Or is it like the original Diablo, a single player game with Co-Op features for dungeons?

It's not an MMO. The time you spent typing this thread out you could have easily looked that up lol.

Its an MMO in sense of being online with a lot of players... but honestly the term MMO is so dilluted that theres so many 'ifs' that can make an MMO of a game that has heavy instance focused dungeons like vindictus while a game like diablo 2 isn't considered one because the 'lobby' section isn't in character. 

Honestly, MMO should just mean any game that supports a massive amount of players online, no matter if its core gameplay is involved in instances. If we are being stingy on stuff, lets make sure to mark DDO as a single player game with online features and wipe out a good 60-70% of the list of games on this site off the MMO catagory cause their channel designs or use of lobbies doesn't make them count due to technicallity. 

Originally posted by Purutzil

Its an MMO in sense of being online with a lot of players... but honestly the term MMO is so dilluted that theres so many 'ifs' that can make an MMO of a game that has heavy instance focused dungeons like vindictus while a game like diablo 2 isn't considered one because the 'lobby' section isn't in character. 

 

Honestly, MMO should just mean any game that supports a massive amount of players online, no matter if its core gameplay is involved in instances. If we are being stingy on stuff, lets make sure to mark DDO as a single player game with online features and wipe out a good 60-70% of the list of games on this site off the MMO catagory cause their channel designs or use of lobbies doesn't make them count due to technicallity. 

Vindictus in my eyes in considered a co-op online action... just because the "lobby" of sorts IS in character, doesn't change much at all.

Although "MMO" stands for "Massive Multiplayer Online" - I always seem to veer towards only considering games an MMO when it has a more open world - even instanced, but the likes that you have to travel from one side of a certain instance to another to reach the next - effectivly making it a huge world. I don't even know why I feel this way as no part of "MMO" has "huge world" in it.

Originally posted by helthros

It's not an MMO. The time you spent typing this thread out you could have easily looked that up lol.

 With all due respect that's a stupid response, simply for the fact that this site is for MMOs, and I saw D3 here.  If it's not an MMO wtf is it doing here then?

Nevermind, don't answer that. 

Originally posted by Purutzil

Its an MMO in sense of being online with a lot of players... but honestly the term MMO is so dilluted that theres so many 'ifs' that can make an MMO of a game that has heavy instance focused dungeons like vindictus while a game like diablo 2 isn't considered one because the 'lobby' section isn't in character. 

 

Honestly, MMO should just mean any game that supports a massive amount of players online, no matter if its core gameplay is involved in instances. If we are being stingy on stuff, lets make sure to mark DDO as a single player game with online features and wipe out a good 60-70% of the list of games on this site off the MMO catagory cause their channel designs or use of lobbies doesn't make them count due to technicallity. 

 I can agree with your points entirely.  Thanks for the coherent response.

 it has instanced 4 man groups  kinda like SWTOR

Originally posted by Broomy

Originally posted by helthros

It's not an MMO. The time you spent typing this thread out you could have easily looked that up lol.

 With all due respect that's a stupid response, simply for the fact that this site is for MMOs, and I saw D3 here.  If it's not an MMO wtf is it doing here then?

Nevermind, don't answer that. 

I suppose I read your initial post wrong. It's not an MMORPG, but I suppose it could be considered an MMO. It's a hack & slack action rpg - If I'm not mistaken, that's the official genre.

If around 100 avatars can exist in the same space then I consider it an mmo. This makes GW1 an mmo, DDO an mmo... but D3 is a lobby based game so I don't consider it an mmo.

People, particularly on this site, have been using way too broad a definition of the term MMO to define games.  By the logic they use you can call MW3 or CS:S MMO's because they have thousands of people playing online at any given time.

The term developed to describe a game in which there was a concurrent world that stayed online 24 hours a day, that you and hundreds or even thousands of others players could log into and when you logged out the world and people continued on without you.

Really the biggest thing it needs to be an MMO is a large noninstanced concurrent world.

Another example of a game that want an MMO was STO.

Its as much of an MMO as many games that claim to be one. But no, it isnt. 

This thread is going places.

So is it safe to say D3 is a "hybrid"? 

/JK  (but seriously this thread seems to be very similar to the  "themepark vs. Sandbox" infamous debates)

I don't think it's an MMO because it has no persistance. But at the same time it will have massive amounts of people online and it is multiplayer so in a sense it is an MMO.

We all know, with the exception of the OP before this thread, that the game is not an MMORPG, much less an MMO.  We know quite a few of the games listed on this site are not MMORPGs.  I would imagine that this website stays in operation due to advertising money, and those games (including Blizzard for D3) have paid for advertising on the site and would like their game listed here for more exposure.  Once you accept that we can get on with things :D

Simply put, I think most everyone would agree the standard "MMORPG" could be described like so:

"A persistent online world"

Basically if you log on or off the world stays.  If you kill something, it's dead (until respawn) for all other players.  However this line continues to blur as new games release "channels" to further instance and separate players.  SWTOR, TERA, and other recent releases have done this heavily.  This feature is required when games have limited starting areas.  Not much fun to have 5000 players all starting at level 1 in the same location... Takes HOURS to get a few simple quests completed.

This is good question. Why D3 is here? Some ppl say beasue it has co-op, pvp, other that it is rpg game, etc. But simillarly u could write here about Battlefield 3, it has also all those elements, u have different classes of soldiers, u level up, unlock new weapons and equipment, etc.