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An Intersting Read

AlBQuirkyAlBQuirky Member EpicPosts: 7,432
in The Pub at MMORPG.COM

History of MMO Gaming from Wikipedia. If you have a few minutes to spare, it is an interesting walk through the evolution of MMOs. I sure missed out on a lot of games :)

- Al

Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse.
- FARGIN_WAR


Comments

  • maplestonemaplestone Member UncommonPosts: 3,099

    It's interesting how perceptions of value change.  I always found it hard to believe that those games that had a price per hour found an audience.

  • AlBQuirkyAlBQuirky Member EpicPosts: 7,432

    No kidding! I gasped at the going rate of $6/hour! Add that onto the per hour charge the internet providers did back then and I am sure it kept a lot of people from playing :)

    - Al

    Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse.
    - FARGIN_WAR


  • GrixxittGrixxitt Member UncommonPosts: 545
    Originally posted by AlBQuirky

    No kidding! I gasped at the going rate of $6/hour! Add that onto the per hour charge the internet providers did back then and I am sure it kept a lot of people from playing :)

     

    I was fucking thrilled when outfits like Prodigy and CompuServe started to die off and local ISPs started to pop up pretty much all over the US

    The above is my personal opinion. Anyone displaying a view contrary to my opinion is obviously WRONG and should STHU. (neener neener)

    -The MMO Forum Community

  • cosycosy Member UncommonPosts: 3,228

    hmmm good link OP

    BestSigEver :P
    image

  • nariusseldonnariusseldon Member EpicPosts: 27,775
    Originally posted by maplestone

    It's interesting how perceptions of value change.  I always found it hard to believe that those games that had a price per hour found an audience.

    I played one of those ... kingdom of Drakkar. I remmeber it was like $2 an hour.

  • AlBQuirkyAlBQuirky Member EpicPosts: 7,432

    Originally posted by nariusseldon
    Originally posted by maplestone It's interesting how perceptions of value change.  I always found it hard to believe that those games that had a price per hour found an audience.
    I played one of those ... kingdom of Drakkar. I remmeber it was like $2 an hour.

    And the concept of the dreaded "timesink" was birthed :) Had to keep the players paying with their time online.

    - Al

    Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse.
    - FARGIN_WAR


  • huskie77huskie77 Member Posts: 354

    I still remember how hard I was hit by a $380 charge for Neverwinter on AOL. Great game as it used the SSI engine, but on dial up it was slow to play and very expensive. Good times.

     

    Thanks for the flashback OP. Best thread on this forum in many months.

    image
  • erictlewiserictlewis Member UncommonPosts: 3,022
    Originally posted by huskie77

    I still remember how hard I was hit by a $380 charge for Neverwinter on AOL. Great game as it used the SSI engine, but on dial up it was slow to play and very expensive. Good times.

     

    Thanks for the flashback OP. Best thread on this forum in many months.

    I was about to give you my 180 dollar neverwinter night charge on prodigy, but you got me beet.   I am so glad providers like prodigy no longer exist, and to think of how much we paid for dial up connection, not to mention the regular phone bill if you happened not to have prodigy or aol in the area.

     

  • huskie77huskie77 Member Posts: 354

    Yeah, I was one of those who eventually got caught by prodigy for generating fake 10 hours free codes, so I made the transition to AOL who was lightyears ahead of Prodigy at the time anyway.

    I was sad to leave Prodigy though as I had created and managed a successful message board Wargame called UN: Africa.

    image
  • IchmenIchmen Member UncommonPosts: 1,228

    lolol makes me glad i was more interested in fps/rts games at the time when i still had 28.8 and dialup modems..  spending up to 4hrs downloading a demo of a game or even a full game on dialup was sick.. cant even fathom trying to play an mmo on that lolol (didnt help house had 1 phone line so if someone called in/out the net was killed lol)

     

  • AlBQuirkyAlBQuirky Member EpicPosts: 7,432

    Originally posted by erictlewis
    Originally posted by huskie77
    I still remember how hard I was hit by a $380 charge for Neverwinter on AOL. Great game as it used the SSI engine, but on dial up it was slow to play and very expensive. Good times.  

    Thanks for the flashback OP. Best thread on this forum in many months.

    I was about to give you my 180 dollar neverwinter night charge on prodigy, but you got me beet.   I am so glad providers like prodigy no longer exist, and to think of how much we paid for dial up connection, not to mention the regular phone bill if you happened not to have prodigy or aol in the area.
    @cosy and huskie77: Thanks! I was feeling nostalgic today :)

    Yea, those old services were tricky on the ol' budget :) Think of the pricing then... If AOL or Prodigy or CompuServe were NOT in your area, you had long distance fees/minute, ISP fees/hour, AND the game fees/hour! Thank goodness that went the way of the dinosaur :)

    - Al

    Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse.
    - FARGIN_WAR


  • nariusseldonnariusseldon Member EpicPosts: 27,775
    Originally posted by AlBQuirky

     

    Originally posted by nariusseldon
    Originally posted by maplestone It's interesting how perceptions of value change.  I always found it hard to believe that those games that had a price per hour found an audience.
    I played one of those ... kingdom of Drakkar. I remmeber it was like $2 an hour.
    And the concept of the dreaded "timesink" was birthed :) Had to keep the players paying with their time online.

     

    Funny that KoD wasn't mentioned in the article.

    And yes, that game was very arcane by today's standard. But you *can* play with others in a dungeon adventure, in 2D tile graphics.

  • BarCrowBarCrow Member UncommonPosts: 2,195

    There is still a Kingdom of Drakkar site....probably updated since you guys played but its a free online rpg.

    http://www.kingdomofdrakkar.com/

    It apparently started as a MUD(Multi-user dungeon) called Realm in 1984. Wow.

    http://kingdomofdrakkar.wikia.com/wiki/Category:History_of_Drakkar

     

  • CyclopsSlayerCyclopsSlayer Member UncommonPosts: 532

    Gods, a fun but somewhat depressing read... :)    I feel so old now. A lot of the AOL/CompuServe games I never even heard of, or played.

     

    I played Adventure on a teletype terminal while in school for electronics 1977-78. Many rolls of paper to track each play session. XYZZY ftw!

    I had a friend that worked on Control Data's PLATO system locally, late '70's to early '80's, so I was able to play TREK and Dungeon without the then incredible fees. All most all the hours of play were on orange plasma screen monitors, but such headaches the color caused. Even got him into trouble after a TREK game one time where my spastic trigger finger was firing my phasers so fast I personally hit 1.7% TIPS, yup personally consumed 1.7% of Plato's entire nets processing power. lol. Ahh the days of spending all your starting money on a flask of Holy Water, taking the Dungeon elevator down to L127 and throwing it at the first Vampire you saw in the scant hope you would kill it and hit L40 instantly.

    Later in the '80's I was on several local MUDs/MUSH's and a couple of online PnP RPG games. That and playing Rogue and much later the various RogueLikes, NetHack, Moria, Angband etc...

    Later joined Meridian99. Dabbled in UO but was a late starter there so didn't find the getting ganked constantly all that much fun.

    Later joined EQ near launch and have been lost ever since... :)

  • maplestonemaplestone Member UncommonPosts: 3,099
    Originally posted by CyclopsSlay

     

     

    I played Adventure on a teletype terminal while in school for electronics 1977-78. Many rolls of paper to track each play session. XYZZY ftw!

    Ha!  I got a box of "hunt the wumpus" printout as a present one year because a friend of the family had found somone had burned through an entire box of paper playing the game.  Without knowing anything about the game, it made so little sense that we just couldn't stop laughing at the continuous stream of gibberish punctuated now and then by a line like "player kills wumpus and self in six by brains"

  • waynejr2waynejr2 Member EpicPosts: 7,769
    Originally posted by CyclopsSlay

    Gods, a fun but somewhat depressing read... :)    I feel so old now. A lot of the AOL/CompuServe games I never even heard of, or played.

     

    I played Adventure on a teletype terminal while in school for electronics 1977-78. Many rolls of paper to track each play session. XYZZY ftw!

    I had a friend that worked on Control Data's PLATO system locally, late '70's to early '80's, so I was able to play TREK and Dungeon without the then incredible fees. All most all the hours of play were on orange plasma screen monitors, but such headaches the color caused. Even got him into trouble after a TREK game one time where my spastic trigger finger was firing my phasers so fast I personally hit 1.7% TIPS, yup personally consumed 1.7% of Plato's entire nets processing power. lol. Ahh the days of spending all your starting money on a flask of Holy Water, taking the Dungeon elevator down to L127 and throwing it at the first Vampire you saw in the scant hope you would kill it and hit L40 instantly.

    Later in the '80's I was on several local MUDs/MUSH's and a couple of online PnP RPG games. That and playing Rogue and much later the various RogueLikes, NetHack, Moria, Angband etc...

    Later joined Meridian99. Dabbled in UO but was a late starter there so didn't find the getting ganked constantly all that much fun.

    Later joined EQ near launch and have been lost ever since... :)

    I played on PLATO back in the 70s and it was fun for the time.  Maze wars was great too.  Then again, I am old compared to this crowd.

    The $ per hour charges were killer for tsn and aol.  But hopefully some kids will see where some of us old timers are coming from on a $15.00 monthly fee.

    http://www.youhaventlived.com/qblog/2010/QBlog190810A.html  

    Epic Music:   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAigCvelkhQ&list=PLo9FRw1AkDuQLEz7Gvvaz3ideB2NpFtT1

    https://archive.org/details/softwarelibrary_msdos?&sort=-downloads&page=1

    Kyleran:  "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience because it lacks a few features you prefer."

    John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."

    FreddyNoNose:  "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."

    LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you playing an MMORPG?"




  • dave6660dave6660 Member UncommonPosts: 2,699

    "Many of the most recent big-budget contributions to the market have focused on giving players visually stunning graphics."

    True, at the expense of just about everything else.  It's like trout fishing, dangle something shiney in front of them and they bite.

    “There are certain queer times and occasions in this strange mixed affair we call life when a man takes this whole universe for a vast practical joke, though the wit thereof he but dimly discerns, and more than suspects that the joke is at nobody's expense but his own.”
    -- Herman Melville

  • RamanadjinnRamanadjinn Member UncommonPosts: 1,365

    Meridian 59 didn't launch with a flat monthly fee either.

    they had more of a tiered pay as you play system that ended up costing about $30 a month if you played all the time every day like i did.

    i dont' remember the details but you paid every time you logged, every hour, or every day up to a maximum amount or something to that effect.

  • CyclopsSlayerCyclopsSlayer Member UncommonPosts: 532
    Originally posted by waynejr2

    The $ per hour charges were killer for tsn and aol.  But hopefully some kids will see where some of us old timers are coming from on a $15.00 monthly fee.

    Too damn true!  I think AOL hit 19$ an hour at one point. CompuServe was half the price, but like a fifth of the content. One of my earliest internet friends connected from Sweden and he was charged a Base rate plus a fee per kilobyte of data transferred.

    So I don't even blink at 15$ a month. Hell, that's less than a movie with snack, or less than a couple of drinks in the pub.

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