Blind devotion is not healthy to your favorite MMO

I don’t think it is a small thing to say that fanboism or fangirlism has become more rampant lately in the social media market. I can understand why it happens and in fact I don’t deny that I've had a lot of my own moments in the past, but it has become even greater in the MMO market. Now, one might argue what defines a fanboy or fangirl? Well, to put it simply a fanboy or fangirl is a person so devoted to a product or idea, that no matter how much you try to prove that problems, and no matter how blatant the issues, people will make excuses and defend it. If you feel a direct ire that moment someone says something negative about something you like you want to correct them, or worse, punch them you might be fanboying/fangirling. And make no mistake, everywhere for almost anything you can find a fanboy or a fangirl for something. The MMO market is rife with them.

Before I get started, I will just put this out. If you are the type of person that gets easily offended because you don't like it when people might have a different opinion from you or might even point out the negative flaws of something you loved, then you might want to stop reading right now. I am not going to make apologies for my point of view. If you disagree, that's fine. If you plan to write an 8 page frothing hate list of why I suck because you didn't like any of my points, then well, go some place else.

Now, for me, again, I admit I had my moments where I would fangirl over things and defend it staunchly. But lately, I've been trying to distance myself from things so I can take a more objective look at the stuff I use to sit there and defend saunchly. The reason this article is coming up is because of a recent debate I found myself in over on the The Secret World forums, as well as a recent controversy that cropped up with the closing of City of Heroes and the outright fervor that those fans have towards their personal gem.

Now, on the controversy that cropped up with The Secret World is actually something I quite agree with; namely that the combat is not very engaging and that many aspects of the game, a game that was supposed to be built on mystery and secrets, tends to do a lot to actually rip you right out of that immersion. There are several elements that do this to me in that game, one being the combat system which as ingenious the idea might be, are not as deep as some people might make it out to be. On top of that the “stealth” missions don’t feel very stealthy, as you tend to casually stroll past the enemies instead of actually trying to be stealthy about it, and even then there are only a few of these missions where not agroing baddies is even required (I say agro because by all accounts they can see you).

I was not the one who brought this point up, of course, someone else started the thread but I put my points in about why I thought the combat system was shallow and a lot of the games mechanics did a lot to damage my immersion factor into the lore and story (which is what I actually like about The Secret World) but once I stated that came in the fanboys and fangirls and the apologists (which one is worse you take your pick) trying to come up with all manner of excuses. My favorite excuse is that I just didn't understand the ability wheels, which regardless of what people believe, is not that complicated once you get into it. The other argument always boiled down to it was just like WoW, SWTOR, or pick any other MMO on the market, and thus the argument was invalid, to which my reply was straight forward no, it wasn't  While elements were similar in respects, the strategic use of abilities, while maybe limited in those mediums was still there and in many instances I would at least be required to put some thought and effort into my attacks instead of just watching a counter go up while using a builder then using a consumer after every 5^th hit. The response were hilarious in that respect with how many people just kept trying to repeat the same answer as before that I just countered, by saying I either didn't understand the ability wheel or that it was just like any other MMO.

I used several instances of evidence to back this up in fact, including tanking (which I think most people know I do) and such. Pointing out as a tank the only strategy you really have is spin to win (basically all you do is use an AE builder with an occasional consumer or two), with very little deviation from that. Avoiding attacks is one thing but there isn't even a reason to do that after a point and the few instances before nightmares that interrupts are needed really aren't  and even in nightmares interrupting isn't exactly required except for a few screw you powers that the bosses might use. They are useful but that’s about it. It boils down that I am generally adding in particular abilities and attacks just to break up my tedium, not because I need them, but because it’s not as engrossing as people might have you believe.

Then of course there is a lot of immersion breaking moments about the game. Again, this is a game built on the idea that the world is secretive and such and everything you do is hidden from the public eye, as it were. But you spend a lot of time going from point to point with assault weapons on your back, some of them well past military grade hardware, and no one bats an eye lash. Then of course, the aforementioned stealth missions which aren't really stealth, only a handful of which require you to avoid things. You actually just walk to the point that you stay out of the agro range of critters, nothing else. They might actually be staring right at you, but as long as you are out of that predefined radius that says they attack you, you are fine. Then of course there is the constant combat from one point to the next that just really takes me out of the game and ruins my immersion factor for the story as a whole. In short, it’s not a very engaging system, as many of the fans might have you believe.

And there in lies the problem. While people were pointing out this flaw with the system itself, and well-constructed posts about it, the fanboys and fangirls kept parading the deniability card and just kept trumpeting those same two tag lines I mentioned above. Well, here is a basic fact, you can like something but that doesn't mean you have to blindly accept the faults of the game, especially if they are the faults that are causing more actual harm than good for the game. If something doesn't feel fun people are not going to stick around for it, and trying to tell people they are wrong because you think they are dumb is not something smart to say, especially since your game has evidently, by the companies own admission, not hit the magic numbers they were hoping for.

This of course brings me round about to City of Heroes, and leaving me feeling an unhealthy need to find cover. Now, as far as communities go, City of Heroes players are generally helpful and do a lot of things for the community, as a whole, but they do have their dark side and to a point they can be the most rabid fanboys and fangirls on the planet. At any moment you might mention a game that could potentially rival or even beat the game, these fans would do anything to talk smack and belittle the product no matter the differences or at worse, how much of an improvement it might actually be. In fact, if you point out the negatives about the game, City of Heroes players would be the first to jump on the bandwagon of apologizing or outright denying the evidence at hand. I would know I use to actually be a part of that particular bandwagon, sadly.

But the most telling sign, to me at least, is how surprisingly many people actually believe that City of Heroes was wildly popular. In spite of all evidence to the contrary, these people believed that hundreds of thousands of people were flocking to their game on a regular basis, especially towards the end. Not all of them thought this, but many of the more vocal groups did. Some even tried to claim that City of Heroes had revolutionary game designs that no one has ever done before or since, to which I really get confused at because the only thing that CoH brought to the table that was actually new was User Generated Content to MMOs (known as Mission Architect in game) and was such a colossal disaster that even the games producer threw a massive hissy fit when people began misusing it. It was bewildering on so many levels that I am left reeling at times just trying to understand this frothing fanaticism that was being demonstrated on a level that I don’t even think God has witnessed. Hell this level of fanaticism even sparked ChaosD1 of MMOGrinder.net to repeatedly say in several of his reviews for CoH fans to "stay well the fuck away from any site his review appears on" because of how frothing they could be.

Now, I am not here to condemn or condone the shut down, and I do agree, partly, it was poorly handled. But the lengths people go to try and claim that their product was somehow pulling out magic numbers demonstrates either how much blind faith they actually had, or more likely the reality they don’t understand the difference between revenue and profit. They even believed that there was some grand conspiracy to shut down the product because it was still profitable, but every time I do the math, it just doesn't add up (and looking at other people's math that have actually sat down and done the math to).

Others have actually dissected this before, but let me put it this way; running an MMO is not cheap. Now while CoH was pulling something like $10 to $12 million a year according to the last report, it was also evident that the game was steeply declining and in fact Freedom did little to avoid this decline. It also points to evidence that with those numbers CoH had less than 55,000 subscriptions, probably even fewer thanks to the cash shop, and that is the money used to keep the game running. Of course if you just take those numbers as they are, you think, then the game must be doing great. Well here’s the catch-22, revenue, again, does not equal profit, and all those developers (Paragon Studios reportedly held 80 at least) the cost of running the servers with technicians, the cost of internet, the cost of basic building utilities, employee training, employee benefits and all other overhead, my figure which others have even done in greater detail, have shown either two outcomes; City of Heroes was either just barely treading water (ie breaking even) or worst case scenario, was operating in the red.

Again, I don’t condone or condemn the actions and several of the points raised are valid by players, but some of the reactions are just baffling. One of the arguments presented about this was how the developers would be out of work and such, but those same people turned around and said just cancel the other project. So in the resolution of that the solution to keeping the CoH devs from being fired was probably firing the other developers on their other project? That would have been around 40 or more developers out of work by that, possibly even as high as 60, because that entire company would not be devoted to working on City of Heroes as admitted to by several of Paragon staff.

Other points that come up are things like how games like AION or such aren't doing well in America. Well, they are doing fine in Asia. Here’s the problem with that line of logic. CoH bombed hard in Asia, and at the end there wasn't doing well in America either. Yea, it’s easy to see conspiracies whenever you narrow your vision and just focus on one or two things about something that goes on, but you have to actually look at the whole picture on the grand scale.

Yea, I know for a lot of people that CoH was their love, the game they enjoyed and in that instance, their first MMO. Like Scotty said in the episode Relics, “You never love a woman like that again.” And the same can be said for your first MMO. Through all its faults and imperfections, you will love it because it was your first. It is what introduced you to the genre. I do miss CoH and what it was, but what it became is not the game I originally loved.

Now, my intent is not to make people mad with my points of view or even to try and dissuade them from loving their favorite product, but loving something doesn't mean blind devotion to it. You have to understand and admit that even if you love something doesn't mean it was perfect. The numbers speak for themselves in that regard, because a perfect system that everyone loves would have people jumping over each other to be a part of it. You have to admit to the flaws of the product and understand them and at least constructively point out why they are flawed. Yes Men do not help get the weak points of your beloved title fixed, and if you really want that level of exposure, you need to be sure that you help get those weak points fixed or improved, otherwise they could be game shatteringly detrimental to the longevity of your loved product. Change is a necessary thing in the life of an MMO, and sometimes things need to be changed, re-balanced and improved just to make sure the game survives, especially if they are part of the key features.

My review of The Secret World

Well, I thought about it for a while, and considering that I haven’t actually written anything for this blog in like two months or so, I figured I should. Given that The Secret World has been out for over a month now, as they so proudly proclaimed in an email, that sounded like a desperate plea to me to get more people to sign up to their game, I figure it is about time to probably sit down and discuss why this game didn’t work with me like I hoped it would and why I never got it after having played it for a while during its beta. In fact, I came to despise the game so much that I actually uninstalled it twice during the beta life, only reinstalling it again after a friend got in beta and thought I could at least give them a familiar face to hang around with (until we discovered he was in those weekend betas which was completely different and builds behind the beta I was actually in).

Now, let me begin this by saying I wanted to like this game; I really did. You can’t believe how deep down I wanted this game to actually be the fresh faced, change of pace and offer something new that was sorely needed in the MMO space, especially given the stagnating nature of the genre. The idea of a modern setting place with the investigation missions sounded fresh and original, but even sounding fresh and original doesn’t mean it delivers exactly what was promised. So, when it comes to the break down I will try to point out exactly what I liked, but I will probably have a lot of things I absolutely despised about this game, and I am quite sure this will set off a few people who think that TSW is the second coming, just like people who believe GW2 is the second coming as well.

Now, first up let me talk about character creation. Needless to say, a few articles I’ve read have applauded the character creator and I have to keep asking myself one simple question; why? It’s atrocious in this game. Now, I will freely admit I might be spoiled from other games like City of Heroes, Champions Online and APB, but come on. The character editor makes games like SWTOR and WoW look positively deep and complex. At best you can do is choose a couple of faces and various slide positions that actually do nothing in the long run and despite TOR actually has a limited but at least an ability to change height and body mass on a character. This is just appalling.

Now, that’s not to say that the character art is bad; it isn’t. In fact, the character models are fairly detailed and animated (at least with emotes) fairly well, and with little tearing or stretching of the actual character model polygons; but if you were hoping for deep, or meaningful character generator, you might as well look someplace else. Clothing variations are limited, and anything you look for style which actually put you off because things like long coats or jackets still use that ancient taped to the back of your legs type of animation, thus it doesn’t look good at all.

Game world wise, this is a beautiful world; as long as you aren’t playing around in the three central hubs. London, Seoul, and New York are all cramped, tiny, not well built or well-planned out. The other locations in the game, however, are nicely sized and in some instances can feel too big at times, and quite beautiful to look at and very atmospheric. It’s almost a jarring contrast because the actual play areas feel like so much went into them, while the hub areas, the areas meant for socializing and getting together, feel like such an afterthought. Of the three hub locations, only London was the one thought about the most as it is the largest, and New York feels like the smallest. None of them feel like they offer the venue they were supposed to be for and feel completely superfluous to the actual game as the Argatha network provides all that basically.

That brings up the three factions; again totally superfluous. They aren’t required other than the once in a while faction story arc you might get. The three factions can be completely cut from the game and nothing would change. That is how tacked on they feel. I never really got to try out PvP, because every time I would try the actual thing would break, so I can’t say how any of the PvP maps are, but considering my past experience with games that base their PvP around skirmish maps, that would most likely suck anyways, especially given the fact it’s skirmish maps with 3 factions fighting instead of 2. 3 factions really don’t work well in a theme park environment. But down to the wire, other than a few lines of dialog here and there, there is no reason to have three factions in this game. Once you’ve passed your initial intro (which is the exact same for all three factions again) your contact with your faction is negligible at best and just completely pointless.

Speaking of superfluous systems, that brings me around to the entire skill system. Now, outside looking in, this sounds like a great and awesome concept; except, it’s not. There’s little to differentiate one skill set from another and there is even less reason to actually shoot for high level skills other than you have them. This is a game where the low skills are just as good, and in many cases better, than the higher skills you can actually get later on. The whole concept just seems like bad ideas, and instead of feeling like earning something new, you just get the same skill you were already using with a slightly different animation, sometimes, that can have a longer cast time or actually delivers less damage. It really did sound like a neat, and interesting concept, it’s just it was delivered poorly because each skill set does the exact same resource building as the other, offering no real variety other than a look when the wire is actually drawn out.

And that brings me to the other part of that equation the combat animations or skill animations. Take your pick. They are horrid. I am not going to mince words here. The combat animations are stiff, poorly animated and at times makes me just want to go play a game like City of Heroes at times just because I feel a game that is now 7 years old going on 8 has better animations, when I feel that most of the new animations in City of Heroes are atrocious now. The characters are stiff, very wooden and when it comes to actual attack animations barring a couple, look like they went the cheapest route possible for animation budget.

Next on that list is combat. And good God, was there entirely too much of it and it is very boring. Early on in the game, dealing with the zombies, you can probably plow through several of them without issue or problem. But as the game progresses, it has a habit of increasing the monster health factor substantially, but your damage stays relative. This is a very gear oriented game and if you are under geared even by a little bit, solo enemy fights will take a while to do. Combat is very repetitive, very boring, and it breaks up an otherwise immersive experience constantly. No matter how you try you can’t avoid it either, you will be fighting regardless of your intent just because of how the game was set up. The only way to avoid combat is to just avoid questing all together.

Now, missions themselves are… standard MMO tripe. Except they lead you by the nose as well as hold your hand to each of the next parts of the mission chains. What makes missions atrocious in TSW is they are so far apart from one part to the next, and are set up exactly like WoW style mission settings it makes you wonder what the developers were thinking. And the mission journal is the worst offender as it is purposely designed to limit how many missions you can actually have at a single time with you only able to have 3 side missions 1 main plot and 1 investigation type mission at any given moment. If you pick up more than that you have to choose to delete an older mission thus losing that progress. This would have been smart, if the missions in this game were not set up to be spoonfed like they are in other MMOs.

However, I will give props to the investigation missions. Now I said earlier that missions lead you by the nose, and for the most part that is right. They lead you by the nose going so far as to highlight and show you the object right down to the few meter area they are in, that you need to click. However, investigation missions actually make you have to do a bit of research and have no such hand holding going on. This is refreshing, to a point. The problem I have with the investigation missions was they sort of club you over the head with the clues that the in game browser became nearly pointless. I did several investigation missions and only a couple of times did I open the browser and sadly, when I entered keywords, it took me straight to the answers as they were already filled out on the game web site itself. While the theory was nice and sound that means that any investigation loses all-purpose thanks to any search engine more advanced than a pocket calculator being able to pick out any post or wiki with the answers you are seeking. This also has the fact that any replay value is set instantly to zero because the answers are always the exact same.

Story, voice acting and the like, I give this game prop’s for. I enjoyed it a lot better than TOR’s poor attempt and I certainly thought it was a lot better written and sounded better acted. I rather enjoyed the conspiracy over tone and that the NPCs actually moved around. However, no matter how good the story is, it is completely over shadowed by bad game play and game design at almost every turn for me. I gave it my all, and then during the last few beta weeks, FunCom started shoving out patches that would break entire systems just to get the patches out fast. My enjoyment factor kept plummeting and fast, especially after the 3^rd time I remade a character because of something that happened that forced me to rethink instead of having to try and go through the process of redoing missions and gaining skill points just to try a new skillset. I uninstalled this game twice from my hard drive. The first time I did it was out of pure frustration and boredom with the game. I reinstalled it again when a friend got in one of the betas and I thought I could join them, only to find out I couldn’t. I toughed it out and tried to keep testing, but with only a couple of weeks left till launch, I uninstalled it again.

The gear grind in this game was just awful as well, because gear is what defines the character, not the skill set regardless of what you are told. And though they try to say that you can have whatever look you want, it didn’t help that most people kept choosing the same face and hair styles because those were the only good ones. I couldn’t even walk around Kingsmouth because my preferred face, hairstyle, and clothing look was being used by several other players. This is a game with a bunch of good ideas but awful implementation. It sounded like it wanted to be a sandbox world, but instead decided to be a theme park instead, which is ironic since you spend a large portion of your game time in a theme park.

If I were to give this an overall, I would say wait until it goes Free to Play. I’ve heard they are adding more hairstyles and such, but hell, I hear a lot of things about MMOs that just launch that turn out to actually do very little. I really did want to like this game, as I said, but it just buried itself under the weight of a lot of things that just make it not very fun for me to play.