No one thing killed the game.

Sure there were places where people were using the "port exploit" to capture them quickly and the red ring of doom would engulf certain starting areas.   Its been so long I don't even remember what Country it was... but their entire newbie area was under the red glow because their new town was so close to a capture port.

So I'm sure that affected that Nation....

I remember setting up my assembly lines and seeing parts for a lot less than it cost to manufacture...

Because everyone (well most everyone) was taking advantage of the horrid AI...  Do the broadsides they abandon ship loot away... was no point to assembly lines for a crafter.   That and it was so easy to get the npc ai to abandon ship you could grind through rather quickly with no risk

It wasn't even an "exploit" because it was just "combat" and no tricks involved... things like that shouldn't make it into a live product.

I think I played France at first and I had a ship yard and did ok... and then I became a pirate and never looked back.. personally loved being a pirate.

I didn't quit over ganking but I know many did...  In the end we just got bored (my group).

So as I said in my opinion it was a combination of things...

ganking, port exploits, crafter issues, horrid ai, to easy to grind out/get materials from ship combat, horrid port battle mechanics at launch... among other things.

Originally posted by damage

Yeah i get like 3 a week like that and i keep reporting them for phishing, but the funny thing is i dont have a wow account so haha to them.

Some of the people in my SL builders group started talking about getting emails and that they've never even played an MMO like WoW.  Their only experience is with SL.

I've played WoW but not in a long time and just yesterday I had at lesat 10 emails that my account was either under investigation or that account settings had changed.   Some days I only get 1 or 2 but I get some every day.

I just delete things like that, but they are annoying.

My actual account has never had any issue (such as being hacked) and I had the game since it came out... just don't play very much.

My main issue with cash shops... is they take items that should be say craftable or similar and then they sell them instead.  I'm big into crafting...  So if the game has no crafting, weak crafting or things I'd want to make in a cash shop there isn't much reason to play.

If they sell XP potions or other thigns for people willing to spend money to level 10% faster (example) more power to them.  I will never be that fast to "end game" so I raelly wouldn't care about that.

Originally posted by Lansid

Pal... you are SO full of BS. EQ2's launch was almost as equal to Anarchy Online and almost as painful to play.

This probably made me laugh more than any post on here I've seen in a while....

I didn't have any issues with EQ2 at launch....  There were a few design things I didn't like but that has nothing to do with "launch".

WoW since its part of the thread... the real issue was just the over population and horrible lag on the database servers.

Then again most of the issues people had with Anarchy Online at launch I didn't have either.  However, the launch of AO and EQ2 are not things that could be compared.... in any logical, sane or non trollish way....

Well you want to be careful how you term it...

There is already a pretty much "player" created MMO... its called Second Life...

If you want a player created mmorpg... that's something else.

Altho in SL there are various combat systems... as well... SL just goes from mundane creations to things you wish you had never seen...

Originally posted by Nightbringe1

Originally posted by uquipu

 The more content the devs make, eg zones, mobs, npcs, towns, dungeons, the more theme park it is.

The more content the players make, eg zones, mobs, npcs, towns, dungeons, the more sandbox it is.

So how much of eq1 was player made?

 

 

Quite a bit.

If you were there you would understand.

The main thing EQ really had was social interaction.  Simply due to downtime groups tended to talk a lot.  Since for the most part no one was really using voice technology you had to pay attention.  Since most places were actually a challenge other than safe areas you didn't afk as much...

Its not really "user created" its "social" .. the biggest thing in most games now is they really aren't "social".

Instances have never ruined an MMO for me...

What does ruin an MMO for me is...

I am told through story one way or another of this dangerous crypt.  No one has ever returned alive from.. so I go there and find 500 other adventurers inside... no mobs alive.. quarrels over spawn points and um no danger.

Yet an instnce that could created to "challenge" a group or raid... if developers would stop handing out "god gear" is bad...

go figure..

I'll start like this... my favorite MMO ever was Ultima Online with my second being SWG pre-cu.

Now that said the title of the thread seems ironic.  In the end its about what someone enjoyed in MMO's as opposed to MMO's having lost something.  Tho I may agree with the idea that MMO's are no captivating to me anymore... there are indeed more people playing now than ever.

The other side of that coin does have some reality to it tho.  So many companies are not going to design "for that crowd" because they don't want to have only 300 or 400 thousand subs...  Well how many new MMO's in the last two years have actually even retained much over 100,000...

At some point someone will design the MMO the OP wants... its more of a question as to whether they will still be gaming by then.  I mean at some point as X more games fail to grab the "wow crowd" someone will get the clue or there won't be many companies making MMO's (due to the epic amount of wasted development dollars and investors pulling away from epic fail investments).

I don't remember exactly how I heard about EvE.   It was in the beta signup stage .. and I was signing up for every MMO beta then (back in the day).  Was always a fan of space games back to Elite on my Commodore 64.

Was accepted into beta and I guess that's about it to how I discovered EvE.

Originally posted by Kuro1n

US laws wont apply to me if i live in Sweden.

IMO they should make games cheaper, they earn more money doing so... Steam ftw?

 

I support piracy and yet i buy all my games... 

That's true...  The US ones won't...  Its why companies also file for "international copyright".

Which would then be enforced by Swedish law like... IPRED among others... (Since you used Sweden as an example).

So I guess I kinda miss the point about what US Laws will or won't do.

Altho you may also want to look into "reciprocation" treaties that do exist between the US and Sweden.

Just for kicks...

Originally posted by clik

Originally posted by qombi

Originally posted by GetViolated

 i like how people call this a next gen MMO but the combat system is from like the 1980s

it's brutally SLOW 

 

ADD kiddie instant killing combat has nothing to do with the generation of the game, only unless you mean this generation of gamers that have to have instant gratification and cry if things are a little tough.

 

Nice foaming at the mouth, knee jerk response attempt to insult someones opinion fanboi.

Seems ironic... given the context...

Originally posted by eycel

Originally posted by Xasapis

So if ... lets say for the sake of argument ... you bought some powerlevel services, deactivated the account when you didn't feel like playing and the powerlevelers reactivated and took advantage of it, it's NCsoft responsibility? Or if your computer is open like a cheddar cheese? Or if you fall for some scam sniffing email?

Do people realise that this game has two account passwords that ought to be different? One is the ingame password and the other is the account password. You only need the account password to activate and deactivate that account, nothing else. It should be kept safe and different for a reason. And if by any change the ingame password gets compromised, you can reset it with your account password.

 

This is a good point that stuck out to me.  Even if this person has done illigal activities with the account in question, either way said persons is geting a raw deal.  The account wasnt just abused by being breached, but the persons finaces has also been breached.  Now with those two things, you can also add in there emotional distress from the situation and time lost attempting to recover all assests that were unlawfully taken.  My point is as enlightning as it is to discuss politics on geting accounts unbanned because of unjustified practices by the account holder, I think the op is geting more criticism then is justified. 

Ok this is going to be what I have to say.. as the thread is somewhat interesting.

I purchased Aion as a pre-order and had hit cancel 2 or 3 weeks into "live".  So I have not been back to NCSoft site at all during this period of time.  So reading this thread I go log into my master account...

Now there is one "panel" in your master account that talks about payment info.  When I go in there I do see the last few numbers of the credit card I used along with the expiration date.  There is also a line that says something like "allow use on file (pending your approval).  So perhaps there is an option to just allow you to subscribe directly with the "on file" card...

The reason I say "apparantly" is because I didn't actually see an option that allowed you to do that.  So I went to my "games" panel and clicked on Aion.... and clicked on the button to subscribe again.

The first thing you are going to see is a drop down box (to pick a credit card type Visa/MC etc), game time card OR Paypal.

Choosing the credit card option... you are then prompted to enter ALL the credit card information including the 3 digit number from the back of the card.  The ONLY information that was retained was my billing address.

So I guess my question is how did someone else bill an extra month to his card?  Because I can't seem to "emulate" that option with my own account....

As they would need my card number (not just the last few digits) expiration date (yes I could see that on the account) but the CCV aka 3 digit number off the back of the card... well they'd need that too...  Now like SOE will retain my credit information on file but when I go to resubscribe I always need to enter the CCV code... which you really can only get from direct access to the card OR scam... someone bought a service/item from you with the same card (which could be done various ways.. however when tied to "breach of account" it usually points one way).

Just my views.. with the information I've seen here.

Its like asking if you can have an MMO without the "trinity".. obviously yes you can.

Ultima Online had no definition of:

Tank

Healer

DPS (magic/melee)

At least when I still played.. I have no idea how messed up it might be now.

You healed with potions if you had them.. magic if you had the skill to cast.

Later they added bandages.. which to work really well required a few skills.  No one spammed "need someone who can heal".

Of course that was my favorite MMO...  but you can't remove healing entirely... you could remove the class as you can remove the entire trinity and basicly make modern Ultima Online.

Originally posted by daemon

Originally posted by Vaed

Sigh..  Well there goes the possibily of a great game. 

 

why is that? what will he do?

Might not do anything.

Personally I wouldn't have hired anyone from that team... just my opinion.

Not sure it was mentioned and I didn't want to read all the pages.

EQ2 - Group XP debt (which was later removed).

Few good wipes and you'd have a nice debt built up.. really wasn't something that encouraged grouping.

If you like level/class based games its not that bad.

The resource system and the crafting are still move involved than the average MMO.

Free trial.. as others have said.

Originally posted by AmazingAvery

Originally posted by finaticd

Originally posted by Xerith

The free level 50 character comes to anyone who hits level 50 on another character.

 

Did they say that this time? Funcom omited it last time in an effort to get more players.....pretty deceptive if you ask me.

 

What?

I'm pretty lost on that one myself.  When I had gone back for a month (last time) was when they first did this.  It was made very clear that in order to get that "level 50" you had to already have one...

So I really dunno... beyond... "what?" was a good response.

Originally posted by LynxJSA

Originally posted by grandpagamer

Figures lie and liars figure. 836% ? Link all you want, I dont believe that shit for a minuete. If thats the case they must have been in the red before Aion released.

 

Ok, wait a minute. I'd expect that from the delusional misfits that run rampant here, but this seemed odd coming from you, Grandpa. So, when something like that comes from one of the more lucid and rational members of the community, I really am curious what prompts it.

Is it that you feel that false financials is an NCSoft thing, a game industry thing or just a makreting thing in general? I'm not asking this to try to prove you wrong or shoot down your argument, and if I find that I disagree with your position I promise I shall keep my mouth shut. I'm really interested, though, in why you feel the number is a lie.

 

 

Well when you consider some of the financial reports that were coming out after Tabula Rasa... I do not find it hard to see a financial statement going up this much from a very successful launch.

You also have to consider the contribution of NCSofts traditional market and the large number of servers running in China.

So that would be my personal perspective on that.  Also since there is an NCSoft west office located in the US... I'm not sure providing false financial statements would be a good idea.

No it could actually be worse than breaking an NDA.... I don't think I've honestly seen anything more than being kicked out of a beta for breaking NDA.

At least I don't remember anything major..

However, if you claimed you were in beta.. then gave "false information" that could be seen as detrimental to that product..  When you consider the amount of money it costs to bring an MMO to market.. and it can be argued that the false information you claimed came from the prodcut had a negative effect ...

You could actually end up in court...  

Originally posted by Vinterkrig

someone explain it to me, i'm not really sure why people are so obsessed with having a pet in a mmorpg

its something that seems fairly new as i've been playing mmos for far to long, and i've never seen it be such an important thing to so many people

This is just like...

Ultima Online... that MMO that launched WAaaaaaaay back in 1997.. had a skill called "Taming".

There were these players that called themselves "Tamers" who ran all over taming things and then stood at west brit bank selling them to people who were to lazy to run all around taming them.

So I'm not sure what "far to long" is... but Pets have been in MMO's since close to the start (as UO wasn't the first MMO... but was fairly early ... 12 years ago...)