I was a bit of a MMO game jumper myself; I started with FF11 and tried WoW, Perfect World, Entropia as well as other more “childish games” such as Wizard 101 and Free Realms.

I have to say that one factor that kept me coming back is the game is actually fun; it doesn’t feel like a chore to play and has a storyline that goes somewhere not just a never ending chain of fetch quests.

I always find myself going back to certain games like AQW, mostly because of the freedom to do what you want (change classes, use whatever weapon you want, ect…) as well as the humour they stuff into the game; it’s refreshing to see a game out there that isn’t always doom and gloom.

Another aspect of MMO’s that keep bringing me back are rewards for playing, I guess at it’s core it’s nice to get something for just logging in and clicking a few buttons.

Everquest is now 15 years old.  Through the years I have returned to this title at least 2 months out of every year. Most of my friends play newer titles. I do as well for the most.  Everquest is the only mmo where I have not seen the entire EQ world. There are still places I have not seen. The game is just that vast!  My characters seem to never finish :-D Which is something I love. There really is not a cap. I have as of yet to meet a player who is completely capped out in EQ.  I do not think its possible :-D

So, I keep coming back to EQ for those reasons above.

It's people.

The people you've met, or the ones you know, even acquantances you just bumped into, familiar faces (even if they're pixelated faces). Guild, your immediate circle of friends, hell once upon a time it even consisted of a list of contacts on AIM or ICQ, before we had pixelated faces to associate with the people.

Most of the rose tint surrounding bygone games doesn't come from game mechanics at all; most honest memories of olden mechanics are clunky, buggy messes. But at the time, we did not notice.

There's that sense of wonder that just won't ever come back, no matter what.

But the people--they're still out there.

Originally posted by adeptuz
People and metagaming.

This is what keeps me going back to EVE

Originally posted by Aerowyn
I like MMOs with a lot of variety in classes and are very alt friendly.. As in I could level multiple characters and not repeat content.. When I'm very restricted in terms of class/ build I tend to loose interest fast... That and fun PvP keeps me aroind

I'm with you on this one.  Love having a different play experience for each class and really love when the world is large enough that I don't see all of the quests on one character but have to play at least 3 to 4 to see all of them.  Something that has been lacking in the past few releases, to be honest.  Fun PVP is icing on the cake and makes it last even longer.  Just don't make me suffer for it a la Full Loot PVP.  Hate being punished for sucking when I just want to have fun.

I like MMOs with depth, meaning good PvE, PvP, harvesting/crafting, exploring and any other systems they have thrown in.  I like to have many different things to do, non-instanced housing is a bonus.

MMOs where crafting is too easy or worthless, coupled with boring harvesting that does not have common/rare/ultra rare type spawns and such bore me pretty quickly.

I couldn't care about forced story, not big on instances (even though thats about everything anymore).  If the world is too small or feels too limited, I do not like that either.  I am not a game jumper, so I look for the MMO I play to provide plenty of different things to do.

I also prefer paying a sub for many reasons, but I am more open to alternatives than I use to be.

If I had any RL friends that played MMOs, I would definitely play that. Since I don't, then I come back to places with good communities where I can meet in-game friends. I also consider the complexity of the game and the potential for unique character development and the depth. I don't like the simplified and streamlined versions. Finally, I come back to a place that feels like a gaming home -- for me a world where I can do combat, but also where there are lots of other things to do when I don't just feel like fighting. So if I sum it up:

1 Community

2 Depth

3 World

Usually either friends or F2P.

But only once I stayed for longer than a few weeks. MMOs don't change that dramatical and the payment model is usally of no relevance for me unless it is pay2win. So I just went back to a previous MMO due to lack of new promising MMOs.

The only title that I've had any success in going back to over the years is EVE. 

Unlike most other titles that I've tried to return to (DAOC, Lineage 2, WOW to name a few) that are but shells of their former glory, it keeps improving and proving the sort of game experience that fits my lifestyle well.

What I really like is I can take off for 6 months and come back without any loss of power/progression against the rest of the player base. (no, it's true, once you get enough skills under your belt, there really is no disparity between players any more)

The only reason I leave is that I do enjoy playing in a fantasy world, and in fact, have been playing Aion again since Christmas and it has been a pretty good experience so far.

Originally posted by Briansho
The switch to F2P.

this. Also in WoW's case i sub back for a month here and there because of the Lore.

And other f2p games i just go back to any that i feel like wanting to play, for any reason, and to play with some friends.

I've never been one to switch games much.  I like to find one where you have to have lots of interaction between other players and build up a group of friends in order to accomplish anything at all.  With all the games switching to things like WoW where you never see the same person again, unless they are in your guild, it really takes a lot of the fun out of the game.  Even most guilds in WoW are just there to do things like raids instead of having fun doing other epic quests or leveling.

The other thing I look for when trying to find a game to play is a game with a large world.  Doing the same resource gathering quests over and over again when you play a new character is so sickeningly boring.  I also preferred it back in games like EQ1 where most quests were impossible to do by yourself and you needed at least a friend or two for help.  None of this go kill 20 basic wolves, 25 bats etc and all the lame quests in WoW and similar games that can be completed from level 1 to max level all by yourself.