Most unique MMORPGs

[Garbage]

Fantasy Earth Zero was pretty cool, though to my knowledge it's not up in the West anymore so you'll have to do some digging to see if you can leech off of some Asia server.

You picked one of five kingdoms and one of three classes that worked in a rock-paper-scissors deal. I think they actually added more classes in afterwards.
You could dick around in towns, on areas of the map and fight mobs, but the meat of the game was the 50v50 Kingdom wars where you battled for control of each area of the map.

It was pretty nice while it lasted in the West, the GMs would actually run events like infected and other junk.

 

[anvi]

Look on MMORPG.com. There is one called Wurm and Project Gorgon is worth looking at. If you are happy to play an old low budget MMO that is really unique and interesting, see if you can get hold of Minions of Mirth. It might not be sold anymore. It was really interesting and lots of unique features. Like it lets you play it online as an MMO, or completely offline. You can have multiple characters that exist inside your main character, so it plays kind of like a blobber, but in a big open world. Some of the creatures you kill unlock the creature as a class, so if you kill a boar you can make a new character that is a boar and it has bites and whatever abilities a boar has. But later on if you kill a dragon, you can make a dragon which can fly and breath fire etc. Also each character you have in your party can be multiclassed twice. There were some other good ideas too.

 

[Beastro]

t would quickly become a spawncamp in which you get killed on arrival by the established playerbase. I have difficulty seeing how a persistent territory/base control game can have much of a future as an MMO.

whydoibother is right. This is why people wanting a classic MMO experience like the old days of EQ and UO will never get it.

The community on Rallos Zek wouldn't exist today to recreate that server, besides those who played then that were anti-PKs, modern players wouldn't be able to fathom playing a game where you didn't attack anyone you wished but stuck to a code to defending the innocent against such PKs.

The sad thing is, that culture was already dying not long into EQ. Sullon Zek showed its beginnings where people didn't see a reason not to attack and kill and be a outright asshole to everyone they could engage and it came out in 2001.

Hell, just the definitional shift should summarize it. Remember when we had "PKers", and not "PvP"? There wasn't a "versus", there was just people like me, killing you. People were willing to accept this kind of thing back when they didn't have to pay for it, and games like this were few and far in between, so it was either git gud or cry trying. But nowadays, if someone takes too much of a beating, they won't pay for it and will just move onto the next game.

But why beat them too much?

This is the same problem that ruins almost every Classic EQ PvP server, the desire for PKs to ruthlessly win at any cost that winds up running off the rest of the server.

This lack of stomach makes for shitty games.

You do not have to pay to quit dealing with too much shit. Why would you do that enough to drive people away?

I wasn't and am not good PvP at EQ beyond the newbie game, yet I loved playing on Rallos and took my lickings, but that was because I wasn't camped or constantly marauded over by the same people over and over again the way SZ and later Emulator servers went.

PKs with your mentality do not understand you are predators. It is idiotic to kill off all your prey and you have to tread carefully to not chase them off. In many older games they didn't because their numbers were so few compared to the rest of the server, but once you reach a certain with this mindset it's just a matter of time for a server to die.

And I know what I'm talking about here given my Troll PK newbie days on EQ. I learned to harvest the newbie population of a zone enough for one day and move onto another, from Nektulos Forest to the Commonlands, and if numbers were short, to call it a day rather that kill my prey one too many times instead of sneer and roll my eyes over people leaving a game because they don't want to endure that crap.

There's no versus, there is only killing.

I'd disagree in so far as the context of "versus" should be set by the players themselves.

To use RZ as an exmaple you had PKs acting as roving bandits and Anti's who actually opposed them when PKs showed up, but played the game largely as the rest of the sheep. You then also had the "political" guilds which were the embroyonic uber raid guilds that's were learning toy with raiding, but mainly gathered together into guilds to push against one another provoke feuds which would result in guild wars. Both of these dynamics continued until about late 2001/early 2002 when raid guilds as we know them began to form. Those who transitioned survived while others were run off the server, like The Peacebreakers. Meanwhile the Anti's slowly faded away leaving the PKs more free room until the gear disparity between them made most PK guilds quit the game.

Some political guild warring continued into 2003, my guild was destroyed by a a new up and coming raid guild in mid 2003 after waking the Sleeper, but AFAIK, that's the last real instance of the old community fighting like that.

Personally, if I wanted to create a game with a setting of this kind of flavor, which is basically any kind of wild lawless frontier where a player makes his own way in a world that's dog-eat-dog,

You need some limitations in place to prevent the logical outcome from happening. On RZ it was the 4 level above or below you range to attack others outside of dueling, in your idea of a space game it would need to be some sort of safe sector like EVE has as it's clear what would happen in high security sectors if they were suddenly changed to 0s when people have found ways around high sec security (like suicide frigate swarms or the one time people feed one ship shields so much it countered the DPS of the security ships attacking it so that ship could sit back and attack everyone who jumped in as the security ignored its "healers").

With all that said, I don't think Rimworld would work well. By the feel of the game, I could see each server not lasting long, like a few weeks at most like most games that get converted into multiplayer ones by modders.

 

[Norfleet]

whydoibother is right. This is why people wanting a classic MMO experience like the old days of EQ and UO will never get it.

The community on Rallos Zek wouldn't exist today to recreate that server, besides those who played then that were anti-PKs, modern players wouldn't be able to fathom playing a game where you didn't attack anyone you wished but stuck to a code to defending the innocent against such PKs.

Well, yes, and this is firmly a middle culture mentality. The earliest days of Online Worlds were dominated by the Tradewarriors. This was Eve before there was Eve. TW2002. You played to win, or you got blown up trying to leave Fedspace. The notion that people were supposed to be playing games for FUN like some kind of child until LORD. Even then, HARDCORE online proto-MMOs were TW2002 and SRE: Kill or be killed.

The sad thing is, that culture was already dying not long into EQ. Sullon Zek showed its beginnings where people didn't see a reason not to attack and kill and be a outright asshole to everyone they could engage and it came out in 2001.

More like it was a childish and naive notion that had no practical applicability, a fad, nothing more.

But why beat them too much?

Because they're there. Are you a gamer or not? I see an enemy, I kill an enemy. That's how things were in the day.

PKs with your mentality do not understand you are predators. It is idiotic to kill off all your prey and you have to tread carefully to not chase them off. In many older games they didn't because their numbers were so few compared to the rest of the server, but once you reach a certain with this mindset it's just a matter of time for a server to die.

Ah, yes, but you see, at least for me, I inherited the mindset from the aforementioned games. I didn't see myself a predator, killing people because they fed me in some way. I saw myself as a conqueror, in it to win it, and the endpoint of simply having a dead game where you stood alone over the ashes and bones was considered to be victory. These games were largely too small and short-lived to give rise to the idea of true permanence, and real-time communication wasn't really a big thing yet, as BBSes had limited connection slots and play was not often fully synchronous. It wasn't until MUDs introduced the idea that someone could bend the knee before they got obliterated, rather than having it happen while they were asleep and unresponsive, that politics really took off.

 

[anvi]

Lol Norfleet still suffering PTSD from some trader that ripped him off in 1998.

 

[PorkyThePaladin]

MMOs are still dead. Shocking when you consider how this genre threatened to take over all of gaming back in late 90s, early 2000s (Everquest, WoW). The shit people play today, like ESO and FFXIV is ...

I think the next batch of upcoming MMOs might bring the genre back to life, but it's hard to say, as so many recent MMOs have failed. Ashes of Creation, and those new mmos from Dark Age of Camelot and Vanguard devs might have a chance. Or not.

 

[Beastro]

You played to win, or you got blown up trying to leave Fedspace. The notion that people were supposed to be playing games for FUN like some kind of child until LORD. Even then, HARDCORE online proto-MMOs were TW2002 and SRE: Kill or be killed.

As opposed to showing the world how mighty and adult you are by killing others on video games?

This brings to mind playing EQ prog years back. OUr guild leader made the final pieces each of us needed for the final hand in to unlock a raid zone and was handing them out, all the while as we were jokingly forming a line and dicking around while doing so.

Right next to us the top raid guilds leader was doing the same, only he was demanding people /kneel before him and thank him for receiving the item like it was Communion. Some in our guild chuckled thinking it was him joking, but they didn't know his or his guilds history going back years where it was very clear the guy was power tripping over a game, the same reason he'd restart his guild on every new progression server simply to get the first kills on raid targets as if it was 2000.

There's a point to take with rivalries and competition, but you take it that far, that obsessively you're getting into fucked up territory. It's the same one in the EQ emu community where so many were so ruthless they killed one server with outright cheating when they couldn't defeat the other rival guild for dominance of the server. They found a way to hack the game and make the opposing guilds screens go black, something which triggered the admins to shut the server down to try to find and fix such a previously unknown hack that wound up effectively killing the server.

More like it was a childish and naive notion that had no practical applicability, a fad, nothing more.

No practical applicability. What applicability comes with your approach.

Whatever your answer, we'll wind up disagreeing. I appreciated that mentality because it helped foster unique servers with multiple, varying groups within them that fought and competed producing a wonderful experience for most that seems to be non-reproducible since.

You are right though in it being a fad, as I think MMOs are in general due to how ephemeral they are. They're very much a genre of games more than any other where you have to enjoy what you're experiencing in the moment because it won't come back again.

Because they're there. Are you a gamer or not? I see an enemy, I kill an enemy. That's how things were in the day.

Yeah I would too, but not repeatedly beyond the point where it was clear I'd won and even them killing me wouldn't undo my victory over them. It was one thing to butt heads with the snooty assholes who'd smacktalk and keep coming at me for hours, I enjoyed repeatedly besting them and seeing the tantrum they'd put on, but when it came to typical players, especially the newer ones that clearly were playing for the first time I'd get in a kill or two and then move to to find others. In the case of the latter I'd even find a couple at the end of the day and toss them some of the trash gear and cash I'd taken off of others to help them to help given them a kick start as I'd only sell it to buy more arrows.

I did that because I knew what it was like when others took PKing too far and knew the point when it stopped being enjoyable for either and just became a sadistic game of power tripping over others, one that would do its part to help kill the server we were on bit by bit leaving us with less time to enjoy the game. I saw that more fully on the EQ Emu servers later on where VZTZ 1.0 lasted over a year, but once the guild warring dynamic of guilds filled with ex-PKs from Live took over it left VZTZ 2.0 and 3.0 only last a 3-4 months at most, the former was the one that was killed in the middle of things with that hacking.

Compared to that RZ lasted a good 2-3 at the least.

These games were largely too small and short-lived to give rise to the idea of true permanence, and real-time communication wasn't really a big thing yet,

How long did they typically last?

I do know in between VZTZs other players would start up what were effectively "instant" PvP servers where you could spawn max level and just buy the choice gear you want from vendors for nothing to then launch right into fighting others. Such servers lasted a couple weeks at most, usually less then one once it was clear who the ultimate winners and losers were.

That kind of gameplay is fine, it's not my cup of tea and for many due to how brief it is. If that's your thing, then ok, the issue is that you should recognize where it fits best and that it doesn't work with games beyond them (and if you try you should be mad that others jump ship because they don't want to be your punching bag).

For it that doesn't work because it's a series of matches rather than a server with enough continuity to start to create history, which is what I really enjoyed with Red Eq. Guilds rose and fell with their guild wars, events happened like the Peacebreakers pretty much declaring war on every other raid server and creating hell for months in Velious until they were finally crushed, all the while smaller battles were taking place with the PK guilds roving around as Darkenbane, House Invisus and Lucid Vision would roll through and those Anti's in the vicinity would begin to gather together to oppose them; or one on one fights would happen like Blart and his antics in Innothule Swamp, Crusaderzog the Anti-PK who'd blindly charge, and keep charging any PK he ran into no matter how many times he died exclaiming in shout "I am as constant as the Northern Star!!!" and my own time in Nektulos Forest as a simple naked Troll with a rusty two hander and bow that piss the zone off enough to get two dozen or more newbies to form an army and chase me around only for it to end more often than nought with me victorious and everyone else smiling despite losing.

Such people I'd run into months or even years down the line passing through as a max level raider only to catch me in the zone list and give a pleasantly surprised shout out happy to see me still there at lv6 killing people.

I'd have rather had that for a long as I could (which ultimately died when they took out item loot, which meant newbie zones began to fill with decked out twink PKs I had a rough time defeating and the newbies had no chance at all with) and the fond memories of it rather than a repetition of burned down servers whose legacy is people to this very day still forum-warrioring and crying out "Wipe it clean!" waiting around for a PvP server that has more than a few dozen people on at any one time: https://www.project1999.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=54

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

What kills the game is a bored playerbase that abandons the game for something else and/or developers selling shit to other groups and changing the hell out of the game usually for the worse.

Level skill caps or NONE/unlimited?
Pay to win?
Or Just pay for extra shit that can help but isnt needed?

Forced group instances or true solo play that can take out anything?

My current MMO is so dead i'm usuallythe only one on.

 

[anvi]

What's your current MMO? LOTRO? D&DO?

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

You're gonna laugh at this one. EUO or Euotopia. Its 2D ultimesque. I haven't heard from the creator Max Breedon (eggmceye) in months.

 

[anvi]

Looks interesting.

 

[Beastro]

What kills the game is a bored playerbase that abandons the game for something else and/or developers selling shit to other groups and changing the hell out of the game usually for the worse.

A problem also is how the genre developed as both players and developers learned as they went.

UO and EQ were made at a time when the idea was to simply create a open world for players to dick around in, which they did and they were sucessful. But then there comes up the spectre with the developer (and publisher most of all) of if the player base is too dumb or simply won't play the sandbox in a good way.

Emergent gameplay is too random from their point of view. If people want PvE and PvP content given them it in the most controlled conditions possible so the developer can produce the most consistent experience.

You instance everything so others can't interfere, you lock out cross team chat so people can't smacktalk and offend one another, you remove the human element from PvP further so people react more like they died to an NPC when beaten by another player and aren't as hurt.

In the end most made sure the players experience is predictable enough to leave as few surprises as possible.

No wonder it's shit.

Same reason why things like MMA are now shit. UFC above all others doesn't allow rivalries to grow organically from fighter interaction now, they need to manufacture fighters career stories as much as possible to make the most consistently profitable fights happen rather than leave it all to chance. I remember being sucked into watching a UFC event last year where the expected winner, an up and coming to be big star, went up against someone no one expected to have chance, chosen as a safe bet by the UFC to put another win on the other guys belt. The underdog won, everyone was going crazy happy at such an awesome upset, but during the aftermath the camera quickly cut to Dana White's face and you could see he was furious. His next generation big name was spoiled. This "good fight" the fans were loving most likely lost the UFC millions in the future had it just been another victory for an undefeated to be champion.

The way MMOs, and games in general now, have gone is the same way. Doesn't matter if it's less fun for the player, that ultimately isn't the most important thing to those with the most weight pushing things around.

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

Don't many mmos offer pvp servers and pve only servers? I just don't play enough and i need a better connection than hotspotting.

Hard for me to get past the boring grind. I used to love grinding now its less so. And all games i guess grind in some way except maybe pick a path adventure games with no stats. Even mario is grindy; stomping on goombas, collecting poweups, coins, extra men.

Maybe its just a phase and i'll get addicted again.

 

[Gerrard]

MMOs that have split PvP and PvE servers just mean that the PvP is an afterthought and it's shit (more than otherwise).

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

Well that's gay.

 

[anvi]

I had a lot of fun on the EverQuest PVP servers! The balance was nonexistent, but still, it was really fun. But it is true, it was an afterthought and it always is if the PVP isn't part of the game.

 

[Beastro]

The only issue with unbalancing of the EQ sort is when some classes wind up favored over time and never fall into eclipse while others never get their day on top.

An example of the former from what I've heard is that Rogues have always remained great in WoW, just being varying levels of awesome, in the latter case, Paladins in EQ never seemed to get any PvP love and remained a class that shone only when played by an exceptional player.

 

[Norfleet]

How long did they typically last?

Your typical MUD might have a heyday anything from 6 months to year and a half before a combination of predation, funding/hosting issues, and/or player/administration drama would bring it down, either outright, or just leaving it limping on life support. Some of the longer-running ones could go on for two or three. Fairly typical run times for even a modern MMO, really. You get 6-18 months of glory followed by either an outright closure, or just a spiral of decline where everyone knows the good days are now in the past.

 

[Phaserlight]

Yeah, so, Vendetta Online: it's pretty different. You've got Newtonian Mechanics, meaning player skill is much more important than leveling up / acquiring the best gear. It's in space, it's indie, it's been running for 17 years, and it runs on everything from Ouya to Oculus Go.

 

[deama]

There's conqueror's blade that's a mount and blade style siege (has open fields too) type of game; it even has an overworld map similiar to mount and blade.

 

[somewhatgiggly]

Space Station 13. It has open pking going on, but it solves the usual problems in two ways. First, entrenchment isn't an issue because because the rounds only last around a couple hours tops. Second, the everyone becoming a murderhobo issue is solved by having antagonist roles be secretly assigned each round.

This fits. Though nowadays you might as well call it a Battle Royale light. it's you, your 'team' (your department) against 20-100 others who are obsentially in the same camp fighting the villian of the round: a vampire, a changeling, corporate spies, gangsters, cultists, aliens, alien thieves. Or try the Fallout mode where you can be NCR, Legion, Vault, BoS...or the WW2 servers...or the like. They come and go. No skills, only a few perks on some servers, just a clean slate, your ping, and how much you want to risk carpal tunnel.

Honestly the main problems I've had with it is 1) communication and 2) Stagnacy. People are too short-sighted and unless you make a 'name' for yourself or metagame no one really works together. Mid RP servers are a tad better at this - Hard RP servers are too restrictive and 'light' RP don't have any RP to begin with. It waxes and wanes. The second is that once you see nearly everything that's it - it takes months, if not years, for something new to pop up; though most servers have weekly/monthly updates on minor things.

 

[deuxhero]

Final Fantasy 14 and Dragon Quest X: They're actually alive and (as far as I know) not pay to win bullshit.

 

[Bricker]

Thanks for your suggestions, guys!

 

[LeStryfe79]

I liked Mabinogi for its life skills and Entropia Universe for atmosphere. God help you if you play Entropia though. Let's just say I'm a huge fan of con artists and pyramid schemes. Both games have good music and came out before WoW.

 

[Sundevil96]

https://store.steampowered.com/app/373720/Ryzom/