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Originally posted by chryses

nearly all my hard core MMO gamer mates have migrated back to the single player market

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Great argument there - your mates no longer play MMOs therefore MMO market is dying.

Seriously...

It is the opposite. The market evolved, you and your mates did not therefore they are left with no games fitting their appeal and why they moved on.

I guess it is a part of that comes with maturity/aging - you start thinking how past times were great and today sucks. All subjective illusion tho...

People mostly do not like changes.

Originally posted by chryses

Either way I feel single player games are leading the way in development and MMO's are just not keeping up.

Single player games have always led the way and will always lead the way. There's more control over the scene which means the graphics can be better and environments richer. There's more control over each step of the story which means storylines can be personalized and deeper.

MMOs are a social, multiplayer platform. That is where they excel. Basically, 

• If you're looking for dev story, play a CRPG.
• If you're looking for player story, play a sandbox/social focused MMORPG.
• If you're looking for a 3D multiplayer hack-n-slask, play one of the hundreds of EQ/WOW variants

Originally posted by Gdemami

 

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Originally posted by chryses

 

nearly all my hard core MMO gamer mates have migrated back to the single player market

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Great argument there - your mates no longer play MMOs therefore MMO market is dying.

Seriously...

It is the opposite. The market evolved, you and your mates did not therefore they are left with no games fitting their appeal and why they moved on.

I guess it is a part of that comes with maturity/aging - you start thinking how past times were great and today sucks. All subjective illusion tho...

People mostly do not like changes.

I think that the MMO community is evolving, while the games arent which is the problem here. There are many people left with no games fitting their appeal not just bitter vets or the OP and their friends.

It probably is related to maturity / aging, but in a different way than you think. While large part of the MMO community consists of adults, the developers somehow tend to ignore it and keep releasing shallow games which cannot entertain adults for longer than several months.

You say that people mostly do not like changes, but what changes?Isnt it change what OP and many other people including me call for? If we didnt like change, we would be all happily playing one of the themeparks released since WoW and this thread would not exist just like tons of those threads "we dont want games, we want worlds". How many of them have been created? Who do you think is making these threads? The young generation? The older ones who do not like change? Nobody is saying that old games were awesome or asking for new MMOs to get back to their roots.

I disagree with what you say as I tend to believe that people are calling for evolution of MMOs which somehow stopped in 2004.

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Originally posted by coretex666

I think that the MMO community is evolving, while the games arent which is the problem here.

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If that was true, there would be no players spending money on these games, which isn't the case as it is proven by rapidly growing MMO market in past years.

What changes? The change from "hardcore" to casual. People indeed want games, not worlds.

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Originally posted by coretex666

I disagree with what you say as I tend to believe that people are calling for evolution of MMOs which somehow stopped in 2004.

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This pretty much proves my point and demonstrates how some people are unable to accept changes... MMOs did evolve, just not in your desired direction, it is still evolution tho.

Originally posted by Sodahz

Originally posted by DrunkWolf

single player games arnt passing MMOs.

MMOs are going backwards, every new mmo that comes out has more resitrction, more linear paths, more story told to you instead of you makeing your own story as you go. they are more dumbed down than ever, and honestly they are just single player games with a bunch of people either in your way or running around doing their own ( story quest ) with no need to interact with them.

when i first started in MMOs back in 2000, i thought damn i cant wait to see how much they progress in 10 years its going to be awsome.... boy was i wrong, it has gone backwards at a alarming rate.

I agree that MMORPGs have gone backwards since WoW and now half the games being developed aren't even finished when they are released anymore that I don't understand.

WoW wasn't finished - JEEZ - I guess we are looking through rose-colored glasses. WoW had the EXACT same type of release that D3 did - people coudln't log in, the game had huge bugs, etc.

Please - let's not have a revisionist history - WoW's released was one of the most flawed ever.

Originally posted by botrytis

Originally posted by Sodahz

Originally posted by DrunkWolf

single player games arnt passing MMOs.

MMOs are going backwards, every new mmo that comes out has more resitrction, more linear paths, more story told to you instead of you makeing your own story as you go. they are more dumbed down than ever, and honestly they are just single player games with a bunch of people either in your way or running around doing their own ( story quest ) with no need to interact with them.

when i first started in MMOs back in 2000, i thought damn i cant wait to see how much they progress in 10 years its going to be awsome.... boy was i wrong, it has gone backwards at a alarming rate.

I agree that MMORPGs have gone backwards since WoW and now half the games being developed aren't even finished when they are released anymore that I don't understand.

WoW wasn't finished - JEEZ - I guess we are looking through rose-colored glasses. WoW had the EXACT same type of release that D3 did - people coudln't log in, the game had huge bugs, etc.

 

Please - let's not have a revisionist history - WoW's released was one of the most flawed ever.

And you're doing the exact opposite. Blizzard, at that time, underestimated it's fanbase, which resulted in queues and latency problems.

Content-wise, however.....yeah.

Originally posted by Gdemami

 

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Originally posted by coretex666

 

I think that the MMO community is evolving, while the games arent which is the problem here.

---

 

If that was true, there would be no players spending money on these games, which isn't the case as it is proven by rapidly growing MMO market in past years.

What changes? The change from "hardcore" to casual. People indeed want games, not worlds.

 

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Originally posted by coretex666

I disagree with what you say as I tend to believe that people are calling for evolution of MMOs which somehow stopped in 2004.

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This pretty much proves my point and demonstrates how some people are unable to accept changes... MMOs did evolve, just not in your desired direction, it is still evolution tho.

I would take the liberty to disagree again.

I insist that MMOs have not evolved since 2004. Or perhaps in areas which do not enhance gaming experience, such as business models. Yes, there are now more F2P titles than in the past, but that is not evolution which I am talking about. There has been zero evolution in terms of game mechanisms, principles on which the MMOs are built.

Trying to put me in a position that I am just disgruntled because MMOs are evolving in a different way than I desire is kind of low, imo.

Maybe we are just looking at evolution as such from different perspectives which means we will unlikely find some consensus.

SPs evolved right way. They are both themepark and sandbox. You can follow your primary quest from A to B and enjoy your ride or you can take longer road, the game doesn't care when or how you get to next part.

While quest in MANY MMOs become way too linear from A to B and there nothing in between but farm/grind. Not to mention how brainless quests has become, not only they tell what to do, they show where and even walk you in to that spot.

I bet many saw something similar too often:

"Hey HERO! Kill 10 rabbits for me and I give you this amazing sword! They are right behind my back!"

"Oh thanks you HERO! Now gather 10 apples from that tree 2 meters away form me and I give you this amazing armor!"

"Amazing HERO!I knew you could do it! Now go kill that annoying pumpkin monster in my garden and you will be rewarded!"

"Oh HERO! I can't thank you enough! Take this gold and this scroll, use it to get to my brother in next village so you can do same S****T OVER AGAIN!

There some MMOS started some changes: TSW,GW2,MO,DF,TERA,Rappelz, Wizardry, Dragon Nest,Wurm etc which involved combat,questing,crafting etc etc. It might be as perfect as it is for some,could be flawed for others,but imo it is good changes which might inspire more dev to make a better version.

There are over one hundred of themepark MMOs out there from niche-indie to big AAA. And how many sandboxes? Can we gather 20? And biggest and actually oldest of them probably EVE?

Originally posted by ShakyMo
Wow was a crappy launch.

They even had
Unable to login
Loot stuck bug
Missing warlock talents
Missing hunter talents
Charge through microscopic crack in the floor and end up in space bug
Server crash with too many people in same area

When they launched in the eu 6 months later, lord only knows how bad the usa launch was.

P.s. they still had loot stuck, charge into space and server crash with crowding bugs AFTER burning crusade when I quit.

The blizzard make polished games with very little bugs Is a huge myth, supported by their Apple like fanatical fan base.

The "polished" term became popular because WoW was so polished at release. Stability and content-wise, it was one of the best releases in MMO history. Its major problem was hundreds of thousands of players (soon to be millions of players) flocking to the game. Their biggest error was under-estimating the quality and broad appeal of what they had created.

The reason why Single Player games can do so much better, is that they don't really need new games.  Almost every single game on G4TV and E3 coverage, and any other gaming magazine (who still reads those? lol) is a sequel or the third, fourth, fifth, etc. game of a series.  In MMOs they don't have sequels (well some have tried, but they never pan out, haven't seen one yet that's done well), they have content patches.

I think it was the golden joystick awards last year that had almost every single non-MMO game was a sequel, etc.  The only "new" game on the list that I remember was Journey.

Originally posted by Sidraket

Originally posted by Boardwalker

Originally posted by Wickedjelly

Originally posted by Boardwalker

Nope, they aren't.

 

Well, not entirely. The "bitter vets" on this site who post their myopic views of the MMORPG industry tend to answer "yes" to the OP's question. However, I imagine for most non-jaded gamers (which is the majority of gamers), MMOs are doing just fine.

 

Personally, I've been playing computer games since the early 80s, but I haven't touched a single-player game since I logged into my first MMO over a decade ago. Playing single-player games is like masturbation: playing by yourself can be ok, but once you play with others, there is no going back. (Well, unless you have don't have internet access, that is.)

Don't agree at all. While I don't think mmos are failing by any means not everyone that has left is bitter or somehow jaded as you seem to think.

Many of them still do multiplayer in their game of choice just in a different genre.

 

Perhaps I was a little harsh. But it often seems that most of the people who post on this site have a very narrow, and jaded, view of MMORPGs and their current state.  I think that 2012 was a banner year for MMORPGs, so I guess I'll have to agree to disagree with many of the people here.

Youre playing EVE, which is one of the few really open mmos out there. The vast majority of mmos are all more or less clones of each other mechanically and follow very linear paths.

Go play an elder scrolls game, any of them. When i first played one back in like 2000 or 2001, it felt exactly like an 'offline mmo' of the time, just with out people and different combat mechanics. I remember thinking that this was pretty much an offline mmo.

If you compare them to modern day mmos you see where they are lacking. Modern mmos are much more linear, are much more focused on creating repetitive endgame content and getting the player to it quickly and effortlessly than fleshing out a vast living world to exist in.

EVE is a world to exist in. Most mmos arent anymore.

I agree - which is why I went back to EVE - on a 14 day trial right now.  I have accounts with a lot of skills but I wanted to try starting off new with nothing.  Recently played in a great guild in EQ2 and ended up bored, before that a great kin in LOTRO.. and ended up bored - even with a new "expansion". Hoping EVE wil wake me up or it is back to Two Worlds 2, Skyrim and a couple of others.

Also P2P model is also problem. There just too many MMO's now. Many of us can't have subscription for all of them. Imagine having subscription for Skyrim,Fallout,Dragon Age etc O_O

B2P ,imo, is way to go! Just like GW2 did.

Originally posted by ShakyMo
Lok
No it wasn't it was buggy as hell.

The only mmos I've played at launch that were more buggy than wow launch were Aoc and dcuo - and bear in mind I got it 6 months later in the eu, must have been worse in north America.

Even warhammer was in a better launch state than wow!

If you want to talk good launches, city of heroes and rift are the benchmarks.

Rift had issues also - mostly with shadowstep skills that made you fall through the map. That took a good 3 months to fix.

Originally posted by ShakyMo
Lok
No it wasn't it was buggy as hell.

The only mmos I've played at launch that were more buggy than wow launch were Aoc and dcuo - and bear in mind I got it 6 months later in the eu, must have been worse in north America.

Even warhammer was in a better launch state than wow!

If you want to talk good launches, city of heroes and rift are the benchmarks.

Yes, Launches like LOTRO and RIFT were very good. Some would say that LOTRO set the standard for solid launches.

Single player games have always had the advantage that the game is tailored to the person playing it and that there is no concern for fairness or complaints about being OP.  Take a game like Skyrim and put 1000 people in the same world and you'll quickly find that what was once a fun game with tons of exploration will be boiled down to 2 or 3 of the most lucractive dungeons followed by people farming the crap out of them. 27 runs of the same dungeon later you'll be asking why it's so boring.

The beauty of single player games is that you only do the content you feel like, at the pace you enjoy, for the reasons chosen by you. Does it feel epic to hunt down that evil wizard? Do that. Do you prefer to weild sub-optimal, but totally awesome weapons? Do that.

But other people are what ruin it. X is better than Y. You're not geared enough to run this dungeon 10 times a day, come back when you are. Sorry, this mount requires you to grind gold for the next 6 months to buy it.  MMO's are designed to limit accessibility and freedom so that people can earn rewards based on effort and time spent.

Single player games are free to reward players with all sorts of stuff and freedom because you're not competing against anyone. Even sandbox mmo's fall prey to the human need to be the best, to limit and restrict, to determine the most effecient methods without concern for fun.

And there's balance. PvP has always and will continue to ruin fun and freedom in game worlds. Once pvp is introduced, balance becomes a thing and holy moly is it hotly contested. It never ends, even in game which were held up for their relatively fair pvp (like gw1) have people foaming at the mouth about some class or skill that's woefully OP.

That's why we can't have nice things. Because of people.

Originally posted by chryses

9 years ago when I found MMO's I thought single player games were dead and gone and I would never look back. 

I really feel that the single player games being released to date (on all platforms) are really pushing boundaries and from my own personal experience, nearly all my hard core MMO gamer mates have migrated back to the single player market. 

Main reasons:

- MMO's are just not evolving fast enough.  Too many cookie cutters

- Hype versus payoff.  Unfortunately for the past 5 years not one game has lived up to their hype WAR, SWTOR, Vanguard, AoC list goes on...

- Dumbing down of genre from the true RPG throw back to the D&D paper based gaming etc.  Crafting is watered down alongside exploration etc.

Single Player Games

- Have gone through several evolution steps for all platforms, graphics and sound.

- Story lines have been developed and supported by in-depth extensive worlds

- online capabilities that still allow for co-op, multi player, score boards etc.

- Immersion is incredible.

 

I would consider myself a hardcore MMO lover but for the past year I have only played MMO games in between single player titles e.g. Modern Warfare 4, Red Dead Remption, Far Cry 3 now (incredible game), XCOM, Skyrim, Civ 5.

Maybe its a time/age thing but it seems myself and ALL my friends are returning back to single player games, table top and board games for the interaction.  We all play MMO's still but we are all really in a holding pattern waiting to see when they will evolve past their current form and most of us are losing interest fast.

Either way I feel single player games are leading the way in development and MMO's are just not keeping up.

 

I agree MMOs are not evolving fast enough, but feel there may be hope in 2013 (ESO, FF XIV RR, ArcheAge, and others).  I disagree on the single player games.  Coming from the console side of the house from over 20 years, it was the stagnation there that moved me to MMOs to begin with.

Consoles will always be more immersive simply because the content only has one character to focus on (as opposed to millions of characters of who play differently).   But from an RPG perspective consoles have lost that hardcore stat/asset management replaced with simple interfaces to give the illusion of an RPG.  For example, a console game may allow you to recieve XP which allows you to level and place skill points in certain trees.  While those are RPG elements, to me they dont go far enough to develop a true RPG experience.   Consoles also cater to the faster/twitch style of combat which doesnt fit within the RPG genre for me.   RPGs aren't about action, but about stats, resource management, and progression.

MMOs to me are best suited for RPGs, but the mechanics to deliver that gameplay could use a serious injection of innovation, of which I believe is coming sooner rather than later.

Personally I am just worried about the genre as its been a big part of my gaming life and I can only see a decline in innovation as companies continue to follow a 'fast food' type of culture.  Simple, easy to digest and instant gratification.

Don't forget when MMO's were first released, consoles, hand held devices, smart phones and facebook etc, didn't even exist or were so basic.  So of course MMO's were seen as revolutionary.

The world has moved on and now I can play games:

-  anywhere on my smart phone against friends or strangers.

- facebook online games like war commander to give me a pvp strategy fix

- numerous FTP games (age of empires etc)

- PSP/DS

- Wii, PS3, Xbox  (numerous online options albiet not as huge as an MMO)

- PC

so on and so on.  Its quite easy now to find a community and companies are making it so very easy to connect instantly and have that buzz of beating another person or playing in a world together. People don't need to play MMO's anymore to engage with a community.

Maybe the market has changed direction and is now targeting 15-25 year olds.  Maybe the 'old school' board, paper based gamer which was my generation is not being considered as the most lucrative market. 

Whatever happens it will be a huge shame if MMO's don't start truly evolving because what was once one of the most exciting concepts for gaming just feels like a run down take away industry that is still trying to hang on to the early years.

IMO of course

I think online gaming its is going down the Minecraft route, single player game with well thought out, well designed & implemented multiplayer & Co-op modes for example DayZ has something like a 800k strong players which is more than the player base of 2 to 3 "mumorpuger's" and is only an Arma 2 mod Minecraft have more players and turn out to be really fun in there own right. Star Citizen & Elite Dangerous are also following the Minecraft both have single player modes with incredibly fleshed out and designed multiplayer modes. Well we could all keep blaming the down fall of "mumorpuger's" on WoW's  mega success, the culture and publishers greed to emulate WoW's success bit for bit instead of making new fresh innovative "mumorpuger's", that is all old harp & hat.