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MMORPGs becoming too easy
huge_froglok
Member Posts: 135
There are a few things that are ruining MMORPGS:
Making leveling much easier. 1-60 might only take a week or 2 Some characters start out at level 55.
What is the end effect of this? You end up with 99% of the server being level 60. It's a D2 like environment where you get 60 and you make another character, and you keep repeating. Instead of investing time in your original character you end up rolling twinks all the time because it is too easy to level up.
What happened to actually investing time into leveling.? Spending days in the same zone before moving on? Getting to really learn the zones and the environment? MMORPGs these days, you're lucky to be in the same zone for more than an hour or two.
Make PvE and raids much easier. They don't want people to spend 5 hours raiding a zone anymore. They don't even want them to spend more than 2 hours. What kind of cheap MMORPG are they making when you can clear 10-20 instance bosses in less than 2 hours? For the bosses to be cleared that fast, they can't be very difficult.
I remember raiding in EQ, spending a whole day doing NTOV. Know what the net effect of making raids difficult is? A gear where players have different gear, that is what.
And the whole instance thing was bad too. Instead of sharing resources with other players, you get your own copy of everything, meaning you can do anything regardless of anyone elses actions on the server. It's funny how you can't affect other players at all on your own server. In EQ you could take out a raid mob and other guilds would have to wait. This also allowed players to have different sets of gear.
The net effect of instancing is for everyone to have the same gear. So games like WoW would rather have people who have the same items than 1 guild having better gear than another guild. Sure they've equalized things, but made it boring for the people who could actually do the difficult content. How is it fair to good players?
By making leveling so easy, making raiding easy, and putting instances all over the place, they've basically given everyone the same stuff. You end up with an MMORPG with everyone who has the same stuff, same level, same classes, etc.
I wonder why they just dont make it obvious and start people out at level 80 with full gearsets? Not that different from actually having to level up a character and show up for a few raids that have been trivialized.
Comments
I feel what you are saying most be start level 1 and be 80 in 2 weeks, then grind for end game gear. Some say they made end game raiding to appeal to n0t so hardcore pc gamers, hell if u cant take a couple commands to raid from 1-60/70/80 then maybe mmo's arent your thing stick to cod4 or somthen.
Yes i know this dont make no sence to some but im under the influence lol..
Incoming casual flame throwers.
That's what I want to say. Truth is there are plenty of casuals sick of the genres movement towards "click to win". So I should say,
Incoming Lazy Flamethrowers
But that doesn't sound as cool. So I'll say this, for this post casual = lazy and/or stupid, not having anything to do with the amount of time you play.
All the best and most popular MMO's are older now. There really haven't been many classic MMO's released in the last few years (classics as in WoW, EQ, FFXI, DAoC..etc). Games like those have made leveling easier to encourage a new player base and to make older players stick around and level other classes/jobs. Example: It took me a full year to get my first 75 in FFXI, if it was another full year for each following 75 I wouldn't have done it. It's a sign of the times. :-/
Easyville is the name of the game today; you, jimbob, ma and pa, grandad and grandma and the dog too need to be able to play it to maximise the customer base.
Looks like our casuals are too lazy to even start a flame or two today.
the net effect of instancing is for everyone to have the same chances at getting gear. The idea of "superl33t basement dwellers" guild camping X boss 24/7/365 is dead in the water. People voted with their wallets, and apparently where thousands though that spending your saturday nights in a virtual world was funnier than getting out (and wondering whats so good about getting some nookie anyway), millions upon millions think otherwise.
about WoW specifically, there is still plenty of hard to get gear and difficult content to do. What they do are sweeping gear balance. Thats what makes WoW so successful, and I find amazing that some people are so dense to not understand thats what any game NEEDS, a sort of ladder reset where newcomers always get a chance.
If you disagree you can always play games like WAR, which apparently side with you in that gear balances arent needed. feel free to get your newly created lvl32 toon to tier 4 and face people RR80 and sovereign geared,you will die 500 hundred times per battle, once every 1 microseconds.
and your only chance to survive enough to set a foot on the battlefield is to put the same year and a half they put...just this time while being faceraped constantly.
there is a reason why games like WoW become history, and games like WAR are this close (|----|) to kick the bucket.
[Mod Edit]
Level up a character in Age of Conan on a PVP server and tell me how easy mode MMO's are. It is a blast, but it is NOT easy. Shoot even PVE content is FAR from easy mode unless you are much higher level then what you are doing. Guilds fight over keeps. There are limited keeps, so not all guilds can get them. You must fight and win them. Towers are being released soon, which will add much more reason to PVP in the borderlands. Fighting over control.
EVE easy mode? I think EVE is the definition of the OPPOSITE of easy mode. EVE also has NO instances, I repeat NO instances. Players effect the game in huge ways, and control space. You can effect the universe in many ways in EVE. Being full loss makes that game the best hardcore sandbox you could ever want.
I think you're just playing the wrong MMO. Not all MMOs are easy mode.
The objective of MMO is to entertain.
As long as MMO provides fun regardless whether you consider them as not challenging, they fullfill their role.
Taking into account that MMO market is growing and producing games being able to make profit thus appeal and satisfy players, they do it right.
4th or 5th rant thread of OP...
Nowadays, most players want to have everything easily. They don't want to spend too much time grinding or farming but they expect their characters to reach high level and have good equips. It's like they wanted everything given to them. And there is the Item Mall (for F2P games) which, if you have money, you can buy your way through the game. Also, if they don't like something in the game they go to the forums and complain about it until their complaints are answered.
Really, players are becoming lazy.
the net effect of instancing is for everyone to have the same chances at getting gear. The idea of "superl33t basement dwellers" guild camping X boss 24/7/365 is dead in the water. People voted with their wallets, and apparently where thousands though that spending your saturday nights in a virtual world was funnier than getting out (and wondering whats so good about getting some nookie anyway), millions upon millions think otherwise.
about WoW specifically, there is still plenty of hard to get gear and difficult content to do, im sure you havent beated or even dared to try it, but just like millions other scrubs, you complain its "too easy"...really? lmao
What they do are sweeping gear balance. Thats what makes WoW so successful, and I find amazing that some people are so dense to not understand thats what any game NEEDS, a sort of ladder reset where newcomers always get a chance.
If you disagree you can always play games like WAR, which apparently side with you in that gear balances arent needed. feel free to get your newly created lvl32 toon to tier 4 and face people RR80 and sovereign geared,you will die 500 hundred times per battle, once every 1 microseconds.
and your only chance to survive enough to set a foot on the battlefield is to put the same year and a half they put...just this time while being faceraped constantly.
there is a reason why games like WoW become history, and games like WAR are this close (|----|) to kick the bucket.
Move with the market or stay behind, but puh-lease, save us your whining.
I'd rather play them than do my homework flamer is expected to.
MMO's were niche because either you "got it" and enjoyed getting lost in a open fantasy world to get away from the drudges of everyday life, or you didn't and moved on to other genres. You want equal opportunity for everything? Instant gratification? Play console games, that is what their mechanics were designed for. MMORPG's started as open world's where YOU, the player, makes or breaks yourself....NOT hand held so you can get the same items that someone else who fully understands how to play and busts their ass to get it has just so you won't whine. It's what made players unique. Now a days, players are just a number, and the worlds are linear ghost towns due to instancing. Because the MMO's now are so easy to pick up and learn..the communities are greedy/rude/selfish cesspools because they have pulled in everyone and anyone with a pulse..most of which never even played MMO's until WoW.
Again, there are tons of MMO's out that cater to the casual players. Sure, since WoW's success, at the expense of (IMO) crippling the genre and MMO communities, most companies are sadly now blinded by the pursuit of the "Massive cash cow" opportunities Blizzard showed. I understand it is a companies goal to make profit, but at what expense? There is no longer, or very little at least innovation, creativity, etc. Other companies have shown you can make a quality product, have a niche community, and STILL make profit and increase your player base without being greedy (See CCP-EVE Online, AoC...now, well after it SHOULD of been..since release anyways). I am not saying there can't be casual MMO's...everyone is entitled to play..but not EVERY MMO just because the majority, which is now the new age player, feels that this is how all MMO's should be and demand them all to be the way they want them so they can play them. It's selfish, and if it ever shifts back towards being challenging...just as some MMO's have tried but had mechanics changed to appease the whining masses, I am certain that you will be in our shoes and finally see what we are talking about.
No one is trying to take away your precious casual MMO's...just quite a generous amount of us would LOVE to have a challenging MMO where your actions count and make your character unique and not be just another face in a sea of clones. To me, this is why so many MMO's now suck and aren't worth the money. You can fly to cap in under a month, and get all the top gear in another month. Even as a casual this is possible. Then what? You either move on to another MMO HOPING to find that challenge..in which is done in vain, or you do as the majority and complain about a lack of content and continue to sit in game and pay $15 a month...which the content was there, but the players complained it was too hard and it was dumbed down. The players are there on downfall, and the developer's can't win because these players are never happy with what they have and are not willing to adapt. Sad.
[Mod Edit]
You must be the fastest leveler ever if you can plow through mmo zones in 2 hours.
Mr. Bagguns
The way I see it, the MMORPG market is simply cleansing itself of flawed design artifacts left over from the days when limited technology and design know-how required the devs to use weak mechanics to keep players playing.
Leveling through getting xp is a fairly weak metric of measuring player progress and giving out rewards. having players grind out xp to gain levels is insulting to the intelligence of the players and let's the devs be lazy about giving players challenges. Levels and progression should be based on how well a player can play their character and how skillful they have become. Grinding xp for levels should be left to the brainless since it is dumbing down the genre.
Time commitment is not the same as challenge. Unless you consider ass sitting a compettive sport. I personally call it the United States government.....
At any rate, MMORPGs have never been difficult. Clicking on more greens to level up slower is just a monotonous time sink. Challenge is derived from other things. A battle can last five minutes or five hours, it's how close you came to losing and how well you recovered or scrapped by that makes it epic or not.
To give an old shool example, the last dungeon of the original Phantasy Star for the Sega Master system was challenging. The whole game only took 20 hours start to finish, but getting to the end was damn near impossible. Especially near then end where ever battle was a fight for survival and your inventory was extremely limited. On top of that, if you warped out, you would have to grind your way all the way back through the Tower of Baya Malay AND Lassic's Palace. Even if you did manage to make it through all of that alive, you still had to go back to the Governer's Mansion, now filled with insanely overpowered monsters, and defeat Dark Fallz. It didn't matter how much time you invested in the game. What mattered was your strategies and resource management. That's what CRPGs are really, resource management games.
Unfortunately, MMORPGs have always been about the treadmill and not the gameplay. And I hate to break it to you, but treadmills just aren't challenging.
A couple of points about things raised in this thread.
1) Being able to camp/fight a mob for 12 hours is no reflection of how "good" a player is, merely a reflection of how much free time he or she is willing to invest in it. I dare say some of the raiders who clear a difficult WOW dungeon in 2 hours are quite good at what they do, far more than people who beat on a mob for 8 hours until they finally manage to wear it down by attrition.
2) No matter how many people you say want this harder play style, the fact is, there are teaming millions more who do not, and if a developer is going to invest 50-150M in creating an MMO, they are going to target the masses because they need to maximize their return on investment. Would I like to see more challenging, AAA games being made, you bet. Do I see it happening in the near future? No.
This thread is not bringing up any new points that haven't already been raised in the 10 or so just like it that have already run their course. Sure its interesting to kick this around (and kick each other apparently) but none of that is going to change the way the market is heading.
But on the plus side, at least I have EVE.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
And on the other hand games like Darkfall that doesn't hand you everything and is a long time character development MMO you have the simpletons coming over from the easy mode MMO's and whining because they have to play a year too to get where the vets are, and boy do these type of players scream ,shout and demand they be able to get where vets are in month or two, they never stop crying how unfair this is! They're from the "everybody is a winner cotten glove kids" generation! They fail to grasp DF is for players who enjoy old school character development!
Like most posts, the points brought up in this thread are utterly subjective. Many of the things the OP rails against I consider plusses in an MMO. To each his own, but it is utterly wrong to state that these points are wrong for MMOs, when they are only wrong for the OP and those who share that point-of-view.
Obviously, a lot of people must enjoy the things that the OP says do not belong in MMOs, or those MMOs wouldn't be popular.
I like fast easy levelling. I find it fun to 'ding' and then gain access to a new ability every few hours instead of every few days. I find slow levelling to a boring slogfest.
I am very grateful for instancing. Goodbye to the days of spawn-camping and mob-stealing. If I wanted to compete in an MMO, I'd play PvP. I do not want any player vs player competition in my PvE.
Raids are too short? For me, they are not yet short enough. Five hours is, IMO, ludicrous. I'm going to psuedo-quote Hitchcock and say that raids should be no longer than the average person's bladder endurance. He was referring to movies, but in other words, two hours tops.
The point I'm making is that the OP is stating what he prefers in MMOs but claims that it is right for all MMOs, when clearly this is incorrect. Variety is the spice of life, to each his own, etc etc.
Look its clear to us all that you are describing WoW. That is the only game that has these 'details' for you to complain about.
Perhaps other MMO's are not having the same problems that WoW is with it being too easy, try one of them. This is not me saying WoW sucks, I think that you did that. What I'm saying is that it seems to me that perhaps you may have only been playing WoW recently, let me assure you other MMO's are difficult.
Try Age of Conan, I really liked it and its not easy.
Put duct tape over one eye, and handcuff one of your hands to your foot. Then, take out half the keys on your keyboard.
This is exactly the same as if the Developers had designed a hard game for you to play.
The same as when people say, well, if you WANT to group even though the game is made for solo play you can, just pretend it's a good grouping game! OR, if you want a perma death game, you can just delete your character when you die, just pretend it's a perma death game!
Why is it that a lot of you people think that time spent is equal to difficulty? You sound a bit like you are mad because you spent lots of time in wow and other people had similar gear to you. Perhaps you missed it when Bliz said that a very small percentage of people even saw the inside of MC and their high end vanilla raids. Spending money to develop something that 3% of your total gaming population is going to ever see is a waste of money. So Bliz said hey how do we cater to everyone here without nerfing the experience of the 3% so in comes upgraded badges on content patches and hard modes. Now your more casual but far larger "casual" player base can possibly get into some of the upper end content without having to invest a huge amount of time. Your more hardcore player base always has the best newest gear that is not available from badges.
This also alleviates gearing issues for higher end content i use to raid "hardcore" and i remember having to run instances several times because we needed specific gear pieces for a member or for myself to help with our progression. It is also very true that in wow the game doesnt start until you reach max level. Perhaps this formula is not for you if you are looking for a game with death penalties and takes forever to level then go play Lineage 2 it will give you years of leveling time and "difficulty" hardly any instancing so if you kill a raid boss everyone else has to wait it offers exactly what you are whining about.
I agree with the OP, but am not going to list all the reasons because I already have in numerous other similar threads.
I will add one additional observation, which has always puzzled me. One of the main arguments against a slower leveling curve and greater efforts to attain rewards goes like this: "I don't have time to play a lot. I can't live in the game. I just want to log in for a few hours and have fun." So ok, fair enough. I don't think that means every game has to satisfy that playstyle, but I get where players like that are coming from.
Yet when I played WoW for three years, I noticed that there are a lot of people who play WOW almost constantly. They are nearly always online. There is no difference in the amount of time they are playing than in how long players in games like original EQ were playing. Some countries have even passed laws trying to limit how much they play. Some players have even died for goodness sake because they play so much.
So while there are surely some players who do just play a couple of hours a week and want to have something to show for it, I really don't think that is the real issue. The issue is a more widespread expectation of frequent rewards for playtime. In WoW you can get a new sword and replace it 2 hours later. In EQ if I got a new sword it may be a month or many months before I got a better one.
So from my point of view, it isn't that most people want the game to be easier in the sense of having to play less, because they are playing a ton. It's just that nowadays people need a constant stream of carrots to feel entertained, while in the past they could still enjoy the game while waiting for their rewards.
What is really going to be interesting is that WoW is constantly adding new content to address that insatiable need for more, more, more. They can afford to do that because they are swimming in cash. Most game companies can't afford to deliver new content that fast. So now that WoW has made rapid and frequent rewards the new standard, who else can hope to keep up with them?
EQ1, EQ2, SWG, SWTOR, GW, GW2 CoH, CoV, FFXI, WoW, CO, War,TSW and a slew of free trials and beta tests
Ah, but before darkfall was launced all the fans said "it's a skill based game, so everyone will be on par and you can play side by side with the vet's from day one." This equality was lauded as a major selling point, it was held up as a game where "level" wouldn't matter as much as in other games. Now it turns out not to be quite so even, and it won't equal out for a while. I'm not saying a long "level" time is a bad thing, but is it really that strange that some new players are dissapointed when the opposite of this was held high as a selling point prior to launch?
This is the exact reason I enjoy Aion, especially now that all the whiney WOW players are gone. I dont want to play an MMO where the person who plays 1 hour a day has the same gear as someone who plays 10, the person who plays 10 SHOULD have better gear then the casual person and subsequently squash them in PvP because of it. Now I dont play 10 hours a day, I play 3 to 4 and more on weekends but my time investment in Aion has made my cleric very strong in PvP and TBH I deserve that because I EARNED it, it wasnt handed to me. Its right of passage, once that newb player goes through what I have he can have good gear to, but in the meantime he gets to be cannon fodder to people like me and the people who play more then me who kill me. Kids these days get everything handed to them, there is talk about removing score keeping from hockey and baseball games so there is no winner or loser...wtf? People need to learn in life that you win some and lose some but instead they come to games like Aion and play 1 hour a day, want the best gear that other people earned over the past few months then complain the game sucks when they die in PvP because its easier to just complain then actually do the work, then they go back to WOW for handouts
duh?
Your preferred genre of entertainment has been hijacked.
I think the question is what is a challenge? Or more so, what is a good challenge and what is a bad challenge.
Penn and Teller once released a game called dessert Buss. Basicly you get to drive a bus from Tucson, Arizona to Las Vegas, Nevada in real time at a maximum speed of 45mph. It's 8 hours of nothing, but road and slightly correcting the course of the buss. This is a game so dull that "a bug splating on the windscreen about five hours through the first trip" is concidered the height of excitement. It's a pure trial by boredom, I would probably never play it, but does that make it challenging? Perhaps, but I think we can agree that it's not a very interesting challenge. If the fundamental game play is not challenging, then making it last for n hours will only ad a very shallow challenge.
One could make similar points out of other ways to create "challenges". Arbitrarily losing or winning is not a good challenge, some random chance is good, but not when it decides everything. The controlls and UI should not in themselves be an obstacle, here it's worthwile to note the diffrence between bad controlls and controlls that are hard to master. We could go on.
I think Axehilt in his insistance on meaningful choice is close to what constitutes good challenge.
On the other hand how many of the "challenging games" are merely Desert Bus in disguise?
I beg to differ on the age of conan statement. i played that game when it first came out, yes it was alot of fun on the pvp server to level up. but it was not hard at all.
there was level 80s 1 week after the game came out. shoot it took me like a month to max level and i felt like i took my time. and that is what killed that game i think, it was so easy to level up that half the server was max level in a few months with nothing to do. the sieges where fubar the end game raids were a total joke. people stood around dueling then they broke that adding guards.
AoC = another easy mode game that failed
I agree that leveling is too easy nowadays. They can remove the levels entirely since almost everyone gets there fast anyways and focus to make a better endgame instead.
As for Raiding the big problem here is that most endgames are just raiding with maybe a bit of PvP, there should be a lot more option for the players. The only thing that have changed since EQ is that everything is easier now.