(04-01-2014, 03:41 PM)Zhavi Wrote: Errr... I think you might need to define 'content' before making that claim. I think your definition might be different from mine!
(04-01-2014, 04:29 PM)Naunet Wrote: Wat. That's about as factually incorrect as one can get. xDOkay, fine, I won't speak on that matter since I don't play WoW anyway.
Incidentally, I've never played Lineage. My own perception of Korean MMOs is based entirely around my own experiences with... Korean MMOs. Don't tell me how to think, thanks. ^^ It's my decision to avoid Korean MMOs based on these experiences, and I'm not damning anyone who enjoys them. They are simply not something I am willing to touch anymore.
I still think it's ridiculous to tar an entire region's games with the same brush, regardless.
(04-01-2014, 04:22 PM)synaesthetic Wrote: The idea that Korean MMOs are "grinders" is borne out by historical evidence. It's not just Lineage. It's Ragnarok Online. It's TERA. It's Aion. It's Bless Online. Pick any random Korean MMO and count how many layers of random dice rolling is involved in endgame gearing. We'll use TERA as an example because it's the most recent one I've played.I admit, I stopped playing Tera a long time ago. I wasn't aware it got that bad. Still don't think Aion's that bad, however, especially if you never bother with eternals (I sure didn't). It's also kind of disingenuous to bring up Ragnarok Online considering its age.
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You say that Korean MMOs are not grinders, but by and large they are. It's possible that Blade & Soul isn't, as I haven't been able to play it yet. If that's true, then B&S is a freakish anomaly.
FFXIV may be made by Square-Enix, a Japanese company, but it is a Western MMO. Even FFXI was a Western MMO, as it was essentially an EverQuest clone with Final Fantasy flavor and lore on top. Western MMOs can be grinders, too--they aren't immune. However, since Blizzard instigated a sea change in the MMO industry with World of Warcraft, Western MMOs have focused on accessibility ever since, with a strong development focus on reducing, limiting or hiding the grind, or simply making the grind more fun. The Korean MMO industry was not affected by this; WoW was not quite so transformative in South Korea.
I will simply have to fundamentally disagree with your assertion that western MMOs have experienced a sea change that Korean MMOs did not. Aion alone is proof against this (unless you really hate enchanting, I guess), since it is about a million times more bearable than the Lineage series. As a counterpoint, Guild Wars 2 becomes grindy as hell if you want to get ascended items or legendary weapons or even just try to keep up with the "Living Story". And if we're including Japanese games under the banner of "western", PSO2 has a weapon grinding and affixing system that's far worse than almost any other game I've ever played.
It's certainly true that the Korean market is by and large different from the Western one, but the whole thing is just blown out of proportion in insane ways. Not even taking chances with games coming from that region is just plain excessive. You should at least try, especially if you can try before you buy anything at all.
(04-01-2014, 04:51 PM)Ignacius Wrote: Actually, that's also how Diablo works. Â It's just not harsh enough for me. Â I mean, complete harshness. Â Get hit too hard and you'll lose movement speed or attack power, as you'll be injured. Â And when I say slowly coming back, I mean your health only will regenerate after a day, so you may have to think about whether you want to risk going somewhere while injured, knowing you are risking becoming more injured. Â It just seems more realistic that way, to have armor actually mitigate damage normally and injury works how it does in real life (-ish). Â So you can only have so much damage you can absorb without retreating from the danger of the game world to town (or whatever).Well, that's certainly different. I don't know if we'll ever get games that work quite like that. Certainly nice to think about, though. It'd be a completely different kind of game than any contemporary MMO, to be sure.
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Just saying that it is a model that would work, but doesn't seem to be explored. Â Most MMOs have you as a globetrotter rather than being at the mercy of a hostile world.
(04-01-2014, 05:11 PM)Ignacius Wrote: A couple things about this, some that other people have touched on. Â I don't play any Korean MMOs, but I wasn't actually aware that the games I wasn't playing were Korean. Â I just haven't been impressed by them. Â I wasn't aware it was a cultural thing. Â However, having read through their endgame content guides, they do seem a lot "grindier" than I'm used to. Â Hell, western MMOs are damn near throwing new gear at you these days. Â WoW is literally giving you a roll on gear that works for your class and spec at this point instead of making you RNG completely for the entire party. Â It's one of the things I like about WoW nowadays as compared to the vanilla days. Â No ninja looting hunters.Probably shouldn't have brought up WoW at all really, because comparing anything to the juggernaut is pretty stupid in retrospect. We're talking about the one singular exceptional social phenomenon that has never, ever seen its success replicated in the history of gaming here. Pretty sure it's not a good example of anything, certainly not as a model to copy (as all the failed WoW clones can attest to).
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I'd say WoW players aren't wont for content; after so long being the top dog via content drops, I'd say it's probably the most extensive MMO in the world. Â If anything, I'd say their biggest problem is that they're too extensive. Â Having to balance high end PVP and PVE, along with making all the deviations and distractions along the way relevant and interesting, means they're constantly having to fix things that cause problems elsewhere. Â I guess that's a better problem to have than "no-content".
At any rate, to your point, yes, obviously F2P models have to create some kind of incentive to get players to play if they're not charging access to the game itself. Some developers use almost entirely cosmetic items for this (Path of Exile and DotA 2 are the most prominent examples of this, followed closely by PSO2). Others choose to walk the tightrope between "unpassable brick wall" and "free lunch", to varying results. Many also sell account services and the like on the side (like cosmetic tickets and such).
I simply disagree with the assertion that F2P is automatically a negative thing, as many F2P games are very competently managed and do just fine, thank you very much. Of course there are also many that are just plain terrible... but as the list of P2P games continues to dwindle into nothingness, you can't really make the assertion that subscription-based games are automatically better, either. It's simply not a clear-cut proposition.
The fact is, the only contemporary games on the market that are still P2P (in the West, at least) are World of Warcraft, Final Fantasy XIV, and EVE Online. And that's it. Some assert that everything that went freemium or F2P did so because they were inferior games... which outright proves the rule that the business model guarantees you NOTHING. It is entirely up to the developer to bring value to the players, and if they fail to do that, their game is doomed to fade away no matter what business model they use.