It’s been a recurring theme with many bloggers and other vocal MMO players out there. The current trend of MMORPG gameplay is getting old! It hit me this past week as I started to feel the continued burn out on Lord of the Rings. I’ve written a few things over the past month or so about my slowly growing distaste for LOTRO but I am not quite sure it’s all LOTRO’s fault anymore. Lately I’ve been losing that urge to play any fantasy based MMO where leveling and adventuring for gear or other upgrades is the only staple of gameplay. I’ve finally reached that point where I can say I’ve had enough… at least for now.
I’m not trying to come across as difficult or demanding. What the current MMO’s have to offer just isn’t good enough anymore. I’m done with the gear grinds and the constant one way street that today’s MMO’s offer us players. Today in LOTRO the thought of creating an alt came to mind but I quickly pushed it out of my mind because I can’t bring myself to following a funneled predefined path of Levels 1-50 doing the same thing over and over again. There’s nothing dynamic about doing the same thing every day for your entire character’s life. Sure, the various locations you visit look different and no two dungeons are “exactly” the same but in the end they all serve one purpose and that’s to get you to the end. Take World of Warcraft for example. WoW has one of the best leveling up experiences in any game out there. It’s polished and there’s loads to do but in the end you are being herded like cattle to their suffocating end-game gear grind (Raiding).
I have a point, I promise. I know I speak a lot about the games coming out soon like Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning and Pirates of the Burning Sea but there’s a reason behind it. These two games are bringing dynamic and enriching varied gameplay back to the MMO scene. I know WAR is technically Fantasy but it’s getting away from the “leveling” so hear me out. WAR will have RVR and scenarios driving the general focus of the game towards a rewarding “PVP” based game where no two afternoons are going to be the same. It’s already been said that gear will be less than 50% important for your character because skill will make up for the rest. So you literally do not need to grind any gear and you don’t need to ever be the best to be competitive. You can log in and make the time you have to play however mixed up and fun as you want. WAR has the dynamic style of PVP but let’s talk about the “open style” of Pirates of the Burning Sea. In PotBS you will have an entire economy and world under total player control. From resource gathering to building a shop to pillaging over 70 ports it’s all about living the life you choose. There’s leveling in these games but it’s not the focus!
Now to satisfy those of you out there who are saying to yourselves “it’s been done before” let me tell you that you are correct! This type of play has most definitely been done before and the best example I can think of is Star Wars Galaxies. It was a player run economy that gave the players a world to mold and live in how they choose in the friendly Star Wars galaxy. But due to some severe development mistakes the game took a nose dive and lost major popularity. SWG wasn’t the only one out there. I was never really into the original UO but I hear it has many of the qualities I have been writing about.
If you absolutely disagree with everything I have said so far or you don’t understand me then perhaps you haven’t reached the point of exhaustion that myself and many others have. Trust me it’s not like we want to feel the way we do about the games out there. They aren’t bad games by any means they just are more of the same. So where does this put me? I return to my search for the next great game with hopes that MMO developers will take the cue from their players and give us that diamond in the rough.
I won’t stop looking.
I like em all. 🙂 But only a select few games coming out or already out will get my subscription fees. I’ll likely buy most of the upcoming MMOs, even if I don’t play them past the 1st month. A month played in an MMO is more than I ever get out of single-player games these days. There’s something to be said for that. I actually feel like I’m getting my money’s worth.
On topic though, indeed, something new is wanted by a lot of us MMO vets. Auto Assault was close for me, but in the end just more of the same with a nifty setting. I sincerely think *wink* that PotBS will deliver on its promise for something different. I also think that Warhammer will take the fantasy MMO and refine it past even what Blizzard has been able to do.
It’ll be interesting to see what the other games like Conan, Gods and Heroes, etc all do with their respective hooks. At least it’s nice to see so many MMOs in the pipeline, and though it won’t happen, I wish them all success. Because the more games out there, the more variety we may have.
I’ve been thinking a bit about this too. I love LOTRO, but am feeling the one trick pony that you mention. Hopefully LOTRO will continue to work on expanding so that there are multiple things to do. E.g., one of the book quests “Call of Men†required you to get some people together and defend Trestlebridge. Then, waves of orcs attacked. It was a blast. You felt like you were repulsing the forces of evil. If they could incorporate more of this, it would be great (e.g., have a zone/instance where people could play either side and fight for helm’s deep or something…hehe sounds like some pvp). They also had a dev pop in a zone once and all the players were trying to repulse the orcs they were sending. If they could incorporate more of that. But fed-ex this, kill that, get to the end to repeat. It starts to feel mundane after the 2,000th time you’ve done it, even with it well done in LOTRO.
In WAR it sounds like they are attempting to incorporate multiple things to do. The reason people leave games is once you’ve done it, there’s little impetus to repeating it. However, like you said, if the experience can be and will be different then you have something that at least attempts to change the “tried†pattern.
IMHO the key is a goal or a struggle for a goal. What is the goal of LOTRO? In WAR the goal is to whoop some butt or get whooped…lol. To me a lot of mmorpgs are like school. It was fun (lol) the first time, but how many of us would do it again? DAOC/WAR is like a sport…the rules don’t change, but you play over and over and over again.
G (-:
I agree that as much as I absolutely love LotRO and its take on things, and will continue playing it, I don’t put in the hours I used to when I was playing WoW. I really am hoping for something different. I can’t afford to be paying out more than a couple of subscription fees, so there’s a definite limit to how many games I’m willing to play, which means they’ll pretty much HAVE to come out with something new and compelling to get my money. Now, Pirates… what I’m hearing has my attention!
I would suggest Darkfall or Fury. Both not very MMO like
http://www.burningsea.com
Read up, me hearties! If you’ve ever played Sid Meier’s Pirates and wished that it could be an MMO, you will have it granted soon.
Well Eve Online is different and rather rewarding if you put time into learning it.
On the other hand, the learning curve is quite steep and you do have to put in time.
Yeah I really have big regrets that I never gave Eve a try. I hear it was a fantastic game once you got into it. The only thing stopping me from jumping into it now is that we have blockbusters on the horizon.
Bildo—well, I’m sure I’m far too late (story of my life), but I did put in a beta app for Pirates. 🙂
Every game, MMO or not has a way of measuring success. It could be gear, levels, epics, crafting etc…. Most games have them all. You have to have a measuring stick or how else would you be able to determine success. Even long running games like DAOC and its RvR concept can be boring after a while. All MMO’s have some type of grind to them and I don’t think anyone will be able to get rid of it.
I think the Matrix had a great concept with the live events if it weren’t for the lag. If a Dev could have live events without the lag imagine the battle for Helms Deep.
All games become boring after a while. I thought I’d still be playing WoW today when I bought it 3 years ago. But I did get a ton of hours and fun out of the title before I burnt out on it and got frustrated with the endgame material.
If I never go back to LotRO (doubtful), I’ll have gotten well over 100 hours of playtime out of it. CoH, though I’ve only subbed for like 4 months total: 40+ hours.
My point is, regardless of how long we stick with an MMO, the truth is that they wind up being well worth the money spent, and much more so than your average game.
There are very precious few offline single-player games that I’ve spent as much time in as an MMO. Super Smash Brothers Melee being 1 of a handful. They are out there though. Just not as easy to come across.
But I agree with Keen on the Fantasy MMO burnout. It’s bound to happen when the Fantasy MMO barely changes from title to title in its gameplay. Innovations are needed. But not half-baked ones. Good, solid, gameplay and design innovations. Getting rid of the tedious things is a good place to start.
WoW, LotRO, newer EQ2, are all taking steps in this direction. I’ve no doubt Warhammer will as well. And GW took a giant step by getting rid of the the long travel aspects. Some will argue that those type of timesinks are “immersion” factors. And that may be. But for me, their barriers to enjoyment.
The Fantasy MMO is not done. It’s in a shifting period. WoW brought it out of the dank depths of “niche”… now it’s time to refine it. That’s my view anyway.
I have to agree, Bildo—I certainly got my money’s worth out of both the basic Warcraft game and TBC; I just have to decide where that point ends with the expansions, and I expect this will probably be it. I think part of the problem with games not changing so much from title to title is that after a while it starts to feel like nothing more than an expansion to the games you’re already playing, just with a makeover, an expensive price tag, and no ready-made access to your old gaming buddies—and people do see through that eventually.
I think WoW has been popular for so long that it made people think it might be possible to have one game that kind of went on forever, and maybe folks are just waking back up to the reality that eventually change has to come from without in the form of new games.
Nice segue into this, for me Heather…
AHEM!
Pirates of the Burning Sea.
Now, I’m not trying to tell you all what to play, but I am. Play it and love it when it comes out. The only way we’ll keep getting varying types of MMOs is if we play the ones that dare to be different.
So as much as we all say we are sick of the Fantasy MMO, it’ll only ever change if we actually branch out and try the different games when they come out.
Lol! I dropped a beta app in yesterday, and you have certainly convinced me to give it a try. Although really all I needed to know was the whole huge scope of crafting/player economy. 😉
If you’re in too, Heather, it seems you, I, Keen, and Fred have ourselves the beginnings of a Society. Please tell me your considering going Pirate. It’s the hardest of lives on the sea, but it’s the only true FREE one. 🙂
We should really start planning… you lot, e-mail me.
bildotheirish at hotmail dot com
[…] – Introduction – What are we playing now and what are we looking forward to? – Wrath of the Lich King and why we won’t be playing. – Is the honeymoon over for LOTRO? (Blog Post) – Are Fantasy MMO’s a one way street? (I’m all leveled out on Fantasy MMORPGs) – Question the Norm and change things up! – Melmoth’s Tree Analogy – Our hopes for Pirates of the Burning Sea – We talk Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning – Wrapping it up – Bildo’s Blog – Common Sense Gamer – The Ancient Gaming Noob – Cuppytalk […]