An odd habit that I've noticed people do when playing an MMORPG - particularly amongst the haters.

[Vortigar]

I don't play MMO's at all. I've got a lot of friends that do and so could group with them or join their guild easily enough. But it all comes down to the following question for me:

Why would I want to do this?

Levelling up to max a certain build and then grinding loot? I played that game. It was called Diablo 2.

The game itself (like all rpg's) isn't really based on any kind of skill. It's a combination of management (for control and levelling) and luck (for equipment). Any halfwit can just put in the hours and become good at it. At the end I can't believe there's any kind of feeling of achievement there (like that little thrill every time you solve a Portal chamber).

Instead you grow comfortable with it. I know, I've played certain short games through hundreds of times and got comfortable with their patterns as well. This makes you come back again and again, going through the motions, I know how enjoyable this can feel. But it's no reason to start playing the game.

So in the end the only reason to play an MMO over another game IS the social aspect. And most people aren't waiting for a social aspect in their game. I'd rather like to engage in a social aspect around a game, not directly in it.

 

[Reaperman Wompa]

Maybe. You make a good point saying that you have to experience team work to really enjoy the game but what also must be considered that even if you really like doing quests in groups, an asshole could easily put you off the game. Some might not have truly experienced the game but I think that many more simply got sick of taking abuse from some little prick who's never met them but just wants to act like an asshole.

 

[MisterDevil]

maybe some people just have a good reason to hate mmo`s, take the random unlucky dude who started mu and just when he got out of the starting town some imba pro idiot kills him with one hit.
Others simply realize just how much time a mmo needs and decide that it`s better not to.
As for the E-bayers and the SinglePlayer : fork them!!

 

[Monkfish Acc.]

In all the MMOs I've played, nobody wanted to play together. Sure, people interact and talk and have fun, but all the tasks they do are done alone. If WoW is different, then I'm definately gonna look in to playing it.

Contrary to most MMO players, I don't play for the grind(though why anyone would is beyond me). I play for the triumph you feel when you finally level up. The problem is, the higher leveled you are, the longer it takes to get that triumphant feeling. That's what usualy puts me off in the end.

 

[GeeDave]

Maybe people don't like MMO's because they don't want to play a game with other people. That's why I don't play them, I can't stand spending all my time with other people in a videogame.

Quoted for truth, and I can't see how such an opinion can be argued against.

I quite like MMO's, big fan of Diablo/Diablo 2, even tried my hand at this "Deicide" game if anyone's heard of it? But I don't particularly like playing WITH other people. I like that other people are there, and I'll always join a Player Party in D2, either to level quicker or to help someone level quicker but for the most part I just like to do my own thing. What the hell is wrong with that? Things like this are annoying to read:

But people are stupid, and conceited and usually forget that they are not the center of the multiverse, thus your problem.

How narrow minded can you get? There is NO problem with people just playing games how THEY want to play them, and since it's been quite well pointed out that these MMO's have quite a large roaming area to allow for single player-esque modes, I fail to see why anyone would think that people playing alone is a "problem". There are many benefits to keeping to yourself in your standard MMO, here are some of my opinions (they will vary, dependant on game... please don't read them and think I'm just talking WoW or something like that, have a brain):

- All item drops from monsters you kill are yours. No drop steals from "team members"
- No kill steals from "team members"
- Less time spent chitty chatting to team/guild members and more time training/playing
- No sense of dependancy, either people depending on you, or you to them.

... actually, I don't even know why I'm bothering. Most of my replies at the escapist are usually wasted on trying to shine some light on poor souls, but it never amounts to anything.

End.

 

[Flour]

How narrow minded can you get? There is NO problem with people just playing games how THEY want to play them, and since it's been quite well pointed out that these MMO's have quite a large roaming area to allow for single player-esque modes, I fail to see why anyone would think that people playing alone is a "problem". There are many benefits to keeping to yourself in your standard MMO, here are some of my opinions (they will vary, dependant on game... please don't read them and think I'm just talking WoW or something like that, have a brain):

- All item drops from monsters you kill are yours. No drop steals from "team members"
- No kill steals from "team members"
- Less time spent chitty chatting to team/guild members and more time training/playing
- No sense of dependancy, either people depending on you, or you to them.

Sure, they can play how they want, but the problem is for those that want to group, or the character classes/people that almost need to group in order to level.
I am unable to level a healing class on my own, but I have never, ever, let a party member die unless that fool deserved it or lag/unlucky crit.
People like me will always be screwed because a group is required, but to compensate for that people like me will double, maybe even triple the kills per hour.

I'll give an extreme example on a Ragnarok Online private server, me and two friends.(all three experienced players, skype on and trying to level as fast as possible)
Me: Healer
Friend 1: Tank
Friend 2: Gunslinger(ranged damage dealer with guns, he chose shotguns)

No downtime in enemy pulls or healing, nobody ever died and we set an unbreakable level record on the server.(level 20 in one hour, level fifty in 2,5-3 hours, normally level fifty would be reached in a day playing the game)

 

[Brett Alex]

I know grouping is the major selling point of any MMO, but once again, almost nobody groups unless it benefits that person and that's the major flaw of almost every MMO.
Heck, I started a priest, got to 20, found out I was too high for deadmines, too low for any other instance and it was impossible to solo(it appeared as if it was a sin to help/talk to a priest outside of an instance) I have made every class multiple times on multiple servers and always as soon as people hit level 20 they ignored everybody unless there was a quest they had to do.

I find that very hard to believe. I've only played one server, and sure not everyone was willing to help you all the time (I actually found it hardest to get help in the level 12-18 Barrens) but more often than not there was someone willing to help, especially if the problem was ganking related.

What I meant when I said you didn't need help wasn't that you didn't play with anyone else till the endgame, but that you didn't need help from endgame players, in fact using Pugs or just by asking in General you can get help from people the same level as you. Now in that example you provided (yet again, I find it hard to believe that a priest had trouble getting in a group in or out of an instance) you said you couldn't find a group for the 4 level gap between Deadmines and Wailing Caverns (the next highest instance, which can actually be done at 18).

Sure, thats bound to happen. Even though there are hundreds of players playing there isn't always going to be someone in the same situation as you so sometimes you will have to solo a few levels. 20-22 can be soloed in 2 days, 3 if your going slow.

If you needed help for those 2 levels and that wasn't your first character, then perhaps MMORPG's (or WoW in particular) just aren't the games for you.

 

[Susan Arendt]

I'm one of those people who enjoys MMOs, but can't really stand playing with other people. The idea of a persistent world that's constantly updated is simply marvelous, but I hate being forced to team up with other people in order to enjoy it. I think it's a wonderful option for the folks who enjoy the community aspect of MMOs -- and I certainly understand why they do, I simply don't share their enthusiasm -- but I vastly prefer to go it alone.

 

[Cyclomega]

I tried only 2 MMOs so far, Maple Story and CABAL Online.

Maple Story looked fun for the first 10 hours, then I discovered my first co-beginner and occasional partner was playing daily, so she was 10 levels ahead, not counting the idiots who steal your kills, ninja loot the drops etc.
So after running from one town to another not knowing which one was hard or not or which retarded fetch quest to take, I stopped.

Then a friend who was a huge Anarchy Online junkie until they forced some big changes which ruined his guild asked me to tag along to test the 14-day beta of CABAL.

We played for a full afternoon, farming wolves and making retarded jokes together, then I never played it again.

Last August, I remembered CABAL had now a basic formula for free, and I downloaded the client again. I played 1 hour of grinding some kinda armadillos and prairie dogs in the desert alone, then I tried to talk to some people in the town.
No one answered, they were all to busy dancing or prancing around, looking at themselves, and I felt bored again.

I think I just don't like MMOs, if it's for dungeon crawling and interaction, I prefer playing local multiplayer with Baldur's Gate or NWN, maybe even install DiabloII LoD and play LAN with a friend. For storytelling and making up adventures I'll resort to pen&paper RPGing with my friends, and for interaction I prefer meeting them in person.

 

[Caliostro]

Maybe I'm crazy and a pessimist but in the very few occasions I venture on MMOs I usually prefer to go solo cause: a) veryone else is generally a dick save for a very restrict minority and b) most MMOs seem to forget they're MMOs and say fuck you to teams. Case and point, in most mmos I join for the first time I give it a go at team leveling... And in the crushing majority the game swiftly kicks me in the balls for it... What the fuck is the point of trying to level with a team if doing it solo nets you more experience? In fact, if there's one thing MMOs love is grind, and if there's one thing that quickly destroys the whole "team" feeling is the mind numbing grind...

The other good reason people complain about mmos being bad has nothing to do with the team factor. Let's face it: Point and click combat is about as interesting and entertaining as slicing your gums with a rusty razor blade... And in team usually it's worst cause it goes from "click each other and see who dies first" to "epic clusterfuck/who brought the bigger backup".

The reason is that grind and turn based/one click combat is bad. Period. There's no "what if you add team play to it"... If you put delicious sauce on a pile of shit it's still shit and you still won't eat it.

As to why people who actually LIKE grind and turn based/one click combat (...weird peculiar creatures they are) don't play in teams more, mostly because the games usually fail to reward this properly, making it more advantageous to go solo.

 

[Caliostro]

So, I ask this - do the MMO Haters USUALLY hate MMO's because "they didn't do it right?" I'm trying to see if I'm onto something, or I'm just overthinking.

I think it's the whole paying someone to do fake work which bothers a lot of gamers.

When an MMO comes out which isn't an MMORPG (massively multiplayer online repetitive poopy grind), I think a lot of people will reconsider their views of this sad genre.

Release an MMO with no grind and a GOOD combat system, and I'll be ALL over it.

 

[monodiabloloco]

I agree with the poster to a degree. I honestly caught myself on that.. I would go in and play WoW by myself when my friends weren't on and it would be boring as hell for me. Partly because I don't really group up with other people I don't know often.
When my friends were online, I tended to dislike the game for a different reason. I enjoyed playing with my bro, but he had the goal of get to the level cap and stopped reading the quests beyond what was needed. I tried to enjoy the story and couldnt because he was pushing me so hard to level.
I think that some people are just not designed for MMORPGs. I think that I am (sadly) one of them. I don't hate on Wow.. I won't say it sucks.. I just can't play it for more than a few weeks without getting bored...

 

[Flour]

I find that very hard to believe. I've only played one server, and sure not everyone was willing to help you all the time (I actually found it hardest to get help in the level 12-18 Barrens) but more often than not there was someone willing to help, especially if the problem was ganking related.

What I meant when I said you didn't need help wasn't that you didn't play with anyone else till the endgame, but that you didn't need help from endgame players, in fact using Pugs or just by asking in General you can get help from people the same level as you. Now in that example you provided (yet again, I find it hard to believe that a priest had trouble getting in a group in or out of an instance) you said you couldn't find a group for the 4 level gap between Deadmines and Wailing Caverns (the next highest instance, which can actually be done at 18).

Sure, thats bound to happen. Even though there are hundreds of players playing there isn't always going to be someone in the same situation as you so sometimes you will have to solo a few levels. 20-22 can be soloed in 2 days, 3 if your going slow.

If you needed help for those 2 levels and that wasn't your first character, then perhaps MMORPG's (or WoW in particular) just aren't the games for you.

I played on a PvE server, that could have been different. I also started that character on an older server so most of the level 20's that played were all supported by raiding guilds.
So the amount of elitist idiots would have been higher than on new servers. Do note that while the priest was not my first character, it was my first alliance character to reach level 20 and that was in the second month of me playing the game so I still didn't know exactly how the game worked(compulsive reroller and too many choices)
I did get in groups, but the characters that actually got in groups were the ones that could solo everything.(I remember tanking Scarlet Monastry cathedral with my hunter's cat and getting to the last boss fight while trying to solo it)

I love MMO's, but I'm also a compulsive reroller, if I get bored I transfer all money to a level 1 alt, recreate the character and start again. Looking back on the amount of time I wasted by doing that, I have to agree that it wasn't a smart decision. 8-9 months playtime, about 500 created characters and I was left with 4 I actually played(28 tauren druid, 26 gnome mage, 25 gnome warrior and 44 Nelf hunter)

The hunter and warrior both were in a good guild, the hunter's guild allowed me to go through a level 50+ instance with them(filled with massive ogres, don't know the name) where I did huge amounts of damage(crits for 15 damage) and the warrior's guild was filled with friendly players.

 

[mooncalf]

Forgive me if I make wrong assumptions about what you believe playing the game "right" constitutes. I login, nobody I know is online, I stand in town and yell "PARTY ANYBODY?" and yet all the townsfolk find this perfectly normal behaviour, some of them reply with their own mutated mating calls of "LVL ?? SPAMMERDIN FOR HELLRUNS" and you wonder if there was someplace they wanted to go or just have an embarrassing medical complaint.

This is not an epic tale of the gradual assembly of unique companions, it's fantasy pick-n-mix, and I for one would rather wander around solo (with something to do) for a few -months- (how long do MMO addictions last? ;p) getting used to the simple things and just avoid all the jerks who'll call them noob and teach them nothing, untill a chance encounter that is the beginning of a beautiful friendship, with more memorable folk slowly added along the way, and screw making do with less if yer true buds aren't online!

Maybe my "problem" is trying to make a story out of the bones of one i'm given (characterisation not included), only to find that the game players don't like stories, they like loot and stats. Such materialistic people (and over digital materials) I just don't get!?

 

[wolfwood_is_here]

I play on a higher pop 2nd gen PvP WoW server, and the mentality is that you are either leveling hardcore or wasting time. Nobody wants to just goof off and have fun. I am of the "social" type where I could care less whether it's Ragefire Chasm or Kara, if I don't group with buddies I just don't have as good a time.

I particularly enjoy taking my time leveling and avoiding the gear grind at endgame, but I still have two 70's, one that is at least in all purples. Due to expansion just over the horizon, people are getting antsy and bored which leads to insane amounts of ganking, because there are people who can't contemplate just "not playing" for a while.

I am a total socialite and could care less about other stuff, though when I have a job to do I try and figure out how to do it correctly and do a good job.

 

[Wicky_42]

I played EVE for a few months, got to flying a battleship - awesome? no, because I would need about a further month's worth of skills to actually be able to use it as more than a very slow shuttle. Gah, I paid about 10 quid for the game, then about 50 quid for the privileged of continuing to play it, following a career ladder well trod by over a million other gamers over the last 5 years or whatever.

I got to thinking, why the hell am I doing this? The corp (guild) wasn't that great and were all more advanced in the game than me, I hadn't done any intensive research into 'advanced' character builds, and pvp was basically a maths simulation - the opponents' guns' average damage vs the others' damage resistance and health regen. The tactical element was on when to turn on your shield booster/hull repairer. Wow, engrossing.

See, when that's all there is to combat, one has to wonder "what is the point?". There's no skill involved, and the likely outcome of the battle is all but fixed before you even begin. I lol at how players complain about macro users getting away with making huge profits, but tbh if a game can be played just using a macro then it should be fairly evident that something is wrong somewhere.

I would take an FPS with an rpg element anyday, or even a third person shooter - I'm looking forward to getting Mass Effect sometime, though that's not MMO. I just feel that if there is some element of skill involved then it doesn't matter quite so much if there's been thousands of players there before you, completing all those instances and dungeons before you, discovering all those secrets and getting all those rare items before you. At least in a single player game no-one's already done the story in your little universe, so you can feel like you've accomplished something.

 

[DeadlyFred]

I would take an FPS with an rpg element anyday, or even a third person shooter - I'm looking forward to getting Mass Effect sometime, though that's not MMO. I just feel that if there is some element of skill involved then it doesn't matter quite so much if there's been thousands of players there before you, completing all those instances and dungeons before you, discovering all those secrets and getting all those rare items before you. At least in a single player game no-one's already done the story in your little universe, so you can feel like you've accomplished something.

I vastly enjoy Hellgate: London for this very reason. I'm sure the game was a great disappointment when it first came out but for 20 bucks the shooter-meets-dungeonhack gameplay is very amusing and certainly much more fun than just clicking on shit until it/you dies.

 

[Ixus Illwrath]

They play it like a single player game.

Why do people do this? People always say "WoW sucks all you do is kill wolves" when they don't join up with parties or interact with the community - or "EVE is boring, you fly places and shoot things" - but never join up with a corp and try raiding a planet or taking down an opposing factions Titan (yeah yeah, easier said than done, as long as you get my point then stay with me here). Hell EVE takes out the grind by letting you just click "train skill" when you want, and then go out and do the fun stuff with your friends.

So, I ask this - do the MMO Haters USUALLY hate MMO's because "they didn't do it right?" I'm trying to see if I'm onto something, or I'm just overthinking.

2 schools of thought on this...

1) They don't get it, they don't want to research a game at all to achieve. They sputter out in a game like WoW and get bored around lvl 10-20.

2) They loved it, and realized how much of their life was spent, costing jobs, relationships, and self-esteem in the long hard road of addiction. Then they ran out of money to keep paying the monthly fee and now feel completely alienated by the game and it's continuing fans.

Edit: I suppose you could add the existential 'wtf am I doing this all for?' conundrum to the list.