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The problem with MMOs these days is developers are making games and not virtual worlds.
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Just put him on ignore. It is not worth the time to deal with him.
But why? At its core, PoE is a hack-n-slash. There is no need to make it bigger. It is about mowing down lots and lots of mobs. I love Diablo 1,2 & 3, but let's not pretend it is anything else. PoE is just a variation .. it has nice ideas about progression and skills, but at the basics, it is about kililng lots of things in interesting ways. It does not need to be bigger. It does not need distraction like mining and gathering.
And yes, i play it a bit and i am waiting for it to launch. I totally agree ... there is no reason to play the unfinished beta, except to satisfy my curiosity of what it plays like. The actual playing will start when the game lanuch and this one does need more polish (same as Marvel Heroes).
I agree with you OP. It's been awhile since I have seen a game come out that had that virtual world feeling. UO felt like a world, EQ and EQ2 felt like worlds. WoW to a lesser extent felt like a world and Darkfall felt like a world (but OMG the grind!). Everything else I have played lately felt like a collection of zones just tied together with string. Even GW2 which I just recently picked up again doesn't quite capture the feeling but that may be because the "world" right now just consists of one continent.
I remember EQ1 going from Neriak and exploring every nook and cranny to eventually going to East Commonlands and not having a minimap having to use in game direction finding to know which way to go based on my out of game map. And I remember seeing a strange cave in West Commonlands which turned out to be the dungeon Befallen.
I'm not really sure I can put my finger on why games don't feel like worlds anymore. I think perhaps it's due to various reasons. It's probably a combination of things. These things probably do it for me.
1. A world map showing a vast living world that give you the feeling that you are only in a small corner of a much larger world where moving from area to area feels like you are actually travelling through the world both by distance and with logical change of environment. This is as opposed to games like Warhammer where you would go to the end of your zone map and walk through a portal and instantly be hundreds of miles from where you just were on the continent because the new zone is where you are now supposed to level at. Oh and you just went from a desert zone to a tundra zone in the blink of an eye.
2. A world where you could put down roots anywhere in a sandbox type style. In UO you had multiple cities you could live out of and base operations for future adventuring from. You could also build houses and live out of those only going to NPC cities when needed. This was somewhat the same for EQ but was a little more restricted due to lack of housing and faction restrictions. But still if I made a dwarf in EQ1 I could spend almost my entire life on my home continent if I wanted to, or I could travel across the world and go live on the other side of the world in Queynos with humans. And getting to Queynos actually felt like a real trip complete with boat voyage and travelling across a dangerous and vast world.
tl;dr To boil it down I think that theme park games with constant zone progression to end game areas, and the proliferation of fast travel everywhere is what has led to the decline of the virtual world feeling.
And that few really want that feeling. Otherwise, they woud vote with their wallet, the market respond, and the feeling will be produced.
Its true, if it doesnt matter to me, it CANT matter to anyone else!
Best bet is to just report the post as a troll and let the mod sort it out...trolls do it to mine all the time, get a ban, reply to the email, ban is removed...now if only the mods would ban the trolls and those falsely reporting legit posts as trolling.
Then how do you explain the wild success of a huge virtual world perma death mod and soon to be standalone game that goes by the name of DayZ?
Are you unaware of this title or do you just like to pick and choose?
There's definitely a market for the type of games you do not find fun whether it sits well in your stomache or not.
"Mr. Rothstein, your people never will understand... the way it works out here. You're all just our guests. But you act like you're at home. Let me tell you something, partner. You ain't home. But that's where we're gonna send you if it harelips the governor." - Pat Webb
Then how do you explain the wild success of a huge virtual world perma death mod and soon to be standalone game that goes by the name of DayZ?
Are you unaware of this title or do you just like to pick and choose?
There's definitely a market for the type of games you do not find fun whether it sits well in your stomache or not.
* It got successful by being a free mod for a game that people had already purchased.
* The level of success demonstrated by the mod does not mean an MMO of the same type would be just as successful relatively speaking. It certainly doesn't mean that an MMO along the same lines would be worth building, considering that MMOs are much more expensive to build.
There is definitely a market for that type of game. It's just not a market where it's feasible to make a nice profit on in the MMO marketplace right now.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
Let's say a religious person refuses to play any game with fictional religions. Should they coin a new term to describe that? Should they make wild claims the term is commonplace and has the same meaning to everyone else?
It's fine to think something matters that few care about. Everyone does that.
It's not fine to repurpose a word like "zoneless" which has historically meant something closer to "seamless" (once zones had zoning (loading), and now they don't; now they're zoneless), and pretend that your personal definition of the word is commonplace and matters to a lot of people, and that you're in fact ignorant of the genre and unqualified to speak unless you know that private definition.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
We'll know in the next few years I think.
Got pissed because you got called out by someone pointing out how you must be a troll because you outright dismissed another persons opinion as if it could not possible matter?
Deal with it.
Just because it doesnt matter to you, it does not mean it cannot matter to someone else.
But I do thank you for the rant that is not tied in any way to what I said as if...it matters. At all. See what I did there? I refuted you, while sticking to what was actually said. Try refuting what he said and only what he said and do so without the added attacks that make you sound like a troll.
You could have easily refuted him without any room for the replies you got in return.
It is totally free. Until it makes some money, and becomes something like a WoT, it is not a big success yet.
On its website, it listed 1.7M unique players. That is really not very impressive for a totally free game. Even TOR has more than that, and some here think TOR is a failure.
In fact, the War Z would be a better gauge .. and that is currently at #49 in xfire.
Go look at xfire top 20 games. How many are focusing on virtual worlds? The best virtual world game is Eve online .. and it is at #24 behind Aion.
So "wild success" of a mob .. is really not wild successes like selling 12M boxes as Diablo 3 has done.
i just want a game within a virtual world that feels like a virtual world instead of a specific rail i must follow. I also want a mmo that isnt designed to be done in 1 month like wow and all the other games coming out now.
for my money asherons call is still the best game that makes you feel like you are in a world and not just riding a rollercoaster which is why I still play it rather than one of these new fangled games that completely fail at the concept of how a mmo was designed.
Actually it's always game-quality that matters to players.
Look back through the history of videogames -- at games vs. simulation -- and you'll notice simulations (even the best ones) have never surpassed games.
Virtual worlds are simulations.
If you wanted to make a successful virtual world, you'd turn it into a game first. A sandbox which is a strong game would do very well*. But without that focus on gameplay, virtual worlds will do poorly just like simulation games.
(* I'd cite Sim City here, if it wasn't for their terrible launch turning the internet's unforgiving wrath upon it. Sim City has a density to interesting decisions which allows it to have fantastically fun gameplay, while also (mostly) being a simulation. Only mostly a simulation, because it's clear certain design decisions were made to promote fun gameplay rather than to be a meticulously realistic city simulation. But it's that sacrifice of realism for gameplay which makes it a fun game.)
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
And the evidence is right there. Go take a look at xfire rankings. All the top ones are not "world games". The highest online "world game" (unless you count minecraft, but that is more a lego game than a world game) is Eve at #24.
And i just want good games that do not sacrifice gameplay and convenience for the sake for a world simulation.
Let's all vote with our wallets and see who get fun entertainment.
To that I say that most MMO gamers today haven't experienced that feeling in order TO vote with their wallet as they started playing MMOs after the virtual world hayday passed.
Why would we look at Xfire rankings that include non MMO's when we are clearly talking about MMOs here on this website which is dedicated to MMOs. Don't try and move the goalposts.
To that I say that most MMO gamers today haven't experienced that feeling in order TO vote with their wallet as they started playing MMOs after the virtual world hayday passed.
People can still play games with well developed virtual worlds. It's not an alien concept.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
You have no idea what you're talking about. The mod (not mob) was never free; you had to purchase Arma 2 in addition to an expansion to play DayZ. Four months after released IGN was calling it "one of the most popular PC games in the world".
Also Xfuckingfire again? You really are a funny fellow
"Mr. Rothstein, your people never will understand... the way it works out here. You're all just our guests. But you act like you're at home. Let me tell you something, partner. You ain't home. But that's where we're gonna send you if it harelips the governor." - Pat Webb
And you have no numbers to show. The best number is 1.7M number on its website .. and that is a small number for a free mod. Oh ... have to buy ARMA2 .. many already have ARMA2.
And your best example is a mod, not even a proper game. Tell me, which virtual world MMO is successful. Which is has sold 12M boxes? Which one has millions of sub?
The best is Eve, with not even a million subs .. with many years to build its audience no less. Even TOR, a failure in many's eyes, went from 0 to 4x Eve's number in a month.
So you have to match the top selling games in order to be considered a success? That's a very intelligent argument you have there Mr. Seldon, lol.
Oh yeah, and the Star Wars IP tends to attract a lot of attention in case you did not know. And how long did that monster take to go "F2P"? Your poinst are are silly at best, and the fact still stands that if a virtual world mod with such brutal mechanics such a perma death in addition to being very difficult to get it to run on your PC can pull in so many people, obviously this isn't something that few players want. You can do the twist as you do all the time, but you're not slippery enough to escape reality.
Wait and see though, the standalone is coming, and I bet it's reception will probably be a bit surprising and disappointing for you.
"Mr. Rothstein, your people never will understand... the way it works out here. You're all just our guests. But you act like you're at home. Let me tell you something, partner. You ain't home. But that's where we're gonna send you if it harelips the governor." - Pat Webb
Oh... we will certainly watch that. And i doubt i will be disappointed. There are plenty of games that i like that are doing well, and having sequels. So whether this game does well or not .. is pretty much meh to me.
Your likes and dislikes are not relevant to the discussion. What a bizarre response.
"Mr. Rothstein, your people never will understand... the way it works out here. You're all just our guests. But you act like you're at home. Let me tell you something, partner. You ain't home. But that's where we're gonna send you if it harelips the governor." - Pat Webb
And you have no numbers to show. The best number is 1.7M number on its website .. and that is a small number for a free mod. Oh ... have to buy ARMA2 .. many already have ARMA2.
And your best example is a mod, not even a proper game. Tell me, which virtual world MMO is successful. Which is has sold 12M boxes? Which one has millions of sub?
The best is Eve, with not even a million subs .. with many years to build its audience no less. Even TOR, a failure in many's eyes, went from 0 to 4x Eve's number in a month.
That's 1.7 Million characters. If your character dies 128 times, that ticker adds 128 characters to the game. There's no way to tell how many actual players have played.
It has been said that however many copies of Arma II sold, they sold even more after the mod released. They sold enough new copies of the game that they dedicated resources to developing the mod, so it is a success.
I agree that the success of that mod doesn't mean that there is a market for an MMO based around a free form world with little or no game play. It may or may not have any implications for MMOs at all.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.