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The problem with current MMO offerings as I see it
Deathstrike2
Member UncommonPosts: 1,777
I can play and have a lot of fun, and then quit playing for weeks, and not miss them at all. Years ago when I played Asheron's Call and later City of Heroes, I used to get lost for hours in the game worlds. There was something about those games that made me want to log in and play. Games like Neverwinter and GW2 are fun to play, but after the gaming session is over, I couldn't care less if I log back in tomorrow or next month or ever.
Of course, I have considered that the problem may be with me, and not the current MMOs, but who knows? All I know is that I'm constantly looking to the horizon for a great MMO, and all I've seen in the last few years are okay to decent MMOs. It's funny, but the industry has almost completely cured my old MMO addiction by churning out sub par games for years.
Comments
By far the most common complaint about CoH was that it was far too repetitive. Most IMO did not play it long term, but rather a few weeks, maybe 2 months every once maybe twice a year, after the initial 3-6 months anyway.
Games have changed and are now providing short term sessions and long term sessions but you have also changed. You are not the same person you were 10 years ago. You have done more, experienced more and know more. A game that was designed the same as they 10 years ago, I expect would not engage you long term either. Why? Because you have allready figured them out.
A good MMO should produce infinite gaming, so perhaps what needs to be looked at is how the game you most appreciated can recapture your interest, not how something new can conform to the old.
Before you criticize someone, walk a mile in their shoes.
That way, if they get angry, they'll be a mile away... and barefoot.
For me the difference is people. In my guild (years ago) I was always helping someone, or being helped. We ran dungeons regularly (the only reliable way to group at the time). We farmed and crafted together. I had RL friends in the guild, and some decent acquaintances with others.
Without people, there is nobody that's going to even notice (let alone care) if you do or don't show up in a game.
The problem is that, in many cases, those older MMOs are either in maintenance mode with no future, dead or nearly so, or have been altered so significantly over the years that they're barely recognizable.
are u saying I might be getting too old for games cuz. I feel like I don't enjoy them as much but i haven't found I game that interests my anymore. is it b/c games that coming out suck or they just not my style
im really hoping wildstar or elder scrolls can turn this around for me if not
I think my pc gaming days are coming to an end
I still believe we are trying to capture that "youthful enthusiasm" as jaded adults. It just is not going to happen, lol. Im playing GW2 and most recently spending lots of time in Neverwinter. Im having fun but don't know how long I will be around. Im not totally convinced it was all better in the "good old days". After all, the "good old days" are here for the next generation of gamers. In about 20 years or so they will be posting on boards about how it was better back when GW2 and Neverwinter was around and this generation of gamers are doing it wrong. Now let me get back to my rocking chair.
Heroin addicts and opium addicts call it "Chasing the Dragon".
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=chasing the dragon
Basically he is searching for that feeling he had the first time he played his first MMO.
The same as when someone shoots heroin. They are constantly trying to get the high they got the first time they shot up, but can never actually achieve it.
OP you need to try Age of Wushu. It really is the best thing to come along since EQ1 in spite of all the unsubstantiated rumors afloat. You can play that stuff for free and feel better than you feel in 98% of anything out there on the market. I kid you not, you will be quite literally lost from the moment you step into the game and at this time a month from now, even with the internet at your disposal, you will still be quite literally lost, but you will still feel compelled to log in every day and try to keep whatever you've got going on going.
It is the sickness just like you like it. Just like you had it the very first time.
It is beast.
And you know it's beast because anyone with a post count above 1000 on this website doesn't have one good thing to say about it.
I've been here a long time dude. I know what that means.
http://thewordiz.wordpress.com/
Hmm. I remember 10 years ago, when I was younger, games may not have been graphically impressive compared to today, yet I was so immersed in them because my imagination worked way better than it does today. A child-like imagination probably plays a role in the "awesome feeling" that RPGs can bring. Also having "adult" things in the real world doesn't help immersion either.
I've been solo'ing for awhile now but it's simply self defense for my sensitive being. Maybe I'm just not good at relationships :P
I don't know, like people are cool, funny and everything, but I'd rather meet one amazing person with whom to share life with than have like, a hundred people that I don't really know, and therefore could potentially open myself up to be hurt.
Are the quality of games decreasing? Maybe not the quality but the execution, I think we're lucky to have so many games to choose from these days. Actually if we count all the games made in the last 20 years that are still fun... I think we'd find a lot to put on a list.
MMO hoping doesn't help either. No loyalty to games. Free to play games for me, hinder my immersion a little bit. So all in all, it may be a mixture of the players and the game. I find that if I'm not serene and calm entering a game, I can't really enjoy myself. Plus the whole "real life" thing. That tends to try to get in the way of fantasy and imagination sometimes.
Yeah, I really don't like the money factor. As a child when I went out to play I wasn't thinking about money. Since the whole nerd/gaming thing became pseudo-popular, some saw it as a chance to make money. Now it seems that subscription games are a thing of the past because cash shops make more money and that kinda sucks.
Anyways, long rant aside, my vote goes to "childlike imagination" being the key factor.
I was in the best guild of my life in GW2. Even that couldn't save the game from it's huge lack of end game content. Stopped playing after 2 months.
Imo it's all about how much there is to do and how fun it is to do it. Is there a carrot in the end? Do you get an epic feeling when doing something? and can you do it with your friends?
The worst problem with MMOs these days is that they are all starting out the same way. You start in an area and see a guy with an exclamation mark over his head and you think "Oh great, now I gotta kill 10 bandits or 8 Zombies again." Same shit, different game. That's a huge let down for a lot of players. You have to get through 60+ levels of shitty gameplay of "kill 8 skeletons", "collect 6 grasshoppers", "escort the slowest moving NPC in the world half across the world map" all of which you have done so many times before.. Untill you finally hit max level.
Then, and only then, can you start out the true game. I think that it's very demoralizing to have to level for a month each time before I can actually try out what the game is all about. That is the true downfall of MMORPGs these days.
Can't we just get an MMO that starts out with 20 quick levels of gameplay, then it's and pure dungeons, raids and gear grind with huge progression? That way there's no reason for the devs to create a bunch of worthless low level areas that are gonna be dry empty after a month anyway.
I think you and Phry hit on one of the biggest factors.
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein
"Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
Yes it is partially because we are getting older and genre is getting very stale. I fully recognise that nothing will compete with my first weeks logging in to EQ1 in the Spring/Summer of 1999 and being totally overawed by the scale and depth. I know what MMOs are now, and how they work, and these things just aren't amazing anymore. They're routine.
But, it is also true that the MMO market has changed. It is bloated and in many ways decaying. Instead of developers spending serious money on a massive, deep and engaging game they would rather put out something that is a few weeks and months of fun, and then ultimately sustained by a much smaller more committed contingent. This is the problem of competing for market share in a huge and widespread market.
People have foolishly tried to make something that would compete with WoW for market share and failed, because they failed to see that WoW is a phenomenon that is unrepeatable. Just look at SWTOR - not a failure entirely, but I'm sure the profit projections had to be seriously downsized. I think this makes more developers conscious not to try the same route and fail, but instead to make a light, fun and not too challenging game that people play for a short while, or hop in and out of alongside playing other games.
The days of the longterm all-consuming MMO are over.
Likely it is not the games, but you. It is easy blame someone or something else and most people do just that.
People change. The novelty is gone. Things we accepted and enjoyed 10 years ago do not feel the same today. More people need to realize this.
Only way is forward.
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been -Wayne Gretzky
Pretty sure that's what it comes down to, especially for those of us who have spent a lot of hours in them.
I don't play anymore without seeing the various hoops the developers designed for us to jump through, be they hoops that steer me to new areas of the game, hoops that encourage longer playtime, hoops that nudge me toward the cash shop (including GW2's gold exchange), or hoops that try to force me to be more social than I want to be.
It wouldn't matter if I didn't object to any of those types of hoops, I still see them, and that's immersion breaking.
I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy, accompanied by an educational system which would be oriented toward social goals.
~Albert Einstein
I don't agree, I think that mmos have become more lobby/co-op games with shallow systems in them lately. I have really enjoyed playing mmos close to 10 years after playing my first mmo that I loved. I often hear, you are chasing that feeling etc....But If that was the case, how would it be a whole 10 years and a handful of mmos later I have a good listing of mmos that I have loved...
I am not playing any atm, due to the design of most of the mmos of the last 6-8 years becoming more shallow/railed.
Only way is forward? I hope that doesn't mean that mmos are going to be even more lobby/co-op/railed/shallow than they are now generally. I am hoping that the new focus on delivering more sandbox sticks.
Too solo orientated
And especially too easy
(there's the odd exception though like dfuw, ps2, aow)
I do have some sympathy with this. While I freely admit I see the nuts and bolts more than the Ferrari these days and that turns me off games quite quickly, the games themselves have also dumbed down massively.
I know I'm old school, but I sometimes think back to my days of pen & paper D&D. The long and detailed campaigns I wrote, with fleshed out countries, politics and personalities lasted my players for months. Whereas specific modules were a couple of weeks of play at best. I think MMO developers today have forgotten their roots and instead give us the equivalent of D&D modules with a short burn, rather than an environment in which to make our own stories and adventures.
I play mmo(sandbox mainly)when bored or frustrated i play sologames or games with friend like DayZ.
Games i play most are those that have huge risk and exploration or many secrets to find.
DayZ huge risk dangerous enviroment but alot of exploring its a real pure game in a realistic settings awesome.
Darkfall which i quit 2 years ago had same kind world one open world to explore huge risk and exploring.
Skyrim huge open world alot exploring and secrets to be found(love dungeons the most)
I play also sometimes Crysis3-deus ex3-dishornred or older games like stalker or bioshock and Dragon age:O again.
This way keep me intrested in games.
Got 2 highend gaming rigs and laptop with 25 games installed all DRM free.
Waiting for The Witcher 3 and DayZ standalone.
Mmo in future must be open world sandbox with free for all i hope DayZ will be enough with higher pop then 50.
Maybe you just have a more healthy approach to MMOs now that you have gotten older
Instanced - great ... let's get rid of the open world.
Solo friendly - great ... but keep it as an option.
Too easy .. that may be a problem. All MMOs should have difficulty settings like Diablo 3, so everyone can find the right level of challenge.
how can you have difficulty settings in a mmo? If you set it hard and I set it easy, how hard are the mobs when we both come across the same pack of them?
Only way they could do that is if everyone had their own phase, and then it wouldnt be a mmo, it would be a single player game with a chat box.
D3 is a bad example anyway, D3 has the same problem as MMOs, it forces you to play through it once on hand held noob mode before you can turn up the difficulty,