• 16Jul 08

  MMORPG: Raiding - World of Warcraft

  MMORPG: Raiding - World of Warcraft

  Love it or hate it is the world of raiding. Most people seem to hate it while the elite few love it. What I find sad is I have heard recently by people that think there has to be raiding in an MMO or it will not be good. Why do people think that? My favorite MMO was Ultima Online. There are so many screen shots and memories I had playing that game. There was in game weddings I went to, drinking contests, houses to see and build, vendors to shop for the lowest price, and with friends I explored all the new lands.

  As our skills grew, we started to venture into the harder dungeons and look at the dragons and hard enemies. Could I take them down? No, but I could look at them and run away really fast. And often I would trick them into attacking my friend and killing him for laughs when I was younger. And those are my favorite memories, exploring new things until it all was seen. Did you need 25 people to take down the dragon? No, you just needed a few and well thought out tactics. And when you had people, did they all need to be "maxed out" and have perfectly setup gear? No, it was about freedom and the experience, not items.

  It doesn't make it more fun to have more people attack a problem, it really just makes it take a lot longer and become a lot more frustrating. Don't get me wrong though, I think raids are an awesome addition to MMOs. Getting lots of people together to attack something is an amazing experience but I think WoW has it all wrong. Forcing people to grind one dungeon over and over to get to the next dungeon is just lazy, especially if it is exactly the same each time. Randomness made Diablo awesome yet they fail to realize that in WoW years later. But not even the random aspect, why would you make 25 people have to do something every week to get to parts of the game? It just doesn't work for 98% of the people that play. And all 100% pay the fees so cost analysis tells me to focus on the 98%.

  While I admit it's good to give elite players something to work on, this is a poor way to go about it. Most have to leave the game wondering what its like to see and play in the Sunwell or Black Temple. Giant dungeons with lots of interesting bosses to fight are things that really upset me that I don't get to try without dedicating my life to it. Personally, random loot is my favorite. If you know "Boss X" is going to drop X, Y, and Z, people are going to flock there and grind it all the time. If you only know that X, Y, or Z drop in 1 or 2 dungeons randomly and let any group of 5-10 people go there, everyone gets to enjoy it and only the elitist will stay for hours on end to get the item.

  The next point is the item that drops should look "cooler" or add 1-2% better stats, but not bend the game in such a way that you have to get that item to continue to play the game. Elitist people want better stuff and they deserve it I guess so give them a mace that glows in flames. I'll be jealous and I'll probably try for awhile to get the very low random drop and when I don't get it, it will be okay because I can still play the whole game and have fun. That has always worked in the past, why not anymore? Why do people think you have to get gear to get gear to get gear to get gear to play parts of the game?

  I blame WoW for this because now the customer that thinks this has to be in MMOs now to be good. It is not fun to HAVE to raid 3-5 days a week for 3-6 hours to try to get enough gear to move to the next part. How hard is it to make a difficulty slider like in AO or DDO or CoH/V? Only elite players can do hardest difficulty and they get their flame mace and I do it on easy and get a green mace made out of cardboard. Seems like this satisfies everyone; casual players get to play the game and hardcore people get "different" stuff.

  I can't stress that enough; you can't reward hardcore people with overly better stats. Give them 25 HP, give them 20 more mana, something that makes them better but doesn't change the game play for everyone. Because that brings up my next point, the next thing people say is "Well don't raid than n00b! Do BG and arenas! It's for casual noobs like yourself". The only problem here is that it is NOT for us casual players. The elite people with the awesome gear are the only ones that can fairly compete in PvP because their stats are much better. Not to mention the other problem, I just played WoW level 1-70 playing PvE and now you are telling me the only way I can play now is PvP or suck it up and raid 24/7 and don't worry about sleep or your family.

  And the problem is people don't see it like I do. They see it as there are lots of options for everyone. But really there isn't. I have to respec to do BG or arena and have different gear than I did level 1-70 before. So I have to play a play-style I don't want to and get all new gear by grinding for it, and then in the end it's still not fun because the gear factor still applies. Casual gamers can't arena or raid, they can only BG. And even BG isn't fun if most of your enemies are Tier 6 and you're not.

  When a game becomes a job, it is no longer fun. Blizzard has always understood that in the past, I don't know how they got so off track. BC was a disaster I think and hopefully they learn from their mistakes in the new expansion. They did get some new good ideas from BC but they seem to of made plenty new mistakes too. Good things were the dungeons were all in one place, heroic dungeons were a good addition for hardcore people, PvP contested points in new areas was a great idea too. Not new ideas to MMOs but good they added. Just the hardcore raiding and arena ruined by gear needs made it poor. Which is sadly where everyone that still plays is at doing, no one does BG for fun anymore, only to grind honor. Why didn't they steal Guildwars PvP based on skill? That would have been nice.

  In closing, hopefully WotLK delivers all it promises and lets casual players have a little more fun.

  • Posted Jul 16, 2008 1:48 pm PT
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• 18Jun 08

  MY Top 20 Favorite Games

  Complied the best list I could of the Top 20 games I could think of! Take note these are my opinions and I haven't played plenty of games. Feel free to tell me games you think are comparable or better than on my list and I'll give some of them a go. Enjoy!

  Goes from 1 to 20 in order:

  Half-life: Played it and its mods more than any other game, its my favorite, no discussion

  Half-life 2 (complete series)

  Ultima Online: Made me love rpgs and MMOs, so many memories I can't possibly explain how much I love this game

  Starcraft: Broodwars: Along with SC orginial, the game that got me to play games on PCs

  Pokemon - Blue/Red: Simply great when I was young, so many hours played

  Monster Hunter: I didn't get this until I got a PS3 and omg, I wish I could get everyone I meet to play this game online!

  System Shock 2 (Also that RPG mini game in it): So underrated, amazing game, tops Bioshock by a long shot

  Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater: I love the "Hey this is an interactive movie" gameplay. Story > all

  Golden Eye: N64 / Perfect Dark -- TIE: Me and my friends played this so much I don't remember school or what happened there

  Virtual Striker 3 (Dreamcast): A God's game, so funny and great

  Counter-strike (Beta 3 HL Mod): Wow, I competed and was in CAL and OGL and stuff, I was hardcore into this for too long

  Robopit (Sega Saturn) / Soul Caliber -- TIE: Robopit was a terribly awesome game no one knows, Soul Caliber is obvious

  F-Zero: Best racing game ever? I think soooo.

  Natural Selection (HL Mod): RTS and FPS... Thank you smart people, I was competitive with this game too.

  Mike Tyson's Punchout: Me and my brother bonded a lot on this game, great game

  Super Mario Bro's 3: Obvious.

  River Raid (Atari 2600 game): Find it, play it. Argue its great? I doubt it.

  NeverWinterNights: RPG classic, very very good game.

  Tony Hawk: Pro Skater 3: I don't know why this is here, but it was awesome. Painting ramps against other people, loved it.

  World of Warcraft: I don't want this here, but its here. Stupid game makes me play it all the time.

  ---------------------------------------------------------------------------

  TOTALS:

  9 PC games: 2 MMOs, 5 FPS, 1 RTS, 1 RPG

  3 PS2 games: RPG, FPS, Sports

  2 Dreamcast game: Sports, Fighting

  2 NES: Fighting, Racing

  2 N64: 2 FPS

  1 Gameboy game: RPG

  1 Sega Saturn game: Fighting

  1 SNES: Side Scroller Action Game

  1 Atari: Top Down Shooter

  • Posted Jun 18, 2008 2:49 pm PT
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• 11Jun 08

  MMO Games They Need to Make

  First and foremost, I want to get it out of the way that I love MMOs. I started with Ultima Online and I'm currently playing WoW, with the newest game I played was Vanguard. The promise that MMOs would bring us when I played Ultima got be very excited for the future. But I come to complain that this most current future is not as good as I foresaw.

  I had good Anarchy Online times, awesome CoH/CoV times, great Guild Wars moments (though I don't consider GW an MMO). Of course I also went through the "I need something more!" phase so I hopped from all sorts of F2P games and tried all the trials of things like DnD Online and EQ2. I did the free Shadowbane for awhile and countless other games that do not really need mention. Besides I guess I played SWG briefly and EVE for a few hours. I'm aware lots of people love EVE but not me, not ever.

  Anyways, now that my generic resume out of the way, on to what should come. First off, this one is a no-brainer:

  POKEMON MMO:

  I've seen some free things that you can technically play online I guess but POKEMON has a huge following, I loved playing this game in middle school back in the day. The implementation would be strange and hard to overcome but this game would be successful. Guys would love the mega-awesome monsters and girls would love the cute cuddly Pikachu types. And with all the monsters and story already in place, if done correctly, this game could capture an entire new market.

  Next we have what I think is so bizarre that it is not an MMO yet...

  MECH MMO:

  There is not a development company that cannot sell the idea that a post-apocalypse game with giant mechs wouldn't work? I know there is sort of that NCSoft one but that looks like garbage. What I want here is real looking mechs that you start out as a raw piece of metal and you get better and better weapons and armor. It'd be more slowly paced, which would turn some people off, and they'd have to make a game with CoH detail customizable giant mechs, but it would be awesome I think.

  And so we're on the same page, I played Planetside, so I know they have mechs there but obviously I want something a lot more RPG styled. Use the general rules of Battletech (a mech rpg board game) and you're good to go on this one.

  NEW SANDBOX MMO:

  Okay, so there is Runescape and some games on the horizon that might have decent sandbox abilities, but why did no one replicate Ultima yet? A world where you can do what you want, when you want, and how you want... it worked well and lots of people loved it. Okay it was 2D and EQ was 3D so people ran to EQ and forever call it their god, but Ultima didn't fail. Why in all the new games do I have to be a Healer or a Tank or whatever? Why can't I have a Cook, which makes bread for the town using my pots and pans? I know you can cook in many of them, but you don't get a good sense you ARE a cook in them. Maybe EQ2 has this feel; I didn't play long enough to get too involved in crafting area.

  Any feedback you have, feel free! Just wanted to spark interest. And obviously they need to make a Starcraft MMO, I assume that idea is already bought and paid for.

  • Posted Jun 11, 2008 8:02 am PT
  • Category: Games
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