MMORPG.com's Jon Wood returns this week with another list, this time taking a look at ten games that have, for better or worse, solidified a place in MMORPG history.

#10 The Sims Online

When The Sims Online was first announced, it caused a great deal of excitement throughout the video game industry. The game that had become a phenomenon both inside gaming circles and in the world beyond, was going to be available to play online. No longer would players be restricted to interacting with their own creations and NPCs. Instead, they would be doing what the game itself simulates: interacting with other people. The IP alone, a popular video game franchise that was at the height of its popularity, should have meant success for the game.

The reality of the situation, however, was quite different. The end result of The Sims Online was that players found it underwhelming. It somehow failed to capture the elements of the original IP that made the game a best-seller and Will Wright a household name.

Read The List: 10 MMOs and Their Place In History.

The link is to mmorpg.com

Edit: Guess it was fixed.

Great write up! Perfect summary.

In the EVE section you may want to mention that while some may scoff at 300,000 subsribers, lets not forget that all of those people play together on one server!

This is really interesting read thanks again. Would maybe of added AO in there as it survived a horrible launch to become a "sucessful" game. But thats only in my heart!

I agree, My top 3 favorite games are on that list. Pre-cu SWG, Eve, and what I am playing atm Darkfall.

I unsubbed to darkfall and went back to EVE, because the magic was so OP, but now it looks like the devs see the problem and are about to fix it in the expansion(hopefully). I think with the expansion the game would be what it once was advertised to be in the first place, which has my mouth watering! Even if they dont finish it on this expansion I am sure the next one will seal the deal of awakening a masterpeice.

I think you missed a major Title in your history of MMOs.  Wasn't it Asheron's Call that introduced Instancing?  If my memory serves, it was the first MMO to use instanced dungeons which are the staple of many MMOs, and foundation of others.

Also, DDO was pretty innovative with its combat -- a hybrid of FPS and RPG.  Is that historically important? Not sure.

What about FFXI ? It is probably one of the most successful mmos ever. Its far better than mmos 1-9 on your list! :D

Darkfall made it on the list because... people thought it was vaporware? That's it?

I agree with the list as a whole (though I would've included some in the list and not others, they all have reasons to be in a top 10 list), and that even Darkfall may have its place here, but not for the one lame reason given. What about it's unusual "limited account releases to take it easy on the servers" method of trying to give original players a good launch? What about all of the bugs and issues that future games should learn not to make? I'm sure that others who have followed the game closer could come up with a few more big hitters other than, "Wow, no one expected THAT ONE!"

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Originally posted by Cerion
Wasn't it Asheron's Call that introduced Instancing?

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Originally posted by streea

Darkfall made it on the list because... people thought it was vaporware? That's it?

I agree with the list as a whole (though I would've included some in the list and not others, they all have reasons to be in a top 10 list), and that even Darkfall may have its place here, but not for the one lame reason given. What about it's unusual "limited account releases to take it easy on the servers" method of trying to give original players a good launch? What about all of the bugs and issues that future games should learn not to make? I'm sure that others who have followed the game closer could come up with a few more big hitters other than, "Wow, no one expected THAT ONE!"

Given the number of games that have been darkfall and failed from mourning to dark and light DF i think DF has a place on this list.  Not above eve though

Agree with poster above, where is FFXI?

First true console mmorpg to do very well and is still kicking. Also the first mmo to incorporate users of 3 different platforms all on one server as well as multiple countries and languages. Not only that, but the first game to have one character be ALL classes, not having to have an army of alts to play them. Also I think it incorporated the first true "story" into an mmorpg and has only been matched recently by the work LOTRO has done, which is another one I would add to this list.

Remove the Sims and Darkfall and replace them with these 2 games I just mentioned, since I never think about the Sims in the same context with mmo's and Darkfall is just another of 2009s MMOs that came and went without much bravado.

Originally posted by elocke   Blah blah blah and Darkfall is just another of 2009s MMOs that came and went without much bravado.

 

Came and went eh?  LOL.

I agree with most of them, but DFO? Really?  What about DAOC or  GW?

I would have been tempted to fit DAOC in as well.

I can only think of one game that has done pvp as unique and successfully as DAOC.  Yeah, there are plenty of good pvp focused games out there, but any true mmorpg gamer that enjoys pvp and ever participated in DAOC RvR in it's hay-day is going to say it defined meaningful pvp for them.  I feel sorry for anyone who enjoys pvp that missed out on DAOC before Trials of Atlantis.

UO may be the single MMO with the most overall influence on every game that came after it in its genre.

I think you're confusing UO with EQ, since pretty much every MMORPG has been modelled after it. Dwarves, elves, and -- most importantly -- level based character development system. Unfortunately, sandbox games with skill based systems are in the extreme minority. Also, that screenshot you posted below the paragraph about EQ is actually UO's login screen.

DFO on the list and Asheron's Call which just celerbrated a 10th anniversary is not, that is a sad list.

Originally posted by Cerion

I think you missed a major Title in your history of MMOs.  Wasn't it Asheron's Call that introduced Instancing?  If my memory serves, it was the first MMO to use instanced dungeons which are the staple of many MMOs, and foundation of others.

Also, DDO was pretty innovative with its combat -- a hybrid of FPS and RPG.  Is that historically important? Not sure.

Cerion,

No it was not Asheron's Call that introduced Instancing.  All of there dungeons were part of the world that you could enter not seperate entities that only your party could enter.  Anyone could go into any dungeon, and still can.  Now with that said I think Asheron's Call 2 did have instancing so you may be getting them mixed up.

While I understand Blizzard is the by far the biggest MMO ever(and I doubt we ever see another game surpass the 10 million mark) in terms of subscribers I disagree that it should be listed as the number one MMO. No doubt current MMOs are influenced by WoW as all the devs are chasing the numbers. However, lets not forget the MMO that influenced WoW; EQ. Without the success of EQ, and many of EQ faults that WoW learned from, I seriously doubt we would have seen this genre flourish.

Not taking anything away from WoW. It does many things right. I have no grudge against it. In fact, I love how they listened to the complaints from EQ players, and did away with downtime and retarded death penalties. I also love how the game is accessible to everyone, unlike EQ where you have to be a hardcore raider to access later content.

Originally posted by streea

Darkfall made it on the list because... people thought it was vaporware? That's it?

I agree with the list as a whole (though I would've included some in the list and not others, they all have reasons to be in a top 10 list), and that even Darkfall may have its place here, but not for the one lame reason given. What about it's unusual "limited account releases to take it easy on the servers" method of trying to give original players a good launch? What about all of the bugs and issues that future games should learn not to make? I'm sure that others who have followed the game closer could come up with a few more big hitters other than, "Wow, no one expected THAT ONE!"

This seemed more like a brainfart that spilled out onto your keyboard than any kind of real post.

I'm sure everyone would modify this list and it's contents to some degree. But I thought it was a good read, and I certainly enjoyed it.

toon town and the sims made it into the top 10 by ffxi didnt? wow biased writers swg pvp was my favourite esspecially on bria where it was FoE and LFD against the entire server lol i loved them days of base defense in bastion and silicon valley. God now im getting depressed soe killed the game lol

Strange to see Guild Wars absent from the list...the game that proved that P2P quality is available on a "F2P" basis.

Originally posted by zantax

Originally posted by Cerion

I think you missed a major Title in your history of MMOs.  Wasn't it Asheron's Call that introduced Instancing?  If my memory serves, it was the first MMO to use instanced dungeons which are the staple of many MMOs, and foundation of others.

Also, DDO was pretty innovative with its combat -- a hybrid of FPS and RPG.  Is that historically important? Not sure.

 

Cerion,

No it was not Asheron's Call that introduced Instancing.  All of there dungeons were part of the world that you could enter not seperate entities that only your party could enter.  Anyone could go into any dungeon, and still can.  Now with that said I think Asheron's Call 2 did have instancing so you may be getting them mixed up.

No, Cerion is right (and it's a shame AC was left off your list Jon; tsk tsk). It's a matter of the degree of instancing, but all of the dungeons in AC you had to go through a portal and loading screen to get to. They were in an instance not open to the main world. Whetehr or not that other people could go into them falls under the specification of flavors of how you do instancing. Looking from a high level or macro perspective those were indeed instances. Just instances that theoretically everyone could enter. Just the same as the instanced housing in LOTRO.

Originally posted by brostyn

While I understand Blizzard is the by far the biggest MMO ever(and I doubt we ever see another game surpass the 10 million mark) in terms of subscribers I disagree that it should be listed as the number one MMO. No doubt current MMOs are influenced by WoW as all the devs are chasing the numbers. However, lets not forget the MMO that influenced WoW; EQ. Without the success of EQ, and many of EQ faults that WoW learned from, I seriously doubt we would have seen this genre flourish.

 

Not taking anything away from WoW. It does many things right. I have no grudge against it. In fact, I love how they listened to the complaints from EQ players, and did away with downtime and retarded death penalties. I also love how the game is accessible to everyone, unlike EQ where you have to be a hardcore raider to access later content.

 

I would tend to agree with you concernign EQ.  However, I belive the OP had WoW at the top soley for the numbers it has generated.  Even though I love EQ and remember when it launched  In its hay day it had a peak of what 500k  then all of a sudden WoW shows up and you see numbers in the millions.

  Althought FF had one storey it was not the first to do so.  Eq for one actually has one interwoven main story  if people study the quests and lore.

Originally posted by Khalathwyr

Originally posted by zantax

Originally posted by Cerion

I think you missed a major Title in your history of MMOs.  Wasn't it Asheron's Call that introduced Instancing?  If my memory serves, it was the first MMO to use instanced dungeons which are the staple of many MMOs, and foundation of others.

Also, DDO was pretty innovative with its combat -- a hybrid of FPS and RPG.  Is that historically important? Not sure.

 

Cerion,

No it was not Asheron's Call that introduced Instancing.  All of there dungeons were part of the world that you could enter not seperate entities that only your party could enter.  Anyone could go into any dungeon, and still can.  Now with that said I think Asheron's Call 2 did have instancing so you may be getting them mixed up.

No, Cerion is right (and it's a shame AC was left off your list Jon; tsk tsk). It's a matter of the degree of instancing, but all of the dungeons in AC you had to go through a portal and loading screen to get to. They were in an instance not open to the main world. Whetehr or not that other people could go into them falls under the specification of flavors of how you do instancing. Looking from a high level or macro perspective those were indeed instances. Just instances that theoretically everyone could enter. Just the same as the instanced housing in LOTRO.

True but by that definition even Eve is an instanced game.  Generally, people consider only locked instances to be instances when talking about MMO's.

Yeah Im surprised FFXI wasn't on there.  It was the first console mmo if I remember, PS2, 360 and PC can all play on the same server, and I really don't remember any other game before it that used cut scenes for the quests.   Hell really not many games after it used cut scenes for quests, which I wish more would, it brings more immersion to the game, well for me at least.