A question that has been asked many times. Wars have been fought over this, villages have been burned to the ground, and nations overthrown. ok, not exactly, but it certainly is a hot topic for debate. This topic began a few years ago, with the release of the game "Guild Wars". Guild Wars is a game that has many MMO features. You can talk with other players, meet up with them in towns, it has stats, weapons, levels, quests,trading (although not exactly an MMORPG only thing, the way it is set up in GW is related to MMORPG's) it is fully instanced,except for the towns, but it is set in a persistent world...or is it?
We will get back to that later. GW is not the only game that uses this set up. Another well known game is Dungeons & Dragons Online. Other lesser- well known titles that also use this setup are Phantasy Star Online (1+2+3+4) and Phantasy Star Universe.
Right, so these games have a few things in common.
1: In all of those games, all dungeons & fields which feature combat, quests, etc, are fully instanced.
2: Things like towns,outposts, lobbies etc are all open for everyone to visit. BUT, it has to be said, each area can only hold a certain amount of people.
So what do the companies behind the games have to say about this?
Arena net, has taken a stance right from the start. "Guild Wars is not an MMORPG".
Jeff Strain, producer of the game
""Guild Wars is not an MMORPG," said Jeff Strain, producer of the game."
Turbine, on the other hand, has always promoted Dungeons & Dragons Online as an MMORPG.
So we have two companies,two games, both which use the exact same set up. One claims this set up is part of the MMORPG genre, the other says it isn't.
Lets make things even more confusing.
ign Guild Wars Preview
"The first thing that needs to be said is that Guild Wars is not an MMO"
okay, so guild Wars is not an MMO, according to IGN.
IGN Guild Wars Review
" Guild Wars has slickly sidestepped most of these issues by being only partly an MMO. The cities and some far-flung locations act has hubs where players can socialize, trade, buy gear, sell loot, and gather up into parties, but everything outside of those relatively small zones is an instanced experience, where you either fly solo, with your four-person party, or with game-controlled henchmen."
Good, so we have that cleared up. According to IGN, GW is only partly an MMO. Its not a full MMO because it makes use of instanced zones.
Now, lets see what IGN has to say about Dungeons & Dragons Online.
Dungeons & Dragons online IGN Preview
And what do we see here?
"Rather than being a strict translation of the 3.5 rules, D&D Online merely uses the core concepts as the foundation for an MMO."
Dear IGN, would you please make up your mind? so a game like Guild Wars is not an MMO because 4/5th of the world is instanced, but D&DO, Who also has 4/5th of the world instanced, is an MMO?
Am I missing something here?
If you look at the review made by IGN, you will see that D&DO is also considered an MMO in that article.
So IGN isn't exactly helping us here.
Oh, and in case your wondering, Neither reviewers nor Sega consider PSO/PSU an MMO.
So the big review sites aren't going to clear it up for us.
So let me give you my view on the subject.
My arguements for saying DDO, GW, PSO and PSU are not MMORPG's are like this:
- Wikipedia: MMORPG (massively multiplayer online role-playing game) is a genre of online computer roleplaying games.(RPGs) in which a large number of players interact with one another in a virtual world..
and
MMORPGs are distinguished from single-player or small multi-player RPGs by the number of players, and by the game's Persistent World,
so my arguement is that games like DDO, GW, and the others are not set in a virtual, persistent world. they are set in multiple virtual worlds which can not hold up a massive amount of people, they are not sharing one world. One party of 8 are going inside a dungeon, another party goes in the exact same dungeon, but will receive their own world of the dungeon.
Sure the same thing could be said for a game like WoW or Everquest, but in those games, its only a small portion of the game. in the other games, its almost the full game, aside from the time you spent in towns. in WoW or Everquest, You have the CHOICE to do instancing, in DDO and GW, you do not. Yes, to advance in WoW or EQ, you will at one point have to do instances, but that isn't really the point here, so I'll skip that.
My next point is a simple one. There is nothing Massive about GW or DDO. You never really have the chance to play with hundreds of people at the same time in the same world. this is possible in games like WoW, Everquest, Lineage, etc. In most cases, it would be downright stupid to go hunt with hundreds of people at the same time, but that isn't the issue. its POSSIBLE.
So because of those reasons, I don't think GW, D&DO, PSO, and PSU are part of the MMORPG genre. they are online roleplaying games with some MMO aspects.
Feel free to post a comment, but please keep it civil.
We will get back to that later. GW is not the only game that uses this set up. Another well known game is Dungeons & Dragons Online. Other lesser- well known titles that also use this setup are Phantasy Star Online (1+2+3+4) and Phantasy Star Universe.
Right, so these games have a few things in common.
1: In all of those games, all dungeons & fields which feature combat, quests, etc, are fully instanced.
2: Things like towns,outposts, lobbies etc are all open for everyone to visit. BUT, it has to be said, each area can only hold a certain amount of people.
So what do the companies behind the games have to say about this?
Arena net, has taken a stance right from the start. "Guild Wars is not an MMORPG".
Jeff Strain, producer of the game
""Guild Wars is not an MMORPG," said Jeff Strain, producer of the game."
Turbine, on the other hand, has always promoted Dungeons & Dragons Online as an MMORPG.
So we have two companies,two games, both which use the exact same set up. One claims this set up is part of the MMORPG genre, the other says it isn't.
Lets make things even more confusing.
ign Guild Wars Preview
"The first thing that needs to be said is that Guild Wars is not an MMO"
okay, so guild Wars is not an MMO, according to IGN.
IGN Guild Wars Review
" Guild Wars has slickly sidestepped most of these issues by being only partly an MMO. The cities and some far-flung locations act has hubs where players can socialize, trade, buy gear, sell loot, and gather up into parties, but everything outside of those relatively small zones is an instanced experience, where you either fly solo, with your four-person party, or with game-controlled henchmen."
Good, so we have that cleared up. According to IGN, GW is only partly an MMO. Its not a full MMO because it makes use of instanced zones.
Now, lets see what IGN has to say about Dungeons & Dragons Online.
Dungeons & Dragons online IGN Preview
And what do we see here?
"Rather than being a strict translation of the 3.5 rules, D&D Online merely uses the core concepts as the foundation for an MMO."
Dear IGN, would you please make up your mind? so a game like Guild Wars is not an MMO because 4/5th of the world is instanced, but D&DO, Who also has 4/5th of the world instanced, is an MMO?
Am I missing something here?
If you look at the review made by IGN, you will see that D&DO is also considered an MMO in that article.
So IGN isn't exactly helping us here.
Oh, and in case your wondering, Neither reviewers nor Sega consider PSO/PSU an MMO.
So the big review sites aren't going to clear it up for us.
So let me give you my view on the subject.
My arguements for saying DDO, GW, PSO and PSU are not MMORPG's are like this:
- Wikipedia: MMORPG (massively multiplayer online role-playing game) is a genre of online computer roleplaying games.(RPGs) in which a large number of players interact with one another in a virtual world..
and
MMORPGs are distinguished from single-player or small multi-player RPGs by the number of players, and by the game's Persistent World,
so my arguement is that games like DDO, GW, and the others are not set in a virtual, persistent world. they are set in multiple virtual worlds which can not hold up a massive amount of people, they are not sharing one world. One party of 8 are going inside a dungeon, another party goes in the exact same dungeon, but will receive their own world of the dungeon.
Sure the same thing could be said for a game like WoW or Everquest, but in those games, its only a small portion of the game. in the other games, its almost the full game, aside from the time you spent in towns. in WoW or Everquest, You have the CHOICE to do instancing, in DDO and GW, you do not. Yes, to advance in WoW or EQ, you will at one point have to do instances, but that isn't really the point here, so I'll skip that.
My next point is a simple one. There is nothing Massive about GW or DDO. You never really have the chance to play with hundreds of people at the same time in the same world. this is possible in games like WoW, Everquest, Lineage, etc. In most cases, it would be downright stupid to go hunt with hundreds of people at the same time, but that isn't the issue. its POSSIBLE.
So because of those reasons, I don't think GW, D&DO, PSO, and PSU are part of the MMORPG genre. they are online roleplaying games with some MMO aspects.
Feel free to post a comment, but please keep it civil.
