Originally posted by NorseGod

It required thinking. Thinking is outdated and so 1999.

Remember eating and drinking?

Remember picking a certain species for specific attributes to better min/max your class?

Remember corpse runs?

Remember planning with your friends how to get from a city to a dungeon across zones alive?

Remember having good standing with a npc faction but couldn't go to town because your friend in the group was KOS?

Get with it man, it's 2012. Wait in your city (lobby) for your que to pop and warp you to wherever you want to go. Then spam 1112311123 (or use a macro to fight for you)  for 15 mins and get the uber loot.

Man I miss those days...  I think I might launch up EQ!

Originally posted by NorseGod

It required thinking. Thinking is outdated and so 1999.

Remember eating and drinking?

Remember picking a certain species for specific attributes to better min/max your class?

Remember corpse runs?

Remember planning with your friends how to get from a city to a dungeon across zones alive?

Remember having good standing with a npc faction but couldn't go to town because your friend in the group was KOS?

Get with it man, it's 2012. Wait in your city (lobby) for your que to pop and warp you to wherever you want to go. Then spam 1112311123 (or use a macro to fight for you)  for 15 mins and get the uber loot.

It not just that, the MMOs in the 90s were not as focused on getting new gear as the new are.

The main point in games like M59, UO, AC, EQ and so on was gaining more exprience/level/skills. While getting good gear was nice in all of them most time was still trying to level up (or similar if the game had no levels).

Nowadays leveling is a 3 weeks tutorial, it is all about gear. Together with the fact that they have added a lot more vendortrash you need more space and carrying capacity then.

While the games have become easier and dumbed down, this is more about that they also changed focus. "Character development" have gone the same way exploration have.

Originally posted by Meowhead

Everybody who wants these mechanics, and who wants monsters to drop monster-appropriate items (Like dragons dropping say... dragon scales and horns) should go out and buy TWO copies of Dragon's Dogma by Capcom.

Maybe if it sells incredibly well, more games will be made with those kinds of vaguely realistic mechanics.

The game pays attention to weight, height/weight of characters, uses endurance for running/climbing and fighting, has monster-appropriate loot drops... even has short characters have shorter melee reach but smaller hitboxes to compensate.

I'm not sure I'd want EVERY game I play to be like that, but it's interesting as a change of pace!

No I would not want EVERY game to be like that. Maybe not even most of game. Still it is really irritiating that no no-old or no-inide mmorpg is like that.  Not even one.

Do not want to play some old or indie or f2p niche crap game to have those mechanics.

As for Dragon Dogma if It ever comes to PC as decent made port I will buy it.  Don't have console and do not plan to own one.

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Originally posted by chefdiablo

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Originally posted by lizardbones

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Originally posted by Wizardry
I agree mr GT wonder,so many new gamers havbe been playing really cheap games and got in the nabit of just button mashing with no meaning.

Us older gamers have seen how all those in depth ideas can add a lot of meaning to game play.

FFXI is one of those games that covered a lot of those areas but the only weight idea was in the weapons.That however added a LOT of strategy and versatility to weapon selections.

FFXi's storage system definitely worked to curb RMT boitters.You see if you allow massive storage with no care ,be it weight or not,RMT will just sit there in auto bot and load up.In FFXI you have very little bagg space,you had to earn the extra space and RMT are usually not into actually playing a game,so it screwed them over.They did however figure ways around it by just having extra players sit  there and act as transporters.

Sadly when i read MANY excuses,it sounds like a lot of lazy people who really do not want a RPG,so i wonder why they are bothering to hang out in one?This is probably also why we see so many new games get a ton of people ,then they all quit.

I beleive most game system designers are passionate,but they are cutting corners to make game development shorter and make a higher profit.

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I've been playing video games and rpg since 1976. I do not miss encumbrance rules or anything of the kind. Mostly, I think it's because it seems like people spend so much time getting caught up in the rules, they forget to play the game. If the rules are the game, why bother playing online rpg? Play pnp rpg, where the rules are king?

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Most people welcome with open arms any changes that makes life easier. Many of these easier, less cumbersome games are not replacing the absent challenge with anything new.

I might very well be a minority but I still want to have some challenges while I play my games. I am not suggesting that they be annoying to the degree of pointless but whether it is a weight issue, or a bag space issue the choice will have to be made.

Personally I favor the concept where the weight of the items you are wearing also affect your speed and attack abilities. Cloth wearing characters should be faster than plate wearing players. We read about how people want their choices to affect the game, but then we also want to keep those choices limited to other areas of the game because it is easier.

Easier and faster are two of the most important factors for a majority of players.

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Originally posted by NorseGod

It required thinking. Thinking is outdated and so 1999.

Remember eating and drinking?

Remember picking a certain species for specific attributes to better min/max your class?

Remember corpse runs?

Remember planning with your friends how to get from a city to a dungeon across zones alive?

Remember having good standing with a npc faction but couldn't go to town because your friend in the group was KOS?

Get with it man, it's 2012. Wait in your city (lobby) for your que to pop and warp you to wherever you want to go. Then spam 1112311123 (or use a macro to fight for you)  for 15 mins and get the uber loot.

fun times..

oh yeah corpse runs...just so much of a good time all around, trying to get your corpse at 3 am on a work day from lower guk, yeah that was just plain awesome.

what is fun about having to plan how to get from one zone to another again? i'm not saying i don't like exploration but that isn't exploration that is an exercize in bordom and frustration.   now that you can basically perma invis in eq, they randomly added mobs that see through it, that is not fun.

oh yeah i sure loved having to waste my time trying to get my group members past gaurds because you couldn't fix faction on some of them, instead of having fun.

being a vet of eq1 and eq2 with all of those mechanics, i hate them to the core.

call me an instant gratification loser all day long, it won't change the fact that i expect  more from my games than lazy road blocks and horrible outdated mechanisms designed by mascists

the only reason i even enjoyed those games dispite the mechanisms i hate is because what i got otherwise made me overlook them.

those games have moved on and so have i, why can't you guys?

edit: one thing to point out, if anyone remembers,  most of this stuff and other mechanisms in eq were used to promote how much better later mmos were.

DAoC was promoted as removing the horrible things eq had, and so did WoW.

in fact i would say a ton of people left because of the mechanisms some people posting on this thread seem to love, what does that say about the possiblity of a game being made with those mechanisms?

it would never  happen, because it would be a failure.

Originally posted by NorseGod

It required thinking. Thinking is outdated and so 1999.

Remember eating and drinking?

Remember picking a certain species for specific attributes to better min/max your class?

Remember corpse runs?

Remember planning with your friends how to get from a city to a dungeon across zones alive?

Remember having good standing with a npc faction but couldn't go to town because your friend in the group was KOS?

Get with it man, it's 2012. Wait in your city (lobby) for your que to pop and warp you to wherever you want to go. Then spam 1112311123 (or use a macro to fight for you)  for 15 mins and get the uber loot.

Not sure about return of corpse runs - but I could live with them again I think.

Everything else - yeah I do miss them.

I would go even further.

- Remember having diffrent kind of arrows?  Like arrows made for bleeding wounds, arrows made for penetrating heavy knight's armors. Posioned arrows, fire arrows, etc   I miss it.

- STAMINA - damn that was good mechanic. Made you think and PLAN how to fight, move, jump or run.

With current tech I would like to see implementation of things like:

- HEAVY RAIN making movements harder, slower using more stamina - after a certain time and making it worse the longer you are in the heavy rain.  When leather armor or even parts of chain mail / some non-plate parts of plate armor are totally soaked they are preety hard / tiring to move in.

- WIND - affecting arrows or possibly even projectile magic so you have to take it into consideration when using those.

- SNOW - affecting moves, running

- ICE - having to control movement of your character better / more carefully because you can fall, etc

Damn possiblities are endless - that's what just came to my head in like 5 minutes.

More fun, more realistic, more mini-games into a game.

Today's mmorpg's are too simple, boring, conveniant and  with reduced thinking & managment & planning.

Just a note - NOT EVERY mmorpg should be like that. 

I am actually SURE than not even MOST of them should be like that. Since many players just don't find those appealing or interesting.

Still I think many of older mechanics and ideas for possible mechanics were 'thrown out like baby with the bath-water" INSTEAD of thinking them better and implementing them better.

Many (most?) of ideas from early mmorpg's were not bad - they were just not implemented good enough.

Kinda not surpising since those were "virgin" implementations.

Current mmorpg devs could use older experiences and solutions and avoid making mistakes in implementations.

MMOs now are for 8-12yo.  There are limitations to what they can do.

Originally posted by demongoat

 

 

i'll never understand why people want to go back to days of frustration and tedium that just made the game unfun.

 

Every inconvenience is a game for someone else.

Something totally unfun for you may be very fun for someone else.

I don't understand why it is so hard to understand.

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Saying this that NOT ALL old mmorpg mechanics were good.

That would be most challanging to developers which one to implement and which one to not implement.

Also which one of mechanics ideas to implement but diffrently.

Originally posted by grogstorm

What ever happened to weight limits?

Replaced by inventory slots.  Two answers to (essentially) the same basic design question.

Originally posted by fenistil

Saying that not ALL old mmorpg mechanics were good.

That would be most challanging to developers which one to implement and which one to not implement.

Also which one of mechanics ideas to implement but diffrently.

Well that's good, because when we choose similar mechanics to another, older game we call the newer games "clones" and fling monkey-poo at them.  Ook ook.

Unless it's a mechanic the industry (in general) already gave up on a decade ago.  Then we write poems to it and bemoan its demise.

Gamers are only too filled with contradictions.

Originally posted by kikoodutroa8

I think what happened is that the "rpg" in "mmorpg" disappeared.

 BAM

Originally posted by Icewhite

Originally posted by fenistil

Saying that not ALL old mmorpg mechanics were good.

That would be most challanging to developers which one to implement and which one to not implement.

Also which one of mechanics ideas to implement but diffrently.

Well that's good, because when we choose similar mechanics to another, older game we call the newer games "clones" and fling monkey-poo at them.  Ook ook.

Unless it's a mechanic the industry (in general) already gave up on a decade ago.  Then we write poems to it and bemoan its demise.

Gamers are only too filled with contradictions.

Roses are red, violets are blue, picking up and dropping items, how I loved you!

Originally posted by Icewhite

Originally posted by fenistil

Saying that not ALL old mmorpg mechanics were good.

That would be most challanging to developers which one to implement and which one to not implement.

Also which one of mechanics ideas to implement but diffrently.

Well that's good, because when we choose similar mechanics to another, older game we call the newer games "clones" and fling monkey-poo at them.  Ook ook.

Unless it's a mechanic the industry (in general) already gave up on a decade ago.  Then we write poems to it and bemoan its demise.

Gamers are only too filled with contradictions.

Maybe it is cause I've not got enough sleep - but I don't get you.

Think you're overanalyzing this.

I can tell only about myself, but truth is real simple.

1. I also embraced simpler, more conveniant mechanics that came with WoW and later games (like i.e. Lotro) and I HAD FUN with them. I really had, never said otherwise.

2. After playing such games for few years - I became bored of them. Convenience appeal weared off and once again I am attracted to less covneniant, more demanding solutions / mechanics.

3. People always long for a change after a while.  Even if this change is not really a change or true 100% innovation, but partial return and redoing old ideas.

Propably if I would play mmorpg that sacrificed some conveniance i spite of more 'virtual world mechanics / micromanaging' for a few years, then I would long for more conveniant mmorpg again.

That is just natural and seriously I am surprised that someone would see this as anything unusual.

     The problem nowadays is the game makers are trying to figure out how to make it easier instead of how to make it more challenging......One thing we're forgetting with weight management is how in the world do we carry several backpacks full of stuff and still fight??.....It isnt just the weight, but the sheer amount (I have how many bear skins on me?) that we have on us.

Originally posted by fenistil

3. People always long for a change after a while.  Even if this change is not really a change or true 100% innovation, but partial return and redoing old ideas.

Yes, they do.  Not to drag forth yet another label, but we call them "reactionaries".  You most often find them standing on their lawns, waving their canes at the damned kids.

But they aren't the problem.  The problem is the rhetoric often (in the same day!!) endorses argumentum ad antiquitatem and ad novitatem, and no one sees the inherent contradiction.

Is "cloning" mechanics from "the olde days" good, or bad?

Originally posted by redcloud16

I personally found encumberance to be one of the more moronic game systems. 

I love role playing and I am by no means one of the instant gratification crowd, but I am playing a game. I have no intention of playing a reality simulation. 

There are certain real life trappings I simply do not want to have to deal with. But to each his own. 

I agreee with this. I really don't want to have "eating" or "sleeping" in the game. I prefer those things to do in real life, not in the game.

Originally posted by Icewhite

Originally posted by fenistil

3. People always long for a change after a while.  Even if this change is not really a change or true 100% innovation, but partial return and redoing old ideas.

Yes, they do.  Not to drag forth yet another label, but we call them "reactionaries".  You most often find them standing on their lawns, waving their canes at the damned kids.

But they aren't the problem.  The problem is the rhetoric often (in the same day!!) endorses argumentum ad antiquitatem and ad novitatem, and no one sees the inherent contradiction.

Is "cloning" mechanics from "the olde days" good, or bad?

Huh?

I view it diffrently. 

Not-so-short example :

When I was in my teenage years I went to concerts, great fun even though it took lot of time, money and effort. In home I plyaed my music from CD's at my hi-fi.

I stopped, I've found other more interesting ways to spend my money and time. I mostly listened to music from my very conveniant Ipod like music player or PC. Did not care about slight worse quality, but I did had thousands of songs in once place.

Recently I started to go at concerts and music festivals again (which they take alot of time, effort and money) and I started to buy music in loseless formats like FLAC and others, even though they are often more pricey and take more space on HDD or portable player - lso had to buy FLAC capable portable player whcih was expensive.

So I actually went back to older, more costly, more hassle-like and more time consuming way to enjoy music.

Of course there are diffrences, and it is not simple going back to exact same thing. I have faster way of transport / can afford faster way of transport to concerts / music festivals and I can still have even if a bit less conveniance of lose-less audio formats on my portable ( I could load more MP3 on my pprtable than I do FLAC's so it would be more conveniant ).

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I think you have some kind of grudge about people want to re-experience SOME of improved old ideas again.

No idea why. 

Maybe becasue yo u despise them and view as inferior in all aspects?

It is your right, but ridiculing people based on that and calling them 'reactionaries' is downright silly and just plain wrong.

"Is "cloning" mechanics from "the olde days" good, or bad?"

"Cloning?"  As just directly Crtl C + Crtl V into? 

It would not be "bad" or "wrong".  Just would propably be ineffective.

Analyzing which one of them could be enjoyed by PART of playerbase and improving & resuing those imporved ones?

Would not be first time in human history when that happens and succeeds.

Actually this kind of things happen all the time.

Unless you see everything as linear progress with all of ideas going into trash bin permanently and never being modified and used again.

Which is kinda hmm untrue.

TL; DR post - sorry bout that, if you read it hope you enjoyed. If not well noone forced you ;)

I consider encumberance to be a 'dumbed down' mechanic.  The devs are not brave enough to put in a realistic inventory system but still feel that they need to restrict player choice and freedom in matters of equipment. 

If you want a realistic inventory system, you do not let players carry multiple sets of weapons and armor.  If you want to let them carry more than their personal equipment set, you let them use pack animals and/or carts. 

Requireing your players to play 'inventory management games' is not role playing.  It's just lazy design.

Originally posted by NorseGod

It required thinking. Thinking is outdated and so 1999.

Remember eating and drinking?

Yeah .. i played a RPG .. not a food game. And food/drink are still in many MMOs. There are even cooking skills.

Remember picking a certain species for specific attributes to better min/max your class?

STill in many MMOs.

Remember corpse runs?

Glad that those are gone.

Remember planning with your friends how to get from a city to a dungeon across zones alive?

Glad that those are gone. I would much rather plan with my friends on how to beat the boss in a dungeon. Much more fun.

Remember having good standing with a npc faction but couldn't go to town because your friend in the group was KOS?

Glad that those are gone. So inconvenient. Need no thinking ... just things the game don't let you do.

Get with it man, it's 2012. Wait in your city (lobby) for your que to pop and warp you to wherever you want to go. Then spam 1112311123 (or use a macro to fight for you)  for 15 mins and get the uber loot.

Not hard core loot. Wish i can get uber hard core loot .. but only very few % of players will ever do.

What thinking? Wait till you cannot move and start removing stuff? That is no difference than having limited inv slot and start to go sell when your bags are full.

in·ven·to·ry [in-vuhn-tawr-ee, -tohr-ee] noun, plural in·ven·to·ries, verb, in·ven·to·ried, in·ven·to·ry·ing.

1. a complete listing of merchandise or stock on hand, work in progress, raw materials, finished goods on hand, etc., made each year by a business concern.
2. the objects or items represented on such a list, as a merchant's stock of goods.

The idea of a person carrying around an inventory is absurd in the first place. I don't care if you're Brock Lesnar, no way are you going to be able to move and fight normally while carrying a spare warhammer, a dragon skull, and three marlboro vines. It's not a question of how tall you are or how much weight you can lift. There's just no way to carry those things in a way that doesn't impede you. A real person carrying a video game character's inventory is just ludicrous.

There's this thing called "abstraction". In the same way that you can simplify the laceration of muscle tissue and loss of blood from a dagger to the hamstring as "losing 220 HP", you can simplify the carrying of a thousand pounds of junk to "I have access to it." Quick, do you have a tie? Are you wearing it or carrying it right now? (Probably not.) But whenever you know you're going to need it, you can get it. You own it, you have access to it, it's "in your inventory" so to speak. Whether you're physically holding it or not is irrelevant.

Same deal here. You find a staff while dungeon crawling. Maybe you're carrying it strapped to your back. Maybe everyone took a break while you ran back to your pack mule at the entrance. Maybe you hired a peasant (or a team of peasants) to follow you around carrying your treasure. Maybe you're leaving it lying there on the ground and saying "Don't let me forget to come back and pick up my staff when we're done with our business here." The actual physical location of the staff is irrelevant; you own it and it's "in your inventory". Only when inventory management is an integral part of the game should you be forced to really decide whether that staff is physically present on your person or lying on the ground.

Take abstraction too far and you get Progress Quest. Take it too far in the opposite direction and you get Dwarf Fortress (which I love, btw). The easy argument in favor of abstraction is that bad complexity adds no depth to the game, so you lose nothing by removing it. The easy argument against abstraction is that it is pandering to people who don't have the skill to deal with the additional complexity. Most games fall nowhere near either of these extremes, though, and you may prefer leaning one rather than the other based on your tastes. But I have to say, I think that abstraction makes a lot of sense in RPGs, including MMORPGs. Most people play them for the story, the spectacle, and the interactions with others. Accurate simulation isn't a key feature, because these aren't sims.