i do think they're out of touch, if the success of WoW is any indication, what the VAST majority of gamers want is something more casual and solo friendly as opposed to another epic group grind fest that requires them to take regular vacations in order to participate in the game.  all these hardcore mmorpg's that are coming out are only for the lifers, which as much as i'm sure they get a woody over (being incorrectly viewed as THE market), is a very limited market.

it seems like devs are still stuck on making the next everquest, even when that formula (aside from the first time) has failed over and over again in terms of reaching critical mass appeal.

games like WoW are popular exactly BECAUSE they're not another everquest wannabe.

i think there is a seriously huge untapped base of players, that probably dwarfs even WoW, who would love to play online mmorpgs, if they felt they could actually enjoy the game on their own schedules rather than having to look for groups, or raids or even wasting time being IN groups to progress/explore/enjoy all that a game has to offer.

people love to socialize, they just don't love being forced to do so.  most of the grouping in current mmorpg's is akin to mutual leeching off of each other.  the basic mentality is "I need to finish this quest to get this sword, but i can't solo it, so i have to find someone else to help me..." so what do you do, you put up a LFG flag and join with people who, more often than not, you don't know, care to know, or generally give one flying F about, and would have no objection to PK'ing after accomplishing your quest if the game allowed you to.  you leech off each other's talents to perform something and then move on to the next quest.  people that do it enough end up joining guilds so that their pool of group  members has a slightly higher level of inter-member respect, but even then, most of the time its done for the leeching aspect, and nothing else, you NEED to group to progress and/or even enjoy the treadmill.   yes i know guilds also have many RL friends in them, but its the exception, not the rule.

i'm NOT saying grouping is bad, i'm saying its bad WHEN you're forced to group to progress.  and finding a solo grind spot is NOT being solo friendly (cough WoW/LOTRO.POS)

case in point, even something as simple as SIMS, yeah, its not an mmorpg, but the fundamentals of the game are that its easy to get into, easy to get lost in (in a good way), and can be played on the person's own schedule.  that's not a function of being solo focused, that's a function of being intelligently designed.

Developers don't develop all this content just so players can rush through it.

you're right, but sadly i think they develop the content for little reason more than to "slow you down" and keep you paying the monthly fee longer.

if this wasn't the case then they wouldn't force you to group grind so much.

I would love to explore all this content that they put the time/effort to build in the game, but sadly I don't have the gaming time available to waste looking for groups in order to progress and enjoy any of the content.

they should have delivered on their 'solo friendly' bullet point, as they were one of the few that actually claimed it.

i'm still resentful of their claims for being solo friendly and never delivering in any way other than perhaps being able to find a 'safe' corner and grinding.

i was so set to buy the lifetime membership and to love this game forever, but it only took a week of beta to cancel my preorder.

now that i gave up that option of a lifetime membership i cannot in good faith ever return to the game :)  oh well, i'll have to keep on looking.

Kongratuluje za dobra robote :)