Hey Kilsin,
I'm going to throw some honesty out here...
I generally work to find a game where I like the play style primarily, then there has to be good friends/guild interaction, and finally there must be good grouping/communication mechanism built in before I make the long-term connection.
If I find that trifecta of value in the game I will generally stick with the game even past the point of "fun" until the next game comes up. Sometimes I will fork out time/money for other games in the hope that they will satisfy the same basic needs. I used to get involved in alpha or beta tests to determine whether I was going to be hooked.
Unfortunately, I find that gaming companies have figured me and others like me out pretty well and now expect early payment as an incentive to play early. That was not the case way back when you were able to be detail oriented and provide lots of good test data while in alpha or beta modes and get a free shot at determining whether the game was something you wanted to continue for any length of time. As a software tester and dev project manager by trade I totally understand this situation but still hate to fork out just to see.. :p
Replayability.
The same character gets boring once I've reached whatever my goal was for him, but if it's a fun idea to make a new and different character, then I'm now theoretically playing the game twice as long. So on and so forth for just how many interesting options there are for replaying the game.
Things Pantheon will have, like individualized classes, can definately help with this. Keeping lower level content as robust and interesting as possible, and fighting the policy that the end game is the only meaningful part of the game, is also important. Finally, allowing players to experience the game very differently from one another if they so choose, perhaps based on race, can also help with this, so long as it doesn't divide everyone "too much".
Friending strangers that helped me complete "X"- and getting that message from one of those friends maybe days later when I haven't seen them asking me to help them in their thing. That's a great feeling.
Completeness: having a venue to allow various levels of completion- this I can do now, this I can't do alone, this I can do with alot of help, this I might never see....- and ticking off some ofthose items for personal feeling of success in completion, this goes for quests or crafting.
Making alot of aquaintance friends, and having a core- regular group of friends that I met through trial an error.
Introducing my core group friends to other aquaintances and the pride in hearing them say they are good and then the random invite form a stranger who heard, form someone else who grouped with me at some time, that I would be fun to play with.
Making a nice impresison on strangers. Likewise- having my opinions validated by my friends about other strangers that dont fit "our" playstyle and that is not a bad thing.
Being a Newb over and over again as things get harder and helping newbs! when I am "older"
Throwing in bits of RP based on the environment and our actions and having that received and riffed on by the group- even if they dont RP normally and even if its snarky jokes.(something about bariatric Ogres only needing to nibble on just a few gnome fingers or something)
The short answer: Challenging content for haveing always a goal to reach. Perfect: Content consumed, next one is ready to start.
Our guild played many mmo`s in the past 20 Years. It was always the same. As friends you can have fun in almost every MMO, so it belong more to it. In the most cases we changed the game because of lack of content, the missing challenge. We are not a fast 24/7 playtime, server/world first goal guild. But if we dont have content anymore to play/beat, people start to try out other games. If they find one, most of the guild will follow them and have fun there. For me i can say, friendships to players last longer as an MMO lifetime. EQ Expansions made me personally play few years with friends, my longest time in an MMO. No clue how content will be handled in Pantheon, but in EQ it worked well with new content every half year.
Content can be raids, tradeskills or even personal epic quests.
Kilsin said:What motivates you to play an MMORPG for long periods of time, as in months, sometimes, years? #PRF #MMORPG #MMO #communitymatters
EverQuest did it very well. What keeps me coming back are several things, I'll list them from most important to least important to me.
1. Character Progression: Leveling wasn't trivial in EQ and spending a 6 hours session just to gain a level, to me, was worth it and the achievement was exhilarating. Just hearing that *DING* and shouting it in the zone getting "gratz!" "wtg!" replies is something I've never experienced in any other game due to fast leveling and the easy nature of progression for other games.
2. The Chase: I've always had a few items in mind at all times that I wanted to seek. Sometimes I spend a whole week just trying to get that rare drop. If items and itemization were trivial and boring; why would I bother? But in EQ seeking, for instance, Efreeti Boots or Fungi Tunic were a self-entitled quest we all set to ourselves. "The Chase" made me think about EQ before sleeping; those thoughts "I'll plan with my friends to go to SOLSEK B so we can camp the Efreeti, I really need those boots!" this what makes you come back.
3. Community: Unlike Quest-Drive MMOs where they really hate you'd just stop for a while and look around, EQ set us free and also because the content was tough we needed to band together. And banding together created friendship and community. You'd come back to talk to friends, to play with friends. Real life friends or friends you met in the game. If the content promotes group play my real life friends and family and I would love to jump in and play for hours! Why would we play a game designed for solo game where monsters die in 3 hits from one single target? Why would we play a game that makes ME go do quests alone and follow my own personal story? MMORPGs lost their track and Pantheon developers know what's going on.
Let me add something, grinding in one spot was fun and is still fun. It's an option, make it an option... having to run around in a theme-park ride-like dungeon gets tedious. You cannot AFK to go grab a cup of coffee, you cannot talk to your friends. I really think grinding in one spot was something amazing keeping in mind we're there to wait for a named or two to pop for their drops. It's like playing the slot machine, every time it pops we wait in expectation. It keeps the thing going, and while at it we are getting XP. That kind of game play really consisted of 80% of my time in EQ. In recent games things just get boring no matter how "dynamic" or "scripted" they are... in the end, after 400+ hours of game play... you really get bored to tears. It's that calmness of grinding with friends while chatting what makes the whole thing meaningful. We don't play MMOs to pew-pew, we play it to progress.
Class interdependency - I thrive if I have a role that is well defined but with a little flex room for unique situations. And I want to play with others playing classes that have different specific roles whom I need and that need me to succeed. I get bored easily if I can do anything and do it on my own. I get bored if evertone, including my self is a rotation zombie. I want to have to strategize and adapt with a group to several different kinds of situations and variables.
Immersion - Give me a big and scary world that will always have an unown danger lurnking around the next shadowy corner. Give me a few spots of civilization that offer refuge and economy and alternate professions and trades.
Lore - I love a good narrative and complex webs of narrative.