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Where Does the MMO Genre Sit With You? a Column at MMORPG.com

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  • Slapshot1188Slapshot1188 Member LegendaryPosts: 16,985
    I think the genre is "resetting". It really became a hybrid of other games. Those will transition out on their own and I think we will come back to old style MMORPGs at some point.

    All time classic  MY NEW FAVORITE POST!  (Keep laying those bricks)

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  • TheodwulfTheodwulf Member UncommonPosts: 311
    It so bad I don't want their products for FREE. The last game I payed for was SWtOR, at launch + 1 month.
  • VolgoreVolgore Member EpicPosts: 3,872
    Great article.

    I get the feeling that the genre is no longer about delivering the best gaming experience, but in first place about establishing a highly effective monetization model for a low to medium effort product .

    Of course everyone wants to get paid, but looking at some titles it's like there's more effort being put into making money from a product than into the product itself. We've seen some studios/publishers pulling off borderline scams that would have caused an outrage some years ago, but are widely accepted nowadays.
    What was once an all-inklusive experience is now about microtransactions, lockbox gambling and paying to get a game into a playable state in first place (bags, bank space, character slots etc.). We've been the ones playing mmorpgs for so long, now we are more and more being played by mmorpgs.

    Yet the genre is what it is because people still play along and buy these $150 alpha packs and such. So this monster became huge because we fed it and hence we got the genre that we deserve.

    image
  • holdenhamletholdenhamlet Member EpicPosts: 3,772
    edited September 2016
    I agree with this article.

    I too would love to see an MMO that favored group play/cooperation, but I'd settle for just a decent modern MMO because I'm desperate.

    I love MMORPGs, but last year was the first year in over a decade that I didn't play any MMORPG because there wasn't any I found worth playing.

    This year I tried a couple MMOs, and enjoyed them despite them institutionalizing inconvenience to prod me towards the cash shop, but had to leave when they dropped the p2w on us.

    So for me the current state of MMORPGs sucks ass and has for well over a year now.

    As for the future, I think there could be something worth playing next year, "maybe", but maybe not. It's possible at this point that another MMORPG I would enjoy fully will never be made, which is a disappointing prospect because I had enjoyed many MMORPGs for about a decade.

    There's always a chance that something can come out of the blue, and I've been surprised by good MMORPGs coming out of left field in the past (Mark Jacobs' announcement that Camelot Unchained will be subscription makes me hopeful, and I do like him as a Dev and enjoyed Warhammer, so it's possible), but I'm pretty worn out on hope for a good MMORPG.
  • WizardryWizardry Member LegendaryPosts: 19,332
    Well one thing was said correctly.it did start with Wow but NOT because it was such a success,that is just a bunch of rabid followers that made it a success.

    I started playing EQ2 a week or two before Wow launched and just wanted to try both not really knowing anything much about Blizzard or Wow.IDK maybe i was living under a rock since i knew almost nothing about Blizzard.I did try a couple their  games and thought they were rubbish.
    So when i tried Wow i was  like wtf,this is garbage,at that time i considered EQ2 a million times better game...bugs aside because i do not rate games on bugs.If all i cared about was bugs i could play checkers or Chess.

    Anyhow my point is that pretty much starting with Wow the standards took a standstill or even a fall back.Wow was a really cheap looking game and did everything simple with no housing what so ever,just a bunch of yellow markers to follow like some zombie.

    My point is that since that day,a few devs "thought" they could simply copy Wow and strike it rich and many just figured they could do a little worse and still strike it rich.The common theme however was that NOBODY was trying to a better job because 75% of the mmorpg player base had decided that WOW was good enough.
    So then you get a thousand new upstart developers all flooding the market with crap,so to compete in that market they come up with the f2p moniker.So then development hits a new all time low,figuring that since we are letting you somewhat play our game for free you can't complain that our game is actually crap.So then 99% of the devs start making nothing but fast unfinished crap and many of them  sell their game that has yet to be even started and that part i find hilarious.

    long story short,an industry that is full of crap and showing no sign of improving.However rest assured that sooner or later we will have a few devs turn this sinking ship around with quality over f2p gimmicks.

    Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.

  • SEANMCADSEANMCAD Member EpicPosts: 16,775
    Wizardry said:
    Well one thing was said correctly.it did start with Wow but NOT because it was such a success,that is just a bunch of rabid followers that made it a success.

    I started playing EQ2 a week or two before Wow launched and just wanted to try both not really knowing anything much about Blizzard or Wow.IDK maybe i was living under a rock since i knew almost nothing about Blizzard.I did try a couple their  games and thought they were rubbish.
    So when i tried Wow i was  like wtf,this is garbage,at that time i considered EQ2 a million times better game...bugs aside because i do not rate games on bugs.If all i cared about was bugs i could play checkers or Chess.

    Anyhow my point is that pretty much starting with Wow the standards took a standstill or even a fall back.Wow was a really cheap looking game and did everything simple with no housing what so ever,just a bunch of yellow markers to follow like some zombie.

    My point is that since that day,a few devs "thought" they could simply copy Wow and strike it rich and many just figured they could do a little worse and still strike it rich.The common theme however was that NOBODY was trying to a better job because 75% of the mmorpg player base had decided that WOW was good enough.
    So then you get a thousand new upstart developers all flooding the market with crap,so to compete in that market they come up with the f2p moniker.So then development hits a new all time low,figuring that since we are letting you somewhat play our game for free you can't complain that our game is actually crap.So then 99% of the devs start making nothing but fast unfinished crap and many of them  sell their game that has yet to be even started and that part i find hilarious.

    long story short,an industry that is full of crap and showing no sign of improving.However rest assured that sooner or later we will have a few devs turn this sinking ship around with quality over f2p gimmicks.
    basically I have a similar story. I selected EQ2 because to me WoW looked like a childs cartoon. I had a friend who played WoW and we had that conversation which led to him saying the main attraction is PvP

    Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.

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  • mmoguy43mmoguy43 Member UncommonPosts: 2,770
    SEANMCAD said:
    mmoguy43 said:
    As much good as it was that the decade of WoW copying came to a close, there still isn't enough support behind Indy MMO devs. Many of the early ones have failed to deliver and I'm concerned that based on the heavy disinterest of KS and all other crowdfunding that the window for Indy MMOs is quickly closing. The costs and expectations for games in general is exploding to the point that even AAA-studios can't keep up or manage player's demands.

    The mindset of player's has also changed so much since the old days of MMOs designed with social and cooperative play that I don't know if we can ever get back to that, regardless of the game. I'd love to be wrong but I'm still playing so many other non-MMOs to get better multiplayer based gameplay or SP RPGS games instead of MMORPGs.

    I, and maybe developers too, feel like what's the point of massively multiplayer anything? How much better is a game with 50-500 players in the same place you are? How can you justify having so many players at once vs a better game experience with less? The old times of thinking "wouldn't it be cool if x game was an MMO?" are over.

    honestly I think any indie developer would instead do what Life is Feudal and others have done.

    private servers and/or singleplayer
    Far too many indies are making generic survival copies mainly for profit rather than for improving that genre. Kind of like what happened with MMORPGs.
  • SEANMCADSEANMCAD Member EpicPosts: 16,775
    mmoguy43 said:
    SEANMCAD said:
    mmoguy43 said:
    As much good as it was that the decade of WoW copying came to a close, there still isn't enough support behind Indy MMO devs. Many of the early ones have failed to deliver and I'm concerned that based on the heavy disinterest of KS and all other crowdfunding that the window for Indy MMOs is quickly closing. The costs and expectations for games in general is exploding to the point that even AAA-studios can't keep up or manage player's demands.

    The mindset of player's has also changed so much since the old days of MMOs designed with social and cooperative play that I don't know if we can ever get back to that, regardless of the game. I'd love to be wrong but I'm still playing so many other non-MMOs to get better multiplayer based gameplay or SP RPGS games instead of MMORPGs.

    I, and maybe developers too, feel like what's the point of massively multiplayer anything? How much better is a game with 50-500 players in the same place you are? How can you justify having so many players at once vs a better game experience with less? The old times of thinking "wouldn't it be cool if x game was an MMO?" are over.

    honestly I think any indie developer would instead do what Life is Feudal and others have done.

    private servers and/or singleplayer
    Far too many indies are making generic survival copies mainly for profit rather than for improving that genre. Kind of like what happened with MMORPGs.
    however nearly all of them are about 100x better than AAA titles in both the single player and MMO market. 

    Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.

    Please do not respond to me

  • KyleranKyleran Member LegendaryPosts: 43,507
    The genre "evolved" into a playstyle I dont care for but lately some newer ones such as Albion Online have caught my interest.

    "True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde 

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    Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm

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  • laseritlaserit Member LegendaryPosts: 7,591
    SEANMCAD said:
    mmoguy43 said:
    SEANMCAD said:
    mmoguy43 said:
    As much good as it was that the decade of WoW copying came to a close, there still isn't enough support behind Indy MMO devs. Many of the early ones have failed to deliver and I'm concerned that based on the heavy disinterest of KS and all other crowdfunding that the window for Indy MMOs is quickly closing. The costs and expectations for games in general is exploding to the point that even AAA-studios can't keep up or manage player's demands.

    The mindset of player's has also changed so much since the old days of MMOs designed with social and cooperative play that I don't know if we can ever get back to that, regardless of the game. I'd love to be wrong but I'm still playing so many other non-MMOs to get better multiplayer based gameplay or SP RPGS games instead of MMORPGs.

    I, and maybe developers too, feel like what's the point of massively multiplayer anything? How much better is a game with 50-500 players in the same place you are? How can you justify having so many players at once vs a better game experience with less? The old times of thinking "wouldn't it be cool if x game was an MMO?" are over.

    honestly I think any indie developer would instead do what Life is Feudal and others have done.

    private servers and/or singleplayer
    Far too many indies are making generic survival copies mainly for profit rather than for improving that genre. Kind of like what happened with MMORPGs.
    however nearly all of them are about 100x better than AAA titles in both the single player and MMO market. 
    Better than porn in VR?

    "Be water my friend" - Bruce Lee

  • TheocritusTheocritus Member LegendaryPosts: 9,754
    Since WoW came on the scene in 2004 I have had a hard time finding the kind of game I liked.....It changed pretty radically and I didnt like the massive WoW clones that came on afterward....Basically my hope is that the next group of games starts to get away from the WoW playstyle and maybe starts to create some good virtual worlds for us to play in.
  • waynejr2waynejr2 Member EpicPosts: 7,769
    laserit said:
    SEANMCAD said:
    mmoguy43 said:
    SEANMCAD said:
    mmoguy43 said:
    As much good as it was that the decade of WoW copying came to a close, there still isn't enough support behind Indy MMO devs. Many of the early ones have failed to deliver and I'm concerned that based on the heavy disinterest of KS and all other crowdfunding that the window for Indy MMOs is quickly closing. The costs and expectations for games in general is exploding to the point that even AAA-studios can't keep up or manage player's demands.

    The mindset of player's has also changed so much since the old days of MMOs designed with social and cooperative play that I don't know if we can ever get back to that, regardless of the game. I'd love to be wrong but I'm still playing so many other non-MMOs to get better multiplayer based gameplay or SP RPGS games instead of MMORPGs.

    I, and maybe developers too, feel like what's the point of massively multiplayer anything? How much better is a game with 50-500 players in the same place you are? How can you justify having so many players at once vs a better game experience with less? The old times of thinking "wouldn't it be cool if x game was an MMO?" are over.

    honestly I think any indie developer would instead do what Life is Feudal and others have done.

    private servers and/or singleplayer
    Far too many indies are making generic survival copies mainly for profit rather than for improving that genre. Kind of like what happened with MMORPGs.
    however nearly all of them are about 100x better than AAA titles in both the single player and MMO market. 
    Better than porn in VR?

    Is isn't the porn in VR per se, but those unwanted surprise porn ads for porn you would never want to see. 
    http://www.youhaventlived.com/qblog/2010/QBlog190810A.html  

    Epic Music:   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAigCvelkhQ&list=PLo9FRw1AkDuQLEz7Gvvaz3ideB2NpFtT1

    https://archive.org/details/softwarelibrary_msdos?&sort=-downloads&page=1

    Kyleran:  "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience because it lacks a few features you prefer."

    John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."

    FreddyNoNose:  "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."

    LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you playing an MMORPG?"




  • SEANMCADSEANMCAD Member EpicPosts: 16,775
    waynejr2 said:
    laserit said:
    SEANMCAD said:
    mmoguy43 said:
    SEANMCAD said:
    mmoguy43 said:
    As much good as it was that the decade of WoW copying came to a close, there still isn't enough support behind Indy MMO devs. Many of the early ones have failed to deliver and I'm concerned that based on the heavy disinterest of KS and all other crowdfunding that the window for Indy MMOs is quickly closing. The costs and expectations for games in general is exploding to the point that even AAA-studios can't keep up or manage player's demands.

    The mindset of player's has also changed so much since the old days of MMOs designed with social and cooperative play that I don't know if we can ever get back to that, regardless of the game. I'd love to be wrong but I'm still playing so many other non-MMOs to get better multiplayer based gameplay or SP RPGS games instead of MMORPGs.

    I, and maybe developers too, feel like what's the point of massively multiplayer anything? How much better is a game with 50-500 players in the same place you are? How can you justify having so many players at once vs a better game experience with less? The old times of thinking "wouldn't it be cool if x game was an MMO?" are over.

    honestly I think any indie developer would instead do what Life is Feudal and others have done.

    private servers and/or singleplayer
    Far too many indies are making generic survival copies mainly for profit rather than for improving that genre. Kind of like what happened with MMORPGs.
    however nearly all of them are about 100x better than AAA titles in both the single player and MMO market. 
    Better than porn in VR?

    Is isn't the porn in VR per se, but those unwanted surprise porn ads for porn you would never want to see. 
    I have about 200gb of VR porn. Yes...yes in fucking deed

    Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.

    Please do not respond to me

  • ApexTKMApexTKM Member UncommonPosts: 334
    the lack of AAA title mmos is a good thing. The MMO genre for me is not sitting at a priority for me gaming wise because what it use to be just isn't there anymore. MMOs don't feel like a big deal anymore imo which is a problem. Its the equivalent of playing sports video game exhibition matches or whatever, over time thats what it eventually feels like or a team season's worth of gameplay. The genre just doesn't feel special anymore so I don't really bother with it as much as I use to.
    The acronym MMORPG use to mean Massive Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game.

    But the acronym MMMORPG now currently means Microscopic Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game. Kappa.
  • kjempffkjempff Member RarePosts: 1,759
    The genre has experienced a hostile takeover, and the new owners have deconstructed it and discontinued the unprofitable parts. Taking the remaining parts and assembled them into a new genre, but didn't change the name because of the brand recognition. This new genre is doing well with a their new consumer demographic, and this is where AAA games will continue.

    What used to be mmorpg is now sprouting as indie games, which will re-form the original mmorpg ideas and in time evolve from there, eventually continuing what the hopes were for mmorpgs pre wow.
    We need a new name for these games to differentiate them from what is now known as mmo.
  • DeserttFoxxDeserttFoxx Member UncommonPosts: 2,402
    Every MMO in the last 5 years has been a straight up cash grab. Nobody is making games out of passion, everyone is making games like they are fishing for the next - get rich quick- game release.

    Unless they go back to the days of everquest, where they wanted a living breathing world you wanted players to come home from work and start their second life within, the genre will stay on this stead road of shallow mechanics and cash shop cash grabs.

    Quotations Those Who make peaceful resolutions impossible, make violent resolutions inevitable. John F. Kennedy

    Life... is the shit that happens while you wait for moments that never come - Lester Freeman

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  • DuvarisDuvaris Member UncommonPosts: 127
    Haven't been able to get into any MMO since SWTOR came out. I only played that enough to get one character to max. Haven't played WoW since Burning Crusade. Did get back into EQ2 for a month or 2. They just don't seem to grab me like they used to. Nothing has ever compared to EQ1 back in the day. Great times.
  • waynejr2waynejr2 Member EpicPosts: 7,769
    Every MMO in the last 5 years has been a straight up cash grab. Nobody is making games out of passion, everyone is making games like they are fishing for the next - get rich quick- game release.

    Unless they go back to the days of everquest, where they wanted a living breathing world you wanted players to come home from work and start their second life within, the genre will stay on this stead road of shallow mechanics and cash shop cash grabs.

    I personally would love a world but I don't believe even many of the people around here much less the masses want that.
    http://www.youhaventlived.com/qblog/2010/QBlog190810A.html  

    Epic Music:   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAigCvelkhQ&list=PLo9FRw1AkDuQLEz7Gvvaz3ideB2NpFtT1

    https://archive.org/details/softwarelibrary_msdos?&sort=-downloads&page=1

    Kyleran:  "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience because it lacks a few features you prefer."

    John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."

    FreddyNoNose:  "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."

    LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you playing an MMORPG?"




  • ApexTKMApexTKM Member UncommonPosts: 334
    kjempff said:

    What used to be mmorpg is now sprouting as indie games, which will re-form the original mmorpg ideas and in time evolve from there, eventually continuing what the hopes were for mmorpgs pre wow.
    We need a new name for these games to differentiate them from what is now known as mmo.
    IMO, pre-WoW is more deserving of the mmo title. The Massive part is taken away once you put WoW into the equation, thats my POV though.
    The acronym MMORPG use to mean Massive Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game.

    But the acronym MMMORPG now currently means Microscopic Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game. Kappa.
  • AlbatroesAlbatroes Member LegendaryPosts: 7,671
    edited September 2016
    The future of the genre is honestly bleak. The reality of this genre is that many people who did get into it 10+ years ago honestly didn't have much choice in what they wanted to play. Now, you have new mmos in general coming out at least each week. For a genre that was never that big to begin with in terms of entertainment venues, the further division of an already low population genre only makes it harder for many people to find long term enjoy as was once found. More importantly, the less people there are to stick to a game within the genre only increases the likelihood of that game shutting down regardless of its quality, which is an increasingly subjective matter as time goes on.
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  • TalonsinTalonsin Member EpicPosts: 3,619
    The problem with us old timers is that we were around when MMO's gave you everything.  We saw:

    - Fully customizable housing
    - Place-able vendors to sell your stuff
    - Crafting that was unique to the person doing it
    - Not being able to tell what class your opponent was by his armor
    - Having classless, fully customizable characters that only had the skills you wanted to train

    We got all that for our monthly sub fee.  In todays world, you get almost none of that for your sub fee PLUS you will feel compelled to spend even more in the cash shops.
    "Sean (Murray) saying MP will be in the game is not remotely close to evidence that at the point of purchase people thought there was MP in the game."  - SEANMCAD

  • aCi11i3saCi11i3s Member UncommonPosts: 54
    Unfortunately, the original success of WoW ruined what could of been great experiences in many other games. These companies saw the dollar signs and pushed out content too early &/or created game killing patches full of loot boxes and ptw content. The companies creating these games are just that; companies. Driven to profits and tailoring games for the masses to draw players. You cant make a mmo too hard core anymore as the risk is too high for the developer's budget. WoW just got it right first and was able to reap the profits. I hope the genre isnt dead, but I get more skeptical every time I try a new one. BDO, Neverwinter, Rift, SWTOR, GW2, and ESO...Im talking to you. I had such high hopes for all of these games, only to be eventually disappointed. For now Ill just stay in Azeroth where at least I know what Im getting...good or bad. Zug zug :)
  • GruugGruug Member RarePosts: 1,791
    There are a lot of MMO's out there but none of them really excites me. My primary problem with most of them is the so called "f2p" marketing of many and the item shops. Both have become items of contention to me. While there are a few that have launched as non-f2p, they all seem to succumb to that "fast money" alure in time. I have recently looked at a couple of MMO's but again, have just felt that there is no point to even trying them as they are sure to disappoint. So, for now, I am MMO-less.

    Let's party like it is 1863!

  • AnnwynAnnwyn Member UncommonPosts: 2,854
    The MMO genre is my favorite genre out there, but it's also the one I dislike playing the most these days, and yet every once in a while I go back to playing one because I miss it. I love being part of a living, breathing world with people running around, banding together, etc. Sadly, the "biggest" innovation the genre has managed to bring over the years was "Dynamic events". Don't get me wrong, they're nice to have as they offer another alternative to character progression, but just like questing, they suffer from the same disease: a repetition of all the quests/events that came before hit (kill 10 rats, pick up 10 boxes of tools, talk to npc1, npc2, npc3 and come back).

    What's great about single player games compared to MMORPGs, is that since the story is always progressing, the single player game doesn't have to worry about giving you a list of repetitive tasks at every stage of the story to level up your character or to slow down your progress, instead your characters improves naturally throughout the course of your story. Of course you will still do some quests that will follow similar patterns, but not to the same extent as an MMORPG.

    For example in a game like Skyrim, it's true that most of the quest are very similar (clear that dungeon, collect that item, etc), but for the story to progress, whether it's the main or the side storyline (like the Dark Brotherhood), your progression along that story is not halted at every step by requiring you to complete 10 different unrelated quests. Sometimes you'll have 1-3 missions in-between story quests, but they're still relevant to that story. Yes, you might have to kill 3 NPCs for the Dark Brotherhood before you can move on to your next story assignment, but it's still Dark Brotherhood-relevant content.

    Look at MMORPGs on the other hand, and whether you're level 1 or level 70, you're still collecting pumpkins and defending crops for some farmers. You enter a new village to be given 10 different quests with maybe one or two that are "relevant" with 'some' kind of story about the area you're in, but the rest is just the same 2-3 quest types (kill, fetch, go to) over and over again, and when you're done you receive a quest that will send you to the next town to repeat that process once more. The genre has grown stagnant and developers lazy. It is not "dying" as it is showing no signs that it is about to disappear, but from personal experiences I'm having a lot more trouble finding communities that plays MMORPGs as opposed to other genre these days. I don't see the genre experiencing a rebirth anytime soon at the very least, but the day a solid VR MMORPG comes out, perhaps things will begin to change. Until then...well I've got 10 more rats to kill.
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