4 ms·

Sounds like that story is worth a submission of its own!

marginalia_nu 5y ago
There's probably enough material to write a whole article about it. I just thought it was funny how history repeats itself.
- w-ll 5y ago
  There were MUDs and Roguelikes way back. I personally consider Ultima Online is the genesis of modern MMO's
  - marginalia_nu 5y ago
    UO is actually roughly the same generation as Graal. There were several of these fairly creative stabs at the problem before WoW came along and really defined what a MMO is. I think in many way Neverwinter Nights' persistent worlds is another noteworthy entry. They weren't massively multiplayer, but I think more like a cross between Baldur's Gate and a MUD.
    - harph 5y ago
      I did some scripts for a NWN RP persistent world back when I was a teenager. Great memories
    - mattw2121 5y ago
      Yes, let's not forget Legends of Kesmai and its predecessor Island of Kesmai.
    - kbenson 5y ago
      > WoW came along and really defined what a MMO is. I wouldn't call WoW the first that defined it, or even the first wildly successful one that did. I never played any of them, but EverQuest was huge back in the day. If we are willing to lower the bar of success, there's predecessors to EverQuest as well. Then again, maybe there's something very different than WoW and EverQuest that I'm not aware of? They seemed pretty similar from the outside.
      - marginalia_nu 5y ago
        I don't think WoW did anything particularly new, what it did was completely suck the air out of the room with its runaway success (which also ended up turning a lot of its competition into ghost towns). Before WoW, there were a lot of different multiplayer games. After WoW, there was almost only WoW and WoW-clones (often down to mimicking the art style).
        danachow 5y ago
        You are getting the replies because though unintentional your prior wording implies that MMORPG was some niche experimental, concept type genre until 2004 which just doesn’t jive with history. EverQuest was out for years already and was immensely successful as was UO. That WoW became dominant is a different point. And as you have already stated - WoW didn’t do too much new in terms of genre defining.
        codebje 5y ago
        WoW was accessible in a way that previous MMOs were not: instead of repetitive grinding from the very start players are hand-held through levelling with the quest system and a story line. The levelling dungeons have comparatively generous static loot tables, with the rare drops from those dungeons just a nice little bonus. It's not until endgame that WoW reverts to genre. WoW IMO killed Star Wars: Galaxies, which was exploring a more "open world" style of game; subsequent expansions progressively dialled back the classless system and player generated content. More traditional repetitive grind MMOs remain popular in some parts of the world, but it's either EverQuest style or WoW style MMOs now.
        edgyquant 5y ago
        I loved Star Wars Galaxies, that was the last MMO I really played.
        shmoe 5y ago
        I beta tested SWG -- it had so much potential.
    - evandale 5y ago
      I don't think WoW was anywhere close to the first MMO. RuneScape came before it and Tibia came before that.
    - w-ll 5y ago
      UO had a persistent world. It even had real estate, and later fully customizable houses. And the custom server scene had some really crazy stuff as well.
    - outworlder 5y ago
      Ultima Online was actually ahead of its time in many aspects (it sort of still is). The concept of 'shards' which many MMO games embraced (sometimes not even supporting as many players). Only Eve Online really rejected the idea. The in-game 'economy', by having player craftable items, done in a way that IMHO was way better than what WoW came up with. It wasn't restricted to crafting. Mages could charge for portals, ditto for healers. There was robbery - you could either demand money or pickpocket people. Law enforcement was limited to cities and had to be called. Housing! That was actually in world, not another instance. There was actually a real state market. And scouting for empty spots was a viable 'profession', even if informal. Full PVP - in fact, I'd say that the non-PVP servers actually caused its demise. One concept that was not embraced by later MMO games was 'no levels'. Only had skills and attributes. And items were not a big deal. Sure, you could yield a very rare magical sword, but are you really going to risk losing it? Most people would fight with cheap weapons and armor and only take out the special stuff in limited circumstances. I could go on. I think there's a modern 'Ultima' game that could be birthed from what Origin came up with decades ago.
      - hunterb123 5y ago
        Tibia is basically the successor to UO, it's art and many gameplay elements are inspired by it.
  - hoten 5y ago
    Funny you should mention UO. I've been working forever to recreate the UO experience (it's called Gridia, you can find links to it on my website). Not too far from being ready, but still a lot of work to be done. Now that I've wrapped up this Zelda Classic project I'll return my focus to Gridia soon.

There's probably enough material to write a whole article about it. I just thought it was funny how history repeats itself.

w-ll 5y ago
There were MUDs and Roguelikes way back. I personally consider Ultima Online is the genesis of modern MMO's
- marginalia_nu 5y ago
  UO is actually roughly the same generation as Graal. There were several of these fairly creative stabs at the problem before WoW came along and really defined what a MMO is. I think in many way Neverwinter Nights' persistent worlds is another noteworthy entry. They weren't massively multiplayer, but I think more like a cross between Baldur's Gate and a MUD.
  - harph 5y ago
    I did some scripts for a NWN RP persistent world back when I was a teenager. Great memories
  - mattw2121 5y ago
    Yes, let's not forget Legends of Kesmai and its predecessor Island of Kesmai.
  - kbenson 5y ago
    > WoW came along and really defined what a MMO is. I wouldn't call WoW the first that defined it, or even the first wildly successful one that did. I never played any of them, but EverQuest was huge back in the day. If we are willing to lower the bar of success, there's predecessors to EverQuest as well. Then again, maybe there's something very different than WoW and EverQuest that I'm not aware of? They seemed pretty similar from the outside.
    - marginalia_nu 5y ago
      I don't think WoW did anything particularly new, what it did was completely suck the air out of the room with its runaway success (which also ended up turning a lot of its competition into ghost towns). Before WoW, there were a lot of different multiplayer games. After WoW, there was almost only WoW and WoW-clones (often down to mimicking the art style).
      - danachow 5y ago
        You are getting the replies because though unintentional your prior wording implies that MMORPG was some niche experimental, concept type genre until 2004 which just doesn’t jive with history. EverQuest was out for years already and was immensely successful as was UO. That WoW became dominant is a different point. And as you have already stated - WoW didn’t do too much new in terms of genre defining.
      - codebje 5y ago
        WoW was accessible in a way that previous MMOs were not: instead of repetitive grinding from the very start players are hand-held through levelling with the quest system and a story line. The levelling dungeons have comparatively generous static loot tables, with the rare drops from those dungeons just a nice little bonus. It's not until endgame that WoW reverts to genre. WoW IMO killed Star Wars: Galaxies, which was exploring a more "open world" style of game; subsequent expansions progressively dialled back the classless system and player generated content. More traditional repetitive grind MMOs remain popular in some parts of the world, but it's either EverQuest style or WoW style MMOs now.
        edgyquant 5y ago
        I loved Star Wars Galaxies, that was the last MMO I really played.
        shmoe 5y ago
        I beta tested SWG -- it had so much potential.
  - evandale 5y ago
    I don't think WoW was anywhere close to the first MMO. RuneScape came before it and Tibia came before that.
  - w-ll 5y ago
    UO had a persistent world. It even had real estate, and later fully customizable houses. And the custom server scene had some really crazy stuff as well.
  - outworlder 5y ago
    Ultima Online was actually ahead of its time in many aspects (it sort of still is). The concept of 'shards' which many MMO games embraced (sometimes not even supporting as many players). Only Eve Online really rejected the idea. The in-game 'economy', by having player craftable items, done in a way that IMHO was way better than what WoW came up with. It wasn't restricted to crafting. Mages could charge for portals, ditto for healers. There was robbery - you could either demand money or pickpocket people. Law enforcement was limited to cities and had to be called. Housing! That was actually in world, not another instance. There was actually a real state market. And scouting for empty spots was a viable 'profession', even if informal. Full PVP - in fact, I'd say that the non-PVP servers actually caused its demise. One concept that was not embraced by later MMO games was 'no levels'. Only had skills and attributes. And items were not a big deal. Sure, you could yield a very rare magical sword, but are you really going to risk losing it? Most people would fight with cheap weapons and armor and only take out the special stuff in limited circumstances. I could go on. I think there's a modern 'Ultima' game that could be birthed from what Origin came up with decades ago.
    - hunterb123 5y ago
      Tibia is basically the successor to UO, it's art and many gameplay elements are inspired by it.
- hoten 5y ago
  Funny you should mention UO. I've been working forever to recreate the UO experience (it's called Gridia, you can find links to it on my website). Not too far from being ready, but still a lot of work to be done. Now that I've wrapped up this Zelda Classic project I'll return my focus to Gridia soon.