I'm not too hip on massive customization after seeing the end results. Look at Secondlife or LBP, %95 of the user creative content is ugly as sin therefore making your product look bad. I even think Aion was a little too loose with it's character customization:
Yeah, have to agree on that. I like what they did detail wise but that's a little to far
I don't play MMOs. I barely play regular RPGs. I've watched WoW and EVE, I've played several free MMOs. The one that kept me the longest was Runes of Magic, it's actually really well made and fun for a free game. That lasted me something like a month before I grew tired of it, despite several friends trying to keep me from leaving.
One thing that I miss in any and all RPGs I've played is the sense of... I don't even know what to call it, physicality? That some other games provide so nicely. No matter the game, you're always in a huge, static world with other "people" running around in, but thanks to lag, stiff animations, the lack of player collision and environmental physics, it's far too easy to stop seeing the other players as actual characters and more like pieces of information darting about on a grid. Sure, it's an RPG, that's what it actually is... but I wish I didn't feel that way.
I'm sure it's not even possible to pull off with today's technology and bandwidths, but some day I hope the most popular MMOs feel more like GTA IV or something, where concepts like gravity and inertia actually exist and make themselves known very frequently, as opposed to every current MMO I've seen where, no matter how pretty and detailed it is, in the end it always "feels" like some sort of empty void. Even games like Age of Conan and Aion eventually strip down enough in my mind that I start seeing them as player coordinates and hitboxes floating about.
I can't be sure, but I think that's one of the primary reasons why no MMO so far has "worked" for me. Even the ones I think are fun, I just lose the will to play. I think the games I enjoy the most, I enjoy because of how tactile they are, and no RPG so far has had any of that. Maybe it's just not my genre. But it's a shame, because I wish I could enjoy them. And I do believe it ultimately boils down to something as simple as that; The games don't "feel" good enough to my brain.
Blade and Soul looks like a step in the right direction when it comes to combat. The navigation still looks really really stiff though.
WoW didn't ruin the industry, the industry ruins itself by trying so hard not to be WoW that they forget to include what makes WoW good in the first place. Also as someone pointed out on Massively the other day WOW's audience aren't really gamers, a large portion play WoW and that's about it.
Oh and I'll go ahead and point this out about WoW now since it's bound to come up: if you played WoW when it launched and haven't played since you haven't played WoW. So much has changed with the leveling experience that it's really not the same game. A pre-Burning Crusade paladin took me about 24-26 hours to get to level 20 then. Now I could get that paladin to level 20 in 8 hours or less.
Anyway... Disorganized thoughts ahead!
I like a well realized world in an MMO. World of Warcraft is about the only MMO I've tried that really gets this feel down. Baring dungeons/raids the only time you see a loading screen is when you change continents.
Star Wars Galaxies had loading screens for each planet but those planets are so devoid of useful content it's pitiful (a byproduct of their original player housing/harvesting plan).
Dungeons and Dragons Online and City of Heroes/Villans instance too heavily. DDO's main city of Stormreach is instanced by district which gives the whole city a disjointed feel.
Travel within those zones is a big factor in the feel of the world. DDO has no travel except by foot with few rest spot which can make travel tedious (coupled with DnD's spells per day combat system...) Champions Online goes the other direction giving players travel powers (flight, teleport, super jump, ect..) at the end of the tutorial zone. These are rather fast means of travel and make the zones feel much smaller than they are. SWG gives a player a speeder first thing upon leaving the tutorial but with 16km x 16km planets travel can still take some time.
Speaking of SWG... Zone content should be highly weighted towards actual content and not just empty space. Look at this map of the planet Endor. See all that blue in the lower left and center? That's all water. In SWG that means it's completely useless as you can do nothing but swim on the surface in the game. No enemies, no diving, no nothing. 25% of Endor is completely useless. SWG also has no Z axis. Any bit of terrain you can see you can run up.
A MMO needs more to do than just level or pvp. A good crafting/resource harvesting setup, lots of things to harvest, fishing, exploration, and such things are what keep people interested in the world.
A good selection of classes and variety within those classes is needed. Still waiting to see how StarWars: The Old Republic does with only 4 classes per faction.
But the number one things all those classes ABSOLUTELY NEED is the ability to PLAY SOLO! If a MMO is set up so that you MUST group in order to do anything a large number of people will not play the game. No one likes to sit around for 3 hours trying to find a group just to gain a level. *cough*FF11*cough*
XP Loss on death. This in an archaic mechanic that should never be implemented again. This is right up there with giving a console game 3 lives to beat the game. Imagine Assassin's Creed 2 or Uncharted 2 having a limited number of lives.
Questing should be quick and painless. Grinding should be all but eliminated. WoW started out bad at this but Blizzard has learned and questing in WoW now is the main source of XP. Grinding is pretty much eliminated from the leveling process.
If a player runs out of quests at their level in a MMO and has to kill mobs for hours just to gain a level or two in order to move on to the next zone or quest hub then something is wrong. Ideally there should be quests left over in a zone when it's time for a player to move on.
Champion's Online failed at this. There was several places where there were too few quests in a level range and this was exacerbated when the end of beta "level balancing" patch dropped. Bare spots in questing became long tracts of empty content.
The story/lore of a MMO is just as important as the gameplay. A cohesive world with reasons for doing what you are doing. Good story telling. Good characters. StarWars Galaxies rather sucks at this. When it lauched I'm not sure there was even a story outside the Galactic Civil War. Though their biggest offence in that department was setting a Star Wars game in the period where there are no Jedi.
I think story/lore is one area that caused Warhammer Online to not be a big hit. Not that the story/lore is bad but such a grimdarkdeath setting isn't something that a whole lot of people want to stay in for extended periods of time.
PVP... Fun when it's not forced but don't base your game around it and skimp on the PVE.
WoW having, being a seamless world, the least amount of loading screens is really a plus and it definitley gave a 1 up to immersion.
Yup, indeed. The fact that WoW has so much to offer in terms of extra content (Not a big part of the game but, as you said, it really helps players to stay hooked. I mean, look at WoW's fishing system. I was never really into it because I thot it was silly and I was focused more on getting to end game but it is really relaxing and I can see why people like it. Also, WoW's events are pretty awesome, for example, brewfest and Feast of Winter veil.
I'm aware other mmo's have events, such as guildwars, but they don't pull it off aswell, I don't think.
Another thing that I think mounts up alot of replayability when you've maxed out or bored of your character is the fact that you can always try a new race and level up or do whatever. I mean, WoW, in my opinion, didn't really have alot to offer when it came to class customization...and the new race changing and class updates for Catacylsm (I think) is like a Tauren Paladin...which really ruins it for me and it seems like they really don't care what they do. Although, I think champions online and aion are a step up in character customization.
I forget who said it, it was on some forum somewhere. Probably either here or on the WoW forums themselves. But they basically summed up grind MMO's as: "You're given a shovel and a pile of shit and you start shoveling the shit. Eventually you get a bigger shovel and can shovel more shit. Finally, after years of shoveling shit, you stand atop a gargantuan pile of shit waving your giant, golden shovel in the air. You are the greatest shit shoveler of them all!"
If anyone can find the actual quote for me that'd be awesome because it's realllyyy entertaining, haha. I did it no justice.
Sadly, that sum up is...really true. I guess I'm fine with that because I come to MMO's for player interaction and guilds the most. But really, I knew that, when I was playing WoW, that it's all just a huge grind. And the majority of players know that but they still keep going. Why? Because what else is there that has been "ground breaking"? I thot Aion was going to do it for alot of people but I'm not sure that is has from what I am aware of.
First look (Just the video, without being loaded)
Korean-Mircrotransaction-Grind fest?
...Sorry. But really, dude, every asian mmo on the market is a huge grind fest.
Prove me wrong. ;D
Edit - The same guys that done Aion? Interesting...
Oh I see. Yeah that's cool dude, I've got no problem with that.
What would you guys say about the ratio of people who like what WoW does and the people who want a more EQ/UO experience?
Id definatly like an mmorpg based on skill as some said where i can headshot a maxlevel
player because my aim is good but i really dont see any possible way to get such a game
to actually work.
Yeah, it is a mechanic that is hard to pull off but I think it'd be a good invesment from what I've read. It'd be like twich gameplay or something like that perhaps.
snemmy: here is a nice article on the mmo class trinity
as far as customization:
An idea I tossed around for customization of armor is allowing players with a blacksmithing trade skill the ability to reforge weapons and armors to change the visual look. I still like being able to tell what level the player is by their gear so customization options would be limited to the tier the item is in.
Like changing just the colour or to go as far as adding geometry to the item?
It's a cool idea but, as you said, it would probably make for a hard time differentiating levels and such things.
I picture it similar to spore but not as much freedom. maybe the armor would have preset areas where you could cycle through spikes.. the spikes would have widgets that let you smoosh it down into a bolt shape or pull it all the way up to a wicked blade. Probably have lower tier armors limited to bolts and nubby spikes. I'm actually thinking of building a mockup in max in the future, we'll see.
That's actually a kickass idea. It reminds me of the promises WAR online kind of failed to implement. In WAR there was so many amazing (in my opinion) options to have such a distinguishable character, for example, the beer keg on the beared of a Dwarf. They failed to implement such things as dwarves beareds getting longer and orcs getting taller (When I played it anyway. It may have been implemented now but there is a very small player count on there now)
Blizzard does something that only Valve has been able to duplicate.
Release an incredibly polished final product, and continue to support it long after its release. Can't name another MMO that's been able to boast that. I've really only ever seen skimpy content, shoddy launches, with repetetive gameplay, in a small scope.
I believe the latest WoW 3.3 patch had more content in it than any MMO released in the past 2 years.
The common theme is most MMO's I've played, seems to release a beta version, and expect players to play early game content and be testers, with absolutely awful gameplay balancing, and wait around until the mid-endgame content is developed.
And when it finally is developed, it's incredibly underwhelming.
Aside from WoW, I think what could have been a really good MMO (had they approached it with the polish and support), would have been World War 2 Online. Unfortunately it was mired with ghastly issues at launch (like not being able to login for the first month of my paid subscription).
A FPS where you would be an Axis or Ally fighting across the Rhine land in week-long battles, for various control (spawnpoints), Battlefield style.
Hardcore MMO's simply suck.
I was the highest Silver Ranger on my server in Lineage 2, and forced many people to quit the game, after having killed them, and making them drop the weapon they spent 5 months monotonously grinding for.
Blizzard does something that only Valve has been able to duplicate.
Release an incredibly polished final product, and continue to support it long after its release. Can't name another MMO that's been able to boast that. I've really only ever seen skimpy content, shoddy launches, with repetetive gameplay, in a small scope.
I believe the latest WoW 3.3 patch had more content in it than any MMO released in the past 2 years.
The common theme is most MMO's I've played, seems to release a beta version, and expect players to play early game content and be testers, with absolutely awful gameplay balancing, and wait around until the mid-endgame content is developed.
And when it finally is developed, it's incredibly underwhelming.
Aside from WoW, I think what could have been a really good MMO (had they approached it with the polish and support), would have been World War 2 Online. Unfortunately it was mired with ghastly issues at launch (like not being able to login for the first month of my paid subscription).
A FPS where you would be an Axis or Ally fighting across the Rhine land in week-long battles, for various control (spawnpoints), Battlefield style.
Hardcore MMO's simply suck.
I was the highest Silver Ranger on my server in Lineage 2, and forced many people to quit the game, after having killed them, and making them drop the weapon they spent 5 months monotonously grinding for.
/salute to you, Silver Ranger. But seriously, I agree you that Blizz just kickass at maintaining all of their games and especially WoW. I think it comes down to WoW has amazing pros but some not so good cons.
Also, I've never explored the idea of an FPS MMO much. Sounds kind of cool. But, as you said, there were some issues so...I dunno. It could be cool if somone was to make something like that again.
By the way, uhm, I once played a trial of an old MMO that used to be considered semi hardcore in terms of gamplay and legit hardcore in terms of leveling. It took me hours of mob killing to get to level 6 but I can't remember the name. Any idea?
WoW also got a lot more casual with the update.
I just started playing christmas after being bored of it for a few months and its a lot
quicker to level and dungeons get their groups from all servers so thats very quick too
atleast for me as a tank . Also they implemented their own mobmap which additionally helps to speed up. A day for a level on 74 is a very good number methinks theres enough to grind at the endlevels anyways.
Disco, WoW has been getting more casual since 2004
As I said, back in 2006, when I first started playing, there was no such thing as increased XP and shiney loot (Yeah, even that I consider to be a more casual feature ;P)
Hey, nice thread. I',m not going to go into all of the things that I think would make a good MMORPG, just to say, I'd love one that is completley skill based. No matter how much gear you have, it all depends on the players skill. That's part of the reason Aion failed for some people, minus the massive grind there was too much gear dependancy. To a certain extent I'd like a large world where it took a decent amount of time to get anywhere. That would probably up the realism tenfold as opposed to jumping through a magic portal. Brain dead atm, so can't think of anything self apart from stuff like better quests, no grind. ;P
I don't get what people see about aion being a hard grind... yes there is that issue of the damn balaur hearts at 50 for the miragent/fenril armor, I'm at lvl 47 right now and I'm dreading the prospect of farming the mats for potentially... a lot of failures.
Aside from that, the grind was really not that significant. It took me about 2 months to get to lvl 40, the exp curve was pretty good up until the 40s where things slowed down a lot. But you can pretty much get to most of the PVP content in about 2-3 weeks of play.
I find aion's gameplay to be fun and a challenge, compared to wow, where everything seemed to be handed to you, it was easy at launch, and it seems a whole lot easier now.
Everquest 1 at launch and FF11 in the earlier days were GRIND. But in that sense, you saw better players that knew what they were doing in those games because deaths were so heavily penalized.
All these games are all farm farm farm so you can get mats or gear to put you in the next area to farm more for new gear or new mats. That's the bottom line of almost all MMOs. It's all going to come down to which one tickles your particular fancy in terms of how it's played, pvp vs pve content and how the game/world looks. For me that's why I played aion, I like the art.
Where can these games be improved or what would I like to see?
Crafting minigames.
This is the ONLY deadtime in any game, waiting for the damn progress bars to move, only to have the randomized element fail your craft that took you 3 weeks to gather/farm the mats.
Make this part of the game to test the skills of the player in another sense, give them a break, a totally different experience to the grind. I mean all you do in wow and aion in crafting is just start a craft and walk away, come back in a few minutes and find out what you got.
EQ1 took about 1:30 to run across the world from one end to the other, and that's if you caught the boats... if you didn't that's an extra 30-45 minutes plus that time again waiting ON the boat as it goes, and there's 2 boats to catch. I don't think many players liked it. There's a reason why teleporting and flight are in modern games. :P
By the way, can anyone confirm that WoW had a really bad launch in 2004? I think I heared that on a podcast or some place ages ago. I mean compared to the other launches it was like really bad or something, right?
What do people think about crafting in mmo's? What proportion of the game needs to be dedicated to crafting to make the MMO better? I'm not a huge profession person in MMO's but I respect what it does. I always got my stuff from the AH and instances (Never mined items with black smithing and such)
-Edit - Sorry if people have mentioned crafting and prof's in their threads. Haven't read the long ones yet ;P
Personally I'd like to see an MMO that takes more twitch-based skill to play than function key pressing and shin kicking competitions. Not only would this feel better but it would be waaaaaaaaaaay more immersive.
Also, MMOs need to start respecting that we have lives outside of our digital avatars and that we need not be guilt-tripped for not poopsocking it to 60 by our guild of "friends".
I've been induldging myself in SC2 videos today and I just want a SC mmo so badly. I can see how it would get repetative but come on, with the right, elements it would kick ass.
I've been induldging myself in SC2 videos today and I just want a SC mmo so badly. I can see how it would get repetative but come on, with the right, elements it would kick ass.
Me too man, I've actually been spending the past few weeks coming up with ideas for a DOTA inspired mod for SC II. I don't know what exact editor tools they'll be releasing with the game, but I've got my fingers crossed they'll be robust and fairly easy to use. I personally cut my teeth making a UT3 RPG/ FPS hybrid, RamPaGe. If you guys wanna check it out it's pretty cool, you can load it up in the now free UDK editor:
I'm hoping like hell SCII builds on the mod community that was so great with Warcraft III. I think this is the future of modding. Large companies releasing landmark titles that are highly moddable and then charging for high quality custom content created by their users and splitting the profits.
Sounds like a few of you guys in this thread might want to dabble in making your own mods, might want to brainstorm some stuff for the upcoming and dare i say "soon to be released" starcraft II engine.
Dude, that sounds epic.
I was watching a video that showcased modding of units and even making protoss units into a game like galaga or something ;P Was kickass. They even spoofed SC Ghost.
I played wow at launch, I can't say it was a terrible launch... things worked, I don't recall any glaring bugs other than the fact that hunters were fucking gimps and sins and sorcs were king turd of the bowl :P
what do i look for? ummm, everything EQ2 has... end of story.
i raided in wow for 2 years. hardcore raiding (5-7 days a week, 5 hours a night). loved it. but once i tried other mmos, WoW sucks... there really isnt much to it.
i do look for character customization the most though. and eq2 has a huge customization. huge. i just love it. and the trade skill system is better than others ive seen. ive tried ALOT of mmos. alot. but eq2 is the game i ALWAYS go back to.
been trying the EVE Online trial out. pretty but meh on the fun part. The lack of direct control over the ship brings the game down. Same with the inability to invert the Y axis of the mouse or mouse wheel zoom. Saw people in game saying joystick support would take away from the feel of the game.
I would love to see a Star Wars (or Mechwarrior) MMO that took full advantage of in and out of vehicular combat with seamless or near seamless transition from ground to space. Two players start a gunfight in a cantina, have a shoot out in the streets on the way to the hangar bay, jump in their ships, chase each other into space where they have a dogfight further and further from the planet until one jumps into hyperspace. All without a loading screen. :poly142:
been trying the EVE Online trial out. pretty but meh on the fun part. The lack of direct control over the ship brings the game down. Same with the inability to invert the Y axis of the mouse or mouse wheel zoom. Saw people in game saying joystick support would take away from the feel of the game.
I tried EVE about six months ago. I signed up for the trial on the basis of the ship customization and trade aspects of the game, which seemed like a refined Elite-kind of system. That aspect seemed okay, but man, was I disappointed by the combat. The slow, clunky, unresponsive feel to it wasn't helped by the repetition of combat situations and ages spent traveling from system to system.
It's a shame really, because reading through the documentation, the sheer depth of corporations and trade potential made it seem like I could play the Han Solo-type smuggler I've always wanted to, but the actual mechanics of playing seemed pretty dull.
"Congratulations! You have received your first <insert item>. Here is how to equip this item to your ship. First you need to train in the <appropriate skill>.
<appropriate skill> will finish training in 1 hour."
and you are on page 3 of 6 of the tutorial for that particular item type.
I have played a few MMO's (currently playing aion) and while I love the "old school' aspect of the MMO my favourite system by far would be the Monster Hunter system. They also have a Monster hunter MMO (japan only).
Some of the things I like about the monster hunter system:
- No levels. Noobs with leet gear can get pwnt by a newb with leet skill. Happens all the time in monster hunter when you party a guy in Rank 9 White fatalis armour and he gets killed 3 times in a row, which will end the mission fighting a Lowly Wyvern (aka Gypceros)
You do gain hunter ranks which go up when you have collected enough guild points. Guild points are only awarded after succeeding a mission. The harder the mission the more points your have. As you gain a higher rank you can access more difficult quests.
- Armour and weapons are very graphical and they show your status off to your peers and the armour reflects what monster your have bested, yet your skill in battle and your achievements shown on your Guild card is what will get your your praise.
Fighting hard boss wyverns in the nude and not dying is one such initiation into the ranks of a praised Master Hunter.
-Action based combat with combos, rolling, dodging and no targeting. Its all about the timing baby, and could mean the difference between life and death.
- Monsters can one hit kill you if you are not paying enough attention, leet armour or no.
- Loot is evenly given by carving. Monster hunter mobs dont cough up Sword of mighty beast slaying +3 and Armour of Doom +5, they only have what they wear; which happens to be bones, scales, hides and other body parts.
Every person gets a number of carves on the dead carcass and their luck determines if they get a rare carve or a common bone. No more ninja looting and items above a certain rarity can never be traded or sold to other players.
So if you see a guy wearing a suit of armour made from Evil dragon Fatalis, you know he went out there and killed that beast enough times to get those materials himself to make that armour. (or found some way to sponge off some unlucky players)
- No classes. Your class equals the weapon and armour you wear. You want to be a ranger, you go out and make your bow and use it. You want to be a tanking lancer, you have to spend the time to level up your lance weapons and learn how to use it effectively solo and in a group.
Those are the main great things about monster hunter. When they had monster hunter online there were scheduled events that would happen, like the town would be under the attack from giant elder dragons or a rare sighting of a ancient Kirin would be seen and you could only kill it on that day. Sometimes without it returning for months.
The only thing monster hunter lacks is story and a true rpg feel, if they added that I would be totally addicted.
Something that is looking quite similar is TERA online. It is using action based combat with a variety of races and classes. Its made by the ex-Lineage II developers (the ones that left and founded their own studio.) I'm looking forward to that as well as a few other MMO's on the horizon.
anuxinamoon, this monster hunter mmo actually sounds interesting. I'd try monster hunter just based on your post alone... unfortunately no english version/servers is a bit of a shame
Yozora, while there is no English dedicated online servers any more for any of the monster hunter games, you could pick up a copy of Monster Hunter Freedom United for the PSP. If you have a PS3 and can use Ad Hoc Party you can find some people to help hunt with you. Its not quite the same but its a whole lot better than going solo.
Monster hunter Tri (wii) has dedicated servers in Japan. Hazard and I are biting our nails waiting for a release over here!
Personally I'd like to see an MMO that takes more twitch-based skill to play than function key pressing and shin kicking competitions. Not only would this feel better but it would be waaaaaaaaaaay more immersive.
Also, MMOs need to start respecting that we have lives outside of our digital avatars and that we need not be guilt-tripped for not poopsocking it to 60 by our guild of "friends".
Take a peek at Global Agenda on Steam. Pre-order beta just started, and I'm VERY impressed so far. Static screenshots and low-rez vids don't do it justice. "Fluid" is the word for it. Big emphasis on skill and teamwork over uber-gear and levels.
Ive never been a fan of levels. Passive skills based on the players own ability and character's experiences, not "xp" but experiences. I could never stand a game where a player would 1 hit kill me just coz there was a numerical difference in character level all else being equal. An ideal mmo would have complexity enough for the hardcore gamer but would also be simple enough for causal encounters.
I have a file containing a large amount of detail on the gameplay mechanics behind what i believe would be a great system to base a "sandbox space western" style mmo on. What it boils down to is a qualitative system and not the current quantitative systems employed in most games today.
Sure a player that spends 18 hours a day "grinding" would have an advantage over the casual gamer but not enough as to make that style of gameplay superior, the superior gameplay style should be the one where the player plays the game for the enjoyment and not so that at some later point in their characters life can they take part in the fun aspects be it pvp or pve.
Balance is a difficult thing to achieve and an even harder creature to maintain.
My first RPG experience was LOTRO, and i must say i enjoyed it alot, but what made it fall is how content took forever to be updated, once me and a friend got through the story, and the other bits, made our characters what they are, then you just stood around waiting for new content to come out.
Wow did very well to keep shoving little bits in. i think very regular and filled updates are always a bonus, just like other polycounters, i love the lore, the story behind things. I think players make the experience what it is for themselves.
Running through the game, just grabbing the quests without reading them then checking your quest tracker just to find the dot on the map then just looking at your objective makes it seem a grind i reckon.
I dont know about anyone else, but if youve played a 2d browser based game known as Tibia, the greatest thing about that is there was no level cap, the more you played the more you became renowned, although you didnt get more skills, they generally just increased in power and pvp was everywhere, once you hit 12 or something, you were in trouble from anyone.
all the lower levels crowding into a building hoping not to get killed by the higher level passer bys, the general tension of playing was amazing, although it was tough if you ran across some asshole who hunts and kills you all the time (flaw)
i reckon some mmos need this type of experience. although i can see the outcome of some major issues.
Replies
http://www.bladeandsoul.com/global/en
Yeah, have to agree on that. I like what they did detail wise but that's a little to far
One thing that I miss in any and all RPGs I've played is the sense of... I don't even know what to call it, physicality? That some other games provide so nicely. No matter the game, you're always in a huge, static world with other "people" running around in, but thanks to lag, stiff animations, the lack of player collision and environmental physics, it's far too easy to stop seeing the other players as actual characters and more like pieces of information darting about on a grid. Sure, it's an RPG, that's what it actually is... but I wish I didn't feel that way.
I'm sure it's not even possible to pull off with today's technology and bandwidths, but some day I hope the most popular MMOs feel more like GTA IV or something, where concepts like gravity and inertia actually exist and make themselves known very frequently, as opposed to every current MMO I've seen where, no matter how pretty and detailed it is, in the end it always "feels" like some sort of empty void. Even games like Age of Conan and Aion eventually strip down enough in my mind that I start seeing them as player coordinates and hitboxes floating about.
I can't be sure, but I think that's one of the primary reasons why no MMO so far has "worked" for me. Even the ones I think are fun, I just lose the will to play. I think the games I enjoy the most, I enjoy because of how tactile they are, and no RPG so far has had any of that. Maybe it's just not my genre. But it's a shame, because I wish I could enjoy them. And I do believe it ultimately boils down to something as simple as that; The games don't "feel" good enough to my brain.
Blade and Soul looks like a step in the right direction when it comes to combat. The navigation still looks really really stiff though.
WoW having, being a seamless world, the least amount of loading screens is really a plus and it definitley gave a 1 up to immersion.
Yup, indeed. The fact that WoW has so much to offer in terms of extra content (Not a big part of the game but, as you said, it really helps players to stay hooked. I mean, look at WoW's fishing system. I was never really into it because I thot it was silly and I was focused more on getting to end game but it is really relaxing and I can see why people like it. Also, WoW's events are pretty awesome, for example, brewfest and Feast of Winter veil.
I'm aware other mmo's have events, such as guildwars, but they don't pull it off aswell, I don't think.
Another thing that I think mounts up alot of replayability when you've maxed out or bored of your character is the fact that you can always try a new race and level up or do whatever. I mean, WoW, in my opinion, didn't really have alot to offer when it came to class customization...and the new race changing and class updates for Catacylsm (I think) is like a Tauren Paladin...which really ruins it for me and it seems like they really don't care what they do. Although, I think champions online and aion are a step up in character customization.
Sadly, that sum up is...really true. I guess I'm fine with that because I come to MMO's for player interaction and guilds the most. But really, I knew that, when I was playing WoW, that it's all just a huge grind. And the majority of players know that but they still keep going. Why? Because what else is there that has been "ground breaking"? I thot Aion was going to do it for alot of people but I'm not sure that is has from what I am aware of.
First look (Just the video, without being loaded)
Korean-Mircrotransaction-Grind fest?
...Sorry. But really, dude, every asian mmo on the market is a huge grind fest.
Prove me wrong. ;D
Edit - The same guys that done Aion? Interesting...
Answer: WoW?
^^
What would you guys say about the ratio of people who like what WoW does and the people who want a more EQ/UO experience?
player because my aim is good but i really dont see any possible way to get such a game
to actually work.
as far as customization:
An idea I tossed around for customization of armor is allowing players with a blacksmithing trade skill the ability to reforge weapons and armors to change the visual look. I still like being able to tell what level the player is by their gear so customization options would be limited to the tier the item is in.
It's a cool idea but, as you said, it would probably make for a hard time differentiating levels and such things.
Release an incredibly polished final product, and continue to support it long after its release. Can't name another MMO that's been able to boast that. I've really only ever seen skimpy content, shoddy launches, with repetetive gameplay, in a small scope.
I believe the latest WoW 3.3 patch had more content in it than any MMO released in the past 2 years.
The common theme is most MMO's I've played, seems to release a beta version, and expect players to play early game content and be testers, with absolutely awful gameplay balancing, and wait around until the mid-endgame content is developed.
And when it finally is developed, it's incredibly underwhelming.
Aside from WoW, I think what could have been a really good MMO (had they approached it with the polish and support), would have been World War 2 Online. Unfortunately it was mired with ghastly issues at launch (like not being able to login for the first month of my paid subscription).
A FPS where you would be an Axis or Ally fighting across the Rhine land in week-long battles, for various control (spawnpoints), Battlefield style.
Hardcore MMO's simply suck.
I was the highest Silver Ranger on my server in Lineage 2, and forced many people to quit the game, after having killed them, and making them drop the weapon they spent 5 months monotonously grinding for.
/salute to you, Silver Ranger. But seriously, I agree you that Blizz just kickass at maintaining all of their games and especially WoW. I think it comes down to WoW has amazing pros but some not so good cons.
Also, I've never explored the idea of an FPS MMO much. Sounds kind of cool. But, as you said, there were some issues so...I dunno. It could be cool if somone was to make something like that again.
Lineage 2 and Ragnarok Online comes to mind.
A week of hardcore grinding, got me to level 10.
Ridiculous for Ragnarok, considering that it went to level 250.
I just started playing christmas after being bored of it for a few months and its a lot
quicker to level and dungeons get their groups from all servers so thats very quick too
atleast for me as a tank
As I said, back in 2006, when I first started playing, there was no such thing as increased XP and shiney loot (Yeah, even that I consider to be a more casual feature ;P)
I was a tank aswell ;P 80 Nelf Warrior. Haha.
I don't get what people see about aion being a hard grind... yes there is that issue of the damn balaur hearts at 50 for the miragent/fenril armor, I'm at lvl 47 right now and I'm dreading the prospect of farming the mats for potentially... a lot of failures.
Aside from that, the grind was really not that significant. It took me about 2 months to get to lvl 40, the exp curve was pretty good up until the 40s where things slowed down a lot. But you can pretty much get to most of the PVP content in about 2-3 weeks of play.
I find aion's gameplay to be fun and a challenge, compared to wow, where everything seemed to be handed to you, it was easy at launch, and it seems a whole lot easier now.
Everquest 1 at launch and FF11 in the earlier days were GRIND. But in that sense, you saw better players that knew what they were doing in those games because deaths were so heavily penalized.
All these games are all farm farm farm so you can get mats or gear to put you in the next area to farm more for new gear or new mats. That's the bottom line of almost all MMOs. It's all going to come down to which one tickles your particular fancy in terms of how it's played, pvp vs pve content and how the game/world looks. For me that's why I played aion, I like the art.
Where can these games be improved or what would I like to see?
Crafting minigames.
This is the ONLY deadtime in any game, waiting for the damn progress bars to move, only to have the randomized element fail your craft that took you 3 weeks to gather/farm the mats.
Make this part of the game to test the skills of the player in another sense, give them a break, a totally different experience to the grind. I mean all you do in wow and aion in crafting is just start a craft and walk away, come back in a few minutes and find out what you got.
EQ1 took about 1:30 to run across the world from one end to the other, and that's if you caught the boats... if you didn't that's an extra 30-45 minutes plus that time again waiting ON the boat as it goes, and there's 2 boats to catch. I don't think many players liked it. There's a reason why teleporting and flight are in modern games. :P
What do people think about crafting in mmo's? What proportion of the game needs to be dedicated to crafting to make the MMO better? I'm not a huge profession person in MMO's but I respect what it does. I always got my stuff from the AH and instances (Never mined items with black smithing and such)
-Edit - Sorry if people have mentioned crafting and prof's in their threads. Haven't read the long ones yet ;P
Also, MMOs need to start respecting that we have lives outside of our digital avatars and that we need not be guilt-tripped for not poopsocking it to 60 by our guild of "friends".
Me too man, I've actually been spending the past few weeks coming up with ideas for a DOTA inspired mod for SC II. I don't know what exact editor tools they'll be releasing with the game, but I've got my fingers crossed they'll be robust and fairly easy to use. I personally cut my teeth making a UT3 RPG/ FPS hybrid, RamPaGe. If you guys wanna check it out it's pretty cool, you can load it up in the now free UDK editor:
http://www.fileplanet.com/204029/200000/fileinfo/RamPaGe:-Ever-wonder-where-we-go-when-we%E2%80%99re-fragged?-In-the-eternal,-windswept-snow-of-Mount-RamPaGe
I'm hoping like hell SCII builds on the mod community that was so great with Warcraft III. I think this is the future of modding. Large companies releasing landmark titles that are highly moddable and then charging for high quality custom content created by their users and splitting the profits.
Sounds like a few of you guys in this thread might want to dabble in making your own mods, might want to brainstorm some stuff for the upcoming and dare i say "soon to be released" starcraft II engine.
I was watching a video that showcased modding of units and even making protoss units into a game like galaga or something ;P Was kickass. They even spoofed SC Ghost.
Damm huntards.
i raided in wow for 2 years. hardcore raiding (5-7 days a week, 5 hours a night). loved it. but once i tried other mmos, WoW sucks... there really isnt much to it.
i do look for character customization the most though. and eq2 has a huge customization. huge. i just love it. and the trade skill system is better than others ive seen. ive tried ALOT of mmos. alot. but eq2 is the game i ALWAYS go back to.
I'll check out the link.
I would love to see a Star Wars (or Mechwarrior) MMO that took full advantage of in and out of vehicular combat with seamless or near seamless transition from ground to space. Two players start a gunfight in a cantina, have a shoot out in the streets on the way to the hangar bay, jump in their ships, chase each other into space where they have a dogfight further and further from the planet until one jumps into hyperspace. All without a loading screen. :poly142:
Agreed on the second thing =]
I tried EVE about six months ago. I signed up for the trial on the basis of the ship customization and trade aspects of the game, which seemed like a refined Elite-kind of system. That aspect seemed okay, but man, was I disappointed by the combat. The slow, clunky, unresponsive feel to it wasn't helped by the repetition of combat situations and ages spent traveling from system to system.
It's a shame really, because reading through the documentation, the sheer depth of corporations and trade potential made it seem like I could play the Han Solo-type smuggler I've always wanted to, but the actual mechanics of playing seemed pretty dull.
"Congratulations! You have received your first <insert item>. Here is how to equip this item to your ship. First you need to train in the <appropriate skill>.
<appropriate skill> will finish training in 1 hour."
and you are on page 3 of 6 of the tutorial for that particular item type.
Some of the things I like about the monster hunter system:
- No levels. Noobs with leet gear can get pwnt by a newb with leet skill. Happens all the time in monster hunter when you party a guy in Rank 9 White fatalis armour and he gets killed 3 times in a row, which will end the mission fighting a Lowly Wyvern (aka Gypceros)
You do gain hunter ranks which go up when you have collected enough guild points. Guild points are only awarded after succeeding a mission. The harder the mission the more points your have. As you gain a higher rank you can access more difficult quests.
- Armour and weapons are very graphical and they show your status off to your peers and the armour reflects what monster your have bested, yet your skill in battle and your achievements shown on your Guild card is what will get your your praise.
Fighting hard boss wyverns in the nude and not dying is one such initiation into the ranks of a praised Master Hunter.
-Action based combat with combos, rolling, dodging and no targeting. Its all about the timing baby, and could mean the difference between life and death.
- Monsters can one hit kill you if you are not paying enough attention, leet armour or no.
- Loot is evenly given by carving. Monster hunter mobs dont cough up Sword of mighty beast slaying +3 and Armour of Doom +5, they only have what they wear; which happens to be bones, scales, hides and other body parts.
Every person gets a number of carves on the dead carcass and their luck determines if they get a rare carve or a common bone. No more ninja looting and items above a certain rarity can never be traded or sold to other players.
So if you see a guy wearing a suit of armour made from Evil dragon Fatalis, you know he went out there and killed that beast enough times to get those materials himself to make that armour. (or found some way to sponge off some unlucky players)
- No classes. Your class equals the weapon and armour you wear. You want to be a ranger, you go out and make your bow and use it. You want to be a tanking lancer, you have to spend the time to level up your lance weapons and learn how to use it effectively solo and in a group.
Those are the main great things about monster hunter. When they had monster hunter online there were scheduled events that would happen, like the town would be under the attack from giant elder dragons or a rare sighting of a ancient Kirin would be seen and you could only kill it on that day. Sometimes without it returning for months.
The only thing monster hunter lacks is story and a true rpg feel, if they added that I would be totally addicted.
Something that is looking quite similar is TERA online. It is using action based combat with a variety of races and classes. Its made by the ex-Lineage II developers (the ones that left and founded their own studio.) I'm looking forward to that as well as a few other MMO's on the horizon.
Monster hunter Tri (wii) has dedicated servers in Japan. Hazard and I are biting our nails waiting for a release over here!
YESS
Take a peek at Global Agenda on Steam. Pre-order beta just started, and I'm VERY impressed so far. Static screenshots and low-rez vids don't do it justice. "Fluid" is the word for it. Big emphasis on skill and teamwork over uber-gear and levels.
I have a file containing a large amount of detail on the gameplay mechanics behind what i believe would be a great system to base a "sandbox space western" style mmo on. What it boils down to is a qualitative system and not the current quantitative systems employed in most games today.
Sure a player that spends 18 hours a day "grinding" would have an advantage over the casual gamer but not enough as to make that style of gameplay superior, the superior gameplay style should be the one where the player plays the game for the enjoyment and not so that at some later point in their characters life can they take part in the fun aspects be it pvp or pve.
Balance is a difficult thing to achieve and an even harder creature to maintain.
Wow did very well to keep shoving little bits in. i think very regular and filled updates are always a bonus, just like other polycounters, i love the lore, the story behind things. I think players make the experience what it is for themselves.
Running through the game, just grabbing the quests without reading them then checking your quest tracker just to find the dot on the map then just looking at your objective makes it seem a grind i reckon.
I dont know about anyone else, but if youve played a 2d browser based game known as Tibia, the greatest thing about that is there was no level cap, the more you played the more you became renowned, although you didnt get more skills, they generally just increased in power and pvp was everywhere, once you hit 12 or something, you were in trouble from anyone.
all the lower levels crowding into a building hoping not to get killed by the higher level passer bys, the general tension of playing was amazing, although it was tough if you ran across some asshole who hunts and kills you all the time (flaw)
i reckon some mmos need this type of experience. although i can see the outcome of some major issues.
waiting for this one to come out.
I was almost shocked that no one discussed this game until I clicked on this thread.