than coffee money.
If you are interested in making a MMO maybe visit my page to get a free open source engine.
The weird thing about EQNext is that nothing at it's core is like EQ.
EQ Forced grouping...EQNext does not
EQ Trinity.....EQNext is not
EQ slow combat.......EQNext is action spam
EQ tab target....EQNext is not
EQ strictly defined class roles.........EQNext loosely defined multiclassing
It shouldn't even be called EQ. It's like calling a new Hello Kitty game, Ninja Gaiden Next, as if Ninja Gaiden fans are going to be happy with a Hello Kitty game.
Everything you just said about EQN can be applied to WoW. And some people call WoW a EQ clone...
Might have been because you were horrible at EQ and stayed in newbee zones.
You couldn't do a tipt trial "while holding private conversations", one proc form a noc could take out a group tank in a second, one snare from an ukun could wipe your group easily.
Breakdown in communication and the sewer trials was incredibly hard content that current MMO would never dream of implementing.
Cooling chambers wiped our raid tank in a split second, and it was supposed to be a group zone. We had the best equipped tank on the whole server, and he lasted less than a second. Think he was 80k buffed or something, the mob hit him for over 80k.
MMORPG might be dead to someone.
But is not dead to me.
Just saying.
Most of the mmorpgs released in the last ten years have gone out of their way to coddle the players. It's pathetic.
The game environment shouldn't care about your precious self-esteem or long-term success. It should weed out and kill off the weak. It should deny entry to those not worthy. It should humble players into working together.
The game world should beat you down until you cry and give up and then only keep playing because you're ashamed to admit to your real life friends that you couldn't hack it. Bring back harsh death penalties, severe weather, dark nights, long travel times, food and drink, encumbrance and all the other difficulties that used to ground mmorpgs to realistic challenges. Players should have to think ahead and make strategic decisions.
I'm sick and tired of playing mmorpgs designed for whining babies and delicate debutantes. It is time for more substance and less superficiality!
If only that game You described can sustain itself financaly
. Players are casulas right now, You, so called hardcore gamers are minority.
The majority of people are just looking for a relaxed hour or two of downtime sometime between getting home from work/supper/kids/spouse and bed. That's it.
If it's too stressfull we're not interested. It goes against the idea of downtime. If it doesn't deliver what we want we'll just go do something else. Models, T.V...
Please note this has nothing to do with length of time to end game or really even challenge. It is about being able to do something fun and relaxing in a short period of time.
If the devs want us, and so far it seems they do, they will have the game cater to our needs. If they don't, their game won't. It's simple.
edit - I don't think most of us even see the point of the type of masochistic game you are describing. While I can understand the challenge level, if I'm going to develop that much time and effort into it, I'll do it in the real world where the pay off is more than just pixels or admiration from people I'll never meet.
This horse is not dead enough.
Let's beat it again.
It's heading the way of the Northern white rhinoceros ;(