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5 Rules to avoid being disappointed by upcoming MMO X
Jeezesuz
Member Posts: 70
1) Learn from the past. Did the company let you down in the past?
2) Do not participate in the launch. Wait 6 months to a year. To many failed launches and it can forever leave a bad taste in your mouth.
3) Do not buy into the hype.
4) Read reviews from objective people who are constructive in their criticism and watch some videos.
5) Do not try to change the game to suit you, choose a game that suits you.
Comments
Good points, especially the last one.
1) Ahh how sweet it is when a company that has been nothing but good to you fails.
2) Thats right, refrain from playing the games you have waited for so long, hold back a -year- or so.
3) Make your best attempt to ignore the most anticipated games, the more popular they are the worst they must be, right ? Don't believe anyone until you play it after a year or so.
4) Objective review of a subjective experience ?
5) If you have a game in mind, don't believe the hype, spend a year or so researching the game, lurking forums, watching youtube videos and you'll be fine mate.
- Shijeer
#5 is by far the golden rule of MMOs
As for waiting 6 months, In my experience the first month is the rockiest. Best to wait out 30ish days and see what the game/population is like when the dust settles, but no need to wait a half year because you have launch-a-phobia
Torrential: DAOC (Pendragon)
Awned: World of Warcraft (Lothar)
Torren: Warhammer Online (Praag)
My advice.
Don't buy into the hype. And don't go into the game with expectations of what it should be. The expectation that every MMO will be the "one to rule them all" is killing a lot of good ideas
I like the 6 month rule better myself. Most of the failing MMO's that are released get a mass influx followed by a mass exodus. If this happens it's best to avoid it. Not to mention all of the bug fixes and introduction of content that didn't make release.
Hello, Shijeer. I couldn't help noticing your post as I was browsing through the forums. I just want to state that I understand the points you have, but I don't appreciate the way in which you blatantly attack the OP's post. Firstly, Jeezesuz was trying to be helpful to the community as a whole. He is at least trying to be constructive. Secondly, playing an MMO for many is an investment. Although they certainly are games, they are a genre in which large amounts of a person's life are often required to do well in. Even if you average 1 hour per day (which I'm guessing many people surpass), that's over 5% of your daily life while you're awake that you're investing into the game. If I was doing that I'd want to make sure I'm going to enjoy the game. Thirdly, to stoop to another level...
1) Ahh how sweet it is when you waste your time choosing a company that disappoints you over one that's given you a proven track record.
2) Thats right, I'm going to have no self-control and feel like not playing a game for 6 months is going to ruin my life, even considering the large time and money (relative to other genres of game) investments
3) Make your best attempt to understand that the most anticipated games are always the best for you, the more popular they are the better they always must be, right ? Just believe everyone, don't worry about playing it.
4) If you have a game in mind, don't bother having any sort of solid ground to your knowledge. No one ever jumps the gun and buys something impulsively, later regretting it, so don't worry about it!
I don't mean to attack you, but please, think before you post next time. Do you think what you said really helped? If not, let's just not post.
EDIT- And with your edit: The new 4) Of course there's no such thing as a generally accepted good quality of a game. A review could never say something useful because some people might like the crashes, glitches, midi sound effects, and 8-bit graphics in a modern day MMO. Why would you even bother listening to a trained, professional individual when there are thousands of forum trolls to listen to?
EDIT 2- By the way, I'd retake that test. You're much more of an INTJ.
1) I'm also been pleasantly surprised by some companies that let me down in the past. A lot can change over the years including the entire development team. I've also had huge letdowns from companies with good track records too. How about judging a game based on it's own merits and not the company's merits?
2) I'm suppose to wait 6 months to a year to play a game I want to play? This is really bad advice. While I think it's best to wait if you can't get into beta for whatever reason (or the beta being limited) if you enjoyed the beta enough why not pay for the game at launch? Chances are if the game is that flawed there isn't going to be much of a difference in gameplay a month down the road compared to 6 months or more. Most of the bugs should be ironed out around the 2-3 month mark, not 6 months. Also it really shouldn't be this way, and the game should be released "complete" with only a few minor tweaks at launch like console games. It's really just the MMO industry that gets away with this.
3) So how am I suppose to get information about a game? Considering that most of the information available about a game pre-release and from constructive reviews after release are going to have hype of some kind. Am I suppose to just load up a game with a pessimistic attitude towards it? I probably won't like the game at all if I think it's going to suck and don't buy into any hype, no matter how good the game actually is.
4) Good advice
5) Good advice
You don't have to wait. Just a suggestion to avoid being disappointed. If you think you are going to like it, by all means get the game. Just know that most of the MMO's problems you will experience will be within the first 6 months.
Overall nice rules, just wanted to add my reaction/opinion to them, thanks for making them.
I would add to never upgrade a computer for a game that has yet to be released. I did this for Vanguard only to find out that even the best hardware available at the time could not run the game smoothly. I won't go into other engine & crashing problems that took them 2 years to fix. I'll never do this again, lessons learned. If a gaming company can't get a game to run well with mainstream computers, then they are doing it wrong.
Also remember when reading reviews, try to see if the reviewers have seen more than the first 10-20 levels. Companies lately have been polishing their first 15-25 levels of the game, while leaving the rest buggy, unfinished, not itemized, and for the most part untested. They do it this way to allow for raving reviews, as most people don't level past 10 or 15 during beta or shortly after launch before submitting a game review. Many gamers often get disappointed because they spend x amount of time playing x game, only to find that the endgame is broken, sucks, unitemized, and overall a cluster fudge. We pay to play a MMO because we want our characters to progress and keep going. It's very disappointing to get sucked into a game where the early parts of the game outshines the later half. WAR was an example of this.
Avoid reviews that don't talk about the negative parts of the game, because no game is perfect.
Of course you can sticky this thread, but majority of the gamers will still try a new game when it's launched as long as they are remotely interested. People need new things to play, that's why these companies keep pumping these games out.
EQ1-AC1-DAOC-FFXI-L2-EQ2-WoW-DDO-GW-LoTR-VG-WAR-GW2-ESO
Overall nice rules, just wanted to add my reaction/opinion to them, thanks for making them.
Thanks for the feedback and good points.
I totally agree with you 100%. Vanguard, that game cost me $1500...
Naah I pulled a half-troll there. Turns out I'm not good at it.
Anyways, I suspect the thing that struck me in OP's post was the total disregard for the complexity of the human experience, one can't just go around handing out random guidelines like that and call them 'rules', there's nothing 'constructive' about that, if anything, it's an act of 'destruction' to collapse the multiplicity of minds into a flat rule of thumb. All of the mentioned things may or may not be helpful, worse yet they could prevent someone from discovering and enjoying an mmo or perhaps being pleasantly surprised by a not-so-promising game. I merely wished to add some depth to the discussion, a counterbalance to those 5 'rules'. My countering every rule was an act of addition, not one of replacement, your variations are no less viable. I suggest caution and thought precisely because of the 'investment' in mmo's of time and effort.
To the response of 'dude, chill its just some helpful advice on a forum' I respond by pointing out the implied 'importance' of setting out those 5 'rules' for all to see. As an act ill-conceived, yet willful manipulation of thousands. I am merely matching that 'importance' by rushing to point out, in a rather vulgar manner granted, but still to point out that there is more to it, there always is the other side of the coin. What works for you may not for another, do we stop handing out advice ? No, we put more thought into it, we consider angles, perceptions, dimensions.
Note : I'm an INTP aspiring to be an INTJ.
Hint : I make a dreadful actor.
- Shijeer
Naah I pulled a half-troll there. Turns out I'm not good at it.
Anyways, I suspect the thing that struck me in OP's post was the total disregard for the complexity of the human experience, one can't just go around handing out random guidelines like that and call them 'rules', there's nothing 'constructive' about that, if anything, it's an act of 'destruction' to collapse the multiplicity of minds into a flat rule of thumb. All of the mentioned things may or may not be helpful, worse yet they could prevent someone from discovering and enjoying an MMO or perhaps being pleasantly surprised by a not-so-promising game. I merely wished to add some depth to the discussion, a counterbalance to those 5 'rules'.
To the response of 'dude, chill its just some helpful advice on a forum' I respond by pointing out the implied 'importance' of setting out those 5 'rules' for all to see. As an act ill-conceived, yet willful manipulation of thousands. I am merely matching that 'importance' by rushing to point out, in a rather vulgar manner granted, but still to point out that there is more to it, there always is the other side of the coin. What works for you may not for another, do we stop handing out advice ? No, we put more thought into it, we consider angles, perceptions, dimensions.
Note : I'm an INTP aspiring to be an INTJ.
Hint : I make a dreadful actor.
- Shijeer
I understand your point but this list was just meant for dialogue. This is just my opinion based on past experiences. Other people put their opinion. It is a forum after all. This site engages in these types of lists often. As does any magazine.
6. Under no circumstances allow yourself to build the opinion on the game based on these forums.
Or rather, match the reviews people have done of games you have played, find those people that generally have similar preferences to your own, use their reviews for future games if possible.
F2P/P2P excellent thread.
http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/282517/F2P-An-Engineers-perspective.html
I agree with everything except point number 2.
I feel it's worth being there from the start even if it means a disappointment. I want to be part of exploring things while they are new for everybody beta testers excluded. Starting from square one with everybody else means a lot to me. I simply don't have the same fun when I try and play a game that has already established itself over the course of 6 months to a year fully explored from the bottom to the top. It's part of the fun playing with people that is seeing content for the first time with you.
I guess the closest analogy I can give to explain it would be to go and see a movie with people seeing it for the first time vs going with a friend or two that has already seen the movie and knows what happens around the next corner. I know eventually everything in the game would have been explored while i play but I still want to be a part of the newness. As such I'm willing to take that risk