I read some of the threads here and after reading the one entitled "Why cant we find MMOs as good as 'Back in old days' I decided to creat an account and try to open a discussion. You see I disagree with the idea that old school RPers are getting old or that the new MMOs are better then the old ones.

The thing is: I had the bast experience in MMOs with my first one (you must be thinking: yep... the first MMO blah blah blah). But that is not it and I'll try to explain.

I played UO for almost 7 years (from 1998-2005). So there is the idea of a new kind of game, one that you can play with many players and all that. And this held me for a long time but after a while it wasnt what kept me playing the game. From my point of view it is the RP that keeps you playing a MMO game for such a long time. After I joined a guild that had these strict Full-immersion RP polices my gaming experience changed in a way that it is even hard to explain. After that all other MMOs fill quite silly.

What I'm trying to say is that it isnt because UO was my first MMO that it was also the best. It is because it had the ideal system to let RP flourish in a way that no modern game has. I can point a few things:

1- Chat system: you could talk only with those around you. Whisper was a real whisper that only those near to you could "listen" and if some else was hidden nearby he could actually evesdrop! There was no IG chat channels. It provided more sense of reality to the game.

2- Housing system: you could select any place to build you house! And there was many models avaiable. If you had friends enough with money enough you could actually build a city or a kingdom! It was great. Take my guild, for instance, they had actually built a kingdom near the capital city of Britannia. The kingdom had a Keep, houses, markets etc etc a king and a queen, a army and ALL player based!

3- Lvling system: There were no such thing as lvls and couldnt see in what lvl another player or moster were. People had skills and you couldn't know which they were! There was this skill called anatomy that gave you an idea of the guy phisical abilities. And you could evolve different skills and lower then to evolve other with the same char! Much like in real life. You werent restricted to a class system.

4- Maps: Man! You could actually get lost! The only maps in the world were those that you bought from NPC or from other players. They were like real life maps and you didnt had a arrow pointing to where you were in it! You had to find you own way based on a river here, a read there, a building in some other place! I did got myself lost a lot of times.

5- Reviving: No... it wasnt like in Lotro or WoW where you revive and get all you stuff intact. Actually you have no penalties at all in these games. Where is the thrill?!? In you I remember myself quaking before entering a dungeon! All my armor and weapons. How many times have I lost everything and had to walk miles or beg for a gate to get back to a city and begin from 0.

And these are just some of the things that I believe that are terrible for RPers in these new games. They tryied to make a game easy to attract as much players as they could but in doing so they created games that are not much more then every other singleplayer game.

However I'm using experience in UO alone this may be what you guys are missing in the new games. These and some other things make the difference between just another MMO in with I'lll get bored after a couple of weeks and a game that I would actually spend years playing with my friends and developing my own story in it.

I'm sorry for the size of this text but if you got here I would like to know your thoughts on all this. :)

Completely agree with ya OP. UO was by far the best RP experience game I have played. Everything was left for the players. UO gave the world...we had to make the content.

Auctions- UO had no auction vendor. Players had to sell items themselves. And on many servers, there was the weekly aution at some place. All player run.

Crafting- Players had to buy their decent armor from others. As well as having it repaired by players. I remember many hanging out at the smithys in Brit, along with a few GM smithys to fix armor for players.

UO was more about the community, not so much the game. More fun was had without grinding for some epic gear. It was just about getting out and doing something with friends...or making some new ones.

New games are about the next level, or the next peice of gear/armor. Or the next raid for XX loot. UO was about the fun of exploring and actually feeling as part of the world.

OP you need to give Vanguard a show. A lot of RP happens there, the crafting is so in depth you can craft all the way through the game without gaining any adventuring levels, and still have a blast and be resourceful. The housing is old school, find land, build it, live in it. No instances whatsoever.

Hi,

Me and some of my friends have played a wide range of MMOs. Currently playing Perfect World International, I've come to the same conclusions, as the others here. A few years ago we decided to create an RPG game just like you described UO, and this plan is getting closer and closer to realization, but reading your post, that such role playing feeling already exists, I got a little confused.

Maybe my english is not so good to understand it, but why have you stopped playing, if you cannot find another game of your taste? I've just heard about UO before, but taking a look at the Ultima Online site, the game is still active.

As I said, i might have missed something.

I understand what you mean about your role play experance. It's hard to find the right game or the right group of people. Try going to the game Second Life, and look up a place called Midieval Aldenshire. It was some of the best role playing I've had in any game. The combat in Second Life sucks, but the people and comunity made up for it. You might be surprized.

Originally posted by anthyon

Maybe my english is not so good to understand it, but why have you stopped playing, if you cannot find another game of your taste? I've just heard about UO before, but taking a look at the Ultima Online site, the game is still active.

As I said, i might have missed something.

I enjoyed the RP and the features of UO for a lot of the resaons the OP presented. I stopped playing this past December. After 10 years, anything is bound to get old for you. :) 

Originally posted by anthyon

Hi,

Me and some of my friends have played a wide range of MMOs. Currently playing Perfect World International, I've come to the same conclusions, as the others here. A few years ago we decided to create an RPG game just like you described UO, and this plan is getting closer and closer to realization, but reading your post, that such role playing feeling already exists, I got a little confused.

Maybe my english is not so good to understand it, but why have you stopped playing, if you cannot find another game of your taste? I've just heard about UO before, but taking a look at the Ultima Online site, the game is still active.

As I said, i might have missed something.

In my opinion UO was great. I quit shortly after the expansion of AoS. Before that expansion, everything in the game was created by crafters. The game was skill based. So if you were a GM character, you had a chance in a battle. After AoS, the game became heavily loot/item based. No longer was it about your skills, it was just as important to have the 'uber' equipment. So then the game became,in my opinion, Diablo like. Just goin after that next great weapon that would help you kill the next baddie that much easier.

Many of us stopped playing because UO became a game not of our taste. And unfortunately there hasn't been another like it either.  Most games have followed the path of the EQ model rather than the UO model.  SWG pre NGE was the closest to what I enjoyed about UO...unfortunately that was put to a halt as well. So untill another game comes along that is not so dependant on gear, and more about skills and community, I will probibly remain to wonder from MMO to MMO.

Like many I got my feet wet with UO as my first real internet based MMO.  Overall I loved the game the use of a skill based system so you could actually talior you toons to what you wanted them to be in the world, the player housing, player driven world, and many of the other things posted by the OP.  But to think that UO wasn't about charater builds and better gear and you would be fooling yourselves, I mean come on it was a great pvp, before Trammel anyways, game. 

I opine that  almost any MMO out there can foster a healthy RP atmosphere, but that it is not there because it is not supported by the player community.  

I have read many threads where games and devs are blamed for a games lack of RPability and I could not disagree more.  RP first and foremost needs to be driven by it's player community.  As I see it the mentallity of the gamer today is "how soon can I get to "end game" and get that uber gear so that I can get on the raid or pvp treadmill then get bored with the game, blame the devs for lack of contenet and then move on to the next game".   Todays gaming community, for the most part, wants everything "now" and dosen't take time to "smell the roses" and making the most the game they are playing.  I have seen level systems, classes and linear quests blamed for why games do not foster RP, because they limit a players ability to RP, funny pnp RP games usually had levels, classes, and modules(quests). 

IMO the bottom line is that we, the player community, are the ones not taking advantage of what we are given... often large open worlds with a wealth of zones with interesting challenges and dangers lurking around the corner creating options for us to developing RPing environment.  There is nothing today as I see it that stops a player community from doing this with games now except that as a cummunity we no longer have to, want to, or value defining our own world.

Originally posted by anthyon

Hi,

Me and some of my friends have played a wide range of MMOs. Currently playing Perfect World International, I've come to the same conclusions, as the others here. A few years ago we decided to create an RPG game just like you described UO, and this plan is getting closer and closer to realization, but reading your post, that such role playing feeling already exists, I got a little confused.

Maybe my english is not so good to understand it, but why have you stopped playing, if you cannot find another game of your taste? I've just heard about UO before, but taking a look at the Ultima Online site, the game is still active.

As I said, i might have missed something.

Well, Anthyon, I guess that UO was a victim of time. It was the best (and I would dare to say the only) MMO for a long time. But, in the end, came other games with better graphics and the damned patches that turned the once overcrowded cities of UO into ghost towns. Even the RP community began to dwindle.

I recently logged into UO just to see how things were and, for my surprise, I were able to find some of my old friends playing near Yew. But they were few and it is hard to RP when you and other 4 players are the only ones that you see for hours IG. I gave up on UO. 

Originally posted by kiddyno071

Like many I got my feet wet with UO as my first real internet based MMO.  Overall I loved the game the use of a skill based system so you could actually talior you toons to what you wanted them to be in the world, the player housing, player driven world, and many of the other things posted by the OP.  But to think that UO wasn't about charater builds and better gear and you would be fooling yourselves, I mean come on it was a great pvp, before Trammel anyways, game. 

I opine that  almost any MMO out there can foster a healthy RP atmosphere, but that it is not there because it is not supported by the player community.  

I have read many threads where games and devs are blamed for a games lack of RPability and I could not disagree more.  RP first and foremost needs to be driven by it's player community.  As I see it the mentallity of the gamer today is "how soon can I get to "end game" and get that uber gear so that I can get on the raid or pvp treadmill then get bored with the game, blame the devs for lack of contenet and then move on to the next game".   Todays gaming community, for the most part, wants everything "now" and dosen't take time to "smell the roses" and making the most the game they are playing.  I have seen level systems, classes and linear quests blamed for why games do not foster RP, because they limit a players ability to RP, funny pnp RP games usually had levels, classes, and modules(quests). 

IMO the bottom line is that we, the player community, are the ones not taking advantage of what we are given... often large open worlds with a wealth of zones with interesting challenges and dangers lurking around the corner creating options for us to developing RPing environment.  There is nothing today as I see it that stops a player community from doing this with games now except that as a cummunity we no longer have to, want to, or value defining our own world.

 

 

I disagree.

I think it is just too hard for us, as players, to pretend that a game is what it is not. RP is a wonderful thing, mainly based on our imagination but it was hard to let it flourish when you are fighting against the mechanics of the very world in which you try to play.

I also disagree with the idea that the player community do not attempt to make RP work in moderns games. For instance, few years ago there was this organized attempt to bring RP to WoW. In different servers and in Forums a bunch of players tried to teach Full-immersion RP and to play within its rules. But it didnt last. And, in the end, those players gave up. Why? Because you cant RP in a game like WoW... Why? I'll try to clarify the arguments behind this assertion:

1- Class, XP, and quest system: created to allow the player to play the game and evolve in it as if he were playing a usual single player game. You can actually play most of the game without interacting with a single PC. You get XP, itens, hints and even an arrow telling you were to find all this stuff! Why did they do that? With those things you have an easier game what means that more people will buy it. However, it also means that a lot a people will buy that MMO just to powergame, other will be too young to understand, like or respect RP and players that enjoy RPing (how can someone keep in character when a 11 years old brat is ranting about how ridicolous RPers are).

2- A static world - when you are but a toon in the game it is hard to create an appealling fiction to RP with. Although players in lotro are maturer than those in WoW, it is not easy or fun to try to be part of the fiction or believe in it when all that you rich and powerful kin leader has is a house in a player neighborhood were noone ever goes.

... Man... there are many other things that I could list here but it is almost the same than what I said in my first post.

The thing is: I dont want wonderful graphics and a friendly game mechanics. I want a place where RP can flourish and I believe I may have found what I am looking for in a player server of Neverwinter nights. They are a very nice community of good RPers and although player servers have their problems I would rather deal with them than waste my time in Lotro or WoW (however, Lotro is great if you want to walk around Tolkein's world, which is the only reason why I'll keep my Lotro account active).

PS: if you would like to learn more about the above mentioned RP community, here goes the link: http://www.nwvisuals.com/tum/forum/

Originally posted by Avefenix1

I disagree.

I think it is just too hard for us, as players, to pretend that a game is what it is not. RP is a wonderful thing, mainly based on our imagination but it was hard to let it flourish when you are fighting against the mechanics of the very world in which you try to play.

I also disagree with the idea that the player community do not attempt to make RP work in moderns games. For instance, few years ago there was this organized attempt to bring RP to WoW. In different servers and in Forums a bunch of players tried to teach Full-immersion RP and to play within its rules. But it didnt last. And, in the end, those players gave up. Why? Because you cant RP in a game like WoW... Why? I'll try to clarify the arguments behind this assertion:

1- Class, XP, and quest system: created to allow the player to play the game and evolve in it as if he were playing a usual single player game. You can actually play most of the game without interacting with a single PC. You get XP, itens, hints and even an arrow telling you were to find all this stuff! Why did they do that? With those things you have an easier game what means that more people will buy it. However, it also means that a lot a people will buy that MMO just to powergame, other will be too young to understand, like or respect RP and players that enjoy RPing (how can someone keep in character when a 11 years old brat is ranting about how ridicolous RPers are).

2- A static world - when you are but a toon in the game it is hard to create an appealling fiction to RP with. Although players in lotro are maturer than those in WoW, it is not easy or fun to try to be part of the fiction or believe in it when all that you rich and powerful kin leader has is a house in a player neighborhood were noone ever goes.

... Man... there are many other things that I could list here but it is almost the same than what I said in my first post.

The thing is: I dont want wonderful graphics and a friendly game mechanics. I want a place where RP can flourish and I believe I may have found what I am looking for in a player server of Neverwinter nights. They are a very nice community of good RPers and although player servers have their problems I would rather deal with them than waste my time in Lotro or WoW (however, Lotro is great if you want to walk around Tolkein's world, which is the only reason why I'll keep my Lotro account active).

PS: if you would like to learn more about the above mentioned RP community, here goes the link: http://www.nwvisuals.com/tum/forum/

... and while you disagree with me and I agree with almost everything you say-to a point, I think your post supports my assertion that its player communities that ultimately drive successful immersion of MMO's.  Games static worlds are a challenge to RP, but not the end all be all to it, in fact, I think its the "scapegoat" of many a disgruntled RPer.  Is there room for improvement in todays MMO to further the RP experieince?  I would say, Yes!  But to blame the games themselves IMO is a failing of the player community to own their responsibility in this.

Ultima Online is the only mmorpg that can fully support rp.   The clothing, housing and item customization is there like no other game.  Period.

Vanguard might be your closest and best bet for now honestly.  Keep an eye on Mortal Online and see how that shapes up.  Maybe Blizzard's next mmo will be a sandbox?  Ahaha.

Darkfall could grow slowly and come around also you never know.  I think that freely placed player housing and everything being craftable is a necessity to re-capture this environment.

As I said, we're trying to create a game that's fully RP, and your oppinions and thoughts helped us a lot to define how to achieve it. Thanks for it.

I fully understand that without a good community, no game would succeed as RP, but maybe the game can help a lot to build such community. What we are thinking of is a mixture of what you described:

- no character levels, but a lot of skills and stats, that can help to build a really special and unique character. Just like I saw it in Morrowind, the skill is upgraded by using it, not by distributing points

- a few built-in repeatable quests and having some Game Masters "playing" the few NPCs providing a free-text speech availability

- these GMs can manipulate the world to create a linear history, thats consistent between PCs, eg.: only one PC or group can finish a unique quest, though many can start it. With this we would like to get over that "single player" view of MMOs.

- also these GMs are responsible for moderating the world, the in-game chat and such.

I know that many of the players won't last there long. But we would like to create a small but strong RP game, where players can spend their free time having fun. What do you think of this? We're still in design phase, and would like to know if we're on the right path.

You really should check out Mortal online.. Supposed to release Q4 this year. From 29th june you can pre-order and get access to closed beta.

suprised noone has said LOTRO, that game has the best rp'rs hands down

Originally posted by Papadam

You really should check out Mortal online.. Supposed to release Q4 this year. From 29th june you can pre-order and get access to closed beta.

Well, Mortal sounds really interesting. But another thing we would like to achieve, is to be multiplatform, and to have all kind of interfaces, eg: MUD-like, browser based, 2d, 3d, mobile, etc. why should we restrict players to play in a world they can reach only on a given platform and configuration?

Originally posted by ProfRed

Vanguard might be your closest and best bet for now honestly.  Keep an eye on Mortal Online and see how that shapes up.  Maybe Blizzard's next mmo will be a sandbox?  Ahaha.

Darkfall could grow slowly and come around also you never know.  I think that freely placed player housing and everything being craftable is a necessity to re-capture this environment.

Thank you for your suggestions. I did looked into them and I think that Mortal and Darkfall are very promising! Specially Mortal Online! I'll keep an eye on its development. And I'll probably be one of the first to buy Mortal when they release it.

I tried Vanguard. Played for a few hours and couldnt get myself to enjoy the interface and the enviroment. Another problem is the small pop.

mortal online is gonna turn into darkfall, you'll all see

you wont find much immersion there i'm sure, more then darkfall at least, but the wolves will come to the new flock of sheep!

Originally posted by anthyon

As I said, we're trying to create a game that's fully RP, and your oppinions and thoughts helped us a lot to define how to achieve it. Thanks for it.

I fully understand that without a good community, no game would succeed as RP, but maybe the game can help a lot to build such community. What we are thinking of is a mixture of what you described:

- no character levels, but a lot of skills and stats, that can help to build a really special and unique character. Just like I saw it in Morrowind, the skill is upgraded by using it, not by distributing points

- a few built-in repeatable quests and having some Game Masters "playing" the few NPCs providing a free-text speech availability

- these GMs can manipulate the world to create a linear history, thats consistent between PCs, eg.: only one PC or group can finish a unique quest, though many can start it. With this we would like to get over that "single player" view of MMOs.

- also these GMs are responsible for moderating the world, the in-game chat and such.

I know that many of the players won't last there long. But we would like to create a small but strong RP game, where players can spend their free time having fun. What do you think of this? We're still in design phase, and would like to know if we're on the right path.

I would like to know more about this project of yours and I would also be very pleased to help you with it. If you wish to PM me about it we may talk more. I think the idea is great and I also think that you may learn a lot from UO. Remember that in order to provide a good RP enviroment you must give as much as you can of game control to players. I mean... the more the players can customize their characters, their clothing, housing, habilities, pets, etc the more you will provide a RP friendly enviroment.

About graphics, although I think they arent the main concern here they are certainly important. After all, you are looking for a graphic interface in which you can RP. Therefore, within the possibilities, the better the graphics the merrier it is :)