I'm turning to the dark side - I'm talking MMOs

[LBJeff]

I shunned MMORPG's for a long time. My then last year my G/F asked if I ever played Guild Wars (the same g/f who doesn't really game). Said no, and WTF, I'll give it a try because it could be something we enjoy together. I ended up really enjoying it. It was easy to get in to, no monthly fee, can be played in small bursts or long hauls and is pretty user friendly. I don't know....they aren't evil.

[MrPopo]

I shunned MMORPG's for a long time. My then last year my G/F asked if I ever played Guild Wars (the same g/f who doesn't really game). Said no, and WTF, I'll give it a try because it could be something we enjoy together. I ended up really enjoying it. It was easy to get in to, no monthly fee, can be played in small bursts or long hauls and is pretty user friendly. I don't know....they aren't evil.

Guild Wars is NOT an MMO. It's Diablo II where the chat lobby is graphical instead of text based.

[chupon]

Yeah I wouldn't say I'm addicted to video games. I know over the last two years there has been multiple threads on game addiction. It is obviously my hobby - much like everyone else here. Thanks for all the comments so far and for the thread links.
Right now I'm leaning towards FF14. I tried to sign up for the Beta but since I didn't lie on the sign up form and told them I'd only be able to play for about 10 hours a week they obviously didn't pick me.
I'm gonna have to find some new friends to hang with but am obviously a little apprehensive about starting new relationships just because there's so much work involved there. Any one in the South Bend, IN area give me a shout out.
Interesting comment about an MMO being a social outlet as well. Isn't that one of the things MMO's offer? I know they don't ever tout this because it sounds bad but in essence don't they offer the same services as facebook, myspace, ect.? (of which I can't justify using)

[LBJeff]

Guild Wars is NOT an MMO. It's Diablo II where the chat lobby is graphical instead of text based.

Fair enough. I felt the Diablo similarities from minute one. The graphical chat lobby is the descriptor I was looking for.

Excuse me while I try to explain that to my girl. I have a crazy feeling I'm going to get a blank stare in response.

[MrPopo]

Guild Wars is NOT an MMO. It's Diablo II where the chat lobby is graphical instead of text based.

Fair enough. I felt the Diablo similarities from minute one. The graphical chat lobby is the descriptor I was looking for.

Excuse me while I try to explain that to my girl. I have a crazy feeling I'm going to get a blank stare in response.

If you do, start from the beginning:

First there was Rogue...

[Hatta]

And then there was NetHack. Speaking of addictive videogames...

[Niode]

Guild Wars

It's like MMO without the MMO douchebaggery. It's got the end-game in collecting all the elite skills and the PVP system. You can play it with buddies, but it's by no means required, the beautiful thing about GW is that you can 'solo' it in a sense, kinda like an action RPG, playing the campaign is very fulfilling and the game world is HUGE (although split into little bitesize chunks as you go from hub to hub). You can solo-solo it too if you fancy rolling a paladin style Monk-Mesmer and reaping the benefits of not having to share cash with your party (be it human or computer controlled).

Plus the music is by Jeremy Soule (who also did the Elder Scrolls, Neverwinter Nights and Icewind Dale games) so it's awesome to listen to as well.

Did I mention it's CHEAPY CHEAP CHEAP? For the grand total of about £30 you could get all FOUR games in the series and not have to pay a single dime for subscription fees. Which, given your alloted play time will suit you down to the ground.

[chupon]

Thanks Niode - yeah I love Jeremy Soule. I've been playing a lot of Morrowind and love the music. I read a great interview with Jeremy Soule on RPGfan.com - or at least I think that was where it was.

I have heard Guild Wars is the best for the price but I've got friends who played for instance FF11 for years - who bought relic weapons and everything - then sold there accounts for almost a thousand bucks! Now I know I can't play an MMO to make money. And if you factor in the time spent they probably made likw 10 cents and hour at best - but still. Kinda cool to cash out at the end no? Does this kinda thing exist in guild wars? I'm not talking about farming, or gold mining but after I play an MMO for a few years it'd be nice to have a return of some kind. What do you think?

[Niode]

Now you're getting into Real World Trading or Real Money Trading as it's sometimes referred to. It's a shady area at best. It's against the ToS in most if not all MMOs and can lead to having your account banned, which can face repercussions should you sell your account for a lot of money. Since most MMOs are pay monthly, you would have to earn quite a bit on the sale of your account, considering it takes years (and I mean 3+ years) to max a WOW account out, that's £326 right there (£276.84 if you pay in 6 month chunks). That's a lot of money to sell a WOW account for to get your money back… I know other MMOs are different but to be fair, WOW is most likely the one that you are going to get somebody to buy a maxed out character.

In guildwars there's not really much of a market there since you can literally buy all the elite skills from NCsoft (or at least, you could at one point) for a PVP character for those that want to jump straight into PVP without having to put the work into the PVE side of the game. You could always sell your account with all the games activated in it for something roughly the amount of money you put in. Guild Wars isn't really a farming game. In my opinion it's way more enjoyable than WoW if you're like me who doesn't really play games with (or for) other people then there's lots of enjoyment in playing the game as an action RPG, just going from mission to mission doing the campaigns is very satisfying since the story is very good for an MMO. Then there's hundreds of side quests to do, which can just keep you distracted in one area for quite a while. Considering there's around 20+ of these missions within each of the 4 games, and each of the games adds a new class (except eye of the north which is just an expansion to the first game) not to mention each mission has submissions that are optional, which gives quite a bit of re-playability to them, (you can complete missions as many times as you want, think of them like mini-raids) it's a lot of game for not a lot of money.

Of course there's many benefits to playing a WOW-alike such as the completely persistent world. Guild Wars is instanced based, the only time you can interact with other players that aren't in your guild/party are in the hubs/towns, when you leave the town, the field areas are instanced just for you and your party. It's a double edged sword since you don't get anybody griefing you and your party, or if you are on a collecting quest, stealing your drops. But you don't get additional help if you need it when it matters. So if community is something you crave, or the feeling of being part of a huge persistent world where (seemingly) anything can happen, then I'd say go with WoW, but understand that that kind of persistent world comes at quite a cost. With around 10 hours a week, you probably aren't going to get your moneys worth. At around a £1 an hour there's much more expensive ways of spending your time, however, in MMO terms that's very expensive.

Why not try Runescape? It's come on leaps and bounds over the last 6 months, it's shedding it's 'kiddy-mmo' reputation and there's plenty of adult clans out there. The biggest of which (Kingdom of Asgarnia) I helped set up 5 years ago. It's very grind heavy though, but is very easy to get into and there's lots of quests if that's your thing. Best of all, it's completely free to play. When you get bored of the free content (it would take around a thousand hours, and then some to max a free play account out completely) then you can pay £3.50 a month for the members access which opens up 80% of the game. Haven't played it in a long while, I got back into it when my fiancee discovered it and helped her through the early levels/quests. She's gone off it for the moment as she's focusing on getting her piercing business off the ground and I'm helping her with the technology side of the business so that's taking up a lot of my free time right now too.

[Niode]

IF you fancy giving Guild Wars a go then Direct 2 Drive have the first 3 games (Prophecies, Factions and Nightfall) for £14.95 (don't know what the prices are in dollars, sorry).