fercac wrote:I dont need forced grouping to be social. And I dont need group content or raid content. I can chat with others and compare gear even if all content is for solo play. I can trade...Massive Multiplayer only means that a lot of players will play on the same server and that they can play at the same time. It makes no difference if everyone is playing solo. I have no problem with optional team play. As long as I dont need a team to experience all endgame content or get the best gear.
A game can have a huge virtual world. Perhaps with 10K players... And it will really be a MMO. Even if everyone plays solo. And even if all content is for solo play. Like mobs, quests, areas, bosses, dungeons and so on...
People often think that if a game is a MMO it must have forced grouping. If I started to play one of the popular MMO:s and told other people playing it that I wanted to solo the endgame they would laugh at me. And perhaps tell me I should try playing single player games instead... Because people like that really have no idea what MMO means. For them it more or less means the game must be a "WoW clone".
People like that probably also believe the Torchlight MMO will be a "WoW clone". Personally I hope it will be like typical ARPG:s. And that MMO in that case only means a lot of people will play on the same server.
I guess a game could have ARPG combat and still be a WoW-clone in other ways...
I find the idea of soloing a game designed for multiplayer to be...weird. It defeats the purpose of the game. It's a little bit like buying CoD or Battlefield and saying you're going to solo the content. The multiplayer IS the content. If you're not playing the game for the multiplayer then it defeats the entire purpose of the game design. Playing a multiplayer game solo invalidates the entire genre.
In fact, it was the catering to the solo crowd in WoW and the attitude that everyone should be able to get end game gear that lead to its bland distillation of gameplay that it has evolved in to today. Now I grant there's a happy medium in a persistent world setup that can be met that lies outside of the MMO genre. That's where most of these soloing-a-multiplayer-game gamers want to be (I assume) rather than forced to group. That's perfectly understandable. The problem is that you're trying to apply the antithetical definition of MMO as the defition of MMO, which simply isn't true. You're trying to force a game to meet you on your own very narrow terms, rather than adapting to what the game has to offer in the first place. I think that's rather counter productive and something that is unique to MMOs for various reasons. I'm not going to buy a RTS and expect it to play like a shooter, but that's exactly how many people approach the MMO market. If you want 10k players with solo-able content and no forced grouping, what you want is a persistent world MSO (Massively Singleplayer Online). Which is a perfectly good choice. I'd play the hell out of that kind of game myself. That genre, unfortunately, doesn't exist yet and where the crux of our differences lie.
Also there's no need for the generalization that "For them it more or less means the game must be a 'WoW clone'". I think forced grouping and multiplayer content is the point of an MMO and that it should be approached from that general attitude. That doesn't mean that I believe every MMO should look like WoW. I think the genre is still in its infancy and we have yet to see its full possibilities. This is why I'd love to see the isometric ARPG style fused with MMO design elements to create something wholly different from EVERYTHING else that we've seen before. I think Runic has the creative strength and ingenuity to bring us something that plays great but isn't just another copy cat.
It's a small point but keep in mind that the entire reason that TL came about was because Runic was on a path to build an MMO for Perfect World and they happened to get together enough assets that they decided to throw together a game as a stepping stone. TL2 exists because TL did so well but didn't have multiplayer capability. Of course now the whole idea of the MMO may be a moot point with the success of TL2. It's hard to say at this point since we've only heard some vague or cryptic remarks out of Runic on the subject of them building an MMO. The relationship between Runic and Perfect World is, so far, a great mystery as Runic starts to level up.
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