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What was the reason that drove you away from another MMO

1246

Comments

  • What stopped me? The things:
    -No role playing.
    -Neon armour and weapons lit up like Christmas trees.
    -Glittery cartoony mounts, and flaming corgi's.

    The only role playing games I stuck with were Everquest 2 and Star Wars Galaxies... But they became far too dated.
  • Since I am here, that shows I have quit every MMO I've played to date

    DAoC - Dwindling population coupled with NF removing the flavor of the realms
    WoW - I played vanilla but quit when I discovered that every expansion would increase the max level = gear grind every expansion. I hate constantly re-gearing.
    WO - Wizardry Online was a small but very harsh game which I loved. I quit because they made free players clearly inferior to paying players (and it was costly to pay)
    CoH - Lack of end game content. Great game and I loved the leveling but once I got to max lvl there was nothing to do but reroll.
    WAR - A broken dream. I loved the concept, the races/classes and what was promised but they released half baked and the poor game mechanics showed and continued to get worse. That and so many broken promises. When I found the way they were going to introduce Skaven, that was it.
    SB - Shadowbane was another great idea that released half baked. That and it suffered from crippling bugs/performance issues, an empty world and zero end game. I ran across the world once and I spent hours trundling over near featureless/empty terrain. Last straw was having our city raised and then PKed until my armor literally fell off.
    ESO - Only recently took an extended break because all I was doing is logging in to play the mail/craftwrit/resource hunt game more than the actual game due to time. Plus the way they treated the Argonians was appalling compared with other races. I may still return since I have to do something until at least CU come out.


  • Personally, i get driven away by the MMO's that pose of being different when it's really just a major grind-fest and because of this, all the other features are majorly under refined.
  • First of all hugs to @Megs

    I think in the end it's the balance of fun and the chores/disappointments you have in a game. Also I play a lot with 2 close friends, it tends to be a sort of compromise decisions on what each of us is looking for or getting fed up with. We have gone back to games we left and if we don't find a new good one we probably keep drifting around and going back to some only to get disappointed again. 

    Elder Scrolls Online
    + Was really fun to play as group and I like the story
    - Overall feeling of them breaking promises to their community and getting more and more greedy
    - Constant changes to the classes and gear 

    Guild Wars 2
    + Interesting group play and lot's of option for skills & weapons
    + Gear don't get outdated
    - Dungeon still buggy and no longer improved since focus shifted to fractals
    - They made a change to fractals and decided to re-set your progress
    - Story is not always that gripping

    Final Fantasy
    + Preset of the story seems interesting and a nice looking world
    + Interesting crafting system
    - Endless fetch quests marked as the main quest line
    - Quite static feeling combat

    Star Wars: The Old Republic
    + Interesting story
    - The combat doesn't really feel very fun

    Black Desert Online (oh dear..)
    + Very beautiful world and characters 
    + Frequent content updates
    + Big world, interesting exploration
    - Endless grind
    - The whole no personal trading + controlled market prices
    - The RNG on your RNG. 
    - The pay to win elements and pay for convenience.  The way the game went to great lengths in inconveniencing you so you would buy the convenience items.
    - This is perhaps the most difficult to word out, but I felt as if the game failed at creating a world for PvP + Crafting +PvE to co-exist, which I feel created a lot of toxic behavior in game as well as the forums.   
  • ArchivedUserArchivedUser Guest
    edited June 2017
    *attempts a huggle on @santrasa*

    Thanks, I forgot how emotional I was when i wrote that, normally my health issues just make me laugh, got to see the funny side of confusing the word mushroom with sausage... it always makes me giggle when I can't touch the top of my nose with my finger and poke myself in my eye or shove it into a nostril.....

    But yeah, it doesn't make it easy for getting to get involved with groups in a game. :neutral:

    I've played a couple of the games you have and, yeah, that's a terribly accurate analyses of them :)

    How to get a chance to meet your wonderful self in the game :smiley:
  • ArchivedUserArchivedUser Guest
    edited June 2017
    I'm hoping for tens of thousands of hours of grinding required to max (exaggerated)
    We should be hoping for tens of thousands of hours of fun playing the game without grinding...regardless of level.
  • santrasa said:
    First of all hugs to @Megs

    I think in the end it's the balance of fun and the chores/disappointments you have in a game. Also I play a lot with 2 close friends, it tends to be a sort of compromise decisions on what each of us is looking for or getting fed up with. We have gone back to games we left and if we don't find a new good one we probably keep drifting around and going back to some only to get disappointed again. 

    Elder Scrolls Online
    + Was really fun to play as group and I like the story
    - Overall feeling of them breaking promises to their community and getting more and more greedy
    - Constant changes to the classes and gear 

    Guild Wars 2
    + Interesting group play and lot's of option for skills & weapons
    + Gear don't get outdated
    - Dungeon still buggy and no longer improved since focus shifted to fractals
    - They made a change to fractals and decided to re-set your progress
    - Story is not always that gripping

    Final Fantasy
    + Preset of the story seems interesting and a nice looking world
    + Interesting crafting system
    - Endless fetch quests marked as the main quest line
    - Quite static feeling combat

    Star Wars: The Old Republic
    + Interesting story
    - The combat doesn't really feel very fun

    Black Desert Online (oh dear..)
    + Very beautiful world and characters 
    + Frequent content updates
    + Big world, interesting exploration
    - Endless grind
    - The whole no personal trading + controlled market prices
    - The RNG on your RNG. 
    - The pay to win elements and pay for convenience.  The way the game went to great lengths in inconveniencing you so you would buy the convenience items.
    - This is perhaps the most difficult to word out, but I felt as if the game failed at creating a world for PvP + Crafting +PvE to co-exist, which I feel created a lot of toxic behavior in game as well as the forums.   
    Posts like yours make me want the Insightful button back! 
  • [Agree]
  • The last MMO I played was Guild Wars 2. I believe I quit...maybe a year ago? I had played it since it launched and loved every minute of it. I had a lot of fun doing World vs. World and dungeons with my guild. I was in the top 100 achievement point holders in the game. I had badass legendary weapons and was almost impossible to kill.

    After a while, though, it became a lot like a job. My determination to earn as many achievement points as I could became tiring. We were in a large content drought, as well. There was little reason to login anymore. One of the biggest reasons I left was the devs decision to completely neuter the profitability of dungeons. I hear that even now there is almost no reason to do them anymore. That part of the game has been completely abandoned.

    On the plus side, the core members of my guild have all stayed friends. We've become a community of gamers that play and hang out together all the time. I hope that someday I might be able to lead them again in AoC. Perhaps we'll regain the prestige we had in GW2.
  • What drove me away from other MMORPGS was:

    • That I had no impact on the world.
    • The RNG.
    • The P2W.
    • How the Crafters had no consequences on the highest tier of content.
    • The Crazy cosmetics that felt out of place.
    • Fast travel and teleportation.
    • The lack of involvement of the Developers with the community.
    • The developers saying, they will fix something and then proceeding to postpone it indefinitely. Teasing us with Soon Tm for months and sometimes years in other words. The lies.
  • My necro sense is tingling 
  • Game not fun to play or enjoyable.
    Cash shops and hidding things behind cash shops.
    Gear scores and other gear type scoring systems (item tiers for one)
  • I have played MMO's since they were text based (Zmud etc.), then I went to UO, EQ, AION,  on and on and on... what drug me away from most of them was my friends moved on and I followed. I still enjoy most of them.. WOW was a big one for me but I left that for an entirely different reason. Vanilla was awesome... But after they added in look for group, looking for guild, looking for raid, gear scores, player owned areas where you could farm resources without even having to explore the world, flying mounts, and just plain dumming down everything to where you could pull 4 groups in a heroic and it was no big deal, I had enough of it.

    I felt that adding in all the LFG/LFR stuff was a good idea in the sense that those that didn't want to be social could just pop on and join a group... but since you didn't even have to ever talk to anyone it was a really anti social experience... no one in guild ever asked for help or were looking for more because all they had to due was click a button and boom full group.. and because gear scores existed everyone was automatically able to clear the dungeon without any risk... 

    Crafting became a joke because anything you could make was crap compared to anything you could find in a LFR run... 

    You never found anyone just exploring the world since you didn't even need to be in the world to level.. just use LFG/LFR and you're good.. hell.. it was faster than questing at some points... 

    I could go on and on but basically wow is the only MMO I left because I had gotten sick of it. 
  • I have been playing WoW on and off for many, many years. Part of the reason I quit again is because I get tired of the constant gear resets. I would just get my character built up then all my gear would become worthless. When BFA the newest expansion came out I just couldn't find the motivation to do it all again. The gear grind, pathfinder, basically doing everything over. I also didn't like the fact that no matter how much work I put in some new player could catch up to me in a very short amount of time. It made all the work I kept pouring in feel useless and hallow.
  • Games being boring looking, nothing fresh and exciting, always the same shit on repeat..
  • ArchivedUserArchivedUser Guest
    edited September 2018
    Guild Wars 2 for me, since Guild Wars 1 doesn't really count. In the end I quit because it was nothing like GW1. I pretty much entered the first dungeon i found and left it max level with max gear like a episode of southpark, only to find out there was little else for me to do in the game. I don't like zerg gameplay, I don't like action combat, so with these core mechanics distancing me from enjoyment caused me to quit after a month or 2.

    Played GW1 to death though, really enjoyed the combat system (although somewhat archaic now). The vast amounts of builds and strategies served to keep things fresh for a long time, the low level cap and gear cap were also things I really enjoyed. The only grind in that game was for cosmetics/titles, and there was endgame content aplenty. And the PvP was so good!
  • A few reasons depending on the game...
    • 'The Vision' of the game, and/or mechanics, radically changed... Examples: SWGs NGE, EQ2s focus on Ascension levels/classes over the Core Classes/Abilities. Ect...
    • Repetitive Grinds for no reason other then to waste the players time; but implemented to 'stretch' content.
    • RNG. A little randomness is great and fine, locking everything behind a RNG mechanic, not good or fun for anyone.
    • Game Stagnation.
  • PvP died in EQ2 after they removed level-locking.  Virtually everyone left.  I stuck around because PvP was not my main focus, but the game became boring with no one to fight.  The population became so low that all the raiders left.  Crafting became pointless because remaining players only wanted PvP gear obtained with tokens from NPC merchants.  So, the crafters left. 

    Pay-to-win made it worse.  Sony's parting shot was to introduce AA potions available for real money to automatically raise your AA to 320.  You had to buy these potions if you wanted to win at the rare PvP that remained.  Shortly afterwards Sony was gone.

    However, the final straw was the mercs you could obtain that allow a solo toon to kill everything in a zone.  They eliminate any challenge.  

    So, you cannot PvP, it is rather pointless to craft, and it is almost impossible to die below max level unless you are soloing heroic content 7 to 10 levels higher than your toon.  You just go through the motions of mindlessly completing quests, largely letting your merc kill everything for you maybe while you look around for anything to harvest or collect.  It is so dull it has even made me lose interest, and I probably stuck around longer than 97% of the one-time PvPers.

  • ArchivedUserArchivedUser Guest
    edited September 2018
    They all felt like an easy single player rpg but without the great cinematics or character voice of a single player game.

    Instanced group content felt so optional... like a Co-op mode which became boring after the 3rd run. No valuable rewards.

    Isolated PvP (world map areas for PvP only, BGs) was so underwhelming. 

    I want an mmorpg in which the story of the server is the adventures of Fellowships, groups of players overcoming PvE and hostile players in an open world. Not quest chains that offer xp and a gear set which will be replaced within 2 levels.

    I want an mmorpg in which I face a danger in every step, not mobs that die in half a hit or that stop chasing me after 10s.
    I want Raidbosses out in the open, or deep inside an area, ruin, castle, cave, forest, mountain, lair so that I can fight other players for them, and loot great rewards.
    I want epic raid bosses in which for the first 2 years the whole server comes to a truce in order to take them down and later I wanna see massive alliances raging war over them, and the priceless rewards that the bosses will offer.

    I want as soon as I step outside of city walls to feel like everybody might be dangerous.
    I want players to gain PvP experience by countless encounters from hostile people, and not by copying a meta build and skill rotation.

    I want wars to be about towns, castles, guild halls, Raid Boss.
    Not for a ladderboard.

    I want an open world mmorpg (with modern combat and graphics)
  • ArchivedUserArchivedUser Guest
    edited September 2018
    The one I played the most was WoW. Over the years the social aspects were removed. It's turned into a single-player story experience, and that's not why I play an mmorpg. In this genre I'd prefer to be a part of something bigger. The story doesn't need to revolve around me. I'd play a single player game if I wanted that.

    And of course the gameplay design of grind, grind grind: chasing the eternal carrot. The experience is diluted...all that matters is the shiny prize at the end. It's not about having fun; it's about the potential to have fun later on.
  • I stopped playing MMO's seriously back in the early 2000's shortly after Ultima Online introduced Trammel.

    Since then I have played several games that have tried to replicate the "spirit" of pre-trammel Ultima Online, but they never fully succeeded for a variety of reasons (e.g. Darkfall Online and Mortal Online). These games became too PVP focused and struggled to introduce bug fixes and sandbox content quickly enough.

    Personally, I feel that World of Warcraft destroyed the MMORPG for me. Its huge success meant that for the next 15 years every developer felt compelled to make WoW clones to try and get a piece of the pie. We forgot about the sandbox heritage of MMORPGS, like Star Wars Galaxies and Ultima Online. I am hoping that Ashes of Creation will usher in an old-school MMORPG renaissance. I hope they can produce something really fresh and new, whilst also being inspired by the depth of gameplay that the older MMORPGs provided to their gamer base.

    Since than, most other MMO's haven't attracted me for the following reasons -

    1. No risk. No meaningful encounters. Easy mode is basically what characterizes the modern MMO, they are soooooo boring. I'd much prefer just play a well made single player RPG like The Witcher.

    2. Very little sandbox content. The MMO market has been dominated by themepark MMO's. Once again, modern themepark MMO's are just boooooring. They are basically just very average single-player games. Sandbox games allow players to create their own fun and meta-games. Themepark MMOs however just hang a carrot over a players head ad infinitum.

    3. No global PVP. Modern MMORPGs are too PVE focused. (The irony is that i'm not a big PVPer, I just like the risk and the economic benefits that global PVP affords).

    4. The damn concept of an end-game! I hate this concept in modern MMO's. WoW really refined this idea of an "end-game". Basically with these games you just burn through content to get to "end-game". This is largely the product of MMOs that are exclusively themepark.  The frustrating thing is that the younger generation of MMO gamers don't know any better. The concept that there could be anything different is extremely foreign to them. They have never played a game where there are multiple viable paths a player can take in an MMO. Most modern MMO gamers just expect a player to grind through themepark content, do end-game content (which is typically raiding, or  battlesgrounds or some crap) and then whine and pine for new themepark content again. Rinse and repeat.

    5. Free to play business models, and subsequently pay to win models.

    6. Single-player focus. Many modern MMO's actually introduce mechanics that make it harder to connect with others in the online world. In sandbox MMO's it is very common to have people just walk up to you and say "Hi!". In themepark MMO's like WoW, everyone is too focussed on just grinding through content, everyone is just in zombie mode. If someone does walk up to you and say something then you may just miss it because the greeting text is propably hidden away in some dialog box (or channel) that you are probably not looking at.

    7. Failure to implement harsh penalties for murderers. Open world PVP is awesome, only if it has mechanisms that discourage rampant player murdering. Games like Darkfall Online failed to introduce harsh penalties and ultimately paid the price.

    All in all, for me, it is the lack of sandbox elements in MMO's that has stopped me playing modern MMO's, coupled with the lack of open-world PVP.

    Ashes of Creation is attempting to do exactly what I have been missing about MMO's. It is attempting to implement both sandbox and themepark elements coupled with a strong focus on meaningful encounters and risk. I have even heard Steven say that he too does not like the concept of an "end-game". I am sold.

    The only MMO I am currently playing is Ultima Online Forever; a private server. But the game is +20 years old and getting tired. I need something fresh, but also something that has those sandbox elements coupled with risk.

    I am putting all my eggs into the one basket with AoC. If it fails then I think I am going to retire from MMO's.
  • Alrighty after some pondering here are my answer, take note these are not from one MMORPG and are in no particular order.

    1. Grind. My thoughts here echoes many others. My mother taught me early no pain no gain so I dont mind the grind, but when the grind is monotonous, too long, repetitive, RNG... I start getting burned out really fast. My personal pet peve is when it feels like I am grinding for nothing or just the ability to grind more/faster.

    2. F2P. Younger me loved FP2 and hated subscriptions but as I have grown older it has reversed. When I play f2p games, I constantly feel like its trying to drain me off money some do this better than others where you might feel you want to reward them I find it still annoying.

    One example of this I have when game wanted me to grind enough F2P money in order for me to be able to do activities and I had to do the grind for each activity every single month.

    3. Bad devs (Bad Balancing). Harm resulting from this can be almost anything but since I am not creative I am going to give just one example. For example bad devs can badly balance the game forcing you to grind every update for that favor of month gear while shitting all over your favorite stuff. Maybe the build you had for years suddenly got made unplayable? Too bad.

    4. No banter/Bad rules/Madman Ban Hammering. I am not nun at convent I like to throw some spicy banter every once and while to lighten everyone's day and ability to not do so starts affecting enjoyment doubly so if you have to watch your every word.

    You know what sucks more than not being able to speak? Getting banned for no reason or should I say for poor reasons. This can take many forms but most common I seen personally is devs mistakenly accusing people of being bots, banning them and not listening to appeals.

    5. Politicization. Seen this done only once but listing it here anyways because it really sucks. Now take note I am not talking about "subtly" underlying some political themes or tackling them in good manner but when I come to game and it feels like its preaching to me like political activist its time to stop.

    6. PVE/PVP unbalance. This is highly personal but I myself enjoy good mix of PVE/PVP and when that mix feels off I dont enjoy the game as much as I should.

    7. Lack of involvement. I highly enjoy being involved in the game, feeling like I changed something (or helped to) and I mean by this for example taking part of guild vs guild battle where the winner takes certain territory. It doesn't have to be anything huge or grandiose like this but when the feeling is not there I look for greener pastures.

    Luckily for me Ashes nodes system is looking good.

    8. Bad dungeons. Dungeons are bread and butter of many games, place to get that that unique clear and make memories! So when they suck you really feel it, unique twists and hard bosses are always appreciated.

    9. No "End game"  Just this I just mean I want to have something to do when I am max level. It can be things I have already been doing and doesn't need to be "End game" content in traditional sense of the word. Just dont make me feel like damn this game has nothing for me anymore.

    (Felt like nobody understands what I mean by this but decided to include it if someone does.)

    10. Bad community. Be it the players themselves making community toxic or most likely game being built in such way thats its mechanics dis encourage socialization. Interacting with players is most important factor in MMORPG and its mechanics needs to sustain it.

    Thanks all folks. Thanks for reading through that big text that I wrote horribly, but if you did so you are my MVP!

    Ashes pls get it right, I have no seconds.
  • ArchivedUserArchivedUser Guest
    edited September 2018
    Grind. Do not get me wrong please. Is a grind and is a GRIND. Grind is when you grinding fun content for a while to get what you want. GRIND is grind your ass of your life till you die or swap your card and buy materials from cash shop. No thanks. And lets be honest. This is issue of almost all new MMOs these days. I calling it soft P2W.

    Example: BnS.

    Also PvP ballance was an issue. It is not realy fun when some class can shot you for 70% of life because you did nothing wrong. lul
  • ArchivedUserArchivedUser Guest
    edited September 2018
    Lack of challenge in open world pve. Last MMO i tried was ESO, 90% of the content is mindless spamming and everything falls down before you. It ruins immersion for me, if an npc tells me about some scary dangerous monster that has terrorized the area and killed many warriors, and i proceed to kill it with without any effort yeah no thanks. 
    People always say "game starts at X level" 

    But I always burn out before that, because i am bored out of my mind. 

    I am hoping the world in Ashes will be dangerous I want to group with people go on adventures, be a mage for hire to help traders ve through damgerous areas with vicious monsters.
  • Ohh another huge one... Insane stat inflation.. going from 1, 5, 10 million HPs, to over 100 million one expansion later.... well not to mention getting over a mill in the first place.. Just one example, several stats could be used.. DPS going from 1 million to over 80 billion, to name another...
  • ArchivedUserArchivedUser Guest
    edited September 2018
    I agree with the above as well.. Dated.. Once a game hits 10, 12, 15 years.. it's time to put an old horse down. haha. BUT some games do age better then others.. So I know that s subjective.
  • It stopped being an MMO and started being an instanced dungeon running game with a gear treadmill.
  • They are all the same really, its all grind, grind, grind and end game.

    Or P2W I just got bored of always doing the same thing
  • What drove me away has been expressed many times over in so many posts so...

    Grinding;
    Professions - If it must be grindy then be rewarding; don't negate all our work by making it unneeded at end any level.
    Gear -  Should be upgradeable within limits. No unlimited gear drops; makes professions unnecessary.
    Combat and Quests - If grindy then must have world impact; those trolls attacking the town should really be attacking the town.

    Basically fed up with the theme park, "you are the chosen one" (so are all the other millions of players), "the world never changes" (or only in preset patterns), stale, tired games that have tried to cash in on the WoW fad.
  • I know this is another 'grandpa thing'.. but..

    Remember when you saw someone that that one special weapon or armor piece, and you were like.. 'Wow this person has that thing?!" BUT now a days run a dungeon enough time, have the RNG on your side, and you too can have said piece of equipment.. Result, everyone has the exact same gear.. If you are a fighter you have these '10' items, a wizard, these '10', ect.. Cookie cutters.
    This is a multi-tiered issue:
    • Gear is RNG generated by an algorithm pre-expansion with very few items being 'hand made' for the players to find. Developer Laziness.
    • Every named encounter 'has' to drop something. Instead of dropping that one special item 25% of the time, it's now 5% of the time and the other 95% is trash.
    • Every class of 'x' level all end up with identical gear. If it wasn't for appearance gear, everyone would also look identical.
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