IDK about you...but to me wanting a meaningful experience or gain in a smaller time frame in a genre that originally was meant for longer adventures and questing with a multitude of people....hence, what set it apart as a different genre from say...console gaming..which is what modern MMO's have evolved into for the most part...IS instant gratification. Especially when you can reach cap, see all the sites and have most of the best gear in a month or two.
With keywords such as "console gaming" the way you use it and "instant gratification" your argument cannot be taken seriously.
Whatever you say buddy.
Either you take offense for some self induced reason, or the truth hurts. But if you can't see through playing most modern MMO's (And/or not having played the early ones) that they are more like console games (Linear, instant rewards, stat boards, battlegrounds, void of community, solo heavy, make the player a hero instead of the player that makes something of themselves in a world, instance heavy (loading screens), etc etc...IDK what to tell you.
But to someone like myself that enjoyed an open world where I wasn't funneled on a pre-determined path and could go and do as I wished when I wished...and enjoyed soloing...but also grouping with others, sitting and having breaks to chat with others (med breaks) and make friends (Which even 10+ years later stay in contact with them)...the above described is the terms I said. They aren't meant to belittle people here.
And I played console games HEAVILY as well up until a year ago when I sold my XBox 360 because I was only using it to watch DvD movies.
Look a Skyrim. That, but with other player within the world...and without the loading screens for the dungeons, etc...would make a great MMO IMO. Sad that it isn't...but seems more like one than ones passing themselves off as MMO's today.
skyrim with many other players (friends) would be a good game, but not likely mmo. without coersion about play times the experiance would break. it wouldn't work well having a single consistent world regardless of logins for all the players due to the environment changing.
personally i think morrowwind was a better inspiration. because skyrim seems mechanically, a themepark, the only difference is it isn't immersion breaking because you are the only player so the instancing creates an illusion of change. but it isn't true change just a ton of scripted questing. it is rails, just with nodal opening to many of the rail lines through the open world's environment. but again like themeparks you can fast travel to the nodes.
Do you actually think that the future of gaming is WOW clones on top of WOW clones. TOR is a great example of how to make a great game but not a MMORPG. All,you have to do is look at the up coming games and how they are moving away from the on rails linear gameplay and moving into an a somewhat old/new direction. GW2 is getting away from the holy trinity and even though there is story it doesn't look like it will be shoved in peoples faces like TOR has done. Archeage is moving even further than that and going back to making a real mmorg, with a truly epic lanscape that is alive and breathing. To many dev companies are trying to blur the lines between pc mmorpg and console mmo's and that's where the problem lies.
How is TOR not a MMORPG? Most people would expect just that when they hear "MMORPG".
It is not an MMORPG because the game is designed in such a way to separate people, rather than to bring them together. In TOR your character is saving/conquering place X but only inside your own little bubble, the world will stay the same before and after you have "saved the world".
The whole game is basically a single player game but one where you are playing on the same server as others but not affecting each other in any way or form. It is in itself a contradiction, a massively single player online game.
WTF you talking about!
Last time I checked people have the option to group with folks at various lvls for Wold Bosses, Heroics, Flashpoints, Operations, and Pvp.
The words OPTION to PARTICIPATE!
People make it a single player not the game. TOR is not the only fucking game to have this kind of effect on a player.
Just look at the list of other damn games on the market. Each one in some degree tries to encourage grouping, yes the OPTION to PARTICIPATE! Many choose not to.
Where did I say that my opinion was better than yours? Point that out for me please.
High profile games targeted to the wrong audience? Please, do explain.
Instances are not "laziness" they are a design decision with pros and cons just like non-instanced content. Instanced dungeons have solved some of the issues with non-instanced dungeon. They are pretty much the norm now. Crafting and harvesting clearly doesn't sell as well as regular adventuring and killing monsters. And WAR was a poorly managed game - a troubled project to say the least. It is hardly fair to use it as an example of the new crop of MMORPGs.
Instances are laziness. If the world was large enough with enough interesting content then people would be naturally spread out without forcing them into instances which are basically identical copies of the same area. So instead of creating additional, different areas, they create different instances of the same area. If that is not lazyness I dont know what is.
Now your complaining about force grouping? Where are you going with this?
You don't want it to feel like a single player game, but at the same time you don't want to be forced to group (participate) with other players.
Where did I say that my opinion was better than yours? Point that out for me please.
High profile games targeted to the wrong audience? Please, do explain.
Instances are not "laziness" they are a design decision with pros and cons just like non-instanced content. Instanced dungeons have solved some of the issues with non-instanced dungeon. They are pretty much the norm now. Crafting and harvesting clearly doesn't sell as well as regular adventuring and killing monsters. And WAR was a poorly managed game - a troubled project to say the least. It is hardly fair to use it as an example of the new crop of MMORPGs.
Instances are laziness. If the world was large enough with enough interesting content then people would be naturally spread out without forcing them into instances which are basically identical copies of the same area. So instead of creating additional, different areas, they create different instances of the same area. If that is not lazyness I dont know what is.
Now your complaining about force grouping? Where are you going with this?
You don't want it to feel like a single player game, but at the same time you don't want to be forced to group (participate) with other players.
You totally misunderstood his point. He is complaining that they force people into instances. Not to group. Honestly I had a neutral opinion on you until this, you go off on him and try to be clever but you are just setting a straw man on fire.
Where did I say that my opinion was better than yours? Point that out for me please.
High profile games targeted to the wrong audience? Please, do explain.
Instances are not "laziness" they are a design decision with pros and cons just like non-instanced content. Instanced dungeons have solved some of the issues with non-instanced dungeon. They are pretty much the norm now. Crafting and harvesting clearly doesn't sell as well as regular adventuring and killing monsters. And WAR was a poorly managed game - a troubled project to say the least. It is hardly fair to use it as an example of the new crop of MMORPGs.
Instances are laziness. If the world was large enough with enough interesting content then people would be naturally spread out without forcing them into instances which are basically identical copies of the same area. So instead of creating additional, different areas, they create different instances of the same area. If that is not lazyness I dont know what is.
Now your complaining about force grouping? Where are you going with this?
You don't want it to feel like a single player game, but at the same time you don't want to be forced to group (participate) with other players.
You totally misunderstood his point. He is complaining that they force people into instances. Not to group. Honestly I had a neutral opinion on you until this, you go off on him and try to be clever but you are just setting a straw man on fire.
I could care less what you think about me! I don't fucking know you!
You are right though, I completely missed it. My bad!
You honestly have no clue how Rallos Zek was. It wasn't a constant war/gank server. In many ways it was very similar to a non pvp server. Infact we probably got along better than the non pvp servers. People were held accountable for their actions. Yeah there were a few rotten apples but you learned them quickly & the server was pretty friendly/civil if you actually behaved yourself. So although it was ffa pvp it was pretty much consentual (as in if you actually knew how to interact with other people there wasn't much of it but if you crossed that line you were punished) Guild wars happened when people broke the rules & weren't punished. They weren't that common but they had real consequences (usually involving monetary fines to get off KOS lists which weren't trivial) . The random gankers on Rallos Zek were not well equipped at all because they were social outcasts which meant they were pretty easy to deal with.
I know alot of people who would buy into that kind of pvp if it meant not having to listen to chuck norris jokes or the likes from other players. The pvp on Rallos Zek was prior to the influx the FPS/Console generation into pvp. Back then your guilds honor meant something.
And as far as gold farmers? I recognized probably about 75% of the people on my servers. And you also could usually gauge someones worth from the guild they were in (if they weren't in a guild they usually werent for a reason). And you know what. Gold farmers were usually either unguilded or in guilds that popped up out of nowhere. There was no reason to have to "know" a person to figure out there was a gold farmer. There is such a thing as talking to people in the community (ie send a tell to people you know outside of your guild and ask what they think about a person, its kinda like an intelligence network and works really well)
Hey don't look at me, I've made multiple long lasting online friends in Guild Wars 1 where the whole game was instanced. If you don't communicate because of instances then it is not entirely the game's fault.
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been-Wayne Gretzky
Maybe once that game comes out in the west threads like this will stop being made...
until Archeage isn't the holy grail 2nd coming of Christ sandboxers hype it will be.
And they make fun of "themeparkers" for hyping up games... sheesh.
I remember when DF was going to release and "change everything forever" because it was "a true MMORPG and sequel to UO"
lol how did that work out?
Just like how SWTOR or WAR or AoC or Rift etc. were suppoed to "change everything forever" because they were "a true MMORPG and sequal to EQ" etc. etc. etc.
there is no decline in the genre when talking about money. MMORPGs are being made by the dozen. The problem is there are so many its not as exciting as it used to be when there was only say 10 of these around. Now its just a genre for everyone and therefore is being catered to everyone.
Remake EQOA on PC with top end graphics and ill play it for life hehe
Hero Evermore Guild Master of Dragonspine since 1982. Playing Path of Exile and deeply in love with it.
On Rallos Zek in EQ we had Camping, Ninja Looting, Ganking, Queuing (cause it didn't exist) solved before WoW even was out because we had FFA pvp and a community. And guess what we had mob respawns pretty much solved too because we had player enforced rotations on high profile mobs and people were civil cause they had to be to get anywhere
Not interested. It is a case where the solution is worse than the problem.
I will take WOW's way of solving it anyday any time, and it does involve any PvP.
Plus, "enforced rotations" = more waiting .. i will take instance any day any time. That is a reason why EQ is so small compared to WOW. Your "solutions" only work for you, and not me, nor many other players.
On Rallos Zek in EQ we had Camping, Ninja Looting, Ganking, Queuing (cause it didn't exist) solved before WoW even was out because we had FFA pvp and a community. And guess what we had mob respawns pretty much solved too because we had player enforced rotations on high profile mobs and people were civil cause they had to be to get anywhere
Not interested. It is a case where the solution is worse than the problem.
I will take WOW's way of solving it anyday any time, and it does involve any PvP.
Plus, "enforced rotations" = more waiting .. i will take instance any day any time. That is a reason why EQ is so small compared to WOW. Your "solutions" only work for you, and not me, nor many other players.
I think that not having people who barely know how to interact with others, players that don't disrespect other players, lack of chuck norris jokes in chat channels, and not having players generally don't give a you know what about the other players is worth having FFA pvp
And trust me my "Solutions" are honestly suited to a far greater segment of the population than you realize. EQ didn't have as great a "revolving door" segment of players that EQ did (ie players who play/quit/play quit). Considering the attrition rate of players in games like WoW Its easy to see where the older methods bred better players..
I also find it funny that you bolded the word community as well. As if you dont' actually want a community, A MMO without a community is basically the same as everyone else not in your group being part of the static background and not mattering at all(which means its essentially a single group game and not a MMO)
Maybe once that game comes out in the west threads like this will stop being made...
until Archeage isn't the holy grail 2nd coming of Christ sandboxers hype it will be.
And they make fun of "themeparkers" for hyping up games... sheesh.
I remember when DF was going to release and "change everything forever" because it was "a true MMORPG and sequel to UO"
lol how did that work out?
Just like how SWTOR or WAR or AoC or Rift etc. were suppoed to "change everything forever" because they were "a true MMORPG and sequal to EQ" etc. etc. etc.
Are you going to speak for all "sandboxers" now Spock? Because quite frankly, I don't buy on hype anymore, I'll believe it when I see it...before I purchase the game.
Games should be considered crap these days until proven otherwise. Odds are, the game is going to suck.
"Censorship is never over for those who have experienced it. It is a brand on the imagination that affects the individual who has suffered it, forever." - Noam Chomsky
Now your complaining about force grouping? Where are you going with this?
You don't want it to feel like a single player game, but at the same time you don't want to be forced to group (participate) with other players.
Not being funny but you can promote grouping without artificially ramming people into groups in instanced areas or pushing "Tank LFG for wrath king stage 2010103u302!!!".
That most modern day mmos (and their players) don't seem to grasp that does indeed point to the fact that the genre is in decline.
"Come and have a look at what you could have won."
Not being funny but you can promote grouping without artificially ramming people into groups in instanced areas or pushing "Tank LFG for wrath king stage 2010103u302!!!".
That most modern day mmos (and their players) don't seem to grasp that does indeed point to the fact that the genre is in decline.
OK, how?
How do you encourage grouping without forcing it?
"Make the mobs hit harder and have more health so people have to band together to defeat them."
Forcing it.
"Make certain classes unable to solo effectively so they have to group together."
Forcing it.
"Make more clear distinctions between support/crowd control/healing etc. so people have to work together in groups."
Not being funny but you can promote grouping without artificially ramming people into groups in instanced areas or pushing "Tank LFG for wrath king stage 2010103u302!!!".
That most modern day mmos (and their players) don't seem to grasp that does indeed point to the fact that the genre is in decline.
OK, how?
How do you encourage grouping without forcing it?
"Make the mobs hit harder and have more health so people have to band together to defeat them."
Forcing it.
"Make certain classes unable to solo effectively so they have to group together."
Forcing it.
"Make more clear distinctions between support/crowd control/healing etc. so people have to work together in groups."
Forcing it.
You will note I said "artificially ramming people into groups". The whole notion for "forcing" in games is quite, quite ludicrous as it's use is taken to frankly fucking stupid levels.
No one is "forced" to attempt all of a games content in an mmorpg. You are not held at gunpoint and made to kill a certain high level mob. You are not threatened with extortion if you do not have the very best super battle boots of killing +5.
The whole "forced" debate is a pile of shite argument used by people trying to justify their desire to be able to do absolutely everything in every game on their own.
If you want to explore Super Dangerous Area X, go and try it. When you die learn to take friends. You are not forced to take your trading from local shoe merchant level to Shoe Merchant of the World level, but if you want to you can interact with and get help from other players.
There is a vast and clear different between a game world in which social/meta mechanics promote grouping and one in which players are rammed into groups to go and whackamole an instance.
"Come and have a look at what you could have won."
No one is "forced" to attempt all of a games content in an mmorpg. You are not held at gunpoint and made to kill a certain high level mob. You are not threatened with extortion if you do not have the very best super battle boots of killing +5.
The whole "forced" debate is a pile of shite argument used by people trying to justify their desire to be able to do absolutely everything in every game on their own.
If you want to explore Super Dangerous Area X, go and try it. When you die learn to take friends.
There is a vast and clear different between a game world in which social/meta mechanics promote grouping and one in which players are rammed into groups to go and whackamole an instance.
I am a very firm believer in the "if you build it, they will come" philosophy.
As in, you put in big raids that require lots of people, even if you don't get any better rewards for them- people who want to will still do them just to do them because they find it fun.
Lots of people don't understand that, I reckon you do.
Real problem than is with content gating. Without emergant game play you are stuck with repetitive tasks or simply hit a brick wall unless you actively decide to change how you play the game.
The "stepping stone" philosophy of game design is very popular though.
I don't know how many times it takes to drill in the head of you so called "old skool' mmorpg players that the genre is definitely NOT dying/declining. Whether it's finacially, creatively or figuratively, you are all of course welcome to your opinions, even if they're all wrong! Let's take for example the begining of this genre's journey and the first gen of mmorpgs (which I so happened to have been a part of early on):
When I entered the genre I played UO exclusively out of the 1st gen of mmorpgs to choose from which included AC and EQ. These were what was available in the 1990's. During that time the only other mmorpg was an asian based diablo inspired knock-off Lineage. That was it! The genre had a small player base, was under funded and worthy new releases were few and far between.
Flash foward 15 years and now you have a genre that is both well funded and plentiful in population. But nothing and I mean ABSOLUTELY NOTHING has changed for old skool mmorpg players. You still have UO, AC and EQ to choose from. Take away the big budgets and big crowds and you'd be doing the same thing now what I was doing 15 years ago...waiting for the next big thing.
Just because you feel that new players don't have to wait for their next big thing as long as you do does not mean you have to be jerk about the whole damn genre. Sit and wait your damn turn like the rest of us!
"Small minds talk about people, average minds talk about events, great minds talk about ideas."
Not being funny but you can promote grouping without artificially ramming people into groups in instanced areas or pushing "Tank LFG for wrath king stage 2010103u302!!!".
That most modern day mmos (and their players) don't seem to grasp that does indeed point to the fact that the genre is in decline.
OK, how?
How do you encourage grouping without forcing it?
"Make the mobs hit harder and have more health so people have to band together to defeat them."
Forcing it.
"Make certain classes unable to solo effectively so they have to group together."
Forcing it.
"Make more clear distinctions between support/crowd control/healing etc. so people have to work together in groups."
Forcing it.
My theory is that you don't need to do anything to encourage grouping. You just have to NOT discourage grouping and it will happen. People will group just because it's fun so long as the game doesn't make it a major pain to do so.
And the quest-node grind leveling process makes grouping a MAJOR pain to do. In order to group you have to be...
A. Very close to the same level.
B. On the same quest.
C. On a quest that isn't MORE difficult when grouped (like collect 10 bat eyes).
So when the stars line up, you can actually group with someone. But most of the time, they don't line up so people just solo.
In UO post Trammel, there was basically no real incentive to group other than for the fun of it and yet it still happened. People will group and play together as long as the game doesn't go out of its way to make it difficult.
Not being funny but you can promote grouping without artificially ramming people into groups in instanced areas or pushing "Tank LFG for wrath king stage 2010103u302!!!".
That most modern day mmos (and their players) don't seem to grasp that does indeed point to the fact that the genre is in decline.
OK, how?
How do you encourage grouping without forcing it?
"Make the mobs hit harder and have more health so people have to band together to defeat them."
Forcing it.
"Make certain classes unable to solo effectively so they have to group together."
Forcing it.
"Make more clear distinctions between support/crowd control/healing etc. so people have to work together in groups."
Forcing it.
My theory is that you don't need to do anything to encourage grouping. You just have to NOT discourage grouping and it will happen. People will group just because it's fun so long as the game doesn't make it a major pain to do so.
And the quest-node grind leveling process makes grouping a MAJOR pain to do. In order to group you have to be...
A. Very close to the same level.
B. On the same quest.
C. On a quest that isn't MORE difficult when grouped (like collect 10 bat eyes).
So when the stars line up, you can actually group with someone. But most of the time, they don't line up so people just solo.
In UO post Trammel, there was basically no real incentive to group other than for the fun of it and yet it still happened. People will group and play together as long as the game doesn't go out of its way to make it difficult.
Exactly!
This is why I have long been a crusader against LSP (linear statistical progression) and am currently looking forward to GW2.
Sure there are levels and gear, but do they really matter in GW2? Not as much, that's for sure. Perfect? No. Step in the right direction? Booyah.
personally i think morrowwind was a better inspiration. because skyrim seems mechanically, a themepark, the only difference is it isn't immersion breaking because you are the only player so the instancing creates an illusion of change. but it isn't true change just a ton of scripted questing. it is rails, just with nodal opening to many of the rail lines through the open world's environment. but again like themeparks you can fast travel to the nodes.
Well Morrowind wasn't more of a sandbox. You certainly didn't reshape the game world very much, and in the end you were stuck with whatever static themepark rides the developers had created for you.
Themeparks aren't a question of linear vs. nonlinear, they're a question of player agency and authorship over the experience. The metaphor is actually built upon the idea of nonlinearity (real themeparks aren't linear.)
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
Not being funny but you can promote grouping without artificially ramming people into groups in instanced areas or pushing "Tank LFG for wrath king stage 2010103u302!!!".
That most modern day mmos (and their players) don't seem to grasp that does indeed point to the fact that the genre is in decline.
OK, how?
How do you encourage grouping without forcing it?
"Make the mobs hit harder and have more health so people have to band together to defeat them."
Forcing it.
"Make certain classes unable to solo effectively so they have to group together."
Forcing it.
"Make more clear distinctions between support/crowd control/healing etc. so people have to work together in groups."
Forcing it.
My theory is that you don't need to do anything to encourage grouping. You just have to NOT discourage grouping and it will happen. People will group just because it's fun so long as the game doesn't make it a major pain to do so.
And the quest-node grind leveling process makes grouping a MAJOR pain to do. In order to group you have to be...
A. Very close to the same level.
B. On the same quest.
C. On a quest that isn't MORE difficult when grouped (like collect 10 bat eyes).
So when the stars line up, you can actually group with someone. But most of the time, they don't line up so people just solo.
In UO post Trammel, there was basically no real incentive to group other than for the fun of it and yet it still happened. People will group and play together as long as the game doesn't go out of its way to make it difficult.
Exactly!
This is why I have long been a crusader against LSP (linear statistical progression) and am currently looking forward to GW2.
Sure there are levels and gear, but do they really matter in GW2? Not as much, that's for sure. Perfect? No. Step in the right direction? Booyah.
You two seem a bit out of touch with the genre.
To group you don't need B or C, you just need to hit a damn button, keep playing, and in a little while you're in a group in a dungeon, grouping.
So grouping happens all the damn time in modern MMORPGs (except ToR.)
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
Now your complaining about force grouping? Where are you going with this?
You don't want it to feel like a single player game, but at the same time you don't want to be forced to group (participate) with other players.
Not being funny but you can promote grouping without artificially ramming people into groups in instanced areas or pushing "Tank LFG for wrath king stage 2010103u302!!!".
That most modern day mmos (and their players) don't seem to grasp that does indeed point to the fact that the genre is in decline.
Speak for yourself.
If the MMO genre was in a decline how the fuck do you explain the companies that continue to make them and the growth each year? And I'm not just talking about Bioware.
The MMO genre is not in decline.. In fact ithe numbers tell us that it is a growth industry. It may not be a fresh as it once was and many of the games are so similar that they are almost indistingishable from each other. So much so that they appear bland and the gameplay is over familar and tired. I would also add the the genre as a whole has yet to live up to the potential many of us hoped it would reach back in the days of EQ and UI. I feel that only a few games have really taken advantage of the MMO aspect of MMO. What I mean by that is that there is the possibility to create player driven content. However, I feel much of the blame lies on the doorstep of the playerbase who expect 100% of the content to be given to them which is why these virtual worlds will always be as artificial as single player games despite these worlds being played by thousands of people.
Now your complaining about force grouping? Where are you going with this?
You don't want it to feel like a single player game, but at the same time you don't want to be forced to group (participate) with other players.
Not being funny but you can promote grouping without artificially ramming people into groups in instanced areas or pushing "Tank LFG for wrath king stage 2010103u302!!!".
That most modern day mmos (and their players) don't seem to grasp that does indeed point to the fact that the genre is in decline.
Speak for yourself.
If the MMO genre was in a decline how the fuck do you explain the companies that continue to make them and the growth each year? And I'm not just talking about Bioware.
Growth? You mean the critical and financial BOMBS that fail right out of the gate and fail to grow over time? I think probably one of the only MMOs with numbers going UP right now is Eve or Darkfall.
Not being funny but you can promote grouping without artificially ramming people into groups in instanced areas or pushing "Tank LFG for wrath king stage 2010103u302!!!".
That most modern day mmos (and their players) don't seem to grasp that does indeed point to the fact that the genre is in decline.
OK, how?
How do you encourage grouping without forcing it?
"Make the mobs hit harder and have more health so people have to band together to defeat them."
Forcing it.
"Make certain classes unable to solo effectively so they have to group together."
Forcing it.
"Make more clear distinctions between support/crowd control/healing etc. so people have to work together in groups."
Forcing it.
By making the world a dangerous place. Making grouping more rewarding and faster than soloing. Done.
Grouping is harder, it SHOULD give you more rewards.
Soloing should be difficult but possible if you REALLY hate people (wrong genre then, I think) If you simply cannot find a group you can still solo, do kill tasks and such, but it'll be more dangerous than having a group of people backing you up.
Comments
skyrim with many other players (friends) would be a good game, but not likely mmo. without coersion about play times the experiance would break. it wouldn't work well having a single consistent world regardless of logins for all the players due to the environment changing.
personally i think morrowwind was a better inspiration. because skyrim seems mechanically, a themepark, the only difference is it isn't immersion breaking because you are the only player so the instancing creates an illusion of change. but it isn't true change just a ton of scripted questing. it is rails, just with nodal opening to many of the rail lines through the open world's environment. but again like themeparks you can fast travel to the nodes.
WTF you talking about!
Last time I checked people have the option to group with folks at various lvls for Wold Bosses, Heroics, Flashpoints, Operations, and Pvp.
The words OPTION to PARTICIPATE!
People make it a single player not the game. TOR is not the only fucking game to have this kind of effect on a player.
Just look at the list of other damn games on the market. Each one in some degree tries to encourage grouping, yes the OPTION to PARTICIPATE! Many choose not to.
Now your complaining about force grouping? Where are you going with this?
You don't want it to feel like a single player game, but at the same time you don't want to be forced to group (participate) with other players.
You totally misunderstood his point. He is complaining that they force people into instances. Not to group. Honestly I had a neutral opinion on you until this, you go off on him and try to be clever but you are just setting a straw man on fire.
I could care less what you think about me! I don't fucking know you!
You are right though, I completely missed it. My bad!
Hey don't look at me, I've made multiple long lasting online friends in Guild Wars 1 where the whole game was instanced. If you don't communicate because of instances then it is not entirely the game's fault.
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been -Wayne Gretzky
How long until Archeage releases?
Maybe once that game comes out in the west threads like this will stop being made...
until Archeage isn't the holy grail 2nd coming of Christ sandboxers hype it will be.
And they make fun of "themeparkers" for hyping up games... sheesh.
I remember when DF was going to release and "change everything forever" because it was "a true MMORPG and sequel to UO"
lol how did that work out?
Just like how SWTOR or WAR or AoC or Rift etc. were suppoed to "change everything forever" because they were "a true MMORPG and sequal to EQ" etc. etc. etc.
there is no decline in the genre when talking about money. MMORPGs are being made by the dozen. The problem is there are so many its not as exciting as it used to be when there was only say 10 of these around. Now its just a genre for everyone and therefore is being catered to everyone.
Remake EQOA on PC with top end graphics and ill play it for life hehe
Hero Evermore
Guild Master of Dragonspine since 1982.
Playing Path of Exile and deeply in love with it.
Not interested. It is a case where the solution is worse than the problem.
I will take WOW's way of solving it anyday any time, and it does involve any PvP.
Plus, "enforced rotations" = more waiting .. i will take instance any day any time. That is a reason why EQ is so small compared to WOW. Your "solutions" only work for you, and not me, nor many other players.
I think that not having people who barely know how to interact with others, players that don't disrespect other players, lack of chuck norris jokes in chat channels, and not having players generally don't give a you know what about the other players is worth having FFA pvp
And trust me my "Solutions" are honestly suited to a far greater segment of the population than you realize. EQ didn't have as great a "revolving door" segment of players that EQ did (ie players who play/quit/play quit). Considering the attrition rate of players in games like WoW Its easy to see where the older methods bred better players..
I also find it funny that you bolded the word community as well. As if you dont' actually want a community, A MMO without a community is basically the same as everyone else not in your group being part of the static background and not mattering at all(which means its essentially a single group game and not a MMO)
Are you going to speak for all "sandboxers" now Spock? Because quite frankly, I don't buy on hype anymore, I'll believe it when I see it...before I purchase the game.
Games should be considered crap these days until proven otherwise. Odds are, the game is going to suck.
"Censorship is never over for those who have experienced it. It is a brand on the imagination that affects the individual who has suffered it, forever." - Noam Chomsky
Not being funny but you can promote grouping without artificially ramming people into groups in instanced areas or pushing "Tank LFG for wrath king stage 2010103u302!!!".
That most modern day mmos (and their players) don't seem to grasp that does indeed point to the fact that the genre is in decline.
"Come and have a look at what you could have won."
OK, how?
How do you encourage grouping without forcing it?
"Make the mobs hit harder and have more health so people have to band together to defeat them."
Forcing it.
"Make certain classes unable to solo effectively so they have to group together."
Forcing it.
"Make more clear distinctions between support/crowd control/healing etc. so people have to work together in groups."
Forcing it.
You will note I said "artificially ramming people into groups". The whole notion for "forcing" in games is quite, quite ludicrous as it's use is taken to frankly fucking stupid levels.
No one is "forced" to attempt all of a games content in an mmorpg. You are not held at gunpoint and made to kill a certain high level mob. You are not threatened with extortion if you do not have the very best super battle boots of killing +5.
The whole "forced" debate is a pile of shite argument used by people trying to justify their desire to be able to do absolutely everything in every game on their own.
If you want to explore Super Dangerous Area X, go and try it. When you die learn to take friends. You are not forced to take your trading from local shoe merchant level to Shoe Merchant of the World level, but if you want to you can interact with and get help from other players.
There is a vast and clear different between a game world in which social/meta mechanics promote grouping and one in which players are rammed into groups to go and whackamole an instance.
"Come and have a look at what you could have won."
I am a very firm believer in the "if you build it, they will come" philosophy.
As in, you put in big raids that require lots of people, even if you don't get any better rewards for them- people who want to will still do them just to do them because they find it fun.
Lots of people don't understand that, I reckon you do.
Real problem than is with content gating. Without emergant game play you are stuck with repetitive tasks or simply hit a brick wall unless you actively decide to change how you play the game.
The "stepping stone" philosophy of game design is very popular though.
I don't know how many times it takes to drill in the head of you so called "old skool' mmorpg players that the genre is definitely NOT dying/declining. Whether it's finacially, creatively or figuratively, you are all of course welcome to your opinions, even if they're all wrong! Let's take for example the begining of this genre's journey and the first gen of mmorpgs (which I so happened to have been a part of early on):
When I entered the genre I played UO exclusively out of the 1st gen of mmorpgs to choose from which included AC and EQ. These were what was available in the 1990's. During that time the only other mmorpg was an asian based diablo inspired knock-off Lineage. That was it! The genre had a small player base, was under funded and worthy new releases were few and far between.
Flash foward 15 years and now you have a genre that is both well funded and plentiful in population. But nothing and I mean ABSOLUTELY NOTHING has changed for old skool mmorpg players. You still have UO, AC and EQ to choose from. Take away the big budgets and big crowds and you'd be doing the same thing now what I was doing 15 years ago...waiting for the next big thing.
Just because you feel that new players don't have to wait for their next big thing as long as you do does not mean you have to be jerk about the whole damn genre. Sit and wait your damn turn like the rest of us!
"Small minds talk about people, average minds talk about events, great minds talk about ideas."
My theory is that you don't need to do anything to encourage grouping. You just have to NOT discourage grouping and it will happen. People will group just because it's fun so long as the game doesn't make it a major pain to do so.
And the quest-node grind leveling process makes grouping a MAJOR pain to do. In order to group you have to be...
A. Very close to the same level.
B. On the same quest.
C. On a quest that isn't MORE difficult when grouped (like collect 10 bat eyes).
So when the stars line up, you can actually group with someone. But most of the time, they don't line up so people just solo.
In UO post Trammel, there was basically no real incentive to group other than for the fun of it and yet it still happened. People will group and play together as long as the game doesn't go out of its way to make it difficult.
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
Exactly!
This is why I have long been a crusader against LSP (linear statistical progression) and am currently looking forward to GW2.
Sure there are levels and gear, but do they really matter in GW2? Not as much, that's for sure. Perfect? No. Step in the right direction? Booyah.
Well Morrowind wasn't more of a sandbox. You certainly didn't reshape the game world very much, and in the end you were stuck with whatever static themepark rides the developers had created for you.
Themeparks aren't a question of linear vs. nonlinear, they're a question of player agency and authorship over the experience. The metaphor is actually built upon the idea of nonlinearity (real themeparks aren't linear.)
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
You two seem a bit out of touch with the genre.
To group you don't need B or C, you just need to hit a damn button, keep playing, and in a little while you're in a group in a dungeon, grouping.
So grouping happens all the damn time in modern MMORPGs (except ToR.)
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
Speak for yourself.
If the MMO genre was in a decline how the fuck do you explain the companies that continue to make them and the growth each year? And I'm not just talking about Bioware.
The MMO genre is not in decline.. In fact ithe numbers tell us that it is a growth industry. It may not be a fresh as it once was and many of the games are so similar that they are almost indistingishable from each other. So much so that they appear bland and the gameplay is over familar and tired. I would also add the the genre as a whole has yet to live up to the potential many of us hoped it would reach back in the days of EQ and UI. I feel that only a few games have really taken advantage of the MMO aspect of MMO. What I mean by that is that there is the possibility to create player driven content. However, I feel much of the blame lies on the doorstep of the playerbase who expect 100% of the content to be given to them which is why these virtual worlds will always be as artificial as single player games despite these worlds being played by thousands of people.
Growth? You mean the critical and financial BOMBS that fail right out of the gate and fail to grow over time? I think probably one of the only MMOs with numbers going UP right now is Eve or Darkfall.
Darkfall Travelogues!
By making the world a dangerous place. Making grouping more rewarding and faster than soloing. Done.
Grouping is harder, it SHOULD give you more rewards.
Soloing should be difficult but possible if you REALLY hate people (wrong genre then, I think) If you simply cannot find a group you can still solo, do kill tasks and such, but it'll be more dangerous than having a group of people backing you up.
Darkfall Travelogues!
I have hope for MMOs again. We have GW2 (DAoC replacement) and AA (UO replacement). Until then, I got EvE.