WoW right now is like original Everquest: You are forced to group. But, in contrast to EQ, you don't even decide with whom!
(1)
I understand why the companies make single player games with 8-hour (or less) narratives. These games feel different even if the gameplay is the same and they are cheap to produce. In a world in which a lot of players apparently play a game only for 8 hours (or less) this is clearly the correct business decision. I actually buy these games every now and then. It's a nice diversion from movies - even if the stories are always much worse.
That having said, MMOs don't profit from narratives like this. I just quit a short Rift session, because I couldn't stand those hundreds of quest givers who talk my ears off. Or rather my eyes. I don't care about these stories that an 8-year old could have come up with! It is obviously just a way to keep me busy. And it fails. I get bored. I don't want to read and read and read irrelevant background information somebody obviously only invented to keep me playing. It just doesn't work like that.
(2)
Moreover, don't add to these stories vertically, please. Logging into my Rift characters feels like coming late into a movie; a movie that is told by dailies. I don't care about YOUR story, Trion. At least not to the extend that you assume. I enjoy some good background information for a fantasy world. I also appreciate the possibility to read up on it. But what I really want is to log on and get into the action. No, not fast-paced action with finishing moves that make my screen explode: Just normal, good-old MMORPG action!
I guess, I'm pretty damn 'casual' nowadays. But maybe I have always been: other people in MMORPGs are fine. They add a lot to the game. But I don't want to be forced to play with them; especially not in anonymous groups! In Rift, leveling is a bit more fun, yet far from perfect.
(3)
All I want is to log in, get out into the world, and play my character. No instances or teleports are required for that. Certainly no grouping is required for that. I want to group when I meet someone I want to group with; maybe if I come across optional content that requires more players in an organic way. Just let me play alone and explore a world!
What is so difficult about designing a huge (huge!!) world full of caves and forests and deadly deserts and oceans and lakes and mountains and hills and mobs that populate these areas in an interesting way? Interesting means that some of these mobs move. Some of them move in groups. Some of the groups guard something valuable. Some mobs are just alone. Some areas are guarded by groups of mobs, but I can try to sneak past by discovering an 'unknown valley'. Or group up and kill them. This kind of gameplay - just a bit worse - kept players playing Diablo II for forever!
If the landscape is large enough and methods of travel, like carvans and over-night travel exist, it's not necessary to have the world instanced and generated just for me. Just procedurally generate it once and keep it static. Perhaps allow me to build a house somewhere. Add mechanics that encourage building villages in the nowhere. Have different areas of the world drop different materials. Add some player-run trade in one form or another.
Allow me to hunt for gems or rare materials or anything that I can trade for better equipment or a house back in the villiage. No teleport is required for this if the act of traveling is actually kept interesting by good placement of mobs. You don't have to kill everything in sight, you know. Evading an army is fun, too.
(4)
Quests in original WoW have been successful, because you didn't have to read them. They simply pointed you towards some area that you would discover next (not with an arrow that determines every step of the way). These quests could just as well have been roadsigns. The reason this was successful was smart placement of mobs and incentives to explore. Making these quests better doesn't make the game better. Understand those quests for what they are, already!
Why do I have to become ever stronger in Rift? Just remove these stupid levels and allow me to gain abilities while 'leveling up'. I still become more powerful (and versatile!) by playing this way. But in a much more interesting way! And content doesn't become outleveled! And I can play together with everybody I meet - if I want to!
Nobody feels more powerful when his spells do 800 instead of 400 damage while the mob has 4000 instead of 2000 health! Especially not if this higher number is not the result of anything one does and flies by together with 10 other numbers! What keeps us leveling is the anticipation of new skills; not doing more absolute (equal relative) damage with the same fireball spell.
By removing these higher numbers, you allow all players to play together. You gain immense amounts of endgame content for cheap that right now is irrelevant leveling content! I can suddenly play together with my friends who just started !!
(5)
Kring recently asked why we would have to play together with other people if all these other people do is annoy us? A good question, I think! WoW right now is like original Everquest: You are forced to group. But, in contrast to EQ, you don't decide with whom! Oh, and you never see them again which turns most of everybody - including you - into an apathetic asshole.
Anyway. Hope you enjoyed this completely unfocused rant .. somehow.
'Forced grouping' is a buzzword any carries connotations based on the individual interpreting it.
ReplyDeleteTo me, 'forced grouping' is a wonderful thing: a necessary evil if you will. But my definition is 'a natural requirement to work collectively towards a common goal'. MMW.
I much prefer a good social group with [game mechanic] execution failings to asocial [solo] pristine execution successes. The latter is too predictable, I too soon witness the extent of what I am capable of. The former resonates with the fact I am human, and thus, a communal creature.
As far as narratives are concerned, 'roadsigns' as you mention is a good metaphor. The cliche one of 'show, don't tell' abides as well.
Nothing really to add/take away from your post. You did admit, after all, to it being a ramble :)
I'd like to utilise the comment methodology sometimes employed by the OP to state: I agree with the OP.
ReplyDeleteWhat is so difficult about designing a huge (huge!!) world full of caves and forests and deadly deserts and oceans and lakes and mountains and hills and mobs that populate these areas in an interesting way?
ReplyDeleteWhat's so difficult about actually playing the type of games you like, instead of the ones you don't?
Blizzard never pretended WoW was a sandbox. Maybe it had a small sandbox ride in the themepark lineup, but that was the extent of it. I don't boot up Minecraft and lament the lack of a endgame or boss fights.
@Azuriel: Blizzard never claimed it was a sandbox, but they did create a much more world-like, sandboxy game originally. It was like that for years. Then the world was degraded and marginalized ever further in favor of more and more themeparks.
ReplyDeleteActions speak louder than words and for a long time, their actions were sandboxy.
@Klepsacovic
ReplyDeleteOh? Their actions were "sandboxy" for years in an MMO centered on questing, leveling, talent trees, dungeons, gear sets, and eventually BGs and raids? Was EQ a sandbox too?
I have no doubt Blizzard let the world go to weeds, but that indicates to me that the world was never meant to be a sandbox - it was an "expansion encounter" so to speak, that was replaced and marginalized as the bulk of the playerbase consumed it and moved on. As in, textbook themepark.
I understand the sentiment of having a game be fun, and then losing that game. What I don't understand is the notion that it was Blizzard that changed, as opposed to, perhaps, your own expectations being wrong. Is Blizzard responsible for your expectations? To an extent, maybe.
But getting tired of narratives in a themepark MMO is simply ridiculous. "I'm so tired of shooting stuff in this FPS." "Enemies in tower defense games are so dumb." "Football would be a lot more exciting if it was more like Rugby."
I've played WoW since open beta and it never ever resembled a sandbox. That the quality of the worldbuilding was much better than later on doesn't change the fact that it was still a linear romp through theme-parkish zones.
ReplyDeleteThat said, for me it's the quality of the setting that makes me enjoy the narrative. For example, back in original WoW I generally followed and liked the quests, especially things like the Onyxia storyline, but as they made the world more and more ridiculous, I've lost interest in anything the NPCs say to me. In Rift, I just couldn't care at all from the beginning, because the world is just so damn generic.
Contrast this with LOTRO, which doesn't have better written quests objectively speaking, but the setting is so well realized I still really enjoy following the stories of the dumb rangers :)
Here's another thing I am sick of ;)
ReplyDeleteI say: game X is not immersive enough. They say: it was never meant to be immersive.
I say: game X is too silly: They say: it was never meant to be serious.
I say: game X is not like I want it to be. They say: It never was meant to be the way you wanted it.
I fully expect that if I said: game X is bad. They said: It was never meant to be good!
Come on! What kind of 'argument' is that even?
@Nils: it's a GAME. A disposable time-wasting activity you do to have fun.
ReplyDeleteYou write "this game is not fun", I read "I've not bothered to look for a game I like and enjoy and just want to complain for the sake of complaining".
There can be very good arguments against a game (the ones about consistency), and I read them with interest, but lately most of your criticism is not about consistency.
As an example, if tomorrow LotRO introduces pandas and you slam them, I'll be joining you....
As for:
I say: game X is not like I want it to be. They say: It never was meant to be the way you wanted it.
Why don't you stop expecting the world to adapt to your expectations?
..and if you want to join me in wandering about in Moria ignoring quests and just looking around, just let me know. When I want a world I alt-F4 WoW and log into LotRO, ignore global channels and just wander around. I don't expect WoW to become the world it never was. Ryzom would even be better, but their F2P thing is so messed-up, I'd have to recreate a character, and I don't want to play another character.
Why don't you stop expecting the world to adapt to your expectations?
ReplyDeleteBlogging about my expectations is very consistent with my blog. Look at my first post. Be careful I don't turn your arguments against you ... :)
"I have no doubt Blizzard let the world go to weeds, but that indicates to me that the world was never meant to be a sandbox"
ReplyDeleteAnd for me it indicates a change in philosophy. We know Blizzard has changed their approach to the game. Look at class balance, it went from a sort of half-assed effort where hybrids mostly just healed, to a "everyone has their niche" model to "bring the player, not the class".
"What I don't understand is the notion that it was Blizzard that changed, as opposed to, perhaps, your own expectations being wrong."
These are not mutually exclusive ideas. Maybe my expectations were wrong, despite being based on the world as it was. And maybe despite my expectations being wrong, maybe my expectations based the world as it was and Blizzard changed it.
Comments that tell me - in any way - what I am to blog about are deleted. Just a reminder for some commenters.
ReplyDelete