SWTOR is good

STO is not good

I didn't like STO all that much. It felt... detached and cold. The missions were very very repetitive too. I gave it a few weeks and left. SWTOR is more immersive and fun in my opinion. The storyline is quite good too!

Unless I'm from a DIFFERENT planet. The grindy hard MMOs of 10+ years ago are still around. You want to play a hard MMO, check out some of the Koreans MMO where you have to work very hard to get one level or get anything done. You want open world with sandbox, well you don't have to look too far, there's a bunch of them out and most of them are free and of solid quality.

Most of the new games of today are not "hard" like one would mention and for good reason. They didn't sell like they do today... hard MMOs are for niche markets and that sums it right there. If the general population was into HARD mmos, SWG would still be there today with tons of subs and everyone would be playing EVE-Online... That's not the reality.

Hard MMOS however, do exist. Sorry but Mabinogi is not exactly an easy MMO and it's also a very big sandbox with an incredible amount of content and lore. Why are people not playing it more? I Mean is fits EXACTLY what the OP requested.

oh... the graphics and art direction.. right right

To sum it up, no one is ever happy with what they have, they always want more.

Fact is:

- Hard MMOs Exist

- Most of the old awesome mmos that your grand-mother love are still available today

- Easier mmos allows more people to enjoy it and therefore, a much larger community.

- Even in a football team, there's a few rejects in the corner

Also... unless you can actively make some money or there is an official league behind it, asdie from League of Legends, I don't see any competition in any old MMOs. Back in the EQ day, I was making money by winning Quake 3 tournaments... well, at least I was trying to win some :P 

I'm hitting level 40 and so far, Biochem has been great for me. It aint SWG crafting but I cannot complain just yet. Biochem seems to be the one crafting solution that will allow you to have an edge on the end game. Already in PVP, just having those +42 aim reussable stims, area stims and emergency buffs has allowed me beat the odds. A suddent jump of armor by 800 will make a huge difference in certain situation. 

So far, crafting implants for my guildies has been quite good and only a few managed to find better implants or to the least afford them. Sure, you can spend 25K on some blue implant on Quesh but at the same time, I can craft similar implants for not even half the price.

I'm sure it will get better in the future but so far, Biochem has been the way to go for me. 

Also... Slicing might have been toned down but it's no way near a nerf. Anyone in my guild or friends that have Slicing are well beyond the million credits at Level 40. Most took the skill after the "Nerf"

It's funny to see how many people cannot believe that EVE is still the most innovative game of all. You really have to play it and be part of the vibe to see what has been added. You don't have to be hardcore to see all the new bells and whistles but you do need a certain amount of experience within the game. Example, strategic cruisers, wormholes and Incursion are pretty much reserved for semi advance players. If you're a day one player, you have at least 3 to 6 months of work ahead of you before you can get into a T3 ship (as a proper pilot), at least a few months before you can go into wormholes solo or even fight against Advance Sansha units with an improved AI.

Still, the innovation is there but I understand the ones that are bitter.

CCP is the ID software of the MMO industry. This means, trust them :)

After seeing extensive demo play of Dust 514 and the latest videos of Incarna. I can safely say that WoD is in good hands and probably in the best care we could ever desire for.

Even EVE, as it stands today is still one of the most amazing game I've ever played. I simply can't find an equal match when I look at the big picture.

In the end, White Wolf and CCP are making the game. Can't get any better then that :)

CCP is the ID software of the MMO industry. This means, trust them :)

After seeing extensive demo play of Dust 514 and the latest videos of Incarna. I can safely say that WoD is in good hands and probably in the best care we could ever desire for.

Even EVE, as it stands today is still one of the most amazing game I've ever played. I simply can't find an equal match when I look at the big picture.

In the end, White Wolf and CCP are making the game. Can't get any better then that :)

Originally posted by Vesper11

I didn't find eve appealing. It was slow, there was no action, nothing. Yes, there is the human interaction, scamming is legal and blablabla. But you know what? I have enough of that in real life.
I've read that some people spent months of playing, to get into a corp and become a director, just to strip it clean. Remember that south park guitar hero episode? "Congratulations, you are a NERD!"
But people play it, they think they are cool, they've spent months planning their character, earning isk, getting to know the game better and better. And then, they think that they are H A R D C O R E, they got isk, got power, got relations, got knowledge of E V E. And I don't give a fuck.
These people hate WoW players, coz its simple game which involves lots of clicking. And eve is, ofcourse, superhardcore mindblowing game, wow hase no consequences, you die, you ressurect, you get epicz, you dont give a fuck e.g. "eve >>> wow" etc. But for the same reason WoW has so many subscribers.
Eve "combat"... Epic battles of chewing popcorn and reading some magazine, while ships try to blow each other for 10 minutes. Having fun? O'RLY? Making eve a sci-fi game just to make it look big (huge universe, ships, planets etc) sucked. "Bridge! Fire the lazors, engines full power and a cup of coffee to keep myself awake for 10 minutes" says a captain of a 4 module ship with 8 guns of the same type. Thats the sci-fi?! Are you kidding? You cant target subsystems, afterburner takes a whole module slot, no boarding ships, no skill. Watch Legend of Galactic Heroes, thats sci-fi. Coz eve is a perverted joke, worshipped by thousands of zealots.

Freelancer, freespace, homeworld, O.R.B., and others, if BP is going inherit any of their features its going to be a success. Eve had none of them, and seeing BP compared to a joke like eve makes panda sad.

There's one thing I hope for. That BP is going to become nothing like eve. Player-driven economics is fine, polotics is fine, everything else should die with eve.

p.s. habbo hotel with a few tweaks could become eve.

I love your post. You're completely wrong but I still enjoy reading your post. It has some crunch and I see that some evil EVE player must have broken your heart or something in the past. I do agree with one part... afterburner using a module slot but all the rest is off. Anyway, lovely post though :D

Black Prophecy looks promising but I doubt it will ever lift off above most sci-fi niche games. I have the feeling the game will come out then just quietly breeze around. Which means, not a lot of players and entertainment. While EVE can be boring at times... it can have it's own moments of intensity. I should know, I'm part CVA... I've seen boring and I've seen amazing. :)

That is nothing new, people have been doing this in pretty much every mmos now... However, that setup is pretty neat looking!

A bunch of members from CVA (which I am part off as well) and my own clan are sponsoring the server.

So yes, it is a CVA + Fatkidz sponsored server. =)

Hey guys,

Small advert that my clan and EVE-online Alliance [CVA] has teamed up to open a new public dedicated server with forums and all!

http://fatcva.clanservers.com/fatcvaforums/

The server is brand new but we're hoping to build a strong community as time goes!

In recent games credits, I've noticed more VPs then artist themselves... that is pretty scary and it is a huge problem that has plague the Cinema industry for quite a while now.

Check out, Rock Band Metallica (check the credits, you'll laugh)

Very good article btw!

Nice list and sadly too true.

1999 Graphics... I don't know about you but it is basicaly thanks to 1999 that amazing graphics like AION exist. The founders and fathers of the technology that is still widely used today made it's official market debut in 1999. ID TECH3, Unreal Engine are more then just FPS engines, they are the direct reason to today's modern graphics. 

As for lag, it's most of the time the user's fault. People seem to think that a 2003 PC can run Crysis without a hunch. I've often seen people setting up their game way too high for their PC. Take for example EVE-Online where you can 400+ ships in your screen at the same time. If you want to keep your precious 60 frames per second then you might want to either upgrade your kit or lower your settings. Even in 2010, when Vista and WIN 7 have been around for a while, we're still stuck with several people using Direct X 9.0c. For crying out loud, Direct X 11 is out. Help yourself! Getting a better modem, network card and internet connection is also a huge factor. Basicaly, it's 99% of the time, the user's fault. Aside from release days, I've rarely seen a game that lags on it's own. Of course, when I used to play Gundam online, I was lagging like a madman but then again, my server was in Japan.

My conclusion is that people don't actually know what they want and in many cases, it's all about nostalgia. I admit, I too would love to be back in the good old SWG with my guild, pvpinga and RPing it out everynight. Then again, my life context wasn't the same back then, even if I had SWG today, I wouldn't be able to enjoy it as much. People want hardcore but it's strange, when presented with "hardcore" games like EVE or I guess Darkfall, the so called hardcore players often silently slip out through the backdoor. People want a sandbox but if provided with one, many will complain on the lack of story and content. You want hardcore but you don't want any griefing? You want a game as cool as WOW but you don't want WOW? ermmm :p

boggle boggle!

EVE is extremely diverse community. You hang in one region and it's a completely set of rules and mentality. I live Providence and it's not the same thing as living in the Great Wildlands or in Fountain. Even the prefered types of ships are different.

Providence will often turn into Battleship/Battlecruiser slug fest while in Fountain, you'll get super caps on your ass in no time.

To each it's own, EVE is the most diverse community out there. :)

Avatar is not a deep world. It's a pretty planet with pretty people that worships nature. The inhabitants of the planet are all connected together into one symbiote and now Humans are invading for their minerals.

Pretty planet and pretty people does not make good MMOs.

This is not Dune where you have thousands of years of history. It's a very pretty movie with a mediocre storyline.

I remember when Rising Force Online came out, it tried to sell the game with the following tag line: "The most beautifull game ever made"

When it came out, it was indeed the most amazing MMO in terms of graphics but was it really fun lol... you tell me :P

Good article, I am looking forward for this game.

Looks like winner to me

Some people are confusing fun and content with what is a sandbox and not.

Sandbox does not mean that the game cannot have any quests or storyline, it doesn't mean that you cannot have a dungeon and such.

Sandbox simply means that the game offers enough tools for the community to generate their own content. This can be created with a good crafting system combined with gear decay or perhaps player houses and villages. The list goes on... :)

EVE online can be played in so many ways and yet, if you feel like it, you can embark into massive missions, question and cosmo missions that could eat up to 6 month to a year worth of content.

It's a matter of luck

I met my online friends back in 1999 during a Quake 3 league. We then began to stick together and today, 2009, we're still buddies in RL and online. We still play games together and enjoy a few MMOs here and there.

These guys are like family and our core group has always remained around 20 to 30 people at most. We basicaly recruit one new member per 6 months lol.

Ripping the heart out of the stomach is ok. Making love with someone is not...

oh human society... how I ... really don't understand it.

FYI: I slept with the witch :P

The gaming market overall is extremely dynamic right now. The winds of the economie and sudden technology jumps are twisting everything. Stability is the last word I would use in today's gaming industry hehe.

I'm very curious to see what recipe will win the current race. Specially with Allods that according to the early comments; appears to be a killer game. We might start seeing some extremely well polished F2P MMOs in the next few years.

F2P represents the ultimate gaming experience with no strings attached.

- It's technically Free

- Since it has no monthly fee, who cares if you only play 1 hour a week

- All your friends and clan can play with you, they just need to download the game

- You pay for the features you really want (not exactly working like that yet though...)

If someone does it really right, he can completely swallow a market. Many have found clever solutions but no one has really found the ultimate customer trap yet.

It's gona be a hybrid between Starcraft and Diablo :P