JayteeBates
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I was bleding edge - only about 4-5 mages across all servers had better gear than me. That expansion still sucked IMO. PoP was my favorite expansion.
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EQNext" will be the world's largest sandbox-style MMO ever made"
- Thread starter Sky15
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I was bleding edge - only about 4-5 mages across all servers had better gear than me. That expansion still sucked IMO. PoP was my favorite expansion.
If I lost all my equipment I would most likely quit. Especially if it was any sort of raid gear.
I disagree about LDoN. It was a very good expansion and allowed the casual players to actually obtain gear of a decent caliber without raiding. The dungeons were a nice way to spend 30-60minutes if in a decent group getting fairly decent pp and experience. Plus it was something different from the usual grind of sitting in a camp for 3 hours pulling the same 20 mobs and hoping a named spawns. It also provided some amazing augs and the first implementation of the augging system which became a major aspect of the game and character advancement.
LoY was complete crap. The only good it did was provide great experience for around 35-55 and maps.
PoP is probably my favorite expansion in EQ. It provided so many different options to level and they were all accessible rather quickly. Do people really miss the selling in EC and LFG? I mean if you were to ride a boat from EC to say DL it'd take you probably 45minutes to an hour depending on how lucky you were. I know it was more realistic than instant teleporters at the docks or portals like WoW, but come on. Who really would want to waste an hour going somewhere these days? I know a lot of people hated the books (I liked the wizzy spires in Luclin a lot better), and I could go either way, but I thought the Plane of Tranquility was a great idea. The variety of content in that expansion was astonishing. Plus the flagging system was the most in depth EQ has ever seen. Getting Time flagged was serious business and extremely hard. Very few had it that weren't in the hardcore guilds. Plus elemental planes were awesome. I loved Fire.
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Ya I played on Rallos Zek. Nims from Ascending Dawn
Never got that at all in EQ. What I got was frustration and wondering why the hell I was spending an hour of my life doing a corpse run. Fear? EQ never gave me fear. Excitement? Ya EQ PvP gave me that. Nervousness and tension? No never got that at all either. What I did get was frustration for wasting time, telling friends I couldn't go out because I'm the cleric and the raid needs me, or wasting time trying to fight to get levels back I lost. Sorry, life is much more interesting then wasting it doing corpse runs.
PvP in DAoC was rewarding not frustrating. Having to fight your way through every inch of ground was rewarding and fun. Sneaking into a keep and assassinating a key defender was an emotional quality that lacked in EQ. Setting up the perfect ambush with my hunter against an infiltrator hunting me was tension. You know what other game had that? Shadowbane. Protecting a city against an all out siege was excitement and tension. EQ didn't offer that, it was fun at first but eventually broke down into frustration and boredom. It was fun because of my friends, but literally once AC and then DAoC came out we never once looked back.
So let me get this straight. You think just because we've grown past the stage where we enjoy spending a couple hours a night doing corpse runs, spending hours staring the screen waiting for a raid boss to pop, is fun? Ok that is cool; however, most game companies recognize that we're grown up now and have jobs, families, and other social activities. I can't think of a single friend from either online or in real life that want that type of game again. We just don't have time for it. GW2 is boring? Different strokes for different folks. Personally I enjoy the game, even with the broken PvP. I'd love to have a DAoC RvR experience or a Shadowbane experience again. However, corpse runs, lost levels, or time delayed spawns ala EQ can die a horrible death.
Actually I have no clue why I'm arguing against this. I think having a hardcore PvP would be beneficial as I don't have to participate in it. Guess I'm just railing against being called a carebear because I loved PvP so maybe I do miss EQ PvP, I just don't have time for the penalties associated with it anymore. So ya, I love the GW2 system and the like. Would be great to see WvW fixed in it but regardless I don't mind the easymode so much.
That is just it. Most of the full loot PvP games weren't focused on gear, they were focused on the PvP. You can craft or buy the gear from merchants or player vendors. This makes losing your gear not as painful.
I would abso-fucking-lutely bring back the travel back to games, this instant teleport is crap for putting you into the world. There was plenty of nice gear in EQ that you could get with out grinding, the problem is with the players of EQ they soon started to bitch and moan that gear the raiders had wasn't obtainable with out spending as much play time, same thing happened with WoW.
PoP was the last remnant of EQ, it had a partial instanced zone with PoT but that was just to allow more then one guild to practice the encounter.
Instancing ruins games, instant travel ruins games, instant gratification takes the life out of games.
I hope none of these make their way into EQNext. I intend to play games, not worry about "wasting" my time with silly things like exploring or having an encounter that makes me worried for other things except my repair bill cost.
PoP was the last remnant of EQ, it had a partial instanced zone with PoT but that was just to allow more then one guild to practice the encounter.
Instancing ruins games, instant travel ruins games, instant gratification takes the life out of games.
I hope none of these make their way into EQNext. I intend to play games, not worry about "wasting" my time with silly things like exploring or having an encounter that makes me worried for other things except my repair bill cost.
I despise repairing. I think it is an idiotic move to try and create some sort of penalty from death. But it fails in every aspect. This should be removed from nearly all MMOs.
Always doing hour long corpse runs? You must have been running with the wrong crowd.
No nervousness and tension? I can recall countless times controlling zones, fighting epic bosses and having enemy guilds come in and try and kill you all and take the boss for themselves. No ridiculous instancing that disallowed this. You had to constantly be on your toes. The idea to separate and insulate yourselves from the rest of the world in instances is one of the great travesties to ever befall MMORPG's. Defeats the whole purpose of being massively multi-player.
I will agree, DAoC was also a great game. I had some of my best gaming ever in the first six months in that game. I was a pretty epic Scout, had over 100 to 1 kill/death ratio. It was awesome what a skilled player could do in DAoC and EQ. You could actually make a name for yourself. That is gone with current games. You think anyone gives a crap who you are or what you do in a game like GW2? It's a game designed to please the masses with trivial non-sense. I had an immense identity with my EQ and DAoC characters. Years of development, combat and progression. You cannot tell me shallow games like GW2, Rift, TSW or SWTOR even come close to being engaging on that level.
Honestly, the only way to satisfy most people would be to have server clusters with different difficulties and rule sets. Like some easy akin to wow and some hard like the old EQ from the past. Same with pVp stuffs as well, so you don't end up and balance pVp to pVe or vice verse. The maintenance would be tremendous though. Everyone has a different idea of hard/easy and risk/reward and balance. The only way to really win would be to create a different world for everyone, including bosses and loot, like having 50 different games moving in their own directions...
Game developers need to stop catering to everyone at once. The game suffers. All these dev's need to stop trying to copy WoW and fail miserably at it. Making WoW #2 won't steal current players away. Pick out a niche and stick with it. You can still make a ton of money with a few hundred thousand subscriptions. The only non-trivial themepark I see anytime I the near future is the new Darkfall. Hopefully EQNext can expand on this market.
JayteeBates
[H]ard|Poof
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The trouble stems from the travel and things creating a more memorable experience in some ways. I remember sitting at the dock waiting for the boat with people and striking up a conversation with random people. This didn't add anything to gameplay but it did make it more of a community based experience and thus memorable. The problem was this also made it become something that essential became a life substitute simulator. Took way to much time to play EQ which impacted everything from school to social life to work. Essentially a lot of folks including myself really became a major recluse just doing the essentials in real life to play just a little more. They didn't call it EverCrack for nothing.
I don't think it is possible to recreate that comunity based environment on the large scale it had in EQ because EQ really was the only option at that time. People had moved on from UO and EQ was the thing. The difficulty in EQ was miles ahead of the games now. Partly because of the game mechanics and partly because of "The Vision".
I don't think it is possible to recreate that comunity based environment on the large scale it had in EQ because EQ really was the only option at that time. People had moved on from UO and EQ was the thing. The difficulty in EQ was miles ahead of the games now. Partly because of the game mechanics and partly because of "The Vision".
HardUp4HardWare
Supreme [H]ardness
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Yeah, I agree with this.
There are certain things that just don't make sense. Like, you live in this magical wonderland and you have magic armor, and you can be resurrected and be just dandy, but your armor is all f-d up even though, it looks perfect. How about just making it look damaged?
I remember trying EQ a long long time ago. when RUNE came out.
I quit very early because I thought it was stupid "whacking spiders" for XP.
Whacking things does not build up experience, take it from me.
It isn't just the devs, but the players that need to stop expecting that every game should be catering to their playstyle. GW2 was never billed as hardcore, so I can never understand the people complaining about it being too casual. Wizardy Online looks pretty hardcore with permadeath. Wonder how many "hardcore" people will actually play it.
And I always love hearing people talk about how great a game EQ1 was, but all they really seem to say is, it was so great standing around talking to people while they were waiting a couple of hours to do something else.
Still, I do hope EQNext gives all the sandbox people what they are looking for.
What is considered "sandbox people"? The old EQ players?
TwistedAegis
[H]F Junkie
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Paul Atreides.
Ultima Online (pre trammel)
The first EQ wasn't sandbox. It set the foundation that games following it took and what almost every big mmo since then has been built around, the "theme park" design where your level dictates where you can go and what you can do with a strict class system.
A sandbox is bascially the opposite of that. An open world free to explore at your own risk, you usually can develop your character how you wish without a restrictive class focus.
UO didn't even have "quests" or anything, basically plopped you into a huge world and let you go off on your own, do what you want.
Think of how TES (Skyrim, Morrowind, etc) are, that's a sandbox world.
I agree item degradation is a horrible death penalty.
Speaking if corpse runs, I fondly remember the first pof clearing on our server. We had to enlist the aid of a second guild to clear the portal so we could get our bodies back. I lost a few levels but them back just from clearing, as a cleric it didn't mean squat I wasnt 50 because all I needed was super heal and complete heal.
Both Everquests sucked so much of my life away, I don't know if I can handle a third. I think I can squarely blame Luclin and PoP for my poor performance in college. I loved those expansions, but damn do I not need that again.
Also, my life in eq1 as a raid lvl paladin:
"Incoming A_raid_mob_01!"
Main Tank takes 2 hits.
Baldrik casts Lay on Hands on Main Tank.
A_raid_mob_01 kills Baldrik.
Baldrik sits at his bind spot until Soandso_raid_mob is dead because clerics are much to busy to rez a paladin who is only going to contribute 12dps.
Also, my life in eq1 as a raid lvl paladin:
"Incoming A_raid_mob_01!"
Main Tank takes 2 hits.
Baldrik casts Lay on Hands on Main Tank.
A_raid_mob_01 kills Baldrik.
Baldrik sits at his bind spot until Soandso_raid_mob is dead because clerics are much to busy to rez a paladin who is only going to contribute 12dps.
Well I guess my confusion spawns from my experience in beginning EQ. I understand there were classes which helped with need for roles in grouping. But aside from that, I ran around and explored most of my time in EQ, at my own risk, knowing I couldn't kill anything.
So is the idea that in this sandbox EQ, there are no levels, no classes, just characters? Which I'm assuming means no grouping. It's just a world with nothing to do except what the player base makes up for it? That sounds like a total snoozefest, imo. I guess since EQ and EQ2 had lore, where does lore fit into this "sandbox" approach?
Edit: Look at it this way - Mortal online and Darkfall (or whatever it was called, Dark-something) were sandbox MMO's and flopped HARD. I guess I don't see the benefits of doing a "True" sandbox MMO
LeninGHOLA
Vladimir Hayt
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It shouldn't have been your job to heal MT. Popping a LoH at engage would get you booted from many guilds.
Last time I saw a pally tossing heals/LoH around like that, I told our tank lineup to stop taunting during trash. At the end of the night we had de- leveled the paladin and he was locked out of the zone for not meeting req's. This was during his trial period; he didn't make it. Unfortunately it had the side effect of me ending up tanking every time he died, which sucked as a chain class.
The thing that made eq classes fun was lack of metering. Sure we knew wizards out dps'd mages, but mages had roles as well. Sure a druid could heal ok, but you needed a cleric to survive. No one really cared about your max output just your role, some more boring then the others but it got you a place in the raid too.
Anyone remember the mass warrior sit due to the aggro nerf?
Anyone remember the mass warrior sit due to the aggro nerf?
It shouldn't have been your job to heal MT. Popping a LoH at engage would get you booted from many guilds.
Last time I saw a pally tossing heals/LoH around like that, I told our tank lineup to stop taunting during trash. At the end of the night we had de- leveled the paladin and he was locked out of the zone for not meeting req's. This was during his trial period; he didn't make it. Unfortunately it had the side effect of me ending up tanking every time he died, which sucked as a chain class.
Loh was important for mobs who had stupid initial dps, rallos zeke would kill any tank by the time a heal chain started, which is why we paired the mt wroth a paladin ... Poor paladin...
GOD'SlittleSERVANT
Supreme [H]ardness
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OMG THE WOW KILLER?
After reading the interview with John Smedley I would fathom a guess that there will be a very limited class structure in the game. I believe it will ultimately be based on skills, but you may have to ultimately choose some overarching class in the beginning or something.
Sandbox should be great if implemented well. If the game truly is based around customization and a dynamic world along with a few niceties like player run economy and player housing/villages that rival SWG then this game has a real shot at changing the way MMOs in the future. A dynamic world alone if properly done could create an absolutely amazing game. Ever evolving content like mentioned, even if it was based on pre-scripted events that were triggered by specific actions like forests burning as mentioned in the interview, would give a completely different feeling than any MMO out. The feeling that you can actually change the world based on actions of you or others is something that all MMOs lack atm.
You do NOT have to FORCE players to group for them to do it.
I have played almost every mmo since the Eq/UO days up until now, from those two to Asherons call, Anarchy online, SWG, DAOC, WoW, etc.
Out of all those mmo's, sandbox, theme park, forced grouping, classes vs skill, do you know which one was EASILY The most social game?
Ultima Online.
Sandbox games are VASTLY more social/rpg friendly. It allows players to depend on others and do things that many other mmorpgs simply don't offer.
In UO you had open world pvp, players could kill other players. There was a system in place that flagged you for murdering someone, after so many kills you'd turn "red" and be flagged, guards in cities killed you on sight as well as other players.
Then there were groups called "anti pkers" that bascially hunted red players around, would help neutral players who got attacked by reds and defend well traveled/ambush area's where pkers liked to camp out (Ie just west of Britiana bank at a crossroads was a popular pker spot and there was many large group battles of reds fighting anti pk groups, etc. The pvp aspect made it so that you would stick with people you learned to trust , and pvp made traveling and things more interesting and suspenseful.
Then on top of this pvp type of player you had crafters. You could craft armor, weapons, etc. Along with FULL player housing that was not instanced you could set up your house and make it into a shop, other players who were simply out and about exploring could stop by and see what goods you had. This led to people being social and interacting.
For example one of my friends from UO I met because of this. I was exploring, went up to his house to see what goods he had on his vendors and noticed he was on the porch of his house at the forge crafting. He didn't have what I was looking for but I asked him about making some. He did and we got to talking about the game, real life things, etc and I ended up becoming friends with him and he was always my go-to crafter. That is simply something you didn't get in EQ or many other mmorpgs.
Another huge social aspect of UO was both the player run events and GM run events. Throughout UO's life because of it's RPG nature and the non-instanced housing you actually had REAL communties in games. People would get to know neighbors who lived near them. Guilds would form communities, and you'd find people doing fun events from time to time. Such as a house party where large groups of people would get together and hang out, to tournaments where people would duel each other while a large group would form a circle around them and watch it and you had people that would make sure the rules were followed/kept people in check.
GM events could be things like that as well, but even more so things such as for example, an Undead attack on a major city in the game. It made the world feel a lot more "alive" and dynamic then most mmo's.
In my personal experience with this an example was when the undead attacked the city of Trisnic. People flocked to it to try and hold them off, you had liches (very powerful magic undead), skeleton warriors and other things all swarming over the city. People were fighting (and dying) left and right. Then someone discovered by making a portal on top of the bank that people could use it to sit up there and be safe from the undead. So we ended up using the roof of the bank as a "resting" spot for people to recover and take a break while fighting.
All of these kinds of things you find a LOT more in sandbox games, because the nature of sandbox games RELIES on players to make of the game more then simply sending them down a pre-defined "theme park" world while restricting what they can do.
As far as your examples go on MO and DArkfall. Both are Indie games on a shoestring budget. Many people (even mmo fans) have heard of neither of them.
It's not fair to compare a game backed by a huge publisher like Sony or EA to a game that didn't even have a physical product at launcha nd was only a digital launch with very limited advertising and budget.
Hell since Ultima Online you haven't really had a true sandbox MMO that was released from a AAA publisher with a huge budget and marketing to back it up.
Further more, look at rpgs in general. Look at how popular TES games are these days and fallout, both sandbox style games and at the top of the charts.
GOD'SlittleSERVANT
Supreme [H]ardness
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Wtf is a sandbox MMO?
Something that I am hoping EQNext brings to the table is illusions. No game I have played allowed players to change race just by clicking an item or casting a spell. I was an illusion junky and had quite a few. Maybe this is just me, but EQ always seemed to have strong support for illusions and most people wanted them.
RIFT actually has a few illusions. Ironically nothing near the level at EQ offered. In my opinion unless you loved the BS that being an Enchanter brought, you mainly played it to have all the cool illusions.
LeninGHOLA
Vladimir Hayt
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They are fun. I ended up with about 6 or so illusion clickies by the time I retired.
Never played it.
Imho seeing the progression of EverQuest II I think the "sandbox" term doesn't have all that much to do with the class system, but more to do with the player made stuff. It seems a logical evolution for EverQuest II, with its housing system, dungeons and now soon player made items.
What with Minecraft's success I thought it's only a matter of time till we see MMOs that let player build their houses or castles, and whatnot. Most MMOs today still have a pretty much static background. All you do is run around and kill mobs, and then there is a little side dish of crafting that's really just a button mashing fest to keep players in the game.
So I think what they're going for is a mix of Second Life and EverQuest
What with Minecraft's success I thought it's only a matter of time till we see MMOs that let player build their houses or castles, and whatnot. Most MMOs today still have a pretty much static background. All you do is run around and kill mobs, and then there is a little side dish of crafting that's really just a button mashing fest to keep players in the game.
So I think what they're going for is a mix of Second Life and EverQuest
Also remember the really difficult quests, you had to figure out what to ask the NPC as the key text was not in [brackets]? I also loved that there was no map. You actually had to explore and find things out for yourself. There were actual cartographers. I think a world is much more special and interesting to explore if you don't instantly have a map shoved in your face.
Then they go and put paths, and markers, and circles, and all points of interests on maps. All sense of exploration is lost. And no, "revealing" the map as you go along the first time isn't the same thing. The map should be in your brain, it is much more interesting that way and makes the world feel more real. I remember as a Dark Elf on a PvP server, fighting our way out of Nektulos Forrest on server launch. Commonlands were like this huge unknown massive scary place when you are level 7, other players trying to kill you whenever you meet, world completely unknown with no map.
All players want now is instant gratification, silly "events" and cinematic cut-scenes. All rubbish.
The three worst things that changed MMORPG's forever:
1. Instances
2. No death penalty
3. Removal of exploration / full in-game maps.
Hornet
Supreme [H]ardness
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You have to remember that video game is just a form of entertainment. What you find entertaining is different from what others find entertaining. These changes doesn't mean its bad, it just mean you don't enjoy it, simple as that. No where is it written that MMO should be punishing or is should be whatever you think it should be.
At the end of the day, we all play what we find enjoyable. Its just like any other entertainment media. Some people enjoy listening to Justin Bieber, his music makes me want to throw up but if others find it entertaining, then there's nothing wrong with them enjoying it. I don't judge people who enjoy his music regardless of how much I dislike it myself.
That doesn't mean all games should cater to the mainstream of course, but ultimately that's the choice the developers/publishers make. You can't blame other gamers for enjoying what they find enjoyable. No one is holding the dev hostage and force them to make a game they enjoy. Its up to the gaming company to choose.
GOD'SlittleSERVANT
Supreme [H]ardness
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Sounds cool. I don't think I've ever played a Sandbox MMO before, ha.