Are there any good MMORPGs out? I'll try to help clarify my definition of "good." I'm looking for a game that's not PvP and that will likely be around a while (not something brand new with barely any players that will die in a few months). I'm looking for something that doesn't require countless hours of killing bunnies or other nonsense to get to any good parts. I'd rather have fun/interesting places to explore rather than "go find 50 rat tails." I don't care that much about graphics and I'd rather pay a monthly fee than "pay to win" (does this even exist anymore?).

I'm disqualifying everquest and world of warcraft because I've already played them (and didn't enjoy them much, although to be honest I didn't play them that long).

Just curious if there's anything else out there worth playing for a while. It doesn't have to be perfect or provide endless gameplay. Just something fun/interesting to do for a few hours a week.

I'm super out of the loop, and this probably is PvP, but I heard that in Eve, the less you play, the better you do. Although if this was ever true it may have changed since I was told this about a decade ago.

I think that some people have managed to get retro (2000? 2004 era?) AC servers up in some dark corners of Discord. But you'd have to decide you like "countless hours of killing bunnies."

World of Warcraft

Oh.

(Seriously, as I was reading your post I thought “he is exactly describing WoW”, then I got to this part.)

Maybe Final Fantasy XIV? I’ve never played it, but I know a few people who seem to like it.

After SWTOR flopped, I don’t think western studios are investing in MMOs at all anymore. The emphasis seems to be on cheaper arena multiplayer and small scale instanced levels (Guild Wars style). Some AC devs actually commented about the business side on the AC subreddit, saying (in as many words) that the MMO business model is dead and that newer open world stuff isn’t as special anymore, so it doesn’t have as much of a hook.

(Edit: EA had just an absolutely epic crush of MMO market failures within a couple years. They straight up lost billions of dollars trying to break into the market. Scary!)

There are lots of persistent world, exploration-driven single player games, though, if you aren’t necessarily married to the MM, O, or RPG parts.

I'd assume that the rise of VR would coincide with MMOs making a comeback. I guess VR hasn't picked back up again. But what else would VR be for, if not MMO games? to get immersed in a real, virtual reality, a virtual world.

[rant]Well, whatever you do avoid Elite Dangerous. 330 hours I'll never get back while grinding infinitely for ships and gear I actually wanted to experience the game with.
By the time I got those ships I was so burned out I couldn't stomach anymore. The changes the DEVs have made recently are also a good reason to stay far far away.[/rant]

Jon`C well I tried WoW for a while but it exactly made me go kill bunnies or some other stupid tiny mammal and I was so bored. Maybe it's different now?



Ok, sure.

I enjoyed the "questing with friends" (or strangers, but other people as opposed to bots) parts of AC and City of Heroes. I enjoyed the cooperative aspects of it, and the shared excitement of finding new areas and new stuff. It's not quite the same in single player but if there's something worth playing I'll give it a try.

It’s historically taken 10-20 years for new computing platforms to reach critical mass. 10-15 years of obscurity, 5-10 of popular awareness but poor adoption. VR is in the latter stage. It might still fizzle, but it’s not in a significantly more concerning state than the smartphone market was around the iPhone release. (VR is also a whole lot more expensive, and isn’t carrier subsidized.)

VR’s problem isn’t hardware sales, it’s that there is no good answer to “what ... would VR be for” yet.

MMORPGs probably isn’t it though, since the equipment is intolerable to use over extended sessions and there are some safety and mental health issues to work out there. The sweet spot is probably some hyper-personalized single player experience, at least until someone figures out how to do work using it.

ESO seems fine to me. Game doesn''t feel dead, content scales with level so it's easy to group and do dungeons, and all places are basically accessible past low levels (though they become easier at higher levels). Leveling is really easy if you do it casually, you get rested xp that's really strong and daily dungeons give lots of experience.

No pay 2 win mechanics, more pay 2 convenience mechanics. You dont even need a monthly sub, but without it you cant access the crafting bag which takes up all your inventory space. All DLC is also accessible with a subscription, whereas otherwise you have to buy it. Theres plenty of places to check out without any expansions/DLC.

Theres also a new expansion coming out next week (only the 2nd), and if you order it you get the first expansion, so there's that.

Probably the most fun game to play economically speaking, pricing is really well done and to people like me who can program, theres lots of arbitrage and other things you can take advantage of.

The default UI is awful but addons fix it.

Oh god, grinding with VR. Hours and hours of VR.

I feel like the killer app for the VR would be something that doesn't make the player feel helpless or challenged but one that makes him feel powerful. Like a god simulator. Tap into those feelings that we don't get enough in life...

They completely redesigned character progression in one of the recent expansions (Catacylsm). Progression is much faster and based around non-kill, character story quests. Even if the game doesn’t hook you in the long term, it’s a few hundred hours of perfectly serviceable grind-free RPG content that you can experience as socially or anti socially as you want.

The die-hards and nostalgics hate these changes for obvious reasons, so you might read some harsh criticism of Cataclysm online. But it sounds a lot like what you’re looking for.

Ever play Final Fantasy 12? It was originally designed to be an MMORPG. Most of the content is optional and the game does very little to help you find it. If you enjoy discovery and exploration there is no shortage of stuff to do. You might need to do some XP grinding, but it’s a single player RPG amount of grinding, not an MMO this-is-your-job-now amount of grinding.

There was a PC remaster that came out recently. I bought it and can vouch for the port quality.

We should set up a Massassi MUD

The most recent Final Fantasy I enjoyed was III. The only one after that I actually tried was VII on PlayStation I think, and after a few battles with those tiresome animations I gave up. I'll look into 12.

MMUD; sounds like a birth control device. Urgh.











The more I think about it... the more likely that statement could be true.

Massively Multiplayer Uterus Denial

the trump thread is already pedantic enough, we don't need to make it worse by incorporating an even stricter syntax

.

I remember wondering so many years back if it was to late to start playing WoW and, oddly, that still seems like a valid question. Kind of a moot question for me because I have purchased so many massive single player RPGs because I found good deals and them and have played virtually none of them.

I still cringe when people claim that WoW is a good mmorpg. It's one of the two only games I've actually fallen asleep while playing. One was just one random happening, but WoW was because I was so bored, and it happened on a daily basis. The KOTOR mmo was pretty boring too, but I didn't fall asleep to it. It just wasn't able to grab me. I enjoyed Elite: Dangerous, but it takes way too damned long to do anything.

I miss the original Planetside and Star Wars Galaxies.

It sounds like you'd hate all MMORPGs, to be honest. They are necessarily boring, drawn-out games.



Can't comment on SWG, but Planetside: New competitive FPS games have large battles and a persistent player progression system. It's not exactly the same thing, but it's probably close enough.

Only almost an MMORPG, but you might like Path of Exile. It's more like Diablo, than an MMO. You can play alone (have to be online, though) or look for other players in a town.