The only MMORPG I can stand playing is World of Warcraft, which is a lot less tedious than other MMOs I've played. And it isn't a huge timesink... until you get addicted. But yeah in early levels you can log in for just half an hour and get stuff done, whereas in other MMOs you need that time to just find a group.

But even in WoW, the pace is still quite slow compared to offline games. A previous thread, "Why are MMORPGs so boring?", addressed this better than I can word it. In an MMORPG you basically sit there a click on a skill every once in a while. Typically there isn't much strategy.

As for monthly fee. Go to any MMO board... find a post complaining about monthly fees, and see the responses saying "It's only 50 cents a day" and "same as going to a movie (or two) a month" etc. Well hey, $15 a month is $180 a year, which could buy you 3 new games and have some left over. You might be able to get a gym membership for that low, which would probably be a lot better for you. Or you could go on dates with real people.

Don't get me wrong, video games are my hobby and career. But MMOs take both a lot of time and money.

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The monthly fees.

Who are you kidding? The monthly fees are a coup for the player. Most MMOG players will spend 15-30 hours per WEEK playing the game. Call it 60 hours per month, at $15/month, that's less than $.50 per day, or $.25 per hour. I consider MMOGs a great deal for my entertainment dollar.

I will grant though, that I have quit playing MMOGs for the time being.

Why? Oh, I'll start at the top:

1) Lack of any feeling of accomplishment. No matter what I do, it doesn't matter.

2) For some odd reason they think that persistence = same mobs respawn every x hours. I just killed (name mob), don't make me do it again, it's already DEAD. Dead != see ya in 2 hours.

3) No real role-playing. Factions largely mean nothing. Why should I not kill that big guy there? Nobody else cares if I do it.

4) The monsters are so stupid that they won't figure out that there's this group of people standing there (in the exact same spot for HOURS on end) killing everyone that happens by and come to overwhelm you?

Those are the big reasons. The time sinks are annoying at times, but the grind doesn't really bother me so much as the fact that you usually do it in one spot.

Role-Playing games should require you to keep moving to keep progressing. Progression should never mean that you're standing in the same spot killing the same monster over and over again. It should be about adventuring. It should be about gaining life experiences as much as combat experiences. I've known people who stayed in the exact same zone for 10-15 levels at a time and longer (one guy hit Plane of Valor in EQ at level 55 and didn't leave until he hit 65 and well over 500 AAs, about the equivalent of 70 additional levels). While I have no problem with someone gaining more and more experience against the same type of opponent (say Orcs), there should be some form of incentive for going to different areas and most of the MMOGs don't incorporate that.

Monthly fees also tie players to credit cards. This makes it easier to respond to people breaking the terms of agreement beyond simply banning CD keys.

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Original post by Vanquish"Whats the biggest problem with MMORPGs to date?"

It¡¦s the players, I swear. For a messily 14.95 a month (prices may vary on different platform and location) they expect you to fulfill ALL their fantasy and recreational needs for around 110 hours. (this is calculated at 4 hours a week for 5 days and 4 weeks per month). What you¡¦re looking at is a demand of 7.33 hours of content worth per dollar spends. While a movie only has to provides 2 hours of content and earn $7.00(again, prices depend on your location). On top of this, they expect you to be dedicated to their each and every individual need without even thinking the consequences that would affect others; often at the development stage you¡¦ll get two opposite group of players that want conflicting ideas that would shape the future game.

Read this new article by Dr.Bartle

The biggest problem I see are the players as a whole don¡¦t know what they want; and by asking them to identify these problems is really just a waste of time which can be better used at discussing implementing new features.

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Original post by firewindshadow Quote: Original post by Vanquish"Whats the biggest problem with MMORPGs to date?" It¡¦s the players, I swear. For a messily 14.95 a month (prices may vary on different platform and location) they expect you to fulfill ALL their fantasy and recreational needs for around 110 hours. (this is calculated at 4 hours a week for 5 days and 4 weeks per month). What you¡¦re looking at is a demand of 7.33 hours of content worth per dollar spends. While a movie only has to provides 2 hours of content and earn $7.00(again, prices depend on your location). On top of this, they expect you to be dedicated to their each and every individual need without even thinking the consequences that would affect others; often at the development stage you¡¦ll get two opposite group of players that want conflicting ideas that would shape the future game. Read this new article by Dr.Bartle The biggest problem I see are the players as a whole don¡¦t know what they want; and by asking them to identify these problems is really just a waste of time which can be better used at discussing implementing new features.

My needs in any on-line game are easily accomodated. I want to crush and dominate my fellow gamers. Unfortunately, this leads to difficulty among those who don't wish to be so treated. But that's life in the big city. As long as the game is reasonably decent (omitting my general standards of "decent" for the sake of space) and as long as it has a good PvP system (that preferably allows surprise attacks on unsuspecting players), I'm pretty content. I've always cherished that Darwinistic aspect of on-line gaming.

The biggest problem is that in the end they are nothing other than chat rooms with pretty graphics & endless tasks thrown in to keep you from ever leaving.

MMO's have the potential to revolutionize gaming as we know it, but in order for this to happen their developers have to get out of their turn-based paper RPG mindsets & think outside the box.

Done properly, MMO's could go beyond being "the game" for the minority of players that like the current MMO systems, & could also be a lobby of sorts where gamers of every single genre hang out & meet up to play every type of game imaginable that has been designed to blend in with that MMO universe.

The number one problem with MMO's is that they aren't being designed to keep players there by making it so much fun that they don't want to leave, but instead are designed to keep players there by making it take forever to accomplish anything. They're losing millions of potential gamers in order to keep the few who are willing to stick around with this practice.

If I could play such games at my own leisure, I might have more incentive to pay for it. As it stands, I don't want to pay for a month when I only got to play for 10 minutes or only an hour.

I think hourly rates would make sense if they track an actual hour and don't just count an hour as the 60 minutes around when I logged in, even if I logged out since then.

Also, why, if I have to pay subscription fees, do I not get the game for free? I pay $50 for a new game, I get to play it an unlimited amount of time. I pay $50 for a MMORPG, and I still have to pay for the subscription on top of that in order to start playing? As I understand it, Everquest gave you a month or two free with the purchase, but still. Why not let me download a client and pay for the subscription, which is where the real revenue comes from? I'm sure there are reasons, so I don't want to come off as someone who thinks that I am "owed" something, but I haven't seen a response to such concerns.

Also, the lack of Linux clients for MMO games is a turn off for me. It may not be that important to a company's bottom line, but it is important to me. I am more inclined to support Vendetta than Everquest for this reason alone.

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MMO's have the potential to revolutionize gaming as we know it, but in order for this to happen their developers have to get out of their turn-based paper RPG mindsets & think outside the box.

Actually you're right and wrong. They do have the potential to revolutionize gaming as we know it. However, it's not by getting their heads out of the turn-based paper RPG mindset. I should not that all RPGs aren't turn-based and that most MMOs aren't turn-based. What they have to do is get back INTO the paper RPG mindset and stop thinking inside the computer box.

Pen & paper (P&P) RPGs have one thing in common: The players are there to change the world. While MMOs you can only have a small amount of change from each player (or even a guild), they need to be able to change the world around them, see some impact from their actions, not just see Emperor Crush (or enter some other name here) pop back up 35 minutes after you killed him the previous time... which was the 19th time you've killed him already. No matter what you do in the current batch of MMOs, your actions have NO effect upon the world at large.

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Also, why, if I have to pay subscription fees, do I not get the game for free? I pay $50 for a new game, I get to play it an unlimited amount of time. I pay $50 for a MMORPG, and I still have to pay for the subscription on top of that in order to start playing? As I understand it, Everquest gave you a month or two free with the purchase, but still. Why not let me download a client and pay for the subscription, which is where the real revenue comes from?

I completly agree. However, it should be said that downloading a game costs the supplier more than it costs the client. With a T1 line, you get 1.54Mb/sec, that translates into 192kB/sec, 11.5MB/minute, 693MB/hour, 16.63GB/day, 499GB/month. If we translate that into money, a T1 costs between $700 (if your supplier is overselling heavily) and $1500 (if they're not) per month. We'll say that you're going with something in between, $1000/month. Now we break your game down to costing the supplier $5 per client to download (at 2.5GB worth of data). That's not expensive, but only if you have a high retention rate (and 'free' games have a much lower retention rate than ones that cost money).

My suggestion: Sell the game independently for $20 on DVD (or multiple CDs), then let them download the updates. You can also bundle it with the 'strategy guide', which we all know basically tells you all the information that the user's manual *should* tell us all anyway. Then you buy a strategy guide and the game for $20. If they want to download it for free, then they have to pay for the first month up front.

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Also, the lack of Linux clients for MMO games is a turn off for me.

This is a matter of programming preference. Most MMOs are programmed with DirectX, which is not available on Linux. The other problem with Linux distribution is that many people want the source code. That leads to people building nice little cheats. Linux is secure, while making the tools for becoming insecure widely available. I love the idea of making a fully cross platform MMO, but it's hard to justify building an OpenGL engine from the ground up just for that sake, though MacOS is a good reason, IMO.

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Original post by firewindshadow Quote: Original post by Vanquish"Whats the biggest problem with MMORPGs to date?" It¡¦s the players, I swear....

Couldn't agree more.

First, part of being an MMORPG means that it's not going to be a single player game. Unfortunately, everyone wants to solo their player to X level, and be the popular hero. That's just not going to happen. You're going to have people who will hate your guts, and people who look up to you. At the same time, even if you are world renowned in the game's inner circle, Joe Noob is not going to know who you are, so you shouldn't expect everyone to bow down to you.

The ego is a major problem I had with UO. Everyone plays this game differently. The Role Players thought they were above the average person, and treated most other players like ****, because they were the only ones who knew how to play the game. The popular and well known players from the games forums were offended when someone ever dared challenege their ideas, or didn't recognize them, or treated them just like a regular unknown player. And at the same time, all these groups refuse to interact with the other groups.

It's ashame PvP is now optional. It should be mandatory. Why? I hate PvP with a passion, but it forces you to interact with the players you don't want to have to deal with. The RP'ers only interact with PvP'ers if their opponent is also an RP'er, role playing an orc or something. The popular players only fight other well knowns. Honestly, no one wants to be killed in a game, but if a monster kills you, most players don't seem to care. Another player though? Geez, BAN HIM! If a role playing bandit goes up to a newbie and demands money, there is no battle. Either the victim dies or runs away most likely. If l33t Dewd kills an RP'er, the RP'er will complain the other guy has no integrity.

MMORPG's should not allow soloing past the first couple levels imho. If you want to solo, there are plenty of single player games out for you. At the same time, if l33t Dewd is being a jerk and killing you every time you step out of town, try grouping up with his other victims, and go out and kick his ***. The morons only exist as long as they can annoy people. Once they're ignored, they almost always go away. Yet people still fall into these traps.

It's one thing for a player to be abusing another, it's another thing for the player to just have an annoying play style. As long as the game allowed players to interact in some form, they can always create their own player events or quests if the game doesn't have them. Most RPG's aren't fun to me because of the people.

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Original post by solinear Quote: Also, the lack of Linux clients for MMO games is a turn off for me. This is a matter of programming preference. Most MMOs are programmed with DirectX, which is not available on Linux.

True, but a developer can chose to use OpenGL, SDL (for input),OpenAL and socket programming is the same (except for the the "WSAx" functions) in Linux as it is in Windows, your reason does not quite hold because its the same dificulty using one set of API's over the others.

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Original post by solinear The other problem with Linux distribution is that many people want the source code. That leads to people building nice little cheats. Linux is secure, while making the tools for becoming insecure widely available.

That's false, many people may want the source code regardless, and it doesn't matter that the OS is open source, you dont have to make your game open source, cases in point: The (now dead) Loki catalog of ported games, UT2003-4, NeverWinter Nights, Doom3, all run in Linux and none are Open Source (though knowing ID, Doom 3 might become open source in some years).

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Original post by solinear I love the idea of making a fully cross platform MMO, but it's hard to justify building an OpenGL engine from the ground up just for that sake, though MacOS is a good reason, IMO.

See above.