SWTOR as a game wasn't necessarily crap, but as an MMORPG, it was
Lucky that people playing MMORPGs are left out so everyone can just enjoy the game...
Which people? The million and a half who quit SWTOR within the couple months? It's a pretty common sentiment that SWTOR wasn't a true MMORPG, but a solo game with online features.
I think we are getting into semantics over what's fun. I'm not going to argue what you say here. You aren't wrong. But it's not exactly what I was trying to say either. It's fine. I think I am more in line with you than you think We just happen to be looking at it from a different perspective.
Getting on to the grind. Don't get me wrong. I am not saying I want the grind. I am saying it's a necessary evil for a game's longevity with the individual player. (I don't care about games with high revolving door populations) GW2 is now realizing this. They've been getting killed over their one biggest grind. The Legendary. In the guild I was in, I can name 5 core members who were online every single day grinding meta events and CoF-1 (All are grinds in their own rights) to get their Legendary. Well, they got theirs. Now they don't play. So, look what Anet did. They have decided to add a new grind. They are moving the crafting limit cap to 500. That's approximately 800 skill points in crafting they have added, And the top 100pts are the hardest. So yeah, grinding is necessary. But the problem is. Will the reason to do it be a big enough motivator? Currently crafting in GW2 sucks. The system is great, but the reason to do it is lacking. If you need something, you don't craft it yourself, you just go to the TP and buy it. So much easier and cheaper.
I definitely agree that grinding is a necessary evil. I think however that some of the streamlining that people get mad over is a bit unjustified. People got mad over LFD when in reality, spending 20-30 minutes to get to a dungeon doesn't really add much depth, if any.
I think the point I was trying to get across is that, maybe the problem with GW2 wasn't the lack of grind, but the fact that the gameplay that it offered just wasn't good for you. If a game's only saving grace of keeping you is that it gives you some tedium that takes you 100 days, then we already know that the game is going to die, because then you're just counting down to when that tedium actually ends. I honestly feel that MMORPG's would be better served if they put less of an emphasis on grinding and more of an emphasis on game play such as dynamic fights, interesting and well balanced skills, different ways to play the game, multiple levels of customization etc.
Btw, I'm very sorry if I was coming off as incredibly hostile.
I think we are getting into semantics over what's fun. I'm not going to argue what you say here. You aren't wrong. But it's not exactly what I was trying to say either. It's fine. I think I am more in line with you than you think We just happen to be looking at it from a different perspective.
Getting on to the grind. Don't get me wrong. I am not saying I want the grind. I am saying it's a necessary evil for a game's longevity with the individual player. (I don't care about games with high revolving door populations) GW2 is now realizing this. They've been getting killed over their one biggest grind. The Legendary. In the guild I was in, I can name 5 core members who were online every single day grinding meta events and CoF-1 (All are grinds in their own rights) to get their Legendary. Well, they got theirs. Now they don't play. So, look what Anet did. They have decided to add a new grind. They are moving the crafting limit cap to 500. That's approximately 800 skill points in crafting they have added, And the top 100pts are the hardest. So yeah, grinding is necessary. But the problem is. Will the reason to do it be a big enough motivator? Currently crafting in GW2 sucks. The system is great, but the reason to do it is lacking. If you need something, you don't craft it yourself, you just go to the TP and buy it. So much easier and cheaper.
The next 100 won't be that hard. You'll be able to get a lot of them like in each new tier, getting credit for creating ori bars and the like. Plus they're supposed to be adding a lot of new recipes as well. I expect it won't be as fast as earlier levels, but I doubt it'll be a grind in the grindy sense of the word.
I think we are getting into semantics over what's fun. I'm not going to argue what you say here. You aren't wrong. But it's not exactly what I was trying to say either. It's fine. I think I am more in line with you than you think We just happen to be looking at it from a different perspective.
Getting on to the grind. Don't get me wrong. I am not saying I want the grind. I am saying it's a necessary evil for a game's longevity with the individual player. (I don't care about games with high revolving door populations) GW2 is now realizing this. They've been getting killed over their one biggest grind. The Legendary. In the guild I was in, I can name 5 core members who were online every single day grinding meta events and CoF-1 (All are grinds in their own rights) to get their Legendary. Well, they got theirs. Now they don't play. So, look what Anet did. They have decided to add a new grind. They are moving the crafting limit cap to 500. That's approximately 800 skill points in crafting they have added, And the top 100pts are the hardest. So yeah, grinding is necessary. But the problem is. Will the reason to do it be a big enough motivator? Currently crafting in GW2 sucks. The system is great, but the reason to do it is lacking. If you need something, you don't craft it yourself, you just go to the TP and buy it. So much easier and cheaper.
The next 100 won't be that hard. You'll be able to get a lot of them like in each new tier, getting credit for creating ori bars and the like. Plus they're supposed to be adding a lot of new recipes as well. I expect it won't be as fast as earlier levels, but I doubt it'll be a grind in the grindy sense of the word.
If I continue with GW2, and I imagine I will at some point. I won't be able to sleep at night knowing I have Master Craftsman title and don't have any crafting capped anymore. I'll be compelled to cap them............ALL!
The idea that a game cannot be all about fun is one that you share by yourself and a very small minority of the general gaming public. Most people think the idea that a game that has sections that are intentionally unfun or work to be bad design. Thats why most game developers don't add things to intentionally annoy the hell out of you, and they go out of their way to reduce the amount of things that can legitimately piss you off because of stupid design.
Except that if you're always "having fun" that almost always means no real challenge and no sense of having accomplished something worthwhile. Aspects of the game that is frustrating, but have solutions, are necessary if you actually want people to really create the kind of memories that lead to long term attachment. The goal should not be to remove those sections that are "unfun" but rather to emphasize their purpose and what is gained by having them rather than focusing on minutia of that specific activity.
People do get fun out of challenge. I never said remove challenge. I said don't add things that are intentionally unfun, and remove things that are unfun due to bad design. There's nothing challenging about grinding levels or waiting around for a pop or setting up a group to level or spending 20 minutes to travel. That shits easy. It's just incredibly tedious and quite dull.
Besides that, even IF people had 100% ALL fun with no challenge, are you really trying to say that a game that is 100% fun from start to finish is worse than a game that is 50% fun from start to finish? I can't even understand that logic.
I have a couple issues with making something entirely dependent on "fun." First, it's extremely subjective and nearly impossible to quantify. Second, pretty much every successful long term hobby or sport focuses on long term enjoyment rather than immediate gratification. That second part is critical to MMOs as they were originally designed to be long term endeavors, not short term experiences like most games. While the development of the idea that immediate gratification, short term MMOs is not bad in and of itself, the loss of dev support for the original concept of longer term MMMOs that have significantly more challenge and smaller player base is very disappointing to me. The whole idea of MMOs originally was that they weren't like other games, and brought something to the table that most games could not and would not. An emphasis on long term development that didn't focus on being "fun" and "entertaining" was a big part of that. That doesn't mean that those elements can be ignored, and bad design is still something to be alert to, but to emphasize them as if MMOs were just like every other game out there misses the point of MMOs in the first place. They need to be there to some degree to be certain but how and when they are applied needs to be conform to the challenges and opportunities presented by this particular game model, not to the expectations established by other game genres. "Fun" in this genre needs to be something that devs need to let players find and define on their own within the rules and world provided by the devs, not something simply handed to the players because the players are too lazy to find it themselves; there are more than enough games that do the latter already. If the players don't like this fact, they can go play the games that already cater to them; trying to force their style of gaming on a genre of games that set out to be different precisely so that it could provide an alternate experience is a waste of time for everybody.
On a note more related to the OP, both players and devs really, really, really need to stop using WOW as an example for anything; its a great game in its own way, but almost all comparisons completely ignore the few factors that truly made WOW successful, and all comparisons run into the problem that WOW has proven itself to be an anomaly that no one has ever truly explained the success of. The one comparison that truly needs to die is the number of reasonably expected players. Looking at games like EQ or UO at their height, or games like EVE now gives far more sustainable and realistic numbers. Trying to appeal to everybody usually means that games fail to achieve even those comparatively modest numbers, whereas devs like CCP who focus in on a concept and try to perfect it like CCP has with EVE find that they can achieve a sustainable and slowly growing player base. While it may disappoint many who want to see MMOs as something more than niche, realistic expectations are that it really is a niche market, and will always be so, aside from the occasional anomaly like WOW or hybrids that cross genre boundaries with mixed success.
Yes. That's not to say that innovation within the game's content is bad, or somehow retards the ability of the genere to grow.
I just think that the focus on where the innovation comes from has been misplaced. Older MMORPGs (sandbox types) put the burdon of innovation in the hands of the players. The developers put tools or systems in the game that allow the players to take hold and create their own dynamic content. If a developer puts a wall up in the game, the players...left to their own devices....will find a way to get over it. It's in those moments that I've seen really incredible things acomplished by the playerbase.
Modern MMORPGs put the burdon of innovation on the developers. It's the developers responsiblity to create new kinds of boss encounters, skill trees, under water environments, modes of transportation, economic systems, etc. in order to differeentiate themselves from the rest of the saturated market.
The OP referenced many of the issues related to this....but ultimately it almost always ends up in a situation where the novelty wears off on the new twist on things they've been doing for ages....and are back to square one. All that development cost, labor, etc. for things like Rifts, Wings, Directional Combat, Real Money Auction Houses, or multiple skill trees to fade away as soon as it's evident that you're running the same dang kill 10 boars quests you were running 10 years ago.
The issue, however, is scale of markets. MOST gamers are casual in nature, and don't have a lot of time (or want) to do the heavy lifting when it comes to experiencing content. They'd rather an NPC give them an explicit goal, mark the location on their map, and rince & repeat for 30 or so minuets instead of having to sit around and come up with the content on their own.
Considering these games come with a pretty heafty price tag (see need to innovate by developers & publishers), they have to appeal to the largest audience possible (see WOW). You can't recoup the money invested if your game is only palatable by a niche audience (as old sandbox MMORPGs were).
If your game does absolutely nothing different, then why play it when people are already invested in the game that you're cloning?
There is so much you can do with MMOs, cloning is just sad to see. Besides, usually they all clone the same thing (W0W) and we're sick of WoW. I was sick of WoW when it launched because it was just EQ but worse. If they cloned a good nuanced game, like UO, that'd be more bearable.
It's stupidity to clone WoW, and themeparks in general.
In other words, only clone the games he likes.... It's an act of stupidity to not cater to him...
What a pillock.
Cloning UO, a game which no longer exists, and which many people are unfamiliar with, would seem a whole lot fresher than copying the biggest game in the entire genre, which most people are either playing, or don't want to play, right?
Common sense is lost on some of you.
I agree someone should look farther back into the history of the genre to find the magic ingredients that made those games special.
That's where my agreement with you stops,, as most fail at copying what makes for a good themepark. Instead they infuse the typical themepark design with gimmicks like story or dynamic content, thinking that will be good enough. Which it isn't. It's a short sighted philosophy that doesn't strike at the core of what makes a good MMO (community).
M59 was a themepark, Eq was a themepark, DAOC was a themepark, yet they captured something that hasn't been reproduced since really.
They were not themeparks in the modern sense, by any means. They didn't have rails or safety nets, two big things that destinguish a themepark. Themeparks are about lack of freedom and (nowadays) lack of social interaction. Not so with those games.
Rift, by most people's standards, was a fine themepark, as was SWTOR, yet they both failed. Why? Because the themepark model (or if we call it what it is, the WoW clone model) doesn't work. WoW, rereleased today wouldn't event work, because the design isn't what made WoW stick around. The brand name recognition and marketing did.
Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong.
First of all, Rift and SWTOR are not failures. A change in business plan does not equate to failure. SWTOR right now today is probably the best Themepark experience you're going to get. The only bad decision EA made was to not release with its current business plan from day 1. The issue with subscription models is that people no longer want to play Themeparks with a subscription model, because:
1. The Online/Community aspect of the game is practically nonexistent. Themeparks today have 2 modes for multiplayer action: End Game Raids and Arena PvP. Why would anyone pay a subscription for a game with only this, when the Raid content isn't even necessary (you've already beat the game) and you can get a better Arena PvP experience with Call of Duty, LoL, TF2, CS, GW1+2 or any other game that is already F2P?
2. The content is finite by definition. There is no overarching game loop that allows content to refresh itself. Back in the old days, most games had this, primarily because the most important aspect of the game was the multiplayer experience. Themeparks do not have systems built into them that allow a constant refresh of content because they don't have things in the game that the player really cares about: housing, true player customization (no matter how unnecessary it may seem, people will attach more to their characters that look exactly the way they want them to look - no more of this pre-made selections crap), city defense in the form of World PvP.
3. These days, MMO's are nothing but single player games with superficial chat boxes. And even worse - they don't even have half the stuff that makes a good Single Player game good - engaging platforming, responsive controls, amazing story (SWTOR's story for any of the classes is nowhere near as good as just playing KOTOR), challenging puzzles, and most important adaptive AI that recognizes the player as a real entity instead of an object that breaches their aggro wall.
Most importantly, the problem with MMO's these days is not even the games themselves. It's the players. We have a HUGE generation of players who grew up in a time where information is passing through their brain on a constant basis. This is called media indoctrination. As a result, they can't even focus on one thing for more than a few moments. Video games and the way they are designed are a huge part of why people are more and more being diagnosed with ADD. Hell, 90% of you won't even read this post past the first few words because you can't concentrate, and worse... no one has the balls to make you. Instead, they worry over your feelings and give you pills so that you can concentrate when you need to, and go ape shit when you want to.
Secondly, WoW is a success today because when it was released, the only other options we had were SOE's complete inability to provide a single game that the player doesn't have to sift through a mountain of bugs to play and NCSoft and their Asian grind-fests "I only need 1 million XP for a bronze dagger, and I'm only strong enough to kill rats. YAY!" When Blizzard came along with a game that actually worked... it was a god send.
Considering these games come with a pretty heafty price tag (see need to innovate by developers & publishers), they have to appeal to the largest audience possible (see WOW). You can't recoup the money invested if your game is only palatable by a niche audience (as old sandbox MMORPGs were).
So reduce the price tag. CCP do it just fine by focusing on creating the world and the overall rules rather than having to include everything from an expanded feature list to massive content immediately. The key here is that we as gamers must be willing to calibrate our own expectations accordingly. I think too many gamers today have enough experience that its much harder to go back to a more barebones, user generated content style of game simply because as a whole, we've gotten used to the more developed games, and can easily go back to them when the new stuff doesn't match the gameplay we've gotten used to from the more developed product. This to me is why focusing on short term, immediate goals and profit, both as gamers and devs, hurts this genre more than most. In other genres, titles fade away, and you are left with effectively a clean slate periodically; with MMOs, the old games have this tendency to hang on, regardless of their overall quality level, and that makes new entries reallly, really hard to pull off, regardless of budget. I really don't think we'll see another massive success like WOW ever, and we aren't likely to see anything like EVE, or EQ at its height, sustained numbers again until the glut of current games is culled severely. A large part of this is because massive budgets tend to breed massive expectations that are often simply unrealistic for brand new games. The cycle that MMOs are currently in is unsustainable because players insist on innovation, which drives up the cost for developers, which actually limits their ability to innovate.
Originally posted by Notimeforbs ... 3. These days, MMO's are nothing but single player games with superficial chat boxes. And even worse - they don't even have half the stuff that makes a good Single Player game good - engaging platforming, responsive controls, amazing story (SWTOR's story for any of the classes is nowhere near as good as just playing KOTOR), challenging puzzles, and most important adaptive AI that recognizes the player as a real entity instead of an object that breaches their aggro wall. ...
I agree with this to an extent, it is a diluted single player game only if the players themselves make it that way(which appears in many cases true at least for many forums posters dissatisfied with the genre or at least thats my assumption). What MMO's do provide is a shared environment, persistence over a long period of time and tools for social organization, the latter I hardly believe anyone jaded with the genre here has actually utilized.
Its easy to argue gameplay, class systems etc. etc. but in the end a single player game will blow away an MMORPG everytime if we are looking at pure mechanics. I rarely see anyone complain about these things given a good group of people or playing with friends because its more fun when you aren't alone and I'm sorry its not the same with a PUG as opposed to getting 4 others you know and skyping together and running dungeons or exploring. I just think this generation of MMORPG players are just doing it wrong. Hence the lack of innovation threads devolving into another "why I hate the genre" thread.
Its easy to argue gameplay, class systems etc. etc. but in the end a single player game will blow away an MMORPG everytime if we are looking at pure mechanics. I rarely see anyone complain about these things given a good group of people or playing with friends because its more fun when you aren't alone and I'm sorry its not the same with a PUG as opposed to getting 4 others you know and skyping together and running dungeons or exploring. I just think this generation of MMORPG players are just doing it wrong. Hence the lack of innovation threads devolving into another "why I hate the genre" thread.
Tell me what is a good SP Star Trek RPG with both ship & ground combat. There is none. STO is it.
Tell me what is a good super hero RPG with marvel characters. Aside from Marvel Ultima Alliance 1 & 2 (old games whcih i am already done with), there are none. Marvel Heroes it it.
So tell me, if i am looking for a Star Trek or marvel RPG, why should i play these two MMOs as SP games? There are no Sp games in the same settings that blow them away.
Originally posted by nariusseldon Tell me what is a good SP Star Trek RPG with both ship & ground combat. There is none. STO is it.
Tell me what is a good super hero RPG with marvel characters. Aside from Marvel Ultima Alliance 1 & 2 (old games whcih i am already done with), there are none. Marvel Heroes it it.
So tell me, if i am looking for a Star Trek or marvel RPG, why should i play these two MMOs as SP games? There are no Sp games in the same settings that blow them away.
There is no arguing a bad game with poor mechanics is a bad game and these games are far from exemplary of the actual MMO genre. I'll answer your question with another question...why are you playing MMO's as single player games to begin with? My whole point is that people are trying to play MMO's as single player games when its an entirely bad approach to playing MMO's and they should be better off playing a single player game if we keep pointing at game mechanics and content as a measuring tool for MMO's while ignoring the only real advantage an MMO has over all other the games which is the social side.
Rather than use a niche example to try and prove a point, try to argue on the same level next time. I never said there's a single player variant of every MMO known to man. I'm pointing out a single player game mechanically will always be more detailed, polished and cohesive compared to an MMO in general.
Originally posted by nariusseldon Tell me what is a good SP Star Trek RPG with both ship & ground combat. There is none. STO is it.
Tell me what is a good super hero RPG with marvel characters. Aside from Marvel Ultima Alliance 1 & 2 (old games whcih i am already done with), there are none. Marvel Heroes it it.
So tell me, if i am looking for a Star Trek or marvel RPG, why should i play these two MMOs as SP games? There are no Sp games in the same settings that blow them away.
There is no arguing a bad game with poor mechanics is a bad game and these games are far from exemplary of the actual MMO genre. I'll answer your question with another question...why are you playing MMO's as single player games to begin with? My whole point is that people are trying to play MMO's as single player games when its an entirely bad approach to playing MMO's and they should be better off playing a single player game if we keep pointing at game mechanics and content as a measuring tool for MMO's while ignoring the only real advantage an MMO has over all other the games which is the social side.
Rather than use a niche example to try and prove a point, try to argue on the same level next time. I never said there's a single player variant of every MMO known to man. I'm pointing out a single player game mechanically will always be more detailed, polished and cohesive compared to an MMO in general.
Exactly because of what i said. If i want to play a Star Trek RPG, STO is it .. and its mechanics is decent.
In fact, i *do* play STO (and Marvel Heroes) as single player games. If it is fun to do so, can you tell me a reason why i should not?
There is no "bad" approach if it is fun.
And no .. social is not the advantage of MMO over SP games. Unique setting is another. In fact, there is a whole other thread listed many reasons why people play MMOs other than social.
Originally posted by nariusseldon Exactly because of what i said. If i want to play a Star Trek RPG, STO is it .. and its mechanics is decent.In fact, i *do* play STO (and Marvel Heroes) as single player games. If it is fun to do so, can you tell me a reason why i should not?There is no "bad" approach if it is fun.And no .. social is not the advantage of MMO over SP games. Unique setting is another. In fact, there is a whole other thread listed many reasons why people play MMOs other than social.
Correct, I can't disagree with the approach given its fun, but many here complain about the lack of it within MMO's (and in this thread, innovation), which I merely disagree.
As in social not being an advantage makes the MMO somewhat useless. Now before I continue let me clarify social as being a part of the community, interaction with people good or bad, not necessarily having to group or guild with others all the time. Despite the fact that you choose to play certain MMO's by yourself doesn't necessarily take fully away that you are still a part of an environment shared by others (unless of course everything is completely instanced). It is one of MMO's primary features whether you choose to play with others or not, part of the game is the people that are within each games' communities.
Again, if there is nothing that sets MMO's apart from single player games, then why is it labeled in a separate genre. Its a game that supports a massive amount of players under a shared environment. The genre in itself implies a "social" aspect, so you are entirely wrong in saying that's not MMO's big advantage when its inside the name itself. I'm not saying what you like or don't like it, ultimately this is what separates MMO's whether that is the reason you play or not. For your situation and perhaps others, maybe its your only Star Trek option or super hero option but it's still an MMO.
And if you cant see where my aim is at, its not towards the people that actually like what they are playing, its the ones claiming that the whole genre is bad and that there's nothing in it, unfair generalizations on the genre etc. People that complain its the same old thing, perhaps they are just playing for the wrong reasons, you obviously aren't. The people can't complain when they aren't leveraging the advantages of the genre and judging it purely on game play/mechanics which brings us back to where I pretty much started.
I agree here as well, there are many who want those games back along with the original design and vision they started with.
No one person is in a place to speak for more than themselves really.
And if society followed that rule nothing would ever get discussed. There is empirical evidence backing up my statements, so would you please stop derailing?
Sorry to interrupt into your discussion, but a fact is lost. Empirical evidence is that games like UO are not played anymore because it has shitty graphics and most of the new blood wont even bother into looking at it (that's why you had the perception of it not existing anymore, you just didn't care if it existed or not).
When some people say things like they want UO back is not about UO itself, it's to get a game with the same benefits of the new games with the funny gameplay they loved so much in UO.
Had to stop reading there, you are so off base it's laughable.
You're telling me what I meant when I said people want UO back? I know that UO is there, UO has been there for ages. But people don't play it, even people that love it. Why? Because what made it good has long since been patched away. Same for DAoC. I don't give two shits about the graphics or updates, if they rolled back the game to how it was around 2003, I'd be playing it. The classic freeshards prove this to be true.
When EverQuest released a classic progression server that rolled the game back as close to 1999 as they could get it, IT WAS SO POPULAR THEY HAD TO OPEN A SECOND SERVER. IN A GAME OVER 12 YEARS OLD.
It has nothing to do with not wanting to touch the graphics. It's the gameplay. The gameplay we like does not exist anymore.
Just give a 14 years old a private shard with a clean first UO and in another PC triple-A mmorpg of your choice. After that, come here talking about laughable, empiric evidence guy xDDDD. Empirical evidence is something to big to fit on your words based on emotion and theories about numbers. Arrogance doesn't make you right, just so you know.
Come with real numbers and real social studies in the matter to talk about empiric evidence. Everything else it's just speculations. But please, refrain to post the reason why is nowadays going wrong with that arrogance because it's totally out of line and will never get to a point. The only option is to agree with you or it's off base or ridiculous, or you know it better. To be certain about something is harder than just "I think it's that way" . As I said, before acting so arrogant check if technology involved in the new games have no influence. (I still remember long posts debating how Tera had better graphics than GW2 ergo it was better game).
Let's keep it civilized.
Edit: Just to make it clear. There are a lot of private servers offering classic UO and the people who loved it long ago and the people willing to love it doesn't fill those server enough. If we follow your socalled empirical evidence, all of them would have millions of players since everybody loved UO. Everybody loved UO, even the ones who didn't played it at the time. So, where are they?
And by the way, not following your mind pattern about something doesn't make it off base. It's just a real empirical evidence, test it on a 100 14 year old kids and you'll have your answer. Even easier, take a screenshot of UO and another of Tera and ask them about what game is better, just that, "What game is better?". I'm pretty sure a very small number would say "I need to test the game to actually know", most of them (if not every single one of them) will pinpoint Tera as a no brainer.
Edit2: Also I wasn't saying your point is wrong or that it doesn't exist, I'm just saying the new generation of gamer will just ignore them. And not only the new ones, I know people my age saying X game is better based just on looks. So long story short, games may be worst than they were before, and hardcore players left because of that. But that doesn't mean it is the whole reason. CoH had a harcore playerbase loyal to the end, there was a pretty good number of player on the game. It closed even when the people was crying how unfair it was and how the game was alive. The key is not even in graphics, that's just another brick in the wall as the song said. To get in touch to a whole generation is something unpredictable, it just happens. LoL was an indie game which was some kind of ripoff of dota. Today is the most played game.
... In my observations. New innovations to the genre seem to always come with a cost. The cost of initial development for a new idea is a gamble. It may not have the desired impact. It might be more cost prohibitive than it's worth. So large percentages of game budget are lost on developing something that has less of a return than implementing something tried and true. There is also the unseen dynamics that new innovations account for. Some are good, but not everything new innovations bring is. Some have many negative impacts that previous MMOs did not have. New innovations have trade offs and if there are too many at one time of if they are too big for a particular game, we may get something good, but we've lost other things we'd enjoyed previously. ....
Are you kidding. With that mindset there would be no MMOs at all. We would still sit in a cave and use stones and sticks. And probably someone would say: "Tieing a pointy stone to a stick? No, it has been proven that our stick and stone demographic likes their stuff just as it is. Maybe this will not be innovation in the right place and it will not pay off or even damage our great stick and stone genre. No, innovations could be so unpredictable, we don't want that."
I know businessmen do not like innovation, because it may mess up their business plan, but that is their problem.
Name one MMO that closely followed WoW-Formula and did not fail or did not only just pay of. Developers just did not get it for a long time that the same old same old will only dive their company straight into the wall.
MMOs are also different from other genres because the product circles are so long, they have no set ending and the player spents so much time in one game. In the shooter genre players change their games more often and therefore it is enough to only change one small feature for the next title. In MMOs this does just result in your players going back to their old game after a week or two. I am convinced that no MMO can succeed if it does not bring something new to the table. This can include to take established ideas that where never successfully applied before and find a way to make them work.
As in social not being an advantage makes the MMO somewhat useless. Now before I continue let me clarify social as being a part of the community, interaction with people good or bad, not necessarily having to group or guild with others all the time. Despite the fact that you choose to play certain MMO's by yourself doesn't necessarily take fully away that you are still a part of an environment shared by others (unless of course everything is completely instanced). It is one of MMO's primary features whether you choose to play with others or not, part of the game is the people that are within each games' communities.
I said social is not THE advantage. I did not say it is not An advantage. (May be i should add the word "only" to clarify). Obviously some people do like social.
However, it is not the only advantage, and clear it is not even an important advantage for a player like me. If you read the other thread about reason to play MMO, there are a big list of reasons, OTHER than social for people to play MMOs.
Also note that in some MMO like STo, i spent 99% of my time in instances, and it really is not very different than a SP game in terms of gameplay experiences.
Originally posted by ReallyNow10 Socializing is important for MMO longevity, I think. Otherwise, you might as well be playing with yourself, just solo-gaming.
few sacrifices are needed "what works" came from WoWs overwhelming popularity and gave birth to a "Norm" and that gave birth to "WoW clones" what i mean is that WoW is WoW and it will always have its players but if the games keep getting made the same way WoW was done, it will not succeed and will fail miserably the "Norm" and "what works" is just an illusion on the waters' surface yeah it might work for WoW but WoW is WoW its not the game other developers should be developing
WoW was made into the right "hole" and answered the "need" in the market thats why it became popular NO im not saying that it was the first mmo that would just be plain ignorance it just wasnt too hardcore and suited for larger population than EQ and ultima online and others
WoWs mechanics are old and should be forgotten
this is just assuming that your "what works" comes from how WoW works
in the end Developers need to think outside the "norm" and "what works" mentality and actualy create their own game no matter how much the producers pressure and tell them "this works" follow the "norm" look at WoW and how many players it has"
but then again...developing from exsisting code is easier and often cheaper its an endless cycle of create..publish and fail....rinse and repeat
in the end Developers need to think outside the "norm" and "what works" mentality and actualy create their own game no matter how much the producers pressure and tell them "this works" follow the "norm" look at WoW and how many players it has"
They do. They created MOBAs, WoT, Destiny, Divisions ... and many games that depart from MMO themepark trappings.
in the end Developers need to think outside the "norm" and "what works" mentality and actualy create their own game no matter how much the producers pressure and tell them "this works" follow the "norm" look at WoW and how many players it has"
They do. They created MOBAs, WoT, Destiny, Divisions ... and many games that depart from MMO themepark trappings.
if i gave the impression that they dont do that then my apologies
People should stop saying "UO still exists". Technically it does, but it's a very old game, which has not really been properly updated, so it's not actually in the running.
That, and the version that most people loved is long long gone. Just like SWG is gone. Just like a good version of DAoC is gone. The devs made mistakes, and instead of fixing them, moved on to new projects while a ghost team and some interns took over their old ones.
I'd argue there's a far more stable market in cloning old MMOs in their classic state (with some modern improvements, but minimal) than making another AAA WoW clone.
I agree that at times there is too much focus on innovation. There are plenty of things about the mmo genre, staples if you will, that I see bashed on because they are doing the "same old thing" that I have no issue with. Skills for example in battle. It's more and more popular that people are wanting active battles, twitch based if you will, and I'm totally fine with hotbars. I also don't mind quest hubs. What I don't like it lame ass quests and an on rail quest system. Give me a lot of freedom to go where I want and have a quest hub here or there, with interesting quests, and I have no issue with that.
Comments
Which people? The million and a half who quit SWTOR within the couple months? It's a pretty common sentiment that SWTOR wasn't a true MMORPG, but a solo game with online features.
I definitely agree that grinding is a necessary evil. I think however that some of the streamlining that people get mad over is a bit unjustified. People got mad over LFD when in reality, spending 20-30 minutes to get to a dungeon doesn't really add much depth, if any.
I think the point I was trying to get across is that, maybe the problem with GW2 wasn't the lack of grind, but the fact that the gameplay that it offered just wasn't good for you. If a game's only saving grace of keeping you is that it gives you some tedium that takes you 100 days, then we already know that the game is going to die, because then you're just counting down to when that tedium actually ends. I honestly feel that MMORPG's would be better served if they put less of an emphasis on grinding and more of an emphasis on game play such as dynamic fights, interesting and well balanced skills, different ways to play the game, multiple levels of customization etc.
Btw, I'm very sorry if I was coming off as incredibly hostile.
The next 100 won't be that hard. You'll be able to get a lot of them like in each new tier, getting credit for creating ori bars and the like. Plus they're supposed to be adding a lot of new recipes as well. I expect it won't be as fast as earlier levels, but I doubt it'll be a grind in the grindy sense of the word.
Oderint, dum metuant.
If I continue with GW2, and I imagine I will at some point. I won't be able to sleep at night knowing I have Master Craftsman title and don't have any crafting capped anymore. I'll be compelled to cap them............ALL!
I have a couple issues with making something entirely dependent on "fun." First, it's extremely subjective and nearly impossible to quantify. Second, pretty much every successful long term hobby or sport focuses on long term enjoyment rather than immediate gratification. That second part is critical to MMOs as they were originally designed to be long term endeavors, not short term experiences like most games. While the development of the idea that immediate gratification, short term MMOs is not bad in and of itself, the loss of dev support for the original concept of longer term MMMOs that have significantly more challenge and smaller player base is very disappointing to me. The whole idea of MMOs originally was that they weren't like other games, and brought something to the table that most games could not and would not. An emphasis on long term development that didn't focus on being "fun" and "entertaining" was a big part of that. That doesn't mean that those elements can be ignored, and bad design is still something to be alert to, but to emphasize them as if MMOs were just like every other game out there misses the point of MMOs in the first place. They need to be there to some degree to be certain but how and when they are applied needs to be conform to the challenges and opportunities presented by this particular game model, not to the expectations established by other game genres. "Fun" in this genre needs to be something that devs need to let players find and define on their own within the rules and world provided by the devs, not something simply handed to the players because the players are too lazy to find it themselves; there are more than enough games that do the latter already. If the players don't like this fact, they can go play the games that already cater to them; trying to force their style of gaming on a genre of games that set out to be different precisely so that it could provide an alternate experience is a waste of time for everybody.
On a note more related to the OP, both players and devs really, really, really need to stop using WOW as an example for anything; its a great game in its own way, but almost all comparisons completely ignore the few factors that truly made WOW successful, and all comparisons run into the problem that WOW has proven itself to be an anomaly that no one has ever truly explained the success of. The one comparison that truly needs to die is the number of reasonably expected players. Looking at games like EQ or UO at their height, or games like EVE now gives far more sustainable and realistic numbers. Trying to appeal to everybody usually means that games fail to achieve even those comparatively modest numbers, whereas devs like CCP who focus in on a concept and try to perfect it like CCP has with EVE find that they can achieve a sustainable and slowly growing player base. While it may disappoint many who want to see MMOs as something more than niche, realistic expectations are that it really is a niche market, and will always be so, aside from the occasional anomaly like WOW or hybrids that cross genre boundaries with mixed success.
Yes. That's not to say that innovation within the game's content is bad, or somehow retards the ability of the genere to grow.
I just think that the focus on where the innovation comes from has been misplaced. Older MMORPGs (sandbox types) put the burdon of innovation in the hands of the players. The developers put tools or systems in the game that allow the players to take hold and create their own dynamic content. If a developer puts a wall up in the game, the players...left to their own devices....will find a way to get over it. It's in those moments that I've seen really incredible things acomplished by the playerbase.
Modern MMORPGs put the burdon of innovation on the developers. It's the developers responsiblity to create new kinds of boss encounters, skill trees, under water environments, modes of transportation, economic systems, etc. in order to differeentiate themselves from the rest of the saturated market.
The OP referenced many of the issues related to this....but ultimately it almost always ends up in a situation where the novelty wears off on the new twist on things they've been doing for ages....and are back to square one. All that development cost, labor, etc. for things like Rifts, Wings, Directional Combat, Real Money Auction Houses, or multiple skill trees to fade away as soon as it's evident that you're running the same dang kill 10 boars quests you were running 10 years ago.
The issue, however, is scale of markets. MOST gamers are casual in nature, and don't have a lot of time (or want) to do the heavy lifting when it comes to experiencing content. They'd rather an NPC give them an explicit goal, mark the location on their map, and rince & repeat for 30 or so minuets instead of having to sit around and come up with the content on their own.
Considering these games come with a pretty heafty price tag (see need to innovate by developers & publishers), they have to appeal to the largest audience possible (see WOW). You can't recoup the money invested if your game is only palatable by a niche audience (as old sandbox MMORPGs were).
Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong.
First of all, Rift and SWTOR are not failures. A change in business plan does not equate to failure. SWTOR right now today is probably the best Themepark experience you're going to get. The only bad decision EA made was to not release with its current business plan from day 1. The issue with subscription models is that people no longer want to play Themeparks with a subscription model, because:
1. The Online/Community aspect of the game is practically nonexistent. Themeparks today have 2 modes for multiplayer action: End Game Raids and Arena PvP. Why would anyone pay a subscription for a game with only this, when the Raid content isn't even necessary (you've already beat the game) and you can get a better Arena PvP experience with Call of Duty, LoL, TF2, CS, GW1+2 or any other game that is already F2P?
2. The content is finite by definition. There is no overarching game loop that allows content to refresh itself. Back in the old days, most games had this, primarily because the most important aspect of the game was the multiplayer experience. Themeparks do not have systems built into them that allow a constant refresh of content because they don't have things in the game that the player really cares about: housing, true player customization (no matter how unnecessary it may seem, people will attach more to their characters that look exactly the way they want them to look - no more of this pre-made selections crap), city defense in the form of World PvP.
3. These days, MMO's are nothing but single player games with superficial chat boxes. And even worse - they don't even have half the stuff that makes a good Single Player game good - engaging platforming, responsive controls, amazing story (SWTOR's story for any of the classes is nowhere near as good as just playing KOTOR), challenging puzzles, and most important adaptive AI that recognizes the player as a real entity instead of an object that breaches their aggro wall.
Most importantly, the problem with MMO's these days is not even the games themselves. It's the players. We have a HUGE generation of players who grew up in a time where information is passing through their brain on a constant basis. This is called media indoctrination. As a result, they can't even focus on one thing for more than a few moments. Video games and the way they are designed are a huge part of why people are more and more being diagnosed with ADD. Hell, 90% of you won't even read this post past the first few words because you can't concentrate, and worse... no one has the balls to make you. Instead, they worry over your feelings and give you pills so that you can concentrate when you need to, and go ape shit when you want to.
Secondly, WoW is a success today because when it was released, the only other options we had were SOE's complete inability to provide a single game that the player doesn't have to sift through a mountain of bugs to play and NCSoft and their Asian grind-fests "I only need 1 million XP for a bronze dagger, and I'm only strong enough to kill rats. YAY!" When Blizzard came along with a game that actually worked... it was a god send.
It just snowballed from there.
So reduce the price tag. CCP do it just fine by focusing on creating the world and the overall rules rather than having to include everything from an expanded feature list to massive content immediately. The key here is that we as gamers must be willing to calibrate our own expectations accordingly. I think too many gamers today have enough experience that its much harder to go back to a more barebones, user generated content style of game simply because as a whole, we've gotten used to the more developed games, and can easily go back to them when the new stuff doesn't match the gameplay we've gotten used to from the more developed product. This to me is why focusing on short term, immediate goals and profit, both as gamers and devs, hurts this genre more than most. In other genres, titles fade away, and you are left with effectively a clean slate periodically; with MMOs, the old games have this tendency to hang on, regardless of their overall quality level, and that makes new entries reallly, really hard to pull off, regardless of budget. I really don't think we'll see another massive success like WOW ever, and we aren't likely to see anything like EVE, or EQ at its height, sustained numbers again until the glut of current games is culled severely. A large part of this is because massive budgets tend to breed massive expectations that are often simply unrealistic for brand new games. The cycle that MMOs are currently in is unsustainable because players insist on innovation, which drives up the cost for developers, which actually limits their ability to innovate.
I agree with this to an extent, it is a diluted single player game only if the players themselves make it that way(which appears in many cases true at least for many forums posters dissatisfied with the genre or at least thats my assumption). What MMO's do provide is a shared environment, persistence over a long period of time and tools for social organization, the latter I hardly believe anyone jaded with the genre here has actually utilized.
Its easy to argue gameplay, class systems etc. etc. but in the end a single player game will blow away an MMORPG everytime if we are looking at pure mechanics. I rarely see anyone complain about these things given a good group of people or playing with friends because its more fun when you aren't alone and I'm sorry its not the same with a PUG as opposed to getting 4 others you know and skyping together and running dungeons or exploring. I just think this generation of MMORPG players are just doing it wrong. Hence the lack of innovation threads devolving into another "why I hate the genre" thread.
Tell me what is a good SP Star Trek RPG with both ship & ground combat. There is none. STO is it.
Tell me what is a good super hero RPG with marvel characters. Aside from Marvel Ultima Alliance 1 & 2 (old games whcih i am already done with), there are none. Marvel Heroes it it.
So tell me, if i am looking for a Star Trek or marvel RPG, why should i play these two MMOs as SP games? There are no Sp games in the same settings that blow them away.
There is no arguing a bad game with poor mechanics is a bad game and these games are far from exemplary of the actual MMO genre. I'll answer your question with another question...why are you playing MMO's as single player games to begin with? My whole point is that people are trying to play MMO's as single player games when its an entirely bad approach to playing MMO's and they should be better off playing a single player game if we keep pointing at game mechanics and content as a measuring tool for MMO's while ignoring the only real advantage an MMO has over all other the games which is the social side.
Rather than use a niche example to try and prove a point, try to argue on the same level next time. I never said there's a single player variant of every MMO known to man. I'm pointing out a single player game mechanically will always be more detailed, polished and cohesive compared to an MMO in general.
Exactly because of what i said. If i want to play a Star Trek RPG, STO is it .. and its mechanics is decent.
In fact, i *do* play STO (and Marvel Heroes) as single player games. If it is fun to do so, can you tell me a reason why i should not?
There is no "bad" approach if it is fun.
And no .. social is not the advantage of MMO over SP games. Unique setting is another. In fact, there is a whole other thread listed many reasons why people play MMOs other than social.
Correct, I can't disagree with the approach given its fun, but many here complain about the lack of it within MMO's (and in this thread, innovation), which I merely disagree.
As in social not being an advantage makes the MMO somewhat useless. Now before I continue let me clarify social as being a part of the community, interaction with people good or bad, not necessarily having to group or guild with others all the time. Despite the fact that you choose to play certain MMO's by yourself doesn't necessarily take fully away that you are still a part of an environment shared by others (unless of course everything is completely instanced). It is one of MMO's primary features whether you choose to play with others or not, part of the game is the people that are within each games' communities.
Again, if there is nothing that sets MMO's apart from single player games, then why is it labeled in a separate genre. Its a game that supports a massive amount of players under a shared environment. The genre in itself implies a "social" aspect, so you are entirely wrong in saying that's not MMO's big advantage when its inside the name itself. I'm not saying what you like or don't like it, ultimately this is what separates MMO's whether that is the reason you play or not. For your situation and perhaps others, maybe its your only Star Trek option or super hero option but it's still an MMO.
And if you cant see where my aim is at, its not towards the people that actually like what they are playing, its the ones claiming that the whole genre is bad and that there's nothing in it, unfair generalizations on the genre etc. People that complain its the same old thing, perhaps they are just playing for the wrong reasons, you obviously aren't. The people can't complain when they aren't leveraging the advantages of the genre and judging it purely on game play/mechanics which brings us back to where I pretty much started.
Just give a 14 years old a private shard with a clean first UO and in another PC triple-A mmorpg of your choice. After that, come here talking about laughable, empiric evidence guy xDDDD. Empirical evidence is something to big to fit on your words based on emotion and theories about numbers. Arrogance doesn't make you right, just so you know.
Come with real numbers and real social studies in the matter to talk about empiric evidence. Everything else it's just speculations. But please, refrain to post the reason why is nowadays going wrong with that arrogance because it's totally out of line and will never get to a point. The only option is to agree with you or it's off base or ridiculous, or you know it better. To be certain about something is harder than just "I think it's that way" . As I said, before acting so arrogant check if technology involved in the new games have no influence. (I still remember long posts debating how Tera had better graphics than GW2 ergo it was better game).
Let's keep it civilized.
Edit: Just to make it clear. There are a lot of private servers offering classic UO and the people who loved it long ago and the people willing to love it doesn't fill those server enough. If we follow your socalled empirical evidence, all of them would have millions of players since everybody loved UO. Everybody loved UO, even the ones who didn't played it at the time. So, where are they?
And by the way, not following your mind pattern about something doesn't make it off base. It's just a real empirical evidence, test it on a 100 14 year old kids and you'll have your answer. Even easier, take a screenshot of UO and another of Tera and ask them about what game is better, just that, "What game is better?". I'm pretty sure a very small number would say "I need to test the game to actually know", most of them (if not every single one of them) will pinpoint Tera as a no brainer.
Edit2: Also I wasn't saying your point is wrong or that it doesn't exist, I'm just saying the new generation of gamer will just ignore them. And not only the new ones, I know people my age saying X game is better based just on looks. So long story short, games may be worst than they were before, and hardcore players left because of that. But that doesn't mean it is the whole reason. CoH had a harcore playerbase loyal to the end, there was a pretty good number of player on the game. It closed even when the people was crying how unfair it was and how the game was alive. The key is not even in graphics, that's just another brick in the wall as the song said. To get in touch to a whole generation is something unpredictable, it just happens. LoL was an indie game which was some kind of ripoff of dota. Today is the most played game.
Are you kidding. With that mindset there would be no MMOs at all. We would still sit in a cave and use stones and sticks. And probably someone would say: "Tieing a pointy stone to a stick? No, it has been proven that our stick and stone demographic likes their stuff just as it is. Maybe this will not be innovation in the right place and it will not pay off or even damage our great stick and stone genre. No, innovations could be so unpredictable, we don't want that."
I know businessmen do not like innovation, because it may mess up their business plan, but that is their problem.
Name one MMO that closely followed WoW-Formula and did not fail or did not only just pay of. Developers just did not get it for a long time that the same old same old will only dive their company straight into the wall.
MMOs are also different from other genres because the product circles are so long, they have no set ending and the player spents so much time in one game. In the shooter genre players change their games more often and therefore it is enough to only change one small feature for the next title. In MMOs this does just result in your players going back to their old game after a week or two.
I am convinced that no MMO can succeed if it does not bring something new to the table. This can include to take established ideas that where never successfully applied before and find a way to make them work.
I said social is not THE advantage. I did not say it is not An advantage. (May be i should add the word "only" to clarify). Obviously some people do like social.
However, it is not the only advantage, and clear it is not even an important advantage for a player like me. If you read the other thread about reason to play MMO, there are a big list of reasons, OTHER than social for people to play MMOs.
Also note that in some MMO like STo, i spent 99% of my time in instances, and it really is not very different than a SP game in terms of gameplay experiences.
I am. What is your point?
"Occasionally, you will see opportunities for a quantum leap"
Anyone else think of this?
As to the OP topic.
Innovation isn't bad but yeah I can see what your saying it how its harmful.
I think the main culprit is the mentality of "Trying to appeal to everyone."
That is what is essentially is killing the genre. Atleast IMO.
You can't make everyone happy with 1 mmo. Just not going to happen. Doesn't help that most of the MMO community has a locusts mentality also.
Just my 2 cent.
MMORPG Gamers/Developers need a reality check!
They didn't. The current MMO market is not trying to appeal to sandbox fans, or perma-death fans, or open world FFA pvp fans.
So no, they are not trying to appeal to everyone.
without innovation there is no progress
few sacrifices are needed "what works" came from WoWs overwhelming popularity and gave birth to a "Norm" and that gave birth to "WoW clones" what i mean is that WoW is WoW and it will always have its players but if the games keep getting made the same way WoW was done, it will not succeed and will fail miserably the "Norm" and "what works" is just an illusion on the waters' surface yeah it might work for WoW but WoW is WoW its not the game other developers should be developing
WoW was made into the right "hole" and answered the "need" in the market thats why it became popular NO im not saying that it was the first mmo that would just be plain ignorance it just wasnt too hardcore and suited for larger population than EQ and ultima online and others
WoWs mechanics are old and should be forgotten
this is just assuming that your "what works" comes from how WoW works
in the end Developers need to think outside the "norm" and "what works" mentality and actualy create their own game no matter how much the producers pressure and tell them "this works" follow the "norm" look at WoW and how many players it has"
but then again...developing from exsisting code is easier and often cheaper its an endless cycle of create..publish and fail....rinse and repeat
They do. They created MOBAs, WoT, Destiny, Divisions ... and many games that depart from MMO themepark trappings.
if i gave the impression that they dont do that then my apologies
That, and the version that most people loved is long long gone. Just like SWG is gone. Just like a good version of DAoC is gone. The devs made mistakes, and instead of fixing them, moved on to new projects while a ghost team and some interns took over their old ones.
I'd argue there's a far more stable market in cloning old MMOs in their classic state (with some modern improvements, but minimal) than making another AAA WoW clone.