The MMORPGs Of 2003 - Disappointing?

Thanks to GameSpy for their article presenting an overview of the massively multiplayer RPGs released so far in 2003, as the piece advances the opinion that "on balance, the year seemed a bit disappointing." The author bases this on the fact that "...too many games, like City of Heroes, Dragon Empires, Lineage II... and others have slid into 2004.", but also takes issue with the released titles: "Even though we got some hotly-anticipated MMOs like Star Wars Galaxies and PlanetSide, they suffered from some notable feature trim." Although profiling interesting new MMOs like A Tale In The Desert and Rubies Of Eventide, the article ends on a cautionary note: "There just don't seem to be enough players for all of these to garner big numbers. [In 2004] we're going to see some of these MMO publishers doubled-over in pain."

Comments

Disappointing? Quite.

[Kethinov]

It seems like everyone agrees with me when I say the best MMORPGs were the originals in their first few years. Now the greats, most notably EQ and UO have deteriorated in veteran players' eyes and the new releases leave much to be desired. Not all is dim, however. I suppose a set of dismal releases makes the next great one that much more appealing to the fans.

Re:Disappointing? Quite.

[jermyjerm]

Yep. After playing UO for a year, no other MMOG I've played has really lived up. The newer games never seem to deliver what they promise, and all seem to lack in content. They all obviosuly surpass EQ/UO technologically, but end up falling flat anyway. In my estimation this happens because the developers spend WAY too much time on game balance. Looking back on UO it seems like they just set the game in motion and waited to see how it would pan out, which led to some annoying problems (like houses covering every free pixel of land) but overall made the game seem much more vibrant. Unfortunately, I don't have the time or money (or hardware) to try them out anymore, so I may never find an MMORPG that could beat my great UO experiences.

Re:Disappointing? Quite.

[Kethinov]

In recent years in UO, the housing shortage has been all but eliminated. But now there's a whole set of new problems which ultimately forced me to let down my arms shortly after the last expansion.

As for EQ, I don't play it. Never have. But I hear similar complaints for many of my friends who do/did play it.

Re:Disappointing? Quite.

[Draigon]

If the current state of MMOGs is disappointing it should by the games themselves and not the numbers they pull in.

I don't understand this score mentality of MMOGs needing to get larger and larger in numbers. Once you have a few hundred, maybe a thousand or two, you have enough. Of the 250k+ thousand people that played EverQuest, how many did you know? For one you're probably only concerned with your server so that brings the number down to maybe 3k. That's a fair number to support background noise and avoid ghost towns during odd time zones. you'll only meet maybe 100-400 of those people during your time there (and that's being very generous).

So as long as a game has 3k players, you would never notice the difference.

The extremely important number concerning MMOGs is how many NEW players did each generation bring in? Because if the genre is going to survive it's going to need tons more NEW players (previous non-MMOG gamers or non-MMOG non-gamers).

I hope someday you'll be able to choose between 40 or 50 great MMOGs going on. Not sign into Earth MMOG with population.. Earth. feh.

I agree, there are too many similar MMORPGs

[TomGroves]

I strongly agree that there will soon - or may already - be far more Sci-Fi / Fantasy style MMORPG games than the market can bear. I was one of the many that was in UO on 'day 1'. I have also played AC, EQ, DAoC and EVE, though I currently don't subscribe to any MMORPGs. Lately I've been MUDing, but even that is largely because it's free and portable (very easy to find a telnet client when you're out and about).

Re:I agree, there are too many similar MMORPGs

[grumpygrodyguy]

Yep, I switched from EQ to mudding also.

Largely because I'm unemployed and broke. But it's interesting to note that I'm enjoying mudding just as much as I enjoyed playing a subscription MMORG.

MMORPGs

[ziggles]

The thing I always hated about MMORPGs is they were all set in that tolkien-rip-off universe with elves and dwarves and good and bad magic, that's completely uninteresting to me. I suppose SWG also has those types of elements, but it does a better job hiding them so I enjoy it. It's not perfect, but it's the first MMORPG to get my attention for more than a glance. I don't even like the Star Wars movies much, but it's fun to play in that universe.

Shadowbane is redeming its self

[Drakino]

Well, I stand right now, watching a gladiator tournament in Shadowbane. One that was organized by a player, but has a person from Wolfpack (the company behind the game) attending and helping out.

I have never seen this level of interaction between the devs and the gamers before. I think I am going to keep subscribing, even with some of the problems, because I have fun.

Re:Shadowbane is redeming its self

[Caedar]

A Tale in the Desert has an extreme level of interaction between the developers and gamers. The Lead Programmer and Designer gave away their personal cell phone numbers on the account that they are not at the office and players want to report a serious problem. They also let players visit their development studio, and commonly talk casually with the players on the official IRC channel each and every day.

They are idiots

[Anonymous Coward]

Every genre has loads and loads of stinkers coming out for every gem. FFXI for instance, looks good and gets a nod from them. So why are MMORPGs rated by their entire game-base, and not other genres? Just because they aren't 5000 MMORPG clones like there are racing car games?

Where is Neocron?

[skinfitz]

Disappointing that Neocron isn't mentioned.

Get a free 10 day trial here

"After your registration is complete, you will receive an email which contains the download location (URL) of the full Neocron client. If you don't want to download the client (a 1.3 GB download) from that page, then you may prefer ordering Neocron on 2 CD-ROMs for only 9.99 USD. You may also simply copy the full game from a friend."

PlanetSide and SW:Galaxies have the same problem:

[inkless1]

Sony Online Entertainment.

Maybe because they're all the same

[Lord_Dweomer]

You know, I read about the new MMORPGs coming out.....and they are really all the same. They take a few key gaming elements, switch the theme a bit (oh, hmmmm, fantasy's been done, lets change the swords to lasers!), and lock players in to the same leveling treadmill which is really just a virtual Skinner Box. I think the closest thing to an innovative MMORPG lately has been Planetside....but it doesn't offer enough true FPS elements to make it any fun to play. I think the first MMOFPS that can truly combine the two will be earthshattering. Perhaps a future Halflife 2 mod, who knows.

There are good MMORPGS out there

[4barenbou]

I just found one, it's completely free and it takes all the boring micromanagment generally required in MMORPGS out by doing it for you. Check it out at www.progressquest.com.

There still lies hope in the old school.

[xankar]

I, personally, am sick of the dissapointments that are the overhyped games of the present. I had a discussion with a friend, in which he said that he preferred 2D style for MMORPGs. I said that a 3D world is more immersive and offers a lot of potential, but few companies have utilized that potential to its fullest extent.

We bickered for a while, as opinionated gamers often do, until he realized that he basically agreed with me; the reason he preferred 2D was that he couldn't find a 3D game that was as high quality as some games like Nexus.

Nexus isn't very pretty(AT ALL. Massive amount of screenshots here.), so if graphics is one of your top needs in a game, it's not for you. BUT, it's well managed. The economy is perfectly balanced, the community is excellent, and the game is fun. Player and dev run events like carnages(deathmatches), elixir wars(capture the flag with bow and arrow), foxhunts(surround the fox on horseback), and a lot more, plus a huge cultural element including fanfiction, poetry and improv.

Nexus is probably one of the best MMORPGs out there; it's been around for awhile, but too few people have heard of it.

I, for one, am all for sweet, sweet simplicity.

No mention of browser-based games

[Andy_R]

It's really sad to see great browser based games like Planetarion getting ignored in favour of dozens of eye-candy-rich gameplay-poor levelling-up rpgs that cost a fortune.

Thousands of people devoted huge portions of their lives to playing Planetarion, with 180,000 accounts at it's peak, and the on-line community spirit there was simply amazing.

It's just had an complete re-write for round 10 with many improvements, but it's future is in doubt because people won't pay $15 for a 3 to 4 month round, or even bother with the free 2 week trial

3d vs 2d

[Morgahastu]

I played Ultima Online for almost 2 years and it took over my life for a large part of that time.

I didn't decide to play any of the new MMORPG's because I couldn't stand the First Person perspectiv e for an RPG. A world so complex and engaging requires peripheral vision that no first person, or third person game can recreate. The only way I can play these games is from a top-down view (2d or 3d) with no loading times, like Ultima Online. Exploring UO was fun because you never knew what was coming up because you couldn't see into the distance, it was a wonderful game.

Re:3d vs 2d

[PurplePhase]

Eh, exploring is exploring no matter the game. For the 3D games only rough terrain features show up in the distance (mountains, lakes, etc.) which I like more than having no idea there's an impassible mountain there until it appears on my 2D HUD. If you're talking about being surprised by monsters, I suggest closing your eyes and wandering around :)

I hate the lack of peripheral vision, though, and the control schemes are never what I want. No one quite has the controls right for their particular game. I also hate when they hide items and you need to click everywhere to find it. That happens too much in single-player games, too.

Load times are only at area boundaries for EQ but AO only loads if you're entering a special area/dungeon through a doorway, and those are pretty quick. Makes sense they can't pre-load that since too many variables make that indeterminant.

8-PP

What are the problems?

[DAldredge]

I have been thinking about getting back into UO, what problems have you been seeing?

Re:What are the problems?

[Kethinov]

My biggest problem with it was that they turned PVP into an uberness-of-your-items game instead of a skill game. But I only played for PVP. The non PVPers seem to be having even more problems. Read the forums at Stratics.

MMORPG Populations

[aliens]

# of nerds who would be interested in MMORPG's: a fixed number that might grow slowly

# of MMORPG's: a number growing by leaps and bounds

There are simply going to be too many MMORPG's and not enough players. Want to know what will drive future MMORPG's into the hands of the rest of the gaming masses? I'd tell you but that would END all the fun. ::)

URU: Ages Beyond Myst Correction?

[Allaran]

I believe the article is wrong about Uru: Ages Beyond Myst being pushed back to 2004. Last I read, it has gone gold and is supposed to be released in November. I saw a pre-order option on Amazon, not that that's an indication of actual release date.

Delays to 2004 are a good thing.

[Doctor Cat]

I don't see why they should be complaining about games being delayed, given that most MMORPGs are shipped too soon and many of them have a shaky launch because of it. They even noted that some of the ones that did launch in 2003 had features trimmed to get them out the door. I think we're better off when the developers and publishers take the extra time to get more of their bugs fixed & make the games more polished and feature-laden before release.

Re:Delays to 2004 are a good thing.

[ShayUK]

This is a very important point. MMOGs aren't like other games in that they need to get the details right before it ever goes out the door - patching is a big problem, but perhaps an even bigger problem is developers launching games that have been poorly playtested.

These games live and die by their meta- scale systems. The economics, the social structures, item commonality, and so on. When any of these factors fail so to will the game in the long term. And isn't what we're after is the kind of experience that is not only enjoyable today but is going to continue to be enjoyable after months of play?

Only through serious, extended playtesting can problems in these 'higher arts' of MMOGs become apparent. But right now it seems like we're going to have to endure a few more generations of ultimately doomed games... a few more live trial and error experiences that developers will (hopefully) learn from one day.

Probably around 2010 or so... I hope...

Notable Feature Trim

[LincolnX]

Notice that the two cited games from this year that "suffered from some notable feature trim" are both Sony Online Entertainment games. Planetside and Star Wars Galaxies are both put out by SOE. The problem these two games have are NOT from lack of players (Planetside is NOW having a player shortage). The problem is they are UNFINISHED GAMES.