MMORPG News - Five Reasons MMOs Are Broken @ Fidgit

Tom Chick writes at his blogsite Fidgit Five Reasons Why MMOs Are Broken. Subscription fees, button lock, static worlds and social issues all come in for examination. Here's a bit on aggro:

There is no analog for this in real videogames. It's a clunky contrivance, presumably created to keep life interesting for the poor schmucks who get stuck playing the cleric. But this awkward concept is the source of many of the gameplay tropes that keep MMOs from being interesting. Consider how the classes for an MMO are designed around the concept of a tank holding aggro while a DPS class attacks the target, a mezzer holds back adds, and a healer heals the tank, all while the players manage some invisible under-the-hood aggro values that determine which player gets attacked. None of this was in Lord of the Rings, Dungeons & Dragons, or Ladyhawke with Matthew Broderick? Why is this the starting point for every single MMO battle?
This artifice plays a large part in building game worlds. How often have you sidled through some enemy camp hoping to skirt the aggro radius for a monster? If you weren't so conditioned to navigating aggro, you'd feel pretty stupid walking around, hidden in plain sight, while orcs shuffle through their idle animations twenty feet to your right and left. Remember when you were unsullied enough that it occurred to you how retarded this was? Those were the days.

Click to expand...

More information.

Response from Scott Jennings here.

Executive summary: "Tom Chick’s core problem: MMO = World of Warcraft."

Subscription Fees: I don't have a problem with them. They are only $15 per month, for pity's sake. Most have free trials, too. Though the fact that Guild Wars has done fine tells me that maybe they aren't needed.

Agro: FOR SURE! It's not that bad of a model when you're fighting animals or even stupid enemies. It's just plain silly when it comes to high IQ enemies, though. They are going to blast the healer and the DPS paper tiger first thing no matter what insult your tank throws out there. What's real disturbing to me is that single player games are starting to emmulate it.

Button Lock: I think that might be an older game issue, I haven't seen it in a long time. Most modern games have plenty of attacks to pick from and Age of Conan has that attack placement thing, too. Hopefully your game involves moving around and positioning as well.

Static Worlds: I wouldn't call EVE all that static. WoW has that "different views depending on the quests you've done" thing and I'm pretty sure Auto Assault had the same. Overall, though, yeah - with everyone in the same world and everyone needing to be the mighty hero that saves it, you get that problem.

You Can't Play With Me: Definitely a major problem, which was solved quite nicely by City of Heroe's sidekick system (which is the main reason I'm such a fanboy for that game). Now the major team up problem is the time zone differences. Stupid curvature of the Earth. We wouldn't have that problem if the planet were flat like God intended!!

Dunno, but I found most of the reasons a bit odd. Other are so plain, that I dont see the news. No really original new thoughts here.

The genre is broken, I'd agree.

But the real reason isn't mentioned:

They don't end.

I thought the guy writing the article was rather off base. Most of them are not problems and like others have pointed out, some MMOs have done exactly what he has stated.

City of Heroes solved the can't play with me thing(characters of widely differing levels not playing with each other), but EQ2 also followed with their somewhat similar mentoring system which really helped alleviate that problem as well(A friend and I took advantage of the mentoring system there and wished it was used in other online games we played). Word is that Sony will be adding mentoring into thier mmorpg Vanguard in the future as well. Wish other level based online games would follow suit.

Maybe it would be better for him to define what his talking about. I gather he's talking about MMORPG and even that people have different opinions of what constitutes a real one (persistent, instanced, hubs, sandboxed etc).

I wouldn't give too much attention to anything Tom Chick writes about games, as he's totally ignorant of the history of game design - at least if you go back 5-10 years. Besides, he's an attention whore with little or no regard for people who don't think like he does - and in my view doesn't hide it too well.

Beyond that, he has remarkably poor tastes from where I'm sitting - but that's hard to apply to anything - being a subjective thing and all.

Anyway, that's what I've gotten from being a guest at QT3 for a while. Most people seem to be connected to the industry in some way at that site, so it's only natural that they either have no clue about quality game design or wouldn't want to admit to themselves that they're part of the problems we're facing as passionate gamers

QT3 is let's-celebrate-mass-market-dumbed-down gameplay-so-we-can-profit-rather-than-evolve-land

Huh. I think he's one of the best mainstream writers out there but I have no interest in MMOs, so I can't really comment on the article. I think you'll find his understanding of gaming history is fine, opinions on taste aside.

Dhruin said:

Huh. I think he's one of the best mainstream writers out there but I have no interest in MMOs, so I can't really comment on the article. I think you'll find his understanding of gaming history is fine, opinions on taste aside.

Click to expand...

No, I don't find his understanding of gaming history fine. You also said it yourself - he's a mainstream writer. I don't have much regard for the mainstream.

But you don't have to agree, of course

Nor is it really important - I just felt the need to vent. He's not a popular person with me, but I'm sure he's a nice guy. He's more like a symptom of what's wrong - in my view - with the industry than the actual problem.

Sorry if I was too strong, though. I must learn to hold back such personal and irrelevant remarks.

You're entitled to your opinion - you won't offend me.

I got a few things out of this article and enjoyed the writer's style. He seems down to earth and effectively communicates his feelings as well as his ideas. He would never say "effectively communicates," for instance, and I admire that.

The good and bad about massively multi-player is that it's not single-player. There are consequences to that, some that are advantages and others that definitely are not. You get other people to play with, and that's good. Except for the ones you don't enjoy playing with, and that's bad.

Beyond that, there are technical issues, some of which are hugely significant but moot at the moment, because developers of single-player games aren't taking advantage of what they're in a position to do differently.

Unless and until someone develops an alternative software architecture, MMO worlds will always be static, despite recent innovations. That's because at its core client-server is about everyone sharing the same application, and there's just no getting around that.

Single-player games aren't limited to that at all. Each and every player can play his own unique version of the game, something modders have been demonstrating for years. Because they're running on individual platforms that aren't required to work with server-side software, single-player games are free to be anything at all. Each iteration can be modified every day from now until the end of time. That's how single-player is far, far superior.

That means single-player game worlds have the potential to be dynamic. From a technical standpoint, there's absolutely no requirement for them to remain static. They're all just sitting there on the player's computers, waiting to be brilliantly modified.

Myself, I'd like that to work indefinitely and in correspondence with decisions I make, especially ones involving the character I choose and the ways I develop his role.

Dynamic single-player game worlds could be the answer to the angst MMO players are feeling. Tired of dating an endless string of boring women? How about this little hottie over here whose entire reason for existance seems to be focussed on pleasing you? Call me crazy, but I think that might get a few takers.

It takes no small amount of audacity to look at the most commercially successful genre of videogaming and call it "broken". But that's exactly what I'm doing.

Click to expand...

True dat. The author's refreshing self-awareness can't defeat the great implausibility of presuming the the last true bastion of PC gaming is somehow broken. True nothing's perfect, but relative to other genres MMOs provide a disproportionate share of the fun people have in front of computers, and even with subscription fees they provide a playtime-per-dollar value that's orders of magnitude (seriously) greater than a gamer finds elsewhere.

What's funny about the article is that many or most hardcore and casual WoW players will tell you there are plenty of areas where the game "needs" imoprovement; but I think the only one of his points that most people would put on their top 5 would be the one about playing with whom you want. The other four are just like random things that rub him the wrong way, and are not at all general complaints fom members of the MMO community.

Subscription fees, for example. First, while no one prefers spending money, very few MMO players seriously think they're getting ripped off at the $15/month rate. It's a steal relative to any other form of entertainment and relative to the dollars-per-playtime of any other type of game (except freeware, but nothing's perfect).

Second, subscriptions do not prevent people from sampling other MMOs, since most come with a full month's playing time FOR FREE. You need more than a month to "sample" a game? I think you can make a decision by the frigging 30 day mark.

Third, do subscription fees give game developers an incentive to make their games more addictive and keep players playing? Sure. But you know what else provides the same incentive? BEING A GAME DEVELOPER. What alternative does the author imagine? People making games in the hopes that gamers will just play them for a little while and stop? No matter how your game generates money, or even if it doesn't and you work for free to better mankind, a developer will want people to keep playing. Subscription fees may reinforce that, but they don't change it.

Anywho, my point is that even if you want to say some things about MMOs are "broken", this list really doesn't resonate with the concerns that actual MMO players have. And who cares what people who DON'T like MMOs think? That's like asking me what concerns I have with the genre of console sports games.

Maybe it's not irrelevant to ask yourself what you've gained when you stop playing an MMO.

I find it scary that people are content to compare cost against playtime as the ultimate measure of worth. I wasted far too much of my life playing MMOs, and I have little or nothing to show for it.

Maybe it was cheap, but so was the nature of the entertainment. This is the only kind of entertainment that I'm aware of that actually attempts to replace or closely emulate a life - and though it's trying to keep you happy, it won't be able to last without making you work for progress. Almost any MMO is like Diablo - except it takes months or years to become all powerful instead of 20 hours. Why pay to prolong the process?

So you spend hours, days, years playing for a low price - but what are you doing? Are you really having fun or are you simply grinding for something that will represent the "next step"? When you defeat a new raid boss, do you get a true sense of closure and do you ever feel you've "beaten" the game or do you even care about how it'll end?

They soak up your time and they give so little in return, compared with pretty much everything else you could do with your life that isn't directly destructive. If you want social interaction, then is this truly the way to go about it? How lasting and worthwhile are these relationships based on not really ever meeting or knowing the true person behind the avatar?

The way I see it, the genre is broken and will remain broken until it truly manages to replace and improve real life - for why else would you give that up for a fantasy with no closure?

No amount of dynamic content will ever rid us of the fact that all your work in-game is basically a waste. The closer we get to the "perfect" MMO, the sooner we'll realise that we have that already and it's called life.

Let's not hurry to replace our lives with illusion. That's most likely not going to improve the human condition.

Hey there's plenty of people that make lasting friendships in MMos, even marriages!

Sure you can go too far w/ an MMO, but the majority of people probably play for a while then get bored and move on. Are their efforts while playing wasted? Not if they had fun doing it. More interactive than sitting around gellin out watching television or something.

I think MMO's are really good for the socially maladjusted who wouldnt really have a life, any other way. If anything, hopefully it helps to bring them out of their shells a bit and interact w/ others, have friends, etx.

Yeesh said:

True dat. The author's refreshing self-awareness can't defeat the great implausibility of presuming the the last true bastion of PC gaming is somehow broken. True nothing's perfect, but relative to other genres MMOs provide a disproportionate share of the fun people have in front of computers, and even with subscription fees they provide a playtime-per-dollar value that's orders of magnitude (seriously) greater than a gamer finds elsewhere.

Click to expand...

Yes, but he didn't comment on value-for-money. He was commenting that the design of MMO's needs to hook players for the long haul - they need addicts. This means tried-and-true carrot-dangling techniques so that players keep coming back, which he feels is stifling the creativity from a design perspective. Maybe he's wrong but surely you'd agree the basic diku mud template dominates the genre?

As for the "broken" in the headline, he openly admits (and even mocks) the sensationalist approach. It's a headline to generate hits and comments.

xSamhainx said:

Hey there's plenty of people that make lasting friendships in MMos, even marriages!

Click to expand...

I'm not saying that can't happen, I'm questioning whether it's the best place to form them - given how hollow I claim MMOs are otherwise. You shouldn't have to spend hours upon hours doing grinding chores to be able to meet someone, and it could happen during much more interesting or worthwhile activities.

Sure you can go too far w/ an MMO, but the majority of people probably play for a while then get bored and move on. Are their efforts while playing wasted? Not if they had fun doing it. More interactive than sitting around gellin out watching television or something.

Click to expand...

Fun alone is not the absence of waste. It depends on what you give up for that fun, and it depends on how fun it actually is. To me, certainly, there's a difference between being entertained and being occupied or distracted. I had great fun in WoW - for sure - but I'd say at least 70-80% of my time was spent waiting or grinding, and the fun was mostly in the expectations. Now, that's not necessarily a bad thing if you work towards a worthwhile goal - as you could do in real life with real work. But in a game like an MMO with no conclusion and where content varies only slightly (new weapon = a new texture and a bit of stat change) - that struck me as a complete waste. Only it took me far too long to realise that.

I think MMO's are really good for the socially maladjusted who wouldnt really have a life, any other way. If anything, hopefully it helps to bring them out of their shells a bit and interact w/ others, have friends, etx.

Click to expand...

I think they're incredibly dangerous to that type of person, and they have a much greater chance of secluding themselves or turning their back on the world.

I've seen that happen to more than one person, and though I wouldn't call my ex and I socially maladjusted, we certainly had our own share of serious problems because we were unable to let go at the right time.

I'm not blaming any game or developer - I'm just saying the genre is broken from where I'm sitting.

If there are people out there who think what they do in an MMO is worth their time, then that's great. But I'd like to ask them that again at a later stage, and I'd like to keep asking them, because chances are they'll change their mind once they're past the allure of the carrot.

I personally need games to end or conclude, and they shouldn't require disproportionate amounts of time or work to achieve something. However, I'm not blind to the fantastic aspect of social interaction - but that alone doesn't mean they don't have to end. Cooperative multiplayer games are my preferred choice - and I'd love to see more CRPGs incorporate that possibility.

To me, those 20-30 hour experiences that have all the trappings of a real MMO - are much more satisfying and they don't suck up your life asking you to wait for your reward. You even get to choose who you play with - making them that much more appealing.

But a deep multiplayer CRPG is EXTREMELY rare, and it hasn't really been done well beyond Neverwinter Nights or Baldur's Gate. Something like DDO or Guild Wars COULD represent similar experiences in a more MMO-like fashion, but I still think they require a disproportionate amount of time for their rewards.

The worst offenders are games that don't even attempt to give meaning to your character or the world you live in - like WoW - and it's like they're throwing the pointlessness in your face. At least something like LOTRO is trying to serve a meaningful story and world for you, even if it takes a lot of grinding to experience.

Now, obviously, WoW is a fantastically designed and executed game - and if they compressed all the content and added an ending or credible story - I'd probably be crazy about it. But to me, there are few kinds of entertainment more hollow in the long term, except perhaps watching TV.

Yes, but he didn't comment on value-for-money. He was commenting that the design of MMO's needs to hook players for the long haul - they need addicts.

Click to expand...

I say without any snarkiness that I'm just too wordy to read. I did address this in my second to last paragraph, this notion that subscription fees somehow drives game developers to make more addictive games. As if otherwise they'd purposely design games of which people would quickly grow tired...

I will only add this:

Suppose we say that the basic diku mud template dominates this genre. Did that sort of gameplay evolve because mud developers were trying to maximize their subscription fees? Or is it just frigging fun?

Yeesh said:

I say without any snarkiness that I'm just too wordy to read. I did address this in my second to last paragraph, this notion that subscription fees somehow drives game developers to make more addictive games. As if otherwise they'd purposely design games of which people would quickly grow tired...

I will only add this:

Suppose we say that the basic diku mud template dominates this genre. Did that sort of gameplay evolve because mud developers were trying to maximize their subscription fees? Or is it just frigging fun?

Click to expand...

Gameplay used to evolve because developers were passionate gamers themselves, and felt a creative urge to further genres. Today, it's about business and the mass market - and it's not about evolving genres, it's about appealing to the most people and holding on to them. Not for the sake of a better game, but a more addictive game.

Blizzard seem to have done something right in this way, and I find it particularly sad that it's mistaken for better game design - rather than better business savvy. Then again, Bliz always understood the masses even before the shift from a hardcore market to a casual one. It's their basic design philosophy - so I guess you can call them a rarity because it's their passion to appeal to the masses, and not just par for the course to get fatter. I guess that's why their games are so good, because there's some real love in them - not just a love of success. However, I'd still throw out a thousand Blizzards for one new Looking Glass.

As gifted as they are, WoW isn't good for gamers or the genre. Of the modern MMOs, WoW is just about the most hollow and blatantly conservative of them all - even if it's superb in a technical sense. Blizzard are blessed with some of the best craftsmen in the business - which helps them establish their reputation as great developers. But I really can't agree that their kind of game design is good for anything except their own wallets. It doesn't evolve the genre and the cost involved with addiction is too high.