<!--quoteo(post=1836169:date=Mar 6 2011, 04:37 AM:name=DiscoZombie)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (DiscoZombie @ Mar 6 2011, 04:37 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1836169"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->So if this mythical player-driven game is so great, and so many people are waiting for it, how long do we have to wait before it's invented? 5 more years? 10? 20? If there's so many people who want a game like this, I guess it's just a sad coincidence that none of them are game developers? I think it's a little more likely that no one has been able to pull it off because it's not the sort of game that's fun and stays fun. MMO's basically started with UO and Everquest, and it's the Everquest model that stuck, not the UO one.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> You basically answer your own question. Current MMORPGs don't copy Everquest, they copy WoW. When WoW came along and became (mildly put) a smash hit, everyone gave up on trying to do anything different, because who DOESN'T want an 8-figure subscriber count? It is undeniably weird that the "you will never beat WoW by copying WoW" lesson is apparently so difficult to learn, but some day somebody will wake up. I hope.
I'd argue the easy reason for most open world MMOs not being 'WoW' levels of success is that people need a hook.
When you dump someone in a world of endless possibility most people just sit slack jawed at the confusing myraid of choices and log off without really picking any. Straight off the bat people need direction and content driven stuff is good at that, hence why it survives. Ideally what you need is a guided introduction with a path, a path that those willing can leave at any time, but a path none the less to guide new players. You also need systems to suggest things to do when people get lost later too. Ideally everyone should find their own fun, but there are always going to be times that players will just want to simply be told what to do. I say give them that choice, but don't make it the only one. Runescape's "task system' is actually a rather good example of that, though perhaps not the best. Guild Wars 2's upcoming 'scout' system might be a slightly better as it involves talking to the scouts in town who'll show you a map indicating where some action and adventure you can join in is going down.
Also, for the sake of fun I had a look at a few open world MMOs and apparently Runescape (which I've not played in forever) has 10 million or so active players a month and is in the Guinness book of world records as the world's most popular free to play MMORPG (source: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RuneScape" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RuneScape</a> ) Obviously being free to play helps and I've not played the game myself in yeeears but that's still a fairly massive chunk of people and it's one of the Ultima family of MMORPGs so I guess they're not dead yet :p
As for earlier discussion of PvP, I agree when you diversify the meaning to mean player conflict of most kinds LF, it's just that PvP usually means hitting each other over the head rather than the other things :3 Stories are all about conflict, even romance and drama. Without conflict there is no story. It just doesn't necessarily have to be armed combat is all or dedicated support for player-made factions :D
The most fun an memorable things I did were in UO on a free shard. Oh RP, how I miss thee... Too bad this is not possible to do as a game, but rather as a sideproject for some people with too much time on their hands.
<!--quoteo(post=1836186:date=Mar 6 2011, 05:14 AM:name=Panigg)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Panigg @ Mar 6 2011, 05:14 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1836186"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->One thing on Rift: It's good, if it doesn't crash. It's so unstable... I don't know what to do anymore, tried every suggestion I could find and it still crashes.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
what lol. its not unstable. its one of the most stable mmos i know of. I got 2xGTX460s from nivida and it works fine
I have to agree with tiger on this one. I had no stability problems with Rift and that was even before I updated my graphics drivers (which it turned out were over a year out of date ^.^; )
It seemed to have problems with my mobo, turned of spectrum in bios and now it doesn't crash as often. Didn't crash at all today, so I guess the problem is fixed. Could even be a hotfix the applied, since it crashed a couple of times yesterday after I turned spectrum off.
While I've never crashed, I will say that my PC should run a game like this with no problem on ultra settings, but I have an inconsistent framerate even on medium. The stuttering isn't consistent; it will freeze for like half a second, be fine for several seconds, freeze for another half second, etc.
Level 31 now, and I'm starting to get frustrated at the balance issues. Not surprising they'd have trouble balancing a game with 36 different primary specs and the ability to mix and match them however you want, but when my mage can literally be killed before I get out of stun lock by any same-level champion that sees me, or essentially one-shotted by any saboteur, I think they need to do some rebalancing =p
Comments
You basically answer your own question. Current MMORPGs don't copy Everquest, they copy WoW. When WoW came along and became (mildly put) a smash hit, everyone gave up on trying to do anything different, because who DOESN'T want an 8-figure subscriber count? It is undeniably weird that the "you will never beat WoW by copying WoW" lesson is apparently so difficult to learn, but some day somebody will wake up. I hope.
When you dump someone in a world of endless possibility most people just sit slack jawed at the confusing myraid of choices and log off without really picking any. Straight off the bat people need direction and content driven stuff is good at that, hence why it survives. Ideally what you need is a guided introduction with a path, a path that those willing can leave at any time, but a path none the less to guide new players.
You also need systems to suggest things to do when people get lost later too. Ideally everyone should find their own fun, but there are always going to be times that players will just want to simply be told what to do. I say give them that choice, but don't make it the only one. Runescape's "task system' is actually a rather good example of that, though perhaps not the best. Guild Wars 2's upcoming 'scout' system might be a slightly better as it involves talking to the scouts in town who'll show you a map indicating where some action and adventure you can join in is going down.
Also, for the sake of fun I had a look at a few open world MMOs and apparently Runescape (which I've not played in forever) has 10 million or so active players a month and is in the Guinness book of world records as the world's most popular free to play MMORPG (source: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RuneScape" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RuneScape</a> ) Obviously being free to play helps and I've not played the game myself in yeeears but that's still a fairly massive chunk of people and it's one of the Ultima family of MMORPGs so I guess they're not dead yet :p
As for earlier discussion of PvP, I agree when you diversify the meaning to mean player conflict of most kinds LF, it's just that PvP usually means hitting each other over the head rather than the other things :3
Stories are all about conflict, even romance and drama. Without conflict there is no story. It just doesn't necessarily have to be armed combat is all or dedicated support for player-made factions :D
what lol. its not unstable. its one of the most stable mmos i know of. I got 2xGTX460s from nivida and it works fine
Level 31 now, and I'm starting to get frustrated at the balance issues. Not surprising they'd have trouble balancing a game with 36 different primary specs and the ability to mix and match them however you want, but when my mage can literally be killed before I get out of stun lock by any same-level champion that sees me, or essentially one-shotted by any saboteur, I think they need to do some rebalancing =p
Considering something as a time waster this week, but heard the patch is *8GB* D: