How to Revolutionize the MMORPG

[hannibal]

On a sidenote, I just wanted to QQ a little about how LOTRO just seems like an exact replica of WoW. If that's what you're looking for than why not just play WoW? Now, I haven't played LOTRO so if I'm wrong about it being an exact replica then sorry but it looks stupid to me.

LOTRO has much more room for solo playin than WoW, there are much more quests and the "big story" line is nice add, from the traditional computer rpg's.
So I would say that LOTRO is like WoW but with stereoids, but it's depend on what do you like... There is much less grinding in LOTRO and it's fun to play even a low level character.

 

[Acro]

On a sidenote, I just wanted to QQ a little about how LOTRO just seems like an exact replica of WoW. If that's what you're looking for than why not just play WoW? Now, I haven't played LOTRO so if I'm wrong about it being an exact replica then sorry but it looks stupid to me.

LOTRO has much more room for solo playin than WoW, there are much more quests and the "big story" line is nice add, from the traditional computer rpg's.
So I would say that LOTRO is like WoW but with stereoids, but it's depend on what do you like... There is much less grinding in LOTRO and it's fun to play even a low level character.

Actually that was one of the things that WoW did excellently: low level characters were immediately immersed in a world where they mattered. Sure, it gets stale when you level your 3rd or 4th character, but involved enemies like the Defias for the humans and the Scourge for the forsaken made the game extremely enjoyable the first times you level up.

The main problem is that there's no interaction between a level 70 and a level 20, aside from the level 20 begging to be given gold or run through WC, but on new servers or back in the beginning the leveling zones were the most dynamic and fun to play.

Cheers,
Acro

 

[hannibal]

5.) DYNAMIC COMBAT: Why not combine traditional RPG game play with some more dynamic combat system? Why should all attacks be either normal or critical? This isn't D&D... Combat should calculate all things not just min-max damage, speed, etc. How about where you actually hit your opponent? Wear they protected in that area? What material is being used to attack? What part of the weapon your attack hit with? Did your weapon break? Maybe actually being able to control where you hit your opponent.

Anyone remember the game Knight of Legend by Origin. You can aim, high, middle, low; you can choose between various hits: fast strike, slow but powerfull speep, hack, trust etc.. ; you can choose between various defences; there were several hit points: head, torso, left arm, right arm etc...; there were echaust, the more you carry during fight the faster you exhaust, the more you are tired the less your skills become... It was awesome game for C64... There has not been that kind of tactical level since then...
So it has been done, and It could be done again. The problem was that it was not the fastest system around. It was really easy to kill himself (you lose arm, or bleed to dead, or collapse due exhaust), but it was really realistic in that sence.
Anyone could lisence RQ-rpg rules and it would make the same, but that would not be for newbies... So maybe it would not be a good busines, who knows. But I would definitely like it!

One thing that bothers me in MMOrpg's is that you don't die. You don't became part of you character. I would like to see game where you can die, but you can start with new character that has somewhat lower skills than with your previous, but not too much. So when Gurgan dies, it's dead but you next character could be real hero, if you don't want to start from the very start.

 

[Narg]

How to revolutionize? And, Perm dead bosses? Not very relalistic...

The only way to get permanantly dead bosses would be to instance the game. Instances suck. Sorry, but they do. Instances remove the "complete world" feel to an MMO. LOTRO does a good job of instances though in line with the story line, as each step is fully considered "complete" once gone through on a character by character basis.

Also, the battle system would only be improved if it garnered a more FPS style play rather than more turn based. That would give it more realistic feel and action. But, they'd need to remove the "play area" effect, in that you can only see mobs within a certain distance of your character. That can be solved... read on...

I truely believe the next biggest steps in MMO games will occur once gaming goes into full support of 64-bit operating systems. With 64-bits it's possible to remove, or at least reduce many of the limitations currently in MMO games. Such as the number of objects being tracked and viewed within the character's area. And, how those objects interact with your character. Those limitations govern so much of the playability of MMO games today. 64-bit computing can help those problems, so for now we wait while the slow folks finally own up to the realism of 64-bit and get a move on to a better computing environment.

 

[Trizomik]

Its really great to read all this stuff!

I kind of think MMO cannot be said any better or any bad than another. Nobody is the same, that being said it also means there will always be "something wrong" or "something to change".

As for my part I'm tired I'm tired of the click'n'attack type of game. I just got myself in the beta of Tabula Rasa and it holding something different.

So, if we wonder if something has to be changed there is no wrong answer. And keep on posting!

Cheers !

 

[mrog99]

I like your post. This is a great concept - to have microskills be more important than macro. Feedback the microskills of the player and if they are high enough, you can get level like benefits.

Playing WOW as a mage (AOE) was kind of like this. If you could pull off the pull and freeze and AOE, you could take on 10+ guys at a time (at least the guy in the video could). I got to about 5 before I started having problems. It was more fun that playing anyother way though because the challenge of it was still there. I didnt know if I was going to put the AOE circle in the right place everytime. Needed to have contingency plans for No Effect stuff. Still wasnt what I wanted to do for a living but it goes with your post.

 

[pongrules]

I haven't played any mmorpg's except for GW, but I can tell you what I would like.

I'd like the game to have an overall plot, and when the problem is solved, the game changes to include a new overall plot.

I'd like to start out as Joe Schmo, who gets approached by an NPC to start the story, and then be able to explore and make my own way as a thief, a cop, a do-gooder, a merchant, a politician, a bad guy (who can can become a boss) - whatever I choose. Like real life, there are others who can train you in your profession and what you use, you become better at as opposed to leveling.

In this manner, NPC's are replaced by the players. The players determine the outcome of "the world." You can become a bartender and spread gossip, you can work at a newspaper and interview players for stories, then print the stories and send them out to "the world." If you want to go around killing other players, there will be other players who are cops who will come looking for you. If you're high enough in your bad-ass skills, you might be able to defeat the cops but more will come looking. There could be judges who determine the penalties. There could be elected politicians where the players, based on the platforms the politicians are running on, can decide - based on a majority vote, who gets the position.

If players want to form a gang and run around as their own possey, great. They can do good in "the world" or, they can go against the laws of "the world" and wreak havok at their own peril. The only NPC's necessary would be the ones that advance the story until its completion.

I'd also like it if the players' characters would die. You have to go back in the game and start a new one. This makes decision making much more epic. Don't like a player who acts like a buffoon while playing? Make a request to the cops who will make a determination on how to handle the player based on the laws of "the world." Or, you can have rogue cops who take money and riches as opposed to arresting or killing and individual.

Your riches and possessions would be determined how they are in the real world. You have an occupation, you can adventure and work for others (NPC's would have to be in the mix for this), you can rob, cheat - however you want to make your way. If you want to have a home, you'll start out with some money in the game to rent somewhere or purchase a cheap home. From there, you can decide to sell it, trade up or live in the wilderness if you like.

This would be a much more interesting and dynamic setting for an mmorpg than the current ones. Make it like real life, but choose an interesting world in which you make your own decisions that have real affects on the virtual world. No grinding, no leveling, no dungeons. It could be set in a post-apocalyptic world where the earth is just starting to recover again. Romances between players could start, they could get married, get joint accounts, get divorced - all kinds of crazy stuff. How fun would it be to be a judge or a politician in a virtual world? Awesome!

 

[zTargetz]

I would like to see advancements in FPS-MMO's. .

+1

this is what i've been waiting for, more personal interaction,, less "auto attack"

I had hoped www.playtr.com (tabula rasa) would be this... but it doesnt seem to be 🙁

 

[10basetom]

A truly enjoyable MMORPG for me is one that would allow me to be fully immersed in its fantasy setting and let me role play anything I want without boundaries. Changing skies to reflect the passage of time is a good start in Oblivion, but that has been around since the eighties (e.g., Drakkhen). We can do much more than simulated weather and scripted events -- here are just some ideas that I would love to see well executed in a game:
[*:a26e1c955a]Objects. Players should be able to interact with everything in the game, and I do mean _everything_. Every object in the world should be destructible, edible, climbable, holdable, meltable, throwable, etc. if appropriate, and they should interact with other objects, characters, and nature in a realistic way that conform to the laws of physics (or some other physics that is at play in the fantasy setting). Weapons should of course become dull over time if used in actual combat. I expect to be able to dig a hole in the ground to bury my pet or relieve myself--err, or rather my character.

[*:a26e1c955a]Persistence. If an object is damaged, it stays damaged, and in fact should react with its surroundings and change over time (e.g., poor quality metal should rust after a rain, corpses should start to decompose and smell after a couple days if not buried). If I cut down a tree, I expect the trunk to be there in a year, maybe with new shrubs around it. If I engrave something in the tree bark, it should remain there for others to see. If there is a pool of water on the ground, it should persist until it dries up or turns into mud. You get the idea.

[*:a26e1c955a]Physiology. This should be given more importance in MMORGs -- after all, they're supposed to be virtual worlds. Characters should go through regular sleeping cycles such that they would start to lose their reaction times if they go 24 hours without sleep. This may be a controversial proposal (and financial suicide), but I think that the number of hours spent sleeping should be based on real time; in other words, the sleep command should be thrown out and players should be required to stop playing (and go to sleep themselves!) when they put their characters to sleep. If the player logs back in only three hours after their characters went to sleep, then their characters should feel the effects of drowsiness accordingly; on the flip side, if the player logs back in six months later, then the game should freeze the world after the eighth hour in game time so that the players can pick up where they left off, with their characters refreshed after a full sleep. Characters should also feel the effects of hunger (decreased strength) as well as over-eating (decreased speed and increased fat in the 3D model). Characters should also get chills and fevers if overexposed in cold climate, vomit if poisoned (or drunk), and their wounds should heal in a natural progression (blood -> scab -> scar). Last but nowhere near least, characters should be required to attend to their bodily functions and relieve themselves.

[*:a26e1c955a]Customizability. To help players become more attached to their characters, there should be almost limitless flexibility on how their characters should look and dress. Everything from custom clothing (painted on à la Forza 2?) to custom tattoos and micro objects that make up the jewelries should be a given. I don't know how the company will enforce clothes that adhere to the game's era and settings, but somebody will think of something. Furthermore, every character should be allowed to have their own wardrobe so that they could theoretically look different every day of the year (if they can afford to have that many clothes!). Characters should also be allowed to make their own clothes in-game (e.g., killing a dragon to make scale armor).Some newer MMORPGs may already have one or more of the ideas above, but I doubt if there is an online game that has all of the things that I want elegantly wrapped into an engaging, virtual world. MMORPGs are getting bigger and more immersive all the time, so I think it's just a matter of time when they will converge with true virtual reality.

-10basetom

 

[holyjew]

i hear a lot of people saying all this stuff and i keep thinking of a game i have been following for awhile
though it has not gone into beta it APPEARS to be coming soon, and beta for this game is supposed to be relatively REALLY short
www.darkfallonline.com
www.forums.darkfallonline.com
this game has no character level
but rather swordsmanship leveling for a more realistic style
it removed names above heads so you can now HIDE behind a tree and not be seen
hmmmm amazing!
no autoaims, meaning you wanna hit that person with your sword you have to stay at the keyboard and aim each swing carefully
oblivion style good/bad, meaning kill your own species, your in trouble, kill the enemy species, everyone loves you
on top of all this, for all you hc'ers
FULL LOOT, meaning you die, all your stuff is gone
but don't be underfed. its easy to regain basic equipment, not so much the harder stuff...though since it is full loot everything will accumulate so though u don't have your leetsauce dragon sword of kill all someone else does and you find them, you get it back
should be amazing, go check out the WoW killer of a game

 

[holyjew]

A truly enjoyable MMORPG for me is one that would allow me to be fully immersed in its fantasy setting and let me role play anything I want without boundaries. Changing skies to reflect the passage of time is a good start in Oblivion, but that has been around since the eighties (e.g., Drakkhen). We can do much more than simulated weather and scripted events -- here are just some ideas that I would love to see well executed in a game:
[*:d27fb039df]Objects. Players should be able to interact with everything in the game, and I do mean _everything_. Every object in the world should be destructible, edible, climbable, holdable, meltable, throwable, etc. if appropriate, and they should interact with other objects, characters, and nature in a realistic way that conform to the laws of physics (or some other physics that is at play in the fantasy setting). Weapons should of course become dull over time if used in actual combat. I expect to be able to dig a hole in the ground to bury my pet or relieve myself--err, or rather my character.

[*:d27fb039df]Persistence. If an object is damaged, it stays damaged, and in fact should react with its surroundings and change over time (e.g., poor quality metal should rust after a rain, corpses should start to decompose and smell after a couple days if not buried). If I cut down a tree, I expect the trunk to be there in a year, maybe with new shrubs around it. If I engrave something in the tree bark, it should remain there for others to see. If there is a pool of water on the ground, it should persist until it dries up or turns into mud. You get the idea.

[*:d27fb039df]Physiology. This should be given more importance in MMORGs -- after all, they're supposed to be virtual worlds. Characters should go through regular sleeping cycles such that they would start to lose their reaction times if they go 24 hours without sleep. This may be a controversial proposal (and financial suicide), but I think that the number of hours spent sleeping should be based on real time; in other words, the sleep command should be thrown out and players should be required to stop playing (and go to sleep themselves!) when they put their characters to sleep. If the player logs back in only three hours after their characters went to sleep, then their characters should feel the effects of drowsiness accordingly; on the flip side, if the player logs back in six months later, then the game should freeze the world after the eighth hour in game time so that the players can pick up where they left off, with their characters refreshed after a full sleep. Characters should also feel the effects of hunger (decreased strength) as well as over-eating (decreased speed and increased fat in the 3D model). Characters should also get chills and fevers if overexposed in cold climate, vomit if poisoned (or drunk), and their wounds should heal in a natural progression (blood -> scab -> scar). Last but nowhere near least, characters should be required to attend to their bodily functions and relieve themselves.

[*:d27fb039df]Customizability. To help players become more attached to their characters, there should be almost limitless flexibility on how their characters should look and dress. Everything from custom clothing (painted on à la Forza 2?) to custom tattoos and micro objects that make up the jewelries should be a given. I don't know how the company will enforce clothes that adhere to the game's era and settings, but somebody will think of something. Furthermore, every character should be allowed to have their own wardrobe so that they could theoretically look different every day of the year (if they can afford to have that many clothes!). Characters should also be allowed to make their own clothes in-game (e.g., killing a dragon to make scale armor).Some newer MMORPGs may already have one or more of the ideas above, but I doubt if there is an online game that has all of the things that I want elegantly wrapped into an engaging, virtual world. MMORPGs are getting bigger and more immersive all the time, so I think it's just a matter of time when they will converge with true virtual reality.

-10basetom

in response to you i think they are all great idea spare the physiology, this removes the mmo and turn it into a single player game, if you were to incorporate this i think it'd be a very enjoyable single player game at that. but as a mmo i think it would be terrible, emphasis on i think. the whole thought of a forced style of gameplay is terrible, i play games in my spare time(which happens to be quite a bit) but i do not want to have to schedual it to this or that...i would hate it...main thing with sleeping is are you still in the world while your sleeping. can people kill you? are you then forced to be left defeseless for 8 hours. or are you removed, then couldnt you take advantage of it with superior easy. i think it wouldnt work. the best though i have is a 10 min left defenseless before removal.
but then again if the world were to be scaled down etc. i think it would work(only playing if a bunch of people you know so you can set your own in game unofficial rules)

 

[erloas]

A lot of these ideas would make great theoretical games, but very bad practical games. There are reasons a lot of the stuff hasn't been done, its not like you are the first one to think of it, but because someone put some real development time into the idea and found it just wouldn't work.

Most of the "hardcore" PvP types of things fall into this category, perma-death, full enemy looting, unrestricted interaction between players (usually in the form of nothing preventing someone from ganking someone else over and over again).
What fails here is not the game itself, but the human factor. There are certain people that love that sort of thing, but it is really a very small portion of the population. It is enough to support 1-2 niche games but they are not going to be ideas that drive the genre. Also since they are niche they have to greately scale back development in other areas because there simply aren't enough people willing to play those games to justify a production budget of millions of dollars (10s of millions in the more enthusastic ideas).
The market simply will not support such things.

The more freedom you give players the more they will try to take and the more people that will try to destroy stuff simply because they can.
Give someone the ability to dig a permanant hole and in not too long you're going to have digging grand canyon sized trenchs in the middle of widely used areas. Give people the ability to permanantly cut down trees and within a couple weeks there won't be a single tree left standing. For every one person you find that really likes doing that you will find 10 others that are annoyed by the actions of the first person.


The same goes for realism. In case some people forgot, real life isn't that interesting, it is in fact what people are trying to escape when they play a game. How many people want to spend a decent chunk of their free time watching a virtual character sleep, eat breakfast, lunch and dinner, use the bathroom, and walk from place to place because no one can really run constantly. No one wants to wait 8+ hours traveling because thats how long it really takes to travel between countries/states/major cities.

A game should be fun.


Customizability is great and it something most games are working towards. It is also one of the main reasons development times and costs have been growing as fast as they are. Even with fan based content there is a limit to the amount that can be done. Some sort of quality standards must be in place, you can't have someone creating something that completely doesn't fit with the game, you can't have someone creating things in a different manner then what the game uses either. How are you going to pay devs that spend every day pouring over fan entered items, changing them to the formats used in the game, making sure they work right, then adding them to the game and allowing everyone to download them. Then there is also that one group of people that make a hat and shirt with a higher point/triangle count then the rest of the scenery combined so they can try to lag out anyone that meets them.

Even if you streamline the process of getting items into the game there is still the issue of distrubuting them. Lets say you get a successful game and get 1 million subs, and 20% of them decide to make a number of items for the game, lets say one set of equipement consisting of 5 pieces. Thats a million new assets that need to be added to and controlled by the game, pachted to every single user, and then ran in-game. Its already not uncommon for games to ship 10-20GB in size, if they get too much bigger it is going to become an issue with more and more people. It also increases load times and memory usage (system and video) as all of those different things need to be loaded.

There are also sliders, some games love sliders, you have an almost infinate amount of colors for your hair, you can have a wide nose or skinny nose, a long chin or a short chin, etc. etc. All that takes more processing power and is actually something most people don't notice and becomes even less noticable when you put on a few pieces of armor and a helmet (be it fantasy armor and helmet or sci-fi versions). You've put in a lot of effort on the character design, you've made sure the animations work with some really tall guy and a short guy and all the armor scales to each, you've increased system requirements in doing so, and then in the end only a few of the chioces the player makes is even noticable in most situations. At the end of it all its all just some guy in bodyarmor.
It is definately a case of a lot of extra work for very little end result.

Now there is a lot of practical customizablity left to be had, and some games make better use of them then others.

 

[thebee12]

Ok one game that i have found meets most of the "revolutionary" games is made by the Sonic Team from Sega. This games name is Phantasy Star Universe. PSU still has a lvling system but it is very well incorporated. Online content is being developed and added all the time the story line is original and is ever continuing. It is on PS2 as well as PC and Xbox 360. The PS2 and PC servers are connected but the Xbox's is not because Microsoft would not agree to it. All in all PSU is something you may want to check out maybe on PS2 because it does require decent hardware when played on a PC.

 

[ScareTactic]

all i have to say is Age of Conan will change the face of mmorgp

 

[JulioDanglsak]

I've only read through the first couple pages of replies so this MAY have been said. But about 75% of what you're asking for is already out there. Not in the heavy hitters (2mil+ subscribers) but I've been playing Eve-online for a little over a year. There is no grinding. There are no set classes. There are tiered levels of loot. The dungeons are varied in size and difficulty but clearly marked (in many cases) as to how hard they are...

Basically- Eve is a major step towards the next-gen MMORPG. it's not "IT" but it's darn close.

and well- For me, it is "it."

 

[feldron]

Lvling system

Using character lv has its up sides with tiering monsters and drops and other challenges
...so just brake it up, instead of just lving up and getting new powers and hp and mp instantly have the players purchase each bonus one at a time with requirements for advancement, you can then also add uncommon or rare character bonuses in as well to make characters more collectable this would also take away alot of the grind feeling of lvling as your earning more and more power ever few mins instead of grinding for a few hours and gaining instant power

Quest system

Alot of quests are just fetch and kill, with a few storyline quests.
MMO's need more storyline quests with cutsceens naration and lore. with mmo's taking in millions a month they need more storyline.

My idea would have storyline quests set for a certain lvl and have stage where you would play through the intire story in certian lvs. example the story of Grendal lv 5-8. With players choicing when to lv and the uncommon and rare optional bonuses they should have plenty to do while working on the quest. the storyline quest would play out in stage and have as much content as your standard single player rpg. taking like 20+ hour broken up through out the stages with full lore.

Then you have say 50-100 such storys yeah its alot but for what millions players are paying not unreasonable.

so thats about 1000+ hours of just storyline lore so players who like that are happy

Then you need and expansive world, large cities (all adventuring needs near enterence, but room for housing and crafting etc in city center)

unlockable races classes optional

The item system needs reworking

with twinking, nontradeable items and item decay you got game dev working around problems with solving them

For items the should play off character bonuses and item bonus combinations
Example: Ring of Orge Might +1 str (base item grants, no exp or ablity needed)(+1 str player focus (player ablity give this bonus)) (+1,+1 str item focus (player spends exp for these bonuses) so the item has up to +4 str

This gives and the varables gives items vast collectablity with players earning the majority or the bonus provided by the items. This allows items with even the same end bonus from and easy or hard mobs to have different values and allow player with different play style to get items with one fight the hard monster for the easy item and other fight the easy monster for the hard item.

This whould have both items and characters being collectable and then with expansive world and large amounts of lore and storyline. With player earning each bonus on their character they with be getting bonus frequently and even with lvl progession longer then normal players would still have less of a feeling of grind with the constent rewards.

 

[kutark]

I know i'm a little late to the posts here (I always read twitchguru's headlines at work, but the commies at my job block out any website that is even remotely related to gaming). But really reading through the article it just kind of seems to me like what you're looking for is a single player game. Lots of people say that "long, in depth quest lines" would make games better. I say to hell with that. How is it any different then sitting in the same spot pulling a load of mobs from the same area for 3 hours any different then running to the quest guy, him going "you have to get 12 tusks from this boar for me, then i'll let you know what the next step is!" And then you have to proceed to slaughter about 50 boars because guess what, apparently every boar that has tusks doesnt drop them, go figure. All questing is a thinly veiled cover up excuse to get people to go slaughter mobs. If you actually sit and do the math, 8 times out of 10 its quicker and easier to avoid the travel time and just kill the mobs.

NOW, if, (and i've heard LOTRO is good about this) the quests are actually you know, moderately interesting to read and participate in (think Baldur's Gate, etc). I could see quests revitalizing the genre.

I agree that loot has to stay. Really its the ultimate aspect of the fantasy genre. Even in books, people are doing crazy stuff, fighting god like monsters, and inadvertantly they find that magic sphere, of Sword of the Valheru +3, etc.

One thing i'm getting OH so sick of is everyone spouting about how perfect WOW is. I think every one of us can attest to a time or fifty in our lives when something was absurdly popular that ultimately proved to be shit. WOW is one of those things. I played the shit out of the game, dont get me wrong. But in a matter of a total of 6 months of play time (and i dont mean 6 months of in game hours, i mean 6 months of me going to work etc) I was able to exhaust literally all the raid content of the original world, all of the group and solo content of the expansion, and part of the raid content. Its just too damn easy.

I think one of the core aspects of any RPG, MMO or otherwise, is "powering up" your character. I personally dont see anything wrong with levels. Honestly i really liked the way that EQ1 did it. Where eventually they added in points you could add to certain skills that took XP to earn. it was a nice way of differentiating your char from all the other level 65 paladins/rogues/etc in the game, it also gave you a sense of usefullness out of participating in a raid, or a group, when you happened to get bad luck on the rolls for the items, or nothing of use dropped. I can't tell you how many times i've wanted to vomit because i had just spent the duration of the last 3 weeks worth of saturdays in Molten Core, sitting at the top of the Warlock list, just waiting for anything resembling warlock loot to drop. I literally would spend 3-4 hours of my life for literally nothing. As a matter of fact i usually went negative b/c i went through X amt of potions etc.

Honestly (and this will never happen, because like everything, money rules) i just wish that developers would start developing games that cater to a specific crowd, rather than trying to make the "catch-all, lowest common denominator" MMO like WOW. Of course they all want that because they see $$$. Which is fine, i'm not chiding the capitalistic economy or ideals, but its a death knell when it comes to games.

Vanguard is an excellent example of this. Even despite all its current flaws, and there are many, i still log in every day and play it. Its because it pretty much encompasses the things i like in an MMO. Longer level times, difficulty in crafting, non cartoony art style, etc. Unfortunately it was a game that could have been huge, but because of $$$ it got pushed into an early release, when in all honesty the game still needed a good 4 to 6 months of beta work.

Regardless i've lost track here. I'm really not sure whats going to revitalize the genre. I certainly dont think mixing fantasy and sci fi will work.

I think really these games need to stop making concessions and just do their own thing. I'm almost hoping that Conan will do that. It looks like the devs of that game are sticking to their guns. I guess we'll see eh.

 

[vic20]

The evolution of the massively-multiplayer online role-playing game has stalled out. Now all we can look forward to are title after title of World of Warcraft clones. TwitchGuru's Travis Meacham looks at some ways to improve the MMO experience.

Ummm.... well you have to understand that WoW's mechanics was created primarily around getting subscribers and keeping them, just like all MMOs. Blizzard just figured out the secret sauce and now everyone wants a slice.

When the primary intent is to make a great game first and a mass of addicted people to pay you each month second, you might see your wishes come true.

Don't get me wrong, WoW is a very good game in many aspects. But you can see evidence of how they sacrificed fun for member retention everywhere in game.