All I know is I''m tired of doing quests. LAME quests. Singe player games have much better quests (and NPC, creatures AI) then mmorpg's. So in that respect the OP is right when he says mmorpgs are ten year old console games.
I don't get it. Why is is so hard to take advantage of the fact you can have 5000 people on one server and design a game for that which does not involve LAME quests and annoying raids.
I only know two games which are designed properly; Eve online and Planetside (dead now)
And neither of them are rpg's.
There is a simple awnser to that. you dont like theme park games. its pretty obvious, The problem with having missions that have things like open world PVP is that it forces people who don't want it while they are leveling (the majority i assure you) to get randomly killed by somone as they finish fighting a mob, then in return be corpse camped until logging to boost someones Epeen.
My opinion is that if they changed PvP servers to that they had more quests for random killing of players, less people would complain. sadly when it comes to AI based quests you are somewhat limited in what you can do.
Because i can. I'm Hopeful For Every Game, Until the Fan Boys Attack My Games. Then the Knives Come Out. Logic every gamers worst enemy.
I gotta disagree with the OP. its not dead, it has hit a painful Speedbumb but with a genre still in its infancy it cant be dead. was FPS's dead for the years upon years that it was the same game repeated with new guns and pretty new targets to shoot. no it was just in a downturn, now that new ideas are being brought in its getting popular again (well it is beyond popular now) MMORPG industry will do the same thing.
TSW is a sure sign that it is starting to change, its a game that instead of saying "should i play a mage or a warrior" i say to myself "do i wanna do damage Via Zone, AoE consecutive hits, Heavy Single Target, or which ever new style i suddenly stumble upon"
and i know what people are going to say "The game can't be good because funcom made it" to which i will reply "sure, then keep complaining that there is nothing new. the games are clones of wow and that your quitting MMORPG's, i wont miss you"
WTH does the way you choose your skills have to do with MASSIVE MULTIPLAYER game design? Skyrim has that, Oblivion did, come on!
I don't play TSW because it is a single player game with other people around you. I want to be able to interact with other people. I want to hire them to help me explore a dangerous world, I want to track them down to collect the bounty on their head, I want to visit their shop, I want to make trade routes, I want people to look out for a certain item I need, I want specialized crafters, I want to play card games for gold with them, invite them to my castle, etc. etc. etc. All that PLUS a worthwile "end game". (which SWG was lacking) Could be pvp, could be constrcution (think Minecraft), could be power (EVE), could be capitalism (linked to real money) or ALL of that.
I gotta disagree with the OP. its not dead, it has hit a painful Speedbumb but with a genre still in its infancy it cant be dead. was FPS's dead for the years upon years that it was the same game repeated with new guns and pretty new targets to shoot. no it was just in a downturn, now that new ideas are being brought in its getting popular again (well it is beyond popular now) MMORPG industry will do the same thing.
TSW is a sure sign that it is starting to change, its a game that instead of saying "should i play a mage or a warrior" i say to myself "do i wanna do damage Via Zone, AoE consecutive hits, Heavy Single Target, or which ever new style i suddenly stumble upon"
and i know what people are going to say "The game can't be good because funcom made it" to which i will reply "sure, then keep complaining that there is nothing new. the games are clones of wow and that your quitting MMORPG's, i wont miss you"
WTH does the way you choose your skills have to do with MASSIVE MULTIPLAYER game design? Skyrim has that, Oblivion did, come on!
I don't play TSW because it is a single player game with other people around you. I want to be able to interact with other people. I want to hire them to help me explore a dangerous world, I want to track them down to collect the bounty on their head, I want to visit their shop, I want to make trade routes, I want people to look out for a certain item I need, I want specialized crafters, I want to play card games for gold with them, invite them to my castle, etc. etc. etc. All that PLUS a worthwile "end game". (which SWG was lacking) Could be pvp, could be constrcution (think Minecraft), could be power (EVE), could be capitalism (linked to real money) or ALL of that.
i already have a post directed at you, please read that before opening your mouth again.
Funny little fact ive played many Sandbox games, they actually have a good 40% failure rate. most of them either shine (eve is a great example), or then become a over glorified Deathmatch (the sad fate of Face of Mankind)
Because i can. I'm Hopeful For Every Game, Until the Fan Boys Attack My Games. Then the Knives Come Out. Logic every gamers worst enemy.
It would just be great to have something more to do in these modern MMOs. EVE online, Runescape and one or two other old games have way more to do than just questing, a little crafting and some PVP. Just so tired of the same old, same old.
Do some quests, level to max, regurgitate content, repeat till bored. ugggggghhhhhhhhhhh
I gotta disagree with the OP. its not dead, it has hit a painful Speedbumb but with a genre still in its infancy it cant be dead. was FPS's dead for the years upon years that it was the same game repeated with new guns and pretty new targets to shoot. no it was just in a downturn, now that new ideas are being brought in its getting popular again (well it is beyond popular now) MMORPG industry will do the same thing.
TSW is a sure sign that it is starting to change, its a game that instead of saying "should i play a mage or a warrior" i say to myself "do i wanna do damage Via Zone, AoE consecutive hits, Heavy Single Target, or which ever new style i suddenly stumble upon"
and i know what people are going to say "The game can't be good because funcom made it" to which i will reply "sure, then keep complaining that there is nothing new. the games are clones of wow and that your quitting MMORPG's, i wont miss you"
WTH does the way you choose your skills have to do with MASSIVE MULTIPLAYER game design? Skyrim has that, Oblivion did, come on!
I don't play TSW because it is a single player game with other people around you. I want to be able to interact with other people. I want to hire them to help me explore a dangerous world, I want to track them down to collect the bounty on their head, I want to visit their shop, I want to make trade routes, I want people to look out for a certain item I need, I want specialized crafters, I want to play card games for gold with them, invite them to my castle, etc. etc. etc. All that PLUS a worthwile "end game". (which SWG was lacking) Could be pvp, could be constrcution (think Minecraft), could be power (EVE), could be capitalism (linked to real money) or ALL of that.
i already have a post directed at you, please read that before opening your mouth again.
I read it. mobs, missions. You're still stuck in standard game mmorpg design. Why do we need mobs or missions?
I'm not killing mobs in single player rpg's, why in mmorpg's? Surely with 5000 people on one server there is no need for missions which involve NPC's?
The whole mmorpg genre is fucked up. I imagined so many things ten years ago and none of these things happened instead we went backwards and now are locked in a standard design. Like an FPS or RTS. MMO could be anything you want, jut design the game to take advantage of 5000 people (or 50.000!) on one server.
The genre ain't dead -_- it's only changing towards a more rpg-esque nature. If I want to play "community" I'll stick with RL, thank you very much. If on the other hand I want to play a game with a community residing in it, I'll be glad to take an mmorpg.
100% combat oriented gameplay? Oh please have a word with GW2's crafting system, economy and minigames. Sure you can't be a musician in that game, but I ain't intrested in those things.
I play mmorpgs to do things I can't do in real life and being a violist is not one of those things I wish to do in my mmorpg. And having musicians or proffesional dancers in your world doesn't contribute to your so-called "community". It could be a benefactor, but not a necessary one...
Have you been sleeping? We are finally getting out of the WoW-clone era and things are finally changing (GW2 and TSW). Which might mean a new golden age for non WoW clone mmos, but all you can say is that the genre is dying?
"Isn't a raid plundering villages in WoW or something like that?" - Robert Desable
I gotta disagree with the OP. its not dead, it has hit a painful Speedbumb but with a genre still in its infancy it cant be dead. was FPS's dead for the years upon years that it was the same game repeated with new guns and pretty new targets to shoot. no it was just in a downturn, now that new ideas are being brought in its getting popular again (well it is beyond popular now) MMORPG industry will do the same thing.
TSW is a sure sign that it is starting to change, its a game that instead of saying "should i play a mage or a warrior" i say to myself "do i wanna do damage Via Zone, AoE consecutive hits, Heavy Single Target, or which ever new style i suddenly stumble upon"
and i know what people are going to say "The game can't be good because funcom made it" to which i will reply "sure, then keep complaining that there is nothing new. the games are clones of wow and that your quitting MMORPG's, i wont miss you"
WTH does the way you choose your skills have to do with MASSIVE MULTIPLAYER game design? Skyrim has that, Oblivion did, come on!
I don't play TSW because it is a single player game with other people around you. I want to be able to interact with other people. I want to hire them to help me explore a dangerous world, I want to track them down to collect the bounty on their head, I want to visit their shop, I want to make trade routes, I want people to look out for a certain item I need, I want specialized crafters, I want to play card games for gold with them, invite them to my castle, etc. etc. etc. All that PLUS a worthwile "end game". (which SWG was lacking) Could be pvp, could be constrcution (think Minecraft), could be power (EVE), could be capitalism (linked to real money) or ALL of that.
i already have a post directed at you, please read that before opening your mouth again.
I read it. mobs, missions. You're still stuck in standard game mmorpg design. Why do we need mobs or missions?
I'm not killing mobs in single player rpg's, why in mmorpg's? Surely with 5000 people on one server there is no need for missions which involve NPC's?
The whole mmorpg genre is fucked up. I imagined so many things ten years ago and none of these things happened instead we went backwards and now are locked in a standard design. Like an FPS or RTS. MMO could be anything you want, jut design the game to take advantage of 5000 people (or 50.000!) on one server.
Its not "fucked up" your basically saying that the entire MMORPG genre is bad because its not all sandbox. not everyone likes sandbox, personally from the sandbox i have played it took for too long to get into anything interesting and when i did finally get in the game went into a downturn because the casual Crowd hit it. i made this example in another thread but ill post it here because i feel it fits.
Think of it in literal terms, You and your friend are in a real sandbox building and digging. the casual gamer is the kid that walks in and boots everything you made because its fun. (not every casual gamer but you know what i mean) you normally can get rid of that one person, the sad part about it is that he comes back the next day with 7 times as meny people as you have. suddenly the game is no longer building its just kicking Sand in peoples faces.
This is why we have a lack of Sandbox games, they crumble because the wrong crowd turns Simcity into Grand Theft Auto.
Because i can. I'm Hopeful For Every Game, Until the Fan Boys Attack My Games. Then the Knives Come Out. Logic every gamers worst enemy.
lately i have been a bit dislolusioned with mmo's..i bought TSW and GW2 and i have to admit i like TSW and GW2 but i cant be bothered to play the beta on gw2 or login on TSW..i seem to spend more time playing solo rpg's like the witcher 1 and 2,risen,dragon age 1 and 2.dont know how to put it..i,m bored to death of them atm.maybe just a phase i,m going through but i,m more than happy with the solo games.i,m not saying they are better but they seem more appealing..or i,m just too old now to play them.god know's.
100% combat oriented online games. Cash shops come standard. Purely developer driven content. Esport is the name of the game for pvp. Socialization has become automatized.
If you were to tell me ten years ago that this is what MMORPGS would be like, I would have never even bothered to get involved.
MMO versions of old console games from a decade ago. Thats what we have right now. The irony is that console games today are actually more open and diverse than these so called mmorpgs.
Its a shame. I have faith in indie devs, as always. But the AAA mmo devs have really led the genre astray as of late. I wonder if it will ever get back on track.
I am not sure I would go so far as dead but I think your point is valid. The Genre has shifted to the mainstream market and the target audience now are box sales for non-MMO players. The end result is we have games targeted towards high eye candy flashy type of play that non MMO gamers want. FPS combat, PVP base, no grind and simplistic mechanics. But these players are not the type wth the patience to play a MMO very long which is likely why they did not stick with MMOs in the past. Esssentially we have box sales games and people jumping from game. Websites like this help to make it worse by hyping up new games regardless of the quality and letting the fanboys run rampant with their wild claims. The fanboys atack anyone that disagrees with their dream game calling them names and running them off the forums. Bad games are released and a few months later the fanboys have moved on to hying their next game of the week. The only ones that benefit here are the developers in box sales and websites like this with massive page hits.
The more traditional model games lose players every time one of these new gimmick games is released and then get some of those players back a few months later. The sad thing is these gimmick games not only take the non MMO players away but they hurt the traditional games as many people there will buy into the hype until they play a month or two. It does a lot of damage to guilds and the health of these games.
Maybe the best thing is for more games to fail like ToR and maybe we will see more games directed at MMO veterans who want to actually put time into a game rather than being given all a games rewards simply for knowing how to log in. I doubt we will see the vocal FPS/PvP crowd that has emerged the last few years go away but if the money and the hype goes away maybe they will go away to. Maybe the best thing is lower budgets and for MMOs to go back to being a niche genre. With Tor's collapse and the possibiltiy of something similar with TESO it might become much harder for games to get that type of investment.
Regardless I liked your post and feel for you and for what has happened to this genre.
Why cant you people accept reality already? The majoritry doesnt want a fricking simulation game and yes thats EXACTLY what you people are asking for.
Genres evolve through time, deal with it. What was a mmorpg 12 years ago is different to what it is now.
What mmorpg means now is exactly the same as the word.
They are massive
They are multiplayer
They are online
and they are role playing games.
If you people want second life set on the medieval times go make your own game.
As far as im concerned mmorpgs nowdays are great and millions agree with me.
sorry i have to disagree with you aswell. there is a very large sandbox following its just that our games get ruined by people who with dont understand them or simply dont care
Because i can. I'm Hopeful For Every Game, Until the Fan Boys Attack My Games. Then the Knives Come Out. Logic every gamers worst enemy.
I gotta disagree with the OP. its not dead, it has hit a painful Speedbumb but with a genre still in its infancy it cant be dead. was FPS's dead for the years upon years that it was the same game repeated with new guns and pretty new targets to shoot. no it was just in a downturn, now that new ideas are being brought in its getting popular again (well it is beyond popular now) MMORPG industry will do the same thing.
TSW is a sure sign that it is starting to change, its a game that instead of saying "should i play a mage or a warrior" i say to myself "do i wanna do damage Via Zone, AoE consecutive hits, Heavy Single Target, or which ever new style i suddenly stumble upon"
and i know what people are going to say "The game can't be good because funcom made it" to which i will reply "sure, then keep complaining that there is nothing new. the games are clones of wow and that your quitting MMORPG's, i wont miss you"
WTH does the way you choose your skills have to do with MASSIVE MULTIPLAYER game design? Skyrim has that, Oblivion did, come on!
I don't play TSW because it is a single player game with other people around you. I want to be able to interact with other people. I want to hire them to help me explore a dangerous world, I want to track them down to collect the bounty on their head, I want to visit their shop, I want to make trade routes, I want people to look out for a certain item I need, I want specialized crafters, I want to play card games for gold with them, invite them to my castle, etc. etc. etc. All that PLUS a worthwile "end game". (which SWG was lacking) Could be pvp, could be constrcution (think Minecraft), could be power (EVE), could be capitalism (linked to real money) or ALL of that.
i already have a post directed at you, please read that before opening your mouth again.
I read it. mobs, missions. You're still stuck in standard game mmorpg design. Why do we need mobs or missions?
I'm not killing mobs in single player rpg's, why in mmorpg's? Surely with 5000 people on one server there is no need for missions which involve NPC's?
The whole mmorpg genre is fucked up. I imagined so many things ten years ago and none of these things happened instead we went backwards and now are locked in a standard design. Like an FPS or RTS. MMO could be anything you want, jut design the game to take advantage of 5000 people (or 50.000!) on one server.
Its not "fucked up" your basically saying that the entire MMORPG genre is bad because its not all sandbox.
Yes I am.
Think of it in literal terms, You and your friend are in a real sandbox building and digging. the casual gamer is the kid that walks in and boots everything you made because its fun. (not every casual gamer but you know what i mean) you normally can get rid of that one person, the sad part about it is that he comes back the next day with 7 times as meny people as you have. suddenly the game is no longer building its just kicking Sand in peoples faces.
Or they hire good game designers and programmers who make it so the kid can''t destroy your buildings. I can think of several methods just of the top of my head, I'm sure you can as well.
- you acguire a piece of land, only you can build there.
- building is in a private instance (placement is not)
I bet if developers put the same effort they put in making these hundreds of quests (voice acting?!!) and all of these boundaries and systems which make sure players don't do stuff the developers don't want them to, they could make a HELL of a game.
You could call it a sandbox, I will call it a Massively Multiplayer game.
I'm done doing crappy quests with crappy NPC mobs.
The only response I can possible give to threads like these is I've recently been having some of the greatest times of my 9 year MMO career during the past 3 GW2 beta weekends. And I know many more players can say the same about Rfit, SW:ToR and TSW among other games right now. The genre is decidedly not dead.
Why cant you people accept reality already? The majoritry doesnt want a fricking simulation game and yes thats EXACTLY what you people are asking for.
Genres evolve through time, deal with it. What was a mmorpg 12 years ago is different to what it is now.
What mmorpg means now is exactly the same as the word.
They are massive
They are multiplayer
They are online
and they are role playing games.
If you people want second life set on the medieval times go make your own game.
As far as im concerned mmorpgs nowdays are great and millions agree with me.
sorry i have to disagree with you aswell. there is a very large sandbox following its just that our games get ruined by people who with dont understand them or simply dont care
A few 100 thousand is not a large following in a genre of 10s of millions.
This is not to say that there aren't some great sandbox games, but when it comes to MMOs, most gamers these days are too old to invest the amount of time required from the types of sandbox games you people seem to want. They just aren't very practical.
Why cant you people accept reality already? The majoritry doesnt want a fricking simulation game and yes thats EXACTLY what you people are asking for.
Genres evolve through time, deal with it. What was a mmorpg 12 years ago is different to what it is now.
What mmorpg means now is exactly the same as the word.
They are massive
They are multiplayer
They are online
and they are role playing games.
If you people want second life set on the medieval times go make your own game.
As far as im concerned mmorpgs nowdays are great and millions agree with me.
sorry i have to disagree with you aswell. there is a very large sandbox following its just that our games get ruined by people who with dont understand them or simply dont care
What is large? 500k?, 1m?, 2m?. Im sorry but wherever this big sandbox follow is its hiding pretty well. And even if there is a large number of them, compared to themepark players they are very little. And thats why all your sandbox games get ruined by other players as you say.
Games are a bussines thats the reality and making this magical sandbox that you people ask for costs a lot of money. Money that developers arent gona see a return of in a while if they release them now.
Why cant you people accept reality already? The majoritry doesnt want a fricking simulation game and yes thats EXACTLY what you people are asking for.
Genres evolve through time, deal with it. What was a mmorpg 12 years ago is different to what it is now.
What mmorpg means now is exactly the same as the word.
They are massive
They are multiplayer
They are online
and they are role playing games.
If you people want second life set on the medieval times go make your own game.
As far as im concerned mmorpgs nowdays are great and millions agree with me.
sorry i have to disagree with you aswell. there is a very large sandbox following its just that our games get ruined by people who with dont understand them or simply dont care
I think that is the real problem. The old saying "That is why we can't have nice things" applies here. If someone made a nice sandbox with terraforming, I can see some asshats building an impassable moat around the town so nobody could get in or out.
Some would say "well that what player content is!!" Which is true. But the result is it just pisses everyone who wants to get in or out of the town off and they eventually quit instead of dealing with the asshats and griefers.
The real issue is they are taking the MMO out of MMORPG games. No one talks to each other outside of a few instances or if you're lucky enough to be a in a tight knit guild in a game that still has guilds.
Talking to someone else on your computer used to be new and exciting. It no longer is. People went out of their way and out of their comfort zone to converse because it was required to accomplish anything. MMO'ers have always been antisocial, we just couldn't get away with it 10 years ago.
You bring up a good point Alders. The whole idea of playing in a persistent world was fresh and exciting. There was no facebook, no smart phones(heck i didn't even have a cell phone then) and not everyone and there dog had an internet connection.
I remember telling some co-workers about UO and they just couldn't grasp the idea that the game world continued to exist when I wasn't playing. It intrigued them but they never considered it something they would ever do. That and talking to strangers on the internet sounded "risky".
Today you are hard pressed to find a game that doesn't have some form of online function and the market is full of players from all walks of life, not just us old geeks. Heck, my 70 year old mother plays multiplayer scrabble on her iPad.
To the OP. I don't think the genre is dead at all. Like others have mentioned, it has changed with it's player base. It may not have changed for the good in some cases but it has come along way from The Realm or M59 days and I guess we either stick it out, go back to the old games or give up on MMOs all together. I'm gonna stick it out and have fun.
So this topic is pretty much another sandbox topic masquerading as a "genre is dead" speech? Anyways, the topic should be changed to This genre is dead...TO ME and my other 10 MMORPG.com online friends.
Just because you don't like the direction the genre is heading to does not equal to dead. I might hate the state of television but it is not dead to a lot more people, hence the reason why the genre is still the way it is.
Why cant you people accept reality already? The majoritry doesnt want a fricking simulation game and yes thats EXACTLY what you people are asking for.
Genres evolve through time, deal with it. What was a mmorpg 12 years ago is different to what it is now.
What mmorpg means now is exactly the same as the word.
They are massive
They are multiplayer
They are online
and they are role playing games.
If you people want second life set on the medieval times go make your own game.
As far as im concerned mmorpgs nowdays are great and millions agree with me.
sorry i have to disagree with you aswell. there is a very large sandbox following its just that our games get ruined by people who with dont understand them or simply dont care
A few 100 thousand is not a large following in a genre of 10s of millions.
This is not to say that there aren't some great sandbox games, but when it comes to MMOs, most gamers these days are too old to invest the amount of time required from the types of sandbox games you people seem to want. They just aren't very practical.
Yet every themepark game released in the last 8 years ended up being F2P or dead with 2 servers.
It's probably why GW2 doesn't have a sub, why bother with it, games this days are lucky to retain 20% of it's playerbase 6 months after launch.
Maybe im wrong, but EvE has more subs than pretty much every themepark MMO except WOW.
Im sure it will have more players than GW2 in 1 year.
Why cant you people accept reality already? The majoritry doesnt want a fricking simulation game and yes thats EXACTLY what you people are asking for.
Genres evolve through time, deal with it. What was a mmorpg 12 years ago is different to what it is now.
What mmorpg means now is exactly the same as the word.
They are massive
They are multiplayer
They are online
and they are role playing games.
If you people want second life set on the medieval times go make your own game.
As far as im concerned mmorpgs nowdays are great and millions agree with me.
sorry i have to disagree with you aswell. there is a very large sandbox following its just that our games get ruined by people who with dont understand them or simply dont care
What is large? 500k?, 1m?, 2m?. Im sorry but wherever this big sandbox follow is its hiding pretty well. And even if there is a large number of them, compared to themepark players they are very little. And thats why all your sandbox games get ruined by other players as you say.
Games are a bussines thats the reality and making this magical sandbox that you people ask for costs a lot of money. Money that developers arent gona see a return of in a while if they release them now.
The average MMO player doesn't know what a sandbox is. Most people only know WoW, if WoW was a sandbox, sandbox would be the most popular MMO type. WoW defined the genre.
WoW ruined any hope for a decent in-depth MMO. Look at the outrage surrounding SWG.
I, and many other players like me are part of the problem. You see, once upon a time I used to be able to sit in front of a computer for countless hours at a time. Wife and kids later, I just don't have the time anymore. Thing is, neither do a lot of the other gamers that are about my age (38 today). So my time being a more precious commodity than my money in terms of gaming you probably can see where I'm running with this.
I don't have time to look for a group. I do not time to camp a 24 hour spawn. I do not have time to even raid. I need to be able to pick up and go at a moments notice. Game companies are trying to cater to me because I have the money to spend.
Now I'm not saying that there shouldn't be virtual words because I know that there is a market out there, just that it is a smaller market, thus a tougher sell to the suits.
In closing I will simply say that you can vote with your wallet.
The market is huge and may still be expanding. Going into a direction you do not like != dead.
In fact, i think it is becoming MORE ALIVE, solving all the old problems (like camping & finding groups with instances & LFD/LFR), while giving a large part of the games to the players for FREE.
It is getting BETTER.
the genre is dead. not the market. the business of taking old console game concepts into the mmo space is huge. the genre that attempted to make virtual worlds is dead.
I think this is the distinction here a lot of people are missing. It isn't that the mmorpg market is failing, it is expanding and attracting and making record profit, and the OP is not discounting it.
I have a slightly different way of saying it. It isn't to me that the genre is dead, it is that the genre I was introduced to, is not what we original players or what I believe the original developers ever expected the genre to evolve into.
The philosophy back then was that as the genre developed, the worlds would become more open, more in depth, more complex. We envisioned EQ without zone lines and more emersive graphics, more ways to draw you into the world, more ways to differentiate your character, more reasons to play at max lvl. More ways to be unique. Many ways to meet challenges - specifically, I don't any of us expected routine rotations or button mashing.
I'm not necessarily even saying more sandboxy - but I think it is pretty obvious that most of the original crowd thought that would be the direction - but instead, more that the current games feel so completely different than the original games. We thought the worlds we would have would be immersive for years, not months.
But what do we have? Well, to me it is more like fast food. Quick, convenient entertainment in small increments. It is a totally different feel than what we originally defined 'mmorpg' to mean.
And don't take that wrong, quick convenient entertainment is still entertaining. But it is the difference between the fun of, let's say a vacation around the world and a roller coaster. They both can be entertaining, but in totally different ways.
The genre did not evolve as we expected.
One last analogy. If someone had shown me in 1999 the game SW:TOR - I cannot lie, I would have been blown away. I would have been blown away by how far the graphics/tech had come. I'd be blown away at some of the time sinks that went away. I'd have been blown away by how different quest lines had become.
But I don't think if someone asked me in 1999 to describe what TOR was, I wouldn't have said, 'mmorpg'. I would have said it had elements of it. I would have been excited about seeing games like that in the future, but I would have naturally assumed they'd have their own classification like 'online rpg (orpg)' or 'mog (multiplayer online game)'. Because TOR simply doesn't contain the core of how I defined an 'mmorpg' in 1999.
I'm not giving up. I think everyone is recognizing the market is oversturated and running the same formula over and over with a different skin - and continually simplifying these games beyone what we imagined. TOR's maps are the exact opposite of how I believed future mmo landscapes to look. Invisible walls were a necessity pre-1999 - post 1999 we all thought that boat would have sailed.
I still firmly believe that the next, "WoW" is going to be absolutely nothing like the mass of mmorpgs we have today. Maybe it will be like we original players envisioned, I hope so. But maybe it will be something so out of left field, no one saw it coming. But that's the next big hit - I'd put money on it. But you couldn't get me to put money on when it will be released. It could be next year, it could be 10 years from now, but it won't be like what we have now.
So, for me, consider this:
MMORPG's is like one of my long time friends. We grew up together. But now that mmo's have reached puberty, their personality is starting to change. It isn't the friend I had fun with for so many years. Sure we have some laughs now and then. But sometimes, I just want to look my friend squarely in the eye and say,
"Man - you've changed. You are not the mmorpg I used to know. You still have some growing up to do."
The genre ain't dead -_- it's only changing towards a more rpg-esque nature. If I want to play "community" I'll stick with RL, thank you very much. If on the other hand I want to play a game with a community residing in it, I'll be glad to take an mmorpg.
Oh man, we totally need a Community MMO. 8-bit and all.
I do not think this genre is dead or even on it's death bed. We are just in the bad situation of too much competition, too few technological developments as far as internet and MMO worlds are concerned and the growing community of really picky hard to please consumers.
Change will happen. How long it takes is another matter altogether.
Comments
There is a simple awnser to that. you dont like theme park games. its pretty obvious, The problem with having missions that have things like open world PVP is that it forces people who don't want it while they are leveling (the majority i assure you) to get randomly killed by somone as they finish fighting a mob, then in return be corpse camped until logging to boost someones Epeen.
My opinion is that if they changed PvP servers to that they had more quests for random killing of players, less people would complain. sadly when it comes to AI based quests you are somewhat limited in what you can do.
Because i can.
I'm Hopeful For Every Game, Until the Fan Boys Attack My Games. Then the Knives Come Out.
Logic every gamers worst enemy.
Expanding in one direction, not diversifying or innovating.
WTH does the way you choose your skills have to do with MASSIVE MULTIPLAYER game design? Skyrim has that, Oblivion did, come on!
I don't play TSW because it is a single player game with other people around you. I want to be able to interact with other people. I want to hire them to help me explore a dangerous world, I want to track them down to collect the bounty on their head, I want to visit their shop, I want to make trade routes, I want people to look out for a certain item I need, I want specialized crafters, I want to play card games for gold with them, invite them to my castle, etc. etc. etc. All that PLUS a worthwile "end game". (which SWG was lacking) Could be pvp, could be constrcution (think Minecraft), could be power (EVE), could be capitalism (linked to real money) or ALL of that.
i already have a post directed at you, please read that before opening your mouth again.
Funny little fact ive played many Sandbox games, they actually have a good 40% failure rate. most of them either shine (eve is a great example), or then become a over glorified Deathmatch (the sad fate of Face of Mankind)
Because i can.
I'm Hopeful For Every Game, Until the Fan Boys Attack My Games. Then the Knives Come Out.
Logic every gamers worst enemy.
It would just be great to have something more to do in these modern MMOs. EVE online, Runescape and one or two other old games have way more to do than just questing, a little crafting and some PVP. Just so tired of the same old, same old.
Do some quests, level to max, regurgitate content, repeat till bored. ugggggghhhhhhhhhhh
I read it. mobs, missions. You're still stuck in standard game mmorpg design. Why do we need mobs or missions?
I'm not killing mobs in single player rpg's, why in mmorpg's? Surely with 5000 people on one server there is no need for missions which involve NPC's?
The whole mmorpg genre is fucked up. I imagined so many things ten years ago and none of these things happened instead we went backwards and now are locked in a standard design. Like an FPS or RTS. MMO could be anything you want, jut design the game to take advantage of 5000 people (or 50.000!) on one server.
Another one of these threads?
The genre ain't dead -_- it's only changing towards a more rpg-esque nature. If I want to play "community" I'll stick with RL, thank you very much. If on the other hand I want to play a game with a community residing in it, I'll be glad to take an mmorpg.
100% combat oriented gameplay? Oh please have a word with GW2's crafting system, economy and minigames. Sure you can't be a musician in that game, but I ain't intrested in those things.
I play mmorpgs to do things I can't do in real life and being a violist is not one of those things I wish to do in my mmorpg. And having musicians or proffesional dancers in your world doesn't contribute to your so-called "community". It could be a benefactor, but not a necessary one...
Have you been sleeping? We are finally getting out of the WoW-clone era and things are finally changing (GW2 and TSW). Which might mean a new golden age for non WoW clone mmos, but all you can say is that the genre is dying?
"Isn't a raid plundering villages in WoW or something like that?" - Robert Desable
Its not "fucked up" your basically saying that the entire MMORPG genre is bad because its not all sandbox. not everyone likes sandbox, personally from the sandbox i have played it took for too long to get into anything interesting and when i did finally get in the game went into a downturn because the casual Crowd hit it. i made this example in another thread but ill post it here because i feel it fits.
Think of it in literal terms, You and your friend are in a real sandbox building and digging. the casual gamer is the kid that walks in and boots everything you made because its fun. (not every casual gamer but you know what i mean) you normally can get rid of that one person, the sad part about it is that he comes back the next day with 7 times as meny people as you have. suddenly the game is no longer building its just kicking Sand in peoples faces.
This is why we have a lack of Sandbox games, they crumble because the wrong crowd turns Simcity into Grand Theft Auto.
Because i can.
I'm Hopeful For Every Game, Until the Fan Boys Attack My Games. Then the Knives Come Out.
Logic every gamers worst enemy.
Why cant you people accept reality already? The majoritry doesnt want a fricking simulation game and yes thats EXACTLY what you people are asking for.
Genres evolve through time, deal with it. What was a mmorpg 12 years ago is different to what it is now.
What mmorpg means now is exactly the same as the word.
They are massive
They are multiplayer
They are online
and they are role playing games.
If you people want second life set on the medieval times go make your own game.
As far as im concerned mmorpgs nowdays are great and millions agree with me.
lately i have been a bit dislolusioned with mmo's..i bought TSW and GW2 and i have to admit i like TSW and GW2 but i cant be bothered to play the beta on gw2 or login on TSW..i seem to spend more time playing solo rpg's like the witcher 1 and 2,risen,dragon age 1 and 2.dont know how to put it..i,m bored to death of them atm.maybe just a phase i,m going through but i,m more than happy with the solo games.i,m not saying they are better but they seem more appealing..or i,m just too old now to play them.god know's.
I am not sure I would go so far as dead but I think your point is valid. The Genre has shifted to the mainstream market and the target audience now are box sales for non-MMO players. The end result is we have games targeted towards high eye candy flashy type of play that non MMO gamers want. FPS combat, PVP base, no grind and simplistic mechanics. But these players are not the type wth the patience to play a MMO very long which is likely why they did not stick with MMOs in the past. Esssentially we have box sales games and people jumping from game. Websites like this help to make it worse by hyping up new games regardless of the quality and letting the fanboys run rampant with their wild claims. The fanboys atack anyone that disagrees with their dream game calling them names and running them off the forums. Bad games are released and a few months later the fanboys have moved on to hying their next game of the week. The only ones that benefit here are the developers in box sales and websites like this with massive page hits.
The more traditional model games lose players every time one of these new gimmick games is released and then get some of those players back a few months later. The sad thing is these gimmick games not only take the non MMO players away but they hurt the traditional games as many people there will buy into the hype until they play a month or two. It does a lot of damage to guilds and the health of these games.
Maybe the best thing is for more games to fail like ToR and maybe we will see more games directed at MMO veterans who want to actually put time into a game rather than being given all a games rewards simply for knowing how to log in. I doubt we will see the vocal FPS/PvP crowd that has emerged the last few years go away but if the money and the hype goes away maybe they will go away to. Maybe the best thing is lower budgets and for MMOs to go back to being a niche genre. With Tor's collapse and the possibiltiy of something similar with TESO it might become much harder for games to get that type of investment.
Regardless I liked your post and feel for you and for what has happened to this genre.
sorry i have to disagree with you aswell. there is a very large sandbox following its just that our games get ruined by people who with dont understand them or simply dont care
Because i can.
I'm Hopeful For Every Game, Until the Fan Boys Attack My Games. Then the Knives Come Out.
Logic every gamers worst enemy.
Or they hire good game designers and programmers who make it so the kid can''t destroy your buildings.
I can think of several methods just of the top of my head, I'm sure you can as well.
- you acguire a piece of land, only you can build there.
- building is in a private instance (placement is not)
I bet if developers put the same effort they put in making these hundreds of quests (voice acting?!!) and all of these boundaries and systems which make sure players don't do stuff the developers don't want them to, they could make a HELL of a game.
You could call it a sandbox, I will call it a Massively Multiplayer game.
I'm done doing crappy quests with crappy NPC mobs.
The only response I can possible give to threads like these is I've recently been having some of the greatest times of my 9 year MMO career during the past 3 GW2 beta weekends. And I know many more players can say the same about Rfit, SW:ToR and TSW among other games right now. The genre is decidedly not dead.
A few 100 thousand is not a large following in a genre of 10s of millions.
This is not to say that there aren't some great sandbox games, but when it comes to MMOs, most gamers these days are too old to invest the amount of time required from the types of sandbox games you people seem to want. They just aren't very practical.
What is large? 500k?, 1m?, 2m?. Im sorry but wherever this big sandbox follow is its hiding pretty well. And even if there is a large number of them, compared to themepark players they are very little. And thats why all your sandbox games get ruined by other players as you say.
Games are a bussines thats the reality and making this magical sandbox that you people ask for costs a lot of money. Money that developers arent gona see a return of in a while if they release them now.
I think that is the real problem. The old saying "That is why we can't have nice things" applies here. If someone made a nice sandbox with terraforming, I can see some asshats building an impassable moat around the town so nobody could get in or out.
Some would say "well that what player content is!!" Which is true. But the result is it just pisses everyone who wants to get in or out of the town off and they eventually quit instead of dealing with the asshats and griefers.
You bring up a good point Alders. The whole idea of playing in a persistent world was fresh and exciting. There was no facebook, no smart phones(heck i didn't even have a cell phone then) and not everyone and there dog had an internet connection.
I remember telling some co-workers about UO and they just couldn't grasp the idea that the game world continued to exist when I wasn't playing. It intrigued them but they never considered it something they would ever do. That and talking to strangers on the internet sounded "risky".
Today you are hard pressed to find a game that doesn't have some form of online function and the market is full of players from all walks of life, not just us old geeks. Heck, my 70 year old mother plays multiplayer scrabble on her iPad.
To the OP. I don't think the genre is dead at all. Like others have mentioned, it has changed with it's player base. It may not have changed for the good in some cases but it has come along way from The Realm or M59 days and I guess we either stick it out, go back to the old games or give up on MMOs all together. I'm gonna stick it out and have fun.
So this topic is pretty much another sandbox topic masquerading as a "genre is dead" speech? Anyways, the topic should be changed to This genre is dead...TO ME and my other 10 MMORPG.com online friends.
Just because you don't like the direction the genre is heading to does not equal to dead. I might hate the state of television but it is not dead to a lot more people, hence the reason why the genre is still the way it is.
Yet every themepark game released in the last 8 years ended up being F2P or dead with 2 servers.
It's probably why GW2 doesn't have a sub, why bother with it, games this days are lucky to retain 20% of it's playerbase 6 months after launch.
Maybe im wrong, but EvE has more subs than pretty much every themepark MMO except WOW.
Im sure it will have more players than GW2 in 1 year.
The average MMO player doesn't know what a sandbox is. Most people only know WoW, if WoW was a sandbox, sandbox would be the most popular MMO type. WoW defined the genre.
WoW ruined any hope for a decent in-depth MMO. Look at the outrage surrounding SWG.
I don't have time to look for a group. I do not time to camp a 24 hour spawn. I do not have time to even raid. I need to be able to pick up and go at a moments notice. Game companies are trying to cater to me because I have the money to spend.
Now I'm not saying that there shouldn't be virtual words because I know that there is a market out there, just that it is a smaller market, thus a tougher sell to the suits.
In closing I will simply say that you can vote with your wallet.
I think this is the distinction here a lot of people are missing. It isn't that the mmorpg market is failing, it is expanding and attracting and making record profit, and the OP is not discounting it.
I have a slightly different way of saying it. It isn't to me that the genre is dead, it is that the genre I was introduced to, is not what we original players or what I believe the original developers ever expected the genre to evolve into.
The philosophy back then was that as the genre developed, the worlds would become more open, more in depth, more complex. We envisioned EQ without zone lines and more emersive graphics, more ways to draw you into the world, more ways to differentiate your character, more reasons to play at max lvl. More ways to be unique. Many ways to meet challenges - specifically, I don't any of us expected routine rotations or button mashing.
I'm not necessarily even saying more sandboxy - but I think it is pretty obvious that most of the original crowd thought that would be the direction - but instead, more that the current games feel so completely different than the original games. We thought the worlds we would have would be immersive for years, not months.
But what do we have? Well, to me it is more like fast food. Quick, convenient entertainment in small increments. It is a totally different feel than what we originally defined 'mmorpg' to mean.
And don't take that wrong, quick convenient entertainment is still entertaining. But it is the difference between the fun of, let's say a vacation around the world and a roller coaster. They both can be entertaining, but in totally different ways.
The genre did not evolve as we expected.
One last analogy. If someone had shown me in 1999 the game SW:TOR - I cannot lie, I would have been blown away. I would have been blown away by how far the graphics/tech had come. I'd be blown away at some of the time sinks that went away. I'd have been blown away by how different quest lines had become.
But I don't think if someone asked me in 1999 to describe what TOR was, I wouldn't have said, 'mmorpg'. I would have said it had elements of it. I would have been excited about seeing games like that in the future, but I would have naturally assumed they'd have their own classification like 'online rpg (orpg)' or 'mog (multiplayer online game)'. Because TOR simply doesn't contain the core of how I defined an 'mmorpg' in 1999.
I'm not giving up. I think everyone is recognizing the market is oversturated and running the same formula over and over with a different skin - and continually simplifying these games beyone what we imagined. TOR's maps are the exact opposite of how I believed future mmo landscapes to look. Invisible walls were a necessity pre-1999 - post 1999 we all thought that boat would have sailed.
I still firmly believe that the next, "WoW" is going to be absolutely nothing like the mass of mmorpgs we have today. Maybe it will be like we original players envisioned, I hope so. But maybe it will be something so out of left field, no one saw it coming. But that's the next big hit - I'd put money on it. But you couldn't get me to put money on when it will be released. It could be next year, it could be 10 years from now, but it won't be like what we have now.
So, for me, consider this:
MMORPG's is like one of my long time friends. We grew up together. But now that mmo's have reached puberty, their personality is starting to change. It isn't the friend I had fun with for so many years. Sure we have some laughs now and then. But sometimes, I just want to look my friend squarely in the eye and say,
"Man - you've changed. You are not the mmorpg I used to know. You still have some growing up to do."
Oh man, we totally need a Community MMO. 8-bit and all.
I do not think this genre is dead or even on it's death bed. We are just in the bad situation of too much competition, too few technological developments as far as internet and MMO worlds are concerned and the growing community of really picky hard to please consumers.
Change will happen. How long it takes is another matter altogether.