It’s time for another installment in my ‘What type of game do you prefer?’ series. This is part 3 in what I hope is a lengthy series to ultimately determine what sort of MMORPG or Online Game players prefer. The past two articles saw great response from gamers with vastly different views. Part 1 asked gamers to focus on graphics vs. gameplay and decide which was more important to them and why. Part 2 was the PvP breakdown where players had to decide if they wanted a gankfest, sheltered pvp, rvr, or absolutely no player vs. player combat. Combining parts one and two I have discovered that my personal preferences lead me towards a good looking game that runs well with great content, where the focus is on RVR and fighting for your realm’s mutual goals. Some PvE is nice as long as it stays within the ‘great content’ boundries.
I want to delve deeper into the PvE content and explore the needs of solo play vs grouping in a massively multiplayer game. Which do you prefer?
A game that is extremely solo friendly where grouping is optional yet beneficial.
A game where grouping is not only beneficial but often required to get most things done. Soloing can be done, but it’s obviously not like option 1.
A game where grouping is absolutely the only ‘real’ way to level. Soloing isn’t worth it. They’re called massively multiplayer for a reason!
Or simply something else?
There are in existence games that fit each of these categories. There are solo games, group friendly games, and games where you can’t go ten feet without having a group. Which do you prefer? There’s truly nothing wrong with any of these types of games and sometimes based on what we feel like playing our choices might change over time. I can say overall though that I enjoy a game where grouping is beneficial and serves a purpose. I also enjoy the ability to solo whenever I feel like it and know that by soloing I am able to still progress with my character. If you forget about the end-game of WoW and you focus on the PvE leveling only it was a fantastic PvE experience. You could group when you wanted or solo when you wanted and still progress well. Other games have this type of gameplay and actually it’s become rather common to have the ability to Solo AND group.
So where are you in all of this? Are you one of the gamers out there who plays a multiplayer game to actually play with others all the time? I actually know people who will not play a MMO that doesn’t require grouping. They want to always group with other people because if they’re not then they figure they might as well be playing Oblivion (Or some other single player RPG). They make a great point that MMORPGs are multiplayer and the reason you play is for interaction with others. Do you agree?
In this day and age people want to rid themselves of the annoying restrictions and barriers. Games are trying to cater to multiple play styles and in the process they are robbing everyone of a complete experience. Look at Lord of the Rings Online and you’ll see a great example of a game trying to do it all yet not really succeding in any one point. The PvP is lacking, the solo play is lacking, the group play is lacking, the raiding is lacking, and on and on and on. Players representing all the play styles are not happy. Should games pick one path and stick with it?
Combining parts 1, 2, and 3, the type of game I want is a good looking game that runs well with great content, where the focus is on RVR and fighting for your realm’s mutual goals. Any PvE content should be fully developed and friendly to both soloing and grouping and be beneficial in some way to both.
What do you prefer? Remember there are no right or wrong answers and the purpose of this is to not only collect the information but find out for ourselves what type of game we prefer. Thank you for any responses and commentary you provide. As I said earlier the response so far to these articles has been above and beyond what I had hoped for in both comments and emails. Part 4 will look at end-game PvE content so check back often!
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I want a game where the word “grouping” doesn’t even come up. UO, EVE, and Puzzle Pirates fit that bill. People alone or join others. The game design makes it so that whichever you do is barely even a thought. I log into EVE and decide I want to go mining. If a corpmate is on, I’ll say “Hey, want to come mining?” If he does, great. If not, I’ll head out on my own. The design of the game is such that even at high levels, low level resources are still valuable, so I can scoot off to a safe corner of space, mine easy stuff and *still* make a profit or have resources to build with. This also means that when Nes or another corpmate takes out their huge mining barges to go rape an asteroid belt, even a newbie miner in the corp can join and ***be a viable contributor to the group.*** UO, EVE, and Puzzle Pirates all have that key element. It is extremely rare to see any LFG-spam in any of those three games. They are also skill-based games so if you team up, neither person is hurt by the other person’s actions. If I am healing you while you punch an orc mage, I gain in my skills and you gain in your skills. My spells don’t reduce your gain from punching, and your punching doesn’t reduce my chance of gain in Focus, Magery, Int, etc. Again, this is all level independent so helping another player or traveling together doesn’t bring the word “grouping” or any of the other nonsense of class-restricted level-based systems into play.
“Grouping” issues are the result of linear game design – EQ, DAoC, LOTRO, WOW, and that ilk.
Yes… I said ilk.
😛
I’m somewhere between your first two choices. I like certain things to require more than one person, but instead need two or three people, but definitely not full groups.
I really enjoyed duoing dungeons in EQ1 and EQ2. In DAOC two of us could take on certain trophy mobs and even do certain epics. We might fail the first or second try, but with the right tactics it could be pulled off. In LOTRO and WoW we could not duo dungeons, heck we couldn’t even do them with four of us. I won’t stick with a game that requires full groups to accomplish most things.
I’m kind of with Aspen here. I like the content to be geared to small groups as this is the amount of players I tend to play with. Its much easier to fill out a 4 person group than a 6 person.
I also like my solo fluff play too. Maybe its because my playstyle has changed now that I am a little older and have more obligations but I just can’t bring myself to join up with people every night.
[…] It’s time for the next installment in my ‘what type of game do you prefer?’ series. I decided to combine parts 4 and 5 into one blog entry due to their more focused questioning. If you haven’t had a chance to check out the first three parts then definitely do so before or after reading further. Part 1 asked gamers to focus on graphics vs. gameplay and decide which was more important to them and why. Part 2 was the PvP breakdown where players had to decide if they wanted a gankfest, sheltered pvp, rvr, or absolutely no player vs. player combat. Part 3 was the solo vs grouping debate and where the perfect balance was for you. Combining the first three parts: the type of game I want is a good looking game that runs well with great content, where the focus is on RVR and fighting for your realm’s mutual goals. Any PvE content should be fully developed and friendly to both soloing and grouping and be beneficial in some way to both. […]