Do MMORPG need a new audience and customerbase?

Vermillion_Raventhal

I have always felt like the millions WoW brought in simply are not into MMORPG.  I feel like if MMORPG focused on what makes MMORPG unique it would drive away a good portion of player base.  

Your thoughts?

Sovrath

Vermillion_Raventhal said:

I have always felt like the millions WoW brought in simply are not into MMORPG.  I feel like if MMORPG focused on what makes MMORPG unique it would drive away a good portion of player base.  

Your thoughts?

That's what I've always believed. I've read many thoughts about World of Warcraft players being more "world of warcraft players" than mmorpg players.

Not many of my friends play video games but I do have a friend who plays them and the "one" mmorpg he plays is World of Warcraft.

This past weekend I asked him if he was getting on the Classic train and he said no. He said that it seemed that it was better for groups and he prefers his solo journey through Azeroth. He used to be in a guild but that was a while ago and he hasn't really missed it.

I think mmorpg players are a small group of people when compared to other game genres.

Amaranthar

I think there are plenty of people out there who'd love for something more "worldly". 
Especially after all these years of the standard created by the "clone" syndrome, where those that haven't been catered to have played the best thing available. 

Evidence is abundant.
Balder's Gate, people complained that it was linear and they couldn't go off course to explore.
Success of the Elder Scrolls games. 
These two stand out to me because I'm not really much of a gamer so I don't know or remember games I've only read about once in a while. 

MMO's have tried to answer to the problems here, but trying to do so while keeping the core Themepark game play has led to undesirable outcomes. 
In particular, changing the MOBs to suit the party, it just smacks of falseness, if you get my meaning. 

This isn't to say that there are more Themepark style gamers, I think there are. It's just that there are also great numbers, just less, of gamers who would like a World to play in. 

Amathe

Baseball used to be "America's Game." Not nearly as many people watch baseball anymore. They don't have the patience for it. They don't have the time. They find it boring because it lacks non-stop action.

That's really what's changed about mmorpgs. 

In EQ I once camped a spawn I needed for my epic for 3 real life days. Came home on a Friday. Finally got her on Sunday evening. Turned out, she was bugged. Nowadays that would be viewed as utter madness. (Some maybe would have thought that then, honestly).

It's really hard to explain to people the excitement of achieving a goal you really had to wait for.

Sovrath

Amaranthar said:

I think there are plenty of people out there who'd love for something more "worldly". 
Especially after all these years of the standard created by the "clone" syndrome, where those that haven't been catered to have played the best thing available. 

Evidence is abundant.
Balder's Gate, people complained that it was linear and they couldn't go off course to explore.
Success of the Elder Scrolls games. 
These two stand out to me because I'm not really much of a gamer so I don't know or remember games I've only read about once in a while. 

MMO's have tried to answer to the problems here, but trying to do so while keeping the core Themepark game play has led to undesirable outcomes. 
In particular, changing the MOBs to suit the party, it just smacks of falseness, if you get my meaning. 

This isn't to say that there are more Themepark style gamers, I think there are. It's just that there are also great numbers, just less, of gamers who would like a World to play in. 

Baldur's gate is considered a huge classic for role playing fans. Oh sure I guess there were people who complained one couldn't explore but I don't know when that was. I mean, there weren't many "exploration role playing games" at the time as far as I can remember. Also there are people who just don't like the Elder Scrolls Games because they are so loose and open.

Personally I loved Baldur's gate but prefer the open world style of the Elder Scrolls games.

Wizardry

Vermillion_Raventhal said:

I have always felt like the millions WoW brought in simply are not into MMORPG.  I feel like if MMORPG focused on what makes MMORPG unique it would drive away a good portion of player base.  

Your thoughts?

Well op i look at it from a much easier perspective,one that i have mentioned 20 years ago.

Give us CHOICE !!

IDC if Tom or Joe blow want to go play some fake rpg like Wow,if that is what turns them on,go for it i really don't care.However when all the other studios see them making lot's of money and just copy that design,it gives us NO CHOICE.

So nobody would be driven away,you have the Wow and it's clones and then you have the EQ1/FFXi/UO and it's clones.

However there is room for one more and the one I WANT.That is a mmorpg that ALSO has survival game in it.Why not,i mean if we are suppose to be realistic characters in a world,why would we not have survival mechanics?

To me personally survival games are doing a better job at delivering a rpg than the rpg games are.MMorpg's are just delivering linear,automated game play which mostly have no place to live "housing"food and drink do not matter,auto warps into dungeons,instance game play way too often etc etc.
The problem right now is money,all the mmorpg's are low budget and the survival games are even lower budget so nobody is putting together a AAA game.

Amaranthar

Sovrath said:

Amaranthar said:

I think there are plenty of people out there who'd love for something more "worldly". 
Especially after all these years of the standard created by the "clone" syndrome, where those that haven't been catered to have played the best thing available. 

Evidence is abundant.
Balder's Gate, people complained that it was linear and they couldn't go off course to explore.
Success of the Elder Scrolls games. 
These two stand out to me because I'm not really much of a gamer so I don't know or remember games I've only read about once in a while. 

MMO's have tried to answer to the problems here, but trying to do so while keeping the core Themepark game play has led to undesirable outcomes. 
In particular, changing the MOBs to suit the party, it just smacks of falseness, if you get my meaning. 

This isn't to say that there are more Themepark style gamers, I think there are. It's just that there are also great numbers, just less, of gamers who would like a World to play in. 

Baldur's gate is considered a huge classic for role playing fans. Oh sure I guess there were people who complained one couldn't explore but I don't know when that was. I mean, there weren't many "exploration role playing games" at the time as far as I can remember. Also there are people who just don't like the Elder Scrolls Games because they are so loose and open.

Personally I loved Baldur's gate but prefer the open world style of the Elder Scrolls games.

Balder's Gate II was changed to allow more open world activity, because the complaints were so strong from the first game. 

But as I said, and I agree, there are also plenty of gamers who like the Themepark model. 
There's room for great success for both. 

OGDeathRow

Vermillion_Raventhal said:

I have always felt like the millions WoW brought in simply are not into MMORPG.  I feel like if MMORPG focused on what makes MMORPG unique it would drive away a good portion of player base.  

Your thoughts?

Really? 

Massive - check
Multiplayer - check
Online- check 
RPG - roleplaying game - check

Seems all the recent MMO's have those in check. Sure there is lots of trash mmos out there, but same can be said for console games. Have you viewed the ps4 store or xbox store??? Some of those games will make you shake your head. People complain about games being anti social, thats not the games fault, thats on all of us. Make your own guilds, recruit people with like minds. 

What makes a MMORPG unique? That sentence has me baffled. 

Sovrath

Arterius said:

I know I will get flayed for saying this. MMO's have evolved already. I would say  that MMO's didn't die but just became something else. 

You would probably be correct. People might think "evolving" involves "evolving" to their taste but not so. They have changed and adapted and evolved to something that a good many people at the start might not like.

Amaranthar said:

Sovrath said:

Amaranthar said:

I think there are plenty of people out there who'd love for something more "worldly". 
Especially after all these years of the standard created by the "clone" syndrome, where those that haven't been catered to have played the best thing available. 

Evidence is abundant.
Balder's Gate, people complained that it was linear and they couldn't go off course to explore.
Success of the Elder Scrolls games. 
These two stand out to me because I'm not really much of a gamer so I don't know or remember games I've only read about once in a while. 

MMO's have tried to answer to the problems here, but trying to do so while keeping the core Themepark game play has led to undesirable outcomes. 
In particular, changing the MOBs to suit the party, it just smacks of falseness, if you get my meaning. 

This isn't to say that there are more Themepark style gamers, I think there are. It's just that there are also great numbers, just less, of gamers who would like a World to play in. 

Baldur's gate is considered a huge classic for role playing fans. Oh sure I guess there were people who complained one couldn't explore but I don't know when that was. I mean, there weren't many "exploration role playing games" at the time as far as I can remember. Also there are people who just don't like the Elder Scrolls Games because they are so loose and open.

Personally I loved Baldur's gate but prefer the open world style of the Elder Scrolls games.

Balder's Gate II was changed to allow more open world activity, because the complaints were so strong from the first game. 

But as I said, and I agree, there are also plenty of gamers who like the Themepark model. 
There's room for great success for both. 

In truth I've yet to make it through Baldur's Gate II. Always start it, get to a certain point and then it loses me. I'll have to look into "why."

Mendel

Vermillion_Raventhal said:

I have always felt like the millions WoW brought in simply are not into MMORPG.  I feel like if MMORPG focused on what makes MMORPG unique it would drive away a good portion of player base.  

Your thoughts?

I've always thought that a large part of WoW's success was Blizzard's ability to "convert" a significant portion of their Warcraft player base into their MMORPG space.  The most defining attribute of Warcraft?  Player versus player.  WoW brought in a lot of PvP players into a predominantly PvE environment.  It isn't surprising that WoW fans don't really like EQ and vice versa; it's fundamentally a different game than they expect.

However, neither PvP nor PvE game play has evolved in the decades since.  The player base has been attracted to other games, and doesn't appear to hold much weight in the market space.  These people may be out there, but it is really going to take something far more revolutionary to bring them back together.

The big problem for the industry, as I see it, is that no one is working to advance the expected game play for either PvP or PvE styles.  Big companies appear to have abandoned the MMORPG space because the development costs are too high and development of a complete world is far too involved and lengthy to make a reasonable return on investment.  Big companies could acquire the talent to make the changes necessary to the genre, but are short on patience.

Indies are at least trying to step up somewhat, but almost all of these are focused on resurrecting some other game's past glories using the same old formula.  Maybe this approach will work for a while, but none of the independents are really addressing *why* these old models faded in popularity.  There are reasons why the player count for individual MMORPGs have dwindled.  It is pretty reasonable to accept that the players want something different, and flit from game to game hoping to find whatever they think is missing.

This is partly why I think the best way forward for the genre is something new and exciting, a game that will attract modern players in an MMORPG setting, while accommodating those that want old school.  I had had hopes for Titan, but the development stumbled when the management ran out of patience.  Doing something innovative is difficult.

I don't know what form such a game might take, but I doubt it is currently on anyone's drawing board.

Phry

OGDeathRow said:

Vermillion_Raventhal said:

I have always felt like the millions WoW brought in simply are not into MMORPG.  I feel like if MMORPG focused on what makes MMORPG unique it would drive away a good portion of player base.  

Your thoughts?

Really? 

Massive - check
Multiplayer - check
Online- check 
RPG - roleplaying game - check

Seems all the recent MMO's have those in check. Sure there is lots of trash mmos out there, but same can be said for console games. Have you viewed the ps4 store or xbox store??? Some of those games will make you shake your head. People complain about games being anti social, thats not the games fault, thats on all of us. Make your own guilds, recruit people with like minds. 

What makes a MMORPG unique? That sentence has me baffled. 

MMO is not that however, MMO is Massively Multiplayer Online;

Massively Multiplayer is not the same as Massive Multiplayer, its an entirely different concept. Which is why MMO has never meant Massive Mutiplayer Online, though the term does seem to confuse people.

lotrlore

Phry said:

OGDeathRow said:

Vermillion_Raventhal said:

I have always felt like the millions WoW brought in simply are not into MMORPG.  I feel like if MMORPG focused on what makes MMORPG unique it would drive away a good portion of player base.  

Your thoughts?

Really? 

Massive - check
Multiplayer - check
Online- check 
RPG - roleplaying game - check

Seems all the recent MMO's have those in check. Sure there is lots of trash mmos out there, but same can be said for console games. Have you viewed the ps4 store or xbox store??? Some of those games will make you shake your head. People complain about games being anti social, thats not the games fault, thats on all of us. Make your own guilds, recruit people with like minds. 

What makes a MMORPG unique? That sentence has me baffled. 

MMO is not that however, MMO is Massively Multiplayer Online;

Massively Multiplayer is not the same as Massive Multiplayer, its an entirely different concept. Which is why MMO has never meant Massive Mutiplayer Online, though the term does seem to confuse people.

The problem is though that the audience has changed so much that the industry had to change with it. People can feasibly make the claim a game like Fortnite is a MMO - Massively or Massive distinction notwithstanding. While it doesn't fit the traditional definition of what an MMO was when the genre was established, it fits the definition in today's industry. 

And I think that's the key part of any discussion surrounding MMOs today versus yesteryear - the industry has changed so much and with it the target consumer, that the "traditional" MMO doesn't exactly work anymore. Unless your name is World of Warcraft, creating a late 90s/2000s era MMO might see intriguing, but will it be successful? 

There might be a dedicated player base that invests in the game from the get go, but will it be enough to sustain it? I'm thinking back to the conversation we had with Derek Brinkmann on Gaming the Industry earlier this month. Some of the changes they made that upset a lot of the hardcore Ultima-focused fanbase wasn't done to piss off fans and backers - it was to ensure the game stayed alive and the lights stayed on. I truly wonder how many of today's consumers would dive headlong into an old-school style MMO versus the current games on the market. 

We're seeing it with EVE Online too. It's an old-style MMO in every sense of the phrase. Yet it's not retaining players today. Is that because EVE is a notoriously hard game to get into, or because in today's market it just doesn't hold someone's interest? 

I honestly don't know what the answer is, but discussions like this make me hope that someone, somewhere is working on a game that can succeed that brings the genre back to its glory days - because there obviously would be an audience if one were to be brought to the market. I just hope the audience is large enough to make it successful enough to stick around. 

Sovrath

lotrlore said:

We're seeing it with EVE Online too. It's an old-style MMO in every sense of the phrase. Yet it's not retaining players today. Is that because EVE is a notoriously hard game to get into, or because in today's market it just doesn't hold someone's interest? 

I honestly don't know what the answer is, but discussions like this make me hope that someone, somewhere is working on a game that can succeed that brings the genre back to its glory days - because there obviously would be an audience if one were to be brought to the market. I just hope the audience is large enough to make it successful enough to stick around. 

What players are seeing is the audience change toward a different type or types or game play. None of this is new in movies or music or pick your entertainment.

I was watching "The Bishop's Wife" (the Cary Grant original - as far as I know) and some of the scene changes were sooooo slow. It was extremely apparent that how movies in the 40's played out was a lot different to "now." The type of breadth that scenes had or the pace of conversation would just not play today.

Doesn't mean today's movies are bad or that movies from the 40's are bad. Just that things change and tastes change and expectations change.

Video games are old enough now that they are also experiencing their own changes and some players haven't yet realized the "why."

OGDeathRow

lotrlore said:

The problem is though that the audience has changed so much that the industry had to change with it. People can feasibly make the claim a game like Fortnite is a MMO - Massively or Massive distinction notwithstanding. While it doesn't fit the traditional definition of what an MMO was when the genre was established, it fits the definition in today's industry. 

And I think that's the key part of any discussion surrounding MMOs today versus yesteryear - the industry has changed so much and with it the target consumer, that the "traditional" MMO doesn't exactly work anymore. Unless your name is World of Warcraft, creating a late 90s/2000s era MMO might see intriguing, but will it be successful? 

There might be a dedicated player base that invests in the game from the get go, but will it be enough to sustain it? I'm thinking back to the conversation we had with Derek Brinkmann on Gaming the Industry earlier this month. Some of the changes they made that upset a lot of the hardcore Ultima-focused fanbase wasn't done to piss off fans and backers - it was to ensure the game stayed alive and the lights stayed on. I truly wonder how many of today's consumers would dive headlong into an old-school style MMO versus the current games on the market. 

We're seeing it with EVE Online too. It's an old-style MMO in every sense of the phrase. Yet it's not retaining players today. Is that because EVE is a notoriously hard game to get into, or because in today's market it just doesn't hold someone's interest? 

I honestly don't know what the answer is, but discussions like this make me hope that someone, somewhere is working on a game that can succeed that brings the genre back to its glory days - because there obviously would be an audience if one were to be brought to the market. I just hope the audience is large enough to make it successful enough to stick around. 

Glory days? Maybe for you, and a small pct of players. Cannot please everyone, but can please majorities.  If those same people that call them "Glory days" would expand there horizons, the opinions of them may change. But instead all I see is "This is a stupid feature, I dont like it, games trash".  

Just like your grandfather talking about technology as a whole today, that was your era and your stuck in it. Its not that the games were better, your just stuck in your era.

lotrlore

OGDeathRow said:

lotrlore said:

The problem is though that the audience has changed so much that the industry had to change with it. People can feasibly make the claim a game like Fortnite is a MMO - Massively or Massive distinction notwithstanding. While it doesn't fit the traditional definition of what an MMO was when the genre was established, it fits the definition in today's industry. 

And I think that's the key part of any discussion surrounding MMOs today versus yesteryear - the industry has changed so much and with it the target consumer, that the "traditional" MMO doesn't exactly work anymore. Unless your name is World of Warcraft, creating a late 90s/2000s era MMO might see intriguing, but will it be successful? 

There might be a dedicated player base that invests in the game from the get go, but will it be enough to sustain it? I'm thinking back to the conversation we had with Derek Brinkmann on Gaming the Industry earlier this month. Some of the changes they made that upset a lot of the hardcore Ultima-focused fanbase wasn't done to piss off fans and backers - it was to ensure the game stayed alive and the lights stayed on. I truly wonder how many of today's consumers would dive headlong into an old-school style MMO versus the current games on the market. 

We're seeing it with EVE Online too. It's an old-style MMO in every sense of the phrase. Yet it's not retaining players today. Is that because EVE is a notoriously hard game to get into, or because in today's market it just doesn't hold someone's interest? 

I honestly don't know what the answer is, but discussions like this make me hope that someone, somewhere is working on a game that can succeed that brings the genre back to its glory days - because there obviously would be an audience if one were to be brought to the market. I just hope the audience is large enough to make it successful enough to stick around. 

Glory days? Maybe for you, and a small pct of players. Cannot please everyone, but can please majorities.  If those same people that call them "Glory days" would expand there horizons, the opinions of them may change. But instead all I see is "This is a stupid feature, I dont like it, games trash".  

Just like your grandfather talking about technology as a whole today, that was your era and your stuck in it. Its not that the games were better, your just stuck in your era.

Don't disagree with this at all either. Much of this is fueled by nostalgia.

Scot

Amathe said:

Baseball used to be "America's Game." Not nearly as many people watch baseball anymore. They don't have the patience for it. They don't have the time. They find it boring because it lacks non-stop action.

That's really what's changed about mmorpgs. 

In EQ I once camped a spawn I needed for my epic for 3 real life days. Came home on a Friday. Finally got her on Sunday evening. Turned out, she was bugged. Nowadays that would be viewed as utter madness. (Some maybe would have thought that then, honestly).

It's really hard to explain to people the excitement of achieving a goal you really had to wait for.

The same happened to cricket year ago, they started to do one day matches to make it more exciting. Yes you read that right, cricket matches can go on for days and days.

I was thinking about shooters the other day, you can pay for things like getting new avatars and so on. These play differently and are somewhat better, but situationally, they all have strengths and weaknesses. You can pay to pick extra ones or you can just play the game and slowly get them. So I have to ask why on earth would you pay to get one of these other soldiers? Presumably you like playing the game or would not even be having to think about this question. This is all part of the get it quick now, faster entertainment that we see everywhere.

From every film having to have a hook at the start, shorter TV series and people wanting to move on to the next big (ish) thing. A locust mentality which has no time for something to bed in, no time for anything else than "fun".

OGDeathRow

Sovrath said:

lotrlore said:

We're seeing it with EVE Online too. It's an old-style MMO in every sense of the phrase. Yet it's not retaining players today. Is that because EVE is a notoriously hard game to get into, or because in today's market it just doesn't hold someone's interest? 

I honestly don't know what the answer is, but discussions like this make me hope that someone, somewhere is working on a game that can succeed that brings the genre back to its glory days - because there obviously would be an audience if one were to be brought to the market. I just hope the audience is large enough to make it successful enough to stick around. 

What players are seeing is the audience change toward a different type or types or game play. None of this is new in movies or music or pick your entertainment.

I was watching "The Bishop's Wife" (the Cary Grant original - as far as I know) and some of the scene changes were sooooo slow. It was extremely apparent that how movies in the 40's played out was a lot different to "now." The type of breadth that scenes had or the pace of conversation would just not play today.

Doesn't mean today's movies are bad or that movies from the 40's are bad. Just that things change and tastes change and expectations change.

Video games are old enough now that they are also experiencing their own changes and some players haven't yet realized the "why."

Its funny cause we posted the same point at the exact same time..........Am I on par with you, or are you unfortunate to be on par with me : P

AAAMEOW

For some reason many people thought mmorpg players have to hate solo rpg and MOBA...

I think the news flash is those are popular. 

Iselin

Vermillion_Raventhal said:

I have always felt like the millions WoW brought in simply are not into MMORPG.  I feel like if MMORPG focused on what makes MMORPG unique it would drive away a good portion of player base.  

Your thoughts?

I agree that by making MMORPGs accessible to the masses (and as an aside, it's hilarious that the game we considered a lesser MMO in 2004 is now considered a "hardcore" classic ) it brought a lot of new players that hadn't been MMORPG fans before then. And yes, if new MMORPGs do nothing but a nostalgic copy of what they were like before WOW the population will be small and niche.

The thing is that no one has really taken the original concept and updated it while keeping the things that made them unique.

MMORPGs are all about a lot of people playing together and interacting. The problem is that not everyone is as sociable as everyone else and the reality in MMORPGs is that the populations self-fragmented into insular guilds.  Developers dealt with that by featuring solo play more and more creating today's MMOs where solo is the norm and group play is optional.

What MMOs really need is to be all about group play and community goals while being inclusive of the whole population. Games like WAR, Rift, GW2 and ESO have added casual drop-in grouping content to MMORPGs and that is a step in the right direction by leveraging what MMOs are good at while making them inclusive of anyone who wants to participate whether in a guild group, some other group or just solo. Rift, IMO did this best with casual auto-grouping by proximity.

But none of them made that the core feature of the game, They were there as these other fun things you could do but the games were still designed around solo story progress with optional grouping.

What if someone actually ran with that idea and made the whole point about responding to and participating in casual grouping to stop danger that could change the world state for the worse if not stopped?

No more of this nonsense about "you are the chosen one" in a world full of other "chosen ones." How about just being one of many non-chosen ones trying to cope with a dangerous world?

So TLDR: the MMORPG genre is not played out but it is stagnant as hell because they just keep copying and adding single player and small group shit as extra attractions instead of leveraging the intrinsic large group nature of the genre and taking it places where it hasn't been before. If they build that, they will come.

AAAMEOW

Arterius said:

AAAMEOW said:

For some reason many people thought mmorpg players have to hate solo rpg and MOBA...

I think the news flash is those are popular. 

I haven't see many people hate on solo RPG's. I would say 80% of people who post on this forum are excited for Cyberpunk 2077. At least from what I have seen. I would say that a majority is excited for Final Fantasy 7 R. In the what games are you playing I would say that 70% of them list some kind of single player RPG along with a multiplayer counterpart.

I surely get the expression many people on this forum don't like the solo element in a mmorpg.  Or the lack of certain style of group content.

I always thought wow become successful because it use the lowest common denominator and try to please every type of gamer.

Amaranthar

lotrlore said:

OGDeathRow said:

lotrlore said:

The problem is though that the audience has changed so much that the industry had to change with it. People can feasibly make the claim a game like Fortnite is a MMO - Massively or Massive distinction notwithstanding. While it doesn't fit the traditional definition of what an MMO was when the genre was established, it fits the definition in today's industry. 

And I think that's the key part of any discussion surrounding MMOs today versus yesteryear - the industry has changed so much and with it the target consumer, that the "traditional" MMO doesn't exactly work anymore. Unless your name is World of Warcraft, creating a late 90s/2000s era MMO might see intriguing, but will it be successful? 

There might be a dedicated player base that invests in the game from the get go, but will it be enough to sustain it? I'm thinking back to the conversation we had with Derek Brinkmann on Gaming the Industry earlier this month. Some of the changes they made that upset a lot of the hardcore Ultima-focused fanbase wasn't done to piss off fans and backers - it was to ensure the game stayed alive and the lights stayed on. I truly wonder how many of today's consumers would dive headlong into an old-school style MMO versus the current games on the market. 

We're seeing it with EVE Online too. It's an old-style MMO in every sense of the phrase. Yet it's not retaining players today. Is that because EVE is a notoriously hard game to get into, or because in today's market it just doesn't hold someone's interest? 

I honestly don't know what the answer is, but discussions like this make me hope that someone, somewhere is working on a game that can succeed that brings the genre back to its glory days - because there obviously would be an audience if one were to be brought to the market. I just hope the audience is large enough to make it successful enough to stick around. 

Glory days? Maybe for you, and a small pct of players. Cannot please everyone, but can please majorities.  If those same people that call them "Glory days" would expand there horizons, the opinions of them may change. But instead all I see is "This is a stupid feature, I dont like it, games trash".  

Just like your grandfather talking about technology as a whole today, that was your era and your stuck in it. Its not that the games were better, your just stuck in your era.

Don't disagree with this at all either. Much of this is fueled by nostalgia.

Nostalgia my arse !   
But I am tired of this line of BS. Although it is true in some cases. 

There's a desire for something different that's best represented, at it's basis, by some of the older games. 
Today's games, you are a puppet. You go where the game tells you to go, do what they tell you to do, and only have a few choices within those confines. 

It's stagnating to your brain. Feed your brain and break away. Well, you have to wait until someone actually makes a good game that's breakaway worthy. 

Sovrath

Amaranthar said:

lotrlore said:

OGDeathRow said:

lotrlore said:

The problem is though that the audience has changed so much that the industry had to change with it. People can feasibly make the claim a game like Fortnite is a MMO - Massively or Massive distinction notwithstanding. While it doesn't fit the traditional definition of what an MMO was when the genre was established, it fits the definition in today's industry. 

And I think that's the key part of any discussion surrounding MMOs today versus yesteryear - the industry has changed so much and with it the target consumer, that the "traditional" MMO doesn't exactly work anymore. Unless your name is World of Warcraft, creating a late 90s/2000s era MMO might see intriguing, but will it be successful? 

There might be a dedicated player base that invests in the game from the get go, but will it be enough to sustain it? I'm thinking back to the conversation we had with Derek Brinkmann on Gaming the Industry earlier this month. Some of the changes they made that upset a lot of the hardcore Ultima-focused fanbase wasn't done to piss off fans and backers - it was to ensure the game stayed alive and the lights stayed on. I truly wonder how many of today's consumers would dive headlong into an old-school style MMO versus the current games on the market. 

We're seeing it with EVE Online too. It's an old-style MMO in every sense of the phrase. Yet it's not retaining players today. Is that because EVE is a notoriously hard game to get into, or because in today's market it just doesn't hold someone's interest? 

I honestly don't know what the answer is, but discussions like this make me hope that someone, somewhere is working on a game that can succeed that brings the genre back to its glory days - because there obviously would be an audience if one were to be brought to the market. I just hope the audience is large enough to make it successful enough to stick around. 

Glory days? Maybe for you, and a small pct of players. Cannot please everyone, but can please majorities.  If those same people that call them "Glory days" would expand there horizons, the opinions of them may change. But instead all I see is "This is a stupid feature, I dont like it, games trash".  

Just like your grandfather talking about technology as a whole today, that was your era and your stuck in it. Its not that the games were better, your just stuck in your era.

Don't disagree with this at all either. Much of this is fueled by nostalgia.

Nostalgia my arse !   
But I am tired of this line of BS. Although it is true in some cases. 

There's a desire for something different that's best represented, at it's basis, by some of the older games. 
Today's games, you are a puppet. You go where the game tells you to go, do what they tell you to do, and only have a few choices within those confines. 

It's stagnating to your brain. Feed your brain and break away. Well, you have to wait until someone actually makes a good game that's breakaway worthy. 

Well, there are people who are fuled by nostalgia and who genuinely think they can recapture their early game moments.

But I do agree with you in that today's games do hand hold a lot. I don't say that in a bad way because there are people who just want to chill and play through something with some story and enjoy themselves without the need to hit their head in a wall.

But there is something pretty awesome about a game just saying "this is it, figure it out" and you have to do that. 

This is why I still enjoy Morrowind or why I downloaded the Vanguard client again or why I revisit any number of older games I've played. They are just much better experiences for my taste.

Vermillion_Raventhal

AAAMEOW said:

Arterius said:

AAAMEOW said:

For some reason many people thought mmorpg players have to hate solo rpg and MOBA...

I think the news flash is those are popular. 

I haven't see many people hate on solo RPG's. I would say 80% of people who post on this forum are excited for Cyberpunk 2077. At least from what I have seen. I would say that a majority is excited for Final Fantasy 7 R. In the what games are you playing I would say that 70% of them list some kind of single player RPG along with a multiplayer counterpart.

I surely get the expression many people on this forum don't like the solo element in a mmorpg.  Or the lack of certain style of group content.

I always thought wow become successful because it use the lowest common denominator and try to please every type of gamer.

I don't mind solo elements but I don't think single player elements that isolate you into your own story are good for the genre.  

AAAMEOW

Vermillion_Raventhal said:

AAAMEOW said:

Arterius said:

AAAMEOW said:

For some reason many people thought mmorpg players have to hate solo rpg and MOBA...

I think the news flash is those are popular. 

I haven't see many people hate on solo RPG's. I would say 80% of people who post on this forum are excited for Cyberpunk 2077. At least from what I have seen. I would say that a majority is excited for Final Fantasy 7 R. In the what games are you playing I would say that 70% of them list some kind of single player RPG along with a multiplayer counterpart.

I surely get the expression many people on this forum don't like the solo element in a mmorpg.  Or the lack of certain style of group content.

I always thought wow become successful because it use the lowest common denominator and try to please every type of gamer.

I don't mind solo elements but I don't think single player elements that isolate you into your own story are good for the genre.  

That is why they play fake mmorpg like wow.  Because if they are playing solo rpg game... that'll be "really" isolate themselves.

Viper482

Vermillion_Raventhal said:

I have always felt like the millions WoW brought in simply are not into MMORPG.  I feel like if MMORPG focused on what makes MMORPG unique it would drive away a good portion of player base.  

Your thoughts?

Have always thought WoW destroyed the genre. I enjoy the game, but it changed the target player base. Instead of emulating the success of Everquest, UO, DAoC, Asheron's Call, etc.....everyone started to copy WoW's later easy-mode model, which while they most certainly shared a base to some extent, had a completely different target audience otherwise. Playing WoW Classic I will say it is much closer to EQ than it is the crap we get these days.

Viper482

AAAMEOW said:

Vermillion_Raventhal said:

AAAMEOW said:

Arterius said:

AAAMEOW said:

For some reason many people thought mmorpg players have to hate solo rpg and MOBA...

I think the news flash is those are popular. 

I haven't see many people hate on solo RPG's. I would say 80% of people who post on this forum are excited for Cyberpunk 2077. At least from what I have seen. I would say that a majority is excited for Final Fantasy 7 R. In the what games are you playing I would say that 70% of them list some kind of single player RPG along with a multiplayer counterpart.

I surely get the expression many people on this forum don't like the solo element in a mmorpg.  Or the lack of certain style of group content.

I always thought wow become successful because it use the lowest common denominator and try to please every type of gamer.

I don't mind solo elements but I don't think single player elements that isolate you into your own story are good for the genre.  

That is why they play fake mmorpg like wow.  Because if they are playing solo rpg game... that'll be "really" isolate themselves.

There certainly is something to be said for this. To me ESO fits this bill most of all these days because it plays like a single player game, but you are surrounded by others the entire time.