SO! What MMO's are you all playing?

[pmelheck1]

I played EQ2 from launch but haven't touched it a while.  Didn't like WOW as it was to cartoonish for me (reminded me of Dr. Suess).  I've played DDO and LOTRO and prefer LOTRO.  Now that Lotro is free to play I don't have to keep a sub and go back when I want.  I've been dabbling in Star Trek Online Demo to see if I like it.  I really enjoyed Star Wars Galaxies before the NGE.  After the NGE I never returned to SWG.  I have heard both good and bad concerning the new star wars MMO so i'll wait and see how it pans out. 

[Sheytan]

Tried SWG it was deserted except in towns. I was a late starter and missed the "glorty days". I understood from what I read that NGE? Made some drastic changes to the game before I tried it that killed the game. Shame because it was a open canvas from what I saw.

ORIGINAL: mullk

I played EQ2 from launch but haven't touched it a while.  Didn't like WOW as it was to cartoonish for me (reminded me of Dr. Suess).  I've played DDO and LOTRO and prefer LOTRO.  Now that Lotro is free to play I don't have to keep a sub and go back when I want.  I've been dabbling in Star Trek Online Demo to see if I like it.  I really enjoyed Star Wars Galaxies before the NGE.  After the NGE I never returned to SWG.  I have heard both good and bad concerning the new star wars MMO so i'll wait and see how it pans out. 

[diablo1]

SWG was one of the best MMO's till they killed it with the NGE. They destroyed hours upon hours of game time played by doing so because players lost everything that they had accomplished because of the NGE. See you once could be a conglomeration of character classes, you could be a rifleman, artisian, creature handling, medic, entertainer all in one character. Then the NGE dumped all that and you had to pick ONE character class to play and you lost all the rest. That pissed a bunch of players off and we left.

Now it's Guild Wars for me. There is no monthly fee, 3 main chapters and 1 major expansion and a pay to play content story that costs $10. Everything is instance so there's no kill stealing in instances or much moaning and groaning (except in cities and outposts and temples where most lazy gamers hang out just to argue or grief others like in most MMO's).

The only problems I see Guild Wars has is they moved away from the carrot in front of the horse method and loot or treasure is pretty dull and boring. Anyone and everyone can have the best stat armor, weapons and offhands as max stats for a weapon is +15% damage, but, they do have different looking skins for vain type players. Of course like all MMO's some weapons are harder to aquire, but, in the end they all have the same max stat no matter what they look like. This makes the game pretty boring. Same goes for armor and offhands. They have their easy to aquire max stats models and then some skins that are harder to aquire.

I played it pretty heavily till I completed all the chapters and expansion, but, now it's just not as much fun anymore because they have really romper roomed the game to the point any 8 year old can play it with ease. They pretty much killed the game when they introduced Heroes (3 more characters you control in the game and can build them how you like) and most players stopped grouping with each other to complete missions and quests or just exploring in general. It's so easy now I can just use my 3 AI heroes and plow through 99% of the content with them and the way I have them built. (Lots of necros and necro pets work real well in this game along with one character that can blind or mass blind). The new thing coming next year is the ability to use 7 heroes (to make a full party of heroes and yourself) and this is going to blow the game into oblivion of ease. I can already stomp most of the game with just 3, give me 7 and I'll rule the world. 7 necros with Discord? hahaha that will be so overpowered the highest god in the game will cringe.

But, at any rate the main draw for me to Guild Wars was the "no monthly fee" aspect of it. You don't feel pressured to play it all the time everyday because it's not costing you anything after the initial purchase like all the rest.

[hgilmer3]

I have played two MMOs very extensively.  The 1st was Everquest.  I bought it thinking I would hate it or it would at least not keep my interest for very long.  It was one of those buys that you agonize over.  Do I want it? And then you put it off.  Then you think about it again.  I eventually bought it after it was out a year and only recently completely put it up for good.

I play WoW mostly because the graphics are kind of cool.  I play it to see what new thing I'll see.

[ilovestrategy]

ORIGINAL: diablo1

SWG was one of the best MMO's till they killed it with the NGE. They destroyed hours upon hours of game time played by doing so because players lost everything that they had accomplished because of the NGE. See you once could be a conglomeration of character classes, you could be a rifleman, artisian, creature handling, medic, entertainer all in one character. Then the NGE dumped all that and you had to pick ONE character class to play and you lost all the rest. That pissed a bunch of players off and we left.

That was me! I was master Ranger/Pistoleer. I logged on one day and was like "WTF??????" [:@]

All those hours of perfecting my character......gone.

[pmelheck1]

In SWG I had a doc/combat medic and was working on Jedi when the NGE killed everything.  Pre NGE when one saw a Jedi one was quite impressed with the amount of work that went into crafting that toon, It tooks months of real time to accomplish Jedi status working your toon at least weekly.  Post NGE Jedi was just another class.  What I enjoyed most about Galaxies was as others have stated, their was no classes you crafted you toon based on how you played it.  You could have a toon literally shaped by your play style.  Combat was skill based at one point.  When the NGE came SWG became another cookie cutter MMO with FPS combat in a market flooded with the same types.  Sadly I have little hope for the new Star Wars MMO as the NGE was implemented by Lucasarts and if they think that formula is a winner we will see the new one exactly the same as the old with overhauled game play and even greater focus on Jedi.

[Sheytan]

Interesting read. Wasnt aware of what precisely had happened to kill the game. Regarding guildwars you have GW2 coming out soon!

ORIGINAL: diablo1

SWG was one of the best MMO's till they killed it with the NGE. They destroyed hours upon hours of game time played by doing so because players lost everything that they had accomplished because of the NGE. See you once could be a conglomeration of character classes, you could be a rifleman, artisian, creature handling, medic, entertainer all in one character. Then the NGE dumped all that and you had to pick ONE character class to play and you lost all the rest. That pissed a bunch of players off and we left.

Now it's Guild Wars for me. There is no monthly fee, 3 main chapters and 1 major expansion and a pay to play content story that costs $10. Everything is instance so there's no kill stealing in instances or much moaning and groaning (except in cities and outposts and temples where most lazy gamers hang out just to argue or grief others like in most MMO's).

The only problems I see Guild Wars has is they moved away from the carrot in front of the horse method and loot or treasure is pretty dull and boring. Anyone and everyone can have the best stat armor, weapons and offhands as max stats for a weapon is +15% damage, but, they do have different looking skins for vain type players. Of course like all MMO's some weapons are harder to aquire, but, in the end they all have the same max stat no matter what they look like. This makes the game pretty boring. Same goes for armor and offhands. They have their easy to aquire max stats models and then some skins that are harder to aquire.

I played it pretty heavily till I completed all the chapters and expansion, but, now it's just not as much fun anymore because they have really romper roomed the game to the point any 8 year old can play it with ease. They pretty much killed the game when they introduced Heroes (3 more characters you control in the game and can build them how you like) and most players stopped grouping with each other to complete missions and quests or just exploring in general. It's so easy now I can just use my 3 AI heroes and plow through 99% of the content with them and the way I have them built. (Lots of necros and necro pets work real well in this game along with one character that can blind or mass blind). The new thing coming next year is the ability to use 7 heroes (to make a full party of heroes and yourself) and this is going to blow the game into oblivion of ease. I can already stomp most of the game with just 3, give me 7 and I'll rule the world. 7 necros with Discord? hahaha that will be so overpowered the highest god in the game will cringe.

But, at any rate the main draw for me to Guild Wars was the "no monthly fee" aspect of it. You don't feel pressured to play it all the time everyday because it's not costing you anything after the initial purchase like all the rest.

[diablo1]

Regarding guildwars you have GW2 coming out soon!

Sadly even though it's going persistant world (so there can be kill stealing crap and jump on you PVP) they are still sticking with the maxed out loot stats though they may be higher theres just no fun adventuring for the same thing +15^50 I don't care what it looks like. I like power games. I played Everquest for years as well. I like that when I do finally get something that there is something better still out there. Thats why they called it Everquest I guess. Guild Wars has everything else correct, fun battles, lots of content to explore, roaming mobs and instances, but the worst loot system in the entire MMO gaming world. The way they increase the challenge in GW is just to give mobs lots more hit points than you and you just have to overcome there is no great AI in GW's. Even with all the extra hit points the mobs are still dumber than dirt. But, I guess that's the way they all are really. So, to compensate, keep increasing their hit points but let me keep finding better and better stat weapons and armor and offhands like EQ or WOW and the rest at no monthly fee. [:)]

[NefariousKoel]

ORIGINAL: Hertston

ORIGINAL: Sheytan

Is there anything good you folks are playing currently?

At the moment, none, although I'm toying with the idea of getting 'Fallen Earth' in the Steam sale as that seems to have features that could distinguish it from the crowd. The only MMO I've ever played for more than a month or two before getting bored is EVE, which is a great game but just demands more time than I have.

Pity 'Jumpgate Evolution' seems to be vapourware; that looked rather fun.

I played Fallen Earth for a couple months. I liked it, still do, but it seemed to be missing that little something content-wise. Dunno what exactly. Great system, though. The open-ended character advancement has been sorely missed. The loot system is all about scrounging for junk that ppl use in crafting everything which makes sense since it's a post-apoc setting. I'll probably fire it up again sometime and get further than the starter tier area. I had just learned how to put a wannabe M4 together and was doing good saying hi to mutant critters and bandits with my lil friend.

[a7v]

Well, just to add my opinion about some of the mmos I´ve tried, I played WOW for 3 years, LOTRO for 3 months, Warhammer for 3 weeks and Conan for 3 days[;)]
 
After a longer break I bought  WOW´s addon Cataclysm and will level one of my old characters (Warlock[:D]) to lvl 85, after that I´ll probably stop again. This game has changed so much and definitly not for the better.
Like some of the posters before I started to play with a guild, did some of the old instances, but now I just use it as a single player game. The community now is one of the worst I have ever seen, 12 to 15 years probably and the game has been toned down accordingly to meet the demands of little children. The addon is absolutely linear, you have to do every single quest one after the other or you can´t continue. All the quests now are REALLY easy, you can not fail, and they are all made for single players, so no group quests anymore.
 
LOTRO now is free to play although you only get a small part of the content for free. The rest has to be bought in the item shop, which , for me at least, is a no go.
 
A game I really would like to see is Warhammer 40.000. Ultramarines anyone?
 
Ok, enough for now, have to sink more US carriers[:D]
 
Rainer
 

[Vasquez]

Currently only the Black Prophecy Beta. The NDA was lifted some days ago. Ingame gameplay movie:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9DS40cxV ... re=related

Random Trailer:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcBTRJK_ ... re=related

[Lützow]

ORIGINAL: diablo1

SWG was one of the best MMO's till they killed it with the NGE. They destroyed hours upon hours of game time played by doing so because players lost everything that they had accomplished because of the NGE. See you once could be a conglomeration of character classes, you could be a rifleman, artisian, creature handling, medic, entertainer all in one character. Then the NGE dumped all that and you had to pick ONE character class to play and you lost all the rest. That pissed a bunch of players off and we left.

Talking from a hardcore gamers perspective, SWG was doomed from the get-go. We expected an EverQuest in Space and what we got was a game inferior to Ultima Online. Sure, there were a plethora of skills to choose from, but only a single build which made sense. The dev's were downright incapable, created girl's fluff instead of new content, continously nerfed classes and within a few months the economy got ruined by hyperinflation. I rolled a bh/ch right at release and quit after the free playtime, since there was nothing to do anymore.

That said, I was an avid MMOG player before this genre hit the mainstream. Started with UO, spent years in EQ, peeked into WoW and played EvE for quite some time. However, can't be bothered anymore with modern MMOG's.

[Scott_WAR]

Lutz,...you bring up a trend that I HATE. As 'genres' get popular,...they always slowly get dumbed down until they are boring and dont resemble at all what made them popular to begin with. Thankfully wargaming has stayed somewhat immune to this since it remains a 'niche' market.

[Lützow]

I have to agree. Wargames and certain flight sims are the last resort for hardcore players. Sadly, the heyday of crpg's is over. I used to love this genre *sigh*.

[Anthropoid]

I cannot say that I disagree with you guys about the trend toward "dumbing down." Certainly I'm quite disenchanted with what has happened to the Civ series.

But how would you define "hardcore" and what is it that really differentiates the dumbed down from the 'smarted up' games?

Not trying to be argumentative, just thinking about that talk I'm giving in February on computer gaming as 'simulation.'

[ilovestrategy]

ORIGINAL: Lützow

ORIGINAL: diablo1

SWG was one of the best MMO's till they killed it with the NGE. They destroyed hours upon hours of game time played by doing so because players lost everything that they had accomplished because of the NGE. See you once could be a conglomeration of character classes, you could be a rifleman, artisian, creature handling, medic, entertainer all in one character. Then the NGE dumped all that and you had to pick ONE character class to play and you lost all the rest. That pissed a bunch of players off and we left.

Talking from a hardcore gamers perspective, SWG was doomed from the get-go. We expected an EverQuest in Space and what we got was a game inferior to Ultima Online. Sure, there were a plethora of skills to choose from, but only a single build which made sense. The dev's were downright incapable, created girl's fluff instead of new content, continously nerfed classes and within a few months the economy got ruined by hyperinflation. I rolled a bh/ch right at release and quit after the free playtime, since there was nothing to do anymore.

That said, I was an avid MMOG player before this genre hit the mainstream. Started with UO, spent years in EQ, peeked into WoW and played EvE for quite some time. However, can't be bothered anymore with modern MMOG's.

It was never a hardcore gamer's game. Never was. There was nothing like raiding and wasn't meant to be. It was an open sand box game and in that it excelled. It was also a social game. I went to parties in people space yachts, had guild functions in cantinas while players played music and things like that. I never ran out of things to do. And that was not even including all the exploring. Or going out on hunting expeditions with the guild and kicking back in a camp made by my master ranger. Sitting on a beach on Naboo with friends and watching the sun set. It was the best MMO that I had ever played. I cannot think of one instance that I was bored.

I played for a year and a half before the New Generation Experience changed the game. It turned into a leveling grind after that.

Ultima Online was good too. I was there for 3 1/2 years before leaving that for Star Wars Galaxies. UO was also a sand box game. Only bad thing with UO was all the griefers and the time sink required to do anything.

I played EQ for 2 weeks on a free trial period. Just could not get into it. Not my thing.

I have now been playing Lord of the Rings Online for almost 4 years now and I love it even more than before. Turbine really pays attention to detail on following the books. For a Tolkien freak like me it's paradise. Not for raiders and Pvpers though. Never was intended to be.

With computer games one man's hatred is another man's love.

[ilovestrategy]

ORIGINAL: Anthropoid

I cannot say that I disagree with you guys about the trend toward "dumbing down." Certainly I'm quite disenchanted with what has happened to the Civ series.

But how would you define "hardcore" and what is it that really differentiates the dumbed down from the 'smarted up' games?

Not trying to be argumentative, just thinking about that talk I'm giving in February on computer gaming as 'simulation.'

Well, a lot of it is the interface. I've been playing PC games since 1990 and IMHO interfaces are a lot better than before. I think what some people classify as hardcore is in fact annoying. For example Warcraft Orcs and Humans you could only group 4 units at a time and you could only build one keep to bring all your gold to, with Warcraft II, you could group up to 9 units and build multiple keeps so you could have one closer to a gold mine. It made for much for streamlined play. But players could also refer to it as dumbing down.

Elder Scrolls IV Oblivion is another example. After playing with that game I could never play Elder Scrolls III Morrowind because I could not got back to a clunky interface again.

Another thing is tutorials. More strategy games have in game tutorials. That was a godsend for me in Distant Worlds. I ordered War Plan Pacific from Shrapnel and I am SOOOOOO happy I bought the disc version with the book instead of the download. The game has no tutorial and I would have been lost.

Times are changing. A game bought as a download with no sort in ingame instructions or tutorial?

I don't think games are getting dumbed down. I think they are becoming easier to learn. I'm thinking about buying Storm over the Pacific as a download but what if it doesn't have a tutorial? If it doesn't that is not hardcore. It's annoying.

[ilovestrategy]

ORIGINAL: Anthropoid

I cannot say that I disagree with you guys about the trend toward "dumbing down." Certainly I'm quite disenchanted with what has happened to the Civ series.

But how would you define "hardcore" and what is it that really differentiates the dumbed down from the 'smarted up' games?

Not trying to be argumentative, just thinking about that talk I'm giving in February on computer gaming as 'simulation.'

First of all, I want to apologize for making 3 posts one after another. If anyone is upset I apologize. Especially to Erik!

I played Civ I up to IV. Not yet V. Is Civ V made simpler? I'm just curious.

[Sheytan]

Precisely what I was looking for in a game. Content CONTENT CONTENT. Too bad I never had a chance to play SWG in its glory days.

ORIGINAL: ilovestrategy

ORIGINAL: Lützow

ORIGINAL: diablo1

SWG was one of the best MMO's till they killed it with the NGE. They destroyed hours upon hours of game time played by doing so because players lost everything that they had accomplished because of the NGE. See you once could be a conglomeration of character classes, you could be a rifleman, artisian, creature handling, medic, entertainer all in one character. Then the NGE dumped all that and you had to pick ONE character class to play and you lost all the rest. That pissed a bunch of players off and we left.

Talking from a hardcore gamers perspective, SWG was doomed from the get-go. We expected an EverQuest in Space and what we got was a game inferior to Ultima Online. Sure, there were a plethora of skills to choose from, but only a single build which made sense. The dev's were downright incapable, created girl's fluff instead of new content, continously nerfed classes and within a few months the economy got ruined by hyperinflation. I rolled a bh/ch right at release and quit after the free playtime, since there was nothing to do anymore.

That said, I was an avid MMOG player before this genre hit the mainstream. Started with UO, spent years in EQ, peeked into WoW and played EvE for quite some time. However, can't be bothered anymore with modern MMOG's.

It was never a hardcore gamer's game. Never was. There was nothing like raiding and wasn't meant to be. It was an open sand box game and in that it excelled. It was also a social game. I went to parties in people space yachts, had guild functions in cantinas while players played music and things like that. I never ran out of things to do. And that was not even including all the exploring. Or going out on hunting expeditions with the guild and kicking back in a camp made by my master ranger. Sitting on a beach on Naboo with friends and watching the sun set. It was the best MMO that I had ever played. I cannot think of one instance that I was bored.

I played for a year and a half before the New Generation Experience changed the game. It turned into a leveling grind after that.

Ultima Online was good too. I was there for 3 1/2 years before leaving that for Star Wars Galaxies. UO was also a sand box game. Only bad thing with UO was all the griefers and the time sink required to do anything.

I played EQ for 2 weeks on a free trial period. Just could not get into it. Not my thing.

I have now been playing Lord of the Rings Online for almost 4 years now and I love it even more than before. Turbine really pays attention to detail on following the books. For a Tolkien freak like me it's paradise. Not for raiders and Pvpers though. Never was intended to be.

With computer games one man's hatred is another man's love.

[parusski]

ORIGINAL: Sheytan

Curious, I gave up on DAOC, WOW, and finally Warhammer. Is there anything good you folks are playing currently? I plan on buying a Alienware rig in the next month or two and need some MMO suggestions.

Merry Christmas!

In the few minutes I break my WitE addiction I still return to WOW and Warhammer, great games. MMO's? Try Vindictus, City of Heroes going Rogue or LOTRO. I, like ilovestrategy, enjoy the pace of LOTRO.

I have been buying Alienware rigs since the company started many years ago, it's worth the investment. BUT, my son just had Falcon NW build a killer rig-intel core i7 extreme 980x 3.33gh processor, 12 gig ram, 2 GE FORCE GTX80 video cards, 2TB hard drive, 240GB SSD, and other goodies. YES he dropped $6800 on it, but I think Falcon is something to look into. I just looked at some rigs a moment ago and you can bet one that beats Alienware for about the same amount of green. I am impressed. Sorry for the swerve, but I think Falcon may have finally overtaken ALienware as king of gaming rigs. Check them out.