I'm looking for my next game. I have two goals: at first to play, so focus on the things happening inside the game instead of the game itself. Of course that needs the game to be not rigged, therefore the decisions of the players deciding the outcome instead of their payment or corrupting the devs. It's hard to verify, but there are hints. For example I'm sure that WoW is not rigged. I'm also sure that Black Desert Online isn't rigged. Sure, it's pay-to-win, but your payment translates to objectively existing equipment and the equipment does what it supposed to. I mean it's the job of Sword of Uberness to defeat someone without it, while the job of a champion skin is purely cosmetics. So a game that sells Sword of Uberness isn't rigged (though clearly pay-to-win), while LoL is rigged and because of that also pay-to-win. Anyway, I want to pick a game where I can be pretty confident that it's not rigge even if it's pay-to-win.
Secondly, I want my project to be positive. I want to build something instead of destroying something that previously existed and I didn't like. It doesn't rule out destruction of things in the way, but only as much as it's needed to make space for the new.
The game must be a game, not a toy. So there must be goal and some form of competition, even if just a ladder.
I will look for games and ask you to recommend games. I won't just fool around, I'll write posts about the games based on available information and will discuss them in comments. I want to make an informed decision.
Note: the game must be published, no alphas and early access please.
Secondly, I want my project to be positive. I want to build something instead of destroying something that previously existed and I didn't like. It doesn't rule out destruction of things in the way, but only as much as it's needed to make space for the new.
The game must be a game, not a toy. So there must be goal and some form of competition, even if just a ladder.
I will look for games and ask you to recommend games. I won't just fool around, I'll write posts about the games based on available information and will discuss them in comments. I want to make an informed decision.
Note: the game must be published, no alphas and early access please.
64 comments:
Archeage released a new fresh start server about a month ago, pretty similar to black desert but it has much more focus on pvp
Final Fantasy 14 and Elder Scrolls Online would be the top wowlike PVE endgame games.
DOTA2, Heroes of the Storm, and SMITE are the only mobas like league that are relevant
Maybe a card game like Yu-gi-oh, Magic, or Hearthstone as they dont require any reaction time
Tibia and Runescape are old MMOs that still have a decent following on twitch
eve, no matter what the devs do you can build positive and beat them.
Since you've written about Nostalrius before, I have to ask what you think about playing a WoW private server? I assume there's too many issues between things like amateur dev teams and risk of shutdown.
"The game must be a game, not a toy."
This is where you're going to run into trouble. Toys as online games are profitable, games as actual competition are not. (Using the context that toys are entertainment venues and games are competition centers.)
What sells is the illusion of competition in the execution of a toy.
Competition requires a fair and even playing field. No online game provides that. They can't. Even if they wanted to, there would be differences allowing the dedicated and willing to spend to have an advantage. Lag affects the game? Buy the best computer and connection. Really rich? Move to where the server is. What are they going to do, outlaw everyone who lives within 1000 miles of the server center and has fiber optic connection?
You can ameliorate this with leagues and divisions, but you will always have people who just want to pwn and will intentionally de-level themselves (smurfs, per se.) to win. Imagine if a well known major league sports star showed up at a AA ball club and wanted to play, but wore a disguise so no one would recognize him. The obvious issue is he wouldn't get paid the same... well! Gamers don't get paid. So smurfing is a thing. (Yes I know it's possible for one in millions to get paid. So don't point out that ad absurdum argument.)
See the problem? A lot of people will stop at nothing to win. NPCs never cheat, never engage in "emergent game play" and that's why toys are going to be more profitable, they can be made more complicated while still being reasonably fair to the human players.
There's a reason why companies aren't competing for the big budget online chess master game.
I mean... I hope you find the game you're looking for. I like your blog. But man, there's a wall in your way.
How about this one:
http://www.dualthegame.com/
Albion Online
Heroes of the Storm
Mortal online!
Its been around for several years and most issues are fixed by now.
The playerbase is actually rising instead of declining.
You can think of it as a modern first person version of what ultima online once was. A pretty realistic (for an mmo) world based on rules that makes sense.
Full loot open world pvp with the usual housing/base building etc. Crafting is resource focused, "who controls the flow of the spice controls the universe" and to be a truly good crafter you have to focus on it.
Having a decent guild is very important if you want to achieve something worthwhile, since there is no "high sec" in the sense of how it works in EvE.
Dont be dismayed by the "old" graphics on the site, try it out for a couple of hours. Would suggest that you look into some videos on "how to get started" etc, to streamline the process.
http://www.mortalonline.com/features/
Would love to be part of the "Goblin Squad" in this game, or any similar open world PvP focused ones.
As for goals, there is a leader board.. but a more impressive goal is to arrive at this stage and make an impact on the game world. Figuring things out in this game takes actual effort. And the way you can achieve greatness can take on so many different shapes.
Black Desert Online isn't pay to win. Have you ever won a MMORPG? ;-)
Its Time > Money there. Play one hour and pay as much as you can, will get you not even to Top 25% for months.
For MMO's did you consider Guild Wars 2? Although I'm not sure you can have any meaningful project there. But for playing and economy and etc. it can be good.
Also I would recommend Hearthstone, but because there is no economy there, there could be only one project I think: is it rigged? And there is a high chance that it is.
I tend to agree with Smokeman about game not a toy and competitive.
Maybe you could "design" your own game. That could be a game for itself.
@Anon: Archeage, Final Fantasy 14 and Elder Scrolls Online noted, will read up.
I'm troubled with the MOBA genre, they are pretty much twitch games with little decision making. LoL became interesting exactly because it's rigged. However I don't see a positive project in a MOBA. The "solution" of a fair MOBA is simple (though hard to execute): click faster and more accurately.
I never played or particularly liked card games, that would be a huge new field.
@Provi Miner: Devs are Gods in a game. They could create and destroy any asset at a click. Falcon could literally give a Quadrillion ISK to my enemies just to troll me and I have no doubt that he would get away with it (if he got away with lying to the media to protect criminals, he'll get away with anything)
@Anon: no pirate servers, as they are totally not trustable and can be shut down any moment.
@Smokeman: no game in the real World are fair either. I settle with transparent and rule-abiding, even if the rules themselves give "unfair" advantage to either nolifers or wallet warriors.
@Doctor Jeep: http://www.dualthegame.com/ noted
@zergel Albion Online noted
@Anonymous: http://www.mortalonline.com/features/ noted
@Empz: every item can be bought by silver and silver accumulation can be greatly increased by paying. Sure it's not a "buy skin, get free win" like LoL, but still pretty much "gold ammo"
@Guild Wars 2 noted.
Off the wall idea: SWTOR is a top 5 MMO but increasingly solo; a project to reinvigorate raiding(operations) especially for pugs.
Unfortunately for me, I think " a game, ... goal and some form of competition" leaves out all MMOs since MMOs aren't really games. The WoW mythic raider, mythic+10 dungeoneer, Arena, pet battler, AH Warrior could all be good at what they do and bad at the rest; there is no universal goal or victory condition. An xxxKidxxx in EVE thinking a rich trader is a failure due to no "gf frigate" kills shows that there is not a universal victory condition in MMOs the way there is in eSports games.
Personally, I am sad since I like MMOs and don't watch eSports so find your MMO comments more interesting than the twitch stuff.
Hearthstone or Overwatch would be more interesting than DOTA or Smite.
Hearthstone is a surprisingly deep card game with very competitive playerbase.
Also, I understand that EVE Online devs are partly (?) corrupt and the game is basically rigged, but still it won't prevent you from setting your goals and reaching them. Think of it as of doing business in a corrupt 3rd world country.
Read your comment about card games being a huge new field for you and want to add -- just try Hearthstone for about 2 hours.
It won't be a waste of time anyway as the playerbase is huge (25 million or around that) thus the game concept is good to know just for the sake of understanding current gaming landscape.
@Gevlon: you're right, if you spend money, you're in a better position to make in game silver, but not to a point where we could speak of pay to win. Best money to ingame power conversion would (as in every other mmo) be to buy a high end account (against TOS).
Heartstone is probably one of the worst TCGS. Besides, it allows only limited impact for any kind of constructive project that is not literally, follow meta and use a draft list for arena and you will reach top 10%.
I would advise anyone to play almost anything else before it. (Mtgo, hex, esl)
How about pathofexile? Seems not rigged and not P2W. And you can build heaps of chars in it and achive goals. Also there's currency in it for you to do stuff with ;)
@Andru:
There could be good projects in HS. You show the perfect example for it: you think that the meta list is a need for ladder climbing and you think that the draft list is the way-to-go for arena. Neither is too. The problem is that there is a high chance that HS ladder is rigged (for the same reason as in LoL: you should feel better when you buy cards even though most of the time it does not lead to better decks and for you to play better), and an even higher chance that Arena is rigged (to make sure most of the players can't play it continously f2p).
Also there is no way to make an "Is it rigged?" project because there is no API for HS, and there is no way to tell if the other player bought something recently.
I saying it altough my "main" game right now is HS. But I don't except it to be fair.
As Gevlon said in every game where you can buy something for real money (except game access) the developers (or the publisher) is motivated to "help" those people who pay for it. It can be straight pay to win (or pay to boost or pay to make easier or pay with less time etc.) or it's some hidden help (like in LoL) or both (most likely HS and other card games is in this category).
SWTOR, Path of Exile noted
Hey Gevlon,
may I suggest Ultima Online (www.uo.com) as your new game? The game was published in 1997 and is therefore probably the oldest MMORPG around.
Ultima Online defined the word "Sandbox" versus Everquests and subsequently WoWs "linear progression". EVE Online is heavily inspired by UO. There are certain areas where it is safe for anyone but the best resources are found in areas where there is non-consentual PVP. If you kill a player you can also grab most of his stuff (as in EVE). Since UO doesn't know "soulbound" or other restrictions it has a very vibrant economy, where you can sell your loot to other players. In fact about 99% of all items in the world are created by players, either due dungeons or crafting.
Some years ago a new client was released for the game, so the graphics are not as eye-cancerous as they used to be. But they are still very much sub-par. But since you do not intend to make flashy Twitch Highlights this shouldn't bother you.
By it's nature UO is competitve. You can go for wealth, for PVP achievements or for PVE feats. Since it is "the" sandbox you would be able to create and not destroy. You can basically declare any goal to pursue. Whatever you intended to do in EVE (besides getting lazily rich) you can do in Ultima. You mentioned that you thought about creating a guild of like-minded people. Well here you go.
The game is subscription based with about 10$ a month. There is also an in-game store that allows you to purchase additional stuff. This stuff is part fluff part power. But the power you can buy is nothing you couldn't also achieve by normal play. No dev corruption also!
So give it a try, there is a 14-day trial period available.
It is not needed. Hell, you could hack the Heartstone servers and manually place yourself to #0, or whatever.
Thing is, most Gevlon's projects are based on efficiency in order to become 'good enough'.
Something like: "Don't farm, it's more efficient to account and sell stuff." Or "don't carry m&s, if you're social, they are abusing your goodwill"
In HS, 'follow meta and use draft lists' puts you above 90%. It is literally the easiest and most efficient way to do it.
I still think Black Desert is the game that fits you most. My reasoning:
1. It has competitve features, even on the PvE side.
2. It is the only MMO so far that is an actual world, and not a toy
3. The P2W features aren't that big. I.e. you can sell a costume bought for 20$ for 20 million... or you can farm for 3 hours at higher levels and make the same amount of money. I'm sure you can make more money than that by being AFK. Can a random moron spend 2.000 euros and buy a good weapon? Sure. Does anyone actually do it? Nah.
It might not be great for blogging, but I think you should keep it on the side for your own personal enjoyment.
About Hearthstone: avoid it like the plague. This is coming from someone that has played for ~2 years, there is literally no project you do there simply because the meta is unbreakable by one person and there are no secrets for you to find and 'exploit' to prove a point.
Path of Exile: while it is a fun game, it is also a pointless one. The ladders reset every three months, and then you have to do it all over again. Which entails farming like your eyes bleed, trading the uniques you need for your build and then farming some more. It's good as a side game, but there is absolutely nothing new to discover there.
SWTOR: no point since they removed the ability to buy flashpoint and operation passes from the auction house for in-game money. It would be interesting to see how you fare against the most unfair freemium model in the industry, but without a sub there is no endgame for you.
Final Fantasy 14: Actually good. Has an endgame better than WoW in a lot of cases, but there is a huge dealbreaker for you: a lot of the bosses have tons of dance mechanics. Sure, you need to actually have skill playing the class AND knowing the dance, and the content is actually not faceroll. Also, keep in mind that levelling requires doing the MSQ (main story quest), which is easily a couple hundred hours by itself. It is not skippable, because the endgame will not unlock until you complete it, even if you hit the cap.
Hope this helps.
Another vote here for Path of Exile. Be interested to see Gevlon interacting with the POE economy and build optimisation.
One more vote for Path of Exile. If you need a goal, do races or temp leagues.
Have you looked at Elite Dangerous?
@Empz: You are taking the acronym/phrase "Pay to Win" entirely too literally. By your 100% literal definition there is no game that I know of that is truly "Pay to Win". Sure in LoL you can pay and win a few instanced games - but then the advantage wears off and you are still nowhere near the top of the leaderboards...So you certainly haven't "won the game". And there is no way to buy a win in their championship games - where you would at least get a prize.
When people say "Pay to Win" - what they *mean* is "Pay to Gain an Unfair Competitive Advantage Over People Who Are Unwilling or Unable to Pay - Even if it is Only Temporary"
However, since "P2W" is a much catchier acronym than "P2GaUCAOPWAUoU2P-EiiiOT" - Don't expect people to change and use the literally accurate one any time soon.
5.0 swtor has trashed the game gevlon. Essentially IMO bioware have concluded that pvpers and raiders are only 5% of the playerbase, but the most toxic and the most whiney. So they took us out back and shot us in the back of the head.
I recomend swtor to you if you like starwars, dragon age and really cool stories. As an mmo/project? not what your looking for. Its sad as I spent so much time there and really enjoyed it. Ce la vie.
As someone who doesn't play league, that analysis was pretty interesting overall.
The next game....?
Things changed since LK came out. Not many games offer such challenge nowadays, not even WoW.
I personally would like to see you take on Guild Wars 2's economy, but the only point of making gold is getting legendaries/ascended gear to raid, since most activities in the expac are ganging up on bosses. So it's pretty much pointless.
FFXIV: Gold (Gil) is useles unless you craft, Savages mid expac were pretty hard and even top guilds had to farm gear to have the stats to break the DPS checks. Storyline quests are just your regular JRPG, so it doesn't fit you at all. It will just be a repeat of WoW for you "morons and slackers, windows lickers don't play the game they stand by and farm pets"...
I'm not quite sure what you could take on. Either way I keep reading.
"and an even higher chance that Arena is rigged (to make sure most of the players can't play it continously f2p)."
Except by definition "most players" can't play arena continuously without paying, as you need to consistently get 7/3 on average.
And given the fact that you can indeed achieve that with some skill, rigging seems rather unlikely.
Gev, your number crunching and min/maxing aptitude would do VERY well in Path of Exile. It had a barter economy that you might be able to play around with a lot, although it there is a sort of defacto currency. The builds are very expansive.
However, at the end of the day, I prefer reading about the asocial skills you employ for success against the community paradigm. In path of exile, there really isn't a perceived notion that "success" requires a group. Instead, success is meassured by how fast you click through content. That isn't your style. But, check it out. Anything you say will be interesting.
Ff14 is a slower WoW with better graphics. There isn't much value for me in your analysis that uses such a similiar formula to WoW. The answer to any question about progression is "Grind more Tomes" ((there version of Marks of Justice/Valor)).
Archeage would be interesting, honestly. What I'd say about it has been said.
Regarding card games, Hearthstone has a very interesting card economy where players balance slow, predictable gain in resource versus expenditure of card cost and trades against opponent, but that's been done by many.
Now, Heroes of the Storm would be a challenge I'd love to see you tackle. I would argue that coordination and teamwork is mandated. I would posit that you could not rise to gold without coordinating with your team and following the meta. I'd love to see your original test in the HotS Arena. In fairness, it is a MOBA and faster clicking is an advantage, although it is a slower paced game, but with a faster resolution.
Have you considered Elite: Dangerous? Reminds me of Sid Myers Pirates!
Blood Bowl 2?
Lurk around ubisoft games (the crew, division, etc) and you'll see that your last criteria does actually not matter.
Well, not for some devs.
They are released, yet alpha as fuck.
Gevlon says:
"@Smokeman: no game in the real World are fair either. I settle with transparent and rule-abiding, even if the rules themselves give "unfair" advantage to either nolifers or wallet warriors."
Solid point. The important factors are indeed transparency and clear rules. And these things are lacking in most current products.
Gevlon/Ghostboci,
as one of your long-time readers I would highly suggest that you focus on group-content. All your most popular moves were related to bringing sane people into an organization and tackling high-end content with less tools than perceived necessary.
I presume you still have some contact to your old gangs, or at least some fraction of it. Why not see what they're playing, gather them all up and focus your attempts.
For staying on-topic I suggest that you try either Elite:Dangerous (altough still in pre-alpha, you could be able to actually shape this thing to be a fair game, create your utopia), GW 2 ( I would be interested to see how you'll fare in a matured game and community) or Lord of the Rings Online (new expansion coming out after 4 years, graphic upgrade etc.).
I'll try again.
Offworld Trading Company
http://www.offworldgame.com/
An actual economy game, not just a destruction engine with an afterthought economy tacked on to the back end to be a limiting factor on the players.
from wikipedia: Unlike many real-time strategy games, Offworld Trading Company does not feature combat, instead players must defeat their opponents through trading and acquisitions.
No more BDO. the slewest moneygrab of them all.
I don't follow it for some months and dumped too much money into it (380E total). so my rant will be outdated but everso still valid!
with the vanila horse skilling (T7 where the shit) I opted for breeding the fastest T6, leveld it, and reskilled it for aprox 100E. back then I thought saving up for valencia update until T8 and the enhanced horse skills came. Until my interest dropped completely some months later. (two manned small mudster in ~25 mins with two valkyries back then semi casual hardcore quipped, yes I bought a second account so we two could make a guild (at least three people). after that we quit)
why dump that much money? in a gigantic world like BDO with no waypoints, SPEED is everything! and bestin speed horses will be not available or at least very rare for a heavy but worthy price for a loooong time.
Black Desert Online: T7 vs T8 Enhanced Horse Skills Comparison
Black Desert Online: Horse Skill Split-Screen Speed Comparison (Drift/Sprint/Acceleration)
Black Desert Online: T7 Horse Riding from Valencia to Calpheon in 10 mins
that just one of the money grabs. Gevlon did list all of them. You may think it is not P2W ... but it OHHH so very much is P2W.
It has only grind PVE. everything evolves around getting at least TRIs or TETs and blast through hords of horrible AI. level boss alts (ranger or witch) so you only have to char switch bosses for that lucky drop.
it looks great but gameplaywise there's nothing.
I still think you would like War Thunder. They finished giving every country tanks recently and are now officially no longer in Beta.
How about http://www.battlegroundeurope.net/ ?
Sim-Like MMO, playing Infantry, Guns, Trucks, Tanks, Planes and ships.
Axis vs. Allies, limited resources.
Gevlon,
Life is Feudal goes into Beta next month. (I know you said finished game but hear me out).
I've been playing this on and off for the past 18 months via steam as they launched a standalone game based on the future MMO that they continually upgraded over this time.
It is a feudalistic society with open pvp.
It is a pure sandbox.
There is no GM involvement nor is there pay to win.
You have to build. You also have to work together with other players to do so as you only get a finite amount of skill points to distribute.
Which means there is no leveling.
I jumped back in last week and they've made a ton of progress. I have high hopes for this game.
You don't have to pay for the beta. Just purchase the "Life is Feudal Your Own" game on steam.
http://lifeisfeudal.com/mmo?l=features
Try Tibia. If you can look past its graphics and lack of sound they you have a true wild west MMO.
@Smokeman
"Competition requires a fair and even playing field. No online game provides that. They can't. Even if they wanted to, there would be differences allowing the dedicated and willing to spend to have an advantage. Lag affects the game? Buy the best computer and connection. Really rich? Move to where the server is. What are they going to do, outlaw everyone who lives within 1000 miles of the server center and has fiber optic connection?"
The best you can hope for is a game within a game. Or just set up a lan connection with your friends.
Another vote for Path of Exile, it's a F2P game that has no gold, and no trash.
Every piece of gear can get traded for something useful. So-called trash drops (non magical, not enough sockets, etc...) get traded for a piece of parchment, that when you get 5 of, turn into a scroll of wisdom (identify scroll)
Other stuff turn into other items, or shards, and vendors can have recipes (Turn in a magical sash and a normal weapon and an orb, to have +damage on the weapon)
The trading gets done on an official website (chaos orbs are the default currency, exalts are more valuable, other orbs less so) and there are very nice tools to assist as well.
Let's face it, guys - playing a dead game like UO, albion or SWTOR is a waste of blogging time.
I think the choice has to be between top dogs - Hearthstone, PoE, EvE, WoW. These are more or less the best games in their respective fields and command attention/will help attract readers.
I know coming back to EvE or WoW is prolly not an option for a wide variety of reasons, so it's going to be between the first two i'm sure. As an added bonus HS has a cancerous team of devs and horrible community interaction with pay to win elements which i'm sure will provide endless material for your blog.
PoE is a much better game but unfortunately it's not nearly as pay to win and will give you very little controversy.. if any..
I hate to be pushy, but I really want to jump on the Hearthstone bandwagon here. I started playing a few months ago as a way to get into games with my girlfriend. I have to say that I'm impressed.
Not to flatter you, but since I started playing, I have been wondering what your opinion of the game would be.
Just take 10 minutes to check it out. Full disclosure - I've never played a card game like this before either and went in fairly resistant to the idea.
@Hanura
It still can be rigged. Skill means that instead of fair win you have 40% chance to win, but with skill you can still win. That's how they could average 7 wins.
Just apply goblin logic here: would they have more profit if they rig arena? Yes. Do they have any chance to caught in the process? No. So why would they not rig it?
I can't see the point of Hearthstone as a project.
There are websites that give you the best current decks, streams that let you see how the best players play them, youtubes of the best arena players explaining how to play arena and skilled players playing entertaining decks for amusement, even of premier players starting payment free accounts and taking them to the heights of the ladder without investing real money.
What niche is left to explore?
+1 For Path of Exile
Because I think you can bring interesting stuff to read. There's some decent info about builds in PoE forums, but I don't see a lot of number crunching and explanations.
-1 For Heathstone
Its probably rigged and there's no data available to reveal it.
Also there's already tons and tons of content about that game.
@anon: Well an "Is HS rigged?" project could be done theoretically. But in reality I don't think it can be done because you have even more limited data about other players than in LoL. So you would need a large group of players to try out things because you could not back up your data with statistics like Gevlon did in the LoL project. But that's not Gevlon's style (also there is a high chance of trolling from the participants).
It is entering Alpha soon, so I know you are not interested yet, but I follow Starborne closely. One this thing that interest me is that each game will last six months, and I am curious to see how this model will pan out.
How about chess? It has everything. Established player base, competitions official ladder?
So you want to "create" Gevlon don'T you? And a while ago you posted your "Knights vs Demons" idea. So let me make another suggestion that may suit you perfectly: Shards Online.
This is the spiritual successor to Ultima Online. It is developed by the same devs. In Ultima Online you have a large "freeshard" community. Think Nostralus in WoW just more numberous and much more individual (new maps, new skills, new art etc.). Instead of fighting it like Blizzard does, Shards Online embraces this idea. It gives their players the ability to become developers themselves. You get a map editor, a programming toolkit (think RPG Maker) and even access to the LUA database. This way you can make your own shard with your own rules. People need to eat? Do it. People can steal other peoples loot? Do it. People only have on death? Do it.
So the developers provide you with graphics and the base of the game. And you can go ahead and out of that create the game you think would be best. AFAIK you are working in the tech industry so this should pose a neat little challenge shouldn't it?
I've checked several games:
- Path of Exile seems like a Diablo clone with no shared World with other players. There are also resets and you can start over again and again. Is it correct?
- Albion Online is in Beta
- Mortal Online has a tiny playerbase: http://massivelyop.com/2015/02/13/mortal-online-has-a-few-thousand-active-players/
-Heroes of the Storm is a LoL clone. It's either rigged and I'm not interested in evaluating that, or it's a silly twitch game.
I appreciate the feedback and will continue evaluating games.
Path of Exile can be played solo all the way to the end. It's a Diablo clone that does not force you to interact with anyone. PvP was, back when I played, a long time ago, before the Forsaken Masters, apparently full of Shadows with that moving spinning attack that gimped everyone with a bad connection or something because of movement tracking lag. There's no competition to be had in PoE. Ladders put you in your own world, and other people are in their own world, you each go against the PvE enemies, and it's who can do the PvE the fastest who climbs on ladder.
The big name MMOs are currently GW2, FFXIV, WoW.
Then you have Black Desert Online, Tree of Savior, which are niche.
@Gevlon:
- PoE: yes, only shared economy
- Heroes of the Storm: yes, LoL clone. But there are several difference: the gameplay is slower (way less twitch), there are several map which have different objectives to do. These objectives helps your team tremendously when done. So the game is a bit like: first (and bigger) part of the match: similar to a WoW BG, last phase: team fights. Also you can't feed a player here, because the whole teams gets XP, not just the killing player. Of course maybe these are not enough differences for you.
Also based on your recent post there is no reason to evaluate Hearthstone, because (I think) there is no way you can teach / help socials in it.
Craft+Trade MMO: A Tale in the Desert
You would love this game, just read the gameplay on the wiki page:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Tale_in_the_Desert
Wurm Online
Take a look at Dofus. It has turn based combat, no level cap, and everything is crafted. It has been around for a while and has a solid player base.
Some commenter earlier suggested that that Elite: Dangerous is in alpha. It is not, unless he was talking about the PS4 version. The PC version was released in 2014. Don't let that comment deter you you from checking it out. (I don't play it, so I can neither recommend nor discommend it).
Regarding PoE - mostly correct.
There's Standard League which has no resets and you don't start over and over. Like everywhere, cool kids always play temporary leagues (those where everyone starts from the beginning and competes to be first, or earn unique items, or whatever), while Standard League is not considered "cool" but I believe most of the playerbase belongs there.
Despite that, the world is shared only in "cities" (noncombat areas), and combat areas are instanced. Well, mostly. They sometimes run "gank leagues" where people can join others' instances and attack them. That's irrelevant.
But yes, it's Diablo clone (far more advanced one than Diablo itself in terms of game mechanics and economy, though) and it has no direct player interaction apart from trading and forming parties, that's why I formerly said that it is a good game but probably not a good game for an "asociality project".
@Antze
"it has no direct player interaction apart from trading and forming parties"
Which is mostly true for WoW (and other theme park MMO) too.
@Tennyson
I googled Dofus because I never heard about it. It appears there is a "Dofus2" called Wakfu. What's about that?
Gevlon, I've visited your blog from time to time and based on what you describe: You want a game that enables you to number crunch and that also has immersion. But you need to realize that the context of P2W can vary based on your goals and experience, as well as a balancing factor.
For example: GW2 would not be generally considered P2W but getting those legendaries is something you can greatly speed up with money. Also getting Weapon skins, which depends on RNG boxes and then you list that in the auctionhouse for extraneous amount of gold so people will again use money for that because grinding in GW2 is a horrible, horrible experience. Lets not forget they broke their promise with introducing the pink gear. Balancing factor? Low impact in pve/pvp performance
How about Eve? People can now fast track into buying titans by injecting skills which they buy with money. Balancing factor? You can still die and lose it all to a newb.
And BDO? There's all kinds of controversial shit, including maids, pets, outfits, selling pearl items in store, etc but I've recently returned and I'm swimming in silver with barely any effort and 0 spent in the store. The question is, do you want to be in the top 1% asap? Then open your wallet to get there roughly 25% faster. But once you've done that, you've taken away the opportunity to get there by number crunching. And what's the beauty in that?
Balancing factor: It becomes exponentially more difficult to have an edge, which allows people to be relatively competitive without spending cash. Yes, pets are needed. No outfit isnt needed. Take the time and use loyalty points to increase weight. Do the quests to get inventory slots. Fishing is a waste of time and CPU Cycles nowadays.
I have made some content for GW2/BDO/ED and most recently, BDO seems to satisfy my immersion + number crunching needs. Thats just my meager opinion.
Athrael.net
@anon 08:32
Omg, if Gevlon goes to A Tale in the Desert i'm going back too.
I know only 2 one of a kind MMOs; EVE Online and A Tale in the Desert. They have no other game even remotely close to these 2.
It is not needed. Hell, you could hack the Heartstone servers and manually place yourself to #0, or whatever.
Thing is, most Gevlon's projects are based on efficiency in order to become 'good enough'.
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