Old Schooler's generally feel that their way was better. Much like Grandpa insists that a 57 Chevy was the best car ever made.
It's my thought that they are just different.
Eve would definitely be an old school game and really it might be the only game to carve out a successful niche in the market along side WOW. It really only has 1 treadmill, money, and you use this for all other activities including buying a ship. Because of this, it has a true sandbox type feel, with corporations taking over parts of the galaxy and economic corporations raging war on the market.
I don't know why Darkfall failed. Generally, by what I read on their forums, it was not a very friendly environment (downright toxic). It certainly had many Old School elements including corpse looting.
Generally, because Old School games were based on adventuring, their adventuring content was often very challenging. And because the more rewarding content was group based, they were generally more cooperative.
I remember playing Neverwinter Nights, where we would all dump our loot in a chest and someone with high Appraise would sell it at top dollar and divy it up. I don't believe anyone ever stole money in 5 years of gaming. Why? Because the next day they would find themselves isolated and have no one to adventure with. Also, most of the people who stuck it out there were much more mature than your WOW player.
To be honest, I despise the WOW layout of areas (talking outside). Stick 100 mele or throwing creatures into an area, with some different colours and levels, call it content. On the other hand, some of their instanced content is fantastic, so I will give them credit where it is due.
All these people making games could learn a few things about designing ares from Sir Elric, who designed Melnibone Server in Neverwinter Nights. Perhaps my favorite area in any game is the Sandmen area on Melnibone server in the game Neverwinter Nights. The guy who made this server was not your typical gamer, he was an actual programmer who went on to work on some of the professional made modules for NWN2.
Basically, its quite a large area taking in 2 screens. There are some basic mele units, Sandmen, who would take your well equipped fighter to half health solo. So draw 2 of them and your in trouble. The Sandmen Elite are tougher still and you can not knock them down. They will take you to near death. And the Sandmen Champ is not soloable, he is worse than the elite and will disarm you. Most of these units are grouped in pairs and kind of move around like they are patrolling. Some are static guarding key points but not that far from any of the roamers. They all have damage resistance and only take serious damage on a critical hit. Most of all their area looks like an area they are living and guarding as part of a military operation.
The Sandmen would be bad enough but they also have a rather nasty Archer unit that if undealt with will kill you in a few rounds. Throw in a few Mage units that basically try and debuff you, confuse you, then spam an AOE death cloud on you called horrid wilting. Both the Archers and Mages tend to roam around and drop on you when you least want them to. Oh yeah the mages have the feat Epic Evade which allows them to evade your first attack every time.... sweet!
Keeping these fellows company is a huge Land Shark, which will knock you down, some Bebliths, which strip your armour off, and Beetles each with their own immobilising ability. Most of these are tucked into corners, but the shark has been known to travel around.
So when you go into this area it is quite a challenge. You have to react to the roamers and you have to know who to pick up when and how to help your team the best in each situation.
And this is what I feel old schoolers want. An area that is a puzzle in itself. Too often we just youtube the latest boss in a dungeon and none of the MMO areas offer any challenge.
Saturday, August 14, 2010
Old School MMO's vs New School
No, I am not talking about the film where Will Ferrel kills an old man by having him wrestle in a tub of jello with 2 hot chicks.
There has been a lot of talk on some of the MMO forums about what is better old or new school MMO's. First, lets define what old and new school means and if you are an old or new school player.
If your first MMO was World of Warcraft, then you are likely a new school player.
If you were playing online rpg sometime before WOW, then you may be an old school player.
New school refers to the series of MMO's that have copied many features of WOW. In these games, you tend to level quickly and then spend a lot of time in what is referred to as end game.
If your mother has a big gold question mark above her head with a quest to do the dishes, you are new school.
If you think that words like pwn and leet are elvish, you are new school.
Old school games you tended to take a lot longer leveling and you spent a lot more time in each level bracket exploring or dungeoning. There was even a roleplay aspect to some of the earlier games... not immersion, roleplay. You were expected to actually act like a Paladin, if you played a Paladin.
If you have ever been encumbered by loot, you are likely an old school player.
If you have ever lost a level by dying, you are likely an old school player.
If you have ever said, "back when"... you are definitely old school.
If you have ever attended a wedding between characters (oddly I have)... well you might just be crazy.
While I would probably consider myself an old school gamer, looking for a game where you played through each level rather than rushed from gold question mark to gold question mark, I will admit that I could live without a lot of the repetative grind that many old schoolers cherish.
I remember walking sideways back to town, because my character was so heavily encumbered he could not move properly, but strafing seemed to work. I could live without this memory or this type of grind.
So what constitutes an old school game. Quite simply, less treadmills. MMO's are designed with a series of treadmills. And like little hamsters, players will run on these imaginary treadmills to get their various rewards. A game like WOW has multiple treadmills. There is of course XP, then Reputation, PVP points, Arena points, badges/tokens, quests, attunement quests, crafting, gathering, money, mounts, raiding... etc. Sometimes I have heard these referred to as themepark type games, where a bunch of rides are put in. I think treadmills are more apt as completing most of this content is as boring as running on a treadmill. An Asian MMO probably has 2-3 times as many treadmills as WOW.
Old School games tended to only have 2 treadmills. Money and XP. Some had crafting. You often crafted to get money, so it was often still a money treadmill. As a result, there was a lot more content devoted to adventuring.
Adventuring was the focus of the game. Not collecting poofballs
The harder the content the more money and xp it yielded. The less people you did it with, the better. However, all the good content was group content so the social aspect was much greater. I remember raiding Kara with people in my guild who had never done an instance before. Soloing was just not possible or profitable in many of these old school games. As a result, the game tended to be about the adventure. About taking on new areas and/or doing it will fewer people. Constantly, pushing yourself to improve your character.
In the end, what I think people miss most is adventuring. Most of these newer MMO's have so many treadmills, you spend half your time doing things that are not.
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