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Old School..Whats wrong with everyone ?

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  • DistopiaDistopia Member EpicPosts: 21,183
    Originally posted by Torik
    Originally posted by zekeofev

    However, there was not the hand holding quest leveling systems that waypoint the next place to go like current MMOs. In DAOC and SWG you at least had to discover through world exploration good places to level or find resources (or hear about them from friends).

    Are you forgetting the SWG mission terminals which told you to go to waypoints where a mob lair would spawn so you could kill it and then go to the next mission waypoint?  When I played SWG pre-CU that was the primary way for people to level.

    True, yet they were more or less tasks to make credits or xtra xp, they served their purpose, without really needing to disguise themselves as interesting content.

    For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson


  • DistopiaDistopia Member EpicPosts: 21,183
    Originally posted by Demogorgon
    Originally posted by Distopia
    Originally posted by Demogorgon
     

    When finally a game that goes at a much slower pace comes come, with things to do at every levels in a realistic flesh out world, you'll see how wrong you are. But to be honest, I'm not getting my hopes up for that actually happenneing for the obvious reason that its a lot harder to make & devs only see the quick bucks.

    /shrug

    It's harder to make? based on what exactly? Since this is a "what bothers me" thread for the most part; I'll have to say this is what bothers me. This kind of statement, because if we're going to be realistic, what you're basing this on is old games, and they were not harder to make. They entailed significantly less in terms of development (scope is another story, ie SWG). Those games were essentially blank canvases, the players made the game. The devs simply designed UI's, Ai, some sort of profession system, as well as a crafting/combat system, the rest was really up to us as players. 

    When it comes to these discussions this is the biggest fallacy I see in them, the idea that a world is hard to make. What's hard is selling just a world. Sure there's an audience for it, but it requires a lot more time commitment from the player, as well as you have to give them reason to care about being in that world. SWG worked because it's Star Wars... UO is Ultima, which was huge back then in terms of RPG properties. Popular properties have really been key to the success stories in terms of many western titles. It can take years for a new property to really start catching people in mass, for an MMO that's too long.

    That is one of the biggest hurdles for a new game, unless it's carrying with it an established name, it's nothing more than generic setting number 2,000,001, hence no one really cares about it's world, or the stories behind it, therefor that world doesn't really sell.

    There are exceptions like EQ, or EVE, but they're certainly not the rule, random luck, and the right commitment as well as time played huge parts in those success stories.

    If you're going to sit there & tell me that the games we have today hard harder to make, I'm just going to have to disagree.

    Instanses aren't hard to do.. .thats why they are doing it. Moving on...

    (morrowind voice) Ah yes, make some strawman counter and move on...who said anything about instances? I'm referring to overuse of pre-generated worlds, simple content types like SWG's mission systems, or simply camping one world boss all day long. That's what content was back then... The tech.. as well as knowledge of that tech created limitations that didn't allow for much more, on a technical level these games have come a long way....

    For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson


  • immodiumimmodium Member RarePosts: 2,610
    Originally posted by Demogorgon

    Cuz thats the only thing you want to see.

    Like I said moving on... Don't bother. I disagree with you. Can you accept that?

    But what other hard dev created world content was there in SWG that today's MMO's don't do?

    image
  • ReklawReklaw Member UncommonPosts: 6,495
    Originally posted by immodium
    Originally posted by Demogorgon

    Cuz thats the only thing you want to see.

    Like I said moving on... Don't bother. I disagree with you. Can you accept that?

    But what other hard dev created world content was there in SWG that today's MMO's don't do?

    What do you mean with "hard dev created world content"? Cause due to the tools the developers gave us it was we the community who created the content. 

    And that's the difference with todaty's MMO's as people expect content to be generated by the game itself regardless if the game gives player the tools to create their own content. The majority will flock towards what is given.

    But regardless it's hard to come up with a good solution bringing old-school into today's genre because as we all can see there is allot of difference in between like's/dislike's even between old school players and I am talking about those of us who truly enjoy some of the old school games as I also know plenty of old school gamers who are pretty satisfied with today's MMO's

     

  • DullahanDullahan Member EpicPosts: 4,536
    Originally posted by vesuvias

    I started with Uo/EQ an despite that I always find myself on the oppisite side of the arguement from the "Old School" crowd here. I esspecially find the juvinile arguement style of claiming old school games were for "adults" especially ironic. It's the type of comment my 13 year old daughter makes to her younger sibling all the time.

    I do however empathize with what the "vets" are trying to say, to a certain degree. I just wish instead of holding there ground and claiming things like forced grouping, non-instanced camps, yelling for groups, corpse runs, harsh death penalties and long leveling times were what made old school games great they would just simply stick with saying Community, Immersion, and Interdependancy aren't as prevelant now as they were then. I could agree with that statement and get behind it. But I will never play another game that has Corpse runs in they way EQ had corpse runs. That mechanic was broken and poorly designed. While it might have provided a sense of danger and urgency when deep in the bowls of the dungeoun it was far too punitive to be an effective game mechanic for anyone but masocists. 

    This belief that these old mechanics are the only way to move the genre forward is a fallacy. We moved on from these mechanics not because the goal was to eliminate Community, Immersion or Interdependancy but because they were poorly designed mechanics that were more likely to chase people out of the game than they were to encourage the former. 

    Figure out what it was at the core of the experience that made is so much fun. Was it forced grouping that made it fun or the fact that you explored deep in a dungeon with others that were all focused and prepared for a difficult task. Wasn't it more a factor of the fact that your actions had meaning positive or negative for the groups success or failure. Did you really need to lose half your XP on death in order to "force" every other player to focus? Did you really need to be the only one that could "heal" in order to make your actions have meaning?

    Its too intellectually lazy to simply say, EQ was fun, EQ had corpse runs, camping, long leveling, and harsh death penalties. Therefore the only games that are fun as those that have corpse runs, camping, long leveling and harsh death penalties. To champion those mechanics because you can endure the downsides without it ruining your fun is completely discounting the number of people for whom those mechanics pretty much made the game unplayable.

     

     

    What you're saying is, community, interdependency, teamwork etc are great, but all the things that promote them are bad.  Cool story!

    Shared adversity fosters community.  Theres an entire genre designed around this now and its called "Survival."  Those kinds of things aren't for everyone, and perhaps they weren't for you.


  • immodiumimmodium Member RarePosts: 2,610
    Originally posted by Reklaw
    Originally posted by immodium
    Originally posted by Demogorgon

    Cuz thats the only thing you want to see.

    Like I said moving on... Don't bother. I disagree with you. Can you accept that?

    But what other hard dev created world content was there in SWG that today's MMO's don't do?

    What do you mean with "hard dev created world content"? Cause due to the tools the developers gave us it was we the community who created the content. 

    And that's the difference with todaty's MMO's as people expect content to be generated by the game itself regardless if the game gives player the tools to create their own content. The majority will flock towards what is given.

    But regardless it's hard to come up with a good solution bringing old-school into today's genre because as we all can see there is allot of difference in between like's/dislike's even between old school players and I am talking about those of us who truly enjoy some of the old school games as I also know plenty of old school gamers who are pretty satisfied with today's MMO's

     

    I was just wondering why it was harder for developers to create worlds in old games.

    I agree with you, the developers created tools for the player to create the content (housing for example in SWG).

    IMO I think it's a lot harder for developers today to create engaging worlds where players aren't really necessary. Take Skyrim for example. yes it's a single player game but the world is so engrossing people do say they would love to play that with others.

    Old MMO's, for me,  just seemed the opposite to that. The worlds were not that amazing to explore but because your playing with friends it will do. Even though people did solo in SWG. I couldn't, the planets weren't that interesting.

    A world has to be great even solo.

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  • umcorianumcorian Member UncommonPosts: 519
    Originally posted by nariusseldon
    Originally posted by umcorian
     

    I honestly think the key to success in an MMO is to listen to Agent Smith from the Matrix:

    "Did you know that the first Matrix was designed to be a perfect human world? Where none suffered, where everyone would be happy. It was a disaster. No one would accept the program. Entire crops were lost. Some believed we lacked the programming language to describe your perfect world. But I believe that, as a species, human beings define their reality through suffering and misery. The perfect world was a dream that your primitive cerebrum kept trying to wake up from. Which is why the Matrix was redesigned to this: the peak of your civilization."

     

    You think the design philosophy of ENTERTAINMENT should be taken out of dialog of a sci-fi movie?

    I don't think i want to "suffer" through my entertainment. I don't suffer when i read a novel. I don't suffer when i watch a movie, and i certainly do not play games to suffer. If it is not fun (to me), ... next.

    You're reading too much into the word 'suffering'. Think of 'suffering' in an MMO context as losing a LoL match. Not succeeding. Being set back because you just weren't good enough at a particular part of the game. 

    I feel most modern MMORPGs have abandoned any notion of suffering and have made it so anyone can succeed through the vast majority of the content given enough time. I feel that has devolved the genre and driven away a large number of MMORPGers who actually enjoyed the rewards that came with being skilled in more difficult MMORPG settings - thus the rise of MOBAs and competative MMO games. 

    Reinsert a little suffering into the genre that drives players to gradually improve and I suspect everything will get a little better. 

  • pkpkpkpkpkpk Member UncommonPosts: 265

    "If"! Your idea of design in games is a childish, fantastical one.  Why don't, as a homework project, you research the costs of games over the years--the average sizes of the staffs? Did you know there was once a time when a company that made a game would have been likely to have made one before?  There will never be a new "old school" MMORPG. The first and second generations were not made for schoolchildren and illiterates. The only way to get an old school MMORPG is to play one. No worth while designer would give serious credence to someone who wants an "old school" game, but refuses to play the ones in existence because of graphics.

     

    MMORPGs have become poor man's entertainment, and will never again be anything but; mark my words. Flying on an airplane used to be  glamorous; people would put on their best clothes; they would enjoy the flight in luxury, as they traveled through the skies, en route to another country. Now they are stripped of their dignity and searched at the airport, and then crowded onto the airplane like cattle. MMORPGs are the same.

  • JadawwaJadawwa Member UncommonPosts: 9
    Too many point and counter points too many discounted perspectives and splitting of hairs. Is not the core of this simply that game play is evolving but it is leaving behind some of what got it here? Suffering from a loss--learn a lesson or change tactics. Patience for progress--whats that? Its odd but sometimes the statements made about game progress seem to be excuses for not having penalties because then people might walk away. A trophy for everyone mentality.
  • jaxomejaxome Member UncommonPosts: 76
    Originally posted by Jadawwa
    Too many point and counter points too many discounted perspectives and splitting of hairs. Is not the core of this simply that game play is evolving but it is leaving behind some of what got it here? Suffering from a loss--learn a lesson or change tactics. Patience for progress--whats that? Its odd but sometimes the statements made about game progress seem to be excuses for not having penalties because then people might walk away. A trophy for everyone mentality.

    This so much of this. I remember vanilla WoW and I remember loathing it, I remember arguing with my friends as they abandoned SWG for WoW (not cause it was a better game or more fun but because of the great creature handler nurf and intense hate for SOE, those of you who were there know what im talking about). The reason I hated WoW then was cause i thought it was giving cry babies trophies to easy and it was gonna ruin mmorpgs. Point is as much as I hate WoW, i appreciate much of what it has done for making games more fun now, and it has done lots, that is not debatable. 

    Most games now are trying to recreate what WoW did, and mmorpgs are suffering. Archeage had the potential to be great but current F2P cash shops and toxic communities killed the crap out of that game from what I understand, personally I could never get the crap to launch on my computer so I dont know lol. Game devs are forgetting what made mmorpgs great, if you want evidence look at WoW, from what I understand the most recent expansion is moving the game more towards vanilla WoW and away from the direction it was going. Im guessing they see the next wave of the future and its going to be getting healthy happy communities and getting people to feel like they are living in a world and blah blah blah... Games are so much better now then when SWG happened, I and most old school people would agree with that idea, however I dont understand why anyone would disagree with the idea that we are losing something and should strike a balance lol.

    Honestly I think the real solution is for game devs to stop trying to be the next WoW, or the next f2p scam for some quick money, and instead to focus on making a game that speaks directly to a large enough population to make money and not to make all the money, you cant make everyone happy so why not just focus on the people you can... Its not leaving farm land unused so much as making sure you will have fresh dirt for next years plants.

  • delete5230delete5230 Member EpicPosts: 7,081

    I guess this deep in the post it's OK to go off topic, by using SWG, UO or EQ1.

     

    But just remember what the original topic was.

    People seem to reflect back 10 to 15 years ago to discuss a living world given to the players. One that you can play for years because of deep involved things and decisions had to be made.  Some easy content if your not in the mood to play with others on a certain day, and harder stuff when your guild is on.

    How can you measure a game like this when the ONLY way is to refer to something that are so old and involves stick figures, and bad coding.

     

    They just STOPED MAKING THEM, and went the cheap way.

    NO ONE VOTED, for easy simple and follow the popcorn trail......If any of you voted, please tell me where, because no one else here can find the voting booth.

    VOTED WITH OUR POCKETS ?.....Ha.....MMO players will play anything, it's an addiction.....I have it too.....I've played many garbage mmos to finally realize they SUCK !

     

    There is no way to measure if " Old School " would work because we no longer have a reference......Developers just stopped !

  • immodiumimmodium Member RarePosts: 2,610
    Originally posted by delete5230

    I guess this deep in the post it's OK to go off topic, by using SWG, UO or EQ1.

     

    But just remember what the original topic was.

    People seem to reflect back 10 to 15 years ago to discuss a living world given to the players. One that you can play for years because of deep involved things and decisions had to be made.  Some easy content if your not in the mood to play with others on a certain day, and harder stuff when your guild is on.

    How can you measure a game like this when the ONLY way is to refer to something that are so old and involves stick figures, and bad coding.

     

    They just STOPED MAKING THEM, and went the cheap way.

    NO ONE VOTED, for easy simple and follow the popcorn trail......If any of you voted, please tell me where, because no one else here can find the voting booth.

    VOTED WITH OUR POCKETS ?.....Ha.....MMO players will play anything, it's an addiction.....I have it too.....I've played many garbage mmos to finally realize they SUCK !

     

    There is no way to measure if " Old School " would work because we no longer have a reference......Developers just stopped !

    If we go back to the original post. Some people poke fun at the 'old school' posts because some of the posts come across as derogatory.

    You find the new games easy and garbage, great! Don't get offended when me and other gaming vets think that old games were easy, tedious and garbage.

    Opinions hey.

    image
  • JemcrystalJemcrystal Member UncommonPosts: 1,983
    It was probably cheaper to develop and support a game "back in the day" than it is now.  Rising costs plus the shark frenzy of greedy corporate/investors has not helped.  Also, what you call "old school" and what I call "old school" are probably two different thoughts.  I remember mmorpg's being boring and grindy.  Or ugly graphics.  And before that there were no mmo's; just card games or rp p&p D&D.


  • Tasslehoff35Tasslehoff35 Member UncommonPosts: 962
    Yep they just stopped because nobody was playing. Just like some OPs should stop because nobody cares about their ramblings.
  • CrazKanukCrazKanuk Member EpicPosts: 6,130
    Originally posted by delete5230

    I guess this deep in the post it's OK to go off topic, by using SWG, UO or EQ1.

     

    But just remember what the original topic was.

    People seem to reflect back 10 to 15 years ago to discuss a living world given to the players. One that you can play for years because of deep involved things and decisions had to be made.  Some easy content if your not in the mood to play with others on a certain day, and harder stuff when your guild is on.

    How can you measure a game like this when the ONLY way is to refer to something that are so old and involves stick figures, and bad coding.

     

    They just STOPED MAKING THEM, and went the cheap way.

    NO ONE VOTED, for easy simple and follow the popcorn trail......If any of you voted, please tell me where, because no one else here can find the voting booth.

    VOTED WITH OUR POCKETS ?.....Ha.....MMO players will play anything, it's an addiction.....I have it too.....I've played many garbage mmos to finally realize they SUCK !

     

    There is no way to measure if " Old School " would work because we no longer have a reference......Developers just stopped !

    Whaaaaaaaaaaattttt?????? We're not talking about something that's 100 years old here. There's plenty of reference. In fact, there's plenty of people who have played both old and new school games and, although their opinions may be varied, there are plenty of first-person references, actually. You're acting like there's just no possible way we could compare the two "types" of games because there isn't anything around like them. Meanwhile, there are literally hundreds (maybe thousands) of people on this forum alone who have played a wide assortment of MMORPGs (including old ones). 

     

    As far as voting goes, yes, I did vote. It was actually at E3 2012 and they had a voting booth asking whether or not they should revive "old school" MMORPGs. There was a long line-up, but I guess it didn't go your way. As far as sandbox versus themepark goes, I think that there are definitely opportunities, but I believe that the number of people interested in spending 30 or 40 hours a week in a game world are a fraction or a fraction of 1% of MMORPG gamers. When you make that your target market, you're doomed to fail. 

     

    Crazkanuk

    ----------------
    Azarelos - 90 Hunter - Emerald
    Durnzig - 90 Paladin - Emerald
    Demonicron - 90 Death Knight - Emerald Dream - US
    Tankinpain - 90 Monk - Azjol-Nerub - US
    Brindell - 90 Warrior - Emerald Dream - US
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  • nariusseldonnariusseldon Member EpicPosts: 27,775
    Originally posted by Tasslehoff35
    Yep they just stopped because nobody was playing. Just like some OPs should stop because nobody cares about their ramblings.

    May be someone who cares enough to post and tell him "no one cares" is enough for him.

     

  • Tasslehoff35Tasslehoff35 Member UncommonPosts: 962
    Oh I don't care what he has to say. Just pointing out the obvious.
  • nariusseldonnariusseldon Member EpicPosts: 27,775
    Originally posted by Tasslehoff35
    Oh I don't care what he has to say. Just pointing out the obvious.

    you care enough to post and point out the obvious .. isn't that what he wants.

  • Tasslehoff35Tasslehoff35 Member UncommonPosts: 962
    No he wants (like you) for everyone to agree with him. He (like you) thinks he (like you) is always right an even when he (you) are smacked in face with fact after fact to prove him (you) wrong over and over he (you) continue to plug his (your) ears screaming like a child how he (you) are right and everyone else is wrong.
  • nariusseldonnariusseldon Member EpicPosts: 27,775
    Originally posted by Tasslehoff35
    No he wants (like you) for everyone to agree with him. He (like you) thinks he (like you) is always right an even when he (you) are smacked in face with fact after fact to prove him (you) wrong over and over he (you) continue to plug his (your) ears screaming like a child how he (you) are right and everyone else is wrong.

    lol.. why do you think i want everyone to agree with me?

    If so, you think i will be here .. on the most disagreeing forum on earth?

    and apparently you care enough about what i want to post an comment. Thank you!

  • BladestromBladestrom Member UncommonPosts: 5,001
    ^^ it's a bit like being at a party where everyone is dancing and everyone is having fun, and there is one person who wanders around and around pushing people appart while shouting 'I don't parties i want to be on my own' Funny and hard to ignore :)

    rpg/mmorg history: Dun Darach>Bloodwych>Bards Tale 1-3>Eye of the beholder > Might and Magic 2,3,5 > FFVII> Baldur's Gate 1, 2 > Planescape Torment >Morrowind > WOW > oblivion > LOTR > Guild Wars (1900hrs elementalist) Vanguard. > GW2(1000 elementalist), Wildstar

    Now playing GW2, AOW 3, ESO, LOTR, Elite D

  • DistopiaDistopia Member EpicPosts: 21,183
    Originally posted by delete5230

    I guess this deep in the post it's OK to go off topic, by using SWG, UO or EQ1.

     

    But just remember what the original topic was.

    People seem to reflect back 10 to 15 years ago to discuss a living world given to the players. One that you can play for years because of deep involved things and decisions had to be made.  Some easy content if your not in the mood to play with others on a certain day, and harder stuff when your guild is on.

    How can you measure a game like this when the ONLY way is to refer to something that are so old and involves stick figures, and bad coding.

     

    They just STOPED MAKING THEM, and went the cheap way.

    NO ONE VOTED, for easy simple and follow the popcorn trail......If any of you voted, please tell me where, because no one else here can find the voting booth.

    VOTED WITH OUR POCKETS ?.....Ha.....MMO players will play anything, it's an addiction.....I have it too.....I've played many garbage mmos to finally realize they SUCK !

     

    There is no way to measure if " Old School " would work because we no longer have a reference......Developers just stopped !

    That's not exactly true, EQ and SWG can still be measured against today's games fairly easily. We can't really talk about the latter, however, EQ emu is officially legit now.

    There it is again, "the cheap way", you mean by spending way more money as well as resource? Designing real content, rather than leaving that up to us? Objectivity seems to be lost when it comes to these topics. All the lack of objective reasoning does is weaken the overall argument... it certainly doesn't strengthen it.

    As much as I loved SWG back in the day, that doesn't blind me toward it's shortcomings, which even the lead (Raph) recognizes and outlines for us today.

    A lot of those shortcomings were a result of "going the cheap way"... all of their scrapped plans were a result of having to go the cheap way... Raph has basically said as much on this very forum.

    It actually pains me a bit to constantly have to down my favorite MMO in these threads, however,  that's part of being objective..

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson


  • Tasslehoff35Tasslehoff35 Member UncommonPosts: 962
    Originally posted by Bladestrom
    ^^ it's a bit like being at a party where everyone is dancing and everyone is having fun, and there is one person who wanders around and around pushing people appart while shouting 'I don't parties i want to be on my own' Funny and hard to ignore :)

    Agreed 100%. 

  • jaxomejaxome Member UncommonPosts: 76
    I still think going after a small group of the population and investing the time and money to make a great game for that population would work for a developer assuming they could get the funding and blah blah blah. Single player games still do it, someone figured out how to get money to make a good game without founders packs and cash shops in the past, not sure why we cant today. Eve has been working out for ccp for how long now? I dont understand why everyone is trying to make the next big WoW instead of the next eve online, we have crap loads of Korean imports and cheap f2p titles but we cant get a few AAA titles made for smaller groups of the gaming population?
  • AeliousAelious Member RarePosts: 3,521
    Originally posted by Distopia

    That's not exactly true, EQ and SWG can still be measured against today's games fairly easily. We can't really talk about the latter, however, EQ emu is officially legit now.

     

    The great thing is P1999 runs about 1600+ during the day and DGC now has two new progression servers due to the demand at the same time which is only available to subscribers.  In regards to measuring against today's MMOs there really isn't one that is "new" technologically speaking that is "old school" gameplay wise.  There are a few in the works, which is great, but not currently full release quality.

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