The next big MMORPG should drop the first M

Pharone

Pharone

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I think what the industry needs to do is get rid of the first M in MMORPG.

They keep trying to make games that will draw hundreds of thousands of concurrent players which inherently causes a lot of detriment to the product itself.

If they would instead focus on making MORPGs that you play with your friends, they can exclude the cost of server farms and GMs/ customer support.

Also, they wouldn't have to deal with customers getting upset and quitting the game due to cheaters, griefers, bots, etc.

On top of that, creating a game focused around a small group of concurrent players, the developers can enrich the graphical aspects of the game. Plus character classes can be inherently more over powered because there's no need to balance classes in a game where it's just 50 or less people playing in a private server.

If they took a game like valheim and modeled it after Everquest, it would be amazing. Sell the game for a base price, and then sale expansions to add on to the game that every one that plays on that private server has to buy to play.
 
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Hateyou

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Pharone said:
I think what the industry needs to do is get rid of the first M in MMORPG.

They keep trying to make games that will draw hundreds of thousands of concurrent players which inherently causes a lot of detriment to the product itself.

If they would instead focus on making MORPGs that you play with your friends, they can exclude the cost of server farms and GMs/ customer support.

Also, they wouldn't have to deal with customers getting upset and quitting the game due to cheaters, griefers, bots, etc.

On top of that, creating a game focused around a small group of concurrent players, the developers can enrich the graphical aspects of the game. Plus character classes can be inherently more over powered because there's no need to balance classes in a game where it's just 50 or less people playing in a private server.

If they took a game like valheim and modeled it after Everquest, it would be amazing. Sell the game for a base price, and then sale expansions to add on to the game that every one that plays on that private server has to buy to play.
Click to expand...
This is kind of what the first Guild Wars did I think? There were city hubs where you could see other people but when you went out into the world it was just you and your friends. Like you said, the graphics (for the time) were way better than other MMOs. You lose some of the making friends along the way ability like we did in EQ but to be honest that didn’t really seem to happen in WoW. I never met anyone new in that game that I wanted to continue playing with. Now I only played it for a couple months when it launched so my experience is probably atypical.

Anyways, I agree this is a good model and wish someone would do a good game with it.
 
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Chukzombi

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Hateyou said:
This is kind of what the first Guild Wars did I think? There were city hubs where you could see other people but when you went out into the world it was just you and your friends. Like you said, the graphics (for the time) were way better than other MMOs. You lose some of the making friends along the way ability like we did in EQ but to be honest that didn’t really seem to happen in WoW. I never met anyone new in that game that I wanted to continue playing with. Now I only played it for a couple months when it launched so my experience is probably atypical.

Anyways, I agree this is a good model and wish someone would do a good game with it.
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i think the community aspect of Everquest was a one and done kind of thing. due to early days of the internet and the magical aspect of playing a 3d game online. when i played other MMORPGs before EQ. they also had a community feel, but the games were crappy 2d and you couldnt get fully immersed in it. EQ was the one who put it together. if you were there for it, then you know. if you werent, then you will think we're full of shit.
 
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Furry

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Hateyou said:
This is kind of what the first Guild Wars did I think? There were city hubs where you could see other people but when you went out into the world it was just you and your friends. Like you said, the graphics (for the time) were way better than other MMOs. You lose some of the making friends along the way ability like we did in EQ but to be honest that didn’t really seem to happen in WoW. I never met anyone new in that game that I wanted to continue playing with. Now I only played it for a couple months when it launched so my experience is probably atypical.

Anyways, I agree this is a good model and wish someone would do a good game with it.
Click to expand...
WUT? Did you ever play guildwars? Like the entire world experience is focused around group events with tons of players, and its literally the opposite of what you describe, they slam everyone into zones together and it was common to see 100s of players at a time when I played.
 
ShakyJake

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Furry said:
WUT? Did you ever play guildwars? Like the entire world experience is focused around group events with tons of players, and its literally the opposite of what you describe, they slam everyone into zones together and it was common to see 100s of players at a time when I played.
Click to expand...
Uh, the first Guild Wars? Sounds like you're describing GW2.
 
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E

elbas

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Pharone said:
On top of that, creating a game focused around a small group of concurrent players, the developers can enrich the graphical aspects of the game. Plus character classes can be inherently more over powered because there's no need to balance classes in a game where it's just 50 or less people playing in a private server.
Click to expand...

What would be the realistic lifespan of a server like that? Theoretically it could last forever, but how long would those 50 people really be playing the game? It seems like the playerbase is so transitory these days. Even if you started with 50, I would think there would be a lot of attrition in a relatively short time.
 
xmod2

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Games have been doing this, just not traditional RPGs. Survival games like Conan exiles let you spin up private servers for you and your buds. Valeheim, modded Minecraft, etc.

The main thing would be to:
A) Make the server creation/hosting reasonably painless and accessible. Most people don't want to deal with it too much.
B) Have it so you can have random people join. If it's just you and 2 other people it's too fragile for longevity of play.
C) Not have it be some PvP grief fest like 100% of survival games that aren't called Valheim.
 
Hateyou

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Furry said:
WUT? Did you ever play guildwars? Like the entire world experience is focused around group events with tons of players, and its literally the opposite of what you describe, they slam everyone into zones together and it was common to see 100s of players at a time when I played.
Click to expand...
I did not play Guild Wars 2 which I’m assuming you are describing. I was talking about Guild Wars.
 
ShakyJake

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This would have niche audience, but I would love for some studio to create a dungeon crawler type game, something like a "EverQuest Dungeons".

Imagine having a selection of dungeons on the scale of EQ's Sebilis, Chardok, Howling Stones, Guk, et.al. that a group could dungeon crawl through. Of course these type of dungeons were heavily balanced on the golden trinity of classes, and we all know how painful it was to find a tank and healer. Maybe allow for flexible class specializations where people can spec into a role? Not sure. But I think it would be a fun idea. Again, only dungeons -- no persistent external world other than maybe some kind of nexus hub or something. That way the dev team could focus on dungeon content.

I don't think there's anything like this on the market, is there? I guess Diablo, Path of Exile, etc. might be sort of like this but I'm speaking 3D perspective, and gameplay that is slow and deliberate. Not rolling through blasting everything with AoEs.
 
Pharone

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I'm thinking the solo part of the game (when you're buddies aren't logged in to group with) could be spending time harvesting, crafting, and working on things that might result in uber shit you can use to complete much more difficult group content when your buddies do end up logging in.

For example, lets say that as a wizard, you spend your free time during the week doing basic shit when you got time here and there. You get lucky, and happen to a really rare component that gives your class amazing one use mega nuke. That weekend when your buddies login for their Friday night session and you get to that one boss mob that has been kicking your group's ass for the past couple weeks, you're like... "hold my beer". BAM! Mega cool spell casting animation concluding with a WTF just happened boss kill. Everybody in the group is like WTF was that, and you're all "oh just something I picked up while farming earlier this week."
 
tower

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Nah, the problem is theyve made the "M" too Massive as technology allowed them to do so

What drew most of us to MMOs in the first place was that status in a community. You go out and level or quest or whatever it is you did in your first MMO, and in the early levels you'd play with or see someone then 20 levels later you'd run into them again and that was cool. Then as you got to the higher end you developed your reputation with various groups on the server - maybe you had your own group that included that guy you ran into while levelling - and you would get gear that was noticeable and stood out and then you'd AFK in the area everyone gathered to show it off.

Now server loads are big enough that you can cram tens of thousands of people together in one server, or phase them together across multiple servers or put them in new games every single time so you dont run into the same people as much. You have less incentive to do that now anyway with how connected people are carrying friend groups, statics and guilds over from game to game so you'd need more of a push from the game not less to experience it. You dont have that one guy you always see in PvP. There's nowhere to AFK to show off because everyone's either in their own instance or there's a thousand people standing in the same spot and gear means nothing anymore so there's not point to doing it anyway

Servers need to scale back to the 2000 player count days. Let people be big or even medium fish in small ponds

The games youre asking for already exist and have for a long time going back to the Diablo and Gauntlet days to today with PoE and Divinity and whatever. But if youre looking for a newer spin on that take I think a lot of these games that are stealing from Minecraft but putting more RPG shit into them (the Craftopia types) might sate that thirst, there's just the question of any of them ever get out of pre-alpha
 
Pharone

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I'd be ok with that, but I would add to it...

  1. No name changes EVER
  2. No server transfers EVER
Make it so that it takes you long enough to get high level and geared on a server that starting over from level 1 JUST TO CHANGE YOUR NAME is painful enough that you won't do it.

Make reputation matter again.
 
Mist

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xmod2 said:
Games have been doing this, just not traditional RPGs. Survival games like Conan exiles let you spin up private servers for you and your buds. Valeheim, modded Minecraft, etc.

The main thing would be to:
A) Make the server creation/hosting reasonably painless and accessible. Most people don't want to deal with it too much.
B) Have it so you can have random people join. If it's just you and 2 other people it's too fragile for longevity of play.
C) Not have it be some PvP grief fest like 100% of survival games that aren't called Valheim.
Click to expand...
Yeah, this.

I think the future is some kind of NFT-based system where you can make decentralized, pseudo-privately hosted games like Valheim but have objects and characters that can transfer between 'worlds.' I have a lot of ideas in this space but I don't want to give away too many details.
 
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