This! What was it that made it so addicting? You know the old "Evercrack" nickname. I would sit up all night playing just for that next 'thing', be it exp, a rare drop, a key, etc. Granted some of those carrots were on long fucking sticks, but games these days practically shove the carrot in every orifice available with a toothpick for a stick.
Trouble is the genre has evolved since the days of EQ1, today you would have less people fucking around at lvl 30 doing nothing than you did then, most of them would progress towards lvl cap, and even at EQs original leveling speeds they would reach it.. then what? People would quit in droves the second they realized that the primary block to their progression isnt that they can't kill the mobs, its that some guy who hasn't worked in 10 years killed it at 5 am with his box crew so he would sell the loot on player auctions.
There are ways to deal with it with simple changes by the devs. Random spawn timers is one of the most important, along with lockout timers that overlap multiple spawns. That way everyone has a reasonable chance to kill the mob, not have to be online 24/7, and without one group cockblocking it.
Oddly not much has chaged in a decade. Something about the ubersword of flaming leetness. Doesnt get the panties off.
yep. agree wholeheartedly with this... I don't get the short leveling thing, rush to endgame to play a lobby game.. I don't understand why developers have taken that approach..
And.once again, I'd like someone to explain where the funding for such a game would come from.
I think with the recent success of games like Dark soul a company might consider it for sure.. It's really not as risky as you seem to think...
Something that games can work on; combat mechanics are simple enough to improve upon if people give a fuck about it.
But this is a problem that mmos have always struggled with, in a single player game you can give people a difficulty tuning tool to let them pick their poison. In an mmo you can't so if you make the game harder and harder so that the 'good' players find it challenging you start to alienate more and more of the 'bad' players. In EQ we raided with a ton of people who just couldn't handle playing a game like wow on a competitive level because they werent good at that type of twitch play. That faster pace costs you your soccer mom raiders and also kills alot of ingame chat that occurred during combat and downtime.
What I'm thinking would be a good idea is some kind of combo of how GW2 did it, and a skill system rather than a level system. In addition to that, less "level" spread. I'm so sick of seeing games where everyones in the newbie zones or at the endgame. I want something where there's a ton of content, but less of a level spread, so you have time to actually experience it. Maybe slower leveling, and encouragement for trying different dungeons and areas. I felt like in wow I missed tons of shit because of how fast I leveled off of quest hubs. A lot of the most distinct EQ memories for me were low and mid-game dungeons like befallen, beholders maze, splitpaw, sol dungeons...stuff like that. I think eq-kunark-velious all were such a cool experience because gear didn't inflate too fast, and level cap wasn't drastically jacked up. People were still doing classic/kunark stuff when I played in velious, and the population was pretty healthy. I feel like most MMOs now have so much power gain after an expansion that the old world gets abandoned almost instantly.
