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What's The Next "Seamless Open World"?

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Comments

  • RaxeonRaxeon Member UncommonPosts: 2,283

    mortal online is open world if they had some money and an actull talented coding team it could be an awsome game even tho i hear that they have some better coders now jus tnot alot fo cash flow is hurting them who knows

  • fenistilfenistil Member Posts: 3,005

    Originally posted by Teala

    ArcheAge will be the next seamless world.

    This.

  • PsyMike3dPsyMike3d Member UncommonPosts: 388

    Originally posted by fenistil

    Originally posted by Teala

    ArcheAge will be the next seamless world.

    This.

    +1

  • Loke666Loke666 Member EpicPosts: 21,441

    Originally posted by Teala

    ArcheAge will be the next seamless world.

    I don´t think so, at least not in English. Even if they actually find a western publisher today I don´t see it release this year.

    TERA is the next releasing MMO with a open world (at least if you count OPs definition). It will be out in april.

  • fenistilfenistil Member Posts: 3,005

    Originally posted by Loke666

    Originally posted by Teala

    ArcheAge will be the next seamless world.

    I don´t think so, at least not in English. Even if they actually find a western publisher today I don´t see it release this year.

    TERA is the next releasing MMO with a open world (at least if you count OPs definition). It will be out in april.

    Well I 'counted' my definition heh

     

    True it won't be out this year for sure.

     

    Ofc if you count 'almost seamless' worlds like WoW (not seamless but much more seamlessly than Swtor for example - well at least in vanilla cause now it is lobby instance game practically)  then yeah TERA propably.

     

  • elockeelocke Member UncommonPosts: 4,335

    Originally posted by Sylvarii

    Originally posted by expresso


    Originally posted by Sylvarii


    Originally posted by tixylix

    WoW had a great open world when I played before they ruined it with battlegrounds and the ability to enter instances from anywhere. Before all this you had to travel to an instance which took up real world space and you had to enter a structure or cave that lead to the instance. So that is why WoW's instances felt acceptable to me and the fact the rest of the world was seamless.

    I dunno what it is like now but when I left it was going down the shitter.

    Yeah i was there before Battlegrounds but WOW always had instances and loading screens between islands,no other way to get across the sea unless you load.

    That's why WOW was never a seameless open world MMO.

    I think you're nit picking.  Sure you load into instances and have to load between the two (now four major) land masses but thats cus theres a huge ocean or time/portal/wavey thing in the way, I can run,walk,fly from booty bay in the south of the eastern kingoms isle to the plaguelands in the north without a loading screen.. depending on the route I take I would pass by a dozen or more zones without a loading screen.  The Eastern kingdons Isle is estimated to be 100km/s in total that I can run around in without a loading screen.. I would consider that open world and any game that behaved similar would IMHO be open world.

    Seriously i'm not nit picking,a MMO world is totally open or it isn't,you cant have it both ways.Nearly being open is not the same as being open.

    I play football and sometimes i nearly score a goal but i miss,so that means i didn't score,their is no inbetween.I do the lottery and i had 5 numbers,you need six for the jackpot but five nearly gave me the winning prize but it didn't because i didn't have six numbers.

    In WOW you can go from one area to another on said island but to cross a sea or do i dungeon i have to enter an instance or load a screen to cross the sea.

    In vanguard i go to the dungeon and it's part of the open world and i can find other people using the same dungeon because it's a open world.I need to go from qalia to thestra,sure i can use a riftway but i can also fly,ride or sail their,i'm not forced to use a loading screen because it's an open world.

    You see the differance from Vanguard and WOW,would you call LOTRO an open world MMO?

    People here can get the hump all they like but the fact remains that games like WOW and LOTRO and any game with instances are not true open world MMO,that was the question of the OP.

    Perhaps the next true open world MMO will be AA but it's not Tera and it never was WOW.

    You just can't let anyone have the opinion that WoW is open world to them, can you?  Guess what, you lose in that respect.  No matter how hard you try to convince us, those of us who feel WoW is "open world", like myself, will continue to do so.  Now, do I feel Vangaurd is "more" open? sure.  Do I really care about a small difference?  NO.  I only care when the game is butchered into instance oblivion like Vindictus or EQ2.  That's when I would be "nitpicking" at this very RELATIVE and SUBJECTIVE issue.

    Anyway, along the lines of "feeling" open world and seamless, up and coming I believe ArcheAge and Tera will fit that bill.  Also, while GW2 sports loading screens between zones, they say the zones are fairly massive and can feel "open world"

    Another game that used loading screens per zone but always felt like a massive living world, was FFXI.  So, go figure.

  • Loke666Loke666 Member EpicPosts: 21,441

    Originally posted by fenistil

    Well I 'counted' my definition heh

    True it won't be out this year for sure.

    Ofc if you count 'almost seamless' worlds like WoW (not seamless but much more seamlessly than Swtor for example - well at least in vanilla cause now it is lobby instance game practically)  then yeah TERA propably.

    My feeling after trying tERA was that at least it was a lot more seamless than Wow. 

    And rumors say that even Archeage is supposed to have 3 instanced dungeons in it, few games have no instances whatsoever.

    My feeling after reading the OP was that Tera is probably what he is asking for. We can surely argue exactly what "seamless" means (is phasing OK for one thing?) but OP asked us a question and I think we should try to answer him what he want to know instead. :)

  • UrborgeinUrborgein Member Posts: 1

    I can´t believe that you have not talked about Ultima Online, the only seamless MMO in the world. Instances, houses, continents... all that without a single load screen...

  • Loke666Loke666 Member EpicPosts: 21,441

    Originally posted by elocke

    You just can't let anyone have the opinion that WoW is open world to them, can you?  Guess what, you lose in that respect.  No matter how hard you try to convince us, those of us who feel WoW is "open world", like myself, will continue to do so.  Now, do I feel Vangaurd is "more" open? sure.  Do I really care about a small difference?  NO.  I only care when the game is butchered into instance oblivion like Vindictus or EQ2.  That's when I would be "nitpicking" at this very RELATIVE and SUBJECTIVE issue.

    Anyway, along the lines of "feeling" open world and seamless, up and coming I believe ArcheAge and Tera will fit that bill.  Also, while GW2 sports loading screens between zones, they say the zones are fairly massive and can feel "open world"

    Another game that used loading screens per zone but always felt like a massive living world, was FFXI.  So, go figure.

    Wow is kinda seamless. Each continent is a zone  so even if it you don´t count dungeons, battlegrounds and phasing it isn´t completely seamless.

    But frankly is that not so important. I think OP mostly didn´t want a game were zones are small and you don´t have the feeling that they just show a small area of the gameworld with teleporting between them like in AoC and EQ2.

    i personally will experience GW2 pretty zoneless due to my SSDs, since all zones hangs together and are huge and that actually makes things a lot different fromn AoC where the zones have huge gaps between them. That blows no matter how fast you can load.

  • Loke666Loke666 Member EpicPosts: 21,441

    Originally posted by Urborgein

    I can´t believe that you have not talked about Ultima Online, the only seamless MMO in the world. Instances, houses, continents... all that without a single load screen...

    Yeah, it is because UO was unlike earlier games like Meridian 59 and the Realm not in 3D graphics. It is a lot easier to make a zoneless game like that.

    Still, it was a great game but not really what OP asked about.

  • UtukuMoonUtukuMoon Member Posts: 1,066

    Originally posted by elocke

    Originally posted by Sylvarii


    Originally posted by expresso


    Originally posted by Sylvarii


    Originally posted by tixylix

    WoW had a great open world when I played before they ruined it with battlegrounds and the ability to enter instances from anywhere. Before all this you had to travel to an instance which took up real world space and you had to enter a structure or cave that lead to the instance. So that is why WoW's instances felt acceptable to me and the fact the rest of the world was seamless.

    I dunno what it is like now but when I left it was going down the shitter.

    Yeah i was there before Battlegrounds but WOW always had instances and loading screens between islands,no other way to get across the sea unless you load.

    That's why WOW was never a seameless open world MMO.

    I think you're nit picking.  Sure you load into instances and have to load between the two (now four major) land masses but thats cus theres a huge ocean or time/portal/wavey thing in the way, I can run,walk,fly from booty bay in the south of the eastern kingoms isle to the plaguelands in the north without a loading screen.. depending on the route I take I would pass by a dozen or more zones without a loading screen.  The Eastern kingdons Isle is estimated to be 100km/s in total that I can run around in without a loading screen.. I would consider that open world and any game that behaved similar would IMHO be open world.

    Seriously i'm not nit picking,a MMO world is totally open or it isn't,you cant have it both ways.Nearly being open is not the same as being open.

    I play football and sometimes i nearly score a goal but i miss,so that means i didn't score,their is no inbetween.I do the lottery and i had 5 numbers,you need six for the jackpot but five nearly gave me the winning prize but it didn't because i didn't have six numbers.

    In WOW you can go from one area to another on said island but to cross a sea or do i dungeon i have to enter an instance or load a screen to cross the sea.

    In vanguard i go to the dungeon and it's part of the open world and i can find other people using the same dungeon because it's a open world.I need to go from qalia to thestra,sure i can use a riftway but i can also fly,ride or sail their,i'm not forced to use a loading screen because it's an open world.

    You see the differance from Vanguard and WOW,would you call LOTRO an open world MMO?

    People here can get the hump all they like but the fact remains that games like WOW and LOTRO and any game with instances are not true open world MMO,that was the question of the OP.

    Perhaps the next true open world MMO will be AA but it's not Tera and it never was WOW.

    You just can't let anyone have the opinion that WoW is open world to them, can you?  Guess what, you lose in that respect.  No matter how hard you try to convince us, those of us who feel WoW is "open world", like myself, will continue to do so.  Now, do I feel Vangaurd is "more" open? sure.  Do I really care about a small difference?  NO.  I only care when the game is butchered into instance oblivion like Vindictus or EQ2.  That's when I would be "nitpicking" at this very RELATIVE and SUBJECTIVE issue.

    Anyway, along the lines of "feeling" open world and seamless, up and coming I believe ArcheAge and Tera will fit that bill.  Also, while GW2 sports loading screens between zones, they say the zones are fairly massive and can feel "open world"

    Another game that used loading screens per zone but always felt like a massive living world, was FFXI.  So, go figure.

    You can have your opinion,i have no problem with anyones opinion,so where you get this 'i lose' from is beyond me lol.

    Let's get down to facts, no matter how you see WOW, the fact remains it's not an open world MMO,this is a 100% fact,sorry to bust your bubble but truth is truth.

    Feeling like a massive world does not means it is an open world.

    The OP ask people to correct him and i have done.

    You don't care about the small difference but we are not talking about whether elocke cares,we are talking about what makes a MMO a true open world.

    I don't need to convince anyone because what i'm saying is true.

    Does WOW have open dungeons like Vanguard and EQ had before LDON,does WOW force me to use a loading screen to get from one island to another?

    Yes or no..

     

  • Lille7Lille7 Member Posts: 301

    Originally posted by elocke

    Originally posted by Sylvarii


    Originally posted by expresso


    Originally posted by Sylvarii


    Originally posted by tixylix

    WoW had a great open world when I played before they ruined it with battlegrounds and the ability to enter instances from anywhere. Before all this you had to travel to an instance which took up real world space and you had to enter a structure or cave that lead to the instance. So that is why WoW's instances felt acceptable to me and the fact the rest of the world was seamless.

    I dunno what it is like now but when I left it was going down the shitter.

    Yeah i was there before Battlegrounds but WOW always had instances and loading screens between islands,no other way to get across the sea unless you load.

    That's why WOW was never a seameless open world MMO.

    I think you're nit picking.  Sure you load into instances and have to load between the two (now four major) land masses but thats cus theres a huge ocean or time/portal/wavey thing in the way, I can run,walk,fly from booty bay in the south of the eastern kingoms isle to the plaguelands in the north without a loading screen.. depending on the route I take I would pass by a dozen or more zones without a loading screen.  The Eastern kingdons Isle is estimated to be 100km/s in total that I can run around in without a loading screen.. I would consider that open world and any game that behaved similar would IMHO be open world.

    Seriously i'm not nit picking,a MMO world is totally open or it isn't,you cant have it both ways.Nearly being open is not the same as being open.

    I play football and sometimes i nearly score a goal but i miss,so that means i didn't score,their is no inbetween.I do the lottery and i had 5 numbers,you need six for the jackpot but five nearly gave me the winning prize but it didn't because i didn't have six numbers.

    In WOW you can go from one area to another on said island but to cross a sea or do i dungeon i have to enter an instance or load a screen to cross the sea.

    In vanguard i go to the dungeon and it's part of the open world and i can find other people using the same dungeon because it's a open world.I need to go from qalia to thestra,sure i can use a riftway but i can also fly,ride or sail their,i'm not forced to use a loading screen because it's an open world.

    You see the differance from Vanguard and WOW,would you call LOTRO an open world MMO?

    People here can get the hump all they like but the fact remains that games like WOW and LOTRO and any game with instances are not true open world MMO,that was the question of the OP.

    Perhaps the next true open world MMO will be AA but it's not Tera and it never was WOW.

    You just can't let anyone have the opinion that WoW is open world to them, can you?  Guess what, you lose in that respect.  No matter how hard you try to convince us, those of us who feel WoW is "open world", like myself, will continue to do so.  Now, do I feel Vangaurd is "more" open? sure.  Do I really care about a small difference?  NO.  I only care when the game is butchered into instance oblivion like Vindictus or EQ2.  That's when I would be "nitpicking" at this very RELATIVE and SUBJECTIVE issue.

    Anyway, along the lines of "feeling" open world and seamless, up and coming I believe ArcheAge and Tera will fit that bill.  Also, while GW2 sports loading screens between zones, they say the zones are fairly massive and can feel "open world"

    Another game that used loading screens per zone but always felt like a massive living world, was FFXI.  So, go figure.

    I feel that my brown desk is blue. So im gonna say its blue, but its really brown. But it makes me feel better to call it blue. Does that make my desk blue?

     

    Sometimes it's not really a matter of opinion, it's a matter of fact.

  • MogcatMogcat Member UncommonPosts: 193

    Originally posted by Sylvarii

    Originally posted by elocke


    Originally posted by Sylvarii


    Originally posted by expresso


    Originally posted by Sylvarii


    Originally posted by tixylix

    WoW had a great open world when I played before they ruined it with battlegrounds and the ability to enter instances from anywhere. Before all this you had to travel to an instance which took up real world space and you had to enter a structure or cave that lead to the instance. So that is why WoW's instances felt acceptable to me and the fact the rest of the world was seamless.

    I dunno what it is like now but when I left it was going down the shitter.

    Yeah i was there before Battlegrounds but WOW always had instances and loading screens between islands,no other way to get across the sea unless you load.

    That's why WOW was never a seameless open world MMO.

    I think you're nit picking.  Sure you load into instances and have to load between the two (now four major) land masses but thats cus theres a huge ocean or time/portal/wavey thing in the way, I can run,walk,fly from booty bay in the south of the eastern kingoms isle to the plaguelands in the north without a loading screen.. depending on the route I take I would pass by a dozen or more zones without a loading screen.  The Eastern kingdons Isle is estimated to be 100km/s in total that I can run around in without a loading screen.. I would consider that open world and any game that behaved similar would IMHO be open world.

    Seriously i'm not nit picking,a MMO world is totally open or it isn't,you cant have it both ways.Nearly being open is not the same as being open.

    I play football and sometimes i nearly score a goal but i miss,so that means i didn't score,their is no inbetween.I do the lottery and i had 5 numbers,you need six for the jackpot but five nearly gave me the winning prize but it didn't because i didn't have six numbers.

    In WOW you can go from one area to another on said island but to cross a sea or do i dungeon i have to enter an instance or load a screen to cross the sea.

    In vanguard i go to the dungeon and it's part of the open world and i can find other people using the same dungeon because it's a open world.I need to go from qalia to thestra,sure i can use a riftway but i can also fly,ride or sail their,i'm not forced to use a loading screen because it's an open world.

    You see the differance from Vanguard and WOW,would you call LOTRO an open world MMO?

    People here can get the hump all they like but the fact remains that games like WOW and LOTRO and any game with instances are not true open world MMO,that was the question of the OP.

    Perhaps the next true open world MMO will be AA but it's not Tera and it never was WOW.

    You just can't let anyone have the opinion that WoW is open world to them, can you?  Guess what, you lose in that respect.  No matter how hard you try to convince us, those of us who feel WoW is "open world", like myself, will continue to do so.  Now, do I feel Vangaurd is "more" open? sure.  Do I really care about a small difference?  NO.  I only care when the game is butchered into instance oblivion like Vindictus or EQ2.  That's when I would be "nitpicking" at this very RELATIVE and SUBJECTIVE issue.

    Anyway, along the lines of "feeling" open world and seamless, up and coming I believe ArcheAge and Tera will fit that bill.  Also, while GW2 sports loading screens between zones, they say the zones are fairly massive and can feel "open world"

    Another game that used loading screens per zone but always felt like a massive living world, was FFXI.  So, go figure.

    You can have your opinion,i have no problem with anyones opinion,so where you get this 'i lose' from is beyond me lol.

    Let's get down to facts, no matter how you see WOW, the fact remains it's not an open world MMO,this is a 100% fact,sorry to bust your bubble but truth is truth.

    Feeling like a massive world does not means it is an open world.

    The OP ask people to correct him and i have done.

    You don't care about the small difference but we are not talking about whether elocke cares,we are talking about what makes a MMO a true open world.

    I don't need to convince anyone because what i'm saying is true.

    Does WOW have open dungeons like Vanguard and EQ had before LDON,does WOW force me to use a loading screen to get from one island to another?

    Yes or no..

     

    Its not fact because there is no true official definition of open world or true official set of rules to check it on. Sylvarri unless you can get everyone on board with your definition and make it official then his interpretation is just as valid as yours. I mean how open must your world be

    For instance lets for a second theorise that back in Classic they divided EK and Kalimdor for computer memory reason which they probably did but anyway made them both seemless and open. Would you cut them some slack or not? Then they add dungeons oooh but now they've crossed the line in the sand sorry! Even though they did it for a gameplay reason.

    How open must you be?

    How abstract does my art have to be to be abstract art?

    Also who are you to draw that line in the sand? Sorry I get to decide on that! :P

    Sorry but they are not facts.

  • TomTrixxTomTrixx Member UncommonPosts: 94

    Lets not forget Fallen Earth, I think you pretty much can travel all over the world without ever seeing a loading screen, right?

  • Superduper69Superduper69 Member Posts: 363

    Originally posted by Lille7

    Originally posted by elocke


    Originally posted by Sylvarii


    Originally posted by expresso


    Originally posted by Sylvarii


    Originally posted by tixylix

    WoW had a great open world when I played before they ruined it with battlegrounds and the ability to enter instances from anywhere. Before all this you had to travel to an instance which took up real world space and you had to enter a structure or cave that lead to the instance. So that is why WoW's instances felt acceptable to me and the fact the rest of the world was seamless.

    I dunno what it is like now but when I left it was going down the shitter.

    Yeah i was there before Battlegrounds but WOW always had instances and loading screens between islands,no other way to get across the sea unless you load.

    That's why WOW was never a seameless open world MMO.

    I think you're nit picking.  Sure you load into instances and have to load between the two (now four major) land masses but thats cus theres a huge ocean or time/portal/wavey thing in the way, I can run,walk,fly from booty bay in the south of the eastern kingoms isle to the plaguelands in the north without a loading screen.. depending on the route I take I would pass by a dozen or more zones without a loading screen.  The Eastern kingdons Isle is estimated to be 100km/s in total that I can run around in without a loading screen.. I would consider that open world and any game that behaved similar would IMHO be open world.

    Seriously i'm not nit picking,a MMO world is totally open or it isn't,you cant have it both ways.Nearly being open is not the same as being open.

    I play football and sometimes i nearly score a goal but i miss,so that means i didn't score,their is no inbetween.I do the lottery and i had 5 numbers,you need six for the jackpot but five nearly gave me the winning prize but it didn't because i didn't have six numbers.

    In WOW you can go from one area to another on said island but to cross a sea or do i dungeon i have to enter an instance or load a screen to cross the sea.

    In vanguard i go to the dungeon and it's part of the open world and i can find other people using the same dungeon because it's a open world.I need to go from qalia to thestra,sure i can use a riftway but i can also fly,ride or sail their,i'm not forced to use a loading screen because it's an open world.

    You see the differance from Vanguard and WOW,would you call LOTRO an open world MMO?

    People here can get the hump all they like but the fact remains that games like WOW and LOTRO and any game with instances are not true open world MMO,that was the question of the OP.

    Perhaps the next true open world MMO will be AA but it's not Tera and it never was WOW.

    You just can't let anyone have the opinion that WoW is open world to them, can you?  Guess what, you lose in that respect.  No matter how hard you try to convince us, those of us who feel WoW is "open world", like myself, will continue to do so.  Now, do I feel Vangaurd is "more" open? sure.  Do I really care about a small difference?  NO.  I only care when the game is butchered into instance oblivion like Vindictus or EQ2.  That's when I would be "nitpicking" at this very RELATIVE and SUBJECTIVE issue.

    Anyway, along the lines of "feeling" open world and seamless, up and coming I believe ArcheAge and Tera will fit that bill.  Also, while GW2 sports loading screens between zones, they say the zones are fairly massive and can feel "open world"

    Another game that used loading screens per zone but always felt like a massive living world, was FFXI.  So, go figure.

    I feel that my brown desk is blue. So im gonna say its blue, but its really brown. But it makes me feel better to call it blue. Does that make my desk blue?

     

    Sometimes it's not really a matter of opinion, it's a matter of fact.

    There is no such thing as a fact when it comes to ever changing features and definitions of MMO and its elements. However, in this case facts can be disputed very easily.


    fact/fakt/


    Noun:

    1. A thing that is indisputably the case.

    2. Information used as evidence or as part of a report or news article.

     

     

     


     

  • fenistilfenistil Member Posts: 3,005

    Originally posted by Loke666

    Originally posted by fenistil

    Well I 'counted' my definition heh

    True it won't be out this year for sure.

    Ofc if you count 'almost seamless' worlds like WoW (not seamless but much more seamlessly than Swtor for example - well at least in vanilla cause now it is lobby instance game practically)  then yeah TERA propably.

    My feeling after trying tERA was that at least it was a lot more seamless than Wow. 

    And rumors say that even Archeage is supposed to have 3 instanced dungeons in it, few games have no instances whatsoever.

    My feeling after reading the OP was that Tera is probably what he is asking for. We can surely argue exactly what "seamless" means (is phasing OK for one thing?) but OP asked us a question and I think we should try to answer him what he want to know instead. :)

    For me phasing is like instancing - so no not seamless thing at all.

    Sure AA is not completly seamless like UO was / is for example. Just compared to other AAA titles think is most seamless.

  • alakramalakram Member UncommonPosts: 2,301

    Originally posted by Metentso

    WoW is the closest you can have to an open world.

    Fallen Earth, for example, is far more open world and seamless.



  • XasapisXasapis Member RarePosts: 6,337

    OP I think you may avoid the confusion if you separate seamless and open from the thread title, since they describe two different things.

    From my own point of view, seamless is a world where you can move from a region to the next without a loading screen. By that definition, transverse from one continent to the next is allowed not to be seamless and the world can have group specific dungeons.

    Open on the other hand does not allow for group (or raid specific) content. If your group can visit a dungeon and you are locked in it alone, then the world is not open.

     

    Very few games nowadays are open. Games like UO, Vanguard, Lineage 2, Fallen Earth, EVE fit that description.

    It is easier to find seamless games. The design allows for more freedom and accessibility, so they are more popular (among designers for certain). Most popular atm is still WoW (well, was realy. Phasing really killed the seamless part), LOTRO and others. Tera is launching and is seamless as well.

    Then you have games that are zoned by design. For example, I can't think how they could have made The Secret World seamless. Others are heavily zoned without the need for it (while I understand each planet being a separate zone in SW:TOR, I don't see why every second house needs to be one as well.

     

    There is one other change that we see and is not really discussed, because while it is not something new, the reason it is happening today is different. Basically in a game like WoW or LOTRO or any other where landmass is fixed, you had to have your population separated in different servers so as not to overcrowd your areas. Now that server technology is improving, what we see is that they start to merge the serve design in what they call channels. Basically you can have multiple servers tied into one where you can hop from one shard to the next on the fly (sort of like Tera's design) or you can log to any server without restriction or get assigned to a new one if yours is overflown (sort of like GW's design). We're a bit far from one gigantic server for the whole population, but we're slowly getting there.

     

    To keep it sort:

    The next seamless world game to launch in EU/US will be Tera.

    The next open world game to launch in EU/US will be nothing. However, Archeage is about to launch in Korea and if they decide to bring the game in EU/US, it'll be the next open world game to launch.

     

    (Edit: As for the whether instanced dungeons break the open world, it all depends on how much time is spent on them. If the majority of time is spend in instances like in WoW, then the game is not open, if not I think we can let it called open regardless of their presence. So, even if Archeage does have instanced dungeons, if you spend the majority of your time in the open world, we can still call the game open world imo)

  • delete5230delete5230 Member EpicPosts: 7,081

    I would really like to say WoW is open world enough to say yes. Sure we have one clown here trying to argue with everyone by splitting hairs.

    HOWEVER..... As of the last two years ( dungeon finder ) made it a lobby game. And no one ever players in the open seamless world at all. Blizzard encouraged this, this is not the players fault.

     

    To make a long story short......WoW is an open world with mini games.  And everyone is playing the mini games !

  • PurpleCliffPurpleCliff Member UncommonPosts: 156

    Originally posted by tixylix

    WoW had a great open world when I played before they ruined it with battlegrounds and the ability to enter instances from anywhere. Before all this you had to travel to an instance which took up real world space and you had to enter a structure or cave that lead to the instance. So that is why WoW's instances felt acceptable to me and the fact the rest of the world was seamless.

    I dunno what it is like now but when I left it was going down the shitter.

    Yeah, essentially this is what I miss and I don't understand why MMOs are heading in the other direction. The believable persistent online world was so exciting.

  • PsyMike3dPsyMike3d Member UncommonPosts: 388

    Originally posted by Urborgein

    I can´t believe that you have not talked about Ultima Online, the only seamless MMO in the world. Instances, houses, continents... all that without a single load screen...

    not the only, Darkfall and Archeage are seamless also

  • Lille7Lille7 Member Posts: 301

    Originally posted by Superduper69

    Originally posted by Lille7


    Originally posted by elocke


    Originally posted by Sylvarii


    Originally posted by expresso


    Originally posted by Sylvarii


    Originally posted by tixylix

    WoW had a great open world when I played before they ruined it with battlegrounds and the ability to enter instances from anywhere. Before all this you had to travel to an instance which took up real world space and you had to enter a structure or cave that lead to the instance. So that is why WoW's instances felt acceptable to me and the fact the rest of the world was seamless.

    I dunno what it is like now but when I left it was going down the shitter.

    Yeah i was there before Battlegrounds but WOW always had instances and loading screens between islands,no other way to get across the sea unless you load.

    That's why WOW was never a seameless open world MMO.

    I think you're nit picking.  Sure you load into instances and have to load between the two (now four major) land masses but thats cus theres a huge ocean or time/portal/wavey thing in the way, I can run,walk,fly from booty bay in the south of the eastern kingoms isle to the plaguelands in the north without a loading screen.. depending on the route I take I would pass by a dozen or more zones without a loading screen.  The Eastern kingdons Isle is estimated to be 100km/s in total that I can run around in without a loading screen.. I would consider that open world and any game that behaved similar would IMHO be open world.

    Seriously i'm not nit picking,a MMO world is totally open or it isn't,you cant have it both ways.Nearly being open is not the same as being open.

    I play football and sometimes i nearly score a goal but i miss,so that means i didn't score,their is no inbetween.I do the lottery and i had 5 numbers,you need six for the jackpot but five nearly gave me the winning prize but it didn't because i didn't have six numbers.

    In WOW you can go from one area to another on said island but to cross a sea or do i dungeon i have to enter an instance or load a screen to cross the sea.

    In vanguard i go to the dungeon and it's part of the open world and i can find other people using the same dungeon because it's a open world.I need to go from qalia to thestra,sure i can use a riftway but i can also fly,ride or sail their,i'm not forced to use a loading screen because it's an open world.

    You see the differance from Vanguard and WOW,would you call LOTRO an open world MMO?

    People here can get the hump all they like but the fact remains that games like WOW and LOTRO and any game with instances are not true open world MMO,that was the question of the OP.

    Perhaps the next true open world MMO will be AA but it's not Tera and it never was WOW.

    You just can't let anyone have the opinion that WoW is open world to them, can you?  Guess what, you lose in that respect.  No matter how hard you try to convince us, those of us who feel WoW is "open world", like myself, will continue to do so.  Now, do I feel Vangaurd is "more" open? sure.  Do I really care about a small difference?  NO.  I only care when the game is butchered into instance oblivion like Vindictus or EQ2.  That's when I would be "nitpicking" at this very RELATIVE and SUBJECTIVE issue.

    Anyway, along the lines of "feeling" open world and seamless, up and coming I believe ArcheAge and Tera will fit that bill.  Also, while GW2 sports loading screens between zones, they say the zones are fairly massive and can feel "open world"

    Another game that used loading screens per zone but always felt like a massive living world, was FFXI.  So, go figure.

    I feel that my brown desk is blue. So im gonna say its blue, but its really brown. But it makes me feel better to call it blue. Does that make my desk blue?

     

    Sometimes it's not really a matter of opinion, it's a matter of fact.

    There is no such thing as a fact when it comes to ever changing features and definitions of MMO and its elements. However, in this case facts can be disputed very easily.


    fact/fakt/


    Noun:

    1. A thing that is indisputably the case.

    2. Information used as evidence or as part of a report or news article.

     

     

     


     

    How can it be disputed that WoW is a not seamless world? Going from storwind into the stockades, tada loading screen, a seam in the world. Not seamless. Open world? Going from stormwind into the stockade, you are now closed of from the rest of the world. Not open.

  • TerranahTerranah Member UncommonPosts: 3,575

    The more load screens between zones you have the less open the world feels.  There is also a subjective aspect to it when considering the topography of the world and limitations it places on the player in terms of movement and exploration.

     

    Seamless to me refers to my experience as the player.  Some people will say WOW is not seamless because there is loading in the background but this a technical aspect the player does not experience so for me it doesn't count.  Where I get bothered is when a world is comprised of x amt of zones and there is a load screen between each zone, which in turn has instancing and sharding to further splinter the population.

     

    To me a lot of developers make excuses.  They act like many of the things we experienced in past mmos are not possible today, despite most people having faster connections and more powerful computers.  Maybe it's there crappy game engines.

  • tixylixtixylix Member UncommonPosts: 1,288

    Originally posted by expresso

    Originally posted by Sylvarii


    Originally posted by tixylix

    WoW had a great open world when I played before they ruined it with battlegrounds and the ability to enter instances from anywhere. Before all this you had to travel to an instance which took up real world space and you had to enter a structure or cave that lead to the instance. So that is why WoW's instances felt acceptable to me and the fact the rest of the world was seamless.

    I dunno what it is like now but when I left it was going down the shitter.

    Yeah i was there before Battlegrounds but WOW always had instances and loading screens between islands,no other way to get across the sea unless you load.

    That's why WOW was never a seameless open world MMO.

    I think you're nit picking.  Sure you load into instances and have to load between the two (now four major) land masses but thats cus theres a huge ocean or time/portal/wavey thing in the way, I can run,walk,fly from booty bay in the south of the eastern kingoms isle to the plaguelands in the north without a loading screen.. depending on the route I take I would pass by a dozen or more zones without a loading screen.  The Eastern kingdons Isle is estimated to be 100km/s in total that I can run around in without a loading screen.. I would consider that open world and any game that behaved similar would IMHO be open world.

    The thing is as well it made you go on the boat ride, it didn't magically warp you to another location. In EQ2 you click on a carpet and it parts of the way and then you hit a loading screen and suddenly you're there. In WoW you did the travel on both sides and there was only one loading screen between two massive land masses, they did make it so it felt very natural like the instances.

  • tixylixtixylix Member UncommonPosts: 1,288

    nm
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