I can see the point of a first MMO being  a "first hit" type thing but I have also been stating for years that MMORPG's no longer exsist and that we are only left with MMO's now.

Its been said a million times I'm sure but how can you go from owning a house in a game to not even having the option and feel "more" emersed. its just not going to happen. I will admit that I have not played Lotro but I can bet that peoples housing is a big factor in the emersion feel and gives a player the sense of owning a part of the world a bit more. This and more are the reason I have been saying MMORPG's are "devolving " to a point of ho hum drumness. For people to play a game for over 10 yrs even though the sub numbers are not in the millions imo says a lot.(UO)

I believe once we start seeing moves twards more World environments and less a story books we will see a new era usher in and the sun will rise on that day.

Create the world but let us the players bring it alive.. give us the tools to do so and it will happen.

Originally posted by Sophist

I can see the point of a first MMO being  a "first hit" type thing but I have also been stating for years that MMORPG's no longer exsist and that we are only left with MMO's now.

Its been said a million times I'm sure but how can you go from owning a house in a game to not even having the option and feel "more" emersed. its just not going to happen. I will admit that I have not played Lotro but I can bet that peoples housing is a big factor in the emersion feel and gives a player the sense of owning a part of the world a bit more. This and more are the reason I have been saying MMORPG's are "devolving " to a point of ho hum drumness. For people to play a game for over 10 yrs even though the sub numbers are not in the millions imo says a lot.(UO)

I believe once we start seeing moves twards more World environments and less a story books we will see a new era usher in and the sun will rise on that day.

Create the world but let us the players bring it alive.. give us the tools to do so and it will happen.

Sadly it seems to be going exactly the other way around.  Its the devs that deside exactly how things are done and if its not done like they want - then they simply change it and nerf classes and specs.
 

But I totally agree.  mmoRPG stands for not following the one linear story that all the others are supposed to do - but instead go your OWN way  - create your own story, play like you want to play - with the skills that you want your character to have.  When are we going to see a MMO game like that ?  Never.

Originally posted by AOCtester

Originally posted by Sophist

I can see the point of a first MMO being  a "first hit" type thing but I have also been stating for years that MMORPG's no longer exsist and that we are only left with MMO's now.

Its been said a million times I'm sure but how can you go from owning a house in a game to not even having the option and feel "more" emersed. its just not going to happen. I will admit that I have not played Lotro but I can bet that peoples housing is a big factor in the emersion feel and gives a player the sense of owning a part of the world a bit more. This and more are the reason I have been saying MMORPG's are "devolving " to a point of ho hum drumness. For people to play a game for over 10 yrs even though the sub numbers are not in the millions imo says a lot.(UO)

I believe once we start seeing moves twards more World environments and less a story books we will see a new era usher in and the sun will rise on that day.

Create the world but let us the players bring it alive.. give us the tools to do so and it will happen.

Sadly it seems to be going exactly the other way around.  Its the devs that deside exactly how things are done and if its not done like they want - then they simply change it and nerf classes and specs.
 

But I totally agree.  mmoRPG stands for not following the one linear story that all the others are supposed to do - but instead go your OWN way  - create your own story, play like you want to play - with the skills that you want your character to have.  When are we going to see a MMO game like that ?  Never.

Umm, EVE? Mabinogi? Ragnarok Online you can argue that one too lol.

Originally posted by melmoth1

Do we expect too much? Maybe the hardcore mmo-ers need a second hobby in order to "keep it real"? I recommend fly-fishing and DIY for the crafter/gatherers, kick-boxing for the pvpers, and comic books/cool toys for the "exclusive gear" junkies.  Oh, and for the "open world exploration" junkies, a 3 month camping trip in Asia or South America ;)

Fail.

Originally posted by fiontar

I don't think this is a case of expectations being too high. The game delivers a lot of nice elements and could clearly be an extremely successful MMORPG long term. The problem is that Funcom failed to meet the minimum expectations in too many areas.

When the game shipped:

Ability stats had no working function.

Armor offered little to no benefit beyond stats bonuses (many of which didn't work anyway).

Crafting was very much of "placeholder" quality, full of bugs, lacking function, etc...

Many quests post level 20 were broken.

The bank, trader and mail systems were disabled because of bugs and exploit potential.

Chat servers would cut in and out.

Combat animations, attack speed and DPS were broken for an entire gender.

Level advancement rate was greatly sped up, in an effort to stretch the minimal content to cover advancement all the way to max level, but even then there were many gaps that required excessive grinding.

Itemization was horrible. Not only in variety of appearance, but in usefulness of stats.

The Feat (talent tree) system contained poorly organized and balanced skill trees, along with many broken Feats that didn't function at all, or provided no benefit beyond the first point invested in them.

Promised Mounted Spell Casting, claimed to be in for launch, was non-functional.

The game contains too few zones, too few quests and too little overall content.

Class balance was still in an early beta phase, with even minimal early pass balancing lacking.

etc...

I know I'm missing some major issues, which I'm sure some people will fill in. Some of these have been been addressed to one degree or another, but as a whole the game still is far from being in the form it should have been at launch.

All the above point to areas where (to me at least) minimal expectations for a successful MMORPG launch that were not met. By shipping with these issues, Funcom has greatly hampered prospects for future success - up to the game's full potential. The MMORPG audience has little patience for premature game launches and a game will rarely get a second chance.

Another six to nine months (which according to reports on the financial health of this publicly traded company, they could have afforded) almost certainly would have allowed them to launch with an undisputed winner, with very real potential at building a multi-million subscriber player base over time.

That's what makes this all the more painful for fans who are sick of seeing MMORPGs "kill" their potential by launching before they are ready!

You hit the proverbial nail on the head. Many of the issues you list here are why I quit Age of Conan. Now, many of you know I was a staunch defender of the game and I did have faith in Funcom. I still have faith that they will make a great game and deliver on those promises but it is going to take months.

As I told my friends, what Funcom did in Age of Conan, they did VERY well. But what they didn't do, they either ignored or will do later. Some of the things that the above poster mentioned are simply unacceptable at launch. Stats not working? That is unbelievable. An entire gender not having the same capabilities? I do not care if that is a bug or not, that's is unacceptable.Feats not working ( I do not mean broken I mean not working). That is unacceptable.

However, I think much of the community is to blame too. Expectations were high, very high. Its partly a lot of different people's fault (including mine) but it was a combination of the promises that Funcom made, community wanted, and the fact that, for the most part, the community is bored right now because the MMO market has become stangant for good games.

Another issue was the attitude that many of the people took when they tried to warn us about the game. I am sorry but when testers and NDa breakers come here and take the attitude of  "Because I am in beta I know more than you and I am a god so you should bow before me and listen to everything I say", the community will get defensive. Many of the NDa breakers were right on some issues and wrong on others. They would get the community on side-tracked issues like invisible walls and such that proved to be irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. I do not recall s single leaker saying anything about stats not working, or female characters having worse dps. They (the leakers) came here with such an attitude of "they would save us from the great scourge that is Funcom" that they did themsleves a disservice and caused the community to get defensive and not listen. Many times HOW you say something is more important than WHAT you say.

In the end, Age of Conan is a good shell of a game. It needs work and it needs to be finished but for now, it is not worth playing in my opinion.

One of the major downfalls to the game is the community. Many people believed the "M" rating would lead to a better community. In truth, its the worst community I have seen. Just go read the forums. There is a lack of respect, insults fly, the language and comments made would be racy for an "R" rated movie. I personally do not want to subject myself or my family to that.

The funniest thing to me is that people beg and cheer for a full PVP game. However, what is good on paper isn't good in practice so they whine and bitch about it (these being the same ones who want the game). In truth, FFA PVP will always lead to these types of aforementioned communities and that is one reason they are not for me.

Yes, people's expectations were too high for any game to live up to what they would get. WAR,WOTLK, AION and all the others will not live up to them either. However, if devs keep releasing incomplete games with broken systems like Age of Conan and the playerbase accepts it without raising hell, the launch of incomplete games will continue and expectations will simply recede to the state where we expect alpha tests instead of launches.

Originally posted by kaishi00

Originally posted by AOCtester

Originally posted by Sophist

I can see the point of a first MMO being  a "first hit" type thing but I have also been stating for years that MMORPG's no longer exsist and that we are only left with MMO's now.

Its been said a million times I'm sure but how can you go from owning a house in a game to not even having the option and feel "more" emersed. its just not going to happen. I will admit that I have not played Lotro but I can bet that peoples housing is a big factor in the emersion feel and gives a player the sense of owning a part of the world a bit more. This and more are the reason I have been saying MMORPG's are "devolving " to a point of ho hum drumness. For people to play a game for over 10 yrs even though the sub numbers are not in the millions imo says a lot.(UO)

I believe once we start seeing moves twards more World environments and less a story books we will see a new era usher in and the sun will rise on that day.

Create the world but let us the players bring it alive.. give us the tools to do so and it will happen.

Sadly it seems to be going exactly the other way around.  Its the devs that deside exactly how things are done and if its not done like they want - then they simply change it and nerf classes and specs.
 

But I totally agree.  mmoRPG stands for not following the one linear story that all the others are supposed to do - but instead go your OWN way  - create your own story, play like you want to play - with the skills that you want your character to have.  When are we going to see a MMO game like that ?  Never.

Umm, EVE? Mabinogi? Ragnarok Online you can argue that one too lol.

I will admit that EvE does give me a piece of what I look for but I wont sit here and say its nail biting combat. You can pretty much tell if your screwed or your oponents screwed upon the first few seconds.(most battles not all)

As for the other two I  think I tried rag for like a week and never even hear of Mabinogi. But again there was something lacking if it couldn't even hold me for a week. From what I can remember I believe I foung rag to be clunky combat but please remember its been so long I barely remember. Point being is I still think UO had it right  with a good speed on combat and good tactical dynamics. Though they did ruin the game ultimately it had qualities that should have never been removed from mmorpg's.

Yes, expectations for MMOGs are too high. As are people's opinion about their own knowledge concerning and understanding of MMOGs, and about the number of people sharing their opinion.

Another thing that is too high is the threshold for banning people for trolling and posting defamatory comments about developers and publishers, or for simply being plain rude or incapable of being constructive or provide proof - or at least a solid basis - for their claims.

But hey, it's the internet, right? ;-)

If you started bitching mcdonalds suck and a group of people mobbed you, stole your money and beat you to a pulp that is pretty much right on the money of what happens here and vice versa. McDonalds is great guys! Rawr mobbed, robbed, and beaten.

Expectations are in the eye of the beholder what one person expects isn't what that other may expect. And thus you have this war going on between the two sides. But the real question is someone's expectation really all that high when the game is a buggy mess with broken code and features on the box that are not even in the game.

Can you blame them? I mean it's the equivalent to eating an old dry burger at mcdonalds, no one is going to do that, at least those in their right mind. They complain, get a new one and normally something extra for the inconvenience like an ice cream cone or coupon for something free next time. In the mmo world you complain to the world and cancel your account before it cost you anymore. A 30day money back guarantee on these things would be nice.

It is just how the world turns.

Unfortunately people believed and expected  what Funcom  promised. So no our expectations weren't too high.Funcom delivered  far less than they promised.

The short answer to the general question is: NO.

The devs expectations of what will pass muster these days is too low.

Most companies try to provide everything to everyone and fail to satisfy anyone. If more companies would pick a specific target audience and get a good solid game out for that audience they would do 10 times better than what most games do today.

The reason for all the anger at AoC for example is they tried to grab several audiences in one big swoop -

you have the "mature" audience - not sure there is any one specific thing for that audience other than not having a need to censor oneself perhaps.

there is the pvp audience - with pvp servers - battle keeps - sieges - all partially done and thought out but none of it quite finished or very cohesive.

The casual audience - The I dont want to play more than 30 minutes at a time crowd yet I expect to be as well equipped and the same level as the people who play 10 hours a day otherwise its just not fair. This doesnt make up the entire casual audience, however, it is the aspect that causes the ruination of most games as devs try to cater to this specific vocal aspect of the casual market and make every piece of the game accessible to that particular audience.

Then there is the more hardcore raider type of person - They get to max level usually fairly quickly and are looking for something interesting to do - by this time the endless grind of normal mobs is dull and boring and they are looking for some form of challenge. This is the point most games really screw up as they have tried to cater to all the different audiences through the normal levels and then dont know what to do for all those same people at end game. Do I make casual friendly raids? Do I make 4 hour long raids? Is there enough pvp action going on? They usually fracture there attention in so many directions that all of them suck for at least the first 6 months and most of thier audience has allready moved on to another game.

The only recent game that has not suffered this issue has been WoW(which I have never played) due in large part I think to the fact they had a budget the size of 10 normal MMO's and were able to appease most of these different groups of people.

My personal opinion is if the developers would simply pick one group of people and make a 100% complete game for that audience they would do a lot better. That is all the way through end game before beta is over with everything bug checked and all major issues fixed prior to release with enough content in the pipeline pre release to keep people happy for at least 6 months. Other elements to appease other aspects of the MMO audience can always be added later if at least a little forethought is given to them in the initial design of the game, without spending a lot of valuable resources pre-release.

As a sidenote: I have not played a single MMO for more than 3 months since I quit playing eq. Even though I keep looking for a game that will hold me for a longer time span.

Yes I think people expect too much out of any game being released. There is no such thing as a flawless release of any game. I can list atleast a dozen games that were and still are flawed at release and several years later still more of the same. The major ones are EQ2, WOW, both of these games at release were horrible, and even after a few years they still have many flaws, the classes are way out of whack with abilities (example a cloth wearing priest winning in a fight against a dps, or tank class) and other problems, but thats what patches are for. People do expect too much, some of us need to put ourselves in the game devs shoes.

The bit about "oh we were lied to about this and that" well imo thats childish. If I had a dime for everytime someone lied to me, id be a rich person. I understand that people feel betrayed, but seriously is a $50 game the end of the world, is life going to end because a video game didn't meet your expectations. Im not here to belittle anyone for their opinions, im just giving mine. yes people expect too much out of games nowadays.

I personally love aoc because it is new, its not cartoonish, auction house prices aren't over the top, mounts don't cost over 1000 gold, but doesn't mean that you should feel the same. I see thousands of others online, they seem to like it as well.

so maybe it is possible some folks are being too dramatic over this and other games, you got to step back and wonder why thousands of other people aren't seeing or feeling the same way you do.

This won't be the 1st or last time people feel this way, but sometimes it reminds me of the spoiled hollywood rich kid who cried because they were promised the black bmw and got the red.

---

Originally posted by melmoth1
So much hate, so much hate and bitterness.
I don't hate the haters though - they just want the next big thing. They want to be addicted and immersed and a part of some mmorpg that has a buzz about it - a buzz that is retained beyond one month. They want to feel in control and they want to feel connected to a community of shared interest.
I think AOC is ok. I play casual as I'm busy. It has quests (gather, check, kill) like most other mmos, its has character customization, class and race choices etc. To hate it is to hate all fantasy mmos, no? There is nothing there to make it grossly better or worse than any other mmo. It seems pretty standard to my eyes. I enjoy it (for now) for the same reason I enjoyed other mmos: it feels a little more "real" and "connected" than single-player non-mmos.
Yes, that's it. I think the hate is against all fantasy mmos. I got mates who quit AOC and returned to WOW, City of Villians and EVE. They didn't like going back to those games, they just preferred some minor aspect of those games to AOC. Conversely, other mates have stuck with AOC, again for relatively minor attachments and preferences.
I prefer AOC, at least the content is new. But everything else just feels same old, same old. Maybe mmo's in general have a limited burn. After a time you become immune to the usual hooks of mmos? The first time I ever played an mmo, it was fricken amazing - I know I will never get that initial buzz back again and that's just life.
Do we expect too much? Maybe the hardcore mmo-ers need a second hobby in order to "keep it real"? I recommend fly-fishing and DIY for the crafter/gatherers, kick-boxing for the pvpers, and comic books/cool toys for the "exclusive gear" junkies. Oh, and for the "open world exploration" junkies, a 3 month camping trip in Asia or South America ;)
Peace out
Melmoth
NB edited for punctuation/spelling errors

---

Yes I do think that peoples expectations are to high these days but that does not apply to AoC. AoC deserves everything they are getting, honestly I wish funcom would be arrested and put in jail for fraud.

I just sit and laugh when people think that players expectations are too high.

In fact if anything they are too low.  The quality of the released MMO's is horrible, its way worse than WOW was. 

Just because something has been an industry standard practice does NOT make it acceptable.

Things every game should do on release at this point;

1. have a stable client

2.  have an action plan to greatly increase capacity if demand is higher than anticipated (this includes the ability to rapidly scale up customer service)

3. all classes should be working with NO broken abilities. (balance issues will probably exist but thats a different story from broken abilities)

4.  Beginning endgame should be available and working with minimal to no bugs. (aka 1st raid instance/battlekeeps/ etc etc)

5.  No gaps in "content" if its a content centric game that force people to grind.

6. Billing systems that don't double bill people who use prepaid cards.

7. A plan in place with some standard tools (rightclick name /report gold spammer as an example) to deal with gold spammers so players are not harrassed with 10-15 messages in 5 minutes. (using a petition system that is used for bugs/player help is not acceptable here as it ties up customer service resources contacting people over what amounts to a /check log /ban account action)

8.  Whatever system the marketing department is pushing needs to work,  aka pvp level system, battlekeeps, rvr control of zones etc etc.  The system needs to be there and it shouldn't take a rocket scientist to make it work due to bugs. (if it even exists or works at all, which apparently is acceptable to most people)

Now thats a reasonable list of things to expect however none of you are saying what should work, your just asking a generic question if people are asking too much and not using examples or even justifying why it shouldn't work beyond blaming investors.  I'm betting investors are more concerned about quality than you guys give them credit for, if anything you don't get to be an investor without being pretty damn saavy about money in the first place.  

  None of you are listing what expectations should be.  All everyone in this thread is saying is that people expect too much.  I'm sorry but what is too much? to ask for a working stable base game to build on?  thats asking too much.. BS  that should be the basics at this point and companies need to stop having fanbois apologists running around asking them to give them a break.

I bet none of you give GM/FORD/Chrysler a break for subpar quality cars.. why should we allow MMO makers leniency for subpar quality games?

  I'm going to answer the title of this thread directly.

  No

  I think people expect only what they are told to expect from a given product.  They may tack on some slight things, but in the end...most complaints come directly from a product failing to provide that which it has advertised.  If you say, "We're going to have the most beautiful armor ever made!" you had best research ALL armor across ALL games and spend all the time you can ensuring you DO have such a thing.

  Likewise....if you say, "We're going to have a great PvP system and a gorgeous game with a serious and deep mature setting", you had BEST come through on all three.  If you drop the ball on any of them...people are gonna start seeing crap in ALL of them.

Honestly, I don't think expectations are too high.  I find it interesting gamers tend to be very forgiving of companies that produce bad/buggy games.  Are gamers that desperate to play games that they are willing to settle for poor games?  I think the expectations we are seeing are slowing on par with our expectations of other products we buy.

I know this isn't the best example, but think of the other stuff you buy.  Cars, electronics, books...etc.  Consumers expect those things to be working properly and completely once it is bought and taken out of the store.  I realize MMOs are always a job in progress but maybe that term has become an excuse for many gaming companies.

 Are people's expectations too high these days?  No
 

People will always have high expectations and thats only good, but what i do notice is people have unrealistic expectations, and i must admit it amazes me how many people still believe in hype as most complainers have proven they still do believe in hype ( keep in mind i said MOST and not all, so this means that some complaints are good and constructive just not all...unfortunaly)

Originally posted by Reklaw

 Are people's expectations too high these days?  No
 

People will always have high expectations and thats only good, but what i do notice is people have unrealistic expectations, and i must admit it amazes me how many people still believe in hype as most complainers have proven they still do believe in hype ( keep in mind i said MOST and not all, so this means that some complaints are good and constructive just not all...unfortunaly)

Unfortunately, you are right. I stopped believing into what company says after Dark and Light. After Vanguard, I stopped pre-ordering MMORPG's as well. Its shame how devs hype their games with false promises and features. In my book, if the game doesn't have a specific feature at the day of release, that feature should NOT be mentioned as part of the game. Not until its live and working.

If we compromise with companies that claim their game has "Sieges" or "Massive PvP", but doesn't have that feature at the day of release, then in the future, we will end up with broken games and missing content.

Originally posted by melmoth1

Do we expect too much? Maybe the hardcore mmo-ers need a second hobby in order to "keep it real"? I recommend fly-fishing and DIY for the crafter/gatherers, kick-boxing for the pvpers, and comic books/cool toys for the "exclusive gear" junkies.  Oh, and for the "open world exploration" junkies, a 3 month camping trip in Asia or South America ;)

Briliant! Pure bloody genius!

Yes i believe our hopes are to high now a days. I feel all the hype build up for a game ruins the game nowing about a game 4 to 6 years before it comes out lets you build up an expectation. Than you are completley let down because it dosen't meet what you have built up in your mind. Even if the game is good you get let down because you expected so much more than what you got.

I think asking for ideas and things like that is fine early on but you should not start stating what the game is going to have in it until you are very close to release and already in beta so you know you will not let the community down by broken promises.

just a thought.