There are games that have redefined the way we, as players, look at the MMORPG genre. There are games that have survived over a decade with strong community and player support. When asked what their favorite games are many players will likely respond with the same answers. There are games that bring players back into the fold even after being gone for many years. These are truly great games. I have long thought to myself why it is we stop playing a game and move on to the next big thing. This question has no true answer or justification; it is simply a perplexing feeling that each player must come to terms with in his or her own time.
When I look back and try to fashion the greatest MMORPG experience I have ever had the image that comes to my mind is that of Dark Age of Camelot. DAOC is the game that will forever hold a special place for me that no game will ever come close to filling. Why is it that, for me, Dark Age of Camelot was the greatest game ever? And if it was so great why did I stop playing so soon? These are the questions I feel compelled to try and investigate through writing this blog entry.
DAOC had a fantastic leveling system. Each time I leveled my character I felt a sense of true accomplishment and pride. I would often join with others for an adventure into a dungeon or region and form bonds with these players like I have never been able to replicate in latter MMOs. Crafting in DAOC was fun, complex, and useful to players. Through crafting players would obtain nearly the same scale of items that one could obtain through large raids or difficult quests. Keep in mind I did say that I quit DAOC relatively early in it’s life so much of this might have changed. DAOC had the best PVP system ever conceived; we know it as RVR.  Realm vs. Realm combat redefined the sense of purpose for player on player combat. With the realm pride and community that RVR created, Mythic had on their hands a true masterpiece. Why then did I quit?
To this day I am uncertain why it was I stopped playing DAOC. My time in the game came to a close right as ToA (the second expansion) was hitting shelves. I had a fantastic guild (shout out to Fist of the North on Percival!) and multiple maxed out characters that I was proud to call my own. I enjoyed the PVE aspects of the game and took breath each day purely to live for RVR. I was a fanboy zealot for this game. DAOC was not perfect, as nothing in this world will ever be, but it was a truly fun experience. I stopped playing DAOC and began my life in Star Wars Galaxies.
SWG had the whole package from the start. It was a MMORPG set in the Star Wars theme with so many sensational gameplay mechanics. The housing system where players could purchase their own homes and place them out in the world with the opportunity to decorate it made SWG personal. Players choosing the role of a Doctor sat in towns healing players who would visit the hospitals. Performers gave cantinas life that has never before or ever will be found in a tavern-like place. The community was once again the greatest asset to this great game. To clarify, in case you are wondering, I stopped playing SWG before the game took a turn for the worse. After the horrid management decisions it would have been a no brainer to cancel my account. Keep in mind my decision to leave came before this occured.
DAOC and SWG are just the tip of the iceberg for me. As stated before every player has their favorite MMORPG. I hear daily how UO and AC were fantastic MMO’s. When I listen to others profess their love for their favorites, as I have now done, it always brings a smile to my face. There’s something magical about these games. Why do many of us then stop playing and move on when we are still enjoying the game? For me it has always been about playing the newest “best thing”. I am guilty of always giving a game a try when I feel it deserves it. Many times I will hold onto my subscription to a favorite game for months before canceling and moving on.
One of the only reasons I can force myself to swallow is that we outgrow these games much like we do clothing or shoes when we are younger. Our favorite shirt from when we were five years old may have been in perfect condition but it no longer fits as we age. Our favorite games may no longer fit as we grow, age, and mature into something new. It’s not the fault of these games and it’s not really our fault either. That’s one reason. Great games come and go and I always despise myself for letting them get away. I could have still been playing DAOC to this day. I could have continued playing SWG, UO, EQ (which I have not done justice in this post. It deserves a paragraph), EQ2, and the list just goes on.
The only thing that gives me hope is that without my inability to continue playing games for many years after their time in the spotlight I would never have experienced the next best thing. Maybe that is my answer… great games die so that new ones can be born. Still, even as I have reasoned and perhaps justified my actions, I can not accept my reasons for denying myself the experiences I could have had. I truly envy those players who have stuck with their favorites; such as those who have stayed with AC and EQ from day one.
I hope that with the next wave of MMORPGs I can find one that defies this trend and holds my attention for more than a few years. Before I wrap up this entry I want to leave you all with a thought that just came to me. Perhaps it is a good thing that I quit these games when I did and perhaps it is a blessing that I have these fond memories to look back on and share with others. Here I am thinking how unfortunate I am when I should be grateful. To borrow and bastardize a line from one of my favorite movies, “Great games get remembered, but Legends never die”. And there you have it.
I tend to think the tendency to move onward comes from a much simpler place. These games may create nifty systems and great communities, but they tend to need more than that to hold people. For example, I absolutely loved playing Warcraft for more than two years, but after a while you tire of seeing all the same types of content over again. It’s like a television series—no matter how much you enjoy it, often by the time it’s had a good run, viewers are ready to see it come to a close. Eventually people just need a change of pace when it comes to their escapism, otherwise it ceases to be escapism and becomes just a different daily grind.
For me the toughest thing to wrap my head around is that when I quit, for example, DAOC and SWG, I was still having a TON of fun! I wanted to keep playing but I wanted to try something new so that I didn’t miss out.
I’m just glad that I can look back and say that I truly enjoyed those and never saw the day when perhaps they did become stale or poorly managed.
I, like most MMO players, was originally a console gamer. I’m a huge Nintendo dork to this day. The longest I’ve ever played one console game still stands with Zelda: The Ocarina of Time. I’ve played though it several times, and probably spend over 100 hours doing so. But that’s an oddity for me.
Console games in general do not lend themselves to long periods of play. You play it, you beat it, you maybe come back to it one day down the road to revisit the places and the characters.
But with MMOs, they’re designed from the ground up to be long ventures. You’re meant to play them for months, years, maybe even a decade as the case is with some players and Ultima Online.
But me? I can’t help but still get tired of a game after a certain amount of time. You’ll never see me playing an MMO for more than 6 months at a time. Even with WoW, to which I was most “addicted” I took breaks at 6 months.
Games online or off, are a lot like movies, or books, or even music. Like these other entertainment mediums, you can get tired of repeating what they have to offer over and over again. You may always love a game. You may remember it as one of your favorites, but once the newness has worn off you may never share the same affection for it you once had when your senses first experienced it.
It’s not a question of liking a game, it’s a question of how long a person can repeat content, how long they can repeat tasks, before it becomes stale and the natural desire for something new comes along.
I love the LotR Movies. I love the Godfathers. But I’ve seen them so many times these days it’s hard to really enjoy them, regardless of the fact that they’re on my list of all time favorites. The same goes for the Sin City novels, Harry Potter, LeGuin’s Earthsea, and so on and so forth.
Anyway, I’ll stop rambling. My point is, that the mind always wants something new to take in, to feed on. And that’s why we always want a new game eventually. And oddly enough, this is always why we’re so tolerant of sequels. Familiar, but new.
[…] Before I get to my "real" topic, though, I wanted to thank Keen for his great post on Why Do Great Games Die? that he wrote yesterday. Once in a while there are articles posted that a person really "gets" or "connects with", and this one was one of those times. Great thoughts, Keen. Keep up the great blog. It is quickly becoming one of my favourite daily reads. […]