good games and good communities

Foomerang

So ive been reflecting a bit on my mmo gaming experience. Over the past ten years, ive played many different types of mmos. The best ones either had a great community or the gameplay itself was top notch. i began to wonder which aspect of an mmo begets the other. Will an awesome community make a crap game seem like a gem? Will amazing gameplay be enough to overshadow a bunch of tweekers? Which one is more important to me? I can always ignore asshats but the gameplay is always in my face. On the flipside, even just travelling around with a bunch of great rpers in a dull and lifeless world can be interesting and even memorable.

I know the magic answer is both aspects coming together to make the best mmo experience. But i wonder which one comes first: the game or the comminity, when great mmos are made.

What do you think?

FarReach

I can always ignore the idiots. I can't ignore bad gameplay. Generally when I find a game I like, the community is usually pretty good too. The "tweekers" aren't usually attracted to the type of games I really enjoy. 

pierth

For a MMO, I'd have to side with community if I could choose only one. I mean, say something drastic like WoW (excellent gameplay, terrible community) or something as broken as FF14 if it had a good community, I'd probably choose the latter. If gameplay was more important than community I'd play single player games, like Mass Effect or Oblivion.

Ocirusskd

If I look back at games that I liked and played for an extended period of time, then they all had one thing in common, friends and a great community directly around me. Now some of these games had awful overall communities but the people in my bubble where well worth spending my time with and influenced my opinion of the game play.

Foomerang

Interesting. The more I think about it, the more I think that good company will bump a bland game up to a great game. But an awesome game with an awful playerbase makes for a worse game experience. So I wonder, as a developer, do you focus more on making your game appeal to the individual or on giving your game more social aspects like storytelling, or non-combat hubs, or tools that allow for player run events more easily.

On the other hand, I might just make a game that kicks so much ass, you just talk your rl friends into joining you and ignore the rest of the population.

jpnz

The issue with good communities with bad game play is that those people will eventually move.

One's tolerance for bad game play will be different for everyone but eventually that 'limit' will be reached by all and they will all leave. As an MMO this is a terrible business model as you want to have a constant increase or static subscription numbers.

 

Good game play with terrible communities will last as good game play = more players come to play.

Eventually the 'good' players will form their own communities.

Rydeson

     First you need to define good tho..  What one person calls a good community, others will cringe about..  Incomming example:   If I have to read one more lame silly "Chuck Norris" 1 hour long chat in text I'm going to vomit..  To me that Chuck Norris thing isnt' even funny.. I guess for the younger generation that is hip, but to me it's GRRRRR  This goes right along with the "CaN u ReAd tHiS" crap all the time.. or "I PWNZ U"..... Some would call that a good community or kewl chat.. I just find it immature and a turn off..  I'm constantly staying on my daughters case about using appropriate English, but then I care..  This reminds me tho..

     Before I left WoW, I remember an incident where one of our guildies, whom happen to be a damn good dpser and player wanted to raid with us on a Tues night.. I had found out that he had 2 midterm exams on Wednesday and because of the time difference, I had canceled the raid that night and postponed it to Thurs.. Everyone agreed except the young student (he was a senior in HS).. He so insisted on raiding Tues night that he quit the guild, and joined another to go raiding..  I came to find out the following week he received D's on both midterms.. He never studied, which was the whole purpose why I suspended the raid.. I had even told him on Vent that he needs to sign off and get to school work.. We (the guild) aren't going to leave him behind and want him along for the fun.. I guess WoW was more important then school....... Where was this kids parents?  GRRRR

 

Foomerang

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Originally posted by Rydeson
     First you need to define good tho..  What one person calls a good community, others will cringe about..  Incomming example:   If I have to read one more lame silly "Chuck Norris" 1 hour long chat in text I'm going to vomit..  To me that Chuck Norris thing isnt' even funny.. I guess for the younger generation that is hip, but to me it's GRRRRR  This goes right along with the "CaN u ReAd tHiS" crap all the time.. or "I PWNZ U"..... Some would call that a good community or kewl chat.. I just find it immature and a turn off..  I'm constantly staying on my daughters case about using appropriate English, but then I care..  This reminds me tho..
     Before I left WoW, I remember an incident where one of our guildies, whom happen to be a damn good dpser and player wanted to raid with us on a Tues night.. I had found out that he had 2 midterm exams on Wednesday and because of the time difference, I had canceled the raid that night and postponed it to Thurs.. Everyone agreed except the young student (he was a senior in HS).. He so insisted on raiding Tues night that he quit the guild, and joined another to go raiding..  I came to find out the following week he received D's on both midterms.. He never studied, which was the whole purpose why I suspended the raid.. I had even told him on Vent that he needs to sign off and get to school work.. We (the guild) aren't going to leave him behind and want him along for the fun.. I guess WoW was more important then school....... Where was this kids parents?  GRRRR
 

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I see your point. Personally, a good community is first and foremost a helpful one. If you ask a question in general chat and are greeted with flames thats not a good sign. I dont consider it rude if i ask a question and get directed to a database site or a forum topic that covers it. I dont expect everyone to drop what they are doing and give me the exact info i want right then and there. But i do expect to be treated with a certain degree of respect. The same respect that you would give a stranger that asks you a question when youre downtown or on the train. Im not asking for every person i talk to to become my best friend, but i think its fair to expect common courtesy. Internet anonymity runs rampant, i know. But an mmo server shouldnt fall under the same category imho. Its important to treat it differently since potentially youre going to need to rely on these players and vice versa at some point.

CactusJack

Ask any ex-military person the same type of question....would you rather be stationed at a fantastic geographical location, but work with/for idiots?  Or would you rather be stationed at the North Pole or some place horrible but with quality people? MMO's by their very nature are extensions of a virtual communtiy.

We have seen the gameplay/graphics grow by leaps and bounds, which is great. Games with good communities will always last longer b/c the players want them too. Look at these boards...there are requests for Vanguard to stay open, APB is being repurposed...it's loaded with this primarily due to the communities those people have there.

Gameplay is very very overrated. Look at Runescape..tons of people still play that pile of garbage, because they have a network of friends there. Would you rather go to a pub where people know you and you know you'll have a good time? Or would you rather go to a nightclub b/c of all the things that go with it, but it's full of asshats?

MMO's came from PnP games. PnP games required actual human beings to sit at a table together. Graphics only matter to people that got into MMORPG's from consoles or were never exposed to this type of activity. 

Foomerang

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Originally posted by CactusJack
Ask any ex-military person the same type of question....would you rather be stationed at a fantastic geographical location, but work with/for idiots?  Or would you rather be stationed at the North Pole or some place horrible but with quality people? MMO's by their very nature are extensions of a virtual communtiy.
We have seen the gameplay/graphics grow by leaps and bounds, which is great. Games with good communities will always last longer b/c the players want them too. Look at these boards...there are requests for Vanguard to stay open, APB is being repurposed...it's loaded with this primarily due to the communities those people have there.
Gameplay is very very overrated. Look at Runescape..tons of people still play that pile of garbage, because they have a network of friends there. Would you rather go to a pub where people know you and you know you'll have a good time? Or would you rather go to a nightclub b/c of all the things that go with it, but it's full of asshats?
MMO's came from PnP games. PnP games required actual human beings to sit at a table together. Graphics only matter to people that got into MMORPG's from consoles or were never exposed to this type of activity. 

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I agree with all of this. Unfortunately, mmo gamers have grown and crossed over into so many genres that the traditional pnp style is not the standard (not currently at least). So devs in response make mmo console games which in turn arent community based virtual worlds by default, more a consequence of so to speak.