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[–] 75 points 1 month ago (7 children)

I remember playing some shitty free MMOs in my youth. Kill 12 foobars, kill 10 bazbots. Being legitimately excited when they overlapped so I could do more than one at the same time. Some part of the brain just gets excited seeing numbers go up and progress bars fill.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago (2 children)

    Yeah I remember even getting into cookie clicker, knowing fully that it was obviously hijacking my reward centres.

    I feel that as you get older (or rather, have experienced more games) you can't fall for it as easily, but ofc I'm sure that isn't universal.

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  • [–] 7 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    I got a friend to play Path of Exile with me once. They hadn't really played a lot of video games before. When they leveled up and it did all the sparkly lights they were like "oooh wow!!"

    I was like oh, I guess I'm numb to that thrill since I've seen it a million times. But the sparkle reward was fresh for them and got their attention.

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  • [+] -1 points 1 month ago (3 children)
  • [–] 2 points 1 month ago

    Really? I thought most RS quests were far more detailed than go here kill thing. Need to actually read what is going on, work out where to go and even includes puzzles to solve in some of them.

    Actual design that many others are lacking. ESO is another with somewhat better quests, although I think that is more due to them being fully voice acted rather than the tasks themselves.

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    [–] 37 points 1 month ago* (12 children)

    [Kill ten bears, loot an ass off of no more than one of them]

    "How do nine out of ten bears not have an ass?!?"

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  • [–] 13 points 1 month ago (7 children)

    Usually, I'd assume that the act of killing them would destroy the desired object in most encounters. But that's just my personal headcanon.

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  • [–] 11 points 1 month ago (6 children)

    I did the same kind of justification, but it's a design decision to pad out the activity with a gambling adjacent pattern. If the drop rate was 100% no one would question it.

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  • [–] 31 points 1 month ago (6 children)

    Deliver unto me four zebra hooves.

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  • [–] 35 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (5 children)

    How do so many of these zebras not have hooves?

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  • [–] 4 points 1 month ago

    I used to think this all the time "bring 12 spider legs and eyes...." every second spider might have one eye or one leg... "Yo wtf!? The one thing everyone knows about spiders is that they have 8 of each"

    But in hindsight, I think the idea is that after the fight there are only x usable/viable specimens left over.

    Like you drive a mallet into its face, most eyeballs go pop

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  • [–] 18 points 1 month ago* (9 children)

    I can't decide if this is better or worse than FFXIV's "Talk to NPC #1. Talk to NPC #2. Watch long cutscene. Point at NPC #3. Report back to NPC #1. Quest complete!"

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  • [–] [S] 5 points 1 month ago (6 children)

    ffxiv is a good game but the msq actually drives me up a wall i cant do it

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  • [–] 2 points 1 month ago (2 children)

    I'm sure you've heard this plenty already, but if you can push through the base game (A Realm Reborn) story, it gets way way better once you hit the first expansion. I was skeptical, but the story and character development in the expansions legit blew me away

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  • [–] [S] 2 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    Ive done it, ive raided extremes or whatever they wrre called in that game i forgor. I just am very uninterested in the story so the gameplay loop of msq just so i can do dungeons and raids with friends is... lets just say not fun for me.

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  • [–] 17 points 1 month ago

    That quest made me feel embearassed

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  • [–] 16 points 1 month ago

    1 nependeath honey; just a quick item hunt, in and out in 10 minutes.

    1 week of farming later: 0/1 Nependeath Honey

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  • [–] 14 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    So that's why I've been getting so many grindr msgs

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  • [–] 10 points 1 month ago* (11 children)

    Gonna be interesting to see where WoW Forever (such a shit name) goes. The game really doesnt lend itself to horizontal progression, they are going to have to keep dropping content consistently.

    OSRS still king of "forever" MMOs.

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  • [–] 5 points 1 month ago (3 children)

    Turtle WoW (a famous WoW Vanilla+ private server that recently shut down due to Blizzard) actually showed how a healthy Vanilla+ interpretation can look like. They added a lot of meaningful new content without adding power creep or making existing content obsolete. Basically a proof that it is possible with Classic WoW.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 month ago (2 children)

    Its not impossible, but hard. They need a consistent content cycle. You level very fast in WoW, so once people are maxed, what is there for them to do?

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    Open world content, community funsies/rp content, collections, there's a lot more you can do. Look at the vanilla plus private servers...or even Guild Wars 2 where leveling is exponentially faster than wow but you still have near infinite stuff to do. There's tons of ways to do this without constant content additions, you just have to break out of the mindset of min/maxing and progression chasing, do stuff for fun instead of the slot machine effects.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 month ago (5 children)

    “forever” MMOs.

    what are those, and why is OSRS the king of them?

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  • [–] 4 points 1 month ago (4 children)

    Sandbox MMOs, designed with horizontal progression in mind. Something you can pick up, do whatever you want in, put down and then pick back up at a point in the future and carry on from exactly where you left off. You cant do this in WoW as a lot of your progress gets deleted or becomes irrelevant when they release a new expansion. WoW Forever is a mode that is trying to mimic that sandbox experience. That is a real challenge though.

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  • [–] 9 points 1 month ago

    And only every third bear you kill has an ass

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  • [–] 17 points 1 month ago (20 children)

    I do not understand how people can still play stuff like that. Such an unfun and outdated gamemechanic.

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  • [–] 10 points 1 month ago (5 children)

    It's definitely more about the overall journey than the minute to minute gameplay.

    In truth, the kill quests are actually great because they trick players into doing optimal gameplay for a little bit. Questing is a lot of downtime where you run around talking to npcs and going places. The best way to level up in Classic WoW is to sit in a valley and carve your name into a creature's evolutionary line. The lower the drop rate of a quest item is, the more monsters you'll kill, the more XP/hr you'll end up with.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 month ago (4 children)

    You can do that without a carrot on a stick and mandatory kill x. Then you also have to run to the npc 5 times after every quest. Its so boring and unecessary timeconsuming.

    Since i have played guild wars 2 i cannot stand these types of quests in any game and even that game still has to use it in its story from time to time. But they at least always put a twist on it at and its never that long thankfully.

    Games like WoW are nothing but that for the whole game. It has so many other old design flaws that it always astounds me how many people still fall for that and even pay monthly for a bucket of crap.

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  • [–] 8 points 1 month ago (3 children)

    Again, it's about the journey. It is time consuming. that's the point. You don't become as invested in a character if it only takes you 20 hours to reach max level. Vanilla WoW is a marathon. It's a lot of friction, a lot of moving around, and a lot of spending time in the world. What makes that downtime interesting are the people. Quests being really boring and simple isn't really great for making fun gameplay, true, but it is great for getting two complete strangers to be able to collaborate on the task and work together to complete it.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago (2 children)

    I become invested in a character if the story attached to it is well written or if i get to make meaningful decisions with it.

    If the gameplay attached to it is boring or if i only run around the map hunting bear asses, why would i become attached to that?

    Fetch quests just stretch out the game to keep you occupied.

    Even hated that in games like skyrim, but you could mostly ignore it and level by exploring. In most MMOs its most of the game which is just awful and outdated. Just like mindlessly killing mobs.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    Do you enjoy the fights in WoW/Skyrim/whatever? If so, surely an uninspiring quest is still fun because it gets you to engage with a fun mechanic?

    If not, then you can at least understand that other people do?

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  • [–] [S] 7 points 1 month ago (7 children)

    People like different things chill and let people do what they enjoy

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  • [–] 6 points 1 month ago (6 children)

    I really dont want to make people upset and usually do not care what people play, but games like wow just make me angry somehow.

    There are so many better games and even MMOs out there but thats not even the half of it. You spend money MONTHLY for your savegame basically, on something which is attached with so many bad things in the past and present.

    Its only a puppet of microsoft at this point and we all know where that money goes. Not to the devs even if they unionized or whatever. To data centers and war and all riding on nostalgia which was never even that good.

    Sorry for ranting but i dont know where else to put these thoughts other than a meme forum where mostly people ignore it anway.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 month ago (4 children)

    I dunno, it's pretty and braindead and you can explore stuff and roleplay.

    I am not a big mmo person generally but most of the "better" games I've tried and overstimulating and exhausting. I used to like everquest a lot, and there's still a lot other games don't do better imho. I still get lost in some of everquest's cities and dungeons when I load up p99 but that doesn't happen in more polished games.

    People spend monthly on things all the time for enjoyment. Freemium games are full of dark patterns (honestly modern wow is a bit too but a lot less than some), single player are excellent value for money sure but also not very social. Running servers does cost money and it sort of sucks, they are profiting but so are freemium products and shit. Community run MMOs are rare and awesome treasures to preserve, they still cost too though since if you don't donate they die or you're just leaching off people who do.

    I don't think wow is a terrible game, it's just different. The people that make up the community suck though :(

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  • [–] 1 point 1 month ago (3 children)

    You have probably tried Guild Wars 2 already but i think it is one of the only real MMOs since you automatically interact with lots of people if you want to and can engage more if you like, since the community is so nice in there. (Except PvP lol;)

    You also have the freedom from the start to do whatever, which i understand puts some people of.

    And it is also one if the best examples how f2p can work without screwing you over.

    Subs are okay if the company needs money but server costs are not expensive for the big guys. You also pay extra for microtransactions in WoW right?

    Line just always has to go up with them...

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  • [–] 1 point 1 month ago (2 children)

    When I was into MMOs years ago I played its beta. I found it busy, minigame driven, lacking in dead time necessary for social interaction, and a bit ugly. The classes didn't grab me either, they felt very samey.

    Nothing like EQ where a bard can be kiting all around a zone, a wizard teleporting people around, rogues and necros helping people grab corpses etc.

    I also very much enjoy stuff, or I did when I played, like in EQ where the world is extremely unfair and hostile. Modern MMOs are too much like fairgrounds. They're afraid to tell you no or let you make bad decisions.

    MMOs that have been better are things MUDs, EQ, Darkfall, eve (not by thing but amazing), OSRS (very single player now but when it was just runescape 1 and 2 it was neat), and mortal online.

    Happiness writes white, if a game won't let you get in over your head, lose things, and have a genuinely bad and frustrating time then the illusion of a world shatters and it becomes just another sort or masturbation

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  • [–] 1 point 1 month ago (1 child)

    It has changed quite a lot since beta and i find it weird that classes feel same when they differ quite alot from each other.

    Even more so since every big expansion offers Elite specs that change it another time.

    Mesmer can port people and there are guilds specifically to help people with jumping puzzles that way.

    The busy stuff is mostly in open world and map metas. If you wait for a world boss or chill in the cities there is alot of chatter and even roleplay.

    It is very easy in the starting zones but gets very hard and unforgiving in the first big expac maps Heart of Thorns. I do like the laid back approach that you can do whatever from mindlessly exploring to hardcore raiding.

    There are enough unforgiving single player games for my liking and i do not have much time so gw2 sort of values it by not giving me mandatory hurdles. When an update comes out i can play every content without gear grind.

    But i know aswell that many people like that sort of thing.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 month ago

    I agree with you but I guess people are too invested to even try to open their eyes and it is a safety for them to have their group of people in the game. The social aspects are often what holds people in wow I believe. Or that is how it was back when i played long ago when there was no cross server or lfg tools.

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  • [–] 10 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    A friend of mine talked me into playing WoW with him once. He had me spend 4 hours doing fetch quests and skipping an entire encyclopedia worth of dialogue to level up to the point that we could start playing dungeons, then during the first dungeon he told me to just follow behind everyone and collect the loot they left behind. I snapped and couldn't do it anymore after that. I was genuinely on the verge of a mental breakdown.

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  • [–] 7 points 1 month ago

    I kinda feel the same way about Diablo-style games. I'm only ever encouraged to play by people who have put so much time into it that they can't appreciate the gameplay loops or the story anymore and only want to rush to max level and do the same loot runs over and over again.

    If I play by myself, I can kind of see the appeal, but I'm playing "sub-optimally" and wasting a bunch of time. Eventually, I will have to fall in and keep up or just be satisfied playing alone.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 month ago

    I remember playing back in 0X and even then the quests were silly. I liked running around looking at the geometry and hitting things there, but the quests took the fun out of it once I realised they were by far the more efficient way to level up (so you could go to new geometry to hit new things).

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  • [–] 1 point 1 month ago (1 child)

    I played WoW Classic when it first came out. I have not really done much questing at all. Just quickly pushed myself to a level where i can start doing dungeons & then did those to 60, had a pretty good time doing it too.

    On retail questing is a bit better, not great but better. Still wouldn't do it, but Blizzard is basically forcing everyone to do them these days.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 month ago

    Yeah and forcing stuff to proceed aside from tutorials is mostly outdated design IMO.

    Thats why i will never play another GTA. If you build a giant sandbox let players do whatever not get stuck in skinner box loops and cutscenes.

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  • [–] 6 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    I enjoy it while chatting with friends. It’s relaxing.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 month ago

    Never played WoW - so many lives were ruined at university that it was basically a cautionary tale. Don't do crack, don't do WoW. Been playing some Big Walk recently though, and I think the appeal is the same - it's a chill activity to do with friends. Played a lot of Deep Rock Galactic previously and I think it's the same (on haz 3) - a load of chill busywork, a bit of more exciting fighting, then back to chill and chat. Haz 4+ is a bit more focused.

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  • [–] 5 points 1 month ago

    CohhCarnage had a mild heart attack.

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  • mmm amberseeds

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  • [–] 2 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    Normally I don't play any mmorpgs anymore, but WoW Forever seems appealing.

    What the fuck is wrong with me??

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  • [–] 4 points 1 month ago (16 children)

    They have done such a good job with wowf.

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  • [–] [S] 4 points 1 month ago (15 children)

    I hate blizzard and microsoft, but it does look very good and buying a wow sub isnt the worst thing you could do

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  • [–] 5 points 1 month ago (2 children)

    Still think they need to rethink the cost/structure of a subscription.

    Like.. give me a minutes system.

    Im not paying $15/mo when I work full time and can only manage like 4 hours a month

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    APB tried that and it was pretty controversial. That was when a lot of us late millennial PC gamers were still in our teens and had tons of energy so it would be easy to spend all your minutes doing all nighters.

    Having the option of both would be nice though because now I'm in the same boat as you. Would like to play, don't want to sub.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 month ago

    Ah.... I remember APB! Lol

    Yea, maybe some sort of hybrid - $15/mo but if you spend <20 hours a month (or something), it rolls over to the next month until you've played x hours to be charged again

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  • [–] 4 points 1 month ago (2 children)

    I mean they successfully unionized. So I'd say Blizzard is one of the better ones right now to give money to.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 month ago (6 children)

    As it should since they stole everything from private servers

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago (5 children)

    I havent played wpw private servers in a hot minute.. Are they gone now??

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  • [–] 2 points 1 month ago (3 children)

    Sorta? Blizzard hit the big ones and they kinda fractured into a bunch of smaller ones. A lot of what is in WoW forever was taken from Turtle WoW and Ascension.

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