I played WoW tons for a year and on and off for another year. It was fun while it lasted. I wouldn't change anything major about it but I'm not going back to it either. I tried a couple other MMOs, Conan and Warhamer. The former was a mess, the latter was solid but too much like WoW, so I didn't stick to either for long. What I liked most in WoW wasn't the end game with the toughest raids and instances requiring expert preparation and play as well as a guild (although that was fun too for a while) but simply experiencing WoW from lvl 1 to lvl 60 and then slightly less to lvl 70 (I quit before additional expansions) exploring vast areas and fighting new things and completing new dungeons in each. It's a pretty epic journey I'd recommend to anyone if they can play with a few friends like I did. When it stopped offering that experience and instead you had to spend hours upon hours on the same single area to get the equipment you need to then repeat this for another dungeon, the fun factor started going downhill. But realistically all MMOs will end the same, you can't have an infinite amount of handcrafted landscape and quests and if they focus on the leveling journey alone with no end game like this then most subscribers will quit after a few months only, with no interest to stick with it for the long haul or to create new characters and redo the process. There will be no end goal for them.

I just need an interesting, engaging experience like I do for any game, regardless of it being single player multiplayer or whatever. I haven't seen a new MMO that can offer that to me, especially with non-MMO games like Monster Hunter offering such experiences without fees. I look forward to how Guild Wars 2 will turn out as well, although I didn't play the first past the closed alpha, the gameplay wasn't doing it for me. I guess maybe I want too much out of a MMOG but then, when they ask for a fee, I think it's not absurd to do that. I guess they should just try to offer the breadth of content WoW had at launch, be really really polished, and have enough new things to not feel like you've been there done that. Maybe one of those upcoming space MMOG will do it. But I guess it's also a time issue, non MMO games are easier to play when you want rather than have to meet a quota to not stay behind from your friends who will then have to redo content to play with you, etc.

Although it might be a good time to reenter WoW with the new expansion doing major changes to the old world. It could potentially lead to it offering a journey from lvl 1 to max lvl that is interesting and new again for people who have already experienced it as well as newcomers. But I think ultimately it will feel the same to me, like Warhammer Online did, or I'll hate having to start with a weak character, or whatever else. Then again I only ever played one class mainly so I could combine that with trying a completely different character. But I have plenty enough games to play already so I don't see me attempting this, especially when my old WoW buddies mostly still play and will dive into the new high level content rather than start from lvl 1 again. I guess I'll stick to non-MMO games, Diablo 3 and Torchlight 2, Guild Wars 2, Monster Hunter, Valve's DOTA2 and whatever else comes along that I find interesting. I suppose the lesson is you don't need to have servers that hold a ton of people if the gameplay will be mostly focused to you and a few friends or enemies anyway, so you can offer an experience that approaches that type of gameplay without the MMO format and hefty backend and fees and all that.

From my experience with Ultima Online, "private" (ie pirate scum really, unless the game is supposed to support such servers by itself, but few if any are) servers don't offer anywhere near the same experience as official, mainly because they usually have much less people, stupid/arrogant/crappy GMs that just like playing with godlike characters griefing instead of help the game experience be smooth for everyone, and every admin runs his own crappy changes that completely turn the flow of the game from an optimised experience to a mess that allows him to do what he personally wants faster regardless of balance or whatever else. They also tend to offer older versions of the game until new ones are cracked so they often lack many many features and fixes that have been added to the main game. Hence why I didn't really count UO as having experienced an MMO in my last post. As for the fees, well, the first thing a MMO should do is justify it by what it offers so I guess you simply haven't found one that does that for you and should therefor just stick to non MMO games like I'm doing for now.

Eh, I did add an unless there and said I did the same thing with UO, but it is what it is. Anyway, I don't see how it's harder to meet and socialise on a server with 10000 people than on a server with 2000... You start alone, end up finding quests that require more than one person, or are done easier and faster with more than one person, some other people are bound to be there with that high population so you hook up to complete it and move on to other quests. If you liked the experience, found these persons helpful and friendly or whatever, you add them to your list. If not, you don't. This repeats as you keep playing, eventually doing instances, joining groups that are looking for more people of your class, the odd raid if you're lucky, then get in a guild that some of those people you've added so far have gotten into or started themselves, and so on and so forth. Somewhere along the line you've made "friends" that you tend to play with and explore together, then do the high level play together. If you want none of that and just lurk that raid grouping tool waiting to join any random people that need your class, that's up to you and a valid option I guess. But yes, it's going to be better if you play with people you already know simply to skip those initial lone wolf steps and just share the fun from the get go, but again that's something that can happen on official servers just as well. You just get the game together and choose a server. That's what me and a handful of friends did, but by the end we were playing with tons more people just as well as with each other.

I take it you haven't actually delved into WoW and just go by hearsay? It can be far from easy, and there's a ton of grinding. Grinding for reputation based rewards, daily quests, repeating raids and dungeons over and over until the gear you need drops, etc, not so much for actual XP. Crafting professions also have a ton of grinding required to be able to make the high level gear as they require rare materials so again a ton of repeats of the same thing, not to mention a ton of materials and crafts to reach that high level crafting in the first place. Basically, the whole game is a grind once there's no way to evolve beyond getting better gear as you've already reached the max level, but the content is far from over yet and you're still too weak for a lot of it.

Up to lvl 20 it's basically still a tutorial but past that there can be quite tricky instances that will test you and your team and then every time you reach the max lvl (ie until an expansion ups the limit and adds new content) the final instances and raids are super hard, especially after they started introducing higher difficulty repeats of the same instances for better rewards. Which you'll need to do successfully over and over for you and your team/guild to get the required rewards for everyone if you want to get to the final final raids all of which will test preparation (for specific buff potions and such), skill (of your class, especially for healers and tanks) and endurance (as they last hours) as one's mistake is a wipe for all and a waste of many hours as potions will need to be made all over again, tough as nails bosses killed all over again to reach this point, etc.

Even PvP is grinding in WoW with the arena rewards and ranks and shit (which I never did outside Alterac Valley, I liked PvE and that was the only PvP arena that also included NPC bosses and other such things that allowed a tank to be somewhat useful and have some fun too) having people play over and over and over.

Anyway, grinding comes with the genre. Hell, it comes with gaming in general. If you play one game for months and years at some point you'll just be repeating shit you've already done with minor variations at best no matter how much they try to have new content. It can't be infinite. It's not like they can do procedurally generated stuff (which will also feel samey and repeat after a while, it's not magic) because then balance goes out of the window... The best option is probably what Eve Online is doing with player politics and economy. You'll still grind for resources and whatever else as the general idea is still the more you play the more and higher shit you can do, but at least it's an attempt at an everchanging and evolving world, which might be something I can get into with CCP's next Vampire the Masquerade based MMOG (Eve Online's interface and gameplay aren't for me).

Well in theory you can always go to max level by killing the easier mobs so long as they actually still give you experience points, you'll just do it much, much faster and have much more fun if you challenge yourself with the tougher instances and always go to areas appropriate to your level, and not just barely. Still, they can't block that sidestep from being possible, the only time it's possible to block that is when you reach the max lvl and can only evolve by getting better equipment which is in the tougher instances and raids. And that's as "main" as the leveling process, if not more so. Those who get into that probably pass more time on end game than they did leveling.

And yes, that content becomes obsolette comes with the territory. Whenever a new WoW expansion came your character became crap, all the hard work you did was for nothing, and most of the raids and instances up to that point were useless since you could level your character to the new max level by starting with the normal new quests and mobs instead of the tough as nails raids you were doing until now. Common items for lvl 63-65 were better than your super hard to get lvl 60 sets from the end game raids. And new players were likely not going to waste time doing those instances and raids at all as they instead continue leveling normally and pass right into the new expansion's dungeons when they reach that level. It sucked and was one of the reasons I quit but at the same time it's hard to see a way to add more content that you want to do without making your current gear obsolette. If your current gear is still awesome, why will you want to do that new content? Challenge with no reward? Hardly something most people would go for.

And I wasn't saying all this is for the better, I was just saying it's wrong that WoW doesn't have much grinding and it's wrong (imo I suppose since you insist) that it's too easy. Perhaps easy to level, but then again one MMO making leveling hard doesn't mean that's the only way for a MMO to offer challenge and WoW not doing that doesn't mean it's easy overall considering the meaty end game.

aspro said:

To the discussion above, the most important component of an MMO is to justify it's existence.  It's the market economy at it's almost purest form.  It's the same for online multiplayer in any game. More than money, people have to be convinced to invest their time -- creating social networks, investing in building reputation.  It's a bit like our community here.  Some people come here and find enough interesting people that they are prepared to invest their time in coming frequently, posting, building a reputation etc...

I think that's the biggest thing that the DC MMO has going for it - instant currency with DC Comics fans. Very much the same thing that Squaresoft had with FFXI. However, I think the DC game will be able to take it a step further. If the game is half-way decent and pays proper respect to the DC Universe then it's already going to be worth the time for all DC fans. They'll be able to create their own characters that can fight besides their favorite DC heroes and villains. That's a big deal. That's already worth the investment of time. And if the devs take it a step further and put some sort of reputation/noteriety feature in the game, it could be something very special.  

Yodariquo said:

5. People who have played them at some point and find them pointless/uninteresting.

This. After I played Everquest for a month back in 2001.

robio said:

I think that's the biggest thing that the DC MMO has going for it - instant currency with DC Comics fans. Very much the same thing that Squaresoft had with FFXI. However, I think the DC game will be able to take it a step further. If the game is half-way decent and pays proper respect to the DC Universe then it's already going to be worth the time for all DC fans. They'll be able to create their own characters that can fight besides their favorite DC heroes and villains. That's a big deal. That's already worth the investment of time. And if the devs take it a step further and put some sort of reputation/noteriety feature in the game, it could be something very special.  

If that was going to work, then it should have already taken with Star Trek/ Star Wars.  I don't know how the Star Trek one is going, but I heard they changed their pricing program -- which doesn't sound good.

Maybe with Marvel though you have a more diverse pool of scenarios to draw from (other than exploring planets and getting in battles).

I tell you, of all teh MMO's out there EVE Online has the most appeal to me.  And, if I had had a WoW account at anypoint in my life I;d be getting back on for Cataclysm -- such a cool concept.

Agnates said:

Eh, I did add an unless there and said I did the same thing with UO, but it is what it is. Anyway, I don't see how it's harder to meet and socialise on a server with 10000 people than on a server with 2000... You start alone, end up finding quests that require more than one person, or are done easier and faster with more than one person, some other people are bound to be there with that high population so you hook up to complete it and move on to other quests. If you liked the experience, found these persons helpful and friendly or whatever, you add them to your list. If not, you don't. This repeats as you keep playing, eventually doing instances, joining groups that are looking for more people of your class, the odd raid if you're lucky, then get in a guild that some of those people you've added so far have gotten into or started themselves, and so on and so forth. Somewhere along the line you've made "friends" that you tend to play with and explore together, then do the high level play together. If you want none of that and just lurk that raid grouping tool waiting to join any random people that need your class, that's up to you and a valid option I guess. But yes, it's going to be better if you play with people you already know simply to skip those initial lone wolf steps and just share the fun from the get go, but again that's something that can happen on official servers just as well. You just get the game together and choose a server. That's what me and a handful of friends did, but by the end we were playing with tons more people just as well as with each other.

And I wasn't contradicting you.

Maybe the WoW community just sucks then. (And the answer is it pretty much does, actually.)

Agnates said:

Yeah, let's add 15 million people in the same pot, they can't possibly differ and vary from server to server or even guild to guild.

Obviously I would be referring to the server I played on, and obviously my post was not 100% serious.