I tried Runescape, but didn''t really play it long before I discovered it was REALLY boring running back & forth mining & smithing. Then I learned gemcutting and ended up in this huge town (don''t remember which one) trying to sell my gems and discovered that everyone was just sitting around going "H3Y D00D L00K 4T MY K00L 4XE!" I never bothered trying any of the other MMORPG''s because I heard that they didn''t have much RP, if any. (I only tried Runescape because it was there and no one had told me that I probably wouldn''t care for it. )

I played UOL and EQ for a couple months each.

UOL: Quit because of the lag especially near the banks.

EQ: I was a beta tester and loved playing on the released PVP server for a couple months but quit when my computer blew up. It was a good thing because I wasted too much time playing it.

I avoid MMOs now because they reward you for being a bum and I''m avoiding that lifestyle so maybe I can accomplish something

However, if there was an MMO that had a limited schedule I''d love to subscribe for good. Like maybe I could join with people who met every other Tuesday night on a world that opened and closed just on those days. Then I could have a life and play a persistent game occasionally and not feel like I am missing the epic events that people with a life usually miss otherwise.


-solo (my site)

quote: Original post by 5010
However, if there was an MMO that had a limited schedule I''d love to subscribe for good. Like maybe I could join with people who met every other Tuesday night on a world that opened and closed just on those days . Then I could have a life and play a persistent game occasionally and not feel like I am missing the epic events that people with a life usually miss otherwise.

Interesting idea...

Perhaps a game that has a separate ''world'' and has you create separate characters for each day of the week? That way the obsessive players should be relatively content.

quote: Original post by Sakuranbo
Perhaps a game that has a separate ''world'' and has you create separate characters for each day of the week? That way the obsessive players should be relatively content.

Yeah, that would be good too. The masters of each world still get time to plan each session''s events, follow-up with news reports to a web site, and the players can decide how much they want to play by joining more than one world. But it would be great if the hours were limited so you have a chance of being online throughout a particular world''s existence.


-solo (my site)

quote: Personally, MMORPGs miss the R and P parts of the acronym. I like RPGs. Single-player ones, that is. If it's multiplayer, I damned well expect some roleplay. Take MUDs for example. The ones I play on are RP-enforced. Good stuff. MMORPGs? Not interested.

I think we have a different definition for roleplaying. Maybe that's because I also play paper and pen roleplaying games, but for me RP is to play the role of a character. In nearly all single player RPGs the player gets forced into a role by the designers, to follow the pre-defined story.

If you expect roleplay in a game it means for me the possibilities to play any role I want to. And that's exactly what (good) MMORPGs do, they offer the possibilities and tools for players to play a role, to make the world their own story. In MMO games (and more generally all games) the best stories are the ones the players make, the best game content is the one the players invented themselves. I don't mean to let the players do the work for the developers but to use the possibilities they are given and write a true heroic/funny/epic/... story for themselves that they will want to tell their friends about.

Now we come to the darker sides. If you really want to roleplay you have to be hard skinned. First, you have to search for a server where people generally agree that they want to roleplay. There is usually at least one (unofficial?) RP server, so that is not the difficulty. The problem is that there are (many) powergamers that destroy the illusion you want to live with your role. The point is always to stay in character , which is not easy when too many d00z are running around. Those people can kill a lot of fun, but they usually get bored really soon, if they see they don't change anything.

I'm goin to try Star Wars Galaxies when it will be released, because it seems to have the possibilities to play a role of your liking. It has no levels, but a skill system - which should discourage at least some powergamers. We'll see how it turns out, but the game has many good points, even if they are seeling it in the way haro described...

quote: However, if there was an MMO that had a limited schedule I'd love to subscribe for good. Like maybe I could join with people who met every other Tuesday night on a world that opened and closed just on those days. Then I could have a life and play a persistent game occasionally and not feel like I am missing the epic events that people with a life usually miss otherwise.

You should try Neverwitner Nights. It is a RPG based on the DnD paper and pen rules and offers a wide variety of online games. There are even some persistant worlds out there, not so unlike MMORPGs(although on a smaller scale). But the main focus is on "normal" online modes. There is a big community of people building those modules (or adventures) and you could maybe find some people who would like to meet every week to play one of those. Just a suggestion that might be interesting for you...

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There are only 10 kinds of people: those that understand binary and those that don't.

[edited by - grbrg on June 25, 2003 9:40:42 AM]

I have played many MMORPGS, and the one that I keep coming back to does not pull me because of Graphics, certainly not Sound and most certainly not repetitive killing.

I think Runescape is one of the better online rpgs out there because it involves more than just pointing and clicking, and things that I enjoy doing just for the novelty of doing it, for example cooking a fish or mining metal and crafting it into something interesting. I think that the best of these online games will not be true role-playing-games, but instead games where you can choose your own path, rather like an online chatroom with things to do. Almost like the world online. I would enjoy that.

I stay on to play with my friends.

So far all MMORPGs that I have seen and the ones that are coming out all suffers a similar problem - they all lack life. No, I''m not talking about people playing them lack lives, but I can''t help but feel that it is like some kind of decadent hunting sports, where some people just release the bunnies for me to shoot - it feels all so artificial. It seems as if the game world is trying very hard to pretent to be something which it is not, like a room with artifical landscape and stringed puppets. And somehow people know that the representation is not what it really is, yet no one would name it as what it is either - a room.

Anyway, I want to say something about RPing in MMORPGs. Roles are assumed by individuals, not created. The environment, like the invisible hand, creates roles for individuals to assume. Those who don''t role play, as role players like to call them, are assuming the roles available to them in the MMORPG world that is actually there. Those who role play instead are assuming roles inside the world of their creation rather than a world that they share with others. P&P RPG has the least of this problem because there is a complete lack of perceivable ontology, and on the contrary, MMORPG has the worst of this because it is the first paradigm that actually tries to create a persistent world where its ontology is meant to be perceived, rather than interpreted.

quote: Original post by Anonymous Poster
I stay on to play with my friends.

So far all MMORPGs that I have seen and the ones that are coming out all suffers a similar problem - they all lack life. No, I''m not talking about people playing them lack lives, but I can''t help but feel that it is like some kind of decadent hunting sports, where some people just release the bunnies for me to shoot - it feels all so artificial. It seems as if the game world is trying very hard to pretent to be something which it is not, like a room with artifical landscape and stringed puppets. And somehow people know that the representation is not what it really is, yet no one would name it as what it is either - a room.

I think this feeling depends mainly on the players attitude towards the game. I, for one, don''t feel like I''m in an artificial world when interacting with other people. On the contrary, I''m scared how real it all seems sometimes... If a player plays MMORPs for leveling then s/he should have chosen a single player game in my opinion. That''s not what MMOs are meant to be and I''m not surprised to see them get bored/disillusioned.

quote: Anyway, I want to say something about RPing in MMORPGs. Roles are assumed by individuals, not created. The environment, like the invisible hand, creates roles for individuals to assume. Those who don''t role play, as role players like to call them, are assuming the roles available to them in the MMORPG world that is actually there. Those who role play instead are assuming roles inside the world of their creation rather than a world that they share with others. P&P RPG has the least of this problem because there is a complete lack of perceivable ontology, and on the contrary, MMORPG has the worst of this because it is the first paradigm that actually tries to create a persistent world where its ontology is meant to be perceived, rather than interpreted.

I''m not exactly sure what you mean to be honest. I think it''s something like: The more real an environment gets, the more difficult it is to let your fantasy create a world for you...? While I certainly would agree to that, I believe it to be a matter if attitude. If a player doesn''t want to think about a personality of a character he plays but only fills a "standard-role" of the environment he is not really roleplaying, in my opinion. You didn''t roleplay Mario just because he was the character of the game, did you...? If you meant something completely differnt forget my brabbling...


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There are only 10 kinds of people: those that understand binary and those that don''t.

quote: Original post by grbrg
I think this feeling depends mainly on the players attitude towards the game. I, for one, don''t feel like I''m in an artificial world when interacting with other people. On the contrary, I''m scared how real it all seems sometimes... If a player plays MMORPs for leveling then s/he should have chosen a single player game in my opinion. That''s not what MMOs are meant to be and I''m not surprised to see them get bored/disillusioned.

The people I played with are real, feels real too. The other people running around also are as real as they get. But dispite the scenery and and what it suppose to suggest, it feels like a lot of people are stuffed doing their thing in a room where the room is meant to be not a room. It is not the people that are lifeless, but the environment. That''s why I also don''t believe PVP can save MMORPGs because PVP merely changes how people, who I already feel alive anyway, interact with each other, and does not resolve this lifeless environment problem for me.

quote: I''m not exactly sure what you mean to be honest. I think it''s something like: The more real an environment gets, the more difficult it is to let your fantasy create a world for you...? While I certainly would agree to that, I believe it to be a matter if attitude. If a player doesn''t want to think about a personality of a character he plays but only fills a "standard-role" of the environment he is not really roleplaying, in my opinion. You didn''t roleplay Mario just because he was the character of the game, did you...? If you meant something completely differnt forget my brabbling...

Hehe, what you''re saying is relevent, but I wasn''t only talking about what the players can do, but also what they can''t do. I was talking about the limitation of what roles to play is set by the given environment. Every world has its own reality to it, and it is also true that then every world has an environment that dictates the limitation on what roles there are in that world. A d00z is a role, but it is a role that can only exist in an environment where the written language is the major medium of communication. The reality of the current MMORPGs is that the written language is the sole medium of communication, and hence the d00z are born. This reality exists no matter what genre the game is meant to be, because this is reality that exists in all of those virtue environment. Of course, no one needs to play that role, but it is there to be assumed.

I will use people trying to role play Jedi in EverQuest as an example on people who does not role-play correctly. First of all, the environment dictates that there is no such thing as Jedi in the world of EverQuest (the land is called Norrath, but I''m implying the whole world), so there is something wrong with role-playing Jedi obviously. However, what is wrong is not the fact that there is someone role-playing Jedi, but that we know what Jedi is. We know that Jedi is not from that world.

The truth is the world of Everquest itself does not have anything to do with what world we imagine it to be, it is what it is made to be, ie. it has ontological existence (existence independent of our thoughts). You can talk and move in all the ways allowed in the game, and role-playing Jedi would not violate anything in that world. However, what it violated is the world in our collective imagination. We know Jedi is from StarWars, and since StarWars != EverQuest, it is clear that roleplaying Jedi is not right. And the reason it is not right is none other than the fact that the role of Jedi is always associated with its environment, which is StarWars.

P&P RPG like P&P D&D has not this problem because the world of D&D exists on paper only, it has no ontological existence (unless you want to consider the ink + paper + physical attachment of the ink on paper as the world of D&D). What happened is that all the players + GM has to negotiate what this world is suppose to be. But since there is no ontological existence to confirm with the imaginations, the imaginary world would be the only one that the people would have to deal with, and hence no one can role-play incorrectly, or they would not be even in the game.

Going back to MMORPGs like Everquest, role-playing between players still require negotiation of the imagainary worlds between the players. However, what happened is that people who are not in their negotiated universe of Everquest can also exist in the ontological world of EverQuest. This creates the tension that breaks role-players from their role-playing world because the observable conflict of EverQuest(imagined) != EverQuest(ontological). Since there is a (good? bad?) habit amongst the majority of the people (most are realist when it comes to things such as profit even if they don''t want to admit it) to put the ontological before the imagined, "role-playing" in that sense became out of fashion. If you take a note on the remaining small population of "hard core" role-players in all the MMORPGs, the one thing that they must do is to pretent the rest of the non role-playing crowd as just background noises. This is obviously an acknowledgement of their existence but also an attempt to outright ignore part of the ontology of the world - an attitude that is "they are in the world(ontological), but I can imagine they are not there(imagined)."

MUDs, depending on how interactive to the environment, have their places in the spectrum as well (graphics plays a part but it is really part of interactivity). Basically, the more things in the world that has ontological existence to them, the more the negotiated imaginary world would have to contend with.

As a finial note, just in case it was not explicit enough, it is not the case that the more ontological it gets the harder it is to role-play, but rather, the more ontological it gets, the more it has a life of its own, which usually means it != how you imagine it to be and hence the roles available are not the roles you imagined to be available.