As a gamer, One of my favorite types of games has been the role playing game. Usually set in a fantasy setting, but sometimes in a steampunk or cyberpunk setting, they're often the games with the most involved plots and most detailed characters. Now, I've found myself for the last couple of years gravitating towards a particular type of RPG the mmo. I've tried a number, such as World of Warcraft, Warhammer Online, Neocron, Fallen Earth, even a couple free ones like D&D online and Runes of Magic. As a result of my experience, I've noticed pros and cons about both types of games, the single-player RPG and the multi-player, online MMO. So, first off, let's look at the pros of MMO's.
1. You'll Never Roam Alone. Even if you're solo questing, you can almost always be assured there are other people around if you get in a serious bind. When you have trouble taking on the hordes of zombies or pack of wolves between you and your treasure, you can often ask around and in a few minutes on the outside, find at least one other person who'd be willing to help you out. You also get the chance to meet people and, if you've got a good imagination, develop a unique background for yourself to roleplay with. Guilds, clans, brotherhoods, whatever the particular "group" term for a given MMO might be are often great ways to be able to organize efforts and meet people who can help you and who you can help.
2. Longevity. So you're playing a regular RPG. You've worked long and hard to get your character to where he or she is today. From humble beginnings as a wet-behind-the-ears trainee to a force to be reckoned with, wielding legendary weapons and armor. You face the ultimate evil facing the the kingdom, the country, maybe even an entire planet or several planets and smash him down. And then...you're done. I know nothing's meant to last forever, but sometimes it seems like a waste when after all the time and effort you've put into building up a character, you're done with them and drop them. Even a masterful work of art, once finished, can be admired and put on a mantle or something. Sure some games are worth a second play-through, but it's not quite like re-reading a favorite story; the character your playing is you, essentially. It's not always fun to have to relive all your past experience over again, even if you can change some of it up; it's like having to do the same work twice in a row.
With an MMO, you don't have this problem. After you've built up your character to as close to perfection as you can get him or her, you can then enjoy playing with it whenever you like with end-game content (usually player vs. player) until you decide you're no longer interested in them, not because you've run out of things to do with them. And if the game gets expansion packs, you can enjoy all new content to put them in.
3. There's More To Life Than Just Fighting. With an MMO, there's a good reason to have things to do besides what's known as "Core Combat." With other players around, there's things you can make that will be useful to all, plus you get that warm, fuzzy feeling when people say "thanks" after you give them a healing potion you just made when they were two hitpoints away from death. In a single-player RPG, it's all for your sole benefit, which isn't always a problem, but again, the inevitable conclusion to the game makes you wonder why you bother to do anything that would just put off getting there. With exploration, you satisfy curiosity. With things like crafting or other in-game challenges, it's like stopping the game to play some desktop solitaire or something. I think Yahtzee summed it up best in his review of Fable II when he talked about how dumb it was for the character to have to get a job to earn money rather than just go through the pockets of the 50 bandits he just hacked up; you can, but why would you?
So, those are the big strengths of MMO's. But now lets look at the strengths of the single-player RPG's.
1. You are The Chosen One. Again, borrowing from Yahtzee here, one problem you get with MMO's is the niggling knowledge that you're not the only hero in the land out there trying to save all of creation as we know it. You're one of many, a part of a larger force, and that's not always a bad thing. But at times it can make you feel like you're not doing anything significant when you know you're not the first person to bring down the wizard that's cursed the local forest, but the 56,789th and there are more people in line behind you waiting to do the same thing. With a regular RPG, you are making a difference in the land around you and you can see it.
2. Wait for Meeeeeee! This may just be a personal problem, but I suspect others have probably had this one before, especially those who play World of Warcraft. When you get an MMO that constantly changes, there's often an unspoken feeling that you're falling behind when the next major content-expanding patch or expansion pack is looming on the horizon. You're lvl 20 and have 40 more levels to go before you've reached the highest you can climb...and suddenly you've got six months before the bar is going to be set even higher with all-new areas and enemies and storyline that everybody's going to be involved in, so you better get the lead out. This is especially the case when you've got friends who have gotten higher faster than you have. Also, sometimes content changes cause certain content to be eliminated before you can even get there. This is even more frustrating if you enjoy roleplaying and were counting on getting to do something at some point in your character's storyline.
Single-player RPG's never have this problem. Even if a sequel is coming out, you don't have anybody to compete against in getting through a current game (unless you happen to live with someone who plays the same game and is an incorrigible plot-spoiler). And the content of the game you're playing at the moment will never suddenly change on you and cause you to miss out on something you were waiting to see.
3. Once Upon A Time...Finally, while some MMO's have a deep, rich storyline, not all of them do. But just about every RPG you play will have it's own legends, it's own plot and background. It will have twists and developments and keep you entertained through more than just button-mashing. A lot of MMO's are just really stagnant, coming across as nothing more than big sandbox games without a guiding force behind it other than some arbitrary desire to do things besides stand around and listen to people spam a chat channel. Not only that, but single-player RPG's are the only one of the two that will allow you to play as a key character in the story. All story-related characters in an MMO have to be NPC's.
Now as I said, some MMO's do have plots to them, but often when they do, they run into the problem I mentioned in RPG strength 2; in trying to advance the plot, the developers push the plot ahead too quickly for some people. In a single-player RPG, you have all the time you need to develop character and story because the players are the ones controlling the plot advancement, not the developers.
So, there's my two bits. So is either one better than the other? Personally I think that's hard to say. MMO's don't have nearly the background that RPG's do, so there's been comparatively less experimentation with them. In the end I think the two will continue down the road, side by side, each with its own appeal depending on what the person is looking for.
1. You'll Never Roam Alone. Even if you're solo questing, you can almost always be assured there are other people around if you get in a serious bind. When you have trouble taking on the hordes of zombies or pack of wolves between you and your treasure, you can often ask around and in a few minutes on the outside, find at least one other person who'd be willing to help you out. You also get the chance to meet people and, if you've got a good imagination, develop a unique background for yourself to roleplay with. Guilds, clans, brotherhoods, whatever the particular "group" term for a given MMO might be are often great ways to be able to organize efforts and meet people who can help you and who you can help.
2. Longevity. So you're playing a regular RPG. You've worked long and hard to get your character to where he or she is today. From humble beginnings as a wet-behind-the-ears trainee to a force to be reckoned with, wielding legendary weapons and armor. You face the ultimate evil facing the the kingdom, the country, maybe even an entire planet or several planets and smash him down. And then...you're done. I know nothing's meant to last forever, but sometimes it seems like a waste when after all the time and effort you've put into building up a character, you're done with them and drop them. Even a masterful work of art, once finished, can be admired and put on a mantle or something. Sure some games are worth a second play-through, but it's not quite like re-reading a favorite story; the character your playing is you, essentially. It's not always fun to have to relive all your past experience over again, even if you can change some of it up; it's like having to do the same work twice in a row.
With an MMO, you don't have this problem. After you've built up your character to as close to perfection as you can get him or her, you can then enjoy playing with it whenever you like with end-game content (usually player vs. player) until you decide you're no longer interested in them, not because you've run out of things to do with them. And if the game gets expansion packs, you can enjoy all new content to put them in.
3. There's More To Life Than Just Fighting. With an MMO, there's a good reason to have things to do besides what's known as "Core Combat." With other players around, there's things you can make that will be useful to all, plus you get that warm, fuzzy feeling when people say "thanks" after you give them a healing potion you just made when they were two hitpoints away from death. In a single-player RPG, it's all for your sole benefit, which isn't always a problem, but again, the inevitable conclusion to the game makes you wonder why you bother to do anything that would just put off getting there. With exploration, you satisfy curiosity. With things like crafting or other in-game challenges, it's like stopping the game to play some desktop solitaire or something. I think Yahtzee summed it up best in his review of Fable II when he talked about how dumb it was for the character to have to get a job to earn money rather than just go through the pockets of the 50 bandits he just hacked up; you can, but why would you?
So, those are the big strengths of MMO's. But now lets look at the strengths of the single-player RPG's.
1. You are The Chosen One. Again, borrowing from Yahtzee here, one problem you get with MMO's is the niggling knowledge that you're not the only hero in the land out there trying to save all of creation as we know it. You're one of many, a part of a larger force, and that's not always a bad thing. But at times it can make you feel like you're not doing anything significant when you know you're not the first person to bring down the wizard that's cursed the local forest, but the 56,789th and there are more people in line behind you waiting to do the same thing. With a regular RPG, you are making a difference in the land around you and you can see it.
2. Wait for Meeeeeee! This may just be a personal problem, but I suspect others have probably had this one before, especially those who play World of Warcraft. When you get an MMO that constantly changes, there's often an unspoken feeling that you're falling behind when the next major content-expanding patch or expansion pack is looming on the horizon. You're lvl 20 and have 40 more levels to go before you've reached the highest you can climb...and suddenly you've got six months before the bar is going to be set even higher with all-new areas and enemies and storyline that everybody's going to be involved in, so you better get the lead out. This is especially the case when you've got friends who have gotten higher faster than you have. Also, sometimes content changes cause certain content to be eliminated before you can even get there. This is even more frustrating if you enjoy roleplaying and were counting on getting to do something at some point in your character's storyline.
Single-player RPG's never have this problem. Even if a sequel is coming out, you don't have anybody to compete against in getting through a current game (unless you happen to live with someone who plays the same game and is an incorrigible plot-spoiler). And the content of the game you're playing at the moment will never suddenly change on you and cause you to miss out on something you were waiting to see.
3. Once Upon A Time...Finally, while some MMO's have a deep, rich storyline, not all of them do. But just about every RPG you play will have it's own legends, it's own plot and background. It will have twists and developments and keep you entertained through more than just button-mashing. A lot of MMO's are just really stagnant, coming across as nothing more than big sandbox games without a guiding force behind it other than some arbitrary desire to do things besides stand around and listen to people spam a chat channel. Not only that, but single-player RPG's are the only one of the two that will allow you to play as a key character in the story. All story-related characters in an MMO have to be NPC's.
Now as I said, some MMO's do have plots to them, but often when they do, they run into the problem I mentioned in RPG strength 2; in trying to advance the plot, the developers push the plot ahead too quickly for some people. In a single-player RPG, you have all the time you need to develop character and story because the players are the ones controlling the plot advancement, not the developers.
So, there's my two bits. So is either one better than the other? Personally I think that's hard to say. MMO's don't have nearly the background that RPG's do, so there's been comparatively less experimentation with them. In the end I think the two will continue down the road, side by side, each with its own appeal depending on what the person is looking for.
R? There is no comparing single player RPGS to MMOs. They are completely different. The only thing that puts them together is that you level up in both of them.
