I was thinking about this last night, when I was goofing around on several MMOs. While I'm sure that some will disagree, it seems that right at this point in time we've got a lot of really good MMOs that we can sample and play as much as we like.
From MMOs based on known properties (ranging from Star Wars to Conan to D&D) all the way to new designs such as The Secret World, it seems that we're in the middle of an MMO F2P/B2P explosion. Yes, the basic MMO design hasn't changed too much since the EQ and early WoW days, but how it's implemented and for what property has.
As much as some people want to complain about how the F2P and B2P games make their money*, the fact that they not only are able to survive but put out new content has to be heartening. Look at a game such as Age of Conan: after a huge launch, it was pretty much written off and/or left for dead after the glitches and the "Tortage vs. the rest of the game" experience. However, it just finished it's fifth anniversary after having spent the past few years as F2P. The Old Republic suffered from the "nothing to do" syndrome after a toon reached max level**, but after it went F2P Bioware has not only provided new updates and content but has seen a stabilization in subs and a rise in players.
The F2P/B2P models aren't panaceas, and I'm not altogether certain they are the wave of the future, but what these two models do provide is choice. Don't think WoW or Rift is brutal enough? Go try adventuring in Hyborea for a while. Need more Cthulhu? There's an entire game devoted to that feeling of dread and despair (The Secret World). Tired of killing Sith? There's a Klingon D7 with your name on it. Or maybe you want the feel of returning to an old haunt like the Forgotten Realms? Or an even older haunt like The Shire? Or maybe you just want to be an angel for a little while, such as in Aion.***
And that's not even touching games such as Guild Wars 2 (and the upcoming Wildstar).
I think it's pretty safe to say that I'd have burned out on MMOs in general if there weren't such a variety to play with these days. It can cause problems for me when I get into an instance or a battleground, but in general I really enjoy the variety of worlds to play in. My only regret is that I can't pay these companies more for their work (budget, you know). But I do what I can.
Is it too much to have someone look at the old Darklands video game and create an MMO based on that? Now THAT would be cool.
*I was thinking of the Ten Ton Hammer article on how much they hate the lock boxes for Star Trek Online, but the reality is that those lock boxes and those announcements in-game are no worse than seeing hundreds of sparkle ponies in WoW.
**As well as a lack of grouping tools, etc., that players had become accustomed to. Remember, even Blizzard tried to mix things up in Cata by having players find the entrance to the instances before they were allowed to queue for them, but what happened was that players would simply avoid the instances they didn't like (/cough Stonecore /cough).
***Now that I think about it, an MMO based on Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson series would be pretty cool. My kids are presently working on an RPG for Percy Jackson using the Savage Worlds system and the Super Powers Companion books as a starting point, and I'm sure they're not the only ones out there who have had that idea.
Monday, June 10, 2013
Thursday, June 6, 2013
Oh, This is Gonna Hurt....
I was working on the Red Crane Temple area of Karasang Wilds with Anduin in tow* when I ran into yet another gearcheck wall: the two mini-bosses in the separate wings of the temple. What was more annoying this time was that I was properly equipped with as much green and blue quest gear as would be expected as someone attempting this. If it weren't for the ads that show up when the sha bosses are halfway down I don't think there'd be as much a problem, but those ads force me to use up all of my CDs, and then I'm just a sitting duck in leather gear** trying to build up combo points.
I'd been chatting with Vidyala from Manalicious in-game, and hearing of my latest wipe offered to help. (I'd forgotten about CRZ capability in Pandaria; it's there, lurking beneath the surface.) I gratefully accepted her offer, and when her Mage Millya winged in, I crept around and assaulted the first mini-boss. Two zaps from Vid and the mini-boss was a smoldering heap.
"Holy crap!" I said.
Vid laughed. "You're still L88," she pointed out.
"Yeah, but..." then I noticed her health bar. "You're more than twice my health!"
"Did I ever tell you about the time I tanked Elegon?"
"Yeah, but... Wow." I knew that she was on the current raiding tier, but this discrepancy was almost as much as the discrepancy between a fresh L85 and a Mists-geared L89 in a battleground.
We circled around to the other mini-boss --she flew and I crept over-- and repeated the fireworks.
"All I can think about is how it's going to hurt when I ding L90 and get into a BG," I said, awed, as I thanked her for the assist.
Even now, I can see myself as a smudge on the ground, with the "L2P Noob!" ringing in my pointy ears. Just when you thought you made it to the top of the mountain....
*I'm already sick of that kid. For a Mists release, he sure seems to be fighting with the punch of a Wrath-era toon. I find even Corso (the Smuggler companion on TOR) less annoying than Anduin.
**With a conspicuous opening right between the breasts. Reminds me of the old Female Armor Sucks comedy skit that Collegehumor put out a while back. Yes, go watch it through the link; it's a classic.
I'd been chatting with Vidyala from Manalicious in-game, and hearing of my latest wipe offered to help. (I'd forgotten about CRZ capability in Pandaria; it's there, lurking beneath the surface.) I gratefully accepted her offer, and when her Mage Millya winged in, I crept around and assaulted the first mini-boss. Two zaps from Vid and the mini-boss was a smoldering heap.
"Holy crap!" I said.
Vid laughed. "You're still L88," she pointed out.
"Yeah, but..." then I noticed her health bar. "You're more than twice my health!"
"Did I ever tell you about the time I tanked Elegon?"
"Yeah, but... Wow." I knew that she was on the current raiding tier, but this discrepancy was almost as much as the discrepancy between a fresh L85 and a Mists-geared L89 in a battleground.
We circled around to the other mini-boss --she flew and I crept over-- and repeated the fireworks.
"All I can think about is how it's going to hurt when I ding L90 and get into a BG," I said, awed, as I thanked her for the assist.
Even now, I can see myself as a smudge on the ground, with the "L2P Noob!" ringing in my pointy ears. Just when you thought you made it to the top of the mountain....
*I'm already sick of that kid. For a Mists release, he sure seems to be fighting with the punch of a Wrath-era toon. I find even Corso (the Smuggler companion on TOR) less annoying than Anduin.
**With a conspicuous opening right between the breasts. Reminds me of the old Female Armor Sucks comedy skit that Collegehumor put out a while back. Yes, go watch it through the link; it's a classic.
Monday, June 3, 2013
Hellooooo! Anybody home??
Such was my feeling working my way through Pandaria.
I'm already on my third zone, Krasarang Wilds, having completed the first two.* While I know two things --cross realm zones are turned off for Pandaria and I've already passed one of the big "dailies" hubs at the Tillers area-- I'm still surprised at how few toons are out and about in Pandaria itself. I've seen more toons in Hellfire Peninsula than in the first three Pandaria zones, and that's kind of scary.
There's obviously players out there, as Cynwise demonstrated in his class distribution post, but wherever they are, it's not in Panda-land.
I am not going to jump to conclusions here, but I suspect that people like me who took their time to level a new toon are outliers, and most of the utility in the new zones is already spent. As the "game starts at max level" people will tell you, that's not a surprise. But think of all the effort it took to generate the data in those new zones, and you'll understand why I'm more than a bit concerned about the future of WoW.
Just like in Cataclysm, Blizzard expended a lot of effort to create new content (and a new continent), but the usefulness of that content evaporated once the big wave made it to L90. I suppose you could make the argument that 2 years of development was useful for the majority of players up until patch 5.1 dropped, only a few months worth of playtime. That's not exactly fair, but the dearth of characters out in Pandaria feed the perception that Blizzard would be better off spending time devising new raids and BGs. (And pets.)
For those people (like me) who have complained about Blizzard's use of the WoW novels and short stories to advance the lore rather than develop it in-game, this is a pretty damning result. If you were a bean counter at Blizzard, which would give you more bang for the buck: a novel or in-game content? And what's more, if you knew the in-game content would be tossed aside at the earliest opportunity, where would you put your development dollars at?
It's a shame, really, because when Blizz' development staff take themselves and their topic seriously they can create some really good content.
*Given my current leveling rate, supplemented by BGs, I'll be at max level by the time I'm finished with Kun-Lai Summit. That's great for entering the Dread Wastes, but for a BG-er, that's going to be painful.
I'm already on my third zone, Krasarang Wilds, having completed the first two.* While I know two things --cross realm zones are turned off for Pandaria and I've already passed one of the big "dailies" hubs at the Tillers area-- I'm still surprised at how few toons are out and about in Pandaria itself. I've seen more toons in Hellfire Peninsula than in the first three Pandaria zones, and that's kind of scary.
There's obviously players out there, as Cynwise demonstrated in his class distribution post, but wherever they are, it's not in Panda-land.
I am not going to jump to conclusions here, but I suspect that people like me who took their time to level a new toon are outliers, and most of the utility in the new zones is already spent. As the "game starts at max level" people will tell you, that's not a surprise. But think of all the effort it took to generate the data in those new zones, and you'll understand why I'm more than a bit concerned about the future of WoW.
Just like in Cataclysm, Blizzard expended a lot of effort to create new content (and a new continent), but the usefulness of that content evaporated once the big wave made it to L90. I suppose you could make the argument that 2 years of development was useful for the majority of players up until patch 5.1 dropped, only a few months worth of playtime. That's not exactly fair, but the dearth of characters out in Pandaria feed the perception that Blizzard would be better off spending time devising new raids and BGs. (And pets.)
For those people (like me) who have complained about Blizzard's use of the WoW novels and short stories to advance the lore rather than develop it in-game, this is a pretty damning result. If you were a bean counter at Blizzard, which would give you more bang for the buck: a novel or in-game content? And what's more, if you knew the in-game content would be tossed aside at the earliest opportunity, where would you put your development dollars at?
It's a shame, really, because when Blizz' development staff take themselves and their topic seriously they can create some really good content.
*Given my current leveling rate, supplemented by BGs, I'll be at max level by the time I'm finished with Kun-Lai Summit. That's great for entering the Dread Wastes, but for a BG-er, that's going to be painful.
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