Originally posted by Grahor

Originally posted by Quirhid

Yup. Pretty much. Just do what you do with old people, ignore them and their ramblings.

Exactly. That's what I do with ramblings like that.

 

I'm 36 years old. I was one of those "old school players". I've seen the whole thing. The OP is demented. :)

I would say true old school was those of us that actually played Pong in the 70s.  Going on 44, I say  you are a young pup.

I enjoy gaming more now than when I was a kid. Which is why I dont understand the constant bitching over the genre. Pick a game n enjoy yourself. If there arent 5 or 10 titles across the different styles that you enjoy, you really arent a "gamer" IMO. It reads more to me along the lines of a one hit wonder.

Originally posted by Moaky07

I would say true old school was those of us that actually played Pong in the 70s.  Going on 44, I say  you are a young pup.

Exactly.  I'm older than you are.  I think it's funny to see people in their 20s claiming to b e "old school".  Yeah, let me know when you get out of diapers. :)

I enjoy gaming more now than when I was a kid. Which is why I dont understand the constant bitching over the genre. Pick a game n enjoy yourself. If there arent 5 or 10 titles across the different styles that you enjoy, you really arent a "gamer" IMO. It reads more to me along the lines of a one hit wonder.

 So many of these people are stuck in the MMO genre.  They don't want to play anything else.  If you take MMOs away from them, they don't know what to do with themselves.  That's why they sit around and bitch and whine, they have nothing else to do.

Originally posted by Cephus404

Exactly.  I'm older than you are.  I think it's funny to see people in their 20s claiming to b e "old school".  Yeah, let me know when you get out of diapers. :)

 

 So many of these people are stuck in the MMO genre.  They don't want to play anything else.  If you take MMOs away from them, they don't know what to do with themselves.  That's why they sit around and bitch and whine, they have nothing else to do.

 

this is post is remarkable for its irony and bad tempers, this guys shows how immature he is ...

and actually yes, after the experience of the multiplay in every game, every single play game dies instantly, cant understand all this hate about MMO, i believe you are in the wrong place, if you wanna make a crusade against MMOs you are really doing it wrong ...

Originally posted by Icewhite

Over the course of the last fifteen years, my observation that any given attempt to segregate gamers by age and establish generalizations about their expected behaviour...

Is, as predictable, complete rubbish.

Uphill, both ways, through the snow.  Should be ashamed that you entertained the thought for even a moment.

Heh, except when I was young I did walk to school and there was a hill between it and my house and I literally did walk up (and down) both ways in the snow/rain sometimes.

I'll admit it, I wasn't more social back 10 years ago because I am naturally that way, I did so because game design included timesinks such as forced downtime between fights that gave us time to communicate, because as you sat there, wasn't much else to do for 2-10 minutes.

Couple that with combat mechanics/rewards that strongly encouraged/forced people to group, and we grouped because it was more efficient, not through any high and noble purpose. (or superior character)

I will say patience seems to be a virtue that's gone out of style, but perhaps that's just my old folk way of seeing things, maybe that really hasn't changed all that much either.

Originally posted by VengeSunsoar

Originally posted by Isasis

So, I have been playing MMOs since 1999. My first MMO was Asheron's Call, and then moved to SWG after that (until NGE). I then played various MMOs...consisting of: EVE Online, Darkfall, DAOC, Ultima Online (a favorite of mine) and Everquest. As you can see, I have a lot of experience with social-based MMOs.

 

What all these MMOs have in common is that people were (and still are to a point) a very social atmosphere. In Asheron's Call, groups happened all the time and you met people randomly. You didn't have to hit a looking for group button or spam chat, it just happened naturally. In Ultima Online, PKers gathered together to fight non-PKers and whole wars broke out. EVE Online is the greatest example of a more recent MMO, where it is heavily based on being social. Wars break out, chat flies by, people are everywhere. EVE Online also requires a lot of patience, something modern MMOers just do not have. Even the EVE tutorial requires much patience, and sadly, this new generation of gamers, can't even make it past that to a great game.

 

Take MMOs from WoW and onward. People don't want to group or socialize. There is even a button to auto join a group, and 95% of the time, no one even chats or only says a sentence or two if you are lucky. And if someone makes one mistake, they don't have the patience to help them or keep going...they yell "NOOOOOB" and autoquit the group. What happened to MMOers? What happened to the patience and the social aspect of MMOs?

 

One experience I had in WoW. A newbie to dead mines (an instanced dungeon in Westfall, Alliance territory) was tanking for the group. He wasn't bad, but not great either. However, he did not know what "pulling" was and asked in chat. One person in the group said "wtf noob, god this group sucks"...and that was the only two things (the first being the question) said the entire group and the guy "rage" quit the party. Two others followed and the group died.

 

Obviously, this is due to the themepark mentality, even the same as real themeparks. I call it the the themepark mentality.

The company wants a quick dollar and makes an easy to make themepark game (sandboxes take actual skill to make, especially a good one), that is more singleplayer than multiplayer. Notice how all sandboxes have a heavy social influence to them and require a lot of patience? Themepark MMOs are contradictory...they aren't for people who like to group or socialize, they are for people who like singleplayer games and a chat room, with maybe a group or two a week at end game.

I obviously greatly dislike themeparks as you can tell, and I go in knowing just that. But I play them so I have prove of my claims. Maybe even hope a themepark game comes out with a social atmosphere, but it never does. I am much more of a sandbox fan, which are TRUE MMOs and not singleplayer games with a monthly fee.

 I will agree with the patience part but that is a learned response.  Information is available instantly.

However I disagree with the social part. There have been several studies showing that youth today are more social than at any other time in recorded history, they are more connected with each other - friends, cellphones, facebook, twitter, blogs.  Rarely is any youth actually alone.

Now you can say that they are more ambivalent about their social circle however all the evidence shows that they are indeed more social.  However those social tendancies just may not translate well into a game.

That's becasue the guy, like many others, equate the amount of grouping with socializing.  They don't see socializing outside of groups as valid.  He also isn't taking into account the clique factor that is a result of the greatly increased emphasis on guilds in modern games.  From dedicated guild content, to guild channels, guild housing, guild only rewards...etc, all of which influence gamers to fraternize primarily with other guildies.

Interdependence is a large factor in MMOs, but if you have too much of it, you have a game that most gamers don't want to play.  On the other hand, you have too little of it and you suffer from lack of incentives for people to socialize outside of their closeset friends, family and guild.

Originally posted by Kyleran

Originally posted by Icewhite

Over the course of the last fifteen years, my observation that any given attempt to segregate gamers by age and establish generalizations about their expected behaviour...

Is, as predictable, complete rubbish.

Uphill, both ways, through the snow.  Should be ashamed that you entertained the thought for even a moment.

Heh, except when I was young I did walk to school and there was a hill between it and my house and I literally did walk up (and down) both ways in the snow/rain sometimes.

I'll admit it, I wasn't more social back 10 years ago because I am naturally that way, I did so because game design included timesinks such as forced downtime between fights that gave us time to communicate, because as you sat there, wasn't much else to do for 2-10 minutes.

Couple that with combat mechanics/rewards that strongly encouraged/forced people to group, and we grouped because it was more efficient, not through any high and noble purpose. (or superior character)

I will say patience seems to be a virtue that's gone out of style, but perhaps that's just my old folk way of seeing things, maybe that really hasn't changed all that much either.

 

Probably goes both ways. In a world where news / information travels at the speed of light, patience of today is a lot different from 15 years ago.

I will challenge your patience.

• While watching TV, no bathroom breaks or trips to the fridge during commercials, and no switching channels either.
• While reading a magazine read everything (article or ad) from the first page up to the article you wanted to read in the first place.

How long do you last?

There are still friendly people out there - even on this forum! I am not a social player but i love to help people and buff people when I have a class that can do so. In the old days, I almost always got a thank you and often times a responding buff. This often led into temporary grouping which I enjoyed. In general the chat was respectful, even in wow (well with the exception of the Barrens!).

Fast forward to today. I just played 4 hours of wow and buffered more than 20 people as a priest giving them fortitude (increasing their stamina). I did not get a singe thank you nor did I get any acknowledgments. General chat was dominated by a mid-level player needing help and most of the response was "noob!" or deliberately misleading. Sure, this may be an atypical day but it is almost normal from what see day to day.

The only time that I see patient gamers is in betas or when a game is first released - at least on the pve servers.

Originally posted by StrangeEyes

Im also playing for more then decate mmo's and ive met my share of douchebags back then also same behavior in AC as they do now only maybe alot less then in '99.

But i realy don't care anymore i still if i can help people i still have my patience and i won't change and even sometimes i meet people same attitude or social skills so its not all lost hehe.

GW2 at least alot of douchbagging is not posible anymore so im looking forward to silencio game experience in that game but still players around me helping or revive me with not one word:)

Why would you play an MMO? Go find a single player game. Then you won't have to worry and the experience will be much better for you. One of the things I have come to really dislike about GW2 in the BWE's is that it is almost like playing alone. Soft grouping is much better on paper than in practice.

UO: Either you were in a guild or you had your rump raided over and over again... Often right out side the bank... Socialising outside of guilds was pretty much non-existant as far as i saw. Heck the only people that even botherd to conversate was Rp people or the insults after a bunch of darlig PK's stole every thing you had. Sure was a very warm and welcoming atmosphere

Eve: Again i feel you get community and ganking mixed up...

SWG: Ok.. I can agree there, lot's of socializing... Especially if you had a non-combat proffesion like entertainer or ID... Nothing says "welcome to your game" as having to explain that in fact you can be a male image designer without being gay and even if i was you would not be my type as i like my partners with a IQ above 5. Or that the reason that you just had your face turned in to mulch by the group over there is that "hey *bleeeep* can i  *bleeep* my *bleeep* in your pretty pink  *bleep* " is not a propper way to greet a entertainer. Still people really liked all the forced socialization... .. .

Now a game that did it good was City of Heroes, a "WoW-era" game that had about as much community as you can actually fit in to a game... Ofc you have rage-quitters and unsocial nads too.. but those have been around since oh i don't know.. they days of people bashing rocks for fun. You combine your rose-tinted glasses with a desire to reclaim something you simply can not get back. The feeling of something new, And while i can agree that a sandbox takes something... you call it skill i rather call it dedication (and a forgiving mind) it is actually the "older generation" that is the core problem, your average "oldie" have less time to devote to theri hobby but does not want to give it up so they want games that make the life a lot easier.. 

Originally posted by rdrakken

The only thing that HAS changed is that some of the people from the good old days turned into whiney crybaby old people blamming everything on kids these days...

And again, leaping at the opposite generalization should interrupt this post with irony, but doesn't.

Could just make a deal, and you and the old guy can agree to both quit telling the other guy(s) what they think, how they feel, and what they want.

Spend less time arguing with shadows of your own imagining.

Originally posted by stevebmbsqd

Originally posted by StrangeEyes

Im also playing for more then decate mmo's and ive met my share of douchebags back then also same behavior in AC as they do now only maybe alot less then in '99.

But i realy don't care anymore i still if i can help people i still have my patience and i won't change and even sometimes i meet people same attitude or social skills so its not all lost hehe.

GW2 at least alot of douchbagging is not posible anymore so im looking forward to silencio game experience in that game but still players around me helping or revive me with not one word:)

Why would you play an MMO? Go find a single player game. Then you won't have to worry and the experience will be much better for you. One of the things I have come to really dislike about GW2 in the BWE's is that it is almost like playing alone. Soft grouping is much better on paper than in practice.

I despise the combat mechanics in GW2, but I love the soft grouping mechanic.  To each their own.  People play MMOs for many differing reasons, you have no right to say one way is better than another nor the right to tell those with differing play styles which are catered to by most MMOs (soloing for example) to go play single player games.

Originally posted by Vorthanion

Originally posted by stevebmbsqd

Originally posted by StrangeEyes

Im also playing for more then decate mmo's and ive met my share of douchebags back then also same behavior in AC as they do now only maybe alot less then in '99.

But i realy don't care anymore i still if i can help people i still have my patience and i won't change and even sometimes i meet people same attitude or social skills so its not all lost hehe.

GW2 at least alot of douchbagging is not posible anymore so im looking forward to silencio game experience in that game but still players around me helping or revive me with not one word:)

Why would you play an MMO? Go find a single player game. Then you won't have to worry and the experience will be much better for you. One of the things I have come to really dislike about GW2 in the BWE's is that it is almost like playing alone. Soft grouping is much better on paper than in practice.

I despise the combat mechanics in GW2, but I love the soft grouping mechanic.  To each their own.  People play MMOs for many differing reasons, you have no right to say one way is better than another nor the right to tell those with differing play styles which are catered to by most MMOs (soloing for example) to go play single player games.

I didn't say one way was  better or another. I made a suggestion. If you play MMO's you pretty much assume that you want to play with other people. To expect a silent game experience....... you might be looking in the wrong place. ;)

Originally posted by Isasis

So, I have been playing MMOs since 1999. My first MMO was Asheron's Call, and then moved to SWG after that (until NGE). I then played various MMOs...consisting of: EVE Online, Darkfall, DAOC, Ultima Online (a favorite of mine) and Everquest. As you can see, I have a lot of experience with social-based MMOs.

 

What all these MMOs have in common is that people were (and still are to a point) a very social atmosphere. In Asheron's Call, groups happened all the time and you met people randomly. You didn't have to hit a looking for group button or spam chat, it just happened naturally. In Ultima Online, PKers gathered together to fight non-PKers and whole wars broke out. EVE Online is the greatest example of a more recent MMO, where it is heavily based on being social. Wars break out, chat flies by, people are everywhere. EVE Online also requires a lot of patience, something modern MMOers just do not have. Even the EVE tutorial requires much patience, and sadly, this new generation of gamers, can't even make it past that to a great game.

 

Take MMOs from WoW and onward. People don't want to group or socialize. There is even a button to auto join a group, and 95% of the time, no one even chats or only says a sentence or two if you are lucky. And if someone makes one mistake, they don't have the patience to help them or keep going...they yell "NOOOOOB" and autoquit the group. What happened to MMOers? What happened to the patience and the social aspect of MMOs?

 

One experience I had in WoW. A newbie to dead mines (an instanced dungeon in Westfall, Alliance territory) was tanking for the group. He wasn't bad, but not great either. However, he did not know what "pulling" was and asked in chat. One person in the group said "wtf noob, god this group sucks"...and that was the only two things (the first being the question) said the entire group and the guy "rage" quit the party. Two others followed and the group died.

 

Obviously, this is due to the themepark mentality, even the same as real themeparks. I call it the the themepark mentality.

The company wants a quick dollar and makes an easy to make themepark game (sandboxes take actual skill to make, especially a good one), that is more singleplayer than multiplayer. Notice how all sandboxes have a heavy social influence to them and require a lot of patience? Themepark MMOs are contradictory...they aren't for people who like to group or socialize, they are for people who like singleplayer games and a chat room, with maybe a group or two a week at end game.

I obviously greatly dislike themeparks as you can tell, and I go in knowing just that. But I play them so I have prove of my claims. Maybe even hope a themepark game comes out with a social atmosphere, but it never does. I am much more of a sandbox fan, which are TRUE MMOs and not singleplayer games with a monthly fee.

You rant about some player interactions that you do not like, and then you complain about it is more single player? You really need a logic 101 class. It is IMPOSSIBLE to have people rage-quit, or bad mouth others, in a single player game .. because there is NO OTHER PLAYER.

If you want to complain about rude behavior ... complain about rude behavior .. don't say it is "single player".

And what is so great about patience? Does that make my game more fun? Note that the behavior goes BOTH WAYS. If you don't like other players being mean .. you can quit too. In fact, if they rage-quit, you don't have to deal with them anymore .. win-win.

Personally, I don't play games to be nice and i don't play game to chat. I play game to have fun. If a player is too green and the dungeon run is not fun for me, i don't see a compelling reason to stick around.

Originally posted by BadSpock

I've become less social in MMOs because most people are idiots/dicks, thus becoming a dick myself.

It's a vicious cycle.

I think I spent far, far too much time in WoW tanking and carrying people through content.... people who WoW was their first MMO, and it just ruined any sense of patience I once had.

Then again, the games I played before WoW (mostly UO/SWG) were sandboxes and not about instances and gear and holy trinity.

I still blame EQ for everything wrong with this genre.

What are the sequels (spiritual) to UO and SWG?

....

Still haven't found a great PvE sandbox with PvP done right (SWG TEF system was great and Trammel/Felucca split was an ingenius move)

 

Yeah cause forced PVP is such a wonderful thing?

EQ was the best thing to ever happen to MMOs. Games should offer more than a RP/economic sim experience combined with a gankers wet dream.

If the MMO sandbox market had numbers, they would get games made at the AAA level. It is much easier to blame others that dont want what they offer, rather than realizing the average person wont subject themselves to these elitist paradises.

So keep throwing the carebear/ADD comments, cause to that I add "I get new AAA games to play....how about you?".

Posting in an epic thread.

(and btw, I think Slampig won the thread)

Originally posted by Icewhite

Originally posted by rdrakken

The only thing that HAS changed is that some of the people from the good old days turned into whiney crybaby old people blamming everything on kids these days...

And again, leaping at the opposite generalization should interrupt this post with irony, but doesn't.

 It isnt a generalization.

If you played some of the first MMOs, you are older today...and if you are whining like a crybaby and blamming everything on kids these days....

He made a generalization, I pointed out the truth. he is older...crying...even carrying on about the good old days. How much more like an old person can you sound? All old people think things were better when they were younger, its the sad part of life, when you look at the past with rose colored glasses brought on by a weakening mind too cranky to see how great life is in the here and now...now excuse me, I need to yell at some kids that just kicked a ball into my yard.

I half agree with the OP,

I've been playing MMOs since Runescape came out in 2001, I was 10 then, so I'm obviously considered a youngling here.  I agree that people were a lot more social and friendlier back then.  I remember times when people would give me free stuff and help me out on quests just out of their own kindness.  It would happen quite a lot.  Even during early WoW years there was a lot of friendliness, I met some great people.  It all started going down hill, in my opinion, in the late 2000s, when memes started appearing, when it was cool to mistype words etc, basically, it's cool to be a d0uchebag nowadays.  We call it trolling, and it's a sport a huge amount of people partake in.

Sanbox/themepark has nothing to do with it though, buddy.

Originally posted by fenistil

Originally posted by Teala

Originally posted by achesoma

Originally posted by Alders

Are you kidding?  We were still assholes, it's just that game mechanics forced us to cooperate.  I saw the transformation as soon as the ability to acquire gear became easier.

LOL so true.  People are just seeing things through rose colored glasses and only remembering the good times.  Am I the only one that remembers all the kill stealing, training, and other various forms of griefing that would occur? 

I'll even admit I "trained" a few people back in the day.  Most don't even know what training is anymore since it's pretty much a dead form of griefing. 

Yeah it is amazing that people do not remember those things isn't it.  LOL!

True.

There was fair share of griefers, gankers and assholes out there.

 

Still there were many game mechanics that minimized those (and also some mechanics that allow types of griefing non-existant today) and allowed to ostracize those that did.

+ 

mmorpg's desgin, concept and mechanics forced people to cooperate and put them interdependant on many things.

Not talking about forced grouping here, but about things like crafting, finding things and places, trading, etc 

 

No automation and things like AH (player shops much better imo) and much more harsh game world just made much more good (and bad as well !) things possible. 

Also in player's interactions.

 

People were not more patient & social, they had to be more patient & social though.  I even knew people who had learn to be more politle and social throgh playing mmorpg's.  

It was good thing.

I tend to disagree that we were as big of assholes, some of the best friends of my life I met playing everquest, most of us still skype or text each other daily, we visit each other as often as we can, exchange birthday and xmas presents and I am even Godmother for some of their children. Last summer I volunteered to take everyone's kids for the summer and had 6 kids for the whole summer. 

I remember getting a phone call one night at 4am on a work night, one of my guildmates was in tears, he thought his girlfriend was cheating on him and wanted to know if I could talk to her for him, now understand I had never met or spoken to this girl, but I spoke to her all night until I had to get ready for work.  I helped them, today they are married and have 2 beautiful little girls.

I am sorry but we were not assholes, we truly were better people, and others were better for sharing our lives with us, we were better for them sharing their lives with us.

Now to be honest, of course there were exceptions to the rule, I remember a whole guild of asses on our server that made it their mission to ruin every GM event, and grief others every chance they got. However, eventually the GMs banned them all from the game to make the server community happy.

Never see a problem player banned these days.. no matter what he does.

Old MMO's evolved from Pen and paper games, now New MMO's are evolving from old ones. Circle of life. Times change, new gaming generations are brought in.