So, I finally decided to check out WoW after a few months. It’s started to become a spurt thing where I’d go back to WoW after a few months and play for a month or so then leave again out of boredom.
As the 3.1 patch downloaded (yeah, I know, it’s been a while), I was going through the ridiculously long patch notes. Outside of the fact that I have to respec my characters again (try remembering how you specced out your various characters after being gone for 5 months) you can see the damage they’ve done to some areas of the game.
Death Knights took a hit as expected (Blizzard said they were going to do something about it since it was pretty ridiculous going up against an army of Death Knights in PvP). But it’s interesting to see how the game’s maturing over time. As fewer people (I’m assuming) are joining up purely to experience the SP game as “new” players, the game’s gone from a largely PvE game to a largely PvP game. Sure the PvE stuff is all there and is the main way you’re going to level up but the focus isn’t achieving top levels for the sake of “beating the game”. Now, it’s just a nuisance to get your character (sorry, toon sounds stupid) to level 80 so you can hit the arenas, battlegrounds and the like.
Part of this transition includes making a lot of the crafting and gathering professions easier to do. No more flint and tinder for campfires. They already got rid of poisons as a craft. No more books to learn fishing and first aid. No more spices and extra ingredients for most if not all food recipes.
Now, I’m the type of player that actually likes crafting. I endured SWG complicated crafting system (and still do today). I got pissed off at Vanguard‘s ridiculously time consuming crafting system. I lamented the lack of crafting in WAR. And, I’m still trying to find the crafting in the CrimeCraft and Aion betas.
I can’t say that I’m going to miss losing inventory space to flint and tinder. And I can’t say that I miss having to lose a ton of space for vials for Poisons. But, as more and more of the requirements go to the point where you’re just going to click a button with one or two basic ingredients in your pack, I’m starting to wonder if I’m going to want to play this game any more.
This brings me to the Ship of Theseus. The Ship of Theseus is a paradox that essentially asks the question: if you replace all of the parts of an object is that object still the same as the original? The Ship in question was a ship that had been maintained for years. As planks rotted, they were replaced. So, the ship was still there but every single part on the ship had been replaced over time at some point. Was it really the same ship?
As older MMOs like WoW, EQ, and SWG keep moving forward (okay, the latter two aren’t except for SWG’s stupid NGE which basically ruined the game for most diehards) and keep updating their games, at what point do you stop thinking of the game as the one you bought way back when? Today’s WoW looks a lot like the original one but as you dig into the details, you’ve got to ask yourself if you’re still playing WoW.
Technically, it’s version 3.1.3. Still it’s got the flavor and setting you expect to see in a Warcaft game but if that’s just hurdles to pass to get to the PvP game which is less about all that back story and more about ranking and PvP kills, what game are you playing?
Assuming some of the others like LOTRO and WAR survive (should we even bother mentioning Conan?) for a few more years, will their experience be the same or will it be totally different? Same house, different furniture. And, is this the way it should be?
While I can’t answer the first question, I think the answer to the second question is a resounding yes. These games need to mature and organically change to match the current population (assuming you’re not trying to win a whole new batch of people like SOE did with SWG…though that didn’t work by the way). You almost have no choice.
As we all know, the populations on any new MMOG always goes through the same set of changes. You start with a mass of different players (noobs, achievers, consolers, whatever) which eventually thin out as they get bored or pwned by the hardcores. Soon, you’re left with the hardcores (at least a majority of them) who will have plowed through the PvE content and are waging continuous war with their fellow PvPers. And, with the game company wanting to milk all they can out of people, the PvE content will be set up to take the average (non-HC) gamer several weeks if not months to complete. Eventually, though, that’ll need to change as those non-HCs disappear and head out into the light with the HCs remain and complain about how long it takes to level up.
Now, I can’t vouch for EQ or AC (or even UO…anyone still play UO??) but SWG (except for the NGE BS) definitely hasn’t changed much on the PvE side. Level progression is slow (unless you find something ridiculous like some of the crafting paths where you can level up just a couple of crafting sessions assuming you have the mats already). Most of the other MMOGs of note (LOTRO, WAR, maybe Age of Conan) are a bit young comparatively. I can’t speak for EVE Online since I gave up on that bitch early and after hearing about the spacing stories, am glad I did. Still, the people that like that style of play are who they’re catering to…even if it means they’re catering to a few thousand people.
All in all, we’re finally at a point where the MMOG market is getting mature enough to see this sort of thing. Is today’s WoW the same as 2004′s WoW? Can you really say the game is the same game? I think you can…but only because it hasn’t changed THAT much yet. It’s definitely evolving and definitely different on certain fronts like PvP and crafting. However, there are still some left over planks in that ship that date back to 2004. Time will tell. I guess we’ll need to talk about this again…in 2014.
g afk
So, I had the chance, along with other Tabula Rasa account holders, to try the Aion beta twice in the last two weeks. I won’t go into detail about what the game’s like given the whole NDA thing but some general comments:
