Mojeaux over at Another Aion blog will play a game until the end of times. He’s a real hardcore and will stick with his game through the good and bad times until the server shut downs or they release the fabled Hello Kitty expansion pack.
Myself I change games once or twice during the course of a year. I’ve mostly played WoW the past few years with a few breaks here and there where I try new games or go back to some old ones. I will ride out the bad parts for a while until I get really tired of not having fun and move on to another game.
Then we also have numerous others who will switch MMOs whenever they want or they feel like it. They can have 10 subscriptions running at once with multiple characters and never level any of them to max level but it doesn’t matter. They play what they feel like when they feel like it.
Who’s right?
I’m going to go ahead and say that I think the smartest group is probably the last one. Why? Because they realise that playing an MMO is a game and as such they should enjoy themselves every second they play one. Why bother with a boring grind when they could have as much fun rolling another alt or switching game altogether. If the point is having fun why not always do what you actually find fun?
The prize
This is the big argument of players who will stick with the same game no matter what. They argue that while the current part of the game might not be the most fun if you stick with it your going to be rewarded with something really incredible. For example sure the level 30-40 grind is a pain but when you get to 40 the game is really awesome!
And they might be right too. For example in Lotro, the North Downs are a really bad zone you have to go through but when you finally get out of it you are rewarded with some incredibly cool areas like Rivendell. It’s the same for hardcore raiding where you will put up with a lot of bad raids and frustrating raids before getting that awesome kill.
In the end it’s all pixels
Fun is a really subjective topic. What’s fun to someone will not be the same for someone else and the point of the post is not to debate what’s the best kind of fun or how you should have fun.
Playing a game ultimately comes down to having fun in your spare time. Unlike a job that you have to put up with even during the bad times because you need money, an MMO should always be about fun. Some can make an argument about instant gratification and how sometimes holding out for a great moment might be worth it and they would probably be right. My point is that since they only thing that an MMO can really give you is fun what’s the point of playing if you’re not having any? What do you really gain by sticking with something that doesn’t bring you fun? Is the fun you get at the end of the hard road worth more than the fun you could have gotten right away?
“Mojeaux over at Another Aion blog will play a game until the end of times.”
– Not true, I tried WoW once and thought it sucked ballz, so I left and started playing something else.
“He’s a real hardcore and will stick with his game through the good and bad times until the server shut downs or they release the fabled Hello Kitty expansion pack.”
– True to a point, since I like to finish what I start, be it a game or anything else. However, the main reason I don’t hop very much is because I don’t have the time or the energy (have job and married) to hop MMO’s every few weeks since in order to achieve anything in these games you usually have to put in a fair amount of time.
“Then we also have numerous others who will switch MMOs whenever they want or they feel like it. They can have 10 subscriptions running at once with multiple characters and never level any of them to max level but it doesn’t matter. They play what they feel like when they feel like it.”
– NOTHING wrong with that! I never said there was. However, I did equate that with having a short attention span and it seems that some folks took some serious offense at the assertion. Thin skinned and a bit catty, I say. It’s funny because one of them even admitted that he had a short attention span, but yet decided to get offended because someone else pointed it out.
“I’m going to go ahead and say that I think the smartest group is probably the last one. Why? Because they realise that playing an MMO is a game and as such they should enjoy themselves every second they play one. Why bother with a boring grind when they could have as much fun rolling another alt or switching game altogether. If the point is having fun why not always do what you actually find fun?”
– Ok, as I’ve been lumped into the second group, and therefore called “not as smart”, I feel the need to clarify something. I realize that a game is a game, BUT.. come on? You’re not actually telling me that you’re having “fun” every second you’re playing one, are you? If so, may I point you to your own post before this one? And to ask oneself “why bother with a boring grind” is like asking “why bother playing an MMORPG”. They all have some sort of boring grind involved. It’s the nature of the beast. My one comment in where I defended AION was that I said that I didn’t see the big difference between the grind in it compared to the grind in others.
But look, the whole point of my comment on the “blog that shall remain nameless” (so as not to offend any thin skinned bloggers) was to question the recurring theme amongst “on-again off-again” WoW players, I’d list examples, but again, I don’t want to offend anyone /rolleyes.
What’s really interesting is how quick these guys are to point out that AION sucks (ie. not fun), but when someone dares to ask them how their love-hate relationship with WoW is fun, they get all pissy and start throwing “no one is forcing you to read my blog” all over the place. A bit of a double standard, no?
Ahh, sounds like someone is a casual player! I honestly can’t remember what that is like. Personally I can put as much time in gaming as I do in work and still have a pretty good homelife (just gotta try and do almost everything she says).
Whoops.
p.s. – I think that due to my larger hours of gaming that I am more likely to burn out and get bored of the games whereas you have so much time between your sessions that you aren’t seeing your toon in your dreams running around killing stuff. Thus, I am more likely to switch games often. Dunno if this applies to the others.
Quite likely that the more you play the faster your burn out. Seems logical… omg ! Bonedead used logic! Wha have you done with him!! Tell us now!
Yeah BD, despite what some folks think (pointed look in Iono’s direction) I’m not a hard core player at all. I get about 2 hours of playtime a night during the week and anywhere from 6-8 hours a night during the weekends and if I’m not having fun with a particular toon, I log on to an (gasp!) alt. I can usually find something to amuse myself with.
Har har har.
That’s actually quite a bit of time for gaming imo! My problem is that once the levels start going slow or I get completely raped by a different class over and over in PvP, I roll an alt! I always have a ton of alts, one or two guys in their 20-30s and a few 10-15s. Which helps me burn out even faster due to doing the same quests like 5 times. But my main excuse for switching games that I think these others should start using is that I like to consider myself an MMO enthusiast. Har har.
Well, I guess it is, but bear in mind that the two hours a night that I get during the weekdays is done after my wife has gone to sleep and that means having to sacrifice some much needed sleep (I’m old!), which means I can only pull it off maybe three nights out of the week.
On the weekends I usually play from Friday night starting at around 10pm til around 2 or 3am. Saturday and Sunday I might get a couple of hours in the morning with the bulk of my gaming time once again coming after the wife goes to sleep.
Hey I’m lumping myself in the second group too! I don’t mind rubbing you a bit since I know you can take it
And your right I’m not always having fun either in MMOs.
Thing is my recent “I’m done with raiding” makes me think a lot about what’s worth it and what’s not worth it in MMOs. I’ve been changing a lot of things in my playstyle recently to see if maybe I wasn’t missing out something. Turns out that yes, I was doing things that I tought was fun and in the end I didn’t really enjoy.
As for the attention span I know I have a short one and tend to change ideas often but I live well with that
I didn’t take offense Iono, and yes I can take it. I went back to the blog I was referencing in the above post and it seems there was some misunderstandings on my part as well as on the original bloggers. We’ve clarified them, I think.
And again, I don’t necessarily think that a short attention span is a bad thing. I suffer from that too, especially when something doesn’t seem enjoyable to me.
And I can certainly understand why folks don’t find AION fun or interesting, I just get a little irked when “grind” is the oft quoted reason especially when coming from folks who haven’t even given the game a try. Like I said, yes, there is a grind, I just don’t see that there is any more or less of it in AION than in other games that I’ve enjoyed like EQ or EQII, EVE etc.
Might I point you in the direction of Project 1999, emulated EQ server. You might enjoy the harshness of the days of old.
http://project1999.org/
Looks interesting! I played the original for 4 years and loved it. However, I don’t know if would still hold the magic for me. For one, I’m a big fan of good graphics and that is one thing EQ is lacking in. Was great for it’s time, but now I’m not sure how it would sit with me. Still, might be worth a look. Thanks for the link.
It goes in waves for me: I’m a hard-core raider for a year or so, then I turn casual, then I quit whatever game it is completely. It happend this way with Everquest & WoW. I never could get into Aion, and my next big hope is SW:OR.
If you play casually, you never get to really know anyone from the game all that well, unless you already knew them before the game.
Yeah, I’m looking forward to SW:OR as well. When it comes out it will probably be the beginning of the end for AION with me.
And I agree with you about not getting to know anyone really well if you play casually, that’s why I bring my own group to the game with me
Your title has so many connotations…
now that you talk about it…. bonus points for me !
haha feeling are for emos. but dont confuse people taking a different opinion as being upset with you Moj, Ive followed your blog since I started blogging myself and was just surprised I was getting lumped into the ‘Keen’ group of bumming games then dropping them ala every MMO on the planet