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Another one of those posts...
Hrimnir
Member RarePosts: 2,415
This started out as a response to a post about why Blizzard was the most succesful gaming company as far as MMO's were concerned. But, it morphed into something else so i thought i'd make a new thread.
All of this discussion and its all one really VERY simple answer.
Blizzard made an MMO that was ACCESSIBLE.
To elaborate, they used a graphics engine that even at release was not strenuous and could be run on systems that were 1-2 years old, this allowed people who weren't hard core PC gamers willing to invest hundreds if not thousands of dollars into their rigs, to play the game. EverQuest 1 took a big risk at release by requiring a 3d card at a time when only the most dedicated gamers even had 3d cards in their systems. Blizzard made the game mechanics very casual in so much as leveling was absurdly faster than any current MMO, the world and leveling methods were very focused and linear (and don't even try to play the non linear card, questing was far and away the quickest way to level and people followed the quest hubs wherever they were told to go).
What blizzard did was open a gaming genre up to a much broader audience. A genre that beforehand was VERY niche, and had about 1.5mil players split between 3 major games which all catered to a very different style of play.
I still contend that the vast majority of the MMO community are not MMO gamers. What i mean by that is there are people who are RTS fans, or FPS fans, or sports games fans. Do they occasional cross over and play other games, yes, of course, but they are no representative of the fan base of certain types of gaming. For example, the group of people who like flight simulators like them BECAUSE they are brutally realistic. For most people a flight simulator is unfun, boring, has a steep learning curve, and even after you learn, its still boring.
The MMO gamer prior to WOW was attracted to this style of gaming because it was an RPG set in a huge, unforgiving and dangerous world. It actually felt like a world, not a theme-park as everyone likes to call it nowadays. The Pre WOW mmo'er knew and accepted that it took a long time to level, that death penalties were severe, etc. MMO gamers pre wow were made fun of by other gamers. It was like being a LARPer, you knew it was a socially unacceptable activity, so you still did it, but you were careful who you told, etc.
Now, Blizzard releases an MMO, and all of sudden all the people who are very casual gamers, or cross genre gamers, decide to come try out an MMO. These people never knew what an MMO was before WOW, so they assumed WOW was representative of the MMO genre. These people have different ideas of what gaming is about. They're the type of people who are more instant gratification. The type of people who would have fun in an arcade, where its about the short term, right now, action. So, what they did and what Blizzard ultimately facilitated was the equivalent of turning Flight Simulator X into Dog Fighting Game X.
People wonder why so many of us EQ vets and UO vets, etc, are so pissed about the current state of the genre. This is why. Blizzard took our favorite style of gaming, and for all intents and purposes shit all over it and turned into the computer gaming equivalent of a Britney spears pop record. No substance, no dignity, just designed to make money.
And on that note, i really, REALLY can't wrap my head around the fact that people think that just because something is popular, that its inherently good. I know its a normal part of human psychology, but are people really so shallow that the only way they can enjoy something is if 10 million other people "enjoy" it too? I listen to and enjoy major big name rock music artists just as much as i enjoy listening to some very eclectic, underground darkwave or EBM groups. How many records they sold or how many people know about them is literally of zero concern to me.
All i care about is whether the company, musician, artist, whatever, releases a quality product that they put their hearts and souls into making. And though you could argue WOW may have started that way, it certainly hasn't ended that way. All WOW now is a money making machine specifically directed by accountants and investors ensuring they receive maximum profits off all the (IMHO) idiots who still subscribe and play the game because they're too attached to their accounts and characters and the thought of losing all of that invested time and effort is unacceptable. Its like the friggin gaming equivalent of Stockholm syndrome. Yea, we've all been there, even us old school EQ'ers and such. We understand, But its time to let go and realize that your time is better spent pursuing and supporting games that actually deserve your $15/mo.
"The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently."
- Friedrich Nietzsche
Comments
Excellent little write up there! I really appreciated how clearly and concisely you made your case. I've felt like writing something similar but as your title suggests these kinds of posts do appear a decent bit on this site. Still, kudos to you for spearheading the disconnect that occured between old UO/EQ etc players and the current generation of mmorpgs.
Popularity doesn't equal quality, certainly.
But in the case of WOW, there is no MMORPG out there which is a better game (though many might be better worlds) than WOW. And that's why it attracted gamers from other genres, because gamers care about gameplay first and foremost.
I have a hard time feeling the industry's state is anything but justified successes and failures -- at least until I find a game which I feel genuinely surpasses WOW's polish, controls, and combat, which then proceeds to do worse than WOW.
So for now, the games which are the most fun are the ones which are most successful. And that feels right.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
I have to assume that you completely missed the point the original poster had intended to make. As a long time MMO player and former WoW player I can fully understand the opinion expressed here. I would certainly hope that the rest of the responders stop and realize that if you haven't dealt with "Time Progression", "Warr Camp" or "Champion Spawns" then chances are you're not a part of the gaming community that this thread is actually relavant to.
Fun is a completely subjective word just as the example of a Flight Simulator showed. For those of us who enjoy MMORPGs it is about the Challenge, the thrill of victory that is only truly appriciated against the grim taste of defeat. Making close bonds with the people that we rely on and shed blood with repeatedly as we grow from weaklings into legends.
If a company designed a game which involved guns from a first person perspective they might be tempted to lable it a first person shooter. However, if this game also featured a radar which gave away enemy location at all times flat damage reguardless of body part hit and a "tab-target" lock on system to make it more accessible to players who didn't have the reflexes/aim/map-awareness for standard FPS the CoD faithful would be insulted that it would dare lay claim to the genre. WoW is no less a farce in calling itself and MMO than the fictional "FPS" that I detailed.
WoW at no point requires a player to group in order to progress, therefore they don't. That's not multiplayer...
The World of Warcraft had far less square footage than it's predecessors. Hardly Massive...
You do need an internet connection to play it. This one they got right.
Every character shares the exact same story. You're all "THE chosen ONE", wtf? It's predecessors had no problem beginning a quest dialog with "Oh great, another one... Well I suppose I can find something for you to do too" reminding you that you were one of many grunts looking to prove themselves. In a Role Playing scenarios the game may guide you but it doesn't lead you by the nose.
It is a Game they got this one to.
They only got 2 out of the six right, and one of them is a technicallity since it could just have well been a Diablo style single player game with similar online capabilities. I doubt anybody would have noticed a difference.
WoW may be entertaining for a period but it lacks the long term (measured in played hours, not subscription length) "fun" that is expected from those who remember what MMO meant before Blizzard decided to take the genre for a game which barely met the qualifications.
I think it is a lot more basic, Blizzard made the first really proffesional game in the genre.
M59, UO, EQ, DaoC, AC and the rest all had fine ideas, but they never truly had great coding or a big budget. Most of those devs were amateurs even though Garriot made a bunch of single player games.
Compare most hit games with those games though and you see that they never been near in polish. While a few games like Minecraft old good on just the idea you really need a polished game to make a real bestseller and that is why Wow could get so big.
Once Blizz had a few million players they could put work in making the game accessable to all players, but that couldn't have happened without the basics.
Except that what you're describing -- done to a FPS -- completely undermines the core skill involved. More importantly, it undermines the core skills that players find enjoyable.
WOW on the other hand didn't undermine the core skill involved, and actually cut out several fatty deadweight systems which players didn't find enjoyable.
The oldschool MMORPGers (like the OP's post) lament the loss of these fatty systems, when really the better feedback they could give would be how to add more depth to gameplay through tweaks to the existing system, or new systems.
Good game design is about providing interesting decisions. Timesinks and Tediums are the worst forms of "challenge" (if you stretch the definition enough to even call them that) because they're not interesting decisions. They're just inefficient interfaces and big wastes of time.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
I think it's pretty clear that you either havent played EQ, or that you are making the mistake of judging games by modern standards as opposed to the standards at the time of release (I.E. The New > Old fallacy). EQ came out in 1999, most of the top games of the year were not even 3d games. For its time EQ had excellent graphics, excellent and polished code (most MMO's have lag issues to this day, EQ1 ran flawlessly on dialup modems), and it had a far less buggy release than many MMO's released since, including WOW. Also, you talk about success, EverQuest sold 3.5 million copies of the game, compare that to the vaunted Diablo II (released june of 2000) which sold about 4 million copies. Now, factor in that Diablo II was not 3d, and that EverQuest *required* a 3d card to play, and it gives you an idea of how succesful EQ1 was for its time.
The polish argument is bunk when comparing it to EQ.
"The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently."
- Friedrich Nietzsche
You are missing the point. The point was that the "fatty systems" which gamers find "unfun" are only unfun to people who were not MMO gamers. I'll give you an easy to understand example. Race cars. The seats are uncomfortable, they are loud due to no sound dampening materials, its hot, the suspension is harsh, etc. This is all done to save weight and increase performance. But, people who like racing are into this, they wouldnt trade the performance loss for a more comfortable seat, for example. WOW is the equivalent of bringing races to the masses by going to people who aren't racers, and going "hey, wanna try racing" and then strapping them into a "race car" that has nice thick padded seats, and sound dampening so they dont have to listen to the engine, etc, and a soft, compliant suspension so they're not jarred when they're driving. Those people are then convinced by blizzard and subsequently convincing themselves that they are now racing enthusiasts. Guess what, they're not.
The thing that people don't understand is that there is a huge difference between what EQ did and true timesinks. Blizzard has plenty of true timesinks in WOW. Remember those insane faction grinds just so you could get 1 item from 1 faction that was really nice? Remember how there was 1 or 2 caves which had very few spawns that you could kill for said faction? Has anybody forgotten about Archaeology? That was such a blatant slap in the face timesink it wasnt even funny.
You look at other games like FFXI which had timesinks in the form of making everything slow. Running was slow, attacks were slow, etc.
EQ definitely had some timesinks but it was no worse than anything out today. See the difference is in the days of EQ, the idea of a "end game" didnt exist, that term wasnt coined until long after it released. Now, MMOs aren't about the journey, they're about getting to this supposed "end game", and leveling is looked at as this barrier you have to get through before you can play the "real game".
In EQ you didnt look at it that way, because of the fact that leveling did take so long, you didnt mind spending a couple hours to go do some dungeon runs, or to go explore that area which is way higher level than you. Getting to that new outside area and being able to go into that new dungeon was exciting and fun. Everyone thinks people just sat around killing the same 6 mobs in a 50 foot radius for 10 hours a day to get levels. It wasn't like that. I remember many times where i spent hours with people exploring a dungeon, trying to find boss mobs and such, where i didnt even look at the XP bar but maybe one or twice. Why, because i was busy having fun, i didnt care about how long it took to level. I had plenty to do.
In WOW and modern MMO's, you're basically an idiot for doing anything outside of leveling because your options are A. Spend 2 hours questing and make 3-5 levels, or B. Go do a dungeon run, get an item that you're going to outlevel in 3 hours, and realize you were better off just spending that 3 hours "leveling". EQ was smart because it made your main method of getting XP and getting Items one and the same. This in turn promoted grouping, which made you have to interact with other people, which created a real community.
Now, again, im not saying EQ was perfect. There were some insanely dumb things. The ability to have your corpse dissapear and lose ALL of your items for example, was dumb. Being able to delevel from experience loss, was dumb. Ultimately having a lack of instancing due to technology at the time, created situations where dungeons could support 4-6 groups at a time, but due to no instancing, people ended up making lists and you many times had to wait to get into a solid XP group. Again, that was a technical limitation of the times so it cant be viewed as a design flaw.
Anyways, I just wanted to respond, i wont waste a lot of time as ive already said my piece.
"The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently."
- Friedrich Nietzsche
It's not about whether EQ was more polished than any other MMORPG at the time.
It's about EQ's polish vs. the polish of non-MMORPGs at the time.
EQ's look definitely wasn't on par with other games at that time.
Personally my biggest reason for not trying it at the time was during EQ's first couple years I talked with ~20 different people who played it and it felt like each person I talked to brought up a completely new reason the game's gameplay sounded terrible.
Meanwhile, System Shock 2, AOE2, Quake 3, Unreal Tournament, Diablo 2, and SC:Brood War were providing extremely high quality gameplay during those same years (not to mention BG 1 and 2, for the RPG crowd.)
I can't make the direct comparison because I never gave EQ a try, but it definitely sounded like most of the fun was hidden behind obtuse UIs, timesinks, and tedium compared with games released at the same time which let players quickly have a lot of fun.
To a degree it's the nature of the beast. Spreading your dev hours over 20 hours of bread is obviously going to be thicker than spread those same hours over 2000 hours of bread.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
I think you've been pretty clear at driving home the premise that you're the "One True MMORPGer" and that anyone who races in a comfy seat isn't actually racing even though they're racing.
Your views on WOW grouping are pretty outdated, as all of my fastest leveling (and best-geared-while-leveling) characters predominantly group. In fact my fastest levelled character spent like 95% of his time grouping.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
What part of playing EQ wasn't about leveling or getting the best gear don't you understand? You're so hung up on getting to endgame as fast as possible with the best gear possible you are totally missing the points trying to be made in this thread.
Bren
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Wow, where'd that come from?
The only thing I'm in a rush to get to is gameplay. I don't care about endgame. Heck most of my WOW over the last few years has been restarting the leveling process so I get more variety to my continual grouping (instead of playing only the endgame dungeons.)
The MMORPGs which chop out the wastes of time are the ones doing the best, so clearly most others seem to agree that the purpose of games is entertainment (gameplay, interesting decision-making.)
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
A man/woman of my own heart. Agree.
But sadly you just wasted 20 minutes, or however long it too you to write this, trying to explain anything to Axehilt and many others here. They just don't get it, or don't want to get it because it isn't what THEY want. They don't care if the genre is turning for the worse and away from what originally got it going. They didn't start playing them when they first started, and as long as it entertains them for what they are now (Extended version of single player console RPG's that just HAPPEN to have other players around that are basically tons of NPC's to the individual player), they are happy. Sadly, majority DOES rules because money is the root of all evil, and these non-MMO gamers, that think they are MMORPG gamers now after playing WoW, are the majority. Thanks Blizzard.
Yep...I am convinced WoW is the only MMORPG you have ever played. You simply fail to understand not everything in MMORPG's revolves around "Constant" gameplay. But console games do! *hint hint*
Downtime can be a good thing in MMORPG's for those that play them as they were meant in the beginning. For COMMUNITY interaction, to be able to get a drink, somethign to snack on, use the bathroom, etc, etc.
And LOL at interesting decision making (Modern MMO's)...like what?
Something like..."Do I do the quest to kill 10 rats for an already outdated weapon (Because I can get 10 levels in an hour), or the quest to deliver an urgent message of impending attack to town Whateverthename in the time limit..that is marked with a BIG yellow dot on my map" making it uninteresting and/or exciting and of no challenge what so ever.
At least back in the day if you were given quests, they were vague. So it gave somewhat of a hint, but you had to think and actually explore to find things. Map GPS in today's MMO's make it boring and just a grind.
There is little to no interesting decision making in today's MMO's. About your only decision making is..."when I reach cap in a month or less from just solo play, what Big elitist Guild do I want to join where I will be just a number in the crowd but can get the big shinies". It's a joke, and so are you.
THIS post shows me you are an impatient player who wants entertained in your way 24/7. And are the type who wants everything to change for YOU and want everyone to see it your way as being best...regardless of what it does to the genre...just like your God Blizzard does.
Comparing non-MMORPG's to MMORPG's....you are ridiculous.
What part of "different genre's" do you NOT understand. Again, want quick gameplay and fun? Go play console games...where such features were meant for and quit being player 875827589247 trying to change a different genre other people enjoy into what YOU want.
Seriously...are you the gaming industies most slick troller? Or are you really this dense?
I've played tons of MMORPGs, but only really enjoyed the few which focus on gameplay.
Your repeated reference to games as "console games" implies that you never played any PC games except MMORPGs, because PC games have always focused on gameplay too (they're games, it's kinda the point.)
I understand a niche likes world simulations. But what I do constantly is point out the obvious reality of the situation: most people strongly prefer games over world simulations.
The real problem is that I think a ton of the world sim lovers would actually enjoy a gameplay-focused sandbox game done right. But instead of making suggestions to take the genre in that direction, they make suggestions to return to mechanics which obviously failed in the past.
The interesting decisions in MMORPGs are in the moment to moment gameplay, reacting to the shifting needs of combat, and optimizing things to be as efficient as possible. Your character's skillset and rotation are a minigame to optimize, and the mob's abilities are a minigame to optimize against, and while in a group the dynamic actions of your teammates are a force to optimize for too.
These are all interesting decisions which are at the heart of MMORPGs' popularity. When the decisions are frequent and continuous, players consider that gameplay (ie entertainment; the reason they buy games.) When the decisions are infrequent, players consider that a waste of time (not the reason they buy games.)
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
The genre has already shifted to meet the demands of a larger audience. It has happened. This is reality. Players want gameplay, not tedium and timesinks.
It's not "impatient" to demand entertainment from a product designed to entertain. That's what people want.
Why shouldn't they be entertained? You can't come up with a reason (that anyone would care about) that they shouldn't be entertained. The inevitable reality is they prefer gameplay, not tedium and timesinks, and this will be reflected more and more in the games which are released and it's not a bad thing in the slightest.
This is reality, guy. Deal with it.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
I play all kinds of games. EMPIRE: Total War (RTS), PAYDAY: The Heist (FPS), Cities XL (SIM), Skyrim (RPG)...and so on and so on. The difference between me and you is, I know the differences between the genre's. HOW they function, and how they are meant to entertain and keep the players attention....you apprently do not. You seem to think they are all suppose to have infinite and instant fun non-stop. Well...let me let you in on a little secret....they all do, just in different ways, hence, why they are different genre's...to appeal to a certain audiences. All MMORPG's have timesinks...some just disguise them better than others. Even your precious WoW.
I understand what you mean by game play so you can quit trying to drive that point home. Where you are off with it is stated above. MMORPG's have only gone the route they have because of fanboys of WoW such as you. Whine and spam to be heard and change one genre to another selfishly to meet your needs....who care about those that have kept it going so you could even experience them. As long as it becomes more like whatever genre you came from (Betting console gaming) you don't care what else happens.
BTW...I am not reffering to ALL games as "console games", just to the fact that people like you are trying to change MMORPG's into console games...in some instances already have (See WoW and nearly any MMO since).
Anyways, I am done wasting breath on you, because you will never get it. Maybe had you given EQ a chance instead of being shallow and ignorant and just going on what others said you could see what they were, and the bucket of crap they have become, and understand what sets them apart from all other genre's.
A good write-up, Hrmnir. It voiced (wrote) many of my own thoughts.
I quit playing EQ, though, because I HAD to depend on others for my own game play beyond level 15-20. I never understood why people thought "forced grouping" meant "social interaction." I personally interacted MORE out of a group than in a group. I shouldn't open the can of worms of the "What does MMO mean?" argument, but there I did. There are thousands of people in an airport, but not everyone is taking the same flight. Even if there are others on the same flight as I am, I don't HAVE to interact with them in order to get to my destination. It is more fun if I DO interact with them, but I don't HAVE to. I am still able to say "Hi!" if I want, or simply converse if I feel like it to anyone in the airport with me, but I don't HAVE to.
The reason I think MMOs have failed to bring me into their fold lately is the players. You hit it on the head there. For me, there is no end game. I despise raiding and suck at PvP. For me, end game means the old fashioned "retire and re-roll" concept. I see a lot of posts from people who seem to be FPS cross overs ("Moar better combat and gear!") and SPRPGs ("Make ME the star of the story!").
I am not a gear grinder, I am a character builder/developer. There are many things that EQ did that I enjoyed, be it solo or in a group. It kept me playing for 3-4 years even though I had only ONE character get above 20th level (by joining a guild and getting to level 37). There was just so much to do besides gaining levels, but eventually, even that got old without being able to level up on my own terms. I rolled many characters with different race/class combos. I tried all kinds of crafting. I did beginning armor quests over and over, because I could do them solo and they were fun. I explored, even in places I had no business being in
It seems that now-a-days, games cater to the players (and there are millions of them) who race to "end-game" and forget the fun that is "the journey". I cannot blame game companies for trying to cash in on these new players and their play style. It amazes me at how fast games now HAVE to add "end game content" as opposed to the many other areas they could work on. And it is futile. That new content lasts maybe a month and then they have to give more "end game content" to please the masses. The rest of the game (the other 90%) suffers because of it, but it is what most players today desire.
I agree that it is the players and not the games that I find lacking in MMOs today. The MMOs cater to what the majority of players want.
- Al
Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse.- FARGIN_WAR
The difference between us is I observe reality while you seem to want to impose your sense of entitlement on the genre.
I don't get it? There's nothing to get. I observe what people like, with most players enjoying "pure" games (including me) and a niche preferring simulations. I observe that this inherently influences game design; much like natural selection: good ideas thrive while bad ones die out. I observe that you have no clue about PC gaming, to use the term "console gaming" with such vitriol, when even back when I played C64 games players preferred games over simulations. I observe that early MMORPGs had a lot of fatty features, and that later MMORPGs which cut away the fat produced lean, successful games that smashed expectations.
So there's really nothing left to get.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
I do not understand why anyone would want to play a game that feels like work that you should be paid for...
How is wanting an open world free to explore with more emphasis on the journey and not the destination, creative quests, death penalty, a good mix of solo and group content, and a worthy crafting system to promote some sense of an economy and some community a simulation? Explain this to me.
All you observe is easy mode for every game, with no variation to keep it interesting to a person with a brain.
And again, I use console gaming to describe the garbage you want to turn every game into. Instant gratification garbage, you and this ADD society. I guess a bit of challenge (Which in itself creates a sense of accomplishment and excitment when beaten) and having to use that soft tissue between your ears is long gone, and on comes mindless bland straight forward happy happy joy joy hamster wheels you can be bored of in a month for people like you.
To each his own.
I'll continue to lend assistance with this title due in 2013. Hopefully, they stay the course and won't listen to the WoW generation. So far, it shows lots of promise, but I am skeptical about the distance they envision going with it. We will see. Which BTW...I have done more alphas and betas than I can count, and have been playing games since 1982 when you were still crapping your diapers as my brother your age was. Not that 3 years is a huge difference. So don't tell me I don't know games. We just have different outlooks and tastes.
The emphasis isn't on the destination. It's all journey. The only thing all players care about is journey. "Endgame" is journey, because you're still playing the game. The destination is the very end of the game when you have best-in-slot everything, which virtually nobody reaches. Everyone else is still journeying.
If you're not chasing a simulation, you're certainly chasing niche-appeal mechanics like death penalty which don't really add to the depth of games. They usually don't add to challenge either (or add a tedious type of challenge which is less fun than typical gameplay.) And it's so unnecessary, given that a cost is already paid simply by failing an encounter and having things reset.
For the 100th time, easy mode is not what players want. They want a challenge suited to their skill, where skilled play feels rewarded. They want decision-making (and if it's too easy, there isn't decision-making.) But game depth needs to come from quality interactions between simple systems -- obtuse, overcomplicated, or unnecessarily time-consuming game systems are just bad game design. If you actually played games prior to MMORPGs, then remember the myriad of games which were fun without the need to be obtuse, overcomplicated, or time-consuming! Remember when you played well-designed games!
For the 100th time, the point of games is gratification. Entertainment. People want games to serve their purpose efficiently. Suggesting this is somehow a bad thing for people to want is ridiculous.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
What?!?
Journey is starting out at lvl 1...the journey is gaining those other levels towards cap, learning the class you are and how to use it well, do some crafting, questing, and sharing the experience with others in a persistent world.
End game consists of (In almost all cases) several big dungeons and some sub bosses and bosses...then repeating those same dunegeons over and over and over again until everyone is geared out. How is that still journey? That is a new gamer mentality.
If easymode isn't what everyone wants, then why don't you tell me why WoW keeps making things...easier? Why does every other MMO releasing follow suit? Instant travel out the ying yang, map GPS to everything, ability to solo to cap, instance heavy, outrageously OP'ed gear and weapons, safe respawn with no reprocussions for acting like a retard, level to cap in a month or less in most MMO's....but it isn't what most want? YOUR majority?
I am not saying every game has to be the way I want it...as you seem to think everyone wants what you want. Your just one in a majority of loud mouths that don't stop until eveyone sees ti your way. So fine....hamster wheels continue to spin. Sigh...
Going to guess now SWTOR goes f2p within a year.
In gaming terms, there are lots of ways people find fun that I do not, and vice versa. The trouble is that there are not a lot of choices now, even though there are MMOs in numbers never before seen. There are no longer any distinctions between mmoRPG, mmoRTS, mmoFPS, mmoACTION and the many other play styles people enjoy. They have become blended and morphed into a pale shadow of any of their former distinctive games. With the exception of "themepark" and "sandbox" MMOs, if you play one MMO, you have pretty much played them all.
And people pay and play them by the droves...
- Al
Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse.- FARGIN_WAR
The only thing that stops at "endgame" is leveling and (mostly) questing. Which is why it's a logical assumption that you're completely fixated on leveling if you believe journey stops at endgame. I don't know if you've actually played a MMORPG at endgame, if you think those players don't have a lot of learning their class left to do. I assure you: most do.
None of the things you list are true difficulty.
Instant travel is predominantly convenience, and at worst changes a challenge from something shallow ("avoid tough mobs") to a game system with a little more depth ("beat difficult mobs in combat").
Soloing doesn't change the individual skill requirement of a game (which is all that matters to players) -- if I have 0.2 sec to interrupt a spellcast to survive a solo fight, and 3 seconds to interrupt one to save the 5-man group from a wipe, clearly the solo fight is harder (even though the group fight requires a group.) True difficulty is measured on an individual basis.
Similarly, true difficulty is the challenge itself -- death penalty is not difficulty, it's inconvenience.
Map GPS is like instant travel: a shallow challenge (where am I going?) vs. an interesting one. Although I prefer WAR's vague area markers over specific location dots (unless the fiction supports knowing the precise location.) The point of "searching" in many quests is lost if you have a specific dot -- but if you lack a specific area, the act of searching for that specific location can be excessively time-consuming without being all that interesting (and inevitably you'd just look it up online if it passed that difficulty threshold, which is why "find thing thing" quests are dubious to begin with unless they're more dynamic)
Outrageously OP gear? No clue what you're even going on about here. Gear is lategame progression, and a great mechanic for being able to logically distribute rewards players care about when they beat a tough challenge.
Leveling to cap in a month has nothing to do with difficulty. In fact, it's a little more difficult when your progression in a game is completely reliant on the skill of you and your group to beat dungeon and raid bosses -- compared to the constant always-rewarded experience of XP and levels. A skilled player will gear up quickly, while an unskilled one will get their group wiped and receive nothing.
(That said, I could don't care about whether leveling is fast or slow. Doubt most players do. And since there is a niche group like yourself extremely fixated on earning the next level for their hit of dopamine, I think it probably makes more sense to let leveling work like old games. I also think the ability for players to tackle weaker challenges for slow-but-steady XP is a great mechanic for a game to have, which token systems kinda get at but XP is slightly better at.)
Sure, not everyone wants what I want. I never claimed that. I use the term "most" because most gamers like the gameplay-focused hassle-lite games I enjoy. It's clear by which games are successful.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver