My problem with MMOGs.

[Krakrok]

Why is an entire "game" genre being designed and catered to a "non gaming" population? To me, it's a bizarre idea.

That's like asking why do people build casino's. All EQ clones are pretty much built for the same reason.

[stray]

Do casino's change the underlying mechanics of those games to not even be games though? Poker is still a game, Craps is still a game, Blackjack is still a game. Despite the fact that there may be winnings and prizes, those games can still be fun in and of themselves. There's a difference between having prizes and designing a game from the ground up to only be about prizes (which would be EQ).

When you come to Vegas to win, just the desire to win shit isn't going to get you anywhere. You've got to win at something (be it Poker, Blackjack, or Craps). It's not really the same case with EQ: Just the desire is catered to. That's the "game" (which really isn't a game). 

Anyways...Friday night, and I'm afraid that I'm too lost in my thoughts to articulate what I'm trying to say here in less abstract terms. Apologies. Hopefully the above makes sense.

[Krakrok]

I was referring more to the slot machine than any of the other games of chance. Slot machines are designed from the ground up to only be about prizes. Do people actually derive joy out of the spinning fruit and blinking lights? It may fire off the addicting "ohhh shiny" center in your brain but I seriously doubt it stimulates "fun". The core mechanic in EQ clone MMOs is the same way. The more freedom you have ingame (which makes it more worldy) the more you can piggyback your own fun onto it but the core mechanic is still the same.

One thing I think that does need to be figured out is how to make games like Planetside and WWIIOL have more meaning. Planetside never ends and it's a turn off because you are locked in an endless inevitably pointless struggle. WWIIOL ends when one side takes over (most of?) the map and it resets. This method was also a turn off for me and I'm not sure why since it works for board games like Axis and Allies.

Would forced character retirement (and ending) make for better MMOs? It might hurt player retention but I think the games would be better overall. Would procedurally generated worlds (think Spore) make for a more fulfilling game of Planetside by changing the setting all the time (via some story line mechanic)? Would hot dropping on 1000 different worlds make a difference vs. the same 10 continents or whatever?


You know what is really wrong with MMORPGs (EQ clones)? They are too cozy and safe. The only "danger" in them (exp lose) is fabricated and ultimately meaningless.

[stray]

The more freedom you have ingame (which makes it more worldy) the more you can piggyback your own fun onto it but the core mechanic is still the same.

Hell, if they could just do this part as well the crappy slot machines, then I'd probably stick around longer. If it's Virtual Vegas, then I want my virtual All You Can Eat Buffets too damnit! 

[Llava]

I don't know.  If you don't have some method of keeping score, Poker is pretty goddamn boring.

I'd say that puts it right around the level of MMOGs who, without the dings and points, would be pretty goddamn boring.

[Sky]

The people I'm talking about are those who either 1) Use mmo's as a vrml substitute or 2) Achievers . Those who are more concerned about ends and goals, instead of means. They are playing for fulfilment, if you will, more than they are enjoyment (and there is a sharp difference, I think).

I agree with what you said.

As to "games"....another reason UO kicked ass. You could hang out in a player-run tavern and play chess. Why aren't all these Yahoo Games type games embedded in MMO shitbag advancement/collection games? See Stray's quote above.

[Merusk]

One thing I think that does need to be figured out is how to make games like Planetside and WWIIOL have more meaning. Planetside never ends and it's a turn off because you are locked in an endless inevitably pointless struggle. WWIIOL ends when one side takes over (most of?) the map and it resets. This method was also a turn off for me and I'm not sure why since it works for board games like Axis and Allies.

It works for A&A because when you're 'done' you walk away and don't have anything else invested in the game.  WW2OL you've paid your $15, so you're going to log-in the next day.. and the day after that, even if the game just reset.   Or, if you think 'well i"ll stop as soon as our side wins' and that happens to be the day after a billing period, you're going to feel screwed and continue playing.   Some kind of "pay X and you can play until the win/loss" would be a nice feature in such a game, but then the problem becomes your players WILL game the system so they don't ever have to pay again.

Ultimatly, that's the problem.  MMOs don't have an ending, so people feel obligated to continue playing. And since you're playing the same game over and over again you get bored, and when you're bored you're pissed because you're spending money.   Look at my x-fire. I have 600+ hours invested in WoW.  The next closest game is Civs with 77 hours, then BF2 with 75 hours.  I enjoyed the hell out of those two games, but I'll move-on to something else and replay them again later.  Hell I'll even skip a day or two (or even weeks in the case of BF2) and not feel bad about it with both of them.  WoW, however, I feel obligated to log-in to because I'm paying for it.   Each day I skip might only be $.53, but that sits in in the back of my mind, niggling at me because it does have a cost.  Along with that cost I expect entertainment, and when I'm not entertained I get pissed because I've lost something.

Forced character retirement would only amplify this.  You're not just losing a subscription fee, then, but also all the previous time invested.  The only way you could build that into the game is if the cost for the game was based on the length of the character's life.  Your $15.99 gets you a character that lives X number of hours, after which they coak and die.  Could be intereresting, in fact, and would certainly require a less time-intensive game than we currently see, and allow for devs to worry about a story or a narritave rather than "THE ENDGAME."

Pocedural worlds, however, would only mask the problem for a little while.  1 planet, 3 planets or 3,000 plantes in Planetside you still have the same problem.  Your faction wins most of them, then loses to whichever side the Aussies play while you're at work. It doesn't make the game more interesting if you're on LegoWorld vs JungleWorld if your problem with the core mechanics are 'you can never win'.  It might keep your interest for a little while so you could see all 3,000 environments, but after that you'd still be asking yourself about the futility of it all, which is your core problem.

As to 'no danger'.  There's no danger in ANY mmo, even oldschool UO.  It's a fucking video game, man. The only danger is that you wasted your cash or deluded yourself into thinking that anything in it matters.

[voodoolily]

Pretty much agree with everything you have said Vlily. 

I wonder if there's not a complex problem out there for designers you sort of touch on; namely, the division of people who mainly prefer learning vs. conquering, or in another perspective, those people keen on self-improvement vs. self-promotion.

I think for me it's much simpler than that: I would rather spend money on a product than a service. It's probably why I have a sweet collection of mounted insects but have only been to a salon once in my life. I'll always have those insects, and I can cut my own damn hair.

[Merusk]

I think for me it's much simpler than that: I would rather spend money on a product than a service. It's probably why I have a sweet collection of mounted insects but have only been to a salon once in my life. I'll always have those insects, and I can cut my own damn hair.

Do you have Cable TV?  If so, how do you justify the payment for that service vs just broadcast TV?   I saw this question posed in a discussion about game micropayments and I haven't come up with an answer as to why I can justify Cable TV for myself but not game micropayments. So, how would you justify a CATV sub, but not a game sub.

[voodoolily]

My fiance pays for the cable. Besides, we have a Tivo so combined with HBO it's basically like having free movies that we can watch whenever we want (kinda like buying a DVD). Obviously we spend money on some services (internet, electricity, water, etc.), but generally speaking, I'd rather have something to hold in my hands. Guild Wars made a huge stride by not having monthly charges, but not many other games are following suit.

Also, regarding twitch as an alternative to the much-maligned auto-attack, I hate to be fussy but I'm not a huge fan of fps either. Oh wells.

[Krakrok]

As to 'no danger'.  There's no danger in ANY mmo, even oldschool UO.  It's a fucking video game, man. The only danger is that you wasted your cash or deluded yourself into thinking that anything in it matters.

You missinterpreted what I ment about danger. I ment there is no danger for your character. Ultimately your character can not lose. There is no item loss. There is no stat loss. There is no age or limb loss. Your character is like an ageless person in a padded cell with a straight jacket playing dress up while getting force fed lollipops.

Take Mount & Blade for example. Your band can get wiped out, you can get robbed, you have to crawl back to town with only your life, and then start over. EQ clones have no equivalent mechanic as getting your group wiped out means nothing except for the time it takes to get back to the camp spot. There are no character changing moments in an EQ clone. You choose a fighter character and no matter what happens to that fighter character he will always be a fighter character. He can die a thousand deaths and only gets stronger.

I guess what I'm advocating for is less emphasis a single static invincible character+items and more emphasis on multiple dynamic characters that have a definitive beginning and end to them.

[Sauced]

Well, CoV has wonderful Mission Failure, where you can lose the contact that started the mission, and any potential story arcs that you might like to look at without rolling an alt.  That's a fairly severe penalty, in my opinion, but is built into the game in such a fashion that you still get a little token XP for going through the arc.

[stray]

I hate to be fussy but I'm not a huge fan of fps either. Oh wells.

I wouldn't say that twitch is neccessarily "fps". Just something that mostly relies on your observance and input, and not left randomly to the character dice rolls.

Not all games that require you to be an active participant are fps's. Is Donkey Kong an fps? When Donkey Kong is hurling flaming barrels at you, do you just stand there, relying on some dice rolling mechanic to see whether you get hit or not?

No. The game leaves it up to you to just jump out of the way.

[Cheddar]

Basing any opinion on VD's dislike is paramount to disaster.  NO MORE BLOW JOBS, MAKES ME FEEL INFERIOR! 

Blah.



Edit.  666 On this post.  Nice.  Fuck all of you.  Seriously.

[Rasix]

Chill, Winston.

[stray]

Seriously though, what the hell moment of drama did I miss? There are two people who've lately been pretty rude to her, and I have no understanding as to why.

I'm not even defending her here, she's a big girl. I just wonder why it keeps seeping into various threads. What makes it that important?

[schild]

Nothing. I think Cheddar is upset he has no good games to play right now. Also known as sand in the gamer's vagina. We've all had that before. Hell, isn't that how these types of sites are started?

[stray]

To be honest, I don't know what type of gaming site this is anymore. Or what it was in the first place. Or where exactly I fit in.

Not an insult or anything. I really just don't know. Threads like this confuse me all the more.

[Glazius]

Well, CoV has wonderful Mission Failure, where you can lose the contact that started the mission, and any potential story arcs that you might like to look at without rolling an alt.  That's a fairly severe penalty, in my opinion, but is built into the game in such a fashion that you still get a little token XP for going through the arc.

What?

Uh, after I failed the capper (or possibly middle mission, I don't know) for an arc from Dmitri Russianov or whoever in Cap Au Diable, he went right back to giving me his next story arc involving his old creations and the Spetsnaz.

The CauD contacts you get from the paper/broker stop giving you new missions at 16, unless you're already on a story arc in which case they'll let you finish. At 16 (or at 15 if you fill the bar) they pass you off to the next tier up - Wheeler, the Golden Roller, and Marshall Brass.

--GF

[Pococurante]

Now to my point. I had a ton of fun during that time. I had a clear enemy in game (one I couldnt attack), and the politicing between the guilds on the server really made it enjoyable to me. It also made it VERY sweet when he guild, which rocket to be one of the most powerful on the server, crashed and burned. I felt vindicated.

This game sounds familiar to me... Oh Yes!! ;)

[Rasix]

To be honest, I don't know what type of gaming site this is anymore. Or what it was in the first place. Or where exactly I fit in.

Not an insult or anything. I really just don't know. Threads like this confuse me all the more.

Don't be such a damn drama queen. Cheddar was being a douche, he's often a douche towards voodoolilly. 

Here, have a kitten.   

[stray]

Drama queen?

Just telling the truth. I have no idea where the hell many people are coming from half the time.

Take MMO fans for instance...

[Zane0]

People laugh at guild competition and dynamics and whatnot, but really, social interaction and relationships seem to be a very large factor in what substains long-term MMO subscriptions.  You can advocate the continuous content that is unique to MMOs, but that's all essentially a catalyst to keep social interaction fresh; that's how I see it, at least.  When one wants immediately engaging and fulfulling entertainment without any of that "other people" BS, persistant worlds aren't exactly the best place to look. 

I find it interesting that so many of you fine folk reject this idea, even when it has been at the heart of the genre, or medium, or whatever, since its inception, pretty much.

Perhaps things will change or evolve?  It's not my place to say, but I imagine technology puts a large restraint on many ideas.

[Sauced]

What?

Uh, after I failed the capper (or possibly middle mission, I don't know) for an arc from Dmitri Russianov or whoever in Cap Au Diable, he went right back to giving me his next story arc involving his old creations and the Spetsnaz.

The CauD contacts you get from the paper/broker stop giving you new missions at 16, unless you're already on a story arc in which case they'll let you finish. At 16 (or at 15 if you fill the bar) they pass you off to the next tier up - Wheeler, the Golden Roller, and Marshall Brass.

--GF

I was specifically referring to the Ghost Widow/Wretch story arc.

[Calantus]

I never get the "wasting time" philosophy when it comes to MMOGs. I'm a lazy bastard, and while not anti-social, I am no socialite. This leaves me with a lot of free time that I will never fill with anything remotely constructive. If I wasn't playing MMOGs I'd be playing other games, or reading, or watching tv, or listening to music, or painting minature soldiers, or something that is on the whole rather unconstructive. If I'm happy doing what I'm doing then my recreation time is being spent in a manner I want it to. If I'm not having fun I'll just drop what I'm doing and move on. No time is wasted because the time was wasted the very second I had no work or social responsibilities for that timeframe.

If I grind at Tyr's hand for 3 hours straight (yep, done that quite a few times) I didn't necessarily have fun but nothing else in the moment appealed to me more and it didn't really bother me. If I had a good book I felt like reading I'd be doing that, if a good show was on I'd be watching TV, if my mates were at a bar and I felt like going I'd be there, etc. When I look back I don't see X amount of hours spent playing a game I no longer like, I see X amount of idle hours that were filled by something that was as or more enjoyable than anything else available to me at the time.

/shrug

Also I now love guild dynamics and can totally relate to what Morphiend is saying. I wont relate the ins and outs of whats going on in my little corner of WoW but suffice to say it is a source of enjoyment for me at the moment. It's like playing any other game in a way. In an FPS you might come to a point that is difficult for you and you die and die and get frustrated, but you are still having fun at the same time, and once you get past that point you feel real good about it. Guild drama is like a different mode or style within the game IMO, like say jumping puzzles. If you come across a tough jumping puzzle in an FPS and you don't like them you will hate it. You just want to get back to shooting at things and the puzzle is in the way. If on the other hand you LIKE jumping puzzles you'll have a ball, even if sometimes it does get frustrating and sometimes it makes you want to quit in weaker moments, you still are having fun. That's the way I am with guild drama/politics atm. Sure it's a pain in the ass sometimes but it is still a source of enjoyment for me, and that's all that counts.

Maybe some of you wont be able to understand that, but it's like watching a scary movie or tear jerker. While you are evoking negative emotions most of the time, you do so purposefully because in some way that is enjoyable for you. Hope you guys see what I'm trying to say, it is 5am for me and I've been up quite some time.

[stray]

I never get the "wasting time" philosophy when it comes to MMOGs.

Err....We're just speaking in relation to games. "Wasting time" isn't used in some all encompassing sense of the phrase.

It's just our way of seperating the directly game oriented activities from the more indirect ones.

[voodoolily]

Yeah, in particular I use "grind" to connotate gameplay that feels like actual work and is not fun. Like I said, sometimes I don't mind killing a bunch of baddies for rupees so I can buy the sweet whatever, but sometimes it's physically exhausting irl to sit and plug away at some bullshit just to advance or move forward in a game. I never really think of gaming as a waste of time unless I spend two hours trying to figure something out and realize it was fairly obvious from the beginning.

[Sky]

It's a waste of time to sit in an overcamped Guk waiting for the Sage to spawn every half-hour. Well, hoping it's not his placeholder, in which your entire hour was wasted. Then hoping he has his drop, if not, again, wasted time.

After camping the motherfucking jboots for the better part of a year on and off, I can say EQ wasted a lot of my time, and is directly responsible for the bulk of my dislike of mmogs.

I could sit defense in a base in Planetside and not see a soul for an hour and not feel it was wasted. It's when the game wastes my time by design that I get staebby.

[Hoax]

Go read El Gallo's post I quoted on the first page of the thread.  It is the perfect summation of how EQ clones suck monkey balls, made by someone who was just realistically theorizing how the power creep in WoW will work.

[El Gallo]

Evil PvPers twisting my words against the true Gospel!

Unlike most of the strident casuals, I don't cry myself to sleep every night because Furor has shinier pixels than I do.  I just don't fucking care.  All I care about is that there is enough fun/challenging/interesting/new/rewarding stuff for me to do.  I care about power creep only indirectly, because it makes it difficult for the design team to do that.  WoW looks like they may be able to contain power creep so I get what I want. 

Of course, I am a PvEr first.  I dabble in PvP quite a bit for fun, but it isn't my raison d'etre.  I understand why people who are PvPers first and foremost want equally shiny (or equally effective) pixels.  However, you cannot have meaningful PvP in a persistent world MMO.  People need to accept this and move on.   

[Shockeye]

However, you cannot have meaningful PvP in a persistent world MMO.  People need to accept this and move on.   

Perhaps not for largenormous MMOs, but niche MMOs can certainly still do it.

[HaemishM]

However, you cannot have meaningful PvP in a persistent world MMO.  People need to accept this and move on.   

Perhaps not for largenormous MMOs, but niche MMOs can certainly still do it.

Unfortunately, too few people give a shit about creating them, because they are constantly chasing the big-budget blockbuster MMOG.

[tazelbain]

When playing a game for an extended period of time, I like to "not know what's around corner" so I can go around the corner and find good and bad things. With the current crop of PvE games it doesn't take long before I feel the know whats around the corner.  The death penalties and harsh PvP, I feel punished for looking around corner.  But with good PvP, going around the corner stays interesting much longer. So, I am not married to PvP but its the only thing that can hold my attention for any length.  I long for the day when somebody with bust out of the rut and make a game where going around the corner is interesting again.  But, with WoW, the rut seems to be widening.

[Hoax]

Evil PvPers twisting my words against the true Gospel!

Unlike most of the strident casuals, I don't cry myself to sleep every night because Furor has shinier pixels than I do.  I just don't fucking care.  All I care about is that there is enough fun/challenging/interesting/new/rewarding stuff for me to do.  I care about power creep only indirectly, because it makes it difficult for the design team to do that.  WoW looks like they may be able to contain power creep so I get what I want. 

Of course, I am a PvEr first.  I dabble in PvP quite a bit for fun, but it isn't my raison d'etre.  I understand why people who are PvPers first and foremost want equally shiny (or equally effective) pixels.  However, you cannot have meaningful PvP in a persistent world MMO.  People need to accept this and move on.   

I think your post was great, it wasn't anything but a realistic answer to someone's question of whether they should bother doing all the work to get into MC/BWL now or if they can just sit back and wait for the creep and the resulting easy-mode MC equivalent loot drops.

But in the context of Voodoo's thread about why she doesn't understand the deal with MMO's its a perfect example of something console gamers just will not tolerate.

Your post boils down to:

-Defeat initial content to get uber loot
-New content (initial content difficulty+1)
-Defeat new content to get uber loot+1
Repeat...

Which is fine, as long as the encounters and zones get bigger and more detailed, the gear gets more shiney and they introduce new color coded levels of awesomeness in their itemization its all good fun.

I've got nothing against that, but the fact is it takes a ton of time to create new content and new uber loot therefore it is important to make sure that defeating the content is as big as a timesink as possible (remember they need you to stick around to get your sub money).  Hence the 20+ player raids, flag systems, monster camping, rare drops, long grinds to get to the content/loot endgame and so on.

[El Gallo]

Yeah, you and I are on the same page there.  You are right to boil it down to get sword a to kill dragon 1 for sword b, which you use to kill dragon 2. . . . Though this has pretty much been the model of just about every computer and console RPG since Akalabeth.   I am fully aware that it takes a fuckton of money to make content and that this model requires a super-mega-fuckton of content to keep moving.  I accept that there will always be some downtime built in, even for games that make a billion dollars their first year (this would still be true even if said game wasn't designed by a gaming house known for slowness and owned by a megacorp like Vivendi which is hemorrhaging money out of every other orifice of its vast, bloated body).

All Akalabeth-style RPG games (the FFs, the Bgs, the NWNs, the KotORs and all the rest)  water down their content to make them last longer.  Now, they don’t (most of them) water down the content with as much filler as WoW does, but the difference is not outrageous.  At least not to me.  To me, the filler-to-content ratio in WoW is acceptable, but the filler-to-content ratio in EQ or FFO is unacceptable.  I don’t expect single-player level filler-to-content ration in MMOGs. Keep in mind that MMOGs are cheaper: people are essentially bitching that they don’t get the equivalent of a new KotOR II delivered to their doorstep every week for $15 a month (this is the main reason I wish they could charge a lot more for these games).  Even if I had an infinite amount of money, I couldn’t get 15 hours a week of quality single-player CRPGing for the next few years.  Even if I could, it just plain is not as fun for me if 

Anyway, assuming you like Akalabeth-style RPG games, and want to play a massively multiplayer, persistent world version, this is something you have to face.  Pick a game that is matched well to the amount of time you want to play.  Considering my filler-to-content standards, WoW works well for me because I play about 15 hours a week.  If I played 5hours a week, I think that I wouldn’t be able to get shit done.  If I played 40 hours a week, I think I’d have run out of things to do a long time ago.

Now, there’s other things to consider too, of course.  I don’t mind 20-40 person raids.  In fact, I rather enjoy them.  I find them challenging and fun, so long as you are not guilded with a bunch of asstards.  I don’t guild with large numbers of asstards.  Some people absolutely must be the star every second they play, so they naturally won’t enjoy that.  Maybe they want an even more soloable game.  There are costs though.  There is downtime built in to grouping, and a learning curve built into cooperative play.  A single player oriented game will go by much faster, unless it has some other filler to provide downtime.

Anyway, I’ve rambled a lot here.  The post that started this thread is the same post that people have made on this board and its predecessors for years (and I know the author knows that, just like I know this reply is the same one me or someone else has made to those other posts).  The genre isn’t for everyone, and I don’t think that means there is something wrong with the genre.  What gets on my nerves is the idea that there is some easy formula to radically change things – that developers are just morons too stupid to stop making games along this formula (though I have given in to this mentality many times myself).  I don’t think they (by and large) are.  They make games according to this formula because this formula has worked for 25 years.

The “cures” for this state of affairs are far worse than the disease.  Cure #1 is randomly generated content, which means content is now cheap enough to remove all the filler.  However, randomly generated content fucking sucks balls and will always suck balls.  Cure #2 is the PvP oriented game, where other players are the content.  The problem here is that PvP is only meaningful if a match hurts the loser and/or helps the winner.  But this quickly devolves into perma-winners and perma-losers unless you do regular board wipes (which is why every competitive game or sport wipes the board between matches).  Doing that is the equivalent of getting on your knees and begging your players to quit.

I just don’t see the radical genre-shattering re-write (other than pure chatroom “games with no game in them”, like the imaginary Sims-Online-That-Doesn’t-Suck).  The genre will get better by refining current principles and adding new bells and whistles.  You can have an Akalabeth/Diku style MMOG with more Koster-dollhouse features, so long as those features are subordinate to the core game.  You can have an Akalabeth/Diku style MMOG with a PvP sub-game with ladder scoring but no meaningful in-game effects beyond some relatively insignificant extra gear (WoW does this pretty well, though it would be better if PvE achievements had less of an impact on PvP).  Of course you can have Akalabeth/Diku style MMOGs with varying levels of those two add-ons, and with varying content-to-filler ratios, settings, and group-dependency.  But I don’t see a radical re-invention of the whole genre coming along for, well, ever.

You either like the genre or you don’t.