OP I am not trying to be difficult here, but you need to think out your question a little more carefully next time, although it isnt hard to understand what your trying to ask, its all over the damn place.
to answer your question, nothing will compare to EQ/DAOC/UO.
Ok so this is a question to everyone who started with the now 'oldschool' MMORPGs like EQ and Ultima etc.etc, not WoW or Guild Wars, but just 1990-2003.
A lot of people really hate what the MMO market is now, but I was wondering if everyone who played the older MMOs actually felt exactly the same way when WoW and GW and all those types of games came out?
Did you all think 'WoW is way too casual, same with GW and EQ2' compared to EQ1 etc in 2004 and whenever GW came out?
Or do the oldschool and vanilla WoW, GW etc. players all agree that back in 2004 and downwards was collectively when MMOs were the best? Or do you think only EQ and Ultima Online were the best MMOs?
It's hard to explain but basically: was Everquest, DAoC and Ultima Online better than World of Warcraft (Vanilla) and Guild Wars (Vanilla) in your opinion, or do you think WoW and GW were the same games but just improved? Or did you think WoW and GW were in fact better than Everquest and Ultima even though you started with Eq and Ultima?
Hopefully you understand what I'm trying to ask.
Everyone have their own record of history. I will now tell you mine.
There are two main things, we need to consider here -
1. Is the honeymoon. Most MMORPG players have one. Usually the honeymoon is the "great time" a player had with the first MMORPG they really got into. It's not always the first MMO they ever play, but the first game they play and really, really love.
It's a period that seems to pop up again and again in many MMORPG players. The people who got into Everquest had one. Or Ultima. Or SWG(the honeymoon group I was in). Or WoW. Or Lord of the Rings Online.
Following a honeymoon, what seems to happen to most players is that they become less happy. The honeymoon was great. Everything was new and exciting, and the player had the best prospecting waiting for them.
But as time went on, something changed - Perhaps it was a patch that altered something the player did not like, or an expansion that took the end game in a different direction. Perhaps it was the release of a new MMO that made the players friends and guildies leave for this new game. Whatever the case, the experience usually never becomes the same after the honeymoon. Sometimes the honeymoon lasts a month, sometimes years.
Using myself as an example, my honeymoon game was SWG. I had played MMORPGs before, and even loved a MMO before(Planetside) but it was SWG that really defined my playstyle. My newbieness, with MMORPGs having nothing to compare it to, made it easier for me to ignore the bad things. It was not like I had played 10 other MMORPGs before extensively and was able to hand pick each of their strengths against SWG. No. My lack of experience made me a lot more forgiving for SWG.
And then I was able to focus on the strengths of SWG. The things I had never seen in "normal" games. Like building a player city. An actual freaking player city, that altered the planet and server, with the powerful crafters and good salesmen and politicians that branded it. The sense of being part of something larger would to this day, be part of what I consider a MMORPG to be.
As my first real MMORPG it deeply affected me.
I am sure people can tell you the same with other games. People who started with DAOC would probably say, that their expectations for server altering events and PvP are very high, and that they have been left unsatisfied.
In the end, it's not that people hate MMORPGs now. In fact there are lots of people who love MMORPGs. Many people would never have considered paying for one, before WoW came out. It took WoW to create a cultural mainstream change in peoples deception. The majority basked in an ignorance of believing that it was the ultimate ripoff and retardiation, and something to be shunned at, to pay monthly to a boring stinky online game with lame combat.
What has changed for old school MMO'ers is expectations. MMORPG's are a large time investment. Many people seem to become cynical as they grind in yet a new game, and with the release of these new F2P games like Hellgate and Age of Conan, I am doubting myself, and then even when I am able to get these games for free, if they are worth my time. I think we have become so crictical and so selfaware of our limited time, during our best years, from child to age 60 or something, that we do not wish to squander them on mediocre MMO experiences, or merely decent MMORPGs.
When are some developers going to make a MMORPG worthy of us? I believe SWTOR and GW2 are trying. They are trying to be responsible of their time commitment. But only time will tell if they can live up to their word of not giving us a grind, but an actual real narrative throughout the levelling process.
As for end game... I think that's a different discussion. I've rambled long enough.
extremely well written post! Trying to figure out how to give rep.. and i see you are a Dane, which explains the intelligence
I started with EQ back in 1999. Thought about Ultima back in 1998, but wasn't willing to pay a subscription for an isometric view game.
For the most part, I like the trend of the MMO genre in regards to casual game play and reducing time sinks and not requiring grouping. I don't like the trend toward twitch combat and excessive instancing.
I played EverQuest on and off for four years, it was very much a love / hate relationship for me. I played WoW pretty much straight up three years, with a couple of short return visits and it was mostly a loving relationship. WoW and City of Heroes are my two favorite games. My next potential favorite games will likely be Star Wars The Old Republic and Guild Wars 2, both of which will be casual oriented games and probably much more casual oriented end games than even WoW, thank goodness.
I find the majority of the current crop of games to be much more immersive and entertaining than EQ / DAoC / AO. While those games were okay for their time, I'd never have given them a second glance if they'd had WoW or City of Heroes as competition back in 1999.
Writing was on the wall with the inception of Trammel as far as I'm concerned. WoW and the like just pushed it all a step further.
Hindsight is a beautiful thing and it would take a brave man to say that he knew then what he knows now. But the signs were there from the off.
Gaming was different back then, so no one could really have forseen both the change in direction it would take and the rapid change in technological development.
"Come and have a look at what you could have won."
Ok so this is a question to everyone who started with the now 'oldschool' MMORPGs like EQ and Ultima etc.etc, not WoW or Guild Wars, but just 1990-2003.
A lot of people really hate what the MMO market is now, but I was wondering if everyone who played the older MMOs actually felt exactly the same way when WoW and GW and all those types of games came out?
Did you all think 'WoW is way too casual, same with GW and EQ2' compared to EQ1 etc in 2004 and whenever GW came out?
Or do the oldschool and vanilla WoW, GW etc. players all agree that back in 2004 and downwards was collectively when MMOs were the best? Or do you think only EQ and Ultima Online were the best MMOs?
It's hard to explain but basically: was Everquest, DAoC and Ultima Online better than World of Warcraft (Vanilla) and Guild Wars (Vanilla) in your opinion, or do you think WoW and GW were the same games but just improved? Or did you think WoW and GW were in fact better than Everquest and Ultima even though you started with Eq and Ultima?
Hopefully you understand what I'm trying to ask.
If it was better if had no relation with the causual and hard core debate, it is just that the old school mmo were closer to the non computer rpg games, thats all.
That memory was still there, fresh, those games and the players too were more role play stuff than it is now, thats all.
After UO, EQ already killed the genre imo and put the Wow route in place. Themepark was just what it mean really, cheap product for a kiddy audiance that couldn't handle other peoples and didn't even want to try to police themselves. So ye mmo genre went into the arcade like game heads down, and turn their back to the MUDs and rpg for good.
Honestly it have nothing even remotely related to the cuasual vs hardcore debate, or the grind vs dumped down difficulty debate the Wow fan boys talk about. Nothing, it is just about role play.
OP you forgot to mention Asheron's Call in your listing of the earliest MMO's. Asheron's Call was my fisrt MMO love although I dabbled in Everquest, UO DAoC. AC had the best classeless, skill based character development system of all the early games. Why no one has really implemented a skill system like that in another game is beyond me, there was a lot of freedom in that character development system. There was a nice big sandboxy world to play in and the game avoided the traditional fantasy cliches of elves and dwarves. There was evren death penalty, I remember many adventures with friends just in corpse run and you fought your ass off to avoid dying deep down in some dungeon, kept you on your toes.
I enjoyed Asheron's Call so much that the sequel was a complete letdown for me.
I left EQ for WoW. It was supposed to be for EQ2 but after playing the two games at launch it ended up being WoW for me. Much to my surprise at the time. I was a rather huge EQ fanboy back in the day.
I got into WoW mainly because in comparison to EQ it was a lot easier to accomplish tasks such as regaining mana for my spellcaster, the way questing was handled made it seem like there was more to do and accomplish, soloability was more feasible, and I found the dungeons to be a lot of fun. It was definitely more casual, but after experiencing it at least how it was offered initially in that game I found that was what I wanted.
1. For god's sake mmo gamers, enough with the analogies. They're unnecessary and your comparisons are terrible, dissimilar, and illogical.
2. To posters feeling the need to state how f2p really isn't f2p: Players understand the concept. You aren't privy to some secret the rest are missing. You're embarrassing yourself.
3. Yes, Cpt. Obvious, we're not industry experts. Now run along and let the big people use the forums for their purpose.
WOW was the first MMORPG (after trying 8-10 pre-WOW MMORPGs) which didn't feel ultra-grindy and ultra-penalizing. (And even then, in early WOW I got to 56 and quit for a few months before resubbing and trying dungeons; I quit because it had got pretty grindy/bland for those last few levels.)
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
Nostalgia aside, I think all "old-school" gamers knew what was coming when they played WoW. It wasn't that it was astounding or groundbreaking, it was just more tangible. The things we thought of as "niche" or a "cumbersome fact/part of mmo's" were suddenly gone. The waits. Long times of Xp grinding for max level. Forced grouping. Lack of central forums. It's sad when I look back at all the hindrances on playing the game. When I played beta for WoW I loved the art choice as the simplistic design helped with lag. It was also pretty detailed. It was buggy, but much less than most of the early 1st gen games. In whole, I was certain it would be a natural evolution to the mmo genre. And it was. The problem was that it was so popular that it set conventions- conventions that still to this day ruin or hinder other games.
You see, with all the steps towards convenience that WoW took, it's a double-edged sword. Getting rid of the waits hurts the community to an extent as does having a central forum. Taking away forced grouping speeds up the process but it makes MMO’s solo friendly, which also hurts community and immersion. The quick and ease of xping means the company must put out pve content every few months to keep people playing after reaching max level. This makes gear the carrot to keep playing. The ease of the new UI/gameplay simplified everything which took the game out of RPG fans to players who still don’t know what RP means and even mock players for doing it. People who bring this “FPS” mentality to MMO’s are now common.
So yeah, the most important thing I took away from WoW was that this was the death of “old-school” mmo’s, not just in terms of mechanics, but people. But I was also realistic. There was no way the budget of WoW could be supported by just us old school gamers. There needed to be new blood, a new generation. I suppose we just had to sacrifice a bit of what made MMOs roleplaying games.
Virtual World is the key for me. The older games, regardless of problems, had more sense of a world. I remember my first time in EQ running into the 'encumberance problem' and having to ask for a buff so I can make it to the bank. Things like this added to the sense you were in a 'real' world and not just a game. But of course some folks felt that they shouldnt have to deal with 'real' world problems in a game and this is the direction the devs took (even within EQ) and the result was the 'minimization' of the world. Games now days are just that games, nothing more and generally uninspiring relative to the vision of a virtual world.
Mind you I dont mind that there are games out there like that, but for the the devs and a large part the player community to be so entrenched in a 'game' mindset that there is little to no development on virtual worlds is a real pretty sad in my book.
The biggest difference for today then way back when is that WoW put an MMO into different hands, WoW expolded the MMO player base beyond a niche market, into something that people knew about and could be marketed. There were still assholes in the older games but the Market was totally for the older crowd who could play at their job. Games were simply different. trust me, due to World of Warcraft the MMO market will forever be changed,
Who knows how many MMOs or players would be around If WoW didnt burst onto the scene, all I know is SWG might still be playable, Imperator for Mythic would still be in the building/testing process
When WoW was comming out it was a game with a WELL est IP and had a huge following based on the Warcraft Games, Thus the Non-MMO gamer was turned into a WoW-player over night
Ok so this is a question to everyone who started with the now 'oldschool' MMORPGs like EQ and Ultima etc.etc, not WoW or Guild Wars, but just 1990-2003.
A lot of people really hate what the MMO market is now, but I was wondering if everyone who played the older MMOs actually felt exactly the same way when WoW and GW and all those types of games came out?
Did you all think 'WoW is way too casual, same with GW and EQ2' compared to EQ1 etc in 2004 and whenever GW came out?
Or do the oldschool and vanilla WoW, GW etc. players all agree that back in 2004 and downwards was collectively when MMOs were the best? Or do you think only EQ and Ultima Online were the best MMOs?
It's hard to explain but basically: was Everquest, DAoC and Ultima Online better than World of Warcraft (Vanilla) and Guild Wars (Vanilla) in your opinion, or do you think WoW and GW were the same games but just improved? Or did you think WoW and GW were in fact better than Everquest and Ultima even though you started with Eq and Ultima?
Hopefully you understand what I'm trying to ask.
I started with Ultima Online @ launch.
Yes, I do think the older games were better in concept (sure, they had bugs, but they all do) than the ones that came post WoW. MMORPGs back then were more aimed at creating a world for players to live in for years as opposed to the focus nowdays of making a game that people spend hardly anytime in yet advance to the highest echelons of the game in a month or three only to be dropped for the next big thing.
I do acknowledge that there is an audience for the quick three month play type games, I feel that single player games fit that role perfectly. MMORPGs, as initially defined and built, were to be long term play in design and function. SOmwhere around 2004 the "short attention span, must beat this game before the next game comes out" mentality took over the majority of MMO companies.
As to whether I felt doom and gloom with the launch of those games in 2004, no I did not. I had no way of knowing at the time that every company that could afford to make an MMORPG well would switch to the aforementioned mentality when it came to game design. I figured at least one would carry one the "make a world" principles of their forefathers. Well, I was wrong.
"Many nights, my friend... Many nights I've put a blade to your throat while you were sleeping. Glad I never killed you, Steve. You're alright..."
Some people (not a lot) left everquest, but it wasn't noticable. Most of them came back later and were telling how ugly WoW is with it's cartoon graphics and stuff. Others were telling, how bad EQ2 is...
I quit EverQuest a year later, tried all the bigger mmorpgs, but hated all of them.
What i really miss in other mmorpgs, compared to EverQuest, is Realism, Aggressiveness and Liveliness of the world..
Playing today's mmorpgs is like watching an easy disney cartoon for family, with inevitable good ending.
As to whether I felt doom and gloom with the launch of those games in 2004, no I did not. I had no way of knowing at the time that every company that could afford to make an MMORPG well would switch to the aforementioned mentality when it came to game design. I figured at least one would carry one the "make a world" principles of their forefathers. Well, I was wrong.
I wouldn't say that. Vanguard was a true, worthy attempt, and felt more like a pure successor of the first MMO's than an EQ2 did.
Mortal Online, another spiritual successor, only it doesn't have the company and resources backing it that's required to make it truly shine, the same applies to Xsyon. Darkfall and Fallen Earth might be considered somewhere between the early MMO's and the WoW-styled ones.
To all of them applies that they just weren't that successful, but the principles and mechanics they all tried to implement were a clear continuation of those early MMORPG's.
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums: Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
I started with UO, but I was playing EQ with my raid guild at the time WoW launched.
The one thing that I really remember is that there was an expansion to EQ a few months before WoW came out, I want to say it was Gates of Discord or Omens of War. The level cap was increased by five, so I had spent my time in Plane of Fire, kiting the same type of mob for hours each day. Each kill gave about .4% of a level or so, maybe less. Each mob took about a minute to kill, sometimes longer if I messed up and agro'd something else. Added in with the downtime and it took something close to 12 hours of straight grinding to go up one level, and that only got worse with each additional level.
A lot of people have fond memories of these old games, but I distinctly remember wasting over a week of my life kiting the same damn mobs to level, and that was pretty much the fastest experience possible at the time.
So, long story short, WoW was a breath of fresh air. It still is, by comparison. WoW is no sandbox, but not everyone WANTS a sandbox. It does what it does very well, and I have no real hate towards the game. Now the community that it spawned, on the other hand...
For me personally, the answer is twofold. The old school MMOs were defined by two different concepts. First, the vastness of scope of what you can do and the harshness of gameplay. Both are two different features of the old MMOs, which usually are thought together (alas), but which are two different things IMVPO.
(1) THE HARSHNESS
Generally old school MMOs were VERY casual unfriendly, and I profoundly disliked the old MMOs for that. It's why I more or less avoided MMOs in those days. I mean, I tried them out because some friends played it, but it just wasn't my thing. Corpse runs, full loot, item decay, harsh penalities, long ways to walk to the fun, long time investment even to get the most simple things done... I hated that back then and I hate it now. THAT is what I DON'T want back.
(2) THE VASTNESS OF SCOPE
This is the other sphere which were the trademark of old school MMOs. Let's take Ultima Online as ideal example. The MMOs of the past had a WAY greated scope of things you could do. You could do so much more than just go and kill stuff. Yeah you could do that too, but quests to kill things were just one tiny part in the grand scheme of things! And I thought that future MMOs would build on this and make that better! But what instead happend with WOW and now Rift as a sort of apex (or rather all time low) of this development is a continual drop of complexity and scope. With each new MMO now you were able to do LESS than with the MMOs before, until now with Rift we have a MMO which has ONLY quests to kill stuff and NOTHING else. That is where IMVPO MMOs just went totally wrong.
Origin, the developer of Ultima and Ultima Online had the motto "We create worlds". And THAT is what old MMOs were. Worlds to live in. Now this once great vision has degenerated into some boring kill-stuff fast food games. I mean, can you imagine to play games like Rift or DCU for years?
I mean, what WOW did right was cutting some overly tedious conventions, like the hour long boss respawn or other merely tedious things which only a minority really ever enjoyed. But alas, they also cut away all the complexity and narrowed down MMO gameplay to questing. The vast possibilites of games like SWG were just forgotten. And only complex games create really good communities, because people who play for another world and a "second life" are a totally different sort of people than min-maxxers who only seek to get to max level ASAP. Such an environment of kill-quest focussed MMOs of course don't create communities anymore.
Unless MMOs really turn around sometime, MMORPGs are dead for me. And NO I don't think story are a replacement for a WORLD. Not in the long shot.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
I started with Neverwinter Nights, and went on to UO when it launched. I never played EQ, but i did DAoC and SWG.
When WoW first came out, I enjoyed it quite a bit. The levelling process it had was something i hadn't really done before (questing, and dungeons to that extent). When i made it to the level cap, and realized that to progress further I had had to run the same dungeons over and over in the hopes of a purple something droppping, well I wasn't too impressed. Raid scheldules, DKPs and all the things that go with raiding aren't why i play MMOS.
I did the PvP grind, and got to Knight-Lt. or some such, and two friends made Grand Marshall (not sure if i got titles right, but the the 3rd from the top, and 2 friends made top rank) but i was so burnt out on warsong gultch, I didn't last much longer.
So to answer your question, WoW was a good (great?) game, but not my style. I didn't "hate" it, and it certainly had its place in the market. The problem i have with todays games isn't WoW, its all the AAA games that come out with the same 5-10 man dungeons, progress your character with more purples, and/or the 3,4, or 5 capture the flag/node, kill the guy with "thing" instances for PvP.
Ok so this is a question to everyone who started with the now 'oldschool' MMORPGs like EQ and Ultima etc.etc, not WoW or Guild Wars, but just 1990-2003.
A lot of people really hate what the MMO market is now, but I was wondering if everyone who played the older MMOs actually felt exactly the same way when WoW and GW and all those types of games came out?
Did you all think 'WoW is way too casual, same with GW and EQ2' compared to EQ1 etc in 2004 and whenever GW came out?
Or do the oldschool and vanilla WoW, GW etc. players all agree that back in 2004 and downwards was collectively when MMOs were the best? Or do you think only EQ and Ultima Online were the best MMOs?
It's hard to explain but basically: was Everquest, DAoC and Ultima Online better than World of Warcraft (Vanilla) and Guild Wars (Vanilla) in your opinion, or do you think WoW and GW were the same games but just improved? Or did you think WoW and GW were in fact better than Everquest and Ultima even though you started with Eq and Ultima?
Hopefully you understand what I'm trying to ask.
Why is asherons call never included in these "old school" game lists? But yah, Asherons call was this shit. When WoW came out, I was pretty excited. It looked awesome. But after playing for a week or so I couldn't bring myself to log in and kill 10 boars. Collect 5 tails. Run to X town, report to Y person.
I love the idea of MMORPGS, but there hasn't been one to keep my attention or do something DIFFERENT in a long time. FFXI was pretty good for a while (mostly because the fishing in that game was awesome). Shadowbane had some of the funnest moments in any game I've played.
the lack of a real world is what I am personally hoping to find in Guild Wars 2 So many great moments just being in DAoC and taking horse paths and such Barrows was such an intence experience that I could dream of listening to the music. Ohh the sight of mass gravestones ahahahaha
I started with UO, but I was playing EQ with my raid guild at the time WoW launched.
The one thing that I really remember is that there was an expansion to EQ a few months before WoW came out, I want to say it was Gates of Discord or Omens of War. The level cap was increased by five, so I had spent my time in Plane of Fire, kiting the same type of mob for hours each day. Each kill gave about .4% of a level or so, maybe less. Each mob took about a minute to kill, sometimes longer if I messed up and agro'd something else. Added in with the downtime and it took something close to 12 hours of straight grinding to go up one level, and that only got worse with each additional level.
A lot of people have fond memories of these old games, but I distinctly remember wasting over a week of my life kiting the same damn mobs to level, and that was pretty much the fastest experience possible at the time.
So, long story short, WoW was a breath of fresh air. It still is, by comparison. WoW is no sandbox, but not everyone WANTS a sandbox. It does what it does very well, and I have no real hate towards the game. Now the community that it spawned, on the other hand...
So new MMOs are for people like you that didn't know what to do with the freedom of old MMOs.
While you were doing that exciting stuff, I travelled from Ferroth (ogre home land) to the other side of the continent, I forgot the name, it was an island, just to catch some special fish for a mail armor recipie. I had to cross Qeynos through the sewers, because being an evil race the city guards would have killed me. I spent 3 days lost in the sewers, trying to orient myself following a map on a website. I can't really describe the feeling when i swam underwater through a tunel to the other side of the city, to a new sea, and could go on with my adventure.
I have several of these memories, which are just unthinkable in any modern MMO.
Ok so this is a question to everyone who started with the now 'oldschool' MMORPGs like EQ and Ultima etc.etc, not WoW or Guild Wars, but just 1990-2003.
A lot of people really hate what the MMO market is now, but I was wondering if everyone who played the older MMOs actually felt exactly the same way when WoW and GW and all those types of games came out?
Did you all think 'WoW is way too casual, same with GW and EQ2' compared to EQ1 etc in 2004 and whenever GW came out?
Or do the oldschool and vanilla WoW, GW etc. players all agree that back in 2004 and downwards was collectively when MMOs were the best? Or do you think only EQ and Ultima Online were the best MMOs?
It's hard to explain but basically: was Everquest, DAoC and Ultima Online better than World of Warcraft (Vanilla) and Guild Wars (Vanilla) in your opinion, or do you think WoW and GW were the same games but just improved? Or did you think WoW and GW were in fact better than Everquest and Ultima even though you started with Eq and Ultima?
Hopefully you understand what I'm trying to ask.
I started with EQ1. Played from launch to Ykesha. To me, WoW was the logical endpoint of EQ-style game design. They took all the good things about EQ, wrapped them up in the Warcraft universe, tossed out all the tedious aspects of EQ in the process, and struck gold.
Blizzard also offered up a game with a hell of a lot more polish. That counts for a lot.
Honestly, I think WoW was a definite improvement over EQ1. I know that makes me a heretic among the rose-colored glasses wearing people around here who wax nostalgic about pre-PoP EQ and about how great it was to have time sinks and to have the game frustrate the player, but not all of us from back then agree. Anything that can help a game be a GAME and not a second job you have to grind through is a good thing. These worlds should be fun and engaging, not forcing a player to give up all pretense of a social life or a life outside of the game world. WoW did that in spades, at least for me. So did games like City of Heroes, LOTRO, and Guild Wars.
I prefer the newer games to the so-called "old school" ones. I have a life now. I don't want to spend all my time in a game world anymore. I don't give a damn about raids or about getting the top end gear and weapons. Just let me have fun when I play and put me in a game world that is engaging and interestng enough that I want to be there. That's all.
The biggest difference for today then way back when is that WoW put an MMO into different hands, WoW expolded the MMO player base beyond a niche market, into something that people knew about and could be marketed. There were still assholes in the older games but the Market was totally for the older crowd who could play at their job. Games were simply different. trust me, due to World of Warcraft the MMO market will forever be changed,
Who knows how many MMOs or players would be around If WoW didnt burst onto the scene, all I know is SWG might still be playable, Imperator for Mythic would still be in the building/testing process
When WoW was comming out it was a game with a WELL est IP and had a huge following based on the Warcraft Games, Thus the Non-MMO gamer was turned into a WoW-player over night
It's not as mystical as you portray it.
MMORPGs used to be very niche with niche-style rulesets that weren't appealing to a wide audience and offered a variety of ways for players to dislike and quit them.
So if they'd continued being made that way, they would simply have continued as a niche (and actually become more niche over time, as players tired of all the tedious mechanics involved.)
The IP with WOW was useful, but certainly not the only factor. If they'd released an MMORPG that didn't innovate enough, and didn't try to please players, they would've failed just as hard as the majority of companies of the last few years.
Although using "innovate" with Blizzard is always a little tricky. It's like they said, "Hey, look at the rusty spoon market! These guys are making a killing! We should sell spoons. Without rust!" It's not innovation (they're still making spoons), but it certainly advances the genre by leaps and bounds compared to what it was doing before Blizzard arrived (intentionally making games with terrible mechanics; much like rust on a spoon).
It's hard to describe this sort of genre-advancement (I still haven't found an MMORPG with controls/gameplay as smooth as WOW's) without the word 'innovation' ringing eerily true.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
I"ve only read the OP and my reply is in response to the OP only:
I started with EQ. EQ is my all time favorite PVE mmorpg. DAOC is my all time favorite PVP mmorpg. And even upon release, I knew that many of these newer games were just of a different breed, and that I wouldn't like them as much. Most of them I knew were garbage (WOW). Some of them I felt like might be good, but would just have a niche (Guild Wars).
The newer mmorpgs don't really feel like a natural progression from the older, higher quality ones (imo). Instead of progressing the quality of PVE in EQ to something better, and instead of progressing the quality of PVP in DAOC to something better, the industry started over completely with games focused on mass appeal and ways to make as much money as possible, without regard for the base of players who constituted the original mmorpg fanbase (eg me).
It's hard to explain but basically: was Everquest, DAoC and Ultima Online better than World of Warcraft (Vanilla) and Guild Wars (Vanilla) in your opinion, or do you think WoW and GW were the same games but just improved? Or did you think WoW and GW were in fact better than Everquest and Ultima even though you started with Eq and Ultima?
For me the answer is and was, yes the older games were better than for example wow vanilla.
Why didn't we play those then ? Well at some point you have outplayed a certain game. On top of that I think it is safe to say that already back then, our favorite games started turning towards the new trend. Despite what many seem to think, we are not stuck in the past, we want to move on.. just not backwards.
I never really could take wow seriously, because nothing had any consequence and beeing elite in that game meant nothing to me. Still played WoW for years on and off - After all there was/is some elements with great attraction.
As an eq lover, I had huge faith in Vanguard (the true eq2 as it was called), so seeing it fail was sad. Vg had all the "right" ideas seen from an old eq player perspective. Since then, to be a little harsh and provoking, all I see is bling bling with little soul .. blondes with huge b00bs and gansta rappers with no messages.
We have been looking for what we consider quality ever since, and not found much in the mmorpg genre for over 10 years.
ps. To bash myself a bit, I could also say that in eq I was able to be "better" than others, and I was also able to look up to those better than me. There was definately a hierachy, and when you do good in a hierachy you will like it, and when you don't you want something else. One of the issues I also have with new mmorpgs is that I cannot stand out - Those are perfect "worlds" where everyone is equal.. roleplaying or adventure does not create excitement when you can't be someone special. Roleplaying dies when you can't be different.. and I don't mean creating a unique character look only, I mean that you can one of those few players who can craft something, or one of the few with the key to the lower part of a dungeon. Maybe an exceptionally good puller, or maybe good at communication.. there was a role for everyone, and you were dependent on others and they were dependent on you.
I started out in UO, and as a result I've got a LOT of fond memories of my time in the game. I loved it (pre-Trammel), I thought the sense of adventure that the world had was raw and exciting. If I lost something, I had to keep my chin-up, go back out into the world and spend time and effort gathering all over again.
If I said it in a snarky way, I'd say that I grew-up. Truth is, that my life and my taste in games has changed. Back then I had more time, and I could afford to do all sorts of things. These days as a husband a father, a homeowner, my responsibilites have grown greater and greater and I cant invest the same amount of time. So while I look fondly back, I dont think that I'd enjoy that style of game anymore. It doesnt mean its bad, just means that I've changed.
I'm interested in the injection of story from some of the games on the horizon, because that melds one of my favorite non-MMO styles with my favorite type of game, the MMO. Over time, I've grown to enjoy and adapt to some of the "watered down" parts of the genre today, and I've definitely embraced a lot of what they have to offer.
I wont say the old way was best, those are very fond memories, but as I've changed, the way I play has changed the way I look at games.
Comments
OP I am not trying to be difficult here, but you need to think out your question a little more carefully next time, although it isnt hard to understand what your trying to ask, its all over the damn place.
to answer your question, nothing will compare to EQ/DAOC/UO.
extremely well written post! Trying to figure out how to give rep.. and i see you are a Dane, which explains the intelligence
I started with EQ back in 1999. Thought about Ultima back in 1998, but wasn't willing to pay a subscription for an isometric view game.
For the most part, I like the trend of the MMO genre in regards to casual game play and reducing time sinks and not requiring grouping. I don't like the trend toward twitch combat and excessive instancing.
I played EverQuest on and off for four years, it was very much a love / hate relationship for me. I played WoW pretty much straight up three years, with a couple of short return visits and it was mostly a loving relationship. WoW and City of Heroes are my two favorite games. My next potential favorite games will likely be Star Wars The Old Republic and Guild Wars 2, both of which will be casual oriented games and probably much more casual oriented end games than even WoW, thank goodness.
I find the majority of the current crop of games to be much more immersive and entertaining than EQ / DAoC / AO. While those games were okay for their time, I'd never have given them a second glance if they'd had WoW or City of Heroes as competition back in 1999.
Writing was on the wall with the inception of Trammel as far as I'm concerned. WoW and the like just pushed it all a step further.
Hindsight is a beautiful thing and it would take a brave man to say that he knew then what he knows now. But the signs were there from the off.
Gaming was different back then, so no one could really have forseen both the change in direction it would take and the rapid change in technological development.
"Come and have a look at what you could have won."
If it was better if had no relation with the causual and hard core debate, it is just that the old school mmo were closer to the non computer rpg games, thats all.
That memory was still there, fresh, those games and the players too were more role play stuff than it is now, thats all.
After UO, EQ already killed the genre imo and put the Wow route in place. Themepark was just what it mean really, cheap product for a kiddy audiance that couldn't handle other peoples and didn't even want to try to police themselves. So ye mmo genre went into the arcade like game heads down, and turn their back to the MUDs and rpg for good.
Honestly it have nothing even remotely related to the cuasual vs hardcore debate, or the grind vs dumped down difficulty debate the Wow fan boys talk about. Nothing, it is just about role play.
OP you forgot to mention Asheron's Call in your listing of the earliest MMO's. Asheron's Call was my fisrt MMO love although I dabbled in Everquest, UO DAoC. AC had the best classeless, skill based character development system of all the early games. Why no one has really implemented a skill system like that in another game is beyond me, there was a lot of freedom in that character development system. There was a nice big sandboxy world to play in and the game avoided the traditional fantasy cliches of elves and dwarves. There was evren death penalty, I remember many adventures with friends just in corpse run and you fought your ass off to avoid dying deep down in some dungeon, kept you on your toes.
I enjoyed Asheron's Call so much that the sequel was a complete letdown for me.
I left EQ for WoW. It was supposed to be for EQ2 but after playing the two games at launch it ended up being WoW for me. Much to my surprise at the time. I was a rather huge EQ fanboy back in the day.
I got into WoW mainly because in comparison to EQ it was a lot easier to accomplish tasks such as regaining mana for my spellcaster, the way questing was handled made it seem like there was more to do and accomplish, soloability was more feasible, and I found the dungeons to be a lot of fun. It was definitely more casual, but after experiencing it at least how it was offered initially in that game I found that was what I wanted.
1. For god's sake mmo gamers, enough with the analogies. They're unnecessary and your comparisons are terrible, dissimilar, and illogical.
2. To posters feeling the need to state how f2p really isn't f2p: Players understand the concept. You aren't privy to some secret the rest are missing. You're embarrassing yourself.
3. Yes, Cpt. Obvious, we're not industry experts. Now run along and let the big people use the forums for their purpose.
I started with AC and DAOC.
I felt they were both boring as hell.
WOW was the first MMORPG (after trying 8-10 pre-WOW MMORPGs) which didn't feel ultra-grindy and ultra-penalizing. (And even then, in early WOW I got to 56 and quit for a few months before resubbing and trying dungeons; I quit because it had got pretty grindy/bland for those last few levels.)
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
Nostalgia aside, I think all "old-school" gamers knew what was coming when they played WoW. It wasn't that it was astounding or groundbreaking, it was just more tangible. The things we thought of as "niche" or a "cumbersome fact/part of mmo's" were suddenly gone. The waits. Long times of Xp grinding for max level. Forced grouping. Lack of central forums. It's sad when I look back at all the hindrances on playing the game. When I played beta for WoW I loved the art choice as the simplistic design helped with lag. It was also pretty detailed. It was buggy, but much less than most of the early 1st gen games. In whole, I was certain it would be a natural evolution to the mmo genre. And it was. The problem was that it was so popular that it set conventions- conventions that still to this day ruin or hinder other games.
You see, with all the steps towards convenience that WoW took, it's a double-edged sword. Getting rid of the waits hurts the community to an extent as does having a central forum. Taking away forced grouping speeds up the process but it makes MMO’s solo friendly, which also hurts community and immersion. The quick and ease of xping means the company must put out pve content every few months to keep people playing after reaching max level. This makes gear the carrot to keep playing. The ease of the new UI/gameplay simplified everything which took the game out of RPG fans to players who still don’t know what RP means and even mock players for doing it. People who bring this “FPS” mentality to MMO’s are now common.
So yeah, the most important thing I took away from WoW was that this was the death of “old-school” mmo’s, not just in terms of mechanics, but people. But I was also realistic. There was no way the budget of WoW could be supported by just us old school gamers. There needed to be new blood, a new generation. I suppose we just had to sacrifice a bit of what made MMOs roleplaying games.
Virtual World is the key for me. The older games, regardless of problems, had more sense of a world. I remember my first time in EQ running into the 'encumberance problem' and having to ask for a buff so I can make it to the bank. Things like this added to the sense you were in a 'real' world and not just a game. But of course some folks felt that they shouldnt have to deal with 'real' world problems in a game and this is the direction the devs took (even within EQ) and the result was the 'minimization' of the world. Games now days are just that games, nothing more and generally uninspiring relative to the vision of a virtual world.
Mind you I dont mind that there are games out there like that, but for the the devs and a large part the player community to be so entrenched in a 'game' mindset that there is little to no development on virtual worlds is a real pretty sad in my book.
The biggest difference for today then way back when is that WoW put an MMO into different hands, WoW expolded the MMO player base beyond a niche market, into something that people knew about and could be marketed. There were still assholes in the older games but the Market was totally for the older crowd who could play at their job. Games were simply different. trust me, due to World of Warcraft the MMO market will forever be changed,
Who knows how many MMOs or players would be around If WoW didnt burst onto the scene, all I know is SWG might still be playable, Imperator for Mythic would still be in the building/testing process
When WoW was comming out it was a game with a WELL est IP and had a huge following based on the Warcraft Games, Thus the Non-MMO gamer was turned into a WoW-player over night
I started with Ultima Online @ launch.
Yes, I do think the older games were better in concept (sure, they had bugs, but they all do) than the ones that came post WoW. MMORPGs back then were more aimed at creating a world for players to live in for years as opposed to the focus nowdays of making a game that people spend hardly anytime in yet advance to the highest echelons of the game in a month or three only to be dropped for the next big thing.
I do acknowledge that there is an audience for the quick three month play type games, I feel that single player games fit that role perfectly. MMORPGs, as initially defined and built, were to be long term play in design and function. SOmwhere around 2004 the "short attention span, must beat this game before the next game comes out" mentality took over the majority of MMO companies.
As to whether I felt doom and gloom with the launch of those games in 2004, no I did not. I had no way of knowing at the time that every company that could afford to make an MMORPG well would switch to the aforementioned mentality when it came to game design. I figured at least one would carry one the "make a world" principles of their forefathers. Well, I was wrong.
"Many nights, my friend... Many nights I've put a blade to your throat while you were sleeping. Glad I never killed you, Steve. You're alright..."
Chavez y Chavez
was playing EverQuest, when WoW and EQ2 came out.
Some people (not a lot) left everquest, but it wasn't noticable. Most of them came back later and were telling how ugly WoW is with it's cartoon graphics and stuff. Others were telling, how bad EQ2 is...
I quit EverQuest a year later, tried all the bigger mmorpgs, but hated all of them.
What i really miss in other mmorpgs, compared to EverQuest, is Realism, Aggressiveness and Liveliness of the world..
Playing today's mmorpgs is like watching an easy disney cartoon for family, with inevitable good ending.
I wouldn't say that. Vanguard was a true, worthy attempt, and felt more like a pure successor of the first MMO's than an EQ2 did.
Mortal Online, another spiritual successor, only it doesn't have the company and resources backing it that's required to make it truly shine, the same applies to Xsyon. Darkfall and Fallen Earth might be considered somewhere between the early MMO's and the WoW-styled ones.
To all of them applies that they just weren't that successful, but the principles and mechanics they all tried to implement were a clear continuation of those early MMORPG's.
The ACTUAL size of MMORPG worlds: a comparison list between MMO's
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums:
Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
I started with UO, but I was playing EQ with my raid guild at the time WoW launched.
The one thing that I really remember is that there was an expansion to EQ a few months before WoW came out, I want to say it was Gates of Discord or Omens of War. The level cap was increased by five, so I had spent my time in Plane of Fire, kiting the same type of mob for hours each day. Each kill gave about .4% of a level or so, maybe less. Each mob took about a minute to kill, sometimes longer if I messed up and agro'd something else. Added in with the downtime and it took something close to 12 hours of straight grinding to go up one level, and that only got worse with each additional level.
A lot of people have fond memories of these old games, but I distinctly remember wasting over a week of my life kiting the same damn mobs to level, and that was pretty much the fastest experience possible at the time.
So, long story short, WoW was a breath of fresh air. It still is, by comparison. WoW is no sandbox, but not everyone WANTS a sandbox. It does what it does very well, and I have no real hate towards the game. Now the community that it spawned, on the other hand...
For me personally, the answer is twofold. The old school MMOs were defined by two different concepts. First, the vastness of scope of what you can do and the harshness of gameplay. Both are two different features of the old MMOs, which usually are thought together (alas), but which are two different things IMVPO.
(1) THE HARSHNESS
Generally old school MMOs were VERY casual unfriendly, and I profoundly disliked the old MMOs for that. It's why I more or less avoided MMOs in those days. I mean, I tried them out because some friends played it, but it just wasn't my thing. Corpse runs, full loot, item decay, harsh penalities, long ways to walk to the fun, long time investment even to get the most simple things done... I hated that back then and I hate it now. THAT is what I DON'T want back.
(2) THE VASTNESS OF SCOPE
This is the other sphere which were the trademark of old school MMOs. Let's take Ultima Online as ideal example. The MMOs of the past had a WAY greated scope of things you could do. You could do so much more than just go and kill stuff. Yeah you could do that too, but quests to kill things were just one tiny part in the grand scheme of things! And I thought that future MMOs would build on this and make that better! But what instead happend with WOW and now Rift as a sort of apex (or rather all time low) of this development is a continual drop of complexity and scope. With each new MMO now you were able to do LESS than with the MMOs before, until now with Rift we have a MMO which has ONLY quests to kill stuff and NOTHING else. That is where IMVPO MMOs just went totally wrong.
Origin, the developer of Ultima and Ultima Online had the motto "We create worlds". And THAT is what old MMOs were. Worlds to live in. Now this once great vision has degenerated into some boring kill-stuff fast food games. I mean, can you imagine to play games like Rift or DCU for years?
I mean, what WOW did right was cutting some overly tedious conventions, like the hour long boss respawn or other merely tedious things which only a minority really ever enjoyed. But alas, they also cut away all the complexity and narrowed down MMO gameplay to questing. The vast possibilites of games like SWG were just forgotten. And only complex games create really good communities, because people who play for another world and a "second life" are a totally different sort of people than min-maxxers who only seek to get to max level ASAP. Such an environment of kill-quest focussed MMOs of course don't create communities anymore.
Unless MMOs really turn around sometime, MMORPGs are dead for me. And NO I don't think story are a replacement for a WORLD. Not in the long shot.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
I started with Neverwinter Nights, and went on to UO when it launched. I never played EQ, but i did DAoC and SWG.
When WoW first came out, I enjoyed it quite a bit. The levelling process it had was something i hadn't really done before (questing, and dungeons to that extent). When i made it to the level cap, and realized that to progress further I had had to run the same dungeons over and over in the hopes of a purple something droppping, well I wasn't too impressed. Raid scheldules, DKPs and all the things that go with raiding aren't why i play MMOS.
I did the PvP grind, and got to Knight-Lt. or some such, and two friends made Grand Marshall (not sure if i got titles right, but the the 3rd from the top, and 2 friends made top rank) but i was so burnt out on warsong gultch, I didn't last much longer.
So to answer your question, WoW was a good (great?) game, but not my style. I didn't "hate" it, and it certainly had its place in the market. The problem i have with todays games isn't WoW, its all the AAA games that come out with the same 5-10 man dungeons, progress your character with more purples, and/or the 3,4, or 5 capture the flag/node, kill the guy with "thing" instances for PvP.
Its gotten tiresome.
Personal opinion only of course.
Why is asherons call never included in these "old school" game lists? But yah, Asherons call was this shit. When WoW came out, I was pretty excited. It looked awesome. But after playing for a week or so I couldn't bring myself to log in and kill 10 boars. Collect 5 tails. Run to X town, report to Y person.
I love the idea of MMORPGS, but there hasn't been one to keep my attention or do something DIFFERENT in a long time. FFXI was pretty good for a while (mostly because the fishing in that game was awesome). Shadowbane had some of the funnest moments in any game I've played.
Heres for waiting for a no-quest game!
the lack of a real world is what I am personally hoping to find in Guild Wars 2 So many great moments just being in DAoC and taking horse paths and such Barrows was such an intence experience that I could dream of listening to the music. Ohh the sight of mass gravestones ahahahaha
So new MMOs are for people like you that didn't know what to do with the freedom of old MMOs.
While you were doing that exciting stuff, I travelled from Ferroth (ogre home land) to the other side of the continent, I forgot the name, it was an island, just to catch some special fish for a mail armor recipie. I had to cross Qeynos through the sewers, because being an evil race the city guards would have killed me. I spent 3 days lost in the sewers, trying to orient myself following a map on a website. I can't really describe the feeling when i swam underwater through a tunel to the other side of the city, to a new sea, and could go on with my adventure.
I have several of these memories, which are just unthinkable in any modern MMO.
An honest review of SW:TOR 6/10 (Danny Wojcicki)
I started with EQ1. Played from launch to Ykesha. To me, WoW was the logical endpoint of EQ-style game design. They took all the good things about EQ, wrapped them up in the Warcraft universe, tossed out all the tedious aspects of EQ in the process, and struck gold.
Blizzard also offered up a game with a hell of a lot more polish. That counts for a lot.
Honestly, I think WoW was a definite improvement over EQ1. I know that makes me a heretic among the rose-colored glasses wearing people around here who wax nostalgic about pre-PoP EQ and about how great it was to have time sinks and to have the game frustrate the player, but not all of us from back then agree. Anything that can help a game be a GAME and not a second job you have to grind through is a good thing. These worlds should be fun and engaging, not forcing a player to give up all pretense of a social life or a life outside of the game world. WoW did that in spades, at least for me. So did games like City of Heroes, LOTRO, and Guild Wars.
I prefer the newer games to the so-called "old school" ones. I have a life now. I don't want to spend all my time in a game world anymore. I don't give a damn about raids or about getting the top end gear and weapons. Just let me have fun when I play and put me in a game world that is engaging and interestng enough that I want to be there. That's all.
Never played UO, so I can't help you there.
It's not as mystical as you portray it.
MMORPGs used to be very niche with niche-style rulesets that weren't appealing to a wide audience and offered a variety of ways for players to dislike and quit them.
So if they'd continued being made that way, they would simply have continued as a niche (and actually become more niche over time, as players tired of all the tedious mechanics involved.)
The IP with WOW was useful, but certainly not the only factor. If they'd released an MMORPG that didn't innovate enough, and didn't try to please players, they would've failed just as hard as the majority of companies of the last few years.
Although using "innovate" with Blizzard is always a little tricky. It's like they said, "Hey, look at the rusty spoon market! These guys are making a killing! We should sell spoons. Without rust!" It's not innovation (they're still making spoons), but it certainly advances the genre by leaps and bounds compared to what it was doing before Blizzard arrived (intentionally making games with terrible mechanics; much like rust on a spoon).
It's hard to describe this sort of genre-advancement (I still haven't found an MMORPG with controls/gameplay as smooth as WOW's) without the word 'innovation' ringing eerily true.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
I"ve only read the OP and my reply is in response to the OP only:
I started with EQ. EQ is my all time favorite PVE mmorpg. DAOC is my all time favorite PVP mmorpg. And even upon release, I knew that many of these newer games were just of a different breed, and that I wouldn't like them as much. Most of them I knew were garbage (WOW). Some of them I felt like might be good, but would just have a niche (Guild Wars).
The newer mmorpgs don't really feel like a natural progression from the older, higher quality ones (imo). Instead of progressing the quality of PVE in EQ to something better, and instead of progressing the quality of PVP in DAOC to something better, the industry started over completely with games focused on mass appeal and ways to make as much money as possible, without regard for the base of players who constituted the original mmorpg fanbase (eg me).
For me the answer is and was, yes the older games were better than for example wow vanilla.
Why didn't we play those then ? Well at some point you have outplayed a certain game. On top of that I think it is safe to say that already back then, our favorite games started turning towards the new trend. Despite what many seem to think, we are not stuck in the past, we want to move on.. just not backwards.
I never really could take wow seriously, because nothing had any consequence and beeing elite in that game meant nothing to me. Still played WoW for years on and off - After all there was/is some elements with great attraction.
As an eq lover, I had huge faith in Vanguard (the true eq2 as it was called), so seeing it fail was sad. Vg had all the "right" ideas seen from an old eq player perspective. Since then, to be a little harsh and provoking, all I see is bling bling with little soul .. blondes with huge b00bs and gansta rappers with no messages.
We have been looking for what we consider quality ever since, and not found much in the mmorpg genre for over 10 years.
ps. To bash myself a bit, I could also say that in eq I was able to be "better" than others, and I was also able to look up to those better than me. There was definately a hierachy, and when you do good in a hierachy you will like it, and when you don't you want something else. One of the issues I also have with new mmorpgs is that I cannot stand out - Those are perfect "worlds" where everyone is equal.. roleplaying or adventure does not create excitement when you can't be someone special. Roleplaying dies when you can't be different.. and I don't mean creating a unique character look only, I mean that you can one of those few players who can craft something, or one of the few with the key to the lower part of a dungeon. Maybe an exceptionally good puller, or maybe good at communication.. there was a role for everyone, and you were dependent on others and they were dependent on you.
"I am my connectome" https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HA7GwKXfJB0
I started out in UO, and as a result I've got a LOT of fond memories of my time in the game. I loved it (pre-Trammel), I thought the sense of adventure that the world had was raw and exciting. If I lost something, I had to keep my chin-up, go back out into the world and spend time and effort gathering all over again.
If I said it in a snarky way, I'd say that I grew-up. Truth is, that my life and my taste in games has changed. Back then I had more time, and I could afford to do all sorts of things. These days as a husband a father, a homeowner, my responsibilites have grown greater and greater and I cant invest the same amount of time. So while I look fondly back, I dont think that I'd enjoy that style of game anymore. It doesnt mean its bad, just means that I've changed.
I'm interested in the injection of story from some of the games on the horizon, because that melds one of my favorite non-MMO styles with my favorite type of game, the MMO. Over time, I've grown to enjoy and adapt to some of the "watered down" parts of the genre today, and I've definitely embraced a lot of what they have to offer.
I wont say the old way was best, those are very fond memories, but as I've changed, the way I play has changed the way I look at games.