Free MMORPG and MMO Games

In a word, simplicity. There’s something to be said about a game where the characters have only five abilities, one being passive, yet still provide layers of complexity and strategy.

The reason League of Legends is able to accomplish this is through their skill trees, rune system and item store, which allow players to completely customize each character without adding additional abilities. While players can spend hours tweaking their stats, when they get into the actual game it becomes very simple.

When comparing it to my character in Star Wars: The Old Republic, I have two hot bars filled with 24 abilities, then an additional two side bars with another 18 or so abilities, buffs, items and skills. I can’t remember the last time I played a MMORPG  where I had so many abilities as SWTOR. Full disclosure the only other two MMORPGs I played to the level cap were LoTRO and Warhammer Online, neither of which, from what I remember, came anywhere near SWTOR.

However I have played dozens of other MMO games to mid level and I can’t recall  filling up my hotbars by mid game in any of them. In comparison I had filled my two bottom bars and nearly another full side bar before I hit level 25. Then let’s not forget a fifth hotbar for companions.

However there’s a certain complexity that is expected when playing a MMORPG, much more than a MOBA game like League of Legends, but when is enough enough? Do we really need 40 abilities and items to select from while in combat?  Seems like overkill to me and while I don’t expect or even want a MMORPG with only 5 abilities, it wouldn’t hurt for MMO developers to take a look at what RiotGames is doing with League of Legends and perhaps simplify some things.

What do you think? Are MMO games going to far with the amount of skills and abilities players have access to or do you enjoy the complexity of it?

Game Update 1.1 not only brought a new Flashpoint into Star Was: The Old Republic, it also allowed Bioware to respond to player concerns regarding PvP by placing level 50 characters into their own bracket for warzones.

For the most part the bolster system did a good job of levelling the playing field in warzones however it did not account for the expertise stat found on level 50 PvP gear. Higher level players already had access to a complete skill tree and set of abilities, it may have been a mistake to give them a gear advantage (even if only a slight advantage).

As a mid-level character, getting face rolled by full teams of 50′s in all PvP gear was  getting frustrating enough never mind being a fresh level 10 character hoping to try PvP out only to get obliterated. The barrier to entry was increasing with each new level 50 queuing for warzones and it was starting to get slightly out of hand.

On the other hand the inclusion of level 50 brackets has caused problems for some level 50 players on low population servers, leaving them with potentially lengthy queue times just to get into a match against anyone. As far as I can tell from chatting with a few people, the gear gap issue is also still an issue for fresh level 50s going up against better equipped characters. The RNG system behind loot bags probably is not helping this situation either with some players failing to receive a token for PvP gear despite purchasing a LOT of bags.

What’s your opinion?

Are you enjoying the lack of level 50 characters in your warzones? Or do you miss the challenge of taking on a vastly superior opposing force?

Let us know in the comments.

The first time I played the original Realtime Worlds beta of All Points Bulletin I never really got past the first few tutorial missions due to a faulty graphics card. After spending some time with the free-to-play revival of this game, I’m starting to think I may have missed out on a fun experience.

Taking place in the fictional city of San Paro, APB pits criminals vs enforcers in a virtual game of cops & robbers. Featuring no classes, levels or stats, your skill with a gun will largely dictate your success, or failure in this game.

I say there are no classes but that’s not entirely true. Players can purchase equipment and character modifications that grant various buffs in the form of extra health, quicker health regen, ammo regeneration for team mates, and various other goodies I’ve not yet had the chance to play with. This enables players to specialise in various areas, perhaps equipping modifications beneficial to a sniper, or a close quarter shotgun wielder in effect creating your own custom class similar to the perks/specialisation features of modern FPS shooter titles.

Character customisation features some of the most varied options and choices you will likely ever see in an MMO, and will probably suck up a large amount of time when creating your first character. I was able to knock up a hockey masked enforcer tribute to Casey Jones fairly easily. Another childhood fantasy achieved if only in video game form.

Continued…

In the real world we all use a single currency system, ok, maybe two for some of the EU countries that still accept their old currency, but for most of us there’s only one. If you travel to another country you’ll have to exchange your money for whatever currency that country uses, but you remain in a one currency system.

When MMORPGs first started showing up in the gaming world, they followed basically the same logic, one basic currency that players can use to buy and sell their items to other players or vendors. However over the last decade, this system has ballooned into a complicated multi-currency system where it seems everything you do provides you with another type of currency. Call it what you like, tokens, commendations, points, it’s all basically the same.

Today MMORPGs are more about collecting tokens than they are about role-playing or even just playing. They have become a sort of achievement list for players to brag that they played 1000 PvP matches and now have enough tokens to get that awesome weapon everyone wants. To me that’s not a reason to play a MMO.

An overload in currency systems was the reason I quit LotRO some years ago and I have no doubt they’ve crammed even more collecting systems into the game since. However it’s not just a few games that are at fault, nearly every game today follows the same multi-currency system, including RIFT and SWTOR.

The issue has become so bad today that the simple removal of a token makes entire portions of a game pointless and irrelevant. Developers use these token systems to etice players to participate in activities they normally wouldn’t want to. For instance if you want more people playing mini-game X, simply create some epic gear and a token system specifically for that activity.  Boom, you’ll have people flocking to that mini-game in order to obtain those items, but the questions is, should they?

As a developer wouldn’t you want players to participate in certain activities because they’re fun and not because they get rewarded every time they do? If players are avoiding some areas of the game maybe those activities should be removed or reworked until players will actually want to participate.

I personally believe all MMORPGs should stick to a single currency system and allow mini-games or game features to fail if they’re not fun. If mini-game X is boring and I can get the same rewards elsewhere, I will.  That should give developers incentive to make mini-game X better, but instead they take the forceful route and create high rated gear and hide it behind a secondary currency.

Today Turbine announced the fourth expansion to Lord of the Rings Online, named Riders of Rohan.  The expansion which will be released in the fall of 2012 and will bring with it a level cap increase, new locations, mounted combat and much more.  Executive Producer, Kate Paiz, stated that Riders of Rohan will be the largest expansion to date and will be twice as large as Rise of Isengard.

NEW FEATURES:

• Experience the Riders of Rohan – Join with the Rohirrim and ride across the sprawling Plains of Rohan; witness the breaking of the Fellowship at Amon Hen; forge alliances with the Ents of Fangorn; and aid Éomer, adopted son of Théoden, as he seeks to protect his homeland from the growing Shadow.

• Introducing Mounted Combat – Ride into Combat atop your loyal War-steed as you defend the people of Rohan from the forces of Isengard and Mordor. Customize your War-steed’s armor and level its skills over time to aid you in mounted defense of King Theoden’s lands. Mount your steed and gather your fellows to fight against Warbands, contingents of roving warg riders that have been scouted all over the Plains of Rohan! It falls to you to head off and defeat this new threat before they over take the land.
• Advance to level 85 – Continue your legend in the next chapter of The Lord of the Rings Online. Experience new adventures in the epic story, and gain new skills and deeds as you face new challenges on your journey to 85!

Blizzard will be hosting the Battle.net World Championships this year in Asia, launching Diablo 3, Mists Of Pandaria and the first StarCraft 2 expansion, maybe even going to Bed, Bath & Beyond if they have enough time, I don’t know.

But one thing that we do know is that because of their full schedule there will be no Blizzcon this year.

In light of our jam-packed schedule, we’ve decided to hold the next BlizzCon in 2013.

Hmm, so does that mean we’ll get no new info about the Titan MMO project either? Or perhaps we’ll see Blizzard at E3? I had predicted Blizzard would reveal what Titan is in 2012, but now with Blizzcon canceled, I don’t know. We’ll see.

A new location in The Secret World was unveiled in the wee hours of the morning: The Blue Mountains. I say ‘sort of’ because it’s another location within Solomon Island, the New England locale that has had a lot of information already provided to us. The Blue Mountain is located just west of Kingsmouth, and centers around a terrible evil that happened a long time ago. Players can explore what happened here by aiding the Wabanaki tribe, and eventually participating in rituals that will allow us to walk in the dreams of past ancestors. Somewhere in there are Mayans and Vikings, and all sorts of supernatural baddies like Wendigo, Draug, golems, and akab.

I think that sounds pretty cool myself, just think of how much content the devs can add in in future expansions when they aren’t limiting themselves to modern locations! Even with modern locations, there’s a wealth of possibilities, but dreams and memories of the past open even more. Perhaps that’s just my bias though; I studied ancient history in college so anything related to history has my complete attention.

I’ll keep you updated as more is revealed today. I’ve found this article, although it’s in French. The Secret World facebook hasn’t provided anything for us English speakers yet, other than a promise of more to come.

And of course, the moment I post, they update their page. Read the official announcement here.

*Update* Aaaand, as promised, here’s a link to the new video for Blue Mountain.

Ok, semi-new, it was released last Thursday via the Playstation Pulse webcast, however I just saw it today.  The DUST 514 footage is buried inbetween other videos and previews so I decided to cut out the good part and re-post if for those of you who also missed it.

The video is short, only about 25 seconds and shows off two vehicles in action, a warthog (I know that’s Halo) and a dropship. The rest of the video just shows some mashed up combat scenes.

Check out the DUST 514 gameplay video below.

Continued…

Last week BioWare released a video of Game Director James Ohlen talking about some upcoming changes to Star Wars: The Old Republic, one of which was the Legacy System.

Up until now, we knew that the the Legacy system would create a sort of family tree for your main and alt characters and they would gain some sort of benefits. I for one assumed the benefits would be non-combat such as cosmetic gear, titles, mounts or something along those lines, however in the video James clearly states that all characters will gain new abilities and powers.

Being someone that has never played an alt character and who doesn’t plan to, this Legacy System completely gimps players who choose to stick with a single character. The Legacy System almost forces players to start over with an alt in order to remain competitive with other players.

Since SWTOR is all about story and is the game’s main focus, it’s no wonder BioWare would put in place a system that puts a huge incentive for players to start over. However for those of us who are not alt-players, this system makes it pointless to continue playing as we would do so with a permanently gimped character.

What BioWare is trying to do is add replay value to a genre that quite frankly doesn’t need it. Incentivising players to start over should be the last thing any MMORPG should do as the game itself should be engaging enough for players to continue logging in even after completely the story. However when you create a game that has the same old game mechanics and endgame as every MMORPG of the last decade, getting players to start-over is probably the only way to keep your subscribers.

ArenaNet is embracing the Lunar New Year, which is today and according to the Asian zodiac system is the first day of the Year of the Dragon. The dragon embodies passion, independence and ambition which is something that ArenaNet can related to with what they’ve accomplished with Guild Wars 2.

To celebrate the Lunar New Year, ArenaNet has revealed their plans for beta testing and has officially announced that Guild Wars 2 will be released in 2012.

We recently finished our first closed beta test, and we’re now ready to hold progressively larger events. In February we’ll invite select press to participate in beta testing, and in March and April we’ll aggressively ramp up the size of our beta test events so that many of you will have a chance to participate. And of course, this all leads to the release of Guild Wars 2 later this year.

It seems closed beta testing will last at least to April, with open beta and the launch to follow. No hints were dropped as to when GW2 might launch, but it will definitely be in the second half of 2012. Can’t wait!