For many Years now we have seen A+ title after A+ title Fail. The effects we now cleary can see with most of them going Free to play. Lotro, AOC, Aion(euro verison), DDO, Champions online, Star Trek online and many others to name a few. Others have Endless trails like Warhamer and Rift...

Free to Play back in the day were the worst kind of MMOS.. the B class so to speak. No serious western gamer would even think about playing them. They were cunstructed to fool people out of money.. I will go so far as to say they were like online Casinos.. built to scam people out of money..

But today things are diffrent, ore maybe they are not.. Games like AOC, Lotro and DDO still force its players to pay for content inside the game, to be able to progress and have fun...The subscription was a security, it protected the players from getting griefed by the companies...

How did we get to this point? when in 2012 the only legit subscription based games left are WoW and EvE (and handfull of others) , and they both sneak in ways to get thier subscribers to pay more then then the mothly fees.. WoW with payed expansions(and alot of other things/transfers and other stuff) and EvE online lets you pay hard cash for thier ingame currency...

The answer is simple, after the smash hit that was World of Warcraft, developers and Investors thought that this is what gamers want.. This is the holy grail and we can all cash in on it. Cluless about what gamers actually wanted they started to make game after game after game after the same principle. Resulting in the longest run of copy cat games this genre has ever seen. The failure of their competitors dident even put them off, Instead they made the games even more stupid and easy. Item grind mouse wheels with little thought about Endgame or how to keep your subscribers subed to the game..

Any FOOL that has ever played an MMO knows that the most Important thing about an MMO is its Endgame.. It should be Priority number one to create a lasting and fun Endgame. MMO players have after running these games for so long come to the understanding that anything below endgame is just a time sink.. People will speed to max level, because their is no reason whatsover to do any dungeones or get any gear before hiting Max. Everything gets replaced anyways so why bother..

People reached max level in 5 days time in SWTOR for example, some probably reached it faster lol.. Most people will have gotten to max level by the end of the first month ( because levling in modern MMOS is piss easy, and requries zero effort)

So by dumbing down the content, making levling a breeze Developers have put themselfs in a corner. If they slow down the levling process they are afraid of losing consumers ( whining about how hard it is to level) and if they keep it as it is Evryone is going to leave anyways because they run out of things to do..

Now that is what you get for not being Innovating and for not trying to figure out new ways for keeping people subscribed...

It isent Rocket sience, I can personaly think of many ways to keep people entertained without doing Raids and grinding for gear...

Point of the rant = FIRST THING YOU FIGURE OUT WHEN YOU ARE GOING TO MAKE AN MMO IS WHAT IS THE ENDGAME GOING TO BE ABOUT.. and the first thing you start programing and designing is the ENDGAME... if the Endgame is fun people will grind and do boring things to get there, because they know that in the End it will be worth it... But If the game is the other way around all the fun stuff is in the begining and at the end it is BORING and REPETATIVE.. They will tell their friends, " the game up untill the end was kinda fun, but I would not waste my time because endgame is broken" Dont know how many times I have Read or heard this phrase repeated amongst players.. Having a bad Endgame is like giving your game a DEATH SENTANCE from the start...

You big developers are lucky I dont have the financial backing to make an MMO because if I did I would blow all you Retards out of the water. Because for were Im sitting you are a bunch of morons, frankly im suprised you can even put your socks on in the morning...

thats a lot of words for "I like end game, and if you don't make it right then your stupid"

Originally posted by eyelolled

thats a lot of words for "I like end game, and if you don't make it right then your stupid"

 

Yeah, and of course including the "be glad I can't afford an MMO cuz mine would roxxor nubz!"

There's actually a lot more to a game than the end-game.  World of Warcraft realized that.  While their endgame has always been a huge drawing point, they added in their pvp system, a lot of different ways to level, etc etc.

End game is important, but tools that make communities are as well.  Good guild management tools.  Good socialization options.  A crafting system that is intuitive yet challenging is also a good thing.

Originally posted by Zlayer77
 

So by dumbing down the content, making levling a breeze Developers have put themselfs in a corner. If they slow down the levling process they are afraid of losing consumers ( whining about how hard it is to level) and if they keep it as it is Evryone is going to leave anyways because they run out of things to do..

I think you hit it correctly with this part.  Any rush to endgame design better have a very impressive endgame.

I understand what the OP is saying. TBH leveling never seems to prepare you for end game. Leveling is almost this pointless time sink that in the end doesn't really help you understand anything. Maybe it is time developers focus more of their  developmental costs on developing an exciting, content rich end game since that is where we all end up at some point.

The last time I enjoyed an end game though was in SWG.

 Heh , nice read and good to know some people actually think like I do.

I'll never support a F2P MMO that teases me to buy virtual goods to enhance my gaming experience.

I will always support P2P MMO's with the mentality of ; "What you see is what you get" with no hidden fees.

Originally posted by Zlayer77

Any FOOL that has ever played an MMO knows that the most Important thing about an MMO is its Endgame.. It should be Priority number one to create a lasting and fun Endgame.

...

if the Endgame is fun people will grind and do boring things to get there, because they know that in the End it will be worth it... But If the game is the other way around all the fun stuff is in the begining and at the end it is BORING and REPETATIVE.. They will tell their friends, " the game up untill the end was kinda fun, but I would not waste my time because endgame is broken" 

Well of course you can't find a game you'll like if your priority is something that does not, will not, cannot, and should not exist.  Endgames are supposed to be boring and repetitive.  That's the entire point of the endgame.  If it were fun, it wouldn't be part of the endgame.

Originally posted by Zlayer77

Any FOOL that has ever played an MMO knows that the most Important thing about an MMO is its Endgame.. It should be Priority number one to create a lasting and fun Endgame. MMO players have after running these games for so long come to the understanding that anything below endgame is just a time sink.. People will speed to max level, because their is no reason whatsover to do any dungeones or get any gear before hiting Max. Everything gets replaced anyways so why bother..

This has the potential to be very interesting :)

Just for starters, "giving players things to do after they beat the game" is quite different from the strict and limited concept of "endgame" we see these days, which serves more or less no other purpose than to replace long leveling with "long being stuck at maxlevel" so that the greatest possible amount of players is in one place of the gameplay, bringing a host of other problems with it, like shortening the leveling time and the resulting feeling of pointlessness of the leveling process, skill trees and more or less classes, its a cycle :)

Flame on!

:)

Originally posted by Zlayer77

Any FOOL that has ever played an MMO knows that the most Important thing about an MMO is its Endgame.. 

 

Any fool?  I think you're just a result of this new fad of rushing to end-game content.

Have you considered that your ENTIRE OPINION is the reason for the recent stretch of HORRID releases?

Oh, lets make it accessible so that a PERSON who plays once a week for 2 hrs can reach max level in 4 months.  The PROBLEM is MMO's is that people have the ABILITY to RUSH to the end of the game and scream that they don't have any content.

So what does WoW do?  They push an expansion that gives you more levelling content and stave off the end game for longer.  So at the END of the day, creation of END GAME CONTENT is essentially saying "I've given up on expanding ... you can have a Raid or two that you can grind through for months".

Stop it.  Stop this foolish "end game" crap.  The average player doesn't give two shits about endgame.  Most end game RAIDING guilds are just that... an END GAME guild.  Again, percentage-wise you're clamoring for power to the 4% who reach end game and care about such and not the 96% that don't give a rats ass about how many 20-man Raids you can build.  Certainly most casuals don't Raid.  And even then, we ALL know that a PUG Raid is just... well... fail.

Make the xp hard to come by.  Make people explore for the extra content.  Don't give clear linear paths.  Finally, give people the meat of the game as actual PLAY and you'll find more people stay than having people who rush to 50 just to run in the hamster wheel some more.

@OP: You've completely failed to connect these "bad design choices" to F2P, you realize? In fact, if you delete that second paragraph, which has the only mention of F2P, your post makes an equal amount of sense.

And while we're on the topic of bad design choices... well done, catering to developers' near-exclusive focus on end-game. Certainly, no other genre of gaming would get away with such an approach. No wonder retention is so miserable among MMO's.

Originally posted by Zlayer77

The answer is simple, after the smash hit that was World of Warcraft, developers and Investors thought that this is what gamers want.. This is the holy grail and we can all cash in on it. Cluless about what gamers actually wanted they started to make game after game after game after the same principle. Resulting in the longest run of copy cat games this genre has ever seen. The failure of their competitors dident even put them off, Instead they made the games even more stupid and easy. Item grind mouse wheels with little thought about Endgame or how to keep your subscribers subed to the game..

Any FOOL that has ever played an MMO knows that the most Important thing about an MMO is its Endgame.. It should be Priority number one to create a lasting and fun Endgame. MMO players have after running these games for so long come to the understanding that anything below endgame is just a time sink.. People will speed to max level, because their is no reason whatsover to do any dungeones or get any gear before hiting Max. Everything gets replaced anyways so why bother..

People reached max level in 5 days time in SWTOR for example, some probably reached it faster lol.. Most people will have gotten to max level by the end of the first month ( because levling in modern MMOS is piss easy, and requries zero effort)

So by dumbing down the content, making levling a breeze Developers have put themselfs in a corner. If they slow down the levling process they are afraid of losing consumers ( whining about how hard it is to level) and if they keep it as it is Evryone is going to leave anyways because they run out of things to do..

Now that is what you get for not being Innovating and for not trying to figure out new ways for keeping people subscribed...

It isent Rocket sience, I can personaly think of many ways to keep people entertained without doing Raids and grinding for gear...

Point of the rant = FIRST THING YOU FIGURE OUT WHEN YOU ARE GOING TO MAKE AN MMO IS WHAT IS THE ENDGAME GOING TO BE ABOUT.. and the first thing you start programing and designing is the ENDGAME... if the Endgame is fun people will grind and do boring things to get there, because they know that in the End it will be worth it... But If the game is the other way around all the fun stuff is in the begining and at the end it is BORING and REPETATIVE.. They will tell their friends, " the game up untill the end was kinda fun, but I would not waste my time because endgame is broken" Dont know how many times I have Read or heard this phrase repeated amongst players.. Having a bad Endgame is like giving your game a DEATH SENTANCE from the start...

You big developers are lucky I dont have the financial backing to make an MMO because if I did I would blow all you Retards out of the water. Because for were Im sitting you are a bunch of morons, frankly im suprised you can even put your socks on in the morning...

1. SWTOR took seven years to develop.  Seven years ago WOW had 4-5M subscribers... nothing like the near double they have today.  Investors were looking for easy profits and MMOs were it after they found out WOW only had to sell 100,000 copies to become profitable.  Star Trek Online which was really bad sold a million copies.  If the Star Trek license wasn't so expensive they wouldn't have lost their studio.
2. End game is only important to less than 10% of players.  If you go to this forum everyone is yelling SANDBOX SANDBOX SANDBOX.  Other people are saying OMG PROFESSIONS.  Many are commenting how much they enjoyed leveling in SWTOR.  It is a foregon conclusion that people only play MMOs for end game. Blizzard found out after their first expansion less than 1% of players had completed their end game.
3. People reached max cap in 5 days because well, they probably played beta and probably skipped over story.  I spent about 12 days playing on Republic side (I betaed as Sith).  Keep in mind I was playing 8-16 hour days.  So a person will probably on average be leveling for a month.
4. Why do people want leveling to be hard?  Leveling should be something that just happens, not easy or hard.  If leveling was actually hard it would feel less rewarding and people would not want to do it.
5. If you were to make an MMO it would be a horrible failure.  All of the things you are asking for are designed around people who only play MMOs which is a very minority crowd.  You are arguing that they don't give things people want and they give people things they want.  If you want a hard leveling experience just go play Aion... oh wait you've already discounted that game.

Endgame = End of the game for me.

Why must exist a "endgame" in mmorpgs? I thought rpgs was about progression, if the "progression" ends, so does the game, right?

unless ppl consider "endgame" = "lvl cap", in this case is not endgame in alot of games around, we just get to lvl cap, then theres a few thing to continue in progression.

In some themeparks around "endgame" = "lvl cap" and make sense, the player just finish his adventure in the virtual world. Its done, time to quit game or start over again.

In sandbox or sandparks games theres isnt "endgame" , it can exist lvl cap but never "engame". This games is where we conquer territorys, we apply taxes, we take castles, we make war against other group of players to conquer some parts in virtual world, we make part of a political system that interfear with others, etc. 

Now about F2P or P2P:

Devs atm allreay saw that is better having 500k players when 10k spend money in CS then having only 30k in a P2P model.

I still prefer P2P, but i see much more F2P in close future of mmorpgs.

*rubs migrane*

Everything is F2P because of competition, not poor design choice. Nobody is willing to pay for a sub anymore with all the games out there bending over backwards to even get them to try one out.

Nothing has changed in the market, whatsoever, beyond how many new product entries pop up every year, further eating from the giant pie that everyone has to share. Oversaturation, not some horsecrap about "them not getting it right".

You just have too many damned choices... and this thread literally makes me want to smash something IRL with how off-the-mark it is...

WoW have also endless trial.

The fun part should start at level 1, why endure crap content just to get to endgame ?.

Originally posted by GTwander

 

You just have too many damned choices... and this thread literally makes me want to smash something IRL with how off-the-mark it is...

GT... ME TOO... This literally has made me SEETHE because it is SO incorrect on its entire premise.

As English is not my main language some of the points I have made might have bin missed.

1. I do not thing the End of an MMO should be about, Repetative gamplay, Raids, items grinds need to go..

2. Another thing I was trying to say is by making the "endgame" about Items.. Players will not spend time doing lower level stuff over and over for gear. Back in vanilla WoW for example when most of what has now become Industry standards was kinda new. Me and my friends spent alot of time at the Scarlet monestary Gearing up.. But these days people just blow past content like that because they KNOW, that it serves no Purpose, because in the end everything you get " even if it looks nice and gives you + stats at that level" will get replaced. Getting things from lower level content have become kinda pointless. This is because of the FAIL endgame design of modern MMOS... and the FACT that after years of playing the same kind of game we all know what to Expect and what we can avoid etc..

3. There are other things you might find fun other then, kueing for BGs, and RAIDS.. when you hit max level. One of them is crafting, a feture that has sadly taken the backburner.. Crafting in games like SWG, anarchy online, EvE online and Linage2 for example were things that keept the player Entertained past reaching MAX level.... Player driven conflict is another way to change the endgame, In linage2 we took over Castle and held terretories ( You got to ride a dragon if you were the guild leader of a castle holding Guild for example) EvE also has a strong Player vs Player conflict to keep people doing other things then sitting and waiting for the Next BG to PoP up...

I want MMOS to be about more then the Gear you put on. An Example is why not become the maste crafter in a city.. You can get a house, a shop and a Blacksmith shop... You can make your own designs on the weapons you make and if someone has a weapon made by you It is clear you made it. The design says just by looking at it were it comes from.  To take this a bit longer, lets say We make guilds have a specific function. Using game mechanics you can make a CRAFTER guild ( the player in this guild are all crafters and they live in one of the mayor cities of the world) Ofc there is competition by another crafter guild... so guild number 1 hires the Towns theives guild to harass the competition. Crafter guild number 2 rightfully uppset with this and hires the Famous assassins guild to take care of, both the theives and Crafter guild number 1....  This could be the endgame Instead of sitting in a cue waiting for the next raid and the next BG... And its totaly duable.. shit like that happens in EvE all the time...

Originally posted by Zlayer77

As English is not my main language some of the points I have made might have bin missed.

1. I do not thing the End of an MMO should be about, Repetative gamplay, Raids, items grinds need to go..

2. Another thing I was trying to say is by making the "endgame" about Items.. Players will not spend time doing lower level stuff over and over for gear. Back in vanilla WoW for example when most of what has now become Industry standards was kinda new. Me and my friends spent alot of time at the Scarlet monestary Gearing up.. But these days people just blow past content like that because they KNOW, that it serves no Purpose, because in the end everything you get " even if it looks nice and gives you + stats at that level" will get replaced. Getting things from lower level content have become kinda pointless. This is because of the FAIL endgame design of modern MMOS... and the FACT that after years of playing the same kind of game we all know what to Expect and what we can avoid etc..

3. There are other things you might find fun other then, kueing for BGs, and RAIDS.. when you hit max level. One of them is crafting, a feture that has sadly taken the backburner.. Crafting in games like SWG, anarchy online, EvE online and Linage2 for example were things that keept the player Entertained past reaching MAX level.... Player driven conflict is another way to change the endgame, In linage2 we took over Castle and held terretories ( You got to ride a dragon if you were the guild leader of a castle holding Guild for example) EvE also has a strong Player vs Player conflict to keep people doing other things then sitting and waiting for the Next BG to PoP up...

I want MMOS to be about more then the Gear you put on. An Example is why not become the maste crafter in a city.. You can get a house, a shop and a Blacksmith shop... You can make your own designs on the weapons you make and if someone has a weapon made by you It is clear you made it. The design says just by looking at it were it comes from.  To take this a bit longer, lets say We make guilds have a specific function. Using game mechanics you can make a CRAFTER guild ( the player in this guild are all crafters and they live in one of the mayor cities of the world) Ofc there is competition by another crafter guild... so guild number 1 hires the Towns theives guild to harass the competition. Crafter guild number 2 rightfully uppset with this and hires the Famous assassins guild to take care of, both the theives and Crafter guild number 1....  This could be the endgame Instead of sitting in a cue waiting for the next raid and the next BG... And its totaly duable.. shit like that happens in EvE all the time...

Look into The Secret World. might be something interesting for you. the only gear that gives stats is weapons, not sure if you are going to be constantly leveling up and getting new weapons but if they are going for a leveless feel they would need to have alot of equal weapons.

Originally posted by LadyNoh

Look into The Secret World. might be something interesting for you. the only gear that gives stats is weapons, not sure if you are going to be constantly leveling up and getting new weapons but if they are going for a leveless feel they would need to have alot of equal weapons.

It's not going to matter what you recommend to these kinds of people. Haven't you seen it yet?

"I'm looking for a game like XXXXX but with something like the combat from XXXXX and the this and that of XXXXX"

People want a game that doesn't exist, nor will it ever likely exist. They pick apart the things they like about one game, then drop it over other aspects done better in other games. I'm not even just talking about habitual gamehoppers here, I'm talking about people who will never be happy with one game because it fails to live up to the expectations built over hopping from game to game for so long. In their heads, there is something out there taking the best parts from all of them and smashing it together.

There ain't, nor will there be, and if there was - then IT would have a clone come out and compete against it, and we are back in this market of having too many choices in the first place. Games were successful when there were far less options to choose from, not so much anymore. The *only* way an MMO will launch huge like a Blizzard or BioWare game is if the company itself had the fanbase of a Blizzard or BioWare game. They are already huge!

If Infinity Ward came back and said "we are making a shooter mmo", well guess what. Contender.

If Funcom had a larger history than just Dreamfall and AO. Contender.

If Notch sneezed into a rag, and it resembled an MMO. Contender, and damned if I know how he got so huge off of one game.

Why do you think the IP is the most important thing these days? Automatic fanbase... and companies have to be as old as Blizzard or Midway (r.i.p.) to have their own. Whatever they choose to push, sells. People eat it up, but they still complain that Star Wars lacks the combat of Grand Theft Auto, and needs the crafting of Harry Potter.

The stupid idea of a "perfect game" is what needs to die.

Originally posted by troublmaker

Originally posted by Zlayer77
 

1. SWTOR took seven years to develop.  Seven years ago WOW had 4-5M subscribers... nothing like the near double they have today.  Investors were looking for easy profits and MMOs were it after they found out WOW only had to sell 100,000 copies to become profitable.  Star Trek Online which was really bad sold a million copies.  If the Star Trek license wasn't so expensive they wouldn't have lost their studio.
2. End game is only important to less than 10% of players.  If you go to this forum everyone is yelling SANDBOX SANDBOX SANDBOX.  Other people are saying OMG PROFESSIONS.  Many are commenting how much they enjoyed leveling in SWTOR.  It is a foregon conclusion that people only play MMOs for end game. Blizzard found out after their first expansion less than 1% of players had completed their end game.
3. People reached max cap in 5 days because well, they probably played beta and probably skipped over story.  I spent about 12 days playing on Republic side (I betaed as Sith).  Keep in mind I was playing 8-16 hour days.  So a person will probably on average be leveling for a month.
4. Why do people want leveling to be hard?  Leveling should be something that just happens, not easy or hard.  If leveling was actually hard it would feel less rewarding and people would not want to do it.
5. If you were to make an MMO it would be a horrible failure.  All of the things you are asking for are designed around people who only play MMOs which is a very minority crowd.  You are arguing that they don't give things people want and they give people things they want.  If you want a hard leveling experience just go play Aion... oh wait you've already discounted that game.

I think you missed my point.. You attack me with things I never said...

Try thinking outside the BOX for a little while.. Why must MMOS be about Gear and Leveling?? why must the progression be vertical going from bottom 2 top?

Why not design a game that caters to alot of diffrent play styles?

English is not my first languges but Im going to try and explain... MARTIN, ALEXANDER AND JONAS all want to play this new MMO that have come out...

MARTIN decide he is going to Craft weapons and armour and have himself a blacksmith in the largest TOWN in the game world.. He trains himself in all the skills he needs 2 do this.. he sets up his shop calling it the "THE SHARP SWORD" by the help of the game designers he has hundread of diffrent designes he can do on his weapons ( he can combine to get the look he wants all of his weapons to have) He also decided to specialize in Steel armour and weapons.. but he also learns how to craft Dragon armour... His play time will Revolve around getting maths for his weapons and selling them to other players...

Alexander wants to be a warrior and go out and kill the dragons of the land.. He trains in swords and armour.. and to ride his War horse.. he quests across the land slaying monster after monster... He likes Martins designs and often comes by his shop to repair and replace his gear... after getting to talking one day, Martin mentions he can even make dragon armour.. If he would get his hands on some... Alexander tells him that him and his friends are going out this weekend to slay the famed dragon of the Black hills, and that all of them would not mind if Martin came along and skined it after they were done.. Making them all new fancy dragon armour. Martin jumps on this Idea because he really want his personaly designed dragon armour to be shown across the land..

JONAS has decide to be a merchant.. He often visits Martins shop to buy up goods for his journey accross the land ( it taks a long time to move around) and Martins designes sell very well in other parts of the game world were good crafters are hard to find. He also owns a silver mine that he has bought and manges.. When Martin looks at the maths to make Dragon armour he sees that he needs silver to compleat it.. He Ofc contacts his good friend JONAS who is more then happy to sell him some, with the promise that if there are any pices over after Alexander and his friends have had their armours made he can by them off him... Because he knows that  in "FAR PORT" a city across the sea.. there are no dragon armour for sale and he would make a shitload of money selling it there...

What I have just described is sorta the way EvE works... but its about space ships and stuff.. this is a way to make a game diffrent... but hey what do I know.. most of you are probably happy just sitting in the Kue for the next raid and BG...

If I ever get my game out of the realm of the theoretical you may be able to play something like that. I know C++ and OpenGL and I am getting my PhysX license from NVIDIA. I  have amazing math skills and visual spatial ability and I am good with all the standard programming logic. The models may be on the poor side though, just because making loads of good ones is impossible for an individual.