What's with level caps in every mmo?

[Thamelas]

What they need to do is make a modern version of Ultima Online: The Second Age.

 

I truly feel sorry for gamers that missed the true golden age of MMO's that were in that game.

 

Here's a link to some stories from back in the day, when MMO's made your heart race, and made you experience real love and fear.

 

[Sarfux]

How exactly do you propose to make infinite content?

I have very good amounts of ideas put on my computer. I have come up with Star Wars The Old Republic expansion ideas to and all the lore, I mean ALL of it, fits into what is known right now. It is very good. I also have new planets that are all connected to the lore of this time as well as species.

 

I am a very good writer and brainstormer I just wish I had the money to make an mmorpg themepark/sandbox. I would listen to EVERYONES feedback. I know you can't please everybody, but if the majority of people want it right now? I say it's the first thing we would work on and release it next patch that's me anyway!

[WookieBob]

the secret world

 

yes, trust the company that brought you Age Of Conan

[Crymson-Raider]

I think you're forgetting the Legacy System..although not currently implemented, it could allow for your lvl 50 to continue to gain xp that would go towards something and therfore making it worth the effort to play... However until that is revealed, its all speculation at this point. Edited February 7, 2012 by Crymson-Raider

[Armourboy]

There is a reason I loved the original SWG system, no levels, just a cap on the number of skills you could have a one time. You could place them anyway you wanted, and if you decided you wanted to do something different, you could just get rid of those points and start over.

 

Man if I could get a game that had SWG's skill system and crafting, plus the ability to do quests in a game like this or WoW I would be one happy camper.

[Chomag]

Level caps are implemented for 2 reasons:

1. to allow PVE and PVP content to have a base for balancing

2. to allow players to have an equal footing at some point, otherwise unemployed basement dwellers would be 10000000000000000 levels above casuals and pissing on everyone else.

 

The problem with MMOs is that they don't churn out content fast enough at high levels. Content requires time to make, much more time than it takes people to clear it. Therefore end game content is often not enough (specific for new MMOs) or just too grindable (specific to MMOs with understaffed developing department).

[Cial]

Back before MMOs, MUDs had a system called "Remorting" that allowed you to take your max level character and Remort back to level 1. You had to level all the way up again, but you gained more passive stat bonuses, unlocked additional abilities, earned new titles etc. Endless content by making players re-play through the game again AND get progression from doing so.

 

AA (Alternate Advancement) is another good form of endless endgame.

[Tornak]

I have always wondered and have observed this:

 

People get mad at END level, because they are reaching the END of the game and if it isn't what they expected in their mind that they set up, it is a GIANT disappointment for them and they say it was a "crappy game" because of that reason.

 

So why? Why has NO company thought of a system where...there is no end. I know there is no end in mmos..but I mean no level cap.. you just keep leveling and keep gaining more and more and more points for things as you go and the content kind of...recycles itself to make it SEEM different but it is.

 

Why hasn't any company thought of that yet? I'm just wondering. Because I think if an mmorpg was to have NO level cap and you start at 1 and just..keep going and going, earning points, crafting whatever, trying different crew skills, this could be an even better game than it is!

 

Just imagine TOR with this:

 

Level system that just...doesn't stop, you keep going, getting more valor, more ds/ls points that you can buy unique things with even MORE points.

 

No endgame. There is no end at all...no cap...no end raids...just an end to your story...for now.

 

Keep on getting crafting points up and up...your skills just keep going... start at 0 and there be no 400 or w/e to max it just keep going. That would keep people HOOKED.

 

It would be an amazing feature of an already amazing game. You could fight your BUTT off and the game would NEVER END. EVER. That is the mentality that makes or breaks games. It is people, and you have to know gamers' minds. Nobody wants their beloved game to end or story to end. Why should it? We should all be able to play as long as we want without a level cap. It would completely change the mentality of people saying "oh darn, this endgame BLOWS or...man..I'm almost to fifty..I don't want it to end! or man..all I do is raid"

 

Becouse single player themepark "MMO" is just for making money not for reason u stated.

 

There has been multiple games with skill based systems wich is best way to do mmo's but ppl dont have enough imagination or friends to play them long so they fade away usually after few years.

[PHPer]

First MMO i ever played back in 2000 or so, basicly had no cap. Each lvl just ended up being longer and longer exp wise, so at some point it could take a month or more to gain a lvl.

 

Biggest issue was 2 things.

 

1) new players dident have a chance, you could never reach the top.

 

2) People would start up a char in groups so 4 people would play 1 char 24/7

 

So why isent this done anymore ? MMO makers want money, best way to get most money is to make sure all players have fun.

[Sarfux]

you all bring up very good points on the cap system. Just some ideas I had that is all

[MrSpoony]

Havent played it in years but even though Ashersons Call stopped count levels at 126 a extreme amount of time was needed to get anywhere near that, you still got xp to put in your skills. So in a way with the open world setting and the game relaying more on what type of weapon/magic you use more than level/stats anyways it was never ending.

 

Aye, Asheron's Call was the first MMO I played, played it for 2 years and got to lvl 97. And the way the level progression worked, that was probably about half way to 126, and once you got there you could carry on improving, just your level didn't increase, but as I recall your level didn't fine ability at all, just your skills did. Think they removed that arbitrary limit eventually.

[Gigitor]

Why have levels at all? Remember SWG at the start? You chose how you wanted your character to develop. If you leveled up a "class" and didn't like it, you could begin leveling up a new one and dump the other. What a concept. Also, UO was like this. But then WoW happened, and the MMO world went to s&it. As long as WoW has multiple millions of subs, we are going to get nothing but WoW clones.

 

+1 totally agreeing. For most people WoW redefined the mmo genre thus in consequence streamlined it. Sadly it shifted the genre to "korea grind" mmos. It's like people expect mmos to be essentially WoW and I think Bioware was told to make "WoW with lightsabers" by management. It's obviously not KotoR online ;-)

 

But you see it in the rpg genre, too, compare say morrowind with skyrim or fallout 1/2 with 3. All mentioned games are great, but I would like some more variety; maybe game design has become too much of a "science" than an art.

Edited February 7, 2012 by Gigitor

[StealthStalker]

I think there's still a few MUD's out there that have seemingly infinite character level/progression if that's your cup of tea.

[Jaick]

the secret world

 

What....Failcom?

 

LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL

 

Have fun playing a bucket of fail for the 3rd time. HAHAHAHA!

[Salandrea]

Rift actually thought about this, and they made the Planar Attunement. This was to make people get a different kind of "leveling" to make the character stronger. Not insanely stronger, but at least a bit of an edge.

 

Something like this would not be too shabby in this game.

[Trigg]

it wouldn't be feesable if you think that they'd have to make more and more areas with higher level mobs. Or maybe you mean the leveling process after 50 gets so slow that by the time you reach 60, it's given the developers time enough to create a lvl 60 zone? and then again at lvl 70 and so on? the game would be way too huge.

 

I supose you could play with the idea of mobs health and damage changing dynamically as you do, but that would present a new problem, what if you're wandering around with a level 30. those mobs would stay at level 30 for him and you'd be bored.

 

You seriously can't present things like this unless you think of the bigger picture. Where is this development for all the new areas gona come from? how slow would the leveling process be? etc etc. you'd need to redesign the entire game for this to work. In a way, GW 2 does this, using dynamic events rather than questing which is pretty neat but i still believe there is a level cap.

 

Also level caps allow for new expansions. These serve multiple purposes. It's an enticement or something to look forward to for the player. It opens up new content, and a new level cap giving them more stuff to do at a pre-determined time. And it also gives the developers the cash to work on bigger and better things while the subscriptions mostly pay for the uptime and support as well as the constant additions to the current world/bugfixing etc etc (inc flame about "what bugfixes?!")

Edited February 7, 2012 by Trigg

[Moeguin]

Adding lvls just adds to imbalance's down the road.

[Armourboy]

+1 totally agreeing. For most people WoW redefined the mmo genre thus in consequence streamlined it. Sadly it shifted the genre to "korea grind" mmos. It's like people expect mmos to be essentially WoW and I think Bioware was told to make "WoW with lightsabers" by management. It's obviously not KotoR online ;-)

 

But you see it in the rpg genre, too, compare say morrowind with skyrim or fallout 1/2 with 3. All mentioned games ware great, but I would like some more variety; maybe game design has become too much of a "science" than an art.

 

Its like a lot of things out there involving money, it eventually detroys it. MMO's from the start have made money, but not until WoW did they make crazy money. Once companies decided there was crazy money that could be made they were willing to give it a shot.

 

The problem comes in that when you start talking about large amounts of money, and investors, etc. the investors want safe returns on their money. They don't want some guys vision, or some new idea that might be game changing, they want what is percieved to work and they want the money.

 

As much as Blizzard and WoW has advanced the genre that has been on of the biggest side affects of it. No longer are companies willing to take gambles and try to make their own game, nor do niche games make Enough money. Good old greedy is killling the innovation in MMO's right now.

[StealthStalker]

Rift actually thought about this, and they made the Planar Attunement. This was to make people get a different kind of "leveling" to make the character stronger. Not insanely stronger, but at least a bit of an edge.

 

Something like this would not be too shabby in this game.

 

When playing an alt, you (or I, at least) would always have the nagging feeling that I should be trying to squeeze out just a little bit more from my primary character. I don't like being reminded that I'm just grinding away something in that regard.

 

I'm curious to see what the Legacy system will be providing for SWTOR, since it's shared for all characters on the server.

[Ansultares]

Asheron's Call went with unlimited or near-unlimited level cap; it launched with a level cap of 126 (or 128, something like that), while getting into the mid-60s was basically good enough for the hardest content at the time. Edited February 7, 2012 by Ansultares

[BrenMcGuire]

I have always wondered and have observed this:

 

People get mad at END level, because they are reaching the END of the game and if it isn't what they expected in their mind that they set up, it is a GIANT disappointment for them and they say it was a "crappy game" because of that reason.

 

So why? Why has NO company thought of a system where...there is no end. I know there is no end in mmos..but I mean no level cap.. you just keep leveling and keep gaining more and more and more points for things as you go and the content kind of...recycles itself to make it SEEM different but it is.

 

Why hasn't any company thought of that yet? I'm just wondering. Because I think if an mmorpg was to have NO level cap and you start at 1 and just..keep going and going, earning points, crafting whatever, trying different crew skills, this could be an even better game than it is!

 

Just imagine TOR with this:

 

Level system that just...doesn't stop, you keep going, getting more valor, more ds/ls points that you can buy unique things with even MORE points.

 

No endgame. There is no end at all...no cap...no end raids...just an end to your story...for now.

 

Keep on getting crafting points up and up...your skills just keep going... start at 0 and there be no 400 or w/e to max it just keep going. That would keep people HOOKED.

 

It would be an amazing feature of an already amazing game. You could fight your BUTT off and the game would NEVER END. EVER. That is the mentality that makes or breaks games. It is people, and you have to know gamers' minds. Nobody wants their beloved game to end or story to end. Why should it? We should all be able to play as long as we want without a level cap. It would completely change the mentality of people saying "oh darn, this endgame BLOWS or...man..I'm almost to fifty..I don't want it to end! or man..all I do is raid"

 

There are MMO's that allow you to continue going but the level curve becomes so prohibitive that even the most hardcore gamer will play for a decade and still only be several levels higher than average gamers and that level advantage does not correlate to western MMO's where lover level stuff outside a certain range are easy or higher level stuff again with a certain range are hard, it's purely just a small statistical bonus.

[Internetzombie]

I have always wondered and have observed this:

 

People get mad at END level, because they are reaching the END of the game and if it isn't what they expected in their mind that they set up, it is a GIANT disappointment for them and they say it was a "crappy game" because of that reason.

 

So why? Why has NO company thought of a system where...there is no end. I know there is no end in mmos..but I mean no level cap.. you just keep leveling and keep gaining more and more and more points for things as you go and the content kind of...recycles itself to make it SEEM different but it is.

 

Why hasn't any company thought of that yet? I'm just wondering. Because I think if an mmorpg was to have NO level cap and you start at 1 and just..keep going and going, earning points, crafting whatever, trying different crew skills, this could be an even better game than it is!

 

Just imagine TOR with this:

 

Level system that just...doesn't stop, you keep going, getting more valor, more ds/ls points that you can buy unique things with even MORE points.

 

No endgame. There is no end at all...no cap...no end raids...just an end to your story...for now.

 

Keep on getting crafting points up and up...your skills just keep going... start at 0 and there be no 400 or w/e to max it just keep going. That would keep people HOOKED.

 

It would be an amazing feature of an already amazing game. You could fight your BUTT off and the game would NEVER END. EVER. That is the mentality that makes or breaks games. It is people, and you have to know gamers' minds. Nobody wants their beloved game to end or story to end. Why should it? We should all be able to play as long as we want without a level cap. It would completely change the mentality of people saying "oh darn, this endgame BLOWS or...man..I'm almost to fifty..I don't want it to end! or man..all I do is raid"

 

As a few other have pointed out there is EVE. EVE does this, EVE is a sandbox and for that reason it's not widely popular, people dont see an end, they realize that no matter how much time and effort they put in they will never be as good as the players that started years ahead of them.

I am pretty lucky, I started EVE in 04 and have been playing on and off since, as a new player your only hope of ever catching up to me is for me to really **** up (die while not having an updated clone) or I simply stop playing for YEARS. Now it's true that in my time of not playing people who started after me have caught up to where I am, even surpassed where I am.

 

There is no end in EVE, and there is a reason why peak server pop for EVE is only 50K, EVE is a niche market. People do not like sandboxs, also dont forget that with sandbox's you do get trolls like Goon who only exsist to make other people misserable, I admit that I do it all the time to newish players who think they know the game... I love their carebear tears.

[Chomag]

As a few other have pointed out there is EVE. EVE does this, EVE is a sandbox and for that reason it's not widely popular, people dont see an end, they realize that no matter how much time and effort they put in they will never be as good as the players that started years ahead of them.

I am pretty lucky, I started EVE in 04 and have been playing on and off since, as a new player your only hope of ever catching up to me is for me to really **** up (die while not having an updated clone) or I simply stop playing for YEARS. Now it's true that in my time of not playing people who started after me have caught up to where I am, even surpassed where I am.

 

There is no end in EVE, and there is a reason why peak server pop for EVE is only 50K, EVE is a niche market. People do not like sandboxs, also dont forget that with sandbox's you do get trolls like Goon who only exsist to make other people misserable, I admit that I do it all the time to newish players who think they know the game... I love their carebear tears.

 

EVE allows for way too many things that would get you banned in AAA MMOs, like scamming.

[Internetzombie]

EVE allows for way too many things that would get you banned in AAA MMOs, like scamming.

 

Yes because EVE is a sandbox, CCP is there to make the world and it's physical rules, everything else is left to the players.

 

Also scamming is allowed to a point. The CEO of my corp just let in a well known spy/griefer, he wanted to go out and kill the bugger just for laughs, now what happened was the griefer had a feeling this was going to happen so before he left the station he clicked on leave corp bring up the confirmation window. He then left the station and met up with our CEO, CEO targets and webs griefer and then griefer hits the confirm on leave corp meaning that my CEO is now attacking some random guy in high sec, concord shows up and blows away his ship. This is not allowed as you cant leave a corp while in space, the griefer used a glitch to get concord to kill my CEO. CEO was refunded the ship and mods worth of isk (actual value not market value meaning CEO was still out millions of isk)

 

However if your stupid enough to fall for the Charon/Carbon scam then you tottaly deserve it, it's your own fault for not being able to read.

 

I also suspect that if I were to say tell you that I'm going to trade you item X worth 9999 for 1000 but end up giving you similarily named item Y worth 0 that BW would do nothing, I didn't break any of the games rules, I didn't glitch the game and while I wasn't honest with you there is nothing in the EULA that sates I have to be an upstanding guy.

 

EVE just makes it easy, the reality is these scams actually happen all the time in MMO's

[Baxslash]

The closest game to a no level cap mmo is Eve, upper skill level is nearly 500 mill, and, I know I've just gone over the 120 mill point, and, that was just after 7 years of playing.