We Fly Spitfires – MMORPG Blog

The following is a guest post from Professor Beej at (cunningly enough) professorbeej.com. Beej is a blogger who carefully walks the line between a slacker and an academic. I carefully walk the line between being a slacker and an underachiever.

Quick question: how many of you have ever played a fantasy MMO? Raise your hand. Most of you? Cool, I expected that. Now what about science fiction? All right, fewer, I see, but still some. What about post-apocalyptic? I see you over there Fallen Earth guys! Now, what about sports? Anyone? Anyone?

Why is that? Are non-fantasy/sci-fi games less fun? No, not at all, and if you were to ask any of the people who actually play more niche games, I bet you’d get some biased but heartfelt responses that the reality is quite the opposite. The problem comes from people just not knowing what to expect out of them. The more out of the ordinary a game’s setting or premise is, the fewer people will even give it a shot. I’m as guilty of this as anyone. I’ve never tried a sports MMO or racing or puzzle. I generally stick to what I know.

But now, I’m burned out on the mainstream MMO offerings and their takes on the traditional, established settings. I love World of Warcraft, but it’s ruined me on fantasy MMOs, even itself. After playing for nearly five years now, I can’t get excited about a fantasy world, no matter how well-constructed. Aion hasn’t interested me because it looks like it’s just more of the same, whether it actually is or not. I don’t want to get that way for sci-fi games with The Old Republic on the horizon, but outside of the Star Wars license, I don’t see how the setting is really going to be any different from any other game in its genre.

Part of the fun for me in MMOs is exploration. Like Syp, I like finding hidey-holes and special places that maybe a quarter of the population ever see. Unfortunately, in fantasy games, they all turn out the same to me now. I remember exploring in Warhammer Online around its release, and I had a special tome unlock that gave me a title of some kind for finding some particular out of the way ruins. Whee. Ruins. That looked just like every other set of ruins in every other fantasy MMO I had ever played. I actually felt the same way about EVE Online; I was in space. That looked like all the other space in sci-fi games. I was shooting space ships. That looked like every other space ship…well, you get my point.

The world/setting is the most important part of an MMO to me, outside of gameplay mechanics. I want to find a world that makes me want to exist in it like Ultima Online did when I was 16. Part of the glory of an online world is the feeling that the world itself does not owe you anything. Too often the entire world exists for no other reason than to facilitate the gamer to move through it, and because of this, developers will often make the world similar to another successful property instead of developing their own look and feel. Look at Altdorf in WAR and Stormwind in WoW: they share a common visual theme, except that Altdorf is grittier because the game is grittier.

I’m tired of being pushed through generic worlds that could be palette-swaps with another game. I’m tired of, like Gordon posted about recently, being pushed along the rails of a theme park without ever feeling like I’m in the world. And I’m not even an RPer in MMOs. I just want to feel like my character belongs in the game’s setting rather than just visiting while I sign in and run him around. I want for the fantasy world to intrigue me like Middle Earth did when I first read the books as a child. I want to be blown away by actually standing in the Mos Eisley cantina. Unfortunately, though, I find myself being underwhelmed by even adored franchises and their attempts at immersion because of the copy-cats and lazy world designers out there.

I feel like I’ve become a fair-weather MMO fan because of this view. I’m hopping from game to game, looking for something that might not even exist: a new take on MMO setting. I don’t want just another fantasy world or sci-fi that breadcrumbs me to arbitrary end-game content. I want a world that I can inhabit and be a part of, whether that is as an adventurer or just as some schmuck. So far, it looks like Fallen Earth might be my last, best hope of finding a world that is unique enough to satisfy me.

What about you folks? How much does setting affect your MMO enjoyment? Is the world a big draw for you like it is me? Do you scoff at the thought of ever setting foot off the quest-line rails or do you yearn for the freedom that only a persistent, immersive, sandbox world can give you?

Whilst pondering the cancellation of my EVE Online subscription, I idly considered the possibility of MMORPGs having different type of monthly subscription fees. We already see this for cell phones, Internet packages, cable/satellite deals etc so, to me, it seems like a pretty rational and logical thing to request. Off the top of my head, here’s a basic concept (obviously the numbers are totally fictitious):

• Unlimited – $16.99, no restrictions
• Prime time – $12.99, all day weekends, after 5pm weekdays
• Weekend – $8.99, can only play on Saturday & Sunday
• Off-Peak – $4.99, can only play Monday-Friday, 12:00am to 5pm

As a consumer, do you think this sort of monthly subscription model would appeal to you? Personally, although it does complicate things more than a single flat fee, I think it would be nice to have the option to mix and match subscriptions between my MMORPGs. I’d likely be far more inclined to keep multiple subscriptions active if I could, say, pay less to play one of them on weekend or all of them after working hours only.

The problem with sort of model, as Psychochild pointed out in one of the comments yesterday, is that it lacks any sort of business case for the MMO developer. Not only does it have added costs for them to maintain but it’s entirely likely that they would lose money. No doubt many MMOs have lots of players who pay the full monthly subscription yet barely log in and, if they switched to less expensive package as a result of this, the developers wouldn’t make as much cash. It doesn’t cost the MMO company any more if you play 100 hours a month than if you only play 10 as the fee is flat, no matter what.

I guess the curious thing for me though is why these sort of subscription models work for cell phone companies and gym memberships etc. The obvious answer is competition. The more companies competing with each other, the more competitive deals the consumer gets. However, this doesn’t seem to appeal to MMORPGs even though there are dozens of games out there for the player to chose from. The cynic in me would wonder if there’s some sort of fixed agreement in place between them all or that no one wants to be the first to buck the trend and start a bidding war but that’s another post (I’ll supply free tin-foil hats for everyone when I write it).

So what do you think? Would you like to see alternative monthly subscription models and is it viable?

I’m having a bit of a dilemma at the moment because my EVE Online monthly subscription just renewed a few days ago and yet I haven’t logged in for a week or so. I’m still very fond of EVE but I’ve been incredibly busy with moving apartment recently and checking out other MMORPGs so it’s kinda fallen to the wayside.

Currently I’m subscribed to three MMOs – World of Warcraft, Aion and, of course, EVE Online. Is that too many? My personal limit usually sits around two as, quite frankly, I just don’t have the time to play any more than that (even one is a stretch sometimes). This of course is the perfect example of one of the major flaws with subscription based games. There tends to be a threshold for the acceptable numbers of hours playtime per month to justify the fee. Of course that threshold varies per person but ultimately we need to feel like we’re getting value for money.

My big problem is that I keep thinking “I still like the game, I will probably log in and play it a lot sometime soon”. This thought is what kept me paying a subscription to SOE for EQ2 for about three months, long after I really stopped playing it. Maybe I just have more money than sense.

I know there’s a big movement now towards micro-transactions and pay-to-play although I doubt we’ll ever really see the latter take off in the West. What I’d definitely like to see though is some sort of restricted subscription. Maybe something like you can pay reduced fee but only get to play the game for X number of hours a week or in-between certain times of the day. A lot of other services like mobile phones, broadband connections, TV packages and gym memberships offer this already so maybe it’s not too much of a stretch for MMORPG companies to swallow.

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Unless you’ve be hiding under an Apple Mac for the past year you’ll probably be aware that Windows 7 will be launching in a couple of weeks. It’s been hailed as the next messiah and what XP was to Millennium and, quite frankly, that’s good enough praise for me.

To coincide with the Windows 7 launch, Microsoft are encourage users to have Windows 7 “parties”. Yep, that’s right, par-tays, dawg. Now I don’t know about you but I’m a mega-geek and I even I draw the line at inviting all of my friends over to drink low-alcohol beer, eat nachos and talk about last night’s “game” (American football reference y’all) as we crowd around my PC and geek out all of the cool new features Windows 7 has to offer.

“Oooh, check out the new version of Windows Explorer.”

“You’re so awesome for inviting us over for a Windows 7 party, Gordon.”

“Seeing the decreased boot time of Windows 7 really makes me want to have your babies, Gordon.”

Uh huh.

Still don’t believe me that Microsoft are actively pushing this is a legitimate thing? Watch the vid below.

Ironically enough this video is almost so bad, it’s good. If it were a spoof, I’d be chuckling my arse off but the fact that it’s real makes me want to cry inside. Microsoft are even sending out launch party kits to help you plan your event. Oh boy.

Now I hate those combat trouser wearing, iPod carrying, grinning idiot Botherhood of the Mac users as much as you but least Apple don’t encourage us to throw parties to celebrate the launch of Snow Leopard. This has to take the biscuit with Microsoft. If you’re going to have the balls to use Windows at least keep it quiet and hide your shame.

Or how about Sandpark?

My question about raiding as an endgame yesterday received lots of interesting comments and replies which I loved reading and responding to. It got me thinking about whether or not it would be possible to combine the open, player driven perpetual worlds of sandbox MMORPGs with the gated, level driven worlds of theme park MMOs.

Sandbox MMOs like EVE Online tend to offer a vast amount of choice and freedom. They don’t necessarily focus on raiding as an endgame, or at all, but instead provide the players with their own means of determining the nature of the world they live in. Usually this is through PvP and battles over territory and guild wars but it may also extend into crafting monopolies and political alliances. Suffice to say, there is plenty of room to grow and the appeal of this type of game is great as it truly is about the players deciding on how their world is shaped. The Butterfly Effect as CCP called it.

The downside of sandbox MMORPGs though is that they tend to be very difficult to penetrate and learn and can often be very scary and unappealing to new players. They also tend to lack contained stories and, as we’re seeing with Star Wars: The Old Republic, story driven MMOs are the latest and hottest trend.

Theme park MMORPGs on the other hand offer very controlled, gated and obvious progression. It’s easy for a new player to jump into a game like this, pick a race and class and get stuck into the game. Their levels and abilities are clear and obvious and the game can be very accessible and friendly. Not that it’s always utilised well, but gated content can also offer some great story driven elements and clear forms of progression to the user. I’m going to use that old chestnut Tortage (from Age of Content) as an example of self-contained, story driven, gated content that rocked our socks off.

The downside of theme park MMOs though is that they tend to be quite bland in comparison to their sandbox brothers. The appeal of a game like EVE Online is that you can effect everyone with your actions but in World of Warcraft, your individual actions are almost meaningless outside of your own guild. Nothing you do in a theme park game is going to influence anyone else.

So, my mad scientist mind has started wondering if there’s a way to combine to the two into some sort of super MMORPG, a themebox sandpark if you will. And why not? There’s no rule which states that you can’t have classes or level progression in a sandbox world or a free form, sandbox world as the endgame of a theme park MMO to replace raiding.

Can these two entities ever exist as one? Or should I just lay off the crazy pills?

Kinda odd when you think about it, isn’t it? Most new MMORPGs encourage solo play all the way from level 1 to <Insert Max Level Here> and then suddenly you hit the cap and you’re expected to not only find a team of up to 24 players to raid with but also the skill and knowledge to to go along with it. Suddenly your gear is no good, your talent spec is useless and your quest solving skills are pointless. Guess all of those dozens and dozens (and dozens) of hours of leveling up were for naught. I’ve never known a gaming genre that has an end game so radically different from the beginning.

OK, so some MMORPGs encourage grouping as you level. Big whoop. Tanking in a five or six man group is nothing like tanking for a raid, I know that from personal experience. It’s like switching between Java programming and C++ (all the geeks in the room gimme a high-five!) and I’m sure healing and DPSing is just the same. Not only that, but suddenly your play style of casual, two hour gaming sessions goes out of the window as you’re forced to spend four or five hours, several nights a week, raiding. Where did that come from?

All of this just to look hot, get the best rewards the game has to offer and face a reasonable challenge. Couldn’t we face some sort of other challenges anyway? Like really, really tough single player instances? Or some mind-puzzles that tickle our frontal lobes a bit? Or some sort of clever, oh I don’t know, roleplaying social gathering and interaction sessions that actually define the point of playing a RPG with thousands of other players?

OK, I’ll stop it with the creepiness. Come back.

I’ve got nothing against raiding, nothing at all. I just find it so incredibly bizarre that we spend the majority of our MMORPG lives performing activities that bear absolutely no resemblance to the final, and arguably, more important aspect of the game. If raiding’s what you gotta do to get the good stuff and look slick, shouldn’t we at least get same practice in before we get there? Or better yet, learn what it’s like before investing weeks or months of our time in some avatar?

Or hell, maybe it’s just time the whole end game of the MMORPG genre was reinvented. I’m sure I could jot down a few suggestions during my lunch break tomorrow.

Five years ago, Everquest 2 decided to buck the trend and be one of the first and only MMORPGs to allow any race to be any class. It was a decision that was I all in favour of and one I don’t understand why it hasn’t been adopted by more games, especially considering the focus now seems to be more on the MMO and less on the RPG.

Although I’ve dabbled in real roleplaying, I’ve never done it seriously and know very little about the background and reasoning behind restricting class choice by race. Presumably it’s all about keeping the choices of the player limited to the confines of the world they play in in an attempt to maintain some sort of logic and keep it “real”. Barbarians couldn’t possibly be Wizards, for instance, because they aren’t smart enough and Erudites couldn’t be Warriors because they aren’t strong enough.

Apart from basing these decisions on assumption (there’s no reason why a Barbarian couldn’t go off to Wizard school due to some explainable reason), it seems to have very little practical implications on modern MMORPGs. I can understand it being more important in traditional table-top RPG games but, if you look at a game like World of Warcraft, the RPG element is merely an afterthought that no one really cares about. So why does the game even bother to restrict class by race? It seems to be more out of habit than anything else.

It’s not like class/race restrictions are cast in stone and carry any sort of weight anyway. We only need to look at the forthcoming Cataclysm expansion and the new combinations it offers to see that these decisions are arbitrary to say the least. WoW isn’t the first game to open up new class/race combinations either, Everquest did it a few years after it’s release. Adding new class combinations seems to be an easy trick to offer some new variation to the player without having to put much work into it and cheapens the whole argument of preserving the integrity of the game lore. Looking at the new class/race combinations in WoW, it appears that each race can go almost every class apart from one or two, a kinda meaningless remnant.

The reason I don’t want classes to be restricted by race is because I feel that I should be given the flexibility to make the character that I want. If I want to make a Draenei Rogue or a Dark Elf Paladin or a Stygian Dark Templar (why that combination doesn’t already exist boggles my mind – but that’s another post), then that should be my choice entirely.

Plus, how I roleplay my character should be up to me and I shouldn’t confined just because of some throwback to the original Dungeons & Dragons. Besides, wouldn’t be a lot more interesting to see some strange race/class combinations walking about and be able to read/hear about their individual back stories?