This is a question I put before the forum users of MMORPG.com.    I do not think you'll find a better forum anywhere on the Internet right now that can compare to our little piece of the web to ask the question, "What makes a good MMORPG to you?"   We have a wide range of MMO players that frequent these boards and our taste in MMO's is about as broad as one can get.   With that said, I am curious to see what others think makes a good MMORPG.   So to facilitate the answering of this question, I ask that you stay on topic and keep your answers simple.  You can number them from most important to least important.   Or maybe just make a list of the things that you need in an MMORPG to keep you playing.  Feel free to include examples of what you mean in your list.

EXAMPLE:

Game Play  - more than just instanced PvP and raiding the same dungeon week after week.

Character Customization

Character Progression - (maybe list the type you'd like to see here)

Open Seamless World

Community

Graphics

Good Customer Service

Just keep it simple.   I would really love to hear what some of you think would make a good MMORPG.

- Good content: dungeon, special boss fight with special mechanics, quests, stories ....

- good class mechanics: interesting abilities, multiple rotation/strategies

- good aesthetic and graphics DESIGN (not technology .. things need to look COOL, not realistic)

- LFD/LFR tool .. must have

- little time sink

- no (or opt out) pvp

- AH

Dynamic environment...most MMOs are static. Even singleplayer games are more dynamic these days, than certain new MMOs.

things to do besides combat and crafting. I want a variety of things to do. Why does it have to be just combat or crafting?

Not forced raiding endgame

I want it to be an MMO, not a 15 dollar a month singleplayer game...I can play singleplayer games for cheaper. That means, lots of social interaction...note: that doesn't mean forced grouping. Take SWG, it had tons of social options, and it was all optional. I could play as a bard type character and sing in bars, I could be a trader and travel the lands just trading...I could be a crafter+trader, I could be an animal trainer and sell animals or train peoples animals...I could start a city or be a part of another groups city. Or social interaction could be working with others for a common goal.

Instances all over the place are fail, I prefer dungeons being instanced however. Bigger fail when the instances don't even change when you complete them, at least catacalysm did this right

Able to effect the land in some way (be it as small as building a house somewhere, or changing the environment around you...goes back to dynamic environment)

Large world

Proper cities...not tiny hovels that the developers make the mistake of calling it a city (a hovel is not a city)...if I can see one end of the city to the other end on the same screen, it isn't a city

Able to play with people across the world...take classic MMOs...I met people from all over. Even met someone from Africa in SWG, that was awesome. Now a lot (not all) MMOs have segregation on their servers. EVE doesn't segregate either for the most part (guess for China they do)...but their servers do just fine. Meeting people all over the world is one reason I got so into MMOs.

So to sum it up...a dynamic, large world, with lots of (NOT-forced) social interaction...the others are just bonuses

Interdependant content

1. Social Tools and Player Driven Content
2. Difficult Areas with grouping incentive
3. Quick and agile combat.
4. Ability to mix and match skills and classes
5. Deep crafting and player economy.
6. 3rd person point of view.
7. Gigantic open worlds.
8. Non-personal story

1. Customizability

- freedom with skills (perhaps classless)

- non-linear gear. I hate the color coordinated system that seems to have taken over. No more gear with arbitrary stats; let me decide what my equipment does.

2. Non-linear gameplay

- Please, god, no questlines/hubs

- Little, to no instancing. I don't find girnding level-appropriate dungeons fun... at all.

- More content randomization

3. Content relevancy

- No tiered resource system. I despise not being able to harvest a resource because I'm 'skilled' enough. Not only that, but resources quickly become obsolete. Keep crafting components useful.

- Have content in every area that is interesting for all players. I hate seeing empty zones

4. PvP

- No battlegrounds, but still have a competitive arena (or some facsimile)

- A good open-world PvP system (there are a lot of options for this)

- PvP needs to be a more integral part of the game, not just something that's tacked on. It should also accommodate people that don't like PvP, but still be able to contribute to the system in place.

5. World cohesiveness

- Get rid of zones in the traditional sense. I'm tied of crossing a river or something and being in a completely different environment.

- Again, no instancing. Keep the world connected and organic-feeling

5. Extraneous content

- There need to be fun distractions; this can range from events to random items (something that spawns a random mob, or something)

- People should play the game and advance as a consequence, not be playing the game to advance. For this reason, I would implement some type of exp limiter (explaining is too much for this bullet point, but ask me if you want).

6. Greater focus on crafting

- The crafting system in many games can completely be ignored; this shouldn't be the case. The crafting professions need to be indispensable.

- Varied crafting. Have a better variety, and so that players can only have one specialization to prevent oversaturation. Also, have more intersting professions, like one that trains mounts, or harvests enemy souls for gear upgrades... other stuff

- Gathering should be able to be performed by anyone

- Free form city building and house placement

- free form castle building

- full loot / pvp

- skill system

- skill cap

- realistic graphics approach (not hugely concerned but I need immersion)

- plenty of side content

- not a single instance

- boats

- LOTS of forced grouping

1. First and foremost the game has to be fun.

2. Exploration - I want to be able to wander off and find other things to do.

3. Immersion - The game has to look and feel like the setting ether it is fantasy or sci-fi.

4. Group play has to be there.

5. Replayability

6. Customization thought items I obtain within the game.

Ultimately the quality of community (or if the moderators are doing their jobs) and balanced, skill-based PvP.

- No quest hubs

- Player driven world

- Extensive crafting system (Vanguard crafting system comes to mind)

- Massive world to explore

- No quicktravel through teleports (making the world more vast)

- Immersion with the gameworld

- Be anything you want to be (classless system)

- No gear grind for endgame (gathering gear to go the next raid to gather some more gear for the next one, etc)

- No instancing

- Player / Guild housing

- A good and patient community

These things just popped in my mind right off the bat.

Not gonna lie this sounds like a question that would take over 24 hours of writing to answer. There is so much that is expected of an MMO today, gonna have to pass on this question, too overwhelming!

-  No auto-path, no auto-travel, no auto group, no auto learning skills, no auto level up, no auto craft, no auto loot, no macros.

-  No instance zones.

-  No factions.

-  No small worlds, just one big world.

-  No ffa anarchy pvp but ffa pvp with some rules. (something like L2 but it could be better)

-  No Personal pvp ranks, only guild/legion/clan/alliance ranks.

-  No global chat (this feature can stay only for few like heros in L2)

- Territory control.

- freedom to go anywhere i want since lvl 1.

Ah yes, allmost forgot: chars and mobs animations must be cool  :)

It's quite simple, really. I'd like to see a mmo which is a WORLD where games take place rather than a GAME that happens to have a world attached.

Otherwise... content that is automatically generated through a combination of clever AI and player input. Mount and Blade is an awesome example of this for single players.

A lot of stuff to do. (It goes with "world where games take place") Many sub-games within a cohesive world, all influencing each other.. (Crafting game, PvP game, politics game, PvE game...)

Player-controlled NPCs. A must for any game economy that doesn't consist of 90% slave-players. I want to be able to buy a farm, hire some peasants and go off on an adventure. And I want other players to be able to kill my peasants and burn down my farm if I'm not smart enough to hire guards as well. And I want that goblin tribe living in the nearby woods to be able to do the same once they run out of deer and bunnies to catch.

A more advanced RPG system than D&D 1978 style. I'd enjoy something like GURPS with soft CP ceiling or something like that. For you youngsters, I'd like to see a more FPS-like character progression. Horizontal rather than vertical one.

Progression that goes beyond mere character stats and levels. What about social progression? Economy, reputation? Again, look at Mount & Blade and be amazed.

Fantasy is fine by me. It's a common archetypal space. If you see a dwarf you know what to expect and you can concentrate on the meat of the game. It's like the western genre - everyone knows who cowboys and indians are so you save yourself the first 1/2 hr of the movie explaining to bewildered audience what this setting is all about.

In the list of importance for me:

-FUN and enjoyable content, with minimal hassle to login and start playing and progressing my characters.  This means no forced grouping except for areas where you could get the best of the best items (dungeons, raids, etc)

-Good and stable performance, look at Vanguard, a game that could've been much better had it not had all the engine/crashing problems.  People today don't want to lag when they play, they don't want to hitch, crash, and all that.

-Optional PvP, I need my PvP fix but these days I don't prefer FFA PvP anymore.  Pure PvE games always have a ceiling for me, there comes a time when I simply get too bored to continue.  Having optional PvP prolong the game for me and allows me to loosen up and have some fun...sorta like a break from the samo samo PvE.

-Fluid animation, I can't stand bad animation in today's games anymore.  For older games, I can understand.  For newer games, I expect animation to be smooth, combat to be smooth, mount/flying animation to be smooth, etc..  This was and still is a big strong point of WoW, something other games have difficulties recreating.

-Character customization, I don't need a thousand facial expression choices, but I would like to see a wide variety of armor, weapons, cloaks, emblems, etc..  Anything that allows you to look a bit different helps to boost my enjoyment.

Thanks for the replies so far, keep them coming.  :)

Build your own character
...through a set of skills. Advance gradually over time without becoming many times more powerful than new players. Can't hit cap in a short week to two months time frame. Progression with freedom and longevity.

Create your own adventures
Less questing. No going from quest hub to quest hub, zone to zone in a linear fashion. Many hidden quests or side objectives found only by exploring. Combination of great story-quest content and Dynamicly generated content.

A world to explore
A large open, you can set foot anywhere, world. No immersion breaking zones with load screens. A game world full of emergent gameplay. Not planned location to location gameplay.

I kept it fairly vague because this could work any number of ways with various features.

Good MMORPGs? I guess the designers and the suits have forgotten how to make them ...

Anyway:

- Large, open world. No instances, no phasing, no instant travel.

- A game that provides not only content for achievers and killers (like most current games do) but also provides content for explorers and socialisers (yes, the old Bartle test player types).

- A game that is as much a game as a virtual world. I'm aware that this is a fine balance but in recent years we had too many games and not enough virtual worlds. Let it rain, let it get dark during night. Bonus points for seasons.

- More than combat! Crafting is essential, as are activities like resource gathering, farming, fishing, hunting, etc.

- RP friendly. Give me emotes, give me the ability to sit on chairs or on the ground, provide inns, central plazas, a theatre, a meeting spot around a campfire. Bonus points when the devs let me make the campfire in the first place.

- No FFA PvP, gazillions of bonus points for a 3-faction RvR game like DAoC. :)

- Death penalties. Let me be careful again.

Open world not instanced, alla EQ1, Vanguard,AO-

Player developed worlds where you actaully have to build cities and houses from gathering-

Skyrim typ of skill lvls. What skills you use is what you get better in-

Top end realistic graphics that can actually work and run on the technology we have today-(i know this will exclude a lot of people because of cost for high end machines, but take SWTOR for example, game looks like it could have been around 5 years ago)-

Everything is crafted, Armor and weapons. Boss MoBs would drop maybe a mat or such to make a weapon legendary. Would really like it if a players weapon was the only one with the weapon name and look. name your own weapon, Not everyone running around with the same thing. Once the weapon is crafted which could have an epic look to it, that weapon graphic is locked. No one else had the Conan atleantien sword but conan, thats what made it special.  Drizzt has twinkle and iceing death.

No MoDs at all. no auto attack(one thing conan did right was its fighting system IMO).

Its funny how so far most of use want the same typ of things. Need some game developers to read this eh?