Best & Worst of 2004

[Samprimary]

Oh - win? Naw, don't think it should claim a winning slot, I'm just wondering about it being completely absent. Nae' even a blurb.

[Llava]

I'm glad to see CoH in there.  I'm such a fucking fanboy.  But still, I'm very pleased with the game and the development team- that they've consistently stayed involved and dedicated, and that they broke so many "core" MMOG rules with their design.  If you ask me, CoH is far closer to revolutionary than WoW or EQ2.  Unfortunately, it's based in its own universe and time has shown that MMOGs suffer when people aren't already familiar with the world.

[Shockeye]

I'm glad to see CoH in there.  I'm such a fucking fanboy.  But still, I'm very pleased with the game and the development team- that they've consistently stayed involved and dedicated, and that they broke so many "core" MMOG rules with their design.  If you ask me, CoH is far closer to revolutionary than WoW or EQ2.  Unfortunately, it's based in its own universe and time has shown that MMOGs suffer when people aren't already familiar with the world.

I think not being familiar with the world is part of the reason I got away from CoH. It was too different and I wasn't comfortable.

[stray]

I like the originality, like with the space marines which aren't the Allilance, the chaos marines that aren't the undead, the eldar which aren't the night elves, and the orcs which are the orcs but don't have tauren. The comparisons are nigh non-inescapable!

Both Warcraft and Starcraft are in large part rip-offs of Warhammer and Warhammer 40k. Not the other way around. Games Workshop just never got off their asses and made a (good) video game before Blizzard did.

[Llava]

I'm glad to see CoH in there.  I'm such a fucking fanboy.  But still, I'm very pleased with the game and the development team- that they've consistently stayed involved and dedicated, and that they broke so many "core" MMOG rules with their design.  If you ask me, CoH is far closer to revolutionary than WoW or EQ2.  Unfortunately, it's based in its own universe and time has shown that MMOGs suffer when people aren't already familiar with the world.

I think not being familiar with the world is part of the reason I got away from CoH. It was too different and I wasn't comfortable.

Yup.  There's that, and the allure of finally getting to play in a world you've imagined so often.  I mean, Star Wars.  Come on.  It was a dream come true for a lot of fans.

It's something I've discussed before.  Look at "big name" MMOGs versus the rest of them, and the vast majority of big names are from established worlds.  SWG.  Matrix.  DAoC.  Warcraft.  Lord of the Rings.  Hell, I think I heard that EQ had an established world at first too.

Look at some original games.  Shadowbane.  Dragon Empires.  A Tale In The Desert.  Anarchy Online.  Horizons.

Some flopped, some get by.  But let's not delude ourselves- Shadowbane is no WoW.

Of course, we have some trend breakers.  Lineage 2 isn't doing particularly well here (though one could argue that it's not really an established world to North America, given our limited exposure to the original Lineage) while City of Heroes is.

Good design still matters, but it's going to get your game looked at much more seriously if people already have some investment in your world before your release.  <shrug>  It's unfortunate, but that's how it goes.

That was long and fairly pointless.  Apologies.

[kaid]

L2 is not doing good stateside because it is designed for a totally different mentality than you deal with in the states. I played it a bit in beta and it was the most completly lacking in fun game I have ever seen. Down the road I could see where it may get a bit better but there just is no way I would play to level 20+ so I can do something other than auto attack with my dwarf.

Games should be fun RIGHT AWAY.

Eq2's island of refuge and the early newbie zones of WoW do a reasonably good job of being amusing right from the word go. CoH is freaking awsome right away. Even at level 1 you get some fun powers to use and are not sitting beating rats but actually can feel a bit heroic right from the get go.


Kaid

[prettyhatemachine]

CoH got most everything right but unfortunately the players have been dealing with everything wrong with all the other MMOG's they came from.

The market is just too jaded methinks. No one wants another 3-5 year catasser to look forward to.

[HaemishM]

Hell, I think I heard that EQ had an established world at first too.

Yes, it's called Dungeons and Dragons. /rimshot

Actually, I think EQ used a D&D campaign setting that had been used by the developers for years before they started creating games, but I could be pulling that completely out of my ass.

[Llava]

Hell, I think I heard that EQ had an established world at first too.

Yes, it's called Dungeons and Dragons. /rimshot

Actually, I think EQ used a D&D campaign setting that had been used by the developers for years before they started creating games, but I could be pulling that completely out of my ass.

Something like that, yeah.

And I agree 100% about Lineage 2.  Hell, the review that was posted here a while ago reflects my opinion of that game exactly- except I played to 13 before I decided that I just plain did not care.  But it doesn't matter.  If SWG wasn't around, and L2 let you be a Jedi, it'd be doing fantastically.  People will buy crap and force themselves to play it if they're fans of the setting.

[Samprimary]

See, I read the review, saw how early he quit, and understood the general idea, the same thing with EVE:

If you can't make the game fun in the beginning, then you can't tempt me with promises that the game will 'get' fun - there is really no reason whatsoever to have to work for days to make a game get fun, let alone believe in promises of a funner tomorrow.

Me, I played to 28 because I'm an utter goddamned fool. If anything, the game gets more rancid with age. I'm now fairly certain that just about anyone - anyone - who plays to that game's endgame has something wrong with them.