I think the dev's certainly push that artificial grouping vibe nowadays, but in the end if you want to get something done you need to find the right crew for it and that usually applies to any game. In WoW, you want to heroic raid need to find the right people. In EVE, just about anything requires the right corp. In GW2....oh wait there's nothing to get done in that game.
The new "thing" in MMO is artificially grouping people together.
MMO are no longer about dependency but about being able to solo on any class, at any level, and anywhere.
The result is that people don't talk, they don't form a community and most know no one on the server, at best they know their guild and that's about it.
These people become social recluse in the game and lack the ability and social network to form groups.
The way new MMO are trying to fix this is with artificial bandaids, so people can imagine they actually have a community in their game.
GW2 calls them Public quests, EQNext calls them rallying calls, Rift calls them rifts, WoW calls them dungeon finders, FFXIV calls them Fates.
In EQ, everyone knew each other on the server, we made our own groups, our own raids, we didn't need these bandaids. We knew the people we grouped with and made an effort to get to know the ones we didn't, so we could build out our social network and build the server community.
MMO have truly become casual and excuses for multiplayer games, where the community is so incredibly weak that they are unable to form their own groups.
Unless you're grouping with bots, it's not artificial: it's grouping.
Unless you're soloing, you're grouping -- and dependent on others to do their job.
So these aren't "artificial bandaids" by any stretch. They're obvious ease-of-use fixes to the clunky archaic systems of the past.
Certainly if you want the most tight-nit community possible, you stick them into a seething, stinking pit of poor game mechanics, unnecessary hassles, mandatory grouping, and other hardships. The nature of such a game dramatically limits its appeal to a niche. Then, because grouping is required, the remaining players will desperately band together and do everything in their power to keep each other playing. And as a result of suffering the brutal hardships of the game together, they'll become some of the closest gaming friends possible.
I'm being totally serious here. That's what would happen.
But it's kinda like a war vet saying, "We should start a war because there isn't enough brotherhood in the world." Yes, if you put people together in a desperate struggle to survive, forcing them through hell, they will cling to some of the tightest friendships the world has ever known. But...it's just not worth war.
Similarly, gaming comraderie is certainly more limited in good games, but it's not worth making a game shitty just to have a tighter community.
Or just make the content difficult enough to require grouping. You could take out the time-sinks or other archaic mechanics, but the truth is people don't group because they don't have to. Games are made to be solo or easy-mode. You don't have to make a shiity game, just one without hand-held, easy content.
Originally posted by ropenice Or just make the content difficult enough to require grouping. You could take out the time-sinks or other archaic mechanics, but the truth is people don't group because they don't have to. Games are made to be solo or easy-mode. You don't have to make a shiity game, just one without hand-held, easy content.
You are assuming that people would continue playing a game that doesn't work in a manner that they enjoy. Developers have no vested interest in forcing players into group progression paths or solo progression paths. They only have a vested interest in getting players to buy their games. They provide a product that is what their customers want, filtered through what the developer believes is a good game. If developers are making games that allow solo progression, it's because that's what they believe most players want and they believe that solo progression can be or is an ingredient in a good game.
**
Some grammar and clarity issues, fixed.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
I wish older gamers would quit comparing today's gamers and game play mechanics to those of decades past. Not unlike most things in life, MMO demographics have changed and evolved over time. MMO's are no longer played by the niche few. MMO's have been forced to change due to accommodate the various needs and requirements of the masses. Comparing today's gamers and game play mechanics to those of decades past is like comparing today's athletes and sports to athletes and sports of the 1920's and 30's. By and large we still have the same sports, but in name only. As the athletes playing them and the manner in which they are played are vastly different.
Please give it a break with all of these "back in my day" reminiscing threads. Those days are gonet. These threads are no less annoying than when old timers try to round us up and begin preaching about how hard they had it "back in the day" when they had to walk 30 miles in snow going and coming from school and then when they got home they had to milk the cows and herd the sheep. No one wants to hear it.
Originally posted by ropenice Or just make the content difficult enough to require grouping. You could take out the time-sinks or other archaic mechanics, but the truth is people don't group because they don't have to. Games are made to be solo or easy-mode. You don't have to make a shiity game, just one without hand-held, easy content.
You are assuming that people would continue playing a game that doesn't work in a manner that they enjoy. They have no vested interest in forcing players into group progression paths or solo progression paths. They only have a vested interest in getting players to buy their games. They are provide a game that is what their customers want, filtered through what the developer believes is a good game. If developers are making games that allow solo progression, it's because that's what they believe most players want and they believe that solo progression can be or is an ingredient in a good game.
It's much simpler than that.
Forced grouping creates very harsh barriers to playing your game. It severely restricts what a player can do, if their friends or busy, or they can't find the right class necessary for the content.
Making more solo friendly / public questing alleviates these barriers. It allows people to play whether they have a dedicated group or not. While dedicated group-oriented games are much more structured (and some people like that), they also lose a lot of players because they simply can't enjoy the game without a dedicated group. Something that isn't as easy to find as some people think, and is furthermore complicated by how complex most people's lives have become. I know I, for one, cannot do dedicated groups, because I'm constantly traveling / changing time zones.
Its a shame for those that missed out on EQs grouping in its golden years.....Like the OP said, we made alot of friends and guilds really meant something.......The OP is right taht these current systems are a bandaid for broken grouping and I dont think we will ever see community organized grouping again....Lets face it MMOs are now single player games with co-op added on.
The new "thing" in MMO is artificially grouping people together.
MMO are no longer about dependency but about being able to solo on any class, at any level, and anywhere.
The result is that people don't talk, they don't form a community and most know no one on the server, at best they know their guild and that's about it.
In EQ, everyone knew each other on the server, we made our own groups, our own raids, we didn't need these bandaids.
MMO have truly become casual and excuses for multiplayer games, where the community is so incredibly weak that they are unable to form their own groups.
Are today's gamers looking to build online communities in these games, though? "Back in my day..." doesn't count because the world is different and people act, interact and communicate differently now. Public Quests, Rallying Calls and Dungeon Finders aren't a band-aid for a failed in-game community if neither the devs nor the players were looking for that in the first place. They are merely tools to accommodate how people play and don't interact now.
There, fixed it for you. The problem is, you youngens DON'T communicate and have no idea of what a real community really is. This, let me group, never say a word and never interact with these other people ever again isn't a community. It's a gaggle of individuals.
Most MMOs are not played by youngens (Unless you mean anyone under 50)
Actual young people are more socially connected now than ever before
Get off my lawn mentality is the exact mentality that causes terrible communities, like "play my way or you are playing it wrong".
Agreed. Latronus, they communicate differently than you do. They interact differently than you do. Not better or worse, just different.
"The problem is, you youngens DON'T communicate and have no idea of what a real community really is. "
That line alone is something you should concentrate on, Latronus. The assumptions you make about me or even about today's MMO culture indicate that you are simply rejecting something you aren't familiar with or do not like, and you have created in your mind this generalized enemy to rail against.
As krage pointed out, most of those "youngens" are in their twenties and early thirties, and they have moved forward with culture and technology over the past decade and a half. The world communicates and interacts differently now.
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein "Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
I do not agree to the OP. While "Old School" MMOrpgs in many ways had strengths that todays are lacking one big thing was there that was allways a strong negative point: These games forced Players to center their lifes around around their gaming. This is an unhealthy approach to gaming and needs to change that way that Gamers can participate in MMOrpgs and experience the most content in an entertaining yet still challenging way while centering their gaming around their life.
I feel that the EQ:N approach may be a good way to achive that if done right.
"Torquemada... do not implore him for compassion. Torquemada... do not beg him for forgiveness. Torquemada... do not ask him for mercy. Let's face it, you can't Torquemada anything!"
The development of the tools Calmoceans mentions were really just to placate the solo players who felt that any time spent on their part trying to find a group and so on was an anathema. I am not saying I have never got anything good out of those tools, I have, they can do their job no question.
But they do point out what has happened to the community in MMOs. And that in turn points to why the baulk of players leave after two months. You don't have a community in solo games, so we can hardly expect the modern 'easymode solo MMO' model to cater for it in any way.
Indeed those tools which were seen as an empowerment of the individual player have weakened the community. This has a parallel in real life societies in fact, which I find quite fascinating.
It is fascinating. It also shows that the original idea of forcing many into ONE virtual world in the guise of a game is a unworkable idea.
Players self-select to go to the solo-friendly games. They self-select to go to the games with more tools and "less" community.
What is the lesson? Most don't care about community that much, as long as they have a few friends to play with. In fact, that is pretty obvious. Why would I care about a "massive" number of players when i don't even have time to play with 20?
How can you say player self select when ALL games coming out have suffered from the convenience creep? Most of those games failed to hold player and subscriptions and have to supported by cash shops that only a minority players actually use.
Obviously not all.
Back in the WOW days, WOW is the first one who is more solo-friendly. It stole EQ's audience quite fast.
And even today, there are games like DarkFall or Eve which are not solo-friendly. The huge amount of lopsided choice for games other than those obviously push less and less development into non-solo-friendly games, but the self-selection is still there.
You can go play Darkfall and Eve, can you? That is a choice and a selection, by definition.
And what does holding player has anything to do with this? Player want solo-friend and variety .. hence solo-friend games and players hop around. It is a fallacy to think that games need to be long.
WoW is not a good comparision because a lot of it's success was based on the back of it's legion of fans from battlenet and mainstream marketing. Not to mention it was the first polished MMORPG.
And niether Eve nor Darkfall are group only type games either.
Holding players means that games cannot support themselves on the merit that players want to pay a fee to play the games. Free to play is propped up by a minority of players. EQ was P2P for a decade while most of these casual games couldn't survive without F2P.
The development of the tools Calmoceans mentions were really just to placate the solo players who felt that any time spent on their part trying to find a group and so on was an anathema. I am not saying I have never got anything good out of those tools, I have, they can do their job no question.
But they do point out what has happened to the community in MMOs. And that in turn points to why the baulk of players leave after two months. You don't have a community in solo games, so we can hardly expect the modern 'easymode solo MMO' model to cater for it in any way.
Indeed those tools which were seen as an empowerment of the individual player have weakened the community. This has a parallel in real life societies in fact, which I find quite fascinating.
It is fascinating. It also shows that the original idea of forcing many into ONE virtual world in the guise of a game is a unworkable idea.
Players self-select to go to the solo-friendly games. They self-select to go to the games with more tools and "less" community.
What is the lesson? Most don't care about community that much, as long as they have a few friends to play with. In fact, that is pretty obvious. Why would I care about a "massive" number of players when i don't even have time to play with 20?
Really. 99% of all your posts are either oversimplifying, with a trend to just wrong conclusions, or stating the obvious just to draw again somewhat ridiculus conclusions.
Usually it is really a waste of time to read your posts.. and even more a waste of time to reply to one of your posts.
I should really know it by now.. so shame on me. That i actually read once again one of your posts and replied. ;(
Edit/PS: This should not be a personal attack. And just out of curiosity, you do it on purpose? And if you do it on purpose, for what reason? And if not, how old are you? And what is your current occupation?
Of course.. you don't have to answer, or you can answer per pm.. just out of curiosity.
Perhaps you should learn to listen to someone whom while not completely unbiased is farther along than yourself. Also drop the veiled insults, either learn to take a ban like a man or stick to the topic.
"Learn to take a ban like a man", that made my day. Sort of like Mafioso principles applied to the world of posters.
Unlike Nari would have you believe players did not drop more community based MMO's in favour of solo ones. Yes, most of us did like at least some of the changes WoW made, but it just went downhill from there. The reason players flooded into the new solo friendly themeparks was that they appealed to the solo market. There were many more players of solo games than players of MMO's. Reviews back in the day were raving about how much you could do as a solo player, that was who they wanted to attract. In fact if every player pre WoW had never played MMO's again the massive number of new players attracted from solo games would have made solo friendly themeparks the huge success they were.
Oh and the reason why all this is interesting is what it says about real life society, not what it says about MMO's. Even a open world, big community MMO exponent like me does not think MMO's are that important.
The new "thing" in MMO is artificially grouping people together.
MMO are no longer about dependency but about being able to solo on any class, at any level, and anywhere.
The result is that people don't talk, they don't form a community and most know no one on the server, at best they know their guild and that's about it.
These people become social recluse in the game and lack the ability and social network to form groups.
The way new MMO are trying to fix this is with artificial bandaids, so people can imagine they actually have a community in their game.
GW2 calls them Public quests, EQNext calls them rallying calls, Rift calls them rifts, WoW calls them dungeon finders, FFXIV calls them Fates.
In EQ, everyone knew each other on the server, we made our own groups, our own raids, we didn't need these bandaids. We knew the people we grouped with and made an effort to get to know the ones we didn't, so we could build out our social network and build the server community.
MMO have truly become casual and excuses for multiplayer games, where the community is so incredibly weak that they are unable to form their own groups.
Unless you're grouping with bots, it's not artificial: it's grouping.
Unless you're soloing, you're grouping -- and dependent on others to do their job.
So these aren't "artificial bandaids" by any stretch. They're obvious ease-of-use fixes to the clunky archaic systems of the past.
Certainly if you want the most tight-nit community possible, you stick them into a seething, stinking pit of poor game mechanics, unnecessary hassles, mandatory grouping, and other hardships. The nature of such a game dramatically limits its appeal to a niche. Then, because grouping is required, the remaining players will desperately band together and do everything in their power to keep each other playing. And as a result of suffering the brutal hardships of the game together, they'll become some of the closest gaming friends possible.
I'm being totally serious here. That's what would happen.
But it's kinda like a war vet saying, "We should start a war because there isn't enough brotherhood in the world." Yes, if you put people together in a desperate struggle to survive, forcing them through hell, they will cling to some of the tightest friendships the world has ever known. But...it's just not worth war.
Similarly, gaming comraderie is certainly more limited in good games, but it's not worth making a game shitty just to have a tighter community.
Very well said and I agree 100%.
Random Forum Poster: I want an MMO that is different, original and fun.
Me: So you want something like EQN
Them: Nah dude, I want a Holy Trinity, Tab Target combat, Instanced Raiding, and Rigid classes.
The new "thing" in MMO is artificially grouping people together.
MMO are no longer about dependency but about being able to solo on any class, at any level, and anywhere.
The result is that people don't talk, they don't form a community and most know no one on the server, at best they know their guild and that's about it.
These people become social recluse in the game and lack the ability and social network to form groups.
The way new MMO are trying to fix this is with artificial bandaids, so people can imagine they actually have a community in their game.
GW2 calls them Public quests, EQNext calls them rallying calls, Rift calls them rifts, WoW calls them dungeon finders, FFXIV calls them Fates.
In EQ, everyone knew each other on the server, we made our own groups, our own raids, we didn't need these bandaids. We knew the people we grouped with and made an effort to get to know the ones we didn't, so we could build out our social network and build the server community.
MMO have truly become casual and excuses for multiplayer games, where the community is so incredibly weak that they are unable to form their own groups.
Unless you're grouping with bots, it's not artificial: it's grouping.
It's not grouping in my book.
You're solo playing without engaging with people, without talking to them, you're not getting to know them because everyone is too busy zerging content, you might as well be grouping with AI bots.
In many games you aren't even together with other people, you're just a single individual participating in an artificially created event others participate in too, they might as well not even exist.
The community is current MMO is missing, when it becomes a chore to get a response to "Hello all",...your game has issues.
The new "thing" in MMO is artificially grouping people together.
MMO are no longer about dependency but about being able to solo on any class, at any level, and anywhere.
The result is that people don't talk, they don't form a community and most know no one on the server, at best they know their guild and that's about it.
These people become social recluse in the game and lack the ability and social network to form groups.
The way new MMO are trying to fix this is with artificial bandaids, so people can imagine they actually have a community in their game.
GW2 calls them Public quests, EQNext calls them rallying calls, Rift calls them rifts, WoW calls them dungeon finders, FFXIV calls them Fates.
In EQ, everyone knew each other on the server, we made our own groups, our own raids, we didn't need these bandaids. We knew the people we grouped with and made an effort to get to know the ones we didn't, so we could build out our social network and build the server community.
MMO have truly become casual and excuses for multiplayer games, where the community is so incredibly weak that they are unable to form their own groups.
Unless you're grouping with bots, it's not artificial: it's grouping.
Unless you're soloing, you're grouping -- and dependent on others to do their job.
So these aren't "artificial bandaids" by any stretch. They're obvious ease-of-use fixes to the clunky archaic systems of the past.
Certainly if you want the most tight-nit community possible, you stick them into a seething, stinking pit of poor game mechanics, unnecessary hassles, mandatory grouping, and other hardships. The nature of such a game dramatically limits its appeal to a niche. Then, because grouping is required, the remaining players will desperately band together and do everything in their power to keep each other playing. And as a result of suffering the brutal hardships of the game together, they'll become some of the closest gaming friends possible.
I'm being totally serious here. That's what would happen.
But it's kinda like a war vet saying, "We should start a war because there isn't enough brotherhood in the world." Yes, if you put people together in a desperate struggle to survive, forcing them through hell, they will cling to some of the tightest friendships the world has ever known. But...it's just not worth war.
Similarly, gaming comraderie is certainly more limited in good games, but it's not worth making a game shitty just to have a tighter community.
+1 Insight
truth nailed.
/endthread
"There are at least two kinds of games. One could be called finite, the other infinite. A finite game is played for the purpose of winning, an infinite game for the purpose of continuing play." Finite and Infinite Games, James Carse
WoW is not a good comparision because a lot of it's success was based on the back of it's legion of fans from battlenet and mainstream marketing. Not to mention it was the first polished MMORPG.
And niether Eve nor Darkfall are group only type games either.
Holding players means that games cannot support themselves on the merit that players want to pay a fee to play the games. Free to play is propped up by a minority of players. EQ was P2P for a decade while most of these casual games couldn't survive without F2P.
Try to cherry pick your example, and ignore the biggest name in MMO?
And if games can support themselves on a cashshop? I don't see needing players to pay a fee is anything special. And EQ is F2P now, as will EQN.
The only reason it survived some years as p2p is because the trend, the competition has not caught on yet. In this competitive climate, i doubt even WOW can survive as sub-only for long. In fact, it is already f2p up to L20, and has a cash shop.
WoW is not a good comparision because a lot of it's success was based on the back of it's legion of fans from battlenet and mainstream marketing. Not to mention it was the first polished MMORPG.
And niether Eve nor Darkfall are group only type games either.
Holding players means that games cannot support themselves on the merit that players want to pay a fee to play the games. Free to play is propped up by a minority of players. EQ was P2P for a decade while most of these casual games couldn't survive without F2P.
Try to cherry pick your example, and ignore the biggest name in MMO?
And if games can support themselves on a cashshop? I don't see needing players to pay a fee is anything special. And EQ is F2P now, as will EQN.
The only reason it survived some years as p2p is because the trend, the competition has not caught on yet. In this competitive climate, i doubt even WOW can survive as sub-only for long. In fact, it is already f2p up to L20, and has a cash shop.
People are willing to pay subscriptions. The problem is that the games are so causal that players blow through content in a matter of weeks and they play like a single player game. Thus people literally beat the game one or two times and are not going to pay 15 a month for that.
The reason a lot of games are going F2P is that it makes more money and put less pressure on them to have content and environment to maintain a working P2P base.
People are willing to pay subscriptions. The problem is that the games are so causal that players blow through content in a matter of weeks and they play like a single player game. Thus people literally beat the game one or two times and are not going to pay 15 a month for that.
You are contradicting yourself. You just described the reason why people are NOT willing to pay subs.
actually the frog still jumps out even when the water is slowly heated.
IMO people are not looking for community from MMO's these days.
We have community everywhere we go, facebook, twitter, skype, facetime, IM, texting.. It's on our computers, our tablets, our home, our work, our phone.
It's virtually impossible to ignore. IMO there is far far far too much community.
I know I'm not looking to MMO's for community, just a fun diversion.
Those things are not band-aids for a failed community. They are add-ons for a diversion.
Just because you don't like it doesn't mean it is bad.
Originally posted by VengeSunsoar actually the frog still jumps out even when the water is slowly heated.IMO people are not looking for community from MMO's these days.We have community everywhere we go, facebook, twitter, skype, facetime, IM, texting.. It's on our computers, our tablets, our home, our work, our phone.It's virtually impossible to ignore. IMO there is far far far too much community. I know I'm not looking to MMO's for community, just a fun diversion.Those things are not band-aids for a failed community. They are add-ons for a diversion.
Not if you cut out the frog's brain. I'm not sure how the frog stayed alive with no brain, but maybe the brain isn't all that important for frogs.
I think if MMOs want to compete on "community", they'll have to adapt and incorporate those things into themselves somehow. In a way that isn't what Zynga did.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
I think if MMOs want to compete on "community", they'll have to adapt and incorporate those things into themselves somehow. In a way that isn't what Zynga did.
Or may be MMO should not compete on "community". Just focus on better better games.
Originally posted by lizardbonesI think if MMOs want to compete on "community", they'll have to adapt and incorporate those things into themselves somehow. In a way that isn't what Zynga did.
Or may be MMO should not compete on "community". Just focus on better better games.
Well, to be honest, I think that's what they are doing, because that's what they've always been doing. AOL was the closest thing to what we have now for Facebook and the like, and they glommed off of AOL and Compuserve's customers. They didn't try to compete directly, so I think even then they knew what they were developing were games that a community could form around, not neighborhoods that communities would form within.
Of course, I could be wrong. Obviously I don't think so, but the possibility remains.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
Originally posted by lizardbonesI think if MMOs want to compete on "community", they'll have to adapt and incorporate those things into themselves somehow. In a way that isn't what Zynga did.
Or may be MMO should not compete on "community". Just focus on better better games.
Well, to be honest, I think that's what they are doing, because that's what they've always been doing. AOL was the closest thing to what we have now for Facebook and the like, and they glommed off of AOL and Compuserve's customers. They didn't try to compete directly, so I think even then they knew what they were developing were games that a community could form around, not neighborhoods that communities would form within.
Of course, I could be wrong. Obviously I don't think so, but the possibility remains.
Even though I stated above I'm not looking for community from my game, having a group of friends to play regularly with is IMO fun.
I would actually like to see the games hook up to more media friendly things. Have the in game guilds be able to send messages to our cell phones (via whatever account you want) asking/inviting/setting up raids, rp events, crafting sessions... tell me my mates's house was just destroyed and a revenge run is being done, and the house needs to be rebuilt with stronger materials...
Nothing major but a short yes/no text sent from my phone to keep me engaged, just like our RL friends do. I'd be good with that.
Just because you don't like it doesn't mean it is bad.
You're solo playing without engaging with people, without talking to them, you're not getting to know them because everyone is too busy zerging content, you might as well be grouping with AI bots.
In many games you aren't even together with other people, you're just a single individual participating in an artificially created event others participate in too, they might as well not even exist.
The community is current MMO is missing, when it becomes a chore to get a response to "Hello all",...your game has issues.
Um, grouping is grouping.
Use a different word if you mean a different thing.
There are types of grouping I dislike too, but I don't try to pretend it isn't grouping (if it's grouping.)
I don't find it's a chore to get a response to saying hello in a group. You can say you think community is missing but well...read my entire post next time I guess is my advice, haha. I pretty much covered that.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
I wouldn't call the PQ style content a bandaid for community.
Quite the opposite.
Public quest style content is just another way for soloists to do something without joining a group, relying on other players, communicating, or facing challenges. Zerging stuff is hardly a challenge.
As long as devs keep making single player games intended to appeal to people who don't really like MMORPGs, don't have time to play MMORPGs, don't want to group, don't want challenge, etc, then there will be no community in the games being passed off as MMORPGs.
The oddest thing about the MMORPG genre is that is was successful early on. And for whatever reason companies decided to start trying to cater to people who aren't suited for playing MMORPGs instead of to the people who helped establish the genre with them.
It would seem that time has shown that the approach of trying to coerce non MMORPG players into MMORPG players by dumbing down and making weaker overall games hasn't worked so well. And despite the obvious evidence devs have decided to go further away from the original formula instead of returning to it, such that a lot of upcoming MMORPGs are more like GW2 with very little pretense of even being an MMORPG and instead being soloist games.
It's like they're hoping to make some kind of "social" online game, except most of the players they're pulling in want no part of it. Instead they get people who think soloing exclusively in massively multiplayer games is somehow logical.
The MMORPGs of old were WAY more social and players interacted with each other way more (may have been elss mindless/idiotc/childish zone chat but that's a GOOD thing). Older MMORPGs were highly social before social media we even a dream.
Premium MMORPGs do not feature built-in cheating via cash for gold pay 2 win. PLAY to win or don't play.
People are willing to pay subscriptions. The problem is that the games are so causal that players blow through content in a matter of weeks and they play like a single player game. Thus people literally beat the game one or two times and are not going to pay 15 a month for that.
You are contradicting yourself. You just described the reason why people are NOT willing to pay subs.
What? Do you purposely draw conclusions like that?
People claim players want casual games. Players don't play causal games long. Players won't pay subscriptions to casual games. My conclusion is that casual games are propped up their ability to sell items not being quality games that people want to play. If players wanted to pay to play casual games or like them they would have a supporting base like many of the games that out date them still do.
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I think the dev's certainly push that artificial grouping vibe nowadays, but in the end if you want to get something done you need to find the right crew for it and that usually applies to any game. In WoW, you want to heroic raid need to find the right people. In EVE, just about anything requires the right corp. In GW2....oh wait there's nothing to get done in that game.
Played-Everything
Playing-LoL
Or just make the content difficult enough to require grouping. You could take out the time-sinks or other archaic mechanics, but the truth is people don't group because they don't have to. Games are made to be solo or easy-mode. You don't have to make a shiity game, just one without hand-held, easy content.
You are assuming that people would continue playing a game that doesn't work in a manner that they enjoy. Developers have no vested interest in forcing players into group progression paths or solo progression paths. They only have a vested interest in getting players to buy their games. They provide a product that is what their customers want, filtered through what the developer believes is a good game. If developers are making games that allow solo progression, it's because that's what they believe most players want and they believe that solo progression can be or is an ingredient in a good game.
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Some grammar and clarity issues, fixed.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
Another one of these "back in my day" threads.
I wish older gamers would quit comparing today's gamers and game play mechanics to those of decades past. Not unlike most things in life, MMO demographics have changed and evolved over time. MMO's are no longer played by the niche few. MMO's have been forced to change due to accommodate the various needs and requirements of the masses. Comparing today's gamers and game play mechanics to those of decades past is like comparing today's athletes and sports to athletes and sports of the 1920's and 30's. By and large we still have the same sports, but in name only. As the athletes playing them and the manner in which they are played are vastly different.
Please give it a break with all of these "back in my day" reminiscing threads. Those days are gonet. These threads are no less annoying than when old timers try to round us up and begin preaching about how hard they had it "back in the day" when they had to walk 30 miles in snow going and coming from school and then when they got home they had to milk the cows and herd the sheep. No one wants to hear it.
Let it go already.
"Small minds talk about people, average minds talk about events, great minds talk about ideas."
It's much simpler than that.
Forced grouping creates very harsh barriers to playing your game. It severely restricts what a player can do, if their friends or busy, or they can't find the right class necessary for the content.
Making more solo friendly / public questing alleviates these barriers. It allows people to play whether they have a dedicated group or not. While dedicated group-oriented games are much more structured (and some people like that), they also lose a lot of players because they simply can't enjoy the game without a dedicated group. Something that isn't as easy to find as some people think, and is furthermore complicated by how complex most people's lives have become. I know I, for one, cannot do dedicated groups, because I'm constantly traveling / changing time zones.
Agreed. Latronus, they communicate differently than you do. They interact differently than you do. Not better or worse, just different.
"The problem is, you youngens DON'T communicate and have no idea of what a real community really is. "
That line alone is something you should concentrate on, Latronus. The assumptions you make about me or even about today's MMO culture indicate that you are simply rejecting something you aren't familiar with or do not like, and you have created in your mind this generalized enemy to rail against.
As krage pointed out, most of those "youngens" are in their twenties and early thirties, and they have moved forward with culture and technology over the past decade and a half. The world communicates and interacts differently now.
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein
"Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
I do not agree to the OP.
While "Old School" MMOrpgs in many ways had strengths that todays are lacking one big thing was there that was allways a strong negative point:
These games forced Players to center their lifes around around their gaming.
This is an unhealthy approach to gaming and needs to change that way that Gamers can participate in MMOrpgs and experience the most content in an entertaining yet still challenging way while centering their gaming around their life.
I feel that the EQ:N approach may be a good way to achive that if done right.
"Torquemada... do not implore him for compassion. Torquemada... do not beg him for forgiveness. Torquemada... do not ask him for mercy. Let's face it, you can't Torquemada anything!"
MWO Music Video - What does the Mech say: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FF6HYNqCDLI
Johnny Cash - The Man Comes Around: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0x2iwK0BKM
WoW is not a good comparision because a lot of it's success was based on the back of it's legion of fans from battlenet and mainstream marketing. Not to mention it was the first polished MMORPG.
And niether Eve nor Darkfall are group only type games either.
Holding players means that games cannot support themselves on the merit that players want to pay a fee to play the games. Free to play is propped up by a minority of players. EQ was P2P for a decade while most of these casual games couldn't survive without F2P.
"Learn to take a ban like a man", that made my day. Sort of like Mafioso principles applied to the world of posters.
Unlike Nari would have you believe players did not drop more community based MMO's in favour of solo ones. Yes, most of us did like at least some of the changes WoW made, but it just went downhill from there. The reason players flooded into the new solo friendly themeparks was that they appealed to the solo market. There were many more players of solo games than players of MMO's. Reviews back in the day were raving about how much you could do as a solo player, that was who they wanted to attract. In fact if every player pre WoW had never played MMO's again the massive number of new players attracted from solo games would have made solo friendly themeparks the huge success they were.
Oh and the reason why all this is interesting is what it says about real life society, not what it says about MMO's. Even a open world, big community MMO exponent like me does not think MMO's are that important.
Very well said and I agree 100%.
Random Forum Poster: I want an MMO that is different, original and fun.
Me: So you want something like EQN
Them: Nah dude, I want a Holy Trinity, Tab Target combat, Instanced Raiding, and Rigid classes.
Me: Double Facepalm.
It's not grouping in my book.
You're solo playing without engaging with people, without talking to them, you're not getting to know them because everyone is too busy zerging content, you might as well be grouping with AI bots.
In many games you aren't even together with other people, you're just a single individual participating in an artificially created event others participate in too, they might as well not even exist.
The community is current MMO is missing, when it becomes a chore to get a response to "Hello all",...your game has issues.
+1 Insight
truth nailed.
/endthread
"There are at least two kinds of games.
One could be called finite, the other infinite.
A finite game is played for the purpose of winning,
an infinite game for the purpose of continuing play."
Finite and Infinite Games, James Carse
Try to cherry pick your example, and ignore the biggest name in MMO?
And if games can support themselves on a cashshop? I don't see needing players to pay a fee is anything special. And EQ is F2P now, as will EQN.
The only reason it survived some years as p2p is because the trend, the competition has not caught on yet. In this competitive climate, i doubt even WOW can survive as sub-only for long. In fact, it is already f2p up to L20, and has a cash shop.
People are willing to pay subscriptions. The problem is that the games are so causal that players blow through content in a matter of weeks and they play like a single player game. Thus people literally beat the game one or two times and are not going to pay 15 a month for that.
The reason a lot of games are going F2P is that it makes more money and put less pressure on them to have content and environment to maintain a working P2P base.
You are contradicting yourself. You just described the reason why people are NOT willing to pay subs.
actually the frog still jumps out even when the water is slowly heated.
IMO people are not looking for community from MMO's these days.
We have community everywhere we go, facebook, twitter, skype, facetime, IM, texting.. It's on our computers, our tablets, our home, our work, our phone.
It's virtually impossible to ignore. IMO there is far far far too much community.
I know I'm not looking to MMO's for community, just a fun diversion.
Those things are not band-aids for a failed community. They are add-ons for a diversion.
Not if you cut out the frog's brain. I'm not sure how the frog stayed alive with no brain, but maybe the brain isn't all that important for frogs.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling_frog
I think if MMOs want to compete on "community", they'll have to adapt and incorporate those things into themselves somehow. In a way that isn't what Zynga did.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
Or may be MMO should not compete on "community". Just focus on better better games.
Well, to be honest, I think that's what they are doing, because that's what they've always been doing. AOL was the closest thing to what we have now for Facebook and the like, and they glommed off of AOL and Compuserve's customers. They didn't try to compete directly, so I think even then they knew what they were developing were games that a community could form around, not neighborhoods that communities would form within.
Of course, I could be wrong. Obviously I don't think so, but the possibility remains.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
Even though I stated above I'm not looking for community from my game, having a group of friends to play regularly with is IMO fun.
I would actually like to see the games hook up to more media friendly things. Have the in game guilds be able to send messages to our cell phones (via whatever account you want) asking/inviting/setting up raids, rp events, crafting sessions... tell me my mates's house was just destroyed and a revenge run is being done, and the house needs to be rebuilt with stronger materials...
Nothing major but a short yes/no text sent from my phone to keep me engaged, just like our RL friends do. I'd be good with that.
Um, grouping is grouping.
Use a different word if you mean a different thing.
There are types of grouping I dislike too, but I don't try to pretend it isn't grouping (if it's grouping.)
I don't find it's a chore to get a response to saying hello in a group. You can say you think community is missing but well...read my entire post next time I guess is my advice, haha. I pretty much covered that.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
I wouldn't call the PQ style content a bandaid for community.
Quite the opposite.
Public quest style content is just another way for soloists to do something without joining a group, relying on other players, communicating, or facing challenges. Zerging stuff is hardly a challenge.
As long as devs keep making single player games intended to appeal to people who don't really like MMORPGs, don't have time to play MMORPGs, don't want to group, don't want challenge, etc, then there will be no community in the games being passed off as MMORPGs.
The oddest thing about the MMORPG genre is that is was successful early on. And for whatever reason companies decided to start trying to cater to people who aren't suited for playing MMORPGs instead of to the people who helped establish the genre with them.
It would seem that time has shown that the approach of trying to coerce non MMORPG players into MMORPG players by dumbing down and making weaker overall games hasn't worked so well. And despite the obvious evidence devs have decided to go further away from the original formula instead of returning to it, such that a lot of upcoming MMORPGs are more like GW2 with very little pretense of even being an MMORPG and instead being soloist games.
It's like they're hoping to make some kind of "social" online game, except most of the players they're pulling in want no part of it. Instead they get people who think soloing exclusively in massively multiplayer games is somehow logical.
The MMORPGs of old were WAY more social and players interacted with each other way more (may have been elss mindless/idiotc/childish zone chat but that's a GOOD thing). Older MMORPGs were highly social before social media we even a dream.
Premium MMORPGs do not feature built-in cheating via cash for gold pay 2 win. PLAY to win or don't play.
What? Do you purposely draw conclusions like that?
People claim players want casual games. Players don't play causal games long. Players won't pay subscriptions to casual games. My conclusion is that casual games are propped up their ability to sell items not being quality games that people want to play. If players wanted to pay to play casual games or like them they would have a supporting base like many of the games that out date them still do.