After trying various MMOs - WoW is still the highest quality

TheScavenger

First I tried FFXIV, was super excited to play it and was gonna surprise some of my friends who play it that I was gonna join them. Turns out they server lock you out if server is too crowded...don't even have a queue system like a high quality WoW server has. So I got my money back and moved on to ESO

ESO is okay, its still installed. But two friends joined me from WoW stopped playing and both went back to WoW, and I kinda lost any motivation to play. I'd have liked to be able to play FFXIV a lot more tbh, its more my style than ESO...but not with complete server locks.

So tried various singleplayer games...and...the other day decided to renew my WoW sub.

Not only does it have the most content of any MMO (but not very fair, because its so old)...it also has the highest PVE (note PVE, not PvP) quality content. With the exception, I never got to see the quality of content in FFXIV...and PvP is pretty fail in WoW...the world PvP is pretty lame since they sort of combined a bunch of servers into groups.

However, by far its the most fun and highest quality PVE I've personally played in a recent MMO. The animations are smooth, moving is fluid, voice acting is decent (some of its pretty good imo), the story to legion is really immersive and there is soooo much lore. Also the classes are all rather well designed, even better than they were in vanilla. I didn't say balanced, but they are all much more fun to use than how they used to be.

I made a Death Knight, went through their class story in Legion...and wow was it amazing! While I don't do hardcore raids, I've done the "easier" raids to see the story. DK is awesome though because the unholy DK is like a heavy armored necromancer, and its a pretty fun necromancer-esque class. 

The other thing I like about WoW is the pet AI is actually really smart and you have a lot of control over it. Is it great? No. But wow are pet classes in most MMOs have the stupidest pets you could ever imagine lol. Or in ESO you can't even CONTROL the pet...at all...its just a stupid DPS dot disguised as a pet. I think that is what most disappointed me about the sorcerer in ESO, since I really like using pets and there isn't one like that in that MMO.

Still, years later...out of all the RELEASED MMOs (not ones in development or on kickstarter or still accepting funding)...still have yet to see an MMO with such high quality content. And how much content there is is just a bonus.

And 1-3 months from now, I'll want something new...again try various MMOs...and then go back to WoW and singleplayer games lol. Thats how it has been the past 3 years now, waiting for something, anything, to match WoW's quality content, the lore, the story, and how much there is to do.

MightyUnclean

I agree, if you want a PvE themepark experience, you can't beat WoW.  Nothing else comes even close to Blizzard's level of polish.  People love to hate it, but its success over the years speaks for itself.

rx8993

Give SWTOR a try, if only for story, i just buy one month of sub when ever new expansion is released, blast trough it and then go back to WoW.

Thebeasttt

That's why the genre is dying. Every new game fails to deliver over a 13 year one.

esc-joconnor

Thebeasttt said:

That's why the genre is dying. Every new game fails to deliver over a 13 year one.

I don't know, Blizzard seems to be trying to make it easier

Akulas

WoW does what it does well. Although I disagree with the direction it took all it takes is to play another game to realise how smooth everything is in WoW such as chat, gameplay and even their customer service.

Octagon7711

Had many good times in WoW since launch and still come back for a new class and some of the new content.  So still play off and on.

SavageHorizon

Sorry but I think you will find that EQ2 has just as much polished PVE content as WOW, I would say it has more PVE content. That's not taking anything away dorm WOW because it's is a giant where PVE is concerned. 

Octagon7711

I've found WoW's content really easy to pickup where you left off compared to a lot of other MMO's with drastic learning curves.

Thane

you no mess with blizz wang!

Octagon7711

Rhoklaw said:

WoW hasn't been good since WotLK. I say this because I've been given free expansions to both Cataclysm and Mists of Pandaria. I tried both and quit shortly after trying both. It's funny since a lot of games tried to copy WoW, yet for some reason, WoW felt compelled to copy Asian grinders.

I didn't like the Panda so didn't come back for that one.  I did come back for Demon Hunter and played a Monk as a Night Elf and really enjoyed it.

fodell54

SavageHorizon said:

Sorry but I think you will find that EQ2 has just as much polished PVE content as WOW, I would say it has more PVE content. That's not taking anything away dorm WOW because it's is a giant where PVE is concerned. 

EQ2 is a great PVE game. Honestly, I really enjoyed my time with EQ2. However, it has horrible graphics and runs like crap. It also has massive skill bloat that most players now-a-days don't want to put up with. Add to those issues, the population is really bad on most servers and leveling can be tedious.

No matter how you look at WoW is a all around better game. However, I understand you sentiment and realize that people like different things. Good luck with your game and I hope you enjoy it.

Kyleran

fodell54 said:

SavageHorizon said:

Sorry but I think you will find that EQ2 has just as much polished PVE content as WOW, I would say it has more PVE content. That's not taking anything away dorm WOW because it's is a giant where PVE is concerned. 

EQ2 is a great PVE game. Honestly, I really enjoyed my time with EQ2. However, it has horrible graphics and runs like crap. It also has massive skill bloat that most players now-a-days don't want to put up with. Add to those issues, the population is really bad on most servers and leveling can be tedious.

No matter how you look at WoW is a all around better game. However, I understand you sentiment and realize that people like different things. Good luck with your game and I hope you enjoy it.

Personal preferences aside both are near the top of the theme park game list.

Amathe

WoW has done a great job of making it possible for returning players to catch up. So when people are between games, they often go back to WoW for a while. 

I still miss another game that was a great one to return to now and then - City of Heroes. 

SEANMCAD

I would not put WoW on a high quality list of any metric personally, nor would I put EQ2 on such a list.

monochrome19

WoW is definitely the highest quality MMO, but its also played out. I wish I discovered it now instead of years earlier, because I'm completely burned out. I cant play another minute of it.

Kyleran

SEANMCAD said:

I would not put WoW on a high quality list of any metric personally, nor would I put EQ2 on such a list.

That's fine but I would be interested in your top two MMORPGs in terms of quality.

SEANMCAD

Kyleran said:

SEANMCAD said:

I would not put WoW on a high quality list of any metric personally, nor would I put EQ2 on such a list.

That's fine but I would be interested in your top two MMORPGs in terms of quality.

well I can restrict it to just MMORPGs but I honestly fail to see the point of that parameter in the context of the conversation around quality.

But not in order and restricting it to just technically MMORPGs,  I would consider the following of better quality
Eve
Wurm Online
Life is Fudeal
Darkfall

Renoaku

Yeah I don't doubt wow is really that bad in terms of actual game-play but the game itself and the character models look very outdated.

etharn

People only miss City of Heroes because it no longer around. When it was around no one ever talk about it and very few played it or it was there go to MMO when their primary was in maintenance lol. I honestly gave WoW six or seven tries to like it but I just cant. Quality seems to be set to the beholder. I know quite a few peeps that they find older MMO more quality then anything out right now. What I mean by older is classics where you lvled skills not levels. 

SEANMCAD

etharn said:

People only miss City of Heroes because it no longer around. When it was around no one ever talk about it and very few played it or it was there go to MMO when their primary was in maintenance lol. I honestly gave WoW six or seven tries to like it but I just cant. Quality seems to be set to the beholder. I know quite a few peeps that they find older MMO more quality then anything out right now. What I mean by older is classics where you lvled skills not levels. 

EXACTLY! that is the standard mode of operation at least around here.

If Game exists Then 'not intrested'
If game does Not Exist Then either lament or hype depending on past or future.

you could set your watch to it, extremely predictable 

Loke666

I don't really agree but Wow is certainly not a bad game (even though I think it dropped in quality since Kaplan left if not before that). It does what it does really well but you can't fairly compare it with games that differ like Eve or AC, it is like comparing a rap and a metal song.

That the genre is not going well right now is not really because the new games compete with Wow but that they still are so similar. A 13 year old gameplay does not suddenly become "new and great" by changing the graphics. A genre do need new ideas and mechanics now and then or it will start to loose players.

A few games that are well made have tried different things like ESO and GW2 but I don't think they went far enough to really revitalize the genre, they have done fine for themselves but not great. Hopefully will someone else pull it off.

People who played MMORPGs since 1996 or 2004 are a hard sell if the gameplay just is more of the same. Even Wow have lost a lot of players the last 5 years and new games with similar gameplay have even harder getting players, people either move to other genres or stick with the similar game they already play and put a lot of effort into during the years.

A new hit MMORPG don't actually have to be better then Wow was/is to become huge, it needs to be different but fun. Something equally good or even somewhat worse that is different would still be a huge thing today.

Gesph

Ah... WoW. The worst cancer ever created in the form of a MMO. Some people even disgustedly admit that they play the extremely outdated game. To compare this utter trash with FFXIV is extremely awkward.

Broccoleh

Wow is polished yes, possibly the most polished mmo out there but even that took a big dive with Legion. The latest expansion is the most unpolished version of this game I've ever seen, but that is still not the biggest problem with this game.

Wow used to be deep, full of flexibility and thoughtful ways to personalize, theorycraft and perfect your character and gameplay. But then we're talking about vanilla and tbc (at some extent wotlk). Since then, mechanics have been dumbed down to the point where you only have one theoretical route for making your character optimized. Not only that, but to truly optimize yourself in the current state of the game it's more about rolling the correct fotmclass at the correct time where constant rerolling of gamebalance puts your class ahead. Counterplay is limited and almost non-existent. Noteable with the latest arenatournaments on twitch, you see players rolling on alts beating specialized comps that some people mained and perfected for 10 years, with little practice, just because counterplay is now replaced with counterclass/comp.

Being good at this game isn't really a thing anymore, the pruning lowered the skillcap so much you can hardly differ between the good, the bad and the best players anymore. I hit gladrating noskype with randoms from trade when my class was in a good spot balancewise, then the next season I lost alot of games vs sub 2k mmr teams just because my class was now the bottom of the foodchain and literally unplayable. Any clown could win games just by rolling the correct class and comp and there was little to nothing I could do as an individual to counter it. All the while I'm the same player that hit 2k mmr 1vs2'ing people in 2v2 once upon a time when outplaying was a real thing.

This game needs to die to give room for new and better ideas. I would recommend ESO right now, they're doing alot of things better although there's still alot to improve on in that game as well. At least it's nowhere near as shallow as Legion is.

My2c from mainly a pvp pov.

LynxJSA

I liked the WOW I played when it first came out. The current incarnation just seems like a mess of things throwing tasks, rewards, and achievements at me. The story arc for each area also seemed more obvious and engaging back when I first played than it does now. The gameplay is def there for people who want progression, but I find games like Elder Scrolls Online and Guild Wars 2 to be much higher quality across the board. 

Hariken

MightyUnclean said:

I agree, if you want a PvE themepark experience, you can't beat WoW.  Nothing else comes even close to Blizzard's level of polish.  People love to hate it, but its success over the years speaks for itself.

The fact that its still #1 shows just how crap these other games are.