excellent read !

Originally posted by eric_w66

I must be the anti-Dana Massey, I almost always disagree with what he writes.

In this case, there's some small parts I agree with, but I have a better answer as to why Eve keeps "growing" (albiet, VERY slowly):

1) Huge time sink, you don't want to give up what you've done so far, as you've invested tons of time most likely.

2) It has a fairly robust economic system.

3) Its the only "real" space game (Sorry SW:G fans), even if the "space" part of its fairly not realistic, and point and click...

4) The game "grows" by encouraging multiple accounts like no other game does. Its no longer even slightly suprising to meet people with 3-4-5-6-7-8 accounts. I myself have two, and I'm a "casual" player.

The "end game PvP" doesn't even draw that many people into 0.0 space, as can be seen from their quarterly reports, something like 70% of characters never leave empire space.

QFT ,i would like to add unique skill system to list ,you dont need to grind and kill thousands snakes/rats(of course you need money for ships/mods/skills)  you are not limited to a race/class .But social bonds in my eve  bringing growth ?No way ,eve's number one rule is '' trust noone ''  and it  actually works agains it

I would like to add the bar analogy someone posted earlier is an excellent example, and probably THE key element that many MMOs don't develop enough. Sure, most games have meeting places such as bars, taverns, or at least geographic areas that look more like places to socialize than to take down mobs. The problem is that there is no game mechanic that rewards such things. All it would really take is a CSR who was paid to watch said areas and trigger rewards based on actual social interaction, or conversely penalize those who go out of their way to destroy the social experience for others. This could be related to how well someone roleplays, or perhaps on how well they create a sense of community and do their best to involve anyone who comes to interact. I would hesitate to think an automated system could do this effectively, unless there was a class or job designed to enhance such an area (like musicians and dancers in SWG). I still think that human beings are needed to foster and promote true, healthy social interactions, though, and I think the first game that does this effectively is going to be our true WoW-killer, assuming all the other elements are done reasonably well, also.

Originally posted by ericbelser

I agree completely and will add that one of the things many newer game designers seem to have missed is the concept of "down time". There is a direct relation between the amount of chat and socialization going on in EVE and the fact that I (as a player) do not have to be constantly pounding hotkeys, using mouse controls etc the entire time I am playing to accomplish anything.

THIS is exactly one of the main reasons I loved having a crafting-only toon in Star Wars Galaxies.  When I got sick of combat or exploring, I could log into my crafter and chat with my guild and other friends while crafting.  Not only was SWG's crafting much more involved than modern games, it also gave you a chance to have some good down time.  Sometimes I would just head to one of the popular cantinas where there were entertainers (a purely social player class that many people loved), and people getting heals/buffs from the entertainers.  I would pull out my crafting R2 unit, and start crafting while chatting everyone up in the cantina, and making new friends.  Sometimes I would get word of  big group adventure that I wouldn't have ever known about without being in there socializing.

This just scratches the surface of what a game with greate community features and non-combat/social player classes can bring to an MMO. These non-combat classes and features bring different kinds of people to the game world.  People who would be more inclined to log into SecondLife than WoW.  Even though many people do not care for this type of game play, some of the most interesting people I ever met in SWG couldn't have cared less about the PvE or PvP content.  Those people made the game world interesting, and breathed life into it.  If you were into SWG, you had no problem suspending disbelief immediately after logging in, and fully immersing yourself into the game world.

Having non-combat focused classes and skills such as scientists and poiticians was awesome too, and it made for lots of player created content.  Massey hits at a point many of us "sandbox" guys have been saying here for a long time now.  If your game is open ended, and you give the players the mechanics and tools to make their own content, they will.  This is what kepy SWG going despite the myriad of problems with the game.  No one cared about the lack of quests and content, because we players were the content.  The game allowed us almost total freedom to do so. 

Still though, you cannot have one with out the other in my opinion.  You cannot have an open ended MMO that is focused 90% on combat and 10% in social/non-combat play.  There needs to be a blance to pull it off.  It can't be easy and as Massey said, EVE got lucky in this respect, as they probably didn't think about it while designing the game.  The same can be said about pre-cu SWG.  They did not plan for this rich community to happen, but the game facilitated it.

I think the social bonds could be much improved, and I agree with a lot of the article.

Something has changed....the people I was in my first guild in WoW with, just after release, are still on my MSN and email, and we say hi and catch up, even though I havent been guilded or played with them in over 3 ½ years.

There were acquaintences on that server, that I have run into on other games, years later, and we instantly strike up the friendship again.

I even met my better half in that guild eventually!

Now, I have been in a load of guilds, and felt no connection, there is no need to do things as a guild any more in most games, aside from the odd raid...there is very little interaction, everyone has alts providing stuff, so you dont need to help each other out, there is no travelling all across the world in any game to help someone (unless someone in the guild is being particularly annoying "Wtf, why wont you boost me ffs"

I played Eve, among many games, and I did enjoy the corps there.

Having said that, I am against forced grouping for several reasons:

1) Are you sure you want to be forced to group with Joe random? You know, the one that thinks a tank has instant aggro on a whole group so he unleashes his AOE, or, the one that thinks warriors tank perfectly fine in a bikini and uber dps stance?  Or the healer that thinks he can heal with his totem...or the one that has a tantrum when anyone else dare even think about needing something.

2) I suffer from Social Anxieties, among other psychological issues.  These sometimes manifest online as well as IRL.  I have spent many month not wanting to join with a PuG, and pulling out of guild runs at the last minute, as well as randomly leaving my guilds and deleting all my chars in various games....so, I do not want to be forced to group if I cannot.

When I solo, why do I not play a solo game?

Well, that answer is simple, online games also function as a chatbox, and when I am having an insane anxiety episode, logging into a game, killing some time grinding and chatting in general chat is an amazing distractor for me.

CCP  walked with no  shoes on broken glass for a long time , with their policy getting the ppl softly introduced into a open and mean gameworld (i still remember the days i started ,every morning there were officials in the chat  to give you limited help and hints without being dicks/cunts ) worked out perfectly  being  the' most into touch with its playerbase' company i know . Took me 6 month to realize this wasnt my game , but the time i played it it was fun fun fun ..i went off without any bitter thoughts ,cuz i knew the problem was on my  side

2) I suffer from Social Anxieties, among other psychological issues.  These sometimes manifest online as well as IRL.  I have spent many month not wanting to join with a PuG, and pulling out of guild runs at the last minute, as well as randomly leaving my guilds and deleting all my chars in various games....so, I do not want to be forced to group if I cannot.

When I solo, why do I not play a solo game?

 

Well, that answer is simple, online games also function as a chatbox, and when I am having an insane anxiety episode, logging into a game, killing some time grinding and chatting in general chat is an amazing distractor for me.

You have a medical issue, so you want these MASSIVELY MULTIPLAYER online games to cater to your needs, to provide you with a single player game with a chat room. Interesting.  I'm curious to know how your social anxiety affects you in the animated game world but not in chat where the real interaction is happening.

Don't feel too bad though.  There are lots of people, I would dare say most of the people who play these modern MMO's are really looking for a single player game with a chat room.  Ironically, most of them never end up talking to anyone anyway,

Originally posted by ericbelser

I agree completely and will add that one of the things many newer game designers seem to have missed is the concept of "down time". There is a direct relation between the amount of chat and socialization going on in EVE and the fact that I (as a player) do not have to be constantly pounding hotkeys, using mouse controls etc the entire time I am playing to accomplish anything.

I could not agree with this sentiment more.  I always felt like I was alone in this factor.  I hate to use this as an example but when I'm playing a game like WoW I really don't like that I have to pound on so many of my darn hotkeys when all I'm doing is mindlessly grinding out quests for you guessed it "experience".  Of course I'm not really sure what I'm experiencing other than a massive headache.

I REALLY think these games, if they're going to evolve are going to have to learn to incorporate downtime.  You just hit the nail on the head for me.

Originally posted by MindTrigger

2) I suffer from Social Anxieties, among other psychological issues.  These sometimes manifest online as well as IRL.  I have spent many month not wanting to join with a PuG, and pulling out of guild runs at the last minute, as well as randomly leaving my guilds and deleting all my chars in various games....so, I do not want to be forced to group if I cannot.

When I solo, why do I not play a solo game?

 

Well, that answer is simple, online games also function as a chatbox, and when I am having an insane anxiety episode, logging into a game, killing some time grinding and chatting in general chat is an amazing distractor for me.

 

You have a medical issue, so you want these MASSIVELY MULTIPLAYER online games to cater to your needs, to provide you with a single player game with a chat room. Interesting.  I'm curious to know how your social anxiety affects you in the animated game world but not in chat where the real interaction is happening.

Don't feel too bad though.  There are lots of people, I would dare say most of the people who play these modern MMO's are really looking for a single player game with a chat room.  Ironically, most of them never end up talking to anyone anyway,

You can play almost any single player game with MSN messenger running in the background, or ICQ, or whatever it is you use for instant messaging. If playing team games is such a hassle for you sometimes, then you could just adapt, instead of asking the devs to adapt the game rules for you.

There should be solo content in these games - sometimes we don't have the time to go out and set up a group or chat up the guild into a quest and those things, but even then the majority of the content should be geared towards group play (that is, if the genre's name still has any meaning). Why? Because these types of games are way more fun when played in community. And since games are quite a lot about fun, then this should be the main focus.

I used to remmeber daoc when the colour scheme meant if you could kill a orange con mob you were pretty slick and if you saw a red or purple unless you were grouped you ran for it.

i remmeber the days of soloing with my bard killing blue con and green con mobs because the bard was pretty weak to do yellow or higher.

I remmeber sitting around waiting for mana or hp to go back up after a fight and chatting away with folks then it would be "everyone ready" and everyone stood up and we started again. You joined a guild because you were invited too and you respected your guild leader, very few people ran guilds it was very close nit, even the few people who were in elite specifically built rvr groups were still part of that comunity even if they didnt talk much or turned up to save the day.

Slowly though i think the game changed from Realm Vs Realm and having faith  inyour home realm to a ME vs everyone else, where you competted against your fellow realm mates to get the most Realm points or the Most exp or epic loot and artifacts.

The days of defending a keep for the fun of it were gone because it didnt give much rps you had people berating you because you ran into their 1vs1 vs their personal enemies (who they chatted too over irc). You had people constnatly complaining that fights were ruined OR such and such is a noob for zerging.

I think social bonds in Daoc were destroyed when the end game fight changed into a personal one man campaign.

To be blunt, If I cannot solo/duo well in a game, I will not play it.

I think we see less freeform play, classless systems and such, is, it is harder to force you into a group, if you can do more then one narrow role.

Raids seem like lazy programing.  Instead of making an instance adjust to the amount of people in a group, one or more, you need mass amounts of people. Each person with limited roles. We ended up with roles that take over classes.  Tanks better tank, and so on.

I work, juggle family, and play.  I might be playing for an hour, or two.  If I get a day off and get to play for a whole day, I don't want to waste it, searching for groups, getting into a group were my "warrior" has one task, stand there and spam hate skills.

I want to get some levels, do some mining, do some crafting. But, if the scripts for crafting come from a raid, or a componet is only found in a group instance, Well, I will not be crafting.

It comes down to, the more a game forces me into a small role, and a large group, the less I will be there. The social aspect for me, is global chats, market channel, buying and selling on a market.  If someone needs some help, grouping with them to help them out, then going on my way.

I cannot be called casual, I generally have two to six accounts going at any one time.  Two in one game, couple other games and such. Tend to play an hour or so at night, and most of the weekends.

I played EnB untill gate raids. I played COH untill you had to have a group to get a respec.  I played SWG untill you had to raid to make BH armor. Played eq2 recently, till they started talking about making classes more dependant on each other, and getting Tanks back to being Tanks.  I don't play tanks, I play fighters.  So bye eq2.  Lotro same problem. When conan starts nerfing solo/duo play, I will leave it as well.

If MMO's go to total forced social group games, that is fine with me, I will simply not play them. I will not be hampered by , people randomly quitting groups, bio breaks that go on forever, The I only have 30 minutes till school so don't read the quest text people, the reasons go on and on for me.

Last note, It really bugs me when people say, Oh yeah you have to have a group for that quest, but you can get a group easy and do it.  I might be able to, But I am not going to. Or, your not grouping with the right people, once you do you will like it.  No, I will not.

BRAVO BRAVO tats exactly wat i had in mind too:P

The post tells the truth of MMOs

But i sure think that the author can also see from another perspective :

If a person is not able to find a helping group then he looses interest in the game when he comes.... So being independent is all essential as the group... Gammers should not feel obligated to take help for every thing... as said the basic urge of a WINNER is what the gaming community offers... That said we must have periodic intervals in the gme where gamers need to come together to play side by side and build bonds.. BUT TOTAL dependence on other players guidance for ppl to play is difficult 

MMO's need to work on this. Its not about forced grouping, its about putting in game dynamics that promote or encourage positive player interaction.

A great example of this was in SWG pre-nge, in addition to leveling up your skills from a skill trainer NPC, any other player who had the skill could teach it to you. Some did it for money, others just to be nice. It was such a small thing but many of the friends I'd made in SWG were from either having someone teach me, or teaching someone else.

Originally posted by dhayes68

MMO's need to work on this. Its not about forced grouping, its about putting in game dynamics that promote or encourage positive player interaction.

A great example of this was in SWG pre-nge, in addition to leveling up your skills from a skill trainer NPC, any other player who had the skill could teach it to you. Some did it for money, others just to be nice. It was such a small thing but many of the friends I'd made in SWG were from either having someone teach me, or teaching someone else.

I enjoyed that part of SWG. Also crafters making house items. Thats another social aspect of MMO's I enjoy.  There are many areas that can be social and interactive besides requiring group combat.

Originally posted by Torchwood

Originally posted by dhayes68

MMO's need to work on this. Its not about forced grouping, its about putting in game dynamics that promote or encourage positive player interaction.

A great example of this was in SWG pre-nge, in addition to leveling up your skills from a skill trainer NPC, any other player who had the skill could teach it to you. Some did it for money, others just to be nice. It was such a small thing but many of the friends I'd made in SWG were from either having someone teach me, or teaching someone else.

 

I enjoyed that part of SWG. Also crafters making house items. Thats another social aspect of MMO's I enjoy.  There are many areas that can be social and interactive besides requiring group combat.

Image Designers were good too. LoTRO has npc barbers if you want to change your hair color/stye. Why not make it a player skill?  Anything to promote or encourage positive player interaction. So much can be done without talking about grouping for pve.

Originally posted by seabeast

Careful shipmate, the anti-gamers will be all over you for starting a cult and the next thing you know they will bring up the Doom Deal right next to “playing Stairway to Heaven” backwards to hear Satin. Lol.

ROTFL. Your post reminded me of an interview with Robert Pant I heard years ago where the interviewer asked him about subliminal "backwards" satanic messages on Stariway to Heaven. He said [I'm paraphrasing], "No, but if we thought any of that worked, we wouldn't have wasted time with satanic messages. We would have put something on there like buy the next album"

O.k so being forced to group in a mmorpg to improve the character you are playing sucks.

That's pretty much the generalization of it. People want to choose when and how they group. Then why doesn't companies like Blizzard ect understand this ? Ccp seems to understand this philosophy.

Originally posted by Torchwood

To be blunt, If I cannot solo/duo well in a game, I will not play it.

I think we see less freeform play, classless systems and such, is, it is harder to force you into a group, if you can do more then one narrow role.

Raids seem like lazy programing. Instead of making an instance adjust to the amount of people in a group, one or more, you need mass amounts of people. Each person with limited roles. We ended up with roles that take over classes. Tanks better tank, and so on.

I work, juggle family, and play. I might be playing for an hour, or two. If I get a day off and get to play for a whole day, I don't want to waste it, searching for groups, getting into a group were my "warrior" has one task, stand there and spam hate skills.

I want to get some levels, do some mining, do some crafting. But, if the scripts for crafting come from a raid, or a componet is only found in a group instance, Well, I will not be crafting.

It comes down to, the more a game forces me into a small role, and a large group, the less I will be there. The social aspect for me, is global chats, market channel, buying and selling on a market. If someone needs some help, grouping with them to help them out, then going on my way.

I cannot be called casual, I generally have two to six accounts going at any one time. Two in one game, couple other games and such. Tend to play an hour or so at night, and most of the weekends.

I played EnB untill gate raids. I played COH untill you had to have a group to get a respec. I played SWG untill you had to raid to make BH armor. Played eq2 recently, till they started talking about making classes more dependant on each other, and getting Tanks back to being Tanks. I don't play tanks, I play fighters. So bye eq2. Lotro same problem. When conan starts nerfing solo/duo play, I will leave it as well.

If MMO's go to total forced social group games, that is fine with me, I will simply not play them. I will not be hampered by , people randomly quitting groups, bio breaks that go on forever, The I only have 30 minutes till school so don't read the quest text people, the reasons go on and on for me.

Last note, It really bugs me when people say, Oh yeah you have to have a group for that quest, but you can get a group easy and do it. I might be

QFTMFT, I couldn't say it better myself. If i group i want to group on my terms not the games.

I think someone hit the nail on the head when they said "EVE Only encourages joining a corporation because its so dangerous to group with unknown people"

Even in safe space, grouping with someone can merly be a trick to find your location.

in addition, since the new player experience is utter tosh in eve its often easier to ask questions and get a human reply than it is to figure it out for yourself, hence you often spark a debate as people fall over themselves to help you.

I should also point out that the growth of eve is often players buying additional accounts and paying for them with in-game money,  I have two accounts myself now, but only because I can afford it, and I have friends who have grown their accounts to over 10.  If you like Eve then its practically the norm that you would have multiple accounts not long after starting.

I doubt that there is much genuine growth on Eve.

Its incredibly easy to join partys in City of Heroes too, and yet that is one of the few mmo's that I can jump into at any point and be instantly botherd by people wanting to form a party, rather than every other mmo where i genuinly prefer to solo, even if I wanted to party you can shout LFG all day with out a whisper.

I think this is because CoH is one of the few mmo's where after a certain level its very difficult to solo, and the advantage of teaming so vastly out weighs any advantage of soloing that it just doesnt happen.  And CoH like all mmo's has seen a decline over the years, not a steady growth.

In conclusion, I disagree or highly seceptical that EVE's growth is associated with its socialism, it may contribute but paying for subscription using in game money is more likley the reason.

In addition, I doubt making grouping "too easy" is destroying MMO's on the contrary, its the fact that they make them too easy to solo.  We appear to be in an age where people demand Massivly Multiplayer games who then demand them to be soloable.

in any case, your theory doesnt explain why Wow (a very typical mmo in reality) continues to see growth,

Excellent article.

I think you are correct. The new games just don't make you feel neccesary. Any 10 year old can fill your shoes....that's just annoying. (Nothing against 10 year olds).

It's one of the things that kept me playing EQ for so long, at least it used to matter that you took along someone who actually knew how to play their class. Not all healers were the same and it made a big difference if you had made a name for yourself.

Today they have dumbed it all down so much that you just need another body to fill the slot. It makes it easy to group but takes away that feeling of being wanted and needed. I remember many nights playing as a cleric that if I wanted to log it was going to break the group. I lost a lot of sleep to the begging of others, LOL. We burned a lot  of time just getting the right group set up but then we rocked it for hours.

Today, if you log out it's no big deal, they can get anyone else.

I would ask, what's the point of playing an MMO if you are not integral to the experience of others? You may as well play a single player game, the story is almost always better and you are the hero of the whole story. Plus, you have a pause key.

Of all the games I have played for any time EVE is one of the few that I would consider going back to. I think the only reason I quit was I burned myself out mining while trying to fill a contract my little corporation had.

I am not currently playing any MMOs because I'm waiting for something great to come along. I am tired of all the same old thing copies of one another. You would think nobody has any imagination the way fantasy MMOs keep churning out. It's almost like they way every automobile looks the same if it was made by the big 3. No wonder they are doomed. (I hope that's not true but...)

I can make Torchwood's words mine, if he don't mind, OFC.

About EVE, and why it is growing (as slowly that CCP is focused in another project right now) I have to disagree with the author. As someone already said, rule number 1 in EVE: "Don't trust anyone". I've played it for the last (almost) 4 years and I still remember the Bio of one guy when I was in the trial period: "Welcome to the Internet, the place where guys are guys, girls are guys and children are FBI agents". I did not gave credit to that words... I was robbed, betrayed (more than once) and ended with my 3 accounts, 9 characters in a Corporation with 9 members.

You can ask: But what made you play the game all this time? I really don't know, maybe complexity, maybe the freedom to change but more than nothing I never got the End Game. Reaching cap level and asking yourself - Now what? Never happened in EVE, even to those 100+ characters that have 100,000,000 skill points.

About the necessity to grind, as mostly MMO, in EVE you have to grind or either buy your isk with RL money. You can't even train your skills if you don't have money to buy them 1st, not to talk in use that said skils to fly something, no isk, no ship. Oh you lost your ship? Was insured? Hope you didn't fit it with fanction/deadspace/officer mods...

I still love that game, don't ask me why, but is not because social interaction as I had much, much more playing LotRO with only one character that I had in EVE in that (almost) 4 years with 9.

Sorry for my english, is not my native language and, OFC, I'm not the "Holder of the Truth".