Just in from my morning run. That’s the thing where you put your feet on the ground, one after another, in a rapid rotation. And then you come back and feel awesome. Or at least, so I’m told. I tend to roam about looking and sounding like an asthmatic dancing bear, and then feel awful for an hour, and hurt for the rest of the day. But I’m assured that it gets better.
I bet they’re all lying about that.
Today, I checked out a friend’s D&D 4th edition blog to get some impressions of the game. I’ve picked up the DM guide, because it has some general application to game design. Not sure if I’ll bother with the Player’s Handbook, which is the book containing the actual rules. We’ll see.
Via PMOG (web surfing, now with a level grind and traps!), I stumbled across Google Mobile — text-message GOOGLE and get search results.
I’ve been watching (with the same dirty glee I get from catfights on that apocalyptic Tila Tequila show) the blogosphere buzz about Michael Zenke’s interview of Richard Bartle. The fans defending. The foes attacking. And since I’m still bereft of my morning coffee, and therefore bitchy, I’ll give my unsolicited opinion. Bartle is right. WAR is WoW all over again. So is EVERY OTHER GOD DAMNED AAA MMO. There, I said it. We still live in the land of Diku, loot, and grind. Not one AAA MMORPG I can remember has seriously advanced the art. FFS, we had worldy user-built stuff as far back as the MUSH days (yes, yes, they weren’t really games, now shush, I’m ranting). Besides, everyone in the US — imagine Monty Python reading Bartle’s speech. (With apologies to Dr. Bartle, who professed disliking Monty Python and their habit of cutting off, rather than ending, skits.) See? It’s offbeat British humor in that tone of voice, now isn’t it? “I already played WAR; it was called World of Warcraft” is what reasonablepeople often refer to as “hyperbole.” For instance, if I say “everyone who is getting worked up about Bartle needs to move out of Mom’s basement and put down the WoWcrackpipe,” I don’t ACTUALLY mean that all those folks live in their mothers’ basements, or indeed, that there’s anything wrong with living in one’s mother’s basement. It’s a quick way to arouse interest and/or ire to get a point across. Besides, everyone who is getting worked up about Bartle needs to move out of Mom’s basement and put down the WoWcrackpipe.
Phew, I need some coffee.
By Tuebit June 24, 2008 - 4:13 pm
I very much appreciate Bartle’s comment made in a follow-up to the original article.
“Another point: when I said I didn’t play MMOs for fun, I wasn’t saying that MMOs weren’t fun for players, I was saying that they weren’t fun for me. I envy players, in a way, because they get 18 months of fun from an MMO whereas I only get a few hours’ worth. When you’ve looked at play for long enough, you grok the concept.”
Part of Bartle’s perspective is that of the game designer … they tend to see through the game to the mechanics … it detracts from the fun, I’ll bet.
But he’s very aptly expressing the core of his argument in a way that ANY long-time player will (or should) understand.
How many character can you level to 70 (or whatever the level cap of you game of choice)? And once you’ve done that … can you rush right into another game with all the enthusiasm you once had? Burnout!
No-one believes a game stays fresh forever.
Why is it any wonder that, for long time serial MMO players, the whole genre might begin to feel stale?
Sure each new game may perfect (or perhaps just change) a few mechanics, but precious few have really excited me over the years.
Frankly, I don’t understand why there’s any controversy. Bartle speaks the truth.
I suspect anyone who doesn’t agree, at least to an extent, is not yet old enough to be done suckling at the wowteet.
By Keen June 24, 2008 - 5:14 pm
Sorry, I disagree. Just like WoW was not an EQ clone, WAR is not a WoW clone. Complete rubbish to write a game off without any further explanation, as Bartle did, because it happens to be of SIMILAR design in the grand scope of virtual world development.
By Keen June 24, 2008 - 5:19 pm
Just like WoW was not an EQ clone, WAR is not a WoW clone. Complete rubbish to write a game off without any further explanation, as Bartle did, because it happens to be of SIMILAR design in the grand scope of virtual world development.
Are these games advancing the art? Slowly. Does that make them all clones or “all the same” and thus not playing? Absolutely 100% not. Richard Bartle’s comment absolutely implied that.
Bartle has extreme and ‘different’ ideas. In my opinion his ideas would take this industry backwards.
By Keen June 24, 2008 - 5:20 pm
Hrm, sorry about that. I hit enter before I finished and it submitted it twice. (Firefox 3 hates me).
By Tachevert June 24, 2008 - 5:39 pm
Yes, Firefox 3 still hates me as well. I’d clean up the comments for you, but I have a policy of not editing comments that aren’t mine unless I REALLY have to.
I still think all AAA MMORPGs are cut from the same cloth. Graphics and minor fiddly mechanics aside, the core gameplay just isn’t different. Maybe WAR’s RvR will change that. I’d like to think so, but I’m deeply cynical about stuff like that after a few game burnouts. If I were forced into things, I’d place my bet on WAR being “more of the same, but with different ooh shiny.” And yes, I’m basing that solely on what I’ve read about the game, so I could certainly be proven wrong, but…
CoH: I logged in and repetitively ran missions. This was a way to mask the fact that really, I was being sent around to kill legions of stuff. The mobs I killed gave me money and enhancements (which are kind of like equipment) and xp. As I acquired xp, I made character advancement decisions (but without a completely free hand, as some “required” optimizations limited my character development path). Once I got a buttload of xp, I couldn’t get any more. At the end, all I could do was hellishly long grinds for money to make invention enhancements, or raid the Hamidon for hamidon enhancements to improve my character.
WoW: I logged in and repetitively ran missions. This was a way to mask the fact that really, I was being sent around to kill legions of stuff. Sometimes, this mask was “go to a place where you have to run by enemies that will attack.” Sometimes, this mask was “kill enemies that have a 10% drop rate, get 10 things without realizing you’re actually killing 100 enemies.” The mobs I killed, and the people I did missions for, gave me money and equipment and xp. As I acquired xp, I made character advancement decisions (but without a completely free hand, as some “required” optimizations limited my character development path). Once I got a buttload of xp, I couldn’t get any more. At the end, all I could do was hellishly long grinds for PvP honor to purchase battlefield epics, or raid places like Karazhan for epics and badges to improve my character.
SWG: I logged in and repetitively ran missions. This was a way to mask the fact that really, I was being sent around to kill legions of stuff. The mobs I killed and missions that I completed gave me money and equipment and xp. As I acquired xp, I made character advancement decisions (but without a completely free hand, as some “required” optimizations limited my character development path). Once I got a buttload of xp, I couldn’t get any more. At the end, all I could do was hellishly long grinds of specific easy mobs hoping for rare drops, or hellishly difficult raids on extremely difficult mobs and dungeons hoping for rare drops, or both combined with finding a truly expert crafter to craft a rare item. The item might be for my character, or for a house or player city.
*sigh*
I don’t know what I recommend for the industry (or else I’d recommend it — OR do it myself and make a kabillion dollars), but I just can’t name a single MMORPG of the 200x’s that was fundamentally unlike all the others.