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Lessons we should take from WOW....
pencilrick
Member Posts: 1,550
Things to keep
Polish
Colorful Graphics
Simplicity of Class Design
Runs at high settings on mediocre computers
Good layout of noob areas and racial cities
Simple "here and now" quests (i.e., a farmer says, "pigs are eating my crops, go kill 10 pigs")
Faction (but reduce number of factions to workable level. There should not be 40+ factions; maybe a dozen would be about right).
Things to ditch
Sci-fi meshed with fantasy (Gnomes making a telescope might be reasonable, but motorcycles are a bit much)
Lame humor referencing the modern world (breaks immersion)
Dalaran (or any "Plane of Knowledge" type city)
Insta-porting (except certain casters, where it makes sense. Travel and dangerous cross-continent journeys are part of the adventure and give a sense of geography to the world. "Where is Conn?" "Don't know, last I heard he ventured into the Southern Deserts." "Okay, we'll have to do this without him, or venture out to join him." "Sure, let's load up on arrows and rations and see who else wants to go?")
Phasing (isolates players)
Instancing (takes "community" out of dungeons. "Community" in dungeons is fun. It is cool to run into another party in a dungeon, or to venture safely inside while following some other party's corpse kills.)
Storyline quests (especially ones involving phasing. These mean nothing, take time, and suck in general).
Cross-server grouping (no reason to socialize with someone you'll never meet again. Sort of like making friends at a bustop or airport. Why?)
Mobs that look incredibly tough but drop in two swipes, and level 70 "deer" (I once saw a huge level 15 stegosaurus standing next to a level 16 giraffe. C'mon.)
Comments
A lot of that is purely subjective. For example, you said one of the things to ditch was the lame humor. Well for me that was one of the best parts of WoW, it didn't take itself seriously and I quite enjoyed that (especially due to the numerous games that have such a heavy handed approach in their game world).
totally disagree with instancing being a con. Go play Aion and grind KHQ, you can go into that place with a group and find absolutely no grinding spots because they're all taken. It could take you up to an hour to get a group ready, go into KHQ and have no mobs to grind, on top of that if you do find a grind spot some single person can grief your group till you're forced to leave. What do I mean about griefing? A single person can train a bunch of mobs onto a group thats grinding and the train will switch to that group since they are doing dmg/healing, thus wiping the group.
There are many reasons why instancing was brought into the mmo world, a lot of it dates back to EQ when people had to wait in line to kill mobs. I'll never understand how people think instancing kills social aspects in an MMO, grab 25 people do a raid, everyone is on vent talking. It doesn't get much more social than that.
Hmm. I can't really agree with your opinions here. And, I'm the type of person who *does* make friends at the airport and bus stop. I can't help it. I just make friends wherever I go.
That aside, I mainly disagree with your opinions on the new LFG system. I love it and most WoW players seem to love it as well. You are in the minority here with your opinion, I fear.
Level 70 deer? I agree. That's a bit - well, a lot - lame.
I don't mind the lame humor references; WoW was never a very "immersive" game, anyway. It's cartoon-y and ridiculous, honestly. Trolls speak like Rasta Jamacians. You find "immersion" in this?
I enjoy "storyline" quests. They HELP immersion for me.
What you got right:
Keep the game running on many systems, but keep in mind this will bring cries of "the graphics suck!" and "the engine is outdated" from the purists - I mean, there are people bitching about Aion's graphics still and those are impressive to say the least. I love Fallen Earth for example but the game was (and is) plagued bu technical problems; I tell people it helps to know your way around a PC if you want to play it - not a good strategy for getting customers.
Also, one more thing that Fallen Earth didn't do at launch - they didn't offer a "boxed" version of their game at retail stores. This is a huge problem for a lot of people because while I might be comfortable with an online download, many aren't.
Also, good newbie zones. The first impression is very, very important.
funny thing is most of the things you want to ditch are the positives of WoW. Phasing is probably the coolest thing WoW has implemented into the game. Also found the comment under your name funny. Partially true though there haven't been any real mmo's after WoW's release outside of lotro and eve.
agree
"It's not that I'm so smart; it's just that I stay with problems longer."
-- Albert Einstein
Phasing has been one of the best steps forward they made in my opinion. The 'isolates people' part, in my opinion, is negligible compared to it's benefits.
Again, nice try. Almost all areas in WoW have very good layout (with the exception of Azshara, Blades' Edge and Borean Tundra - they're difficult to navigate when you're leveling).
Hmm. Blizzard has always done that. And it has always worked.
What's wrong with Dalaran? You need a place where you can rest and chat and get access to faction-wide services, like bank and AH.
Oh yeah, it was so exciting to run/fly the same routes over and over every day for months. So very exciting.
/sarcasm off
Phasing brings depth and make the world alive. Blizzard needs to use it more and more.
I hope guys like you will never work for Blizzard. I really hope.
MMORPG genre is dead. Long live MMOCS (Massively Multiplayer Online Cash Shop).
Sometimes when I'm lonely and bored I will spread my asscheeks fully and re-enact my own Fantastic Voyage. The only problem is I find pieces of roughage like peanuts and corn instead of Racquel
Most of the things you mention I cannot agree with. One of the core featuers of WoW is (at least now) how easy it is to find a group to play with. Essentially, that's all that's left in WoW, grouping and hacking out drops. That's basically what endgame is about and pretty much all people do for endgame. If you want to get rid of this, you first of all have to change the system itself.
But one thing that should definitly change is that the same mobs litter the game field anywhere. You are fighting essentially the same murlocks and spiders at level 70 that you fought at level 7. They might change a bit in texture, but else they look the same, they sound the same and they even fight the same. What's the deal? If I climb in levels, I at least expect to see a few new mobs if I can't get to see a few new spells (it's not like you get anything new after level 30ish, only stronger versions of old spells, at least way up 'til the 70s).
Ok I can agree with you in all points except 3
1. The Insta-Porting is not used in excess. Since I changed my HS, the only way I could get to Shattrath is by walking to the Blasted Lands, going through and flying to Shatt. I was glad when they added to Dark Portal ports in the cities. I could really care less about the "Scenery" if I could shave off 30 mins. travel time to go train for minining
2. Instancing is a very good feature. If every person who wanted to do Onyxia on my serv did it and had to all do it in the same instance, it would be a nightmare, not to mention it would suck. Play other MMOs and you'll know what I'm talking about
3. The cross-server grouping does diminish the sense of community within the party I agree with that, but the reward of 20 sec. queues, again I could care less