Forgotten Corners of World of Warcraft • Hacker News Board

Re: Forgotten Corners of World of Warcraft

#31

Post by Igglyboo » Fri, Apr 24, 2015, 6:29 PM UTC

Someone1234 wrote: post #20

Blackthorn wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having played both WoW and Guild Wars 1 (not 2), I think Guild Wars 1 had the best solution of them all -- virtually all the content in the game is "max level" endgame content. They don't use the mechanic of more and better gear as a reward, so content doesn't get obsoleted by that.

> They don't use the mechanic of more and better gear as a reward, so content doesn't get obsoleted by that. Interesting. What do they use instead? Most games use either gear or something akin to gear (like ships in Eve).

They use skins.

Max level armor/weapons are easily attainable by anyone in GW1 but if you want fancy looking stuff you're going to have to work for it. Makes the game a lot more skill based instead of grind based. Works very well for GW1 PvP.

Re: Forgotten Corners of World of Warcraft

#32

Post by HCIdivision17 » Fri, Apr 24, 2015, 6:30 PM UTC

codecondo wrote: post #15

burke wrote: post #6

I played WoW a lot when I was in University. I find it really incredible how much nostalgia I'm feeling looking at these screenshots. I reactivate my account once a year or so just to fly around for a couple hours. I'm glad I can still do this, but it concerns me that this generation of online-only games won't be relivable decades later like the games of my earlier childhood will always be.

A bit sad/cheeky story from me, but still relevant I believe. The time was around TBC, I think right in the middle of its launch, I managed to hack an account back then of some characters, and thought I'd log-in to have a good time. It was my first experience of the game, granted I never did destroy any characters or items, since it was my first time playing the game, but I did spend a reasonable amount of time in-ga…

I think there's a lot of us that get misty-eyed on TBC. There was a lot of opportunity for just funnin' around. I was surprised Halaa wasn't shown in the article; I consider it some of the best landscape and I had a lot of fun there. It was the sort of game where you'd say in Org chat that you were putting on a fireworks show in Halaa, and people would switch to characters in the other faction to keep the Halaa battle ballanced. (And it was nice they were there: my bank alt toon was very low level.)

Re: Forgotten Corners of World of Warcraft

#33

Post by raker » Fri, Apr 24, 2015, 6:30 PM UTC

Someone1234 wrote: post #20

Blackthorn wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having played both WoW and Guild Wars 1 (not 2), I think Guild Wars 1 had the best solution of them all -- virtually all the content in the game is "max level" endgame content. They don't use the mechanic of more and better gear as a reward, so content doesn't get obsoleted by that.

> They don't use the mechanic of more and better gear as a reward, so content doesn't get obsoleted by that. Interesting. What do they use instead? Most games use either gear or something akin to gear (like ships in Eve).

Progression through Guild Wars rewards you with access to new skills. At any given time you can only bring 8 of those skills (and only 1 of them can be elite) with you at any given time. In addition, your character is limited to using skills from 2 classes. Many of the skills have specific interactions or triggers. Some skill specifically counter, defend against, or take advantage of other skills. Mobs have a set of skills (including some mob-only skills). The result is a logic puzzle that may have many solutions, left for the player to figure out.

Players have fairly easy access to all skills and max-level equipment in the game. Skills are (almost) never made obsolete by other skills, so you could very well be using the exact same skill you learned early in the game while you fight the final boss. The challenge is finding the combination of skills and gear to best suit your needs at any given task. Comparable to collecting tools to add to your toolbox, a screwdriver can solve new problems for you, but it doesn't make the hammer any less useful.

Re: Forgotten Corners of World of Warcraft

#34

Post by honestcoyote » Fri, Apr 24, 2015, 6:32 PM UTC

burke wrote: post #6

I played WoW a lot when I was in University. I find it really incredible how much nostalgia I'm feeling looking at these screenshots. I reactivate my account once a year or so just to fly around for a couple hours. I'm glad I can still do this, but it concerns me that this generation of online-only games won't be relivable decades later like the games of my earlier childhood will always be.

I don't think you should be too concerned. For WoW specifically, there are private servers available which allow players to experience Classic again. There's also servers concentrating on the other expansions. Runescape also has a healthy server emulation scene. There's work being done to bring back the original Star Wars Galaxies. There used to be private servers for Ultima Online and I suppose those are still out there.

I think if something has at least a minimum amount of popularity, and a portion of the software (the client in this case) is still available, then enough people will find a way to keep it alive even when it's been abandoned by its creator.

Re: Forgotten Corners of World of Warcraft

#35

Post by FlannelPancake » Fri, Apr 24, 2015, 6:33 PM UTC

minimaxir wrote: post #3

I recently reactivated my old WoW account and purchased Warlords of Draenor out of curiosity, and ended up getting my Orc Death Knight to the new level cap of 100. This article only scratches the surface on why the old worlds are abandoned. As with most modern MMOs, the endgame begins at max level. In order to help players level faster, Blizzard added a heirlooms mechanic in the second expansion (Wrath of the Lich Ki…

I think you're clearly correct about the game beginning at max level, but I don't think heirlooms or exp boosts changed anything. Even in vanilla, there were accepted "do this to level as quickly as possible" routes. No one really hung around silithus pre-AQ, with the small exception of people who chose to level there (and there were much better zones to do that).

WoW and mmos in general just don't encourage exploration very much. It doesn't contribute to making your avatar any better. So unless you're really into just having fun - which the game mostly does not encourage in lieu of running dungeons and getting gear and etc, a lot of these zones have just ALWAYS been abandoned, save for some event bringing people to them.

The reason the population is 15-20 in these zones as opposed to 60+ is because there are better ways to level nowadays, not that anyone cared to visit these zones in the first place and heirlooms ruined that.

That being said, I realize you're not blaming this entirely on heirlooms and exp boosts, I just wanted to clarify on that specific part of what you said.

Re: Forgotten Corners of World of Warcraft

#36

Post by searine » Fri, Apr 24, 2015, 6:34 PM UTC

The most fun I had in wow was running a scripted bot to power-level myself.

It added a whole level of meta-gaming and risk. It also made me ungodly rich in gold.

Then I hit the level cap and stopped playing. Oh well.

Re: Forgotten Corners of World of Warcraft

#37

Post by rickyc091 » Fri, Apr 24, 2015, 6:40 PM UTC

leemac wrote: post #9

My WoW experience started with Vanilla. Long hours were spent but I had so much fun. Looking back, I had so much free time and no concept of getting older. MC raids were a blast and getting ganked in STV was a daily occurrence. Today, I'm nearing my thirties and can't seem to get into the game for more than an hour at a time. I'm a very happy homeowner, married and kids are in the plans in the next few years. I have…

Only played during the original WoW days, but from what I heard things are so different now. I remember the days of hardcore 40 man raids, I hear it's not as much as a thing anymore. The game is more catered to the casual gamer. Then again, that makes perfect sense. When I started, I had hours and hours to devote on the game, these days, I can barely find any time to play games.

Re: Forgotten Corners of World of Warcraft

#38

Post by minimaxir » Fri, Apr 24, 2015, 6:42 PM UTC

Nullabillity wrote: post #19

minimaxir wrote: post #3

I recently reactivated my old WoW account and purchased Warlords of Draenor out of curiosity, and ended up getting my Orc Death Knight to the new level cap of 100. This article only scratches the surface on why the old worlds are abandoned. As with most modern MMOs, the endgame begins at max level. In order to help players level faster, Blizzard added a heirlooms mechanic in the second expansion (Wrath of the Lich Ki…

Slight correction: the dungeon finder isn't a new thing, it was added in Wrath, though later than the heirlooms.

That's correct. Although looking into it more, it appears the revamps of the old world dungeons which made them much easier and less time consuming didn't happen until later expansions. (E.g Scarlet Monastery and Blackfatom Deeps two expansions later.)

Re: Forgotten Corners of World of Warcraft

#39

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Apr 24, 2015, 6:43 PM UTC

jdjb wrote: post #27

Someone1234 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They don't use the mechanic of more and better gear as a reward, so content doesn't get obsoleted by that. Interesting. What do they use instead? Most games use either gear or something akin to gear (like ships in Eve).

Guild Wars focused on your synergy with your party. The content got harder but your character stats didn't improve. You got a few new skills at your disposal (and eventually 1 elite skill) but mostly it was about understanding the game mechanics and how to work as a team better. This also meant that not every mission was necessarily more challenging than the last (in Factions there were some missions that were much h…

[deleted]

Re: Forgotten Corners of World of Warcraft

#40

Post by patio11 » Fri, Apr 24, 2015, 6:43 PM UTC

Interesting note: every ghost-town of a zone in WoW, and some of them were ghost-towns immediately, cost N fully realized software startups to develop. (Like, mid-single-digit million dollars per zone.)

It's one of those things to keep in perspective when folks say "Why did anyone sink $1.2 million into $A_FIELD_I_DON'T_CONNECT_WITH?" I don't know, but that's literally less than it cost to put that mid-30s swamp level in Ogrimmar that nobody ever went to, so don't fret too much about the misallocation of society's resources.