What do you think are the most important aspects of MMORPG's?
ID:183972
 Feb 12 2007, 9:20 am
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Feb 12 2007, 10:29 am
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Jermman
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Gameplay for powergamers.
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CyanHB wrote:
What do you think are the most important aspects of MMORPG's? depends on what point of view. money, maybe, from a developer's standpoint. can you get rich on this game? | |
CyanHB wrote:
The question is in regards to the player's point of view. environments(zones, levels, whatever.) if the environments suck, then the game presents itself as a total POS to me. | |
CyanHB wrote:
What do you think are the most important aspects of MMORPG's? Good player to player interaction, good NPC to NPC interaction, good NPC to PC interaction. Good quests system, good character advancement and character flexibility. That's about it. | |
From the player's point of view, the most important aspect is gameplay earned versus money spent. If the game forces you to delay your actions, you have to feel as though you are still being enriched as a result of it.
For instance, World of Warcraft is largely described by critics as being the purest money-sink ever invented. Everything takes time: characters run slowly, and to get a horse to allow you to move faster, you have to invest several hundred hours of gameplay to earn the 50 gold coins necessary to buy one! Even worse, since you have to spend those 50 gold coins entirely, you have to spend even longer online in order to earn some more to buy the other things you want, like weapons, armour, spells, etc.! However, ask any non-critic what they think of World of Warcraft, and they'll tell you it's an incredibly well-done, well-polished game. World of Warcraft is a good example of gameplay earned versus money spent. Now picture Planetside. Although it's not a MMORPG, it is an MMOFPS. Many people largely claim that the game is completely impractical. Aside from a die-hard clique of gamers who swear by it, Planetside just didn't get the gameplay earned versus money spent equation quite right. Sony has already cut back on the number of servers it's hosting and in my best guess, Planetside won't last for more than a year or two longer. | |
I think Spuzzy has it here. I have played WoW, Everquest, and FFXI. The biggest problem with Everquest is that all your work seemed to add up to nothing. The problem with FFXI is that it took so much effort just for a little reward. Weapons and armor cost insane prices while money was a pain to get. Levels were few and far between and took a constant party of 5 to get. WoW, however, allowed anyone to put in a little effort and get an equal reward.
Sure, it was a pain to raise the 50gold for the tiger to ride, but man was it worth it. And it's not like you need to just farm a particular animal to get the money, it was far more beneficial to actually work on leveling to gain the money. I only got bored with it after I had done pretty much everything worth doing(Expect all the level 50 stuff). Most importantly, keep your users interested. The best way to keep them interested is to give them instant rewards for their efforts. Harvest Moon, for example, was very quick to reward you for what seems like a meaningless task as growing crops. | |