The Deal with MMORPG's

Comocat

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Most stories in most video games are crap, so trying to argue that one genre's flavor of shit is better than another one, is kind of ridiculous IMO. I like MMOs because I enjoy running dungeons and interacting with other people. I like logging in to LotRO at 9 pm, seeing my friends, then running some dungeons or quests for a couple hours. I dont see why this is any more ridiculous than killing scrubs in a FPS or pretending to be a space captain saving the universe from sentient robots.
 

Ipsen

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Mylinkay Asdara said:
I realize that's not typical, but that's my best answer / suggestion to your feelings: find a different priority than the gear collection the game offers you - there's plenty of other stuff in those games to do and if you find like minded folks to go off the beaten path with you can enjoy years of gameplay without feeling like you're trapped by the "getting gear to get better gear to get better gear" syndrome.
I second this.

The problem I see with MMORPGs, however, is that the interface hogs your attention and impression on game mechanics.

I could believe MMORPGs are more than their combat systems, or skinner box reward progressions; I've had similar experiences of building guilds, and hanging out, leveling with, crafting with, sacrificing experience for them as well. MMORPGs I find can be one of the best ways for gamers to click with each other....when everything works.

But what I find I have to get past in order to even start to experience this is often what we consider the game itself. Look at a typical MMORPG's chatbox and crafting systems, for two of the biggest examples. Crafting systems usually end up being some sort of inventory alchemy (complete with menu drag and drop mechanics; wheeeeee!). While crafting systems can change from game to game, they largely haven't changed in how they're experienced (at least, to my experience) . And chatboxes? You know, the primary (not necessarily best, as evidenced by the rise of ventrilo/mumble/teamspeak) method of communication? I haven't seen that change significantly since I've started MMORPG's over a decade ago.

The big 'setpiece', if you will, always tends to be the combat. Which is fine and fun, but you get the more negative impressions that are in this thread now; the dominant 'grind until endgame' mentality. MMORPGs like Guild Wars 2 have tried to change up the formula, but MMORPGs need both fun activities outside of combat (including its typical interface) and engaging communication methods.

Anything better than another damn chatbox. ><
 

Ulquiorra4sama

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I don't remember my exact reason for ever downloading Neverwinter, but it was there in my Steam library. Had no playtime on it until recently when my roommate decided to download it as well.

You see, i've never been a huge fan of MMOs specifically because of the grind, piss-poor dialogue and unoriginal stories, but after actually joining a party and having someone to talk to and interact with during the game it because a lot more interesting. So apart from the social aspect i don't think i could think of a good reason to play MMOs either.
 

Verlander

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At the core of most games, MMORPG or not, is a simple mechanic. MMORPG's appeal or repulse for the same reason - the balance between action and reward. Some people love the ratio, some hate it.

I reckon that there's a future for new, groundbreaking MMORPGs, but it's a long way off.
 

The White Hunter

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I've just got into FFXIV, as my first MMO, part of why it's been so fun has been playing with @TizzyTheTormentor: and @Staika: , otherwise the gamneplay amuses me and I enjoy the world a lot.

I'm fine with it being a drip feed of content as you grind along (thus far it's really not that grindy, I've played grindier JRPG's). And as an "explorer" type gamer, I love just wandering around fighting monsters and finding new things.

As for free companies I plan to start one when I hit 25 and get the requisite fee together.
 

masticina

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Mmm MMO's there re cons and pros

What I like about MMO is at least in a few, the social aspect having to work together. Not everybody can do everything. This seems broken in TESO as in that so far the beta go one person can do it all. Mmm really? Isn't the whole idea that one would be a tank, another would be a healer, another magical damage etc..

But what I dislike, it is such a timesink and it just feels meh. I gain more from short singleplayer games with a decent story then that I get from 100 hours of WoW.

Because yes the game is no that long but the story was awesome!

And the social constraints don't pull me in either. A person in many MMO's can be easily replaced by a Macro 2..1...1...2...1...1...2....1...1..2.

But yeah that is MMO's

Lastly downloaded that WoW again. Mmm playing the free version and eh no I don't feel any need to stick around there. If a WoD MMO comes it probably falters because lets be fair WoD is more about stories then about "Kill x y's"
 

raichu845

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masticina said:
Mmm MMO's there re cons and pros

What I like about MMO is at least in a few, the social aspect having to work together. Not everybody can do everything. This seems broken in TESO as in that so far the beta go one person can do it all. Mmm really? Isn't the whole idea that one would be a tank, another would be a healer, another magical damage etc..

But what I dislike, it is such a timesink and it just feels meh. I gain more from short singleplayer games with a decent story then that I get from 100 hours of WoW.

Because yes the game is no that long but the story was awesome!

And the social constraints don't pull me in either. A person in many MMO's can be easily replaced by a Macro 2..1...1...2...1...1...2....1...1..2.

But yeah that is MMO's

Lastly downloaded that WoW again. Mmm playing the free version and eh no I don't feel any need to stick around there. If a WoD MMO comes it probably falters because lets be fair WoD is more about stories then about "Kill x y's"
An MMO which focuses more on story which is pretty good is Guild Wars (the first one). It had a nice system and a decent story that you can just play through alone/with friends and then you can either drop the game once you finished the story or continue farming for the collectibles. Then again I've always seen Guild Wars focus more on PvP over PvE
 

Mylinkay Asdara

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Ipsen said:
And chatboxes? You know, the primary (not necessarily best, as evidenced by the rise of ventrilo/mumble/teamspeak) method of communication? I haven't seen that change significantly since I've started MMORPG's over a decade ago.

The big 'setpiece', if you will, always tends to be the combat. Which is fine and fun, but you get the more negative impressions that are in this thread now; the dominant 'grind until endgame' mentality. MMORPGs like Guild Wars 2 have tried to change up the formula, but MMORPGs need both fun activities outside of combat (including its typical interface) and engaging communication methods.

Anything better than another damn chatbox. ><
See, that's where I have to disagree - I prefer a typed text exchange to voiced by FAR. It's less personal, maybe, and I did end up on the phone with my guild mates rather often to discuss complex/deep/involved issues when they arose, but all the voices going all the time at once in the game is not good for me. Too much talking over each other and too much background interference and - well just too much all around. In the game, I like the chat box. It keeps people to saying things they feel are worth the effort to type rather than just mouth-spew all the time (which is what I've encountered from any and all multiplayer games with Voice running at all times). Sure - you get some annoying abbreviations and weird emoticons, but on the whole I much prefer to deal in typed text with any party larger than 3 - even when I'm just online to chat with friends in Google Chat, I won't do video with more than 2 of them at once or nothing gets done / one person dominates the sound waves.

Of course, to each their own - plenty of people in the games with text use those additional voice things like Ventrillo or whatever the cool kids are doing these days. The thing is, since those things exist to add on, I hope games keep giving us the chat boxes (for those who like the quiet).
 

RandV80

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Ratty said:
"Oh brave warrior! Thank heavens you're here! Go kill 12 gerbils and report back to me!"
"Oh brave warrior! Thank heavens you're here! Go kill 8 wolves and report back to me!"
"Oh brave warrior! Thank heavens you're here! Go kill 26 troglodytes and report back to me!"
"Oh brave warrior! Thank heavens you're here..."

Never found the gameplay rewarding myself, and I'm the kind of guy who can enjoy spacing out while grinding up levels in an old school jRPG. The difference being when I grind in a single-player RPG it feels like it's building to something. Another part of the story or a boss I can go fight, not just more grinding.

PS- http://www.cracked.com/article_18461_5-creepy-ways-video-games-are-trying-to-get-you-addicted.html
Same here, with a single player RPG while it's sort of the same thing there's it's structured differently and there's a clear end game. FFXII was supposed to be 'MMO'-like, and I was fine with it. So then I never played FFXI but had the opportunity to get in on the Beta and first month of FFXIV for $10 and was hoping for something similar except with other people playing. Man was I ever wrong there.

Now in FFXII, you are given a story related task. To accomplish this task usually involves traveling through 2-3 lengthy new zones, where you are challenged by progressively harder enemies. If you want you can take your time and explore, finding the sidequest 'hunts' the game offers, so that each story segment can take a few hours to finish. Yes it was grindy but that kind of challenge and exploration can be fun because it's basically a journey. I haven't played Guild Wars 2 so I can't comment on it, but the first Guild Wars was like this as well.

Now FFXIV? When you first start the game everything seems fine, but as I started approaching level 30 the wheels started to fall off. At first the game seems pretty big, but eventually you start to realize that it's basically 3 cities that each have only 3(?) zones. Now they can be large zones, but the point I'm getting at is they can have level 40 content separated from level 5 content with a simple bridge. By the time you get to level 40 you're not going to be going anywhere new, but rather you will be getting your quest to kill X amount of creatures, or to go see NPC Y who will send you out to kill X amount of creatures, teleport to the nearest crystal, spend a minute or two walking through the lower level content to get to your own level content, and proceed to grind.

So basically for some reason they streamlined out the 'journey' part and all that's left is the grind. Is that really what MMO players want? I mean I can see that in many ways FFXIV: A Realm Reborn is a very well put together game, but I just can't fathom how they thought this was a good way to design the maps and story quests. FFXII would be a horrible game if it was designed the same way.
 

Shadeovblack

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Everyone says they're waiting on that one great MMO that takes what MMO's have and does something great with it. But it's to late, it was City of Heroes, and now it's gone.
 

Rob Robson

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Illesdan said:
I hope you are a patient man, my friend, because the World of Darkness MMO is looking at a 2015 launch date.
I am extremely patient. That aside, I still got all the alphas and betas of Star Citizen to attend, and there's never a shortage of other games coming out. Just the MMO side of things has dried up.

Also, I know I personally will be playing WoD sooner than that :>
 

Mylinkay Asdara

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RandV80 said:
Same here, with a single player RPG while it's sort of the same thing there's it's structured differently and there's a clear end game. FFXII was supposed to be 'MMO'-like, and I was fine with it. So then I never played FFXI but had the opportunity to get in on the Beta and first month of FFXIV for $10 and was hoping for something similar except with other people playing. Man was I ever wrong there.

Now in FFXII, you are given a story related task. To accomplish this task usually involves traveling through 2-3 lengthy new zones, where you are challenged by progressively harder enemies. If you want you can take your time and explore, finding the sidequest 'hunts' the game offers, so that each story segment can take a few hours to finish. Yes it was grindy but that kind of challenge and exploration can be fun because it's basically a journey. I haven't played Guild Wars 2 so I can't comment on it, but the first Guild Wars was like this as well.

Now FFXIV? When you first start the game everything seems fine, but as I started approaching level 30 the wheels started to fall off. At first the game seems pretty big, but eventually you start to realize that it's basically 3 cities that each have only 3(?) zones. Now they can be large zones, but the point I'm getting at is they can have level 40 content separated from level 5 content with a simple bridge. By the time you get to level 40 you're not going to be going anywhere new, but rather you will be getting your quest to kill X amount of creatures, or to go see NPC Y who will send you out to kill X amount of creatures, teleport to the nearest crystal, spend a minute or two walking through the lower level content to get to your own level content, and proceed to grind.

So basically for some reason they streamlined out the 'journey' part and all that's left is the grind. Is that really what MMO players want? I mean I can see that in many ways FFXIV: A Realm Reborn is a very well put together game, but I just can't fathom how they thought this was a good way to design the maps and story quests. FFXII would be a horrible game if it was designed the same way.
Funnily enough I was just talking about this with a friend the other day. Now - full disclosure - I did not care for XII. I was playing XI online at the time and XII seemed to me to be an empty shell without the other people, the more so for that very reason. In XII it's just you, so there has to be a lot of story or what's engaging you - in XI it's the other people around who are supposed to supplement the slimmer story engagement (which has to be slimmer, by nature, because there are thousands of players - you can't ALL be the chosen one who has the great impact on the world you do in a single player).

The lack of content separation is intended to foster cooperation and mentoring between high and low level characters as a social dynamic - you aren't going to be doing that if you don't encounter each other because you are separated by vast distances and goals. Also - as happened with XI - as the game progresses, more content will be added to XIV that will put more distance between truly "upper level" players and "starting players" and it won't be in the cities, usually referred to as "end game content." When things are very far away from each other in MMOs, players tend to complain about the travel time impeding their playtime with others. I remember having to walk or ride through several zones before getting somewhere in XI before they added a bazzillion and five ways to teleport everywhere in the game's later life - and if you died with your people they were waiting on you for 40 minutes to get back - that's not a positive generally speaking.

Yes, single play does suffer, but the structure is designed to facilitate group play over single play over all.
 

Ipsen

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Mylinkay Asdara said:
See, that's where I have to disagree - I prefer a typed text exchange to voiced by FAR. It's less personal, maybe, and I did end up on the phone with my guild mates rather often to discuss complex/deep/involved issues when they arose, but all the voices going all the time at once in the game is not good for me. Too much talking over each other and too much background interference and - well just too much all around. In the game, I like the chat box. It keeps people to saying things they feel are worth the effort to type rather than just mouth-spew all the time (which is what I've encountered from any and all multiplayer games with Voice running at all times). Sure - you get some annoying abbreviations and weird emoticons, but on the whole I much prefer to deal in typed text with any party larger than 3 - even when I'm just online to chat with friends in Google Chat, I won't do video with more than 2 of them at once or nothing gets done / one person dominates the sound waves.

Of course, to each their own - plenty of people in the games with text use those additional voice things like Ventrillo or whatever the cool kids are doing these days. The thing is, since those things exist to add on, I hope games keep giving us the chat boxes (for those who like the quiet).
That's fair; I shouldn't bash chatboxes so hard. I pick on them because it's an old fixture that could be improved upon to expand these games and the communication that is necessary for both fun and organization, but it's usually left to just being a chatbox... Plus, when servers get busy, and you need to use the more populated chats, it's near impossible to get a message across.

I just end up wishing that some of the innovation coming from more recent MMO's went into other parts that actually make MMO's important. For having so many people in one place, the only thing around there seems to do is fight something. One of the most engaging mechanics I've experienced in, well, gaming overall was a very liberal bulletin board system in an old MMORPG that allowed anything from a mail system to puzzle games and even story contests for the community. It served as not only a distraction from the combat of the game itself, but also a way for all of these people online to come together in a different way; it tends to make a more fleshed out world when you want to pay attention to other people. For all the fun a title like, say, Guild Wars 2 is to fight in, it's still a dreadfully lonely place without a guild you clique with (and even then, all guild activities are combat oriented).

But I tend to do dream alot...
Shadeovblack said:
Everyone says they're waiting on that one great MMO that takes what MMO's have and does something great with it.
Thanks for the wake-up, dude.
 

dyre

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Well, on rare occasions the journey is the reward. If an MMO can provide enjoyable gameplay, good storytelling, etc on the path to endgame content, then it's worth playing for the pure enjoyment of it. Sadly most MMOs seem to be all about "do boring grindy shit until endgame, then do more boring grindy shit, but with more people and better gear."
Rob Robson said:
The closest I've been to MMO heaven was The Secret World. It is the only game to bring a quality story and character writing to the MMO space, (no SW:ToR did not do this) but it had other lacking aspects, mostly PvP wasn't good enough for me. I still play it though.
+1, TSW is a wonderful MMO. I've never seen such dedication to making good character, dialogue, and world building. Not to mention some great dungeons (albeit not many in number). Also, did you know a lot of the Transylvania quests are actually based on Eastern European mythology?

Haven't played it yet, but FFXIV seems to have the same sort of tactical boss fights requiring good team micromanagement. Though it'll be a pain to transition from Lovecraftian/Egyptian/Eastern European myth to some generic JRPG setting.
 

masticina

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raichu845 said:
An MMO which focuses more on story which is pretty good is Guild Wars (the first one). It had a nice system and a decent story that you can just play through alone/with friends and then you can either drop the game once you finished the story or continue farming for the collectibles. Then again I've always seen Guild Wars focus more on PvP over PvE
Ah yes guildwars, quite a different story it felt pretty good when I played it. And it was pretty fun at it to :)
 

mezorin

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WildFire15 said:
I tend to role play in MMOs as I always find the creation and interaction of characters more interesting then the game itself. City of Heroes, the game that got me into MMOs and still stands as the best one I've played, had fantastic story as well as millions of character options (and never truly penalised a 'bad build') and encouraged multiple characters. I ended up with about 57 characters when the game was shut down, about 15 of which were at the max level of 50 (though I only had 1 character who had all the end game 'Incarnate' powers and levels as grinding for them more then once doesn't appeal) and I would have happily kept playing it if it had stayed.
For those of you who never played, City of Heroes (and Villains) did its best to break the usual skinner box mold, and was a role playing dream come true with character customization and even mission/enemy customization. The game had a lot of fantastic ideas, like level scaling both up and down, robust character creation/customization, custom missions players could make, instancing, power based 'gear' and just generally being all around *fun* to play. But the notable thing that was great about this game? It was about the players, through and through. To this day, COH had some of the largest degree of player agency and chacter ownership I've ever seen in an MMO, outside of some of the notable sandbox ones like EVE. Compare that to your typical themepark ride MMO where you are just yet another Tauran Shaman that looks the same as the other ones. Yes, I'm spoiled rotten by COH's character creator, sue me.

Ugh I miss that game so much now. Was shut down suddenly, and for no good reason or explaination ever given. Even keeping it on life support with Ned the Janitor looking after the server cluster and some customer service staff would have been better than totally killing it off the way NC Soft did. I guess no good deed goes unpunished, as the expression goes. It was very much the MMO equivalent of the end of Cheers, everyone left then the lights turn out. Here's hoping that City of Titans becomes a thing.
 

gamernerdtg2

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Zira said:
Novaova said:
It's a Skinner Box. The game doles out little tasks and you get little rewards for accomplishing them. It's like a slow but steady drip in the pleasure center of your brain. The only way off is to recognize what's happening and either decide that you're okay with this, or to play games that reward you in other ways.


Well said.

I think mmorpg are bad games. They do have the potential to be GREAT games.... but 99,9% of them, if not 100% of them, are no more a videogame than a slot machine is.

Here's a big world to explore, full of armours to craft, enemies to fight, and characters of your own to create!!!! .......Ok, now please keep repeating the attack button. Repeat the attack button again. Again. Again. Again. Click click click click click clickclickclickclickclickclick
Yes I agree about the potential to be good games. What I don't understand is how this formula has persisted into 2014 with very little in the way of improvement.
 

Tuesday Night Fever

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Zira said:
I think mmorpg are bad games. They do have the potential to be GREAT games.... but 99,9% of them, if not 100% of them, are no more a videogame than a slot machine is.

Here's a big world to explore, full of armours to craft, enemies to fight, and characters of your own to create!!!! .......Ok, now please keep repeating the attack button. Repeat the attack button again. Again. Again. Again. Click click click click click clickclickclickclickclickclick
That describes like... a ton of games, though. I mean, that basically describes the RTS genre as a whole, pretty much every single open-world RPG like Fallout or Elder Scrolls, pretty much every action RPG, many platformers, a huge portion of the FPS genre, etc...

I feel like there are way more valid complaints to be made about MMORPGs than having to repeatedly attack stuff. Like the constant buff/nerf cycles that make it so that the character you love can be ungodly powerful one day and absolute garbage the next. Like the constant balance changes made for PVE and PVP that aren't exclusive, forcing PvP players to deal with changes that didn't have any impact on them (and the same for PvE players in the opposite situation). Like constantly being nickel-and-dimed by either monthly subscription fees or ridiculous micro-transactions. Like the constant issues they have with various internet service providers and college IT departments that restrict you from being able to play (which you won't get a refund for if playing a subscription-based game). Like the constant threat of hackers and identity theft if you're not constantly vigilant with security. Like the need for a fairly high-end PC to be able to smoothly run many MMORPGS, even if they came out years ago using tech even older than that.

The genre is a mess, but constant clicking of an attack button is definitely nothing unique to it.
 

Yuuki

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I think part of what's playing on your mind is the subscription. When you're paying $15 a month on an MMO you will feel entitled to at least some kind of entertainment worthy of that subscription. For millions of players it's worth it, but for millions of others it's obviously not.

That's why I'm enjoying the hell out of GW2 because it suits my lifestyle and playstyle. Log on maybe once every 1-2 days, check out new content (updates are frequent), run a dungeon or two, do a few PvP matches, explore a bit, log off. No subscription biting at the back of my mind...best of all I'm free to drop the game for a month! I can come back and still kick ass because there is no gear treadmill.

Best $60 I have ever spent on any game period (also GW2 is $40-45 now :D).
 

Ashannon Blackthorn

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One game to keep an eye out for is Pathfinder Online. They claim to be doing an open sandbox player driven extravaganza. Now talk is cheap but if they even accomplish 25% of what they claim and somehow keep is from devolving to a PvP gank fest, it might actually be a bit of a genre breaker for the fantasy mmo. But again, talk is cheap and hype is cheaper.