League of Legends - Clash of Fates Forum » General Discussion » Great game. Not an MMO

Firstly I have to say I love LoL. It's fast paced, deeply strategic, offers great team based PvP action and is remarkably balanced for such a young game. That it's completely free is icing on the cake (not to mention remarkable). I would happily pay money for a game of this quality.

But it's not an MMO. It's an RTS with a few persistent RPG elements. There is no persistent world, no persistent avatar to identify with and the entire game is small, instances of localized combat. Sure you have to level up, but the only element vaguely MMO related that LoL has which Warcraft 3 doesn't have is the talent trees. (I guess you could stretch it and say the Runes are vaguely MMO related) All of the MMO elements are functionally just ways to slightly customise your playstyle.

I know there's often conjecture about what an MMO needs to consist of to be classified as an MMO, but I think LoL fails on most of the key indicators.

Originally posted by Amarok44

Firstly I have to say I love LoL. It's fast paced, deeply strategic, offers great team based PvP action and is remarkably balanced for such a young game. That it's completely free is icing on the cake (not to mention remarkable). I would happily pay money for a game of this quality.

But it's not an MMO. It's an RTS with a few persistent RPG elements. There is no persistent world, no persistent avatar to identify with and the entire game is small, instances of localized combat. Sure you have to level up, but the only element vaguely MMO related that LoL has which Warcraft 3 doesn't have is the talent trees. (I guess you could stretch it and say the Runes are vaguely MMO related) All of the MMO elements are functionally just ways to slightly customise your playstyle.

I know there's often conjecture about what an MMO needs to consist of to be classified as an MMO, but I think LoL fails on most of the key indicators.

 League is not an RTS. In most RTS you are the commander and you build structures to churn out troops that you can control. I have yet to play an RTS that is 5v5, where you control a single character (sounds like an rpg) and roam the map killing mobs, players, and structures. Maybe one the reasons LoL doesnt feel like your standard MMORPG PvP game is due to LoL actually having PvP objectives.

MMO stands for massive multiplayer online, so I guess it all depends on what you would consider massive. Games are usually only 5v5, but there are probably thousands of people logged in and playing at any given time. I can find a game at any time of the day. I used to play guild wars and when you are playing in RA or TA its actually smaller than playing in a LoL arena.

 If LoL fails on what you consider key indicators than so do games like Guild Wars, which consist mainly of instances. I dont consider LoL an open world MMORPG, which is what you seem to be comparing it to....

It's a strategy game, that is played in real time (not turn based). It may not be an RTS in the form that we're comfortable with (no force groups, building creation etc) but at least it gets the key indicators right. On a side note Herzog Zwei (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herzog_Zwei) is an example of an RTS in which the player only controls a single unit.

In reality it's part of a new genre of game, a MOBA (Multiplayer Online Battle Arena) spawned by the War 3 Mod DOTA that I'm sure we're all familiar with. It needs a new genre because in you're correct in essense, it doesn't fall into the standard definition of any of the current game genres (including RTS).

Every description of an MMO that I've ever read states that a perisitent world is a key feature of any game to be defined as an MMO. It's why DDO is an MMO but Diablo 2 isn't. It's why Guild Wars (although I haven't played Guild Wars, I understand it's set up much the same as DDO) is an MMO but Borderlands isn't. LoL follows much the same pattern as D2 and BL in that the ONLY areas people can play in are instances, while in DDO there are persistent, communal areas, just not very many of them. The only areas players can convene together communaly are in chat rooms, and if that's all it takes for a game to fall into the genre than Warcraft 3 should also get a forum on this board.

Originally posted by Amarok44

It's a strategy game, that is played in real time (not turn based). It may not be an RTS in the form that we're comfortable with (no force groups, building creation etc) but at least it gets the key indicators right. On a side note Herzog Zwei (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herzog_Zwei) is an example of an RTS in which the player only controls a single unit.

In reality it's part of a new genre of game, a MOBA (Multiplayer Online Battle Arena) spawned by the War 3 Mod DOTA that I'm sure we're all familiar with. It needs a new genre because in you're correct in essense, it doesn't fall into the standard definition of any of the current game genres (including RTS).

Every description of an MMO that I've ever read states that a perisitent world is a key feature of any game to be defined as an MMO. It's why DDO is an MMO but Diablo 2 isn't. It's why Guild Wars (although I haven't played Guild Wars, I understand it's set up much the same as DDO) is an MMO but Borderlands isn't. LoL follows much the same pattern as D2 and BL in that the ONLY areas people can play in are instances, while in DDO there are persistent, communal areas, just not very many of them. The only areas players can convene together communaly are in chat rooms, and if that's all it takes for a game to fall into the genre than Warcraft 3 should also get a forum on this board.

 In Herzog Zwei, you actually can control your troops as well as you build them. Herzog Zwei is an RTS. League of Legends is more like a roleplaying game. You control 1 single character. You kills mobs for experience. You level up. You use abilities or cast spells. You do not control mobs of minions. You do not build structures which create minions. Yes, this game has a strategy element to it, but all games have a strategy element to them.

 There are many MMO's that do not have a persistent world. You could look at this game as being more similar to Guild Wars and less similar to Command and Conquer. In Guild Wars, if you create a PvP character its life consists of nothing but instanced arena combat. Sounds familiar. Thos MOBA shit is just trying to tack another acronym onto a genre full of acronyms...

Originally posted by Amarok44

But it's not an MMO. It's an RTS with a few persistent RPG elements.

Did the devs ever call it an MMO?

Originally posted by t0nyd

Originally posted by Amarok44

It's a strategy game, that is played in real time (not turn based). It may not be an RTS in the form that we're comfortable with (no force groups, building creation etc) but at least it gets the key indicators right. On a side note Herzog Zwei (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herzog_Zwei) is an example of an RTS in which the player only controls a single unit.

In reality it's part of a new genre of game, a MOBA (Multiplayer Online Battle Arena) spawned by the War 3 Mod DOTA that I'm sure we're all familiar with. It needs a new genre because in you're correct in essense, it doesn't fall into the standard definition of any of the current game genres (including RTS).

Every description of an MMO that I've ever read states that a perisitent world is a key feature of any game to be defined as an MMO. It's why DDO is an MMO but Diablo 2 isn't. It's why Guild Wars (although I haven't played Guild Wars, I understand it's set up much the same as DDO) is an MMO but Borderlands isn't. LoL follows much the same pattern as D2 and BL in that the ONLY areas people can play in are instances, while in DDO there are persistent, communal areas, just not very many of them. The only areas players can convene together communaly are in chat rooms, and if that's all it takes for a game to fall into the genre than Warcraft 3 should also get a forum on this board.

 

 In Herzog Zwei, you actually can control your troops as well as you build them. Herzog Zwei is an RTS. League of Legends is more like a roleplaying game. You control 1 single character. You kills mobs for experience. You level up. You use abilities or cast spells. You do not control mobs of minions. You do not build structures which create minions. Yes, this game has a strategy element to it, but all games have a strategy element to them.

 There are many MMO's that do not have a persistent world. You could look at this game as being more similar to Guild Wars and less similar to Command and Conquer. In Guild Wars, if you create a PvP character its life consists of nothing but instanced arena combat. Sounds familiar. Thos MOBA shit is just trying to tack another acronym onto a genre full of acronyms...

Not really trying to prove LoL is an RTS (I've rethought my position since the OP, though I still think it's closer to an RTS than an MMO) more that it's not an MMO.  I also disagree that MOBA is an acronym for the sake of an acronym. The amount of difficulty we're having forcing it into one of the existing genres suggests that games of this type deserve their own genre.

I haven't played Guild Wars, but if all it consists off is a chat room where you organise to do instances together, than it doesn't qualify as an MMO either. Online RPG yes, MMO no.

Is the following correct? (taken from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guild_wars)

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Environment

The Guild Wars universe consists of persistent staging zones known as towns and outposts. These areas normally contain Non-player characters that provide services such as merchandising or storage. Other NPC's provide quests and present rewards to its adventurers. These areas are also used when forming groups of people to go out into the world and play cooperatively. Players that venture out from the staging area and into an explorable area are then able to use their weapons and skills to defeat monsters and interact with other objects in the game. As players progress through the game, they gain access to additional staging zones. Players can then transport their characters instantly from one staging area to another using a process commonly referred to in-game as 'map traveling'.

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Guild Wars sounds similar to DDO, with the added caveat of it having a PvP only option. GW sounds like it skirts on the outermost edge of the genre (and I'd be surprised if we saw it classed as such if it didn't have the persistent world elements) but I think you'll have trouble finding MMO's that have no persistent world at all.

Can Diablo 2 and Borderlands be classed as MMOs. They can both be played online in instances. Their worlds are certainly far more "massive" than LoLs world.

Originally posted by LynxJSA

Originally posted by Amarok44

But it's not an MMO. It's an RTS with a few persistent RPG elements.

 

Did the devs ever call it an MMO?

No. They have called it a MOBA (Multiplayer Online Battle Arena). This site has classified it as such though.

http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm

 It's an MMO, just not an MMORPG.  And yes, it is awesome.