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The Original formula would work, WoW, EQ2,Vanguard, LOTRO
delete5230
Member EpicPosts: 7,081
If I had five million dollars, and I had to spend it on making an mmo, Yes, it would be somewhat be a clone of our old school mmo's.
I don't think I would go so far back as Ultima Online or Ever Quest 1. Sure their the old original classics but they would be to tedious. 2003 would be just right to capture EVERYONE.....In my opinion I really feel that.
Now, this could start an argument, but let me finish please. We have all types here, the living breathing world types, the dynamic event types, solo and hard core grouping types, the list could go on and on. HOWEVER My game would have :
Several classes, more so than WoW, EQ2 and Even Vanguard. They would still have tab targeting, with many abilities.tons of abilities to look forward to.
It would have two continents like WoW and seamless, going from one zone to another would be just like WoW for the fact that the theme of each would blend naturally.
Quest would be long,very hard, no chain quest that leave your friends out.
COMMUNITY WILL BE 100% the focus......Infact a large part of the tutorial would be learning how to use a good search for player tool.
No F2P ever !
No cross realm nothing !
Very nice graphics, but not to take away from Mechanics, no false walls, no carrot on a stick questing, none of that.
Traveling will be manual, by mounts. If It took 20 minutes to get some place, so be it.
The Game would basically be a Vanguard done right....To all the new players that say " screw that " or " I'm not wasting my time "....I seriously think it would grow on you. A living breathing world with focus on deep character building and community. Solo or group.......Developers have seriously gone in the wrong direction, every one of them.
HOW DO I KNOW THIS WOULD WORK ?
Vanguard was a mess, and extreme disappointment, with a crap EQ2 engine, that to this day still does not work. SOE bought it and continued to screw it up. They added the trial Island and that was it, No re advertisement Nothing !!!!
Yet millions of players passed thru this game in a 5 year spread. NEVER AT THE SAME TIME, this made the game forever lifeless. But everyone hoped.....Developers were responsible for a rally that never came....SOE killed it !!!!....SOE did nothing, seemingly on purpose !
Doing this again would work 
Comments
So the original Vanguard cost tens of millions of dollars to do it wrong, and failed in part because they ran out of money in development and had to push it live too soon, but you could do it right for $5 million? Sure.
"Be water my friend" - Bruce Lee
Your point about vanguard doesn't hold THAT much weight. A lot of games will have tons of people dipping in to try before leaving a game. 5 million isn't all that much really when you look at it number wise.
Focusing upon the topic at hand though, I disagree... at least to some extent. Don't get me wrong, the new formula overall many games have fell flat and have over-all had weaker appearances then many older titles (in some part due to bad design combined with an oversaturated market).
That said the games had (in their original work) plenty of flaws. A lot of difficulty was focused upon tedium, which I feel is the wrong way to make things 'difficult'. Gear defining a character really was something I wasn't as big on, granted I do see value in having it play some part in evolving the character to some extent. The boring rep grinds and other activities I feel were really holding such games back and making it quite a drag to play. Honestly, focusing on tab-target combat as well is a bit 'old', and I feel more action should be in place then anything else. Games like Aion actually did something along the lines of keeping the tab target, but also having abilities combo off one another which I feel isn't a bad way to evolve things without making it 'action combat'.
While that "old school" mmo I feel is far better then most modern MMos today, it did have plenty of areas it fell flat. Today's Mmos need to focus on challenge and reward far more, realizing that even those 'die hard casuals' WANT that feeling of acomplishment, even though many will protest with some dillusion they feel they deserve to see it all and its just as rewarding, and quiting just as quick after they seen it without all that much enjoyment doing so. MMos don't need to be about grinding 10 hours a day to get somewhere, they just need that challenge and element of progression that forcing long time sinks doesn't really fix. The best solution is one that is in the middle of 'taking time' but stays old school in its difficulty without any hand holding options.