Behind the Grind

[samwise970]

It's not fair to Blizzard to only play a third of the game (actually far less, just a third of the leveling) and dismiss it all as a grind.

Play through the expansions and then the end game content before judging it. WoW is far more than pressing five buttons.

Then it's not fair that they charge me $15 a month for three months before I get to those "fun" parts.

I mean, if it sucks, and you have to do it to get to the good parts, then it SHOULD get mentioned. It's part of the game. Time-wise, it's a big part of the game.

I suppose you're right there, and this is the reason why something like 70% of WoW players never get past level 10.

My point is that since making the original game, Blizzard has really tweaked questing in the expansions, and really improved the grind. It's still there, absolutely, but that is how the game is designed, as EvilDemon mentioned. But things such as heirloom items and badges make endgame grinding and leveling Alts much more fun than ever. I'm leveling a new mage to have him ready for Cataclysm, and I have yet to feel any grind, thanks to heirlooms and my improved knowledge of how to play the game.

Also, you can gain experience from PVP now. Just throwing that out there.

This is the exact reason Blizzard is remaking the 1-60 zones in Cataclysm, and changing how questing works dramatically. Things like phasing (which isn't new but Blizzard acts like they invented it) are really fun and add some to the actual story other than text in quest logs. Drop rates are also being changed (as in removed), which will take out frustrating hours of searching for the illusive boar that actually HAS a liver.

I've read every one of your articles here on the Escapist and feel that I have really similar taste in games. Getting to 80 in WoW took me FOREVER, and the hardest part was getting through the 1-60 content that hasn't seen the improvements in game design that the expansions have. But I feel that if you get through and all the way, you will enjoy the game much more.

I really hope you play Cataclysm, I would love to see what you think of it.

 

[AcacianLeaves]

I've played dozens of MMORPGs since I began with Ultima Online back in 1999. Here are what I've found really reduce the problem of grind in an MMO. It's not really about combat mechanics.

It's all about varied combat situations.[ul]

[li]Have PvP from start to finish and amp up the xp rewards to match monster grinding so I can switch between PvP and PvE for leveling purposes (a la Warhammer Online or Dark Age of Camelot).[/li]

[li]Insert interesting 'boss' encounters throughout the game, not just at the end, and make them a part of regular gameplay instead of exclusive to raids.[/li]

[li]Give monsters AI. ANY AI. Enemies in MMOs almost NEVER have any AI programmed in, especially enemies in the day-to-day grind. Players just stand still and attack because that's all that enemies ever do.[/li]

[li]Stop with the 'go here and kill x of y quests'. Write quests that occasionally ask players to think, or give us something interesting to do other than poorly disguised grind.[/li]

[li]Public Quests are awesome, and every game should have them. They're social, quick, commitment-less fun and I don't know why more games haven't done them. [/li][/ul]

 

[Da Ork]

It's not fair to Blizzard to only play a third of the game (actually far less, just a third of the leveling) and dismiss it all as a grind.

Play through the expansions and then the end game content before judging it. WoW is far more than pressing five buttons.

Then it's not fair that they charge me $15 a month for three months before I get to those "fun" parts.

I mean, if it sucks, and you have to do it to get to the good parts, then it SHOULD get mentioned. It's part of the game. Time-wise, it's a big part of the game.

Thats actually one of the big things there working on with cataclysm is to fix up the 1-60 experience.

Also I liked matrix onlines take with combat...but sadly that died several years back due to many things not the least of which was only selling it in America.

 

[DTWolfwood]

Anyone ever consider just making it so the xp needed to lvl up is scaled more narrowly? or not to make the experience gain gets smaller as u lvl. <.< thats more or less the only reasons i cant see a game through to the end.

The higher the lvl the lower the xp gained per kill, at the same time the amount of xp needed to lvl gets steeper and steeper...that just makes no sense to me. All i want is end game damnit! Make the lvl up your tutorial for how to play your class! cause essentially that is all it is. Once u know how you can bust some serious boss skulls!

STO and Guild Wars did this well. STO you can max out at around 2 weeks, by then you know how to play your character, and they throw you all the cool exciting boss encounters and such. Guild Wars (which i really cant consider an MMO more like Diablo with a chat lobby u can run around in.) u maxed out in a single afternoon! I thought that was FANTASTIC! cause then its all about the challenge of defeating increasingly harder boss mobs.

everyone wants end game action. just not everyone can sit through the "grind"

 

[TheTinyMan]

Just being a little fanboyish, but DDO have an awesome combat system that isn't "stand still and press 1 to 5"

Ironicaly, while WoW is this on leveling and the endgame is a bit more action-related; DDO is agile, and the endgame is "stand still and smack everything as hard as you can". But it deserve a note anyway.

Out of every graphical MMORPG I've played -- which isn't THAT many, just DDO, WoW, and Guild wars -- DDO was definitely my favorite thanks to the fact that combat involved more interactivity than idly pressing the occasional number key. That as it may be, I haven't gotten to max level in any of them other than Guild Wars. Guild Wars 2 has made some bold promises that I'll have to see to believe, though. I quit WoW around level 16 or so because the game was just boring me (although I'm told that the elements that bored me three years ago are largely changed now) and I simply decided that I didn't want to keep paying for DDO around level 12 and couldn't find much in the way of free content.

To anyone who says that I'm not giving those WoW a 'fair shot' - I play games to have fun, not to judge developers. I can tolerate not having fun for minutes, but if I'm not having fun for hours, I'm not going to keep playing. That wouldn't be fair to *me,* and I'm the one coughing up money.

PvP is scripted.

This is one reason that I hate doing anything online. If you don't do things exactly like the wiki says, your performance will usually be less than optimal, and it will definitely incur the derision of people who *are* following a guide.

 

[BloodSquirrel]

In contrast, just about every monster fight in WoW is the same. You click on the dude and then press the number keys until the dude falls over and gives up the XP. Some classes are more interesting than others, but the gameplay isn't really deep or interesting enough to keep you engaged for the long haul up to the level cap.

WoW has made pretty good progress on that front.

First off, WoW's quest-centered leveling adds some variety. The quest design in Outlands and Northrend is also much better than the original 1-60 content, and offers a lot of cool stuff along the way.

They've also got dungeons (with a new dungeon finder system that actually makes getting groups for non-80 dungeons feasible), and I think you can also get exp for pvp now.

They're making an honest effort to add story to the mix, but with limited success. The quest lines are very story-centric, but as a whole WoW's lore has just become too disjointed for it to work. Their attempts to portray Arthas as a big threat have made him look like sort of a joke.

My main character in World of Warcraft is just over level 40 and I've put a little over 120 hours into it.

Really? 120 hours is kind of long for level 40. Especially if you're doing it slowly, since you should pretty much stay in the rest exp.

Then it's not fair that they charge me $15 a month for three months before I get to those "fun" parts.

I mean, if it sucks, and you have to do it to get to the good parts, then it SHOULD get mentioned. It's part of the game. Time-wise, it's a big part of the game.

To be fair- Blizzard isn't solely responsible for how fast you progress. You could get to 58 in a couple of weeks or you could get there over six months. It's not Blizzard's fault if somebody decides to pay to play for 10 hours a month. How much your time is worth to you would be a better metric to judge off of.

With a game as large as WoW and with as many different facets, it's sort of inherent that compromises have to be made to appeal to different people. Some people like leveling. At the current speed of 1-60 (1-58, really) content, there are enough areas to explore, dungeons, professions, and other things to keep most people occupied on their way Outlands.

Of course, there's always the make-things-interesing-your-own-way route. Personally, I think that if you aren't dying a lot, you're not trying to fight enough monsters at once.

 

[ldwater]

Personally I think of 'grinding' as 'Repetition without fun'.

I make this distinction simply because you CAN enjoy something that is repetitive as long as the context is different.

In your example you say that playing TF2 is not griding when your still playing the same game and the same general activities. That is problably because the context changes. You're not playing the same map, you're not playing the same class, playing against the same players, the same actions, weapons, tactics etc etc - by changing smaller elements of the game it keeps it from being repetitive.

Its also less likely to be seen as a grind because its much more intense and 'active' than an MMO game where the pace is generally slower.

As with WoW it can feel like grinding if you're 'purpose' is to level up. After the first time to level 80 any subsequent characters feels like a grind because you're running the same quests in the same areas and even if the class is different you know how its going to end and in the back of your mind you're thinking "I WANT to be cooler than this"

As with anything in life different people like different games. I used to play alot of FPS games until they got really boring and I hated having to group with a bunch of 10 year old idiots who would spawn camp or complain about getting killed. With MMOs you can have fun on your own if you take the game in the right mindset.

At the moment I am playing EVE online and spent most of the 6 months I have played running missions. The act itself is repetitive but I don't consider it a grind because each mission is different and I enjoy the combat element of the game.

Its the same with any game and if you play it enough it'll feel like a grind and you have to manage YOURSELF to keep it from being a grind. If you kill spiders for 20 hours its a grind because YOUR doing it, not because the game WANTS you to. I think alot of people blame the games on being a grind after they've been doing the same thing for too long without looking for something else to do. Obviously if the alternatives are pretty lame then it doesn't help but I don't think that ANY game will have enough content to satisfy every MMO player.

Its the one worry I have with SWTOR: They say its going to be story based; great - but what happens when that story runs out? You can only have so much content until its all used up and with some MMO players maxing out within a day or so its going to be the 'human' content that keeps people interested in MMOs (ie, raids, guilds, groups, corps, events, PvP etc etc)

 

[ldwater]

Also thinking about it its interesting how you say to keep the rewards interesting as I feel that with any game the 'reward' should be the enjoyment from playing the game.

If you feel that enjoyment can only be obtained by getting 'uber phat lewt' then you'll probably feel that the entire game is a grind and that the quests are simply barriers preventing you from obtaining the loot you so rightlfully deserve.

This creates a vicious MMO circle - if you enjoy the content you won't be able to compete in the end game because you won't have the equipment (generally because you've taken the time to enjoy the game rather than rush through). Then you'll have to 'grind' quests & instances in order to get the equipment you need to be able to participate.

If you just want the loot then most of the game will feel like a grind because you have to work your way through the 'meaningless' content just to obtain your gear. Running through these pointless quests over and over would then become a grind.

At the end of the day a grind is what you make of it and everyone needs to play the game the way they want to play it. The grind is a perception of how you play the game rather than the game itself.

 

[Skyy High]

My solution to this has always been the same: flatten the curve, make the increase in effort steady. Not too much, but still. Make it closer to a line, instead of a exponential curve. Sure, it'll take a little longer at first, but near the end you'll shave so much time it's not even funny, while still spending 20 times as much time to get to lvl 50 as you did getting to level 5 (numbers random, point unaffected)

Here's a link to the article More Fun To Compute pulled that graph from:
Progression and Leveling in Guild Wars 2 [http://www.arena.net/blog/progression-and-leveling-in-guild-wars-2]

ArenaNet has made a lot of promises for GW2, and this announcement concerning leveling is the most recent (just last Thursday). Combat has also been promised to be much more active than it was in GW1, and in other MMOs as well. There are active blocking skills (see: the Shield Stance video on the warrior page here [http://www.guildwars2.com/en/the-game/professions/warrior/], Whirling Defense on the ranger page here [http://www.guildwars2.com/en/the-game/professions/ranger/]), position dependent skills (see: the new boomerang Phoenix on the elementalist page here [http://www.guildwars2.com/en/the-game/professions/elementalist/]), dodgeable projectiles, dodges and counters combined with melee attacks (Serpent's Strike on the ranger page), the ability to block projectiles and attacks by simply standing in front of your squishy teammates without any skill usage, and that's just what we've seen so far. Yes, it's still all speculative, but we're going to be seeing the first real player-run demo at gamescon this month, and suffice it to say that the GW community is ecstatic to see what we've been waiting for over three years to see.

 

[oneplus999]

It's not fair to Blizzard to only play a third of the game (actually far less, just a third of the leveling) and dismiss it all as a grind.

Play through the expansions and then the end game content before judging it. WoW is far more than pressing five buttons.

Then it's not fair that they charge me $15 a month for three months before I get to those "fun" parts.

I mean, if it sucks, and you have to do it to get to the good parts, then it SHOULD get mentioned. It's part of the game. Time-wise, it's a big part of the game.

I think this is one of the biggest problems with WoW, and it really makes no sense. WoW is really at least 5 or 6 games in one. There's the raiding, arenas, battlegrounds, crafting, working the Auction House, RP, etc... and to get to any of them on a serious level you first have to play the worst one, the leveling game, for about 6-10 days of gametime. It's like it's the down payment where you say "yes I am serious about playing this character", but it's way overboard and ends up excluding huge numbers of people who might enjoy the later games but never get to see them.

Hopefully you make it through, Shamus! I'd definitely be interested to hear your opinions on the endgame content.

 

[Varewulf]

I enjoy the space combat of STO quite a lot, but unfortunately the ground combat sucks.

 

[Nibelung2]

Out of every graphical MMORPG I've played -- which isn't THAT many, just DDO, WoW, and Guild wars -- DDO was definitely my favorite thanks to the fact that combat involved more interactivity than idly pressing the occasional number key. That as it may be, I haven't gotten to max level in any of them other than Guild Wars. Guild Wars 2 has made some bold promises that I'll have to see to believe, though. I quit WoW around level 16 or so because the game was just boring me (although I'm told that the elements that bored me three years ago are largely changed now) and I simply decided that I didn't want to keep paying for DDO around level 12 and couldn't find much in the way of free content.

Most people will hate me for it, but... you played the good part of DDO. Sure, story-wise, there are great storylines on DDO (Sharn Syndicate, Necropolis 1-4, and the new Phiarlan Carnival packs are GREAT to read and play), but for most content, the only thing good about the paid modules are... exclusive loot. That's all. And after lvl 13, when you start doing gianthold, the game become a big stalling grind.

Some quests on high-level areas are greatly developed, but you need to repeat the same quests so many times to farm for macguffins that you eventually dont care to check how well made those quests are anymore. You just want to reach the chests fast to proceed on the storyline or to craft your new toy.

And that's why, even being a VIP since 06, i never capped a character. I like the fun parts of the game. I play until level 13-15, and then delete and restart. Since the game became free to play, the new packs are great on the low level range (Sharn, Phiarlan, Sentinels), which made me happy.

 

[rembrandtqeinstein]

I hate to praise allods after they brutally murdered their game with the latest patch but they had one thing going for it.

If you killed an enemy with a crit the enemy corpse went flying and slid a bit before standing still. That made really blowing something up or nuking a group with an aoe more satisfying. Also since the whole game was on big floating islands occasionally you could knock an enemy off with a big hit and that would increase the fun.

The WoW (and mmo in general) pve/pvp combat would be vastly improved if every power gave a unique death animation. It would be a lot of work to set up but they could do it gradually one patch at a time.

 

[Larsirius]

Shamus touches on the very thing that has kept me from playing WoW with most of my childhood friends, apart from it being a computer game; the combat. Cooldowns, and just standing still while you repeatedly tap the number keys until your opponent falls over is so boring that I stopped playing after 20 minutes when I tried the game on a friend's account. I don't really get why no MMOs have tried a more sandbox-like approach, like games such as Oblivion, in terms of combat and movement, etc.

 

[majoras incarnation]

Not sure if this has been mentioned; but Nexon's current and upcoming MMOs Mabinogi and Vindictus seem to definitely mix the combat up to be fast paced and interesting;

Mabinogi features a varied combat system with action game elements where every weapon and tactic type can turn into a different game play experience that allows a skilled low level player to take down things far beyond its suggested foes and a poorly played high level to get murdered if not careful, and the "rebirth" system cuts down on grinding significantly

Vindictus on the other hand ditches almost all traditional RPG combat and goes for something that would look more at home in say God of War than World of Warcraft, From the closed beta (I happened to get into it) I can tell that the combat is not only varied and interestingly brutal, but I entirely forget there even ARE level ups to be had many a time, I am too busy enjoying smacking things around and slamming them face first into walls to mind the long "grind" between levels.

Both games are worth checking out if your looking for a solution to repetitive MMO combat, Mabinogi is out and has been for awhile and Vindictus should be available to the rest of the public by the end of the year.