MMO's, Where did it all go wrong? (long)

[Oulush]

I believe there are couple games that actually was released for a hardcore audience.

 

The problem is, when you guys mention things like these you forget about people with responsibilities.

 

A lot of gamer's today are working class people. They have limited time, and limited responsibilities. It is almost impossible to be able to play 3-4 hours without any interference. When adult life hits, friendships decline, or at least the time that is spend together with friends. Everyone has a schedule that they need to fit and entertainment time is limited.

 

When I see a post like yours I automatically assume that either you are rich enough to afford playing a game nonstop, or you just don't have the responsibilities.

 

The thing is, working class have the means to pay for a game and continue playing it. If a MMO is not satisfying the customer in a shorter time period, there is no need to pay for it.

[Lsya]

Ironically, some friends and I at work were discussing a similar topic about MMOs at lunch.

 

What brought this up at work was when a new employee mentioned he still plays Asheron's Call after all these years. I beta tested it and played for a while. We started thinking about how different things are today.

 

This isn't about SWTOR, but MMOs in general. I'm enjoying SWTOR very much.

 

IMHO MMOs in general have changed from 'playing a character in a virtual world' to 'level up as quickly as possible to pvp and raid and get the best stuff.'

 

There were times in EQ where we could spend most of the day hanging out in the Oasis of Marr on the beach. Catching fish, hunting caimans for meat, cooking specialty food and selling it to the groups fighting. We'd end up meeting lots of people and have a party right there on the beach. It was just fun being in game and hanging out.

 

There were things to do in the game with the community that made it fun just to be there with others.

 

what I don't miss about EQ is the long wait times of getting a raid team together. Aargh! that got old quick.

 

Asheron's Call had a nice skill system and crafting system. It was fun living in that world and just interacting with others. My co-worker said his group of friends aren't worried about leveling up quick, they enjoy crafting and other things and just living in that virtual world.

 

Asheron's Call-2 failed in capturing that feeling and focusing on just leveling up. Not much else.

 

There are other examples, but I'm not going to go into the details.

 

Basically, it feels like the games today focus more on the mechanics of just leveling instead of providing an immersive world to play the character in. Granted, many players are looking for that these days, and fine for them. However, if the world is created just to level up....what else is there to do? These games feel more like single player level-centric games merged with the MMO large scale player base. Warzones are nothing more than online arena based team pvp mini-games (Counterstrike, Tribes, etc). But these pvp arenas are now common in MMOs where in the past it was part of the world you lived in (if the server type allowed).

 

I know many players don't care for in-game things like housing, etc.; but those types of details help define the world the character lives in vs. just another levelquest.

 

I enjoyed the community interaction years ago in the MMO worlds. Today, in modern MMOs, I just don't get that virtual world community feeling anymore.

 

Now that I've babbled all of that, I don't know if it really makes sense.

[crowncrow]

Now that I've babbled all of that, I don't know if it really makes sense.

 

I think your post made a lot of sense at least it did to me. I also have nothing against SWTOR and so far I play it gladly. However the simple fact is that I cannot immerse myself in this world, and this saddens me just a bit, especially since I love the Star Wars universe and its possibilities.

 

It often feels like a very well made direct narration single player. This is not a bad thing actually, I like the story progression and I already look forward to doing other classes. Its just the endgame MMO aspects of player interaction are not especially fulfilling, its basically grind for loot, grind for valor.

Edited January 31, 2012 by crowncrow

[Tohrazer]

again, to all you guys who are "still loving levelling up on alderaan!" i must re-express that someday you're going to hit 50, when you do and you discover most of the L50 population already got bored and quit - and theres even less people for you to do stuff with, you will then understand what im trying to convey

 

to you people telling me "we have jobs these days!" i have guild members with jobs and a family that STILL already hit 50 and fully geared their characters up, its not a huge time investment at all

Edited February 1, 2012 by Tohrazer

[Syrocc]

Was hoping TOR would be my new MMO love. And I do love it. It's great. And yet, I feel discouraged from thinking, of putting effort into having the supreme character. It's just a matter of time, and not much of it.

 

There are 3 steps to the game imo:

 

1.) Level to 50 (takes around 2-3 weeks for an avarage player)

2.) Farm up to battlemaster gear (takes about 3-4 weeks of constant pvping at a normal play rate)

3.) Farm up Rataka gear, and complete all hardmode FPs and operations (also takes around 2-3 weeks, depending on server and playtime).

 

So, bottom line, here you are, 2 months later, level 50, the ultimate gear for both PvE and PvP. Not much else to do, you roll an alt.

 

Is the game fun? Sure. Will I be playing it for awhile? Probably.

 

On the other hand, it's too easy, does not challenge me as a player, and, most importantly, its over before it has ever begun.

 

Farming money? Unnecessary. Why would I bother to be the supreme crafter on the server, when not many people buy or need crafted stuff, nor do I need the profits.

 

Original skill builds? Let's face it, the options are limited, usually it's 2/3 of the skill trees that are viable for either PvP or PvE. You go one way, or the other. Hybrid builds dont work. Not much to think about.

 

To end this, because I'll be carried away, I'm not happy. I don't blame Bioware. They adapt to what the market wants, obviously. And the market, after WoW, wants easier and easier games. Even now, the TOR forums are full of people asking for sentinel boosts, operative nerfs, and so on, simply because they cannot be bothered to figure out how to play or counter a class.

 

After years of waiting for SWTOR, I am now considering of re-activating my Anarchy Online account. It's old, ugly, with a limited community. Yet I never felt more challanged than there. It would take me (knowing 90% of the game by heart) more than a year to get to that ultimate gear and status with a character, and I would probably spend that much again working on a different build, a better setup, an original approach.

 

The MMO market was born with Asheron's Call. It reached its peak level with DaoC, AO, and Ultima. It died with WoW.

 

RIP MMORPG's, you will be missed!

[DarrkLore]

It is called simply lack of wanting to earn

gimme now

 

Yep... and we have WoW to thank for starting that trend. The way things are nowadays, there's no more sense of accomplishment. It really takes away from the game for me. I miss earning my way through the world. I've even thought about reactivating my FFXI account, but I heard they've made that game more casual friendly too... Oh how I long for ArcheAge to come out.

Edited February 1, 2012 by DarrkLore

[DarthWomprat]

It went wrong the time that things were made, "easier" to appeal to a wider player base. That's where things started to decline.

[Fidzlefou]

If gamers would not buy unfinished/unpolished products, companies would start making better games and the <pay now, we will fix it later, we promise.> mentality would go away.

[Syrocc]

If gamers would not buy unfinished/unpolished products, companies would start making better games and the <pay now, we will fix it later, we promise.> mentality would go away.

 

The state of polish in the game is not in question here. With 0 bugs, perfect balance, 200 fps for everyone, the game would still be easy-mode. It's the basic design that is flawed.

 

Oh, and you obviously haven't been through that many launches if you consider SWTOR to be a rushed launch. It's one of the most polished games at launch I've played. The MMOs I loved the most were in a lot worse shape at launch (DaoC, AO, AoC, etc.).

[Pathlight-]

Simple answer OP:

 

as videogames have become truly mainstream, the audience for them has grown from mostly male teenagers with endless hours to devote to them, to people from all walks of life, including working adults and parents wth much less time.

 

Therefore, games adapt to let everyone have a sense of achievement when playing, even for a short time. As a college student myself, I enjoy being able to progress in the game while having only a few hours a week to play. If those few hours had to be spent crafting an item or travelling to get to a quest location, I would quickly lose interest.

[supertouch]

i don't understand why casual players argue against challenges and a slow leveling process in an mmo. these games are supposed to hold your interest for quite a while.

[Syrocc]

It's not the adults and working-class that complain and bring change, it's the access of smaller and smaller children to MMO's, and the content has to be tuned down to appease these players too.

 

Nowadays, it's pretty common for a father to play together with his 11 year old son, for whom, obviously, the challenge of a hardcore MMO proves to be too much. When I quit AO back in the day, I got 2k $ for my account from a father who wanted his son to play too, and the son was simply incapable of leveling up a toon, so the father decided to give him a finished char to pew pew people with.

 

That is why, slowly, the MMO content gets easier and easier, and the hardcore players have less and less options.

[xefe]

i don't understand why casual players argue against challenges and a slow leveling process in an mmo. these games are supposed to hold your interest for quite a while.

 

I think that's one of the great misconceptions about how casual players think and what they want. Sadly most game-designers follow that train of thought nowadays.

They actually THINK that by making all parts of the game 100% accessible to all players, they draw in more players. All it does is bringing your fluctuation rates to all-time highs and deteriorating your core player-base.

 

It is not hard to implement rewarding game-play for different kinds of players, ranging from hardcore raiders to casual craft-geeks. Sadly I think it will take an unknown developer to bring us that as most big time corps are too scared to stray away from wow design decisions.

[gtmach]

First of all, MMOs going wrong is a matter of perspective. But for what the OP talks about, it all delves down to the little changes we all wanted that culminated into what MMOs are today.

 

I'll use WoW as an example.

 

Take exploration for instance. Back in the day, you didn't explore the world purely because you felt like it. You explored because you were trying to find your quest objective. The quest text was vague and didn't give you much to operate on. So you went looking around and you ended up stumbling upon some pretty sites or another player who was willing to help. But over time people lost patience with this. They got sick of having to explore all over the land just to find the objective. So slowly we saw objective trackers implemented in maps. Now we know where we're supposed to go so there's no reason to go off the path otherwise.

 

Handling bosses is another area that gradually saw aid over time. In the beginning you'd figure out boss strategies by trial and error. Some bosses required hours of coordination between tons of people. But over time more and more direction was provided in the form of 3rd party sites and video. Slowly developers felt that it made sense to integrate more direction into their challenges instead of having players go off to 3rd party sites.

 

Mobs are another point. The trash mobs in dungeons became annoying so players wanted them gradually removed over time. Plus it was a pain to die to mobs so they became easier to manage.

 

Grouping was annoying for players because they didn't have the time nor friends to constantly harp on general or trade channels so the LFD/LFG features were implemented to give them an easier time.

 

World PvP is a major issue. Because it's at the mercy of faction balance on a server, the optimal way to address it was to instance it and form queues, which then defeated the world aspect. You can always just go out and gank someone, but it just isn't the same.

 

There are tons of other examples I can label but the bottom line is: For the sake of convenience and sanity, the playerbase of WoW and other MMOs like it demanded an easier means to get access to content while not wanting that content to be so difficult/time-consuming.

 

WE are the reason MMOs are the way they are today. Developers create this environment because we are the ones that demanded it. Not all at once, but gradually over time this is how they addressed our issues..

[Poisonsenvy]

Yeah swtor was a disappointment as an mmo. They should of just called it a single player mmo or online rpg and compared it to Skyrim. Swotor migh be the 2nd mmo I quit b4 hitting 50 and my shadow is 48 atm. The 1st mmo i quit b4 I hit 50 was FF14. But yeah Swtor is so uninteresting that I doubt my 48 shadow will ever hit 50. I'll probably cancel sub at the end of this month I was just trying to stick it out a little hoping things would get better. But when your 48 and your not excited about logging in to ding 50 then thats saying a lot. But the only current mmo out that we have close to what the OP is talking about is Rift and even Rift is a lil easymode but its the most hard core mmo we have that is out. But despite it catering to the casual I'm still having a blast in Rift. Why? Because its a beautiful polished well rounded mmo that is enjoyable. I really wanted swtor to take the spot of my number one mmo but its way too bare bones ans all around just not fun to me. I'm probably going to cancel at the end of February unless things get drastically better.

[SithZigg]

i don't understand why casual players argue against challenges and a slow leveling process in an mmo. these games are supposed to hold your interest for quite a while.

 

The thing that I argue against is the idea that grind = challenge. You can have a challenging encounter, that will take you a few tries at to get past, but that does not mean repeating the same encounter over and over again for a McGuffin. Time sinks/grinds are not challenges; there is no challenge in the "kill monster for McGuffin, if did not get McGuffin, wash/rinse/repeat" idea that some players are pining for.

 

And I am not even entirely against Grinding. MMOs need it to give developers some padding. And a little grind can be used as an incentive for players to stick around a certain area longer. I just recognize it for what it is (padding), and what it is not (adding challenge/difficulty).

[ceciltaru]

The thing that I argue against is the idea that grind = challenge. You can have a challenging encounter, that will take you a few tries at to get past, but that does not mean repeating the same encounter over and over again for a McGuffin. Time sinks/grinds are not challenges; there is no challenge in the "kill monster for McGuffin, if did not get McGuffin, wash/rinse/repeat" idea that some players are pining for.

 

And I am not even entirely against Grinding. MMOs need it to give developers some padding. And a little grind can be used as an incentive for players to stick around a certain area longer. I just recognize it for what it is (padding), and what it is not (adding challenge/difficulty).

 

an MMO player after my own heart!

 

the MMO developer that realizes this, will have the true WoW-killer. until that day, we play what we can. I'm having fun in SWTOR, and looking forward to grinding some flashpoints and operations.

[supertouch]

i wasn't referring to grinding as a challenge.

 

however, grinding in certain contexts can be fun or at least bearable. i'll use everquest as an example. grouping and interaction were encouraged because soloing wasn't very efficient and was nearly impossible for some classes. dungeons were treacherous so people rarely navigated them alone. interacting with others while killing mobs and exploring dungeons is more fun than doing mundane solo quests.

[Arrys]

1) development cost and the need to attract a customer base that can support that development cost.

 

MMO's are now designed to appeal to a larger audience while holding the subscription price flat.

 

This has led from unique classes that filled a niche and WERE ALL BUT REQUIRED to team with other players cooperatively to classes with massively broad toolboxes that are self sufficient.

 

The old games required a massive per sitting time sink. remember the pain of medding up after each fight solo (I'll take the travel time thanks).

 

Yes games are easier but are you willing to pay 39.95-59.95 a mos for your specialty hardmode MMO which attracts a much smaller player base, denies you the massive flexibility charachters now have etc....

 

It's economics that happened. And economics is reality.

[Hunter_Este]

Simple, MMOs went from being a niche genre that attracted the D&D/RPG type player personality, into a mainstream hipster filled pile of trash. Blame WoW, they pushed it into mainstream and made all the little hipster kiddes come running.

[supertouch]

you can't really assess the mmo audience when 90% of americans had never played an mmo before wow. you can call the eq crowd the minority, but it had 500,000 subscribers at its peak several years before wow came out. also, wow wasn't popular because it had instances and was more casual-friendly. it was popular due to a well-known brand name, marketing, and the prevalence of home computers.

[Syrocc]

you can't really assess the mmo audience when 90% of americans had never played an mmo before wow. you can call the eq crowd the minority, but it had 500,000 subscribers at its peak several years before wow came out. also, wow wasn't popular because it had instances and was more casual-friendly. it was popular due to a well-known brand name, marketing, and the prevalence of home computers.

 

This is pretty much true. The fact that it had graphics designed for younger generations also contributed to the way it was developed over the years, and, as a market leader, how future games were built.

Edited February 1, 2012 by Syrocc

[Kalfear]

I am surprised to see 3 of these threads today, one of them my own all from a different perspective. As far as I understand it, you are another person complaining that games these days are too easy and do not cater for 'Hardcores' enough.

 

Give this a read http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=2350680#post2350680 and see if you identify with the 'Whenwe's I mention.

 

<edit> ugh, I had something typed up which then got deleted, so let me do this in bullet form.

 

1) Casuals getting something does not drive away the hardcores. WoW caters for both.

 

2) Hardcores are an extreme minority of gamers currently, much more so than in the past.

 

3) Most "Hardcores" of yesteryear are now working jobs and raising families, while still enjoying games. I.e the casuals you hate so much.

 

4) MMO - Massively Multiplayer Online. Not "Massively Social Online". Multiplayer involves completing goals/tasks with other players, not spamming channels for hours. If I want to be social, I will use facebook or chat with my guild.

 

5) Automated Finders are standard these days. Most serious players would rather be playing than faffing around with overhead.

 

6) Past MMO's were 'hard' in that they were simply numerically overtuned, bugged, grindy or laggy. Heroic Raiding in WoW now is harder than *anything* in the old days, taking the above out of the equation.

 

7) Cross Server features are essential unless you want to totally muck over people unlucky to roll on the wrong server or merge servers.

 

8) I am not sure exactly what you are complaining about. Is it that the game is too easy? Is it that you don't like Republic? Is there not enough endgame content? I am totally lost.

 

I gotta say cause ive read it a number of times

 

1) WOW DIDNOT CATER TO ALL PLAY STYLES. WOW catered to the absolutely lowest common denominatior of players. WOW gave it all away mindlessly and the fall of the Modern MMORPG genre happened BECAUSE OF WOW, not despite it.

 

If you dont know or understand this FACT!!!!!, dont reply, instead spend time learning about the genre, the history, the products that came BEFORE WOW

 

WOW got NOTHING RIGHT and anyone saying otherwise losses any and all credibility when they claim it.

 

So no, I wont be reading your post because its clear you have no experience or knowledge of the genre and game design to draw from (thats not a flame or troll btw, thats god honest truth and reasoning).

 

You dont ask a McDonalds cook about cooking and you dont ask a WOW developed player about MMORPGs.

 

2) Vanilla this, strawberry that, ranbows for everyone....

 

NO ONE CARE!

 

WOW, not at its creation, middle, current state,

NOT ONCE in its hostory was WOW considered challenging, hard, or anything else not called STUPIDLY EASY!

 

One of the first beta reveiws of WOW is a title thats stuck with it through time.

 

WOW is a MMORPG on traing wheels.

 

I really wish WOW Players would understnd this already.

 

WOW was never hard, never dificult, never challenging!

 

3) 20 million subscribers doesnt make WOW a good game.

it makes it a popular game

 

Popularity and quality RARELY go hand in hand and WOW was NOT QUALITY DESIGN

 

What WOW was was EQ, FFXI, DAoC, SWG, AC, AO, and a number of other games all mashed up togather and DUMBED DOWN TO STUPIDLY MORONIC LOW DIFFICULTY SETTINGS.

 

Thats what WOW was.

Thats all, nothing else.

If you got something other then that from WOW, you went intentionally looking for it.

I go looking for a positive dining experience and I can ignore a huge number of faults at the local McDonalds to find it as well.

 

WOW WAS POPULAR

WOW WAS NOT QUALITY

WOW WAS NOT CHALLENGING

WOW WAS NOT GROUND BREAKING

 

WOW WAS POPULAR

 

Have I got this through everyones heads yet?

 

Closing:

 

I hate harping on WOW actually. But just because you played it, doesnt make it this grand game over all.

 

I love some Star Wars novels, get great enjoyment out of them but Im not going to try and convince some literary scholar who was reading War and Peace at age 3 of the Star Wars novels greatness into litature.

 

The people that want MORE from MMORPGs come from a time when MORE WAS GIVEN. WOW Dumbed everything down to its lowest levels and this watered down, instant gratification era is disappointing to them as they remember a greater era.

 

So would all of you who only ever played WOW stop with the

 

"Well golly gee shucks dang darn, WOW once made me change my 2 letter password to 3 letters and I was dumnfounded for a week on that change. They really raised the bar on dat der one yup yup!"

 

posts.

 

WOW did nothing right, nothing proper, nothing great in terms of design.

 

In terms of marketting however, Blizzard sahould get a award for taking a terrible product that was dieing out of the gates and turning it into a WORLD WIDE CULTURAL FAD (which again has nothing to do with quality or even gaming really).

 

TL:DR

 

WOW was a terrible product and anyone that doesnt know that should spend more time learning and less time talking!

[Sephendrine]

Here's what I agree with: that 'back in the day' it was actually cool to see a relative minority of players decked out in top notch gear that required a lot of effort to get. I never felt jealous of them, and was always just impressed with their dedication in getting it. My favorite time in WoW was the few months just after Burning Crusade was released, and indeed now it is barely more than an epic loot vending machine, where everyone thinks they are hot stuff.

 

But I don't agree that something terrible has happened to mmos because of WoW's slide into kindergarten. SWTOR is it's own game, and right now it is highly popular, and the assertion that some obscure majority of players is less than thrilled with the game is just a bunch of hyperbole. Forums are always filled with the disgruntled, even WoW's forums, in fact nearly every game's forums.

 

So the idea that something has gone completely wrong with mmos in general is a fantasy. SWTOR is about the journey as you level, not about the e-peen of standing around in Fleet decked out in hard to obtain gear. There are, in fact, other games for that, and anyway, who cares really what the other guy has and how he got it? Does it really matter? Do you really want to see people lined up in front of the cargo holds in their el supremo gear? In SWTOR what I care about is what is going to happen to my character next. So, "where did it all go wrong?" Nowhere.

[Khyler]

I think what has happened, especially with SWTOR, is the same thing that happened to SWG. It's called Lucas Arts. LA sees the market as 14-15 year olds. SWG's average age was around 35-40. Lucas Arts did a little research and found that millions of 14-15 y/o loved the NGE style play. So they set out to lower the average age of SWG. The problem with these research results, they never ask "who's paying the bill and will they pay for it?".

 

Almost all of us have been anxiously awaiting this game. I'd would expect that the majority of us played SWG - pre-NGE and some NGE. And those of us that hated NGE and quit SWG because of it, being adults, we were sure that mistake wouldn't be repeated by BW.

 

I see NGE in SWTOR. Yeah, they tried to cover it up, with the little customization tree (you can choose 1 of 3 trees)...but, all your skills at a particular level are predetermined for you (how's that different from NGE?) What I see, then, is LA influence in the game. A company that is totally clueless about the MMO market. Then you take BW, a company that makes really great stand-alone games, and you put them together. Throw in EA, online gaming company that is just looking for subs, and what do you get? SWTOR. But, the game does have potential. And like one poster said, he hopes they get enough subs to hire people that can come in and make this a really great mmo. To say it is now, is just denial.

 

Investors are chasing the WoW crowed. They haven't learned, those who like WoW, are playing WoW and unlikely to change to another game if it just comes across like a clone. We need some uniqueness (like SWG was in the beginning, or UO - neither of which had combat levels). Anyways, I'm hoping for the best. Nothing can beat the Star Wars theme for an MMO, except a crappy game trying to implement it.