Another great blog by Wolfshead (wolfsheadonline.com) where he talks about the things that have been lost from the mmorpg genre since the age of WoW. Specifically a lot of talk about player interaction, community and interdependence. Very relevant topics for Pantheon fans.
Wolfshead said:
At the end of 2014, Blizzard Entertainment celebrated the 10th anniversary of World of Warcraft. There can be no doubt that WoW is a juggernaut that changed how we play and how we think about virtual worlds and MMORPGs.
But not all change is beneficial and not all success is healthy.
Amid the accolades and self-congratulatory celebrations going on there is unreported dark side to the triumph of WoW and it has come at a high price. It is this: the fantasy MMORPG that some of us used to know and love has all but evaporated and turned from an experience rich with social interaction into one devoid of it.
As WoW has systematically obliterated every MMORPG that came before it, the fate of the entire genre is now symbiotically linked to WoW. Look at your average MMO today and chances are it’s just another WoW clone with a different skin, story and setting.
Just as a rising tide lifts all ships, the reverse is also true. This essay will attempt to explain the destructive legacy of WoW and in particular how Blizzard caused the widespread decline of social interaction in MMORPGs.
Read the full post here on Wolfshead's blog.
While WoW is no EQ or VG, classic Wow was a good fun game with friends, you had to group for a lot of quests. Raiding while not as hardcore as before mentioned games it was enjoyable with some fun mechanics and a lot of lore behind the whole Warcraft franchise.
It didn't have group finder and people where in chat looking for group members you had to actually walk to dungeons not just get transported there, no cross server stuff back then so your name meant something,
It is a real pity what it has became today.
Thats how I've felt about a number of his blogs. Two of my favorites are The Everquest Paradox Revealed and EQ Next - I Want to Believe Again.
Must reads.
Excellent article, and it is showing very clearly how important the social aspect of gaming is and how it was slowly eroded in WoW (and pretty much all newer MMOs). Many things could indeed be done different to improve this social aspect (and I hope the Pantheon devs really take such articles to heart!).
However, I think its also neccessary to remember WHY some (or many) things were changed or introduced. Take instancing for example. Yes, it was and is over-used often today, but originally they were created to make it possible for ALL players to experience some important encounters. Otherwise these would be perma-killed by strongly organized guilds "with too much time on their hands".
This is really a strong conflict topic, I know. Should everyone be "entitled" to experience some encounter? Or only those who can be online 24/7 and always have a group of friends ready? Tbh I don't want an "anarchy" game where only the "strongest" (= those who have the time and friends ready) can get what they want, while everyone else (who may absolutely be able to kill that encounter too, just cannot be on so much to camp it all the time) misses out?
A gaming world can be harsh and challenging, but at the same time it MUST be fair to all of its players.
Sarim said:
Excellent article, and it is showing very clearly how important the social aspect of gaming is and how it was slowly eroded in WoW (and pretty much all newer MMOs). Many things could indeed be done different to improve this social aspect (and I hope the Pantheon devs really take such articles to heart!).
However, I think its also neccessary to remember WHY some (or many) things were changed or introduced. Take instancing for example. Yes, it was and is over-used often today, but originally they were created to make it possible for ALL players to experience some important encounters. Otherwise these would be perma-killed by strongly organized guilds "with too much time on their hands".
This is really a strong conflict topic, I know. Should everyone be "entitled" to experience some encounter? Or only those who can be online 24/7 and always have a group of friends ready? Tbh I don't want an "anarchy" game where only the "strongest" (= those who have the time and friends ready) can get what they want, while everyone else (who may absolutely be able to kill that encounter too, just cannot be on so much to camp it all the time) misses out?
A gaming world can be harsh and challenging, but at the same time it MUST be fair to all of its players.
I was in a guild in EQ...we did raids in the sleepers tomb, we did PoP, we did all the raiding stuff....just did it about 1 or 2 xpacs behind. I seen everything in EQ I wanted to and never once had to poopsock. Not everyone can nor should be at the front edge of an xpac, sure let the super ubers fight over worlds first and when they have moved on the rest of us come along and play as we want when we want
Sevens said:
I was in a guild in EQ...we did raids in the sleepers tomb, we did PoP, we did all the raiding stuff....just did it about 1 or 2 xpacs behind. I seen everything in EQ I wanted to and never once had to poopsock. Not everyone can nor should be at the front edge of an xpac, sure let the super ubers fight over worlds first and when they have moved on the rest of us come along and play as we want when we want
I don't see that as a viable solution. If a guild has the players, the skill and the equipment, then it should be able to take on the hardest mobs currently in game, and not have to wait until the next expansion when the current uber guild moves on. I don't want real life seeping into the virtual world in such a way. It is a difficult topic, and I don't want to derail this thread with a discussion about instancing.
Sarim said:
Sevens said:
I was in a guild in EQ...we did raids in the sleepers tomb, we did PoP, we did all the raiding stuff....just did it about 1 or 2 xpacs behind. I seen everything in EQ I wanted to and never once had to poopsock. Not everyone can nor should be at the front edge of an xpac, sure let the super ubers fight over worlds first and when they have moved on the rest of us come along and play as we want when we want
I don't see that as a viable solution. If a guild has the players, the skill and the equipment, then it should be able to take on the hardest mobs currently in game, and not have to wait until the next expansion when the current uber guild moves on. I don't want real life seeping into the virtual world in such a way. It is a difficult topic, and I don't want to derail this thread with a discussion about instancing.
There are ways to combat 1 guild dominations like increase the amount of end game content and repop days. On repop day, permitted that the mobs respawn around prime time, every guild should have a shot at a particular mob. If you want to talk about it further, I'd gladly discuss my ideas on this in more detail, because I do not believe instancing is a solution for contested content.
Dullahan said:
There are ways to combat 1 guild dominations like increase the amount of end game content and repop days. On repop day, permitted that the mobs respawn around prime time, every guild should have a shot at a particular mob. If you want to talk about it further, I'd gladly discuss my ideas on this in more detail, because I do not believe instancing is a solution for contested content.
I know there's been some threads on instancing here, and if one can be found to necro discussing alternatives to instancing I'd be up for a discussion on viable alternatives and brainstorming to avoid instancing. Basically, the discussions thus far that I remember have been why instancing is bad and destroys gameplay, but doesn't really offer alternatives.
If not, a thread titled alternatives to instancing would be a good one to start and would probably bring some heated, productive discussion here.
Back on topic, I read your other two links and both were good reads for sure. I'm pretty sure I had read both of those articles - most definitely the one from 2005, and, I was never really expecting much from EQnext, so I didn't share the excitement there, but Wolfshead's numbered list on what needs to be included in EQnext (and now Pantheon is spot on).
Especially this which is relevant to the comments in this thread -
If I were to blame one single feature for the devastation of the MMO genre it would be instancing. Instancing has been a cancer for MMOs. It’s a design cop out. Nothing has destroyed community and the sense of immersion more than the scourge of instancing. Instancing is an abomination to the notion of status. Instancing is a form of virtual world socialism where everyone is entitled to the same content. Instancing creates a sense of entitlement within players.
You can’t have Lord Nagafen — the famous Norrathian dragon — being simultaneously killed hundreds of times each night and thousands of times each week and expect that to not erode the sense of accomplishment for killing a dragon. Instancing is really a virtual world within a virtual world. Instancing is responsible for a host of evils in MMORPGs: it separates players from each other, it creates barriers, it impedes freedom, it devalues achievements and status, it encourages farming and creates a glut of loot. Community dungeons MUST be brought back into EQ Next!"
Sarim said:
Sevens said:
I was in a guild in EQ...we did raids in the sleepers tomb, we did PoP, we did all the raiding stuff....just did it about 1 or 2 xpacs behind. I seen everything in EQ I wanted to and never once had to poopsock. Not everyone can nor should be at the front edge of an xpac, sure let the super ubers fight over worlds first and when they have moved on the rest of us come along and play as we want when we want
I don't see that as a viable solution. If a guild has the players, the skill and the equipment, then it should be able to take on the hardest mobs currently in game, and not have to wait until the next expansion when the current uber guild moves on. I don't want real life seeping into the virtual world in such a way. It is a difficult topic, and I don't want to derail this thread with a discussion about instancing.
I remember large guilds such as Inner Circle...sitting on content (to do with the epic weapons quests first set) for months. You could NOT get near the mobs you needed to finish your staff or what have you. At that time, nobody seemed to care that the big guilds could monopolize. Hopefully if that happens again, there will be times that other people can participate and achieve their goals too. I left in frustration ..had been level 60 for several months and could not get the last 2 or 3 pieces of my staff. Everyone pays their money, eventually everyone should be able to access that content, once the big guilds' attention is directed elsewhere. I don't begrudge them their size or skill, I just want my turn. :)
I try to point out the good as well as the bad in any MMORPG. WoW is no exception. WoW had many great elements, areas of design, and it surprisingly had depth in quite a few areas that competing games lacked. The hunter pet system in WoW versus the pet system in Rift is a prime example. The challenge is truly analyzing the good and bad and including/not including those elements into future games.
I envision MMORPG's to be more than just a game where you sit in a hub waiting for a queue to pop, where an addon assesses your gear level which determines if players will bother grouping with you, and questing that reflects connect-the-dots.
Sarim said:
Sevens said:
I was in a guild in EQ...we did raids in the sleepers tomb, we did PoP, we did all the raiding stuff....just did it about 1 or 2 xpacs behind. I seen everything in EQ I wanted to and never once had to poopsock. Not everyone can nor should be at the front edge of an xpac, sure let the super ubers fight over worlds first and when they have moved on the rest of us come along and play as we want when we want
I don't see that as a viable solution. If a guild has the players, the skill and the equipment, then it should be able to take on the hardest mobs currently in game, and not have to wait until the next expansion when the current uber guild moves on. I don't want real life seeping into the virtual world in such a way. It is a difficult topic, and I don't want to derail this thread with a discussion about instancing.
This is antithetical to the entire point of things being exclusive, the moment you instance raid content so that everyone gets a piece of it whenever they want, you open the WoW can of worms where everyone has every piece of gear they could possibly want and nothing is exclusive anymore. You totally remove the accomplishment of obtaining the gear. I feel like a lot of people who feel instancing should be used in raiding situations haven't thought deeply enough about the subject and honestly don't even know what they really want.
Rallyd said:
This is antithetical to the entire point of things being exclusive, the moment you instance raid content so that everyone gets a piece of it whenever they want, you open the WoW can of worms where everyone has every piece of gear they could possibly want and nothing is exclusive anymore. You totally remove the accomplishment of obtaining the gear. I feel like a lot of people who feel instancing should be used in raiding situations haven't thought deeply enough about the subject and honestly don't even know what they really want.
Why would someone else getting the same piece of loot discredit my accomplishments? This argument from exclusivity sounds like snobbery.
There has to be some sort of middle ground between a few guilds locking all the decent endgame content down and instancing every raid.