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Same play just different actors! (REPOST)
Pangaea
Member Posts: 434
What is wrong with the MMO gaming industry?
What is wrong with the gaming industry? Why do all the latest fantasy games that come out mirror their ancestors? Where is the innovation? Where is the breath of fresh air into the gaming community? Regardless if the game is a real time strategy or a mmorpg it gives me the sense that these are all the same “play” just different actors. Mostly with the MMO games I see this. I can easily get into a mmorpg, but they are tedious, boring, and same old stuff over and over. It is EVERQUEST with different graphics. Here are some of the similarities that MOST mmorpg’s share.
1-Level Grinding: The continuous combat that has to take place with HORDES of tiny monsters outside your starting town to gain enough experience and levels. To move to the bigger and tougher monsters that are a bit farther from town, then you will come across another town and “YAY” more monsters there to kill to get to a higher level.
2-Redundant Monsters: You are in a fantasy world that consists of HORDES and HORDES of the same monsters that have nothing better to do than to stand out in a field, forest somewhere waiting to be killed.
3-Illogical treasure: Well I love killing spiders and finding coins, killing giant flies and finding a sword. That is great I love illogical items that wouldn’t be on those creatures. Makes me feel like I am IN A REAL WORLD. roles eyes
4-Level Requirements: Items and or armor that require that you be a CERTAIN level or other illogical requirements. Like you have to have a certain intelligence to wear a hat. Umm it is a HAT people. (I don’t mind certain strength requirements and mild dex requirements to use agility based weapons) but keep is subtle and keep it logical.
5-Lack of Freedom: I am not talking about climbing buildings and picking apples from trees and climbing through windows, because I know that is a hard thing to code in a game. But I am talking about simple freedoms that other characters have. How many times have you just wanted to wield a shield, or wield a sword and use it but unfortunately you are wizard, or thief, and some class that CAN’T use that sword or shield. Now I understand that it wouldn’t be what they wouldn’t NORMALY use so I am all for gimping them out a bit if they are wearing armor or weapons they are not supposed too. But in the battlefield, any warrior would use any tools available at the time to stay alive.
6-Level Based: Enough said.
7-Redundancy: Anyone who has played for hours and are still looking at the same monster knows exactly what I am talking about. And who cares of the colors is different. It is the SAME monster.
8-Static Questing: I LOVE going on a Quest… a job, a duty for ME to take on. To make me feel special. And when I get to my questing location. I see a line of 10+ people going for the exact same thing as me. Hmmm I am not so special. Now I know making a dynamic questing mechanic is a bit difficult for these lazy developers, but at least find a way (ala Guild Wars) to make the quests separate on their own. If I am really NOT special then at least blind me to the idea that I am. Cause if the quest was designed to kill “John Doe” and get his Helmet. It is not balanced if you get there and John Doe and his protectors are DEAD and when he “spawns” again 10 people take him down instantly and frantically go for his helmet. Not very balanced.
9-Plain Combat: Most people play MMORPGs to go around killing stuff. Yes there is Crafting and the ability to make weapons and armor is certain games but the real excitement is when you take on a creature toe to toe. Well, 99% of games out there are wack, wack, wack, wack, wack and you do that until their little red bar is gone and they fall over and your red bar goes down too. And you will have these specials you can do “combat abilities or spells” and that will have a delayed attack but will do more damage. That is what 99% of the other games have out there. I know it would take more EFFORT but it is possible to add flavor. Body Targeting, with complications. Knock down to leg shots, drop weapon with arm shots. Something that is easy to recover from as game play stance, but in game can cause a problem as difficulty when fighting monsters.
10-The Bunnies: Why do most MMOs start you off as a character that can barely take on a Rabbit, Frog, Tiny Beetle, Bat, or something that ME Frank Mesa can kill with my BARE HANDS non the less a SWORD. These games should at least make weak: logically: tougher looking creatures, this of course is a plagued side effect of LEVEL BASING you game.
11-The Ever-Sharper Sword: I love when I get a good weapon that is a nice sharp iron sword, and it does good damage to what I am attacking and I would love to get attached to this weapon, but I realize that within a days time I go through 3-4-5 weapons because there is always a sharper sword. This motif works with almost everything in these games, a sword that does 1-2 then 1-3, then 2-3, then 2-4, then 3-5, then 4-5, then 5-7, -then 6-8 and on and on and on and on and on. This is also a terrible side effect of Level Based Games. But I don’t believe there would ever bee 1000 levels of swords ranging from 1-2 to 687-900 points of damage. Regardless of magical influence. These swords have way too many variations of silly swords. I think there should be a lot of variation but some of these games are silly with it.
Sorry had to get that off my chest. I know most of these problems are seriously impacted by making a game level based. Level based games are a developer’s EASY way of advancing your character without having to seriously worry about balance issues and having loads of details statistics that a SKILL based game would solve. Ehh.. I don’t know.. I have given up hope for now.
(EDIT) .. is this better for your EYES!!!
What is wrong with the gaming industry? Why do all the latest fantasy games that come out mirror their ancestors? Where is the innovation? Where is the breath of fresh air into the gaming community? Regardless if the game is a real time strategy or a mmorpg it gives me the sense that these are all the same “play” just different actors. Mostly with the MMO games I see this. I can easily get into a mmorpg, but they are tedious, boring, and same old stuff over and over. It is EVERQUEST with different graphics. Here are some of the similarities that MOST mmorpg’s share.
1-Level Grinding: The continuous combat that has to take place with HORDES of tiny monsters outside your starting town to gain enough experience and levels. To move to the bigger and tougher monsters that are a bit farther from town, then you will come across another town and “YAY” more monsters there to kill to get to a higher level.
2-Redundant Monsters: You are in a fantasy world that consists of HORDES and HORDES of the same monsters that have nothing better to do than to stand out in a field, forest somewhere waiting to be killed.
3-Illogical treasure: Well I love killing spiders and finding coins, killing giant flies and finding a sword. That is great I love illogical items that wouldn’t be on those creatures. Makes me feel like I am IN A REAL WORLD. roles eyes
4-Level Requirements: Items and or armor that require that you be a CERTAIN level or other illogical requirements. Like you have to have a certain intelligence to wear a hat. Umm it is a HAT people. (I don’t mind certain strength requirements and mild dex requirements to use agility based weapons) but keep is subtle and keep it logical.
5-Lack of Freedom: I am not talking about climbing buildings and picking apples from trees and climbing through windows, because I know that is a hard thing to code in a game. But I am talking about simple freedoms that other characters have. How many times have you just wanted to wield a shield, or wield a sword and use it but unfortunately you are wizard, or thief, and some class that CAN’T use that sword or shield. Now I understand that it wouldn’t be what they wouldn’t NORMALY use so I am all for gimping them out a bit if they are wearing armor or weapons they are not supposed too. But in the battlefield, any warrior would use any tools available at the time to stay alive.
6-Level Based: Enough said.
7-Redundancy: Anyone who has played for hours and are still looking at the same monster knows exactly what I am talking about. And who cares of the colors is different. It is the SAME monster.
8-Static Questing: I LOVE going on a Quest… a job, a duty for ME to take on. To make me feel special. And when I get to my questing location. I see a line of 10+ people going for the exact same thing as me. Hmmm I am not so special. Now I know making a dynamic questing mechanic is a bit difficult for these lazy developers, but at least find a way (ala Guild Wars) to make the quests separate on their own. If I am really NOT special then at least blind me to the idea that I am. Cause if the quest was designed to kill “John Doe” and get his Helmet. It is not balanced if you get there and John Doe and his protectors are DEAD and when he “spawns” again 10 people take him down instantly and frantically go for his helmet. Not very balanced.
9-Plain Combat: Most people play MMORPGs to go around killing stuff. Yes there is Crafting and the ability to make weapons and armor is certain games but the real excitement is when you take on a creature toe to toe. Well, 99% of games out there are wack, wack, wack, wack, wack and you do that until their little red bar is gone and they fall over and your red bar goes down too. And you will have these specials you can do “combat abilities or spells” and that will have a delayed attack but will do more damage. That is what 99% of the other games have out there. I know it would take more EFFORT but it is possible to add flavor. Body Targeting, with complications. Knock down to leg shots, drop weapon with arm shots. Something that is easy to recover from as game play stance, but in game can cause a problem as difficulty when fighting monsters.
10-The Bunnies: Why do most MMOs start you off as a character that can barely take on a Rabbit, Frog, Tiny Beetle, Bat, or something that ME Frank Mesa can kill with my BARE HANDS non the less a SWORD. These games should at least make weak: logically: tougher looking creatures, this of course is a plagued side effect of LEVEL BASING you game.
11-The Ever-Sharper Sword: I love when I get a good weapon that is a nice sharp iron sword, and it does good damage to what I am attacking and I would love to get attached to this weapon, but I realize that within a days time I go through 3-4-5 weapons because there is always a sharper sword. This motif works with almost everything in these games, a sword that does 1-2 then 1-3, then 2-3, then 2-4, then 3-5, then 4-5, then 5-7, -then 6-8 and on and on and on and on and on. This is also a terrible side effect of Level Based Games. But I don’t believe there would ever bee 1000 levels of swords ranging from 1-2 to 687-900 points of damage. Regardless of magical influence. These swords have way too many variations of silly swords. I think there should be a lot of variation but some of these games are silly with it.
Sorry had to get that off my chest. I know most of these problems are seriously impacted by making a game level based. Level based games are a developer’s EASY way of advancing your character without having to seriously worry about balance issues and having loads of details statistics that a SKILL based game would solve. Ehh.. I don’t know.. I have given up hope for now.
(EDIT) .. is this better for your EYES!!!
Comments
I find it amazing that by 2020 first world countries will be competing to get immigrants.
I was only expecting replies from people who could concentrate on reading rather than the pretty colors.. it helps to keep a more production conversation of the above topic.
But I am glad you like pretty colors.
Take care!
Have you ever tried CoH? It fixes a lot of these problems.
1. I've never grind in CoH to get levels. It's always "Wow, what cool ability am I going to get next? Oh, laser eyes or the ability to fly. Sweet."
2. Clockwork and the Vazarok Zombies. Nuff said.
3. CoH has enhancments. For example, you character may get a cybernetic eye to imrpove his accuracy. But, Tech stuff comes from enmies that would have cybernetic eyes, Sciency stuff comes from groups that would have the technology to warp time, Magic stuff comes from Wizards and Voodoo sorcerers.
4. No equipment but money is called 'influence' and it represents what your character can get contacts to supply them with. Therefor you can get it just from wailing on baddies.
5. Shields aren't really a problem in a super-hero MMO. There's a couple of temporary powers though, like a battery opperated force field or a magic sword.
7. Recolored things just aren't present for a lot of the game. Although you do end up killing Archvillians, it's instanced so you don't see them respawn. Besides, usually you just end up 'capturing' them or they come back to life in a comic book sort of way.
8. If you've ever tried the game, you know seeing other people around is not a problem. Heavy instancing but also well written quest material.
9. CoH uses an Action-y combat system. There's a lot of button mashing, for example, ever punch your melle character throws is a button pushed. It kind of reminds me of simplified street fighter but if feels cool.
10. Not having 'Bunnies' was one of the ideas CoH was founded on. I think the most mundane thing I ever fought in CoH was a prisoner that escaped a maximum security prison.
11. No quipment.
But if Super-Heroes don't suit you, then there's hope. Almost all of the up and coming MMOs try to solve these problems.
1. Both WAR and the Chronicles of Spellborn(TCoS) are using horizontal leveling. It's sort of like CoH where a veteran won't have better stats than a newb, he'll just know more tricks.
2. WAR has a heavy focus on R. You'll mostly be fighting an opposed civilization for your survival. But also, you should go to the website and look at the concept art. The Warhammer IP has a lot of cool monsters. Also, take a look at TSoC's screenshots. They're monsters are almost completely unique. No trolls, no orcs, no wolves. They have bunnies, but they're just there for Saddists to kill
3. I'd love to see explantions for why these creatures have things that weird. Maybe the fly model should have a sword in it's back and say something like "Stay away from my trophy!" when you approach. Or maybe the lizards cough up gold when they die and local merchants complain about rampant thievery.
4. TCoS's items are pruely for looks. One hat won't be better than the other, so you won't have level restrictions.
In WAR you are a part of an army. As you rise in Rank you get better stuff.
5. You'de love TSoC. It was founded on the idea that you should be able to make your character look like what you want them to. Warriors in robes with sticks!? Sure!
You probably wouldn't like WAR so much. It's founded on the idea of characters being iconic and stick to the IP. Hammerers use HAMMERS!
6. See level grinding.
7. See "Repetitive Monsters"
8. Everything like that will probably be instanced in WAR. Besides, it'll mostly focus on fighting an army, rather than a person.
TSoC has actually gone one better and said that if you kill a person, they ain't coming back. To make up for this they have instanced "Ansester Quests" where you relive history through someone else's eyes.
9. TSoC is based on skills, there are no autoattacks. You have a whole deck of them and they all do something different. It's more like a card game than current MMOs. Also, you have to aim your attack like a FPS.
10. Both WAR and TSoC are completely against this. At low levels in WAR though, you do fight vultures. Like I said though, TSoC has bunnies for Saddists.
11. In TSoC, a sword is a sword is asword. Items have no inherenet stats. They're just there for looks.
In WAR there's only four Tiers. I'm not sure if this applies for Weapons too or just armor.