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I haven't liked an MMO since 2005, and the most exciting thing in the genre is WoW Classic....
tixylix
Member UncommonPosts: 1,288
WoW came out in 2005, it was the last good MMO, everything else that came after it has sucked. There has been nothing good since in the genre, I've been disappointed by every launch since.... though FF14 was the last launch I remember, and it was so bad. Has there been anything in the past few years? Cause the genre has been pretty dead, we had a decade of crap WoW clones and that's it. I remember playing games like SWG, PS, EVE and EQ2 and saying "I cannot wait to see what we can do in 10 years time"... turns out nothing, the genre would die.... well unless you like crap Asian MMOs.
I just find it so weird, I've been holding out hope for 14 years, yet still I'm waiting. Luckily I loved Nostalrius, so I know I'll like WoW Classic (as long as Blizzard stay true to Classic) but it just sucks it has come to this. I wish I could be in awe of another MMO like when SWG was being shown off at E3 2002, just seeing the endless possibilities. Now when I see an MMO, it's either not an MMO and is like Destiny, but everyone is calling it an MMO, Or it's some Asian crap thing, or it's promising to be an MMO of old, but it looks so dated.
I want the evolution of the SWG/EQ2/WoW generation, but it just feels like the genre went backwards, and it's been in limbo ever since.
I just find it so weird, I've been holding out hope for 14 years, yet still I'm waiting. Luckily I loved Nostalrius, so I know I'll like WoW Classic (as long as Blizzard stay true to Classic) but it just sucks it has come to this. I wish I could be in awe of another MMO like when SWG was being shown off at E3 2002, just seeing the endless possibilities. Now when I see an MMO, it's either not an MMO and is like Destiny, but everyone is calling it an MMO, Or it's some Asian crap thing, or it's promising to be an MMO of old, but it looks so dated.
I want the evolution of the SWG/EQ2/WoW generation, but it just feels like the genre went backwards, and it's been in limbo ever since.
Comments
Also, why focus on launches? Why not focus on whether a game is good after they've had a time to clean up whatever messes there are at launch?
And if you haven't played any newer MMORPGs since the launch of FFXIV (which came in 2013), how do you know that there aren't any good ones?
Honestly, there is so much happening, and a huge amount of innovation, it's amazing.
If you are not seeing it, it might be because you are stuck in the past.
I am pretty sure there hasn't been any kind of advancement since WoW. Different stuff, sure, usually one step forward 2 steps back. Innovation means nothing in the game isn't good enough as a whole to go anywhere.
The problem is AAA companies can't figure out why their MMORPGs didn't kill WoW, and MMORPGs aren't something you can do as a small studio really. It's like trying got crowdfund a car. There is too much easier money to chase. Unfortunately, that's all they are doing mostly, chasing. With easier games there is so much more competition, so only a small number of games really make it, most by sheer luck.
Just to give you two easy examples.
Minecraft redefined what World Building could be. The idea of building worlds with Voxels (blocks), led to MMO's like Trove to advance on the idea, as well as games like Boundless, and now Camelot Unchained seems to be working to further the idea with their CUBE system. The whole idea of fully destructible worlds made of blocks was simple, elegant, and groundbreaking, on top of that, it was very, very, deliberate. And it had nothing to do with WoW.
Public Social Events, (Dynamic Events, World Bosses, Meta Events, and the like) which may have predated GW2, but GW2 made them a staple in their game, an idea where everyone contributes, everyone gets rewarded, and everyone gets to have some fun. This is an Innovative idea that breaks away from the dark ages of Kill Stealing and Ninja Looting from games of the past like WoW. This was done to combat the age old ideas of rare drops and elitism for massive events, in fact this was put in to be against what WoW was all about, and it was deliberate and successful, So much so, that this has become the norm for pretty much all games going forward.
I could get into Survival games, and a slew of other things.
But the reality is, the innovation is there, and it is continually moving games forward, with new and better ideas.
If you missed these things happening around you that was not because they didn't happen, but because you were not paying attention.
and no.. a game does not need to be a massive seller to put out a really amazing idea. That is often where true innovation is, where risks are taken and sometimes, a great idea is found in the ashes of a dead game, whereas WoW, just like it's clones, took no risks.
You can see my sci-fi/WW2 book recommendations.
Certainly not WoW. The graphics alone, yeesh. Sorry, but I want my characters to look good, otherwise: no dice.
But I'm still playing LOTRO, and like it more than a lot of the new stuff I try.
I always leave LOTRO after a while, but keep going back.
Gut Out!
What, me worry?
The true golden age of MMORPGs was very short, and none of them are playable any more. We have only text MUDs and Project 1999, which was the only, I repeat the only, MMORPG which tried to raise to their greatest height the limitations of a PvE only MMORPG. Final Fantasy XI, Lineage II, Dark Age of Camelot, Everquest II and World of Warcraft are all cut from the same cloth. The golden age? Sure, if you're content to be mocked as someone with bad taste. Final Fantasy XI and Lineage II are so bad I think it is completely impossible to do anything in them, advance at all, &c. without killing innocent animals. Role-playing that is not, and if you disagree you have no clue what you are speaking of. World of Warcraft, I think, is the same way, in any case it is not a role-playing game, as it is built around doing what NPCs tell you to in a rote structure. These are games for the masses, and not only are they shamefully immoral, but they deserve the appellations they have been assigned, from graphical IRC, to chat rooms with graphics, &c. They are entirely removed from the concept of role-playing. I have played on MUDs that make WoW look like a three-armed hunchback. Talk about social decline. Once people gathered to play cards and socialize, now they gather to do that, and you would not know a 50 year old there from a 20 year old. What a wretched lifestyle. I love role-playing games (and other kind of games) and that is precisely why I hate those, cause they are not role-playing games.
Now a quote of Mr Vault Dweller, from 2003:
"My gripe with MMORPG is that people are stupid, hence playing with people is stupid by definition."
I myself am not a misanthrope, but I do know enough to know that one bad apple can spoil the bunch. Together immortals that will ban players wisely, some standards of role-playing decorum, and games that do not force you to kiss up to random strangers (i.e. unlike Everquest, and doubly worse Project 1999) can be a boon in this regard. After several hours of discussion about genitals in OOC, toilet humour as to someone's role-playing name, and endless upon endless locusts trying to usurp me as group leader (I've actually seen people several times say to my group in EQ, "Come on join my group, I'll make a new one.", when they're not inviting people several levels too low for the group without my consent, or just generally stressing me out with constant trifles). This kind of impotent wrath on both sides (the player who has a chip on his shoulder, and the one whose evening is spoiled by trivial babbling and bickering) is largely why I do not consider Everquest the golden age of MMORPGs. They tried, but neither in role-playing nor out of character is there such a thing as a world where everybody gets along. Ultima Online, Meridian 59, Tibia, Lineage, these games had it right, Everquest did not. It is too much a perversion of natural law, shackling the good to the whims of the bad. I would not be surprised to know that most of the supporters of Everquest (what I now consider the first or second excessive MMORPG, along with Asheron's Call, though I've never played it) were people that had left Ultima Online.
Finally a quote from Mr Bartle.
"A virtual world can be fully functioning and free of bugs, but still be pretty well devoid of players. There are plenty of non-gameplay reasons why this could happen, but I'm going to focus on the most basic: lack of appeal. Some virtual worlds just aren't attractive to newbies. There are some wonderfully original, joyous virtual worlds out there. They're exquisitely balanced, rich in depth, abundant in breadth, alive with subtleties, and full of wise, interesting, fun people who engender an atmosphere of mystique and marvel without compare. Newbies would love these virtual worlds, but they're not going to play them.
Why not? Because they're all text. Newbies don't do text."
First line in my post was referring specifically to MMORPGs.
Minecraft is a great innovative game. But it's not even an MMO, never mind an MMORPG.
I don't think taking a hugely popular feature from one game and putting it into another is really that innovative either. My comment was that innovation means nothing unless the game as a whole to succeed. Most of the MMOs that have come out have been innovative. I think SWTOR was pretty innovative for an MMORPG, and it was Star Wars, but how is that doing? Not as awesome as a high budget Star Wars game should do. Call me when one of the games you mention actually succeed.
I'm not even sure where you get Public Social Events from. That implies something like the WoW Kirin Tor pub crawl, you mean Public Events. Sure they are great. But they didn't help Warhammer Online, one of the first to implement them IIRC. And they aren't even that innovative. It's like a world boss without it being one boss. More of a natural progression. About as innovative as 6-minute abs.
Can you can show me one game that has something majorly different, and also has all the same stuff wow has that is a released game? I'm talking major features.
I pay a lot of attention to what's going on in gaming, but I'm 90% an MMORPG guy, so there may have been a lot of OK stuff coming out. But mostly the overall product quality level is bad. I'm still hungry to game though, I'll try to put almost any old crap in my mouth now.
We do not have what I would expect from 15 years of product improvement in the MMORPGs on the market today. They could probably make WoW run on my phone, but all I can expect from my PC is better graphics it seems.
MMO's don't break the wheel they embrace it.
That's what we liked after all. We all wanted carbon copies of our favorite mmo and we got them. Reskinned same games over and over again.
Then when folks realized mmo pvp could be replaced by moba's? OH snap! Turns out more people were into pvp that thought because after moba's holy shit did this genre die like faster than the ad revenue this site used to get.
(It's cool BR games destroyed mobas)
So when like the vast majority of the type of players who play these games move on what happens to the game? It straight dies and we go looking for the same game.
It's the cycle here in text.
It's the cycle here in site by the fact literally not one person here has ever found a game they struck with.
I think the problem is US. We suck as gamers. We are literal assholes.
An example:
ESO has so much to offer people have wished for in the early days.
You can steal from or kill NPCs, there is a persuade skill, every quest is dubbed. There are decisions to make at quests, you can mix every armor with its own pros/cons, housing, RvR, ...
Besides some flaws (multi server tech, skill weaving) it offers so much.
Biggest problem: People !
The people playing those games totally different nowadays.
Its "gogogo fast fast fast"
There is no doing the dungeon together, talking, maybe staying in group afterwards do some stuff together.
You run through the dungeon as fast as possible then abandon directly and queue for the next one. Mostly without even saying hello or bye.
There are open world group dungeons, but people don't group there, or even talk. You run through it with others but its just running besides without being in a group.
Sadly the mega server tech supports this.
There are to many people so everyone is anonymous.
Pairing this with fast travel and quicker sessions for quests and it destroys everything that made MMOs interesting in the past.
Back in the old days you knew some people because they were often around. You talked to people, you had the same goals.
Nowadays its more a side by side than a together.
1997 Meridian 59 'til 2019 ESO
Waiting for Camelot Unchained & Pantheon
What is going on here, is that players are trying to shoehorn a game, IE: Hack-n-Slash Games, or Murder Hobo games, as opposed to the umbrella of just Massive Multiplayer Games.
But even with that, I did mention Trove, Boundless, and Camelot Unchained have adopted the voxel nature of Minecraft, and make no mistake, Trove is an MMORPGs in every sense a game could be one. It also took what Minecraft had and expanded upon it. I encourage you to check it out and see what I am talking about.
In fact the Voxel nature of building in Trove has allowed for player made Dungeons, Weapons, Helms, and a slew of other things.
Not only that, you name it, Trove has it. You want open world dragons, Trove has them, you want dragon mounts, again, Trove has them, you want levels, abilities, classes, dungeons, cosmetic weapons and armor, you want a Raid, or some quibbly little pet.... Trove has that.. and MORE.
You want to be able to gimp yoru character, or max them out, enhancement slots? Weapon Upgrades? Cool Fire Effects on your Gear, or maybe you want to glide on wings.. Trove has that as well.
Want a PvP match, or maybe a Battle Royal? Trove has it.
Want Seasonal Events, Game Upgrades? along with a game that gives you a fully destructible playground to screw around in? Trove has that waiting for you.
Want your own public house that you can take with you, and drop on random plots in the game world to get access to and show off all your cool stuff?... or maybe your own private world instance because you enjoy going MASSIVE Scale... ? Trove has that for you as well.
In fact, if you thought WoW had it all.. and can get past the Voxel Graphics.. Give Trove a Try.
I haven't played Boundless, but it looks similar, so might want to check that out as well.
There is a lot going on in MMO's..
Still, I'm talking about MMORPGs, and I believe the OP was as well.
I've tried Trove. What site do you think you are on? :P It didn't make much of an impression on me. I recall it having lots of stuff, but all very basic. Still for me one step forward 2 steps back. Visually yards back. Games like Portal Knights and Skysaga did the voxel thing better I believe. But Portal Knights isn't an MMORPG, and Skysaga is gone. Planet explorers did voxels without the cubes, but a very low-quality game. Camelot Unchained isn't released or even close yet. Boundless doesn't have a lot of the typical RPG elements as far as I know.
I don't think we are talking about the same thing here. I'm talking about MMORPGS, only MMORPGs. And about games that have made the game better since wow. Which is what the OP was talking about as far as I can tell. I didn't say there is no innovation in gaming. I said it's pointless if the game as a whole doesn't succeed. And that most games are adding some features but losing others.
You seem to be talking about a neat thing in some other type of game, that may or may not be released.
I don't know about you, but I expect my products to be better over time. When my phone screen got larger it didn't lose the camera or have lower colour depth. I know a lot of people see MMORPGs with active players and think that means they are a great game those people love playing. From what I have seen people are largely dissatisfied with MMORPGs and are playing the game that is the best for them out of the available selection. I know I'm in that boat. With the available technology, I expect a lot more from MMORPGs.