Comments on: Am I spoiled for MMOs?

By: nugget

nugget — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 08:19:09 +0000

^_^ Guild Wars mobs already recognise you, and say different things, depending on what you’ve done.

Not only that, because the world is fully instanced, in some cases (that funeral in nightfall… where you have to help decide which of the kids gets the inheritance), the world changes because of what you’ve done.

Or appears to anyway.

What’s an instance, but another box?

By: mister six

mister six — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 06:49:29 +0000

Some MMO have supported just that. Ultima Online, for example, allowed players to be merchants. Some WoW addons even allow players to be quest givers to other players.

By: spinks

spinks — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 05:54:18 +0000

There are things I love about MMOs that I don’t get from other genres. The virtual world aspect, the huge world to explore, and being able to interact with hundreds of other players. Those are the things that drew me in when I first started, and they’re still the main reasons I play.

But increasingly, I can get the interaction outside the game from tools like twitter and blogs (when I started, it was basically MUDs or IRC if you wanted to chat in real time). Which leaves the virtual world, and that’s not something emphasised in current design.

But on the other side, actual group gameplay has improved a lot and that has been interesting. The quests and storytelling can be fun (and storytelling is an interest of mine), but yes, they’re really not what I got into MMOs for.

By: spinks

spinks — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 05:50:24 +0000

Our household is now PS3 enabled actually But that’s only been for a few weeks.

I think in this case, it’s that being a straight-up fantasy setting, DAO is very reminiscent in many ways of single player MMO gameplay. There are quests, the tactics in fights are similar, you level up, get gear, etc etc. So it all ends up mixed up in my head.

Or maybe just that all RPGs (MMO and otherwise) are trying to simulate a pen and paper game and this just does it better. MMO could easily overtake it if there was any way to have actual players standing in for NPCs.

By: spinks

spinks — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 05:47:44 +0000

There is that. But also it makes me think how much of the appeal of the MMO for me really is in being able to play with other real people.

By: Dblade

Dblade — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 02:14:32 +0000

Eh, I think it’s probably more that you are pc only and haven’t played that many decent offline RPGs recently. The bloom will wear off in a little bit. After all, it’s not like KoTor sucked or was any less mindblowing at the time of it’s release.

To me Persona 3 was incredible, but it didn’t make me want to play MMO’s less, because it filled a different need. One is for narrative, the other is for companionship.

By: Pid

Pid — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 21:46:14 +0000

I have been on a long hiatus from MMOs as of late and I am loving it. I am really hoping TOR can capture some of the best of both worlds. I like story in my games. I could care less about getting a hundred achievements or getting the best gear. I want to be entertained, not have a second job.

I really hope that TOR can give an entertaining story while still having that feel of being in a world full of other players. Here’s hoping they can do the job.

By: Elnia

Elnia — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 18:02:40 +0000

I think it’s an unfair comparison. The point you bring up is actually one that bothered me a lot at first too because there was a time last winter when I took a break from WoW and was playing The Witcher. But an MMO isn’t a single player game. It’s just not. And to expect an apple to be like an orange is unfair to both the apple and the orange. One of the things that I had to do early on was put aside my expectations of what WoW should be an enjoy it for what it is. That doesn’t meant that it’s perfect and that I don’t at times QQ.

Again, I think WoW would be stronger if it added more single player elements to the story. But everything that Blizzard has written about Cataclysm indicates it’s heading in the opposite direction.

By: Sara Pickell

Sara Pickell — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 17:57:46 +0000

I’ve found I live a much happier existence when I don’t bother with MMOs.

By: evizaer

evizaer — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 17:53:33 +0000

Welcome to the reason why I write my blog, Spinks. I’ve never be anything but disappointed by MMOs. Single-player games have done so much more with the medium than MMOs have. MMOs have done almost nothing to harness the possible fun of having thousands of people in a virtual world. MMOs are usually pretty awful games, which drives me away from them within the first month or two (or even week or two).

Would you play WoW if you didn’t already have an infrastructure of friends and thousands of previous hours invested?