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MMO players are very very confused
paulscott
Member Posts: 5,613
I'd have to say that MMO players are some of the most confused gamers on the market.
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Case 1: "I want the ability to radically change the world for everyone in the game", "I want that boss to stay dead when killed", and "I want the ability to affect the game's story and lore"
Confusion 1: When give the choice to make a permament choice to their character, or if an MMO even lightly features such mechanics. The forums are endlessly full of hate for it. Scale of affecting everyone VS just yourself.
Confusion 2: Players complain about missing events, or the effects those events had. I mean seriously check a forum after holiday events there will be some complaint of missing it and in the long run there is almost NO effect on game play at all. Scale of event that does almost nothing VS event that locks or unlocks area/effect/abilities
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Case 2: "Grouping should be the best way to advance", "Pure groupers should be tiers above soloers", and "grouping should be where the real challenge is"
Confusion 1: Grouping relies on having as much access to as much of EVERYONE as possible, which means that advancement through grouping actually slows down and eventually kills a grouping game. Since you obviously can't group with as much of EVERYONE as you could before and still have fun(challenge, reward, or otherwise).
Confusion 2: If by not having "solo training" be a challenge that means that you're further killing a grouping game by allowing frustrating people that don't know WTF is going on in your game.
Confusion 3: Grouping INCLUDES small team grouping of just one other player and yourself, just as much as it includes a 40 man raid.
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Comments, insults, flames, and/or your own cases.
In any case the topic should be about how unaware of what the effects people are asking for have. Or how people keeping asking and voting for stuff, then vote in the opposite direction when they actually see that game. Then again I'm asking for people to stay on topic, something that just won't happen.
I find it amazing that by 2020 first world countries will be competing to get immigrants.
Comments
No flames, only nods.
You are absolutely correct.
No one knows what they want, they think they want choices, they dont' want choices, choices breed unhappiness.
You always second guess yourself.
Grouping doesnt kill a game look at FFXI. Only thing thats going to kill it is 1) More Time or 2) FFXIV. Grouping vs Solo has been beaten to death and I can argue that to much solo play lowers a games life
Waiting for:EQ-Next, ArcheAge (not so much anymore)
Now Playing: N/A
Worst MMO: FFXIV
Favorite MMO: FFXI
Meh, even know I love my grouping, I have to agree with yah. You make some good points. Plus, with out single playing, you cant really get the experience of your class and how not to panic when about to die. Single player is a great way to learn, and Multiplayer (Grouping) Is the best way to conqure. Admit it, you cant rule the world with out going through all the shit it puts in your way.
Off topic. FFXI also has mechanics that makes "dependancies" less important, starting with the most incredibly obvious of the dual classing system.
I find it amazing that by 2020 first world countries will be competing to get immigrants.
If we have a game with fully working sandbox mechanics, like you said in case one, I think the permanent death for rare creatures/bosses is fucking stupid. Everyone should have a chance at this, not just the most dedicated guild/person.
Hypothetical situation:
We have a sandbox game. We have guild cities. We have one rare non-instanced boss monster which respawns once in a while and gives huge bonuses to the guild that kills him. In this case, ofcourse, the most "hardcore" guild will be first, but later on everyone will have their chance.
About holiday events - They don't usually give a player any huge advantages, just cosmetic stuff. You missed it - Oh well, it's fun but it's nothing to cry about.
About permanent character choices - I fully understand all whining surrounding it. God forbid perma - death, when your beloved level 999 get's smashed to pieces due to lag and months of effort are wasted, that sure sucks.
Small permanent stuff like no respec ability can mostly work only in a game with perfect skill system, where there are NO useless skills that no one ever picks and no mistakes can be made, which won't happen anytime soon. So say, you hit the level cap and realize your character is fucking useless. You go to whine on forums, naturally. After that you go and whine some more.
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My thoughts on grouping:
I hate forced grouping, I admit it. But nowadays MMO's force it like no tomorrow. You want end game content? Get a group of well geared level capped people who are pretty knowledgable of their character. And you need to have like 20 of them.
IMO - screw that. I hate such mechanics. THE perfect game for me is twitch based game, where yes, you sometimes need groups of 5 or so people for pve, but where it requires real skill not just gear and button mashing. The real grouping potential can be seen in world pvp'ish events. Think sand - box mmo based around guilds fighting for territories. There you can have 20, 40, or even 100 people.
And they can, you know, make solo play challenging and with it's help make you not completely suck when first introduced to a group. (Which can easily be done in a twitch based game, but that's my mmo wet dream so i'll stop forcing it in your thread)
Well...
a) Generalizing this to cover all gamers is off;
b) By the wording it intimates that the the same person/people vote for something and then vote against it; It could very well be one person voting for it and later a different person who skipped the first vote (for whatever reason) voting against it.
c) You'll never get everyone to be happy about everything. It's human nature to complain about something, anything. If you gave 10 people an equal share of X item, at least one would complain that they didn't get theirs first. If you gave it to them all at the same time, they'd find some aesthetic reason to complain about X, or that they'd rather had Y.
There's always something and there will never be a point when people can just be happy with what they have.
"Many nights, my friend... Many nights I've put a blade to your throat while you were sleeping. Glad I never killed you, Steve. You're alright..."
Chavez y Chavez
Change world: I am one of those in favour of this, however I agree that many people do not understand what this means... some people do miss out. the only real time you can argue though is when all the events are for one time zone (eg. Tabula Rasa) rather than spread evenly (eg. Eve)
Grouping: A balance is hard to achieve, and yes, the ability to group as 2 people is just as useful as people grouping as 5 or even 40. Those of us who play during off peak times are highly aware of this issue in grouping.
As you can see the problem lies not in the confusion, but that most players do not understand the concept of time zones and peak/off peak times. Just because a gae has the ability to group in 200 strong armies means a single player will get that oppurtunity, the player may live in Australia (we often get screwed this way on US servers), or the person may work night shift. As a result Changing the world and grouping needs to be balanced for those people that do have trouble experiencing things at peak times.
Games need to make sure they allow for non-peak times as well as peak times.
I think when it comes to "changing the world" people/gamers want to do it in more subtle and less profound ways. That is, a new shop in a city; a new way to "serve the Mayor" of a town; become a member of nobility; as a reward, design a mob for a zone or raid boss; erect statutes of heros (new "artist" profession); and so on and so forth. Create a sword (abilities, appearance, and so forth). Create unique NPCs that protect a town, castle, you, etc. Possibly even burn some towns to the ground, player-made towns. PvP features also have yet have its potential tapped.
It is not the ability to change the story, but feel a part of it; that is what we desperately yearn for. Explore the world, and leave small footprints upon it.
Feel a part of the world. In a word, innovate.
A mechanic that devs seem to have left in the past, that I feel could really help re-invigorate a lot of these newer MMOs was monthly content updates. A great example of this was Asheron's Call, where each month there was a new update, and more often than not that meant progression in the game's storyline. The world was an evolving world, yes, much of it was scripted, but there were opportunities for the player to become involved in the story. What's more, it kept things interesting because the world was constantly changing. You might take a 6 month break and come back to find one of the towns has been wiped out and the sky is raining blood because Bael'Zharon has been revived. What's more, it gave you a reason to come back.
As for the forced grouping, screw that. I'm all for grouping, and there should be benefits for it, but it should never be forced. You don't satisfy your playerbase by forcing them to play a certain way, you give them options and allow them to choose their own playstyle. MMO players don't fit into a single genre. We don't all like to play one way, we don't all play for the same reasons. We need options or we lose interest. What's more, if server population ever drops, forced grouping becomes an extreme hinderance. It only compounds the problems caused by low population, which is something every MMO has to deal with at one time or another.
As for the "MMO gamers are confused" bit, of course "they" are if you're going to lump us in as one group. We don't have one mind, one goal, one interest. We're not a collective, we're a group of people with a similar interest and a million different backgrounds and priorities. As people have already stated, you can never satisfy them all, the best you can hope for is to find a need that's not being filled, or that you can fill better than your competition, and fill it.
Different players want different things. Different players like different things. People who request a certain game mechanic are not the same peopel who are complaining about that game mechanic. You're lumping all players together into one group as if we all share a brain, and all want/like/dislike the same things. We don't.