I vote that riskiness has been all but eliminated by today's MMO's.  There is no risk in anything. You die, you come right back without penalty.  You get lost, you port out (without penalty).  You can't kill a boss: tag onto a group for the kill and port out.  Thotbot everything.  Don't have time to log in and play? well now you can level off-line.  Can't find the that NPC? just follow the dotted line, you dork muffin.  Can't decide which response to give to an NPC when you have to choose: well they all lead to the exact same outcome now. 

I want risk. I want consequences. I want immersion.  I want theater.  I want persistent changes based on my actions.  I want the looming possibility of failure.  

Originally posted by WhiteLantern
The "my genre has been ruined" hipsters. Definitely the most annoying trend.

^

Not a feature per say... but rather a form of mentality.

That mentality being that you MUST have features X, Y and Z in your game or else it will fail. There is no magic bacon that works great with anything in the mmo genre. Think of what would benefit the game the most, as opposed to what is the "standard" in the industustry.

Ok some things I can see as standard, such as basic communication features such as guilds, friends lists and ignore lists.

Originally posted by Agent_Joseph

 

 

2 (for mmorpg games ).transforming rpg gameplay in to action/shooter  gameplay

 

 

100% this one. Screw character development, meaningful crafting, self-allocation of stat/skill points, throw away permanent choices you'd make, screw player roles. I'm told to play some jack-of-all-trades who can do some damage, heal a bit, tank a bit if some mob gets angry at me out of the blue (as aggro tables are so 2005ish). I'm told to use 10 skills, 5 being passive. I know if i'm good or not if i can: "aim well", "manually dodge" and "combo" with others. Bleh.

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Originally posted by WhiteLantern
The "my genre has been ruined" hipsters. Definitely the most annoying trend.

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If so, did you enjoy them?

If not, why not?

I enjoyed playing MMOs "way back when." Some of the newer ones are OK, but they are very different games now. Do you agree?

There was an article written by a MMORPG.com columnist titled "You Got Your CCG in My MMO". For me, it is "You got your ARPG/FPS/Single Player game in my MMORPG."

Does that make me an almost 50 year old hipster? I doubt it. I always thought hipsters were the ones first on the "advancement" bandwagons. I would call myself a "get off my genre!" kind of cranky old fart.

All immersion breakers: mini maps, AH, instances, port travel, global chat, mini games...

1. Instancing everything, a little was ok in EQ at first, then it seemed like people took it and ran with it, to where their are no more open dungeons in most games. 

2. Catering to the 'now', leveling and skill gain have become too quickly for my taste, I played TOR, and I maxed out a crafting skill in like one not very long session.  I know this doesn't get most people, but if I ddidn't have to do much to 'max' aspects of my character, it doesn't seem to work for me, or mean much.

3.  Crafting / Harvesting / Housing - These have become afterthoughts in most MMOs that are mostly useless for the crafting/harvesting or very bland.  Housing, I dislike instanced housing, and it is something that devs decide is not worth it usually.  I get it,since mmos seem to be catering more to the mmo jumper, and f2p, and those people generally do not care for housing, as they will not be staying anyway.

4.  Less sandbox type features, things seemed to be getting pur themeparked, rails, super quest hubbed, kinda goes along with #3.  Then everything turns into daily quest/dungeon grinds as the content to keep people playing.  I almost never find this to be enjoyable.  It feels like I have a checklist of 'must do' things.  Some of the newer MMOs are starting to throw some sandbox back into things, Archeage, EQnext, WoD to name a few in development.

5.   Story/VO/Hero stuff - I don't want some forced story, that to be honest feels lame in every mmo I have played or is poorly done.  The cut scenes take me out of the game, and I generally cut them short 90% of the time.  I would rather read it and not be taken away.   The hero stuff, was real bad in Rift, they acted like I was the savior, that everything was done to insure I could save them, but theirs hundreds of other saviors running around....I don't need NPCs kissing my butt.

6.  F2P - I don't refuse to play them (sometimes I do), but not a huge fan.  I would rather pay a sub, but I do not play 5-10 MMOs at a time.  I do not like feeling like the game is trying to squeeze money out of me the whole time I am playing it.  Some are worse than others.  I know even P2P games have cash shops too, which is annoying, but the  squeeze feeling is generally not there for them, its usually some stupid mount or whatever (any of these that offer more than cosmetic are suspect to me).

Last MMO that I enjoyed a lot of these aspects was Vanguard, it suffered from bad coding and bugs, but it atleast had an attempt to deliver something a little more.  IT had flaws and compromises, but if it would of been coded a little better, it could of really taken off imo.  It had a lot of depth to many of its systems imo.  It was far from perfect, but I atleast felt like they tried to deliver something more than a small super railed quest hub world (although it did have hubs, but felt less railed).

So yes, I don't find as much enjoyment in most newer MMOs.  My shortest time ever playing a MMO was over a year, till I played Rift (3 months), and it has gotten shorter since then.  I played UO/EQ for 6-8 years total each with a couple breaks in each for my longest.

Voted for the cut-scenes because they don't add anything to the game for me. I have enough imagination to visualize how a conversation might go when I read the quest text (something most players just don't do...).

On the other 2 things, I can only say:

Linear story, well, you gotta have story progression in your game. I think you actually meant railroaded storytelling like most 'WoW-clones' do these days, where you hop from one quest to the next and from one zone to an other. Yeah, I hate that, but the linear story itself is not a bad thing...

No holy trinity. That one made me LOL and is so 'WoW-clone' (yeah again...). Certain MMOs just don't stick to it and you can party the way you want. Okay, 1 tank and 1 healer is preferred, but if you have no tanks, 5 DPS and 2 healers and you can manage then who cares? I actually think that the 'holy trinity' as brought to us by the 'WoW-clones' is a bad thing and kinde makes you wait for that one class you're missing...

Most annoying trends.......

Giving in to the whiners

and

Big shoulder armor

Originally posted by WhiteLantern
The "my genre has been ruined" hipsters. Definitely the most annoying trend.

Well it has.  I'm just waiting for the MMO to be released that has one ability labeled "I Win".  I bet it would be a huge success. /sarcasm

But seriously, there are a lot of trends that have irritated me.  Group finders, linear progression, "?" and "!" over quest givers heads, maps that show you where to go, and many other little things have all caused the sense adventure and discovery to vanish from MMOs for me.

Jaded gamers who like to whine needs to be added.

Specific example: Today's MMO's are just boring theme parks! 

News flash old MMOs, and even quite a few new MMOs are boring! Have always been boring, and are like working a second job. Sandbox, theme park, doesn't matter. Different title with the same community, and same shit.

Originally posted by Agent_Joseph

 

1.cutt scenes & voice acting  ; waste of time & resources for any MMO's

 

2 (for mmorpg games ).transforming rpg gameplay in to action/shooter  gameplay

 

 

 Yeah these absolutely ruined TSW for me....The game didn't even feel like a MMO because it was so overdone.

Originally posted by wormywyrm

:/  Is it just me or is the OP targetting GW2? 

I didn't get that at all. Maybe you are just too sensitive about your beloved GW2.