“Everyone can be super – everyone can have powers! And when everyone’s super…no one will be.” - Syndrome The Incredibles
There’s a special intimacy that exists between a player and their game. That invisible connection that intersects your eyes, ears, hands and taps directly into your imagination. Whether you’re alone in a darkened room or leaping about in amongst your friends, you still maintain that connection. It’s the same when reading a book, listening to music or watching a movie. Only even more than that, as you constantly input to alter, react to and change the parameters of what you are experiencing.
This intimacy is none more powerful then when you assume the role of the hero; a fantasy we all love to indulge in. A healthy escape that rewards and nourishes you within the bubble of whatever scenario in which you choose to be immersed. Like Alice in Wonderland, Dorothy in Oz or Neo in The Matrix, they transcend a humble and insignificant existence in the ‘real’ world to become, even if it’s only short lived, the hero of another. They are special, even if they never realised it before.
Computer games have been experts at this transition for decades and as technology has improved have become all the more thrilling and believable in doing so. But technology is a double-edged sword, where just as the worlds have become richer and more vibrant the ways for people to connect to and share those experiences has changed beyond all recognition. For the first time in human history not only can human-beings share information in real time with one and other regardless of geographical location, we can now directly interact in virtual environments of our own design. Assume the roles of whom or whatever we desire in either collaboration or competition. It’s our choice. Sounds good yeah? Well, in theory, sure. In 2014, in practice, no.
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Among the various things revealed in Destiny 2: Into the Light, I don't think any of them beat the speculation Pantheon received. The unexpected raid boss - IS
Demi god complex.
MMOs fail to realise that if they aim to give a real world feel where you earn your victory then it needs to be very real world like, but again why not live your life properly and level up in real life lol.
I like how Battlefield games handle multiplayer. Have 64 players be almost equal. Its just some guns and attachments that give a minor advantage but most decent players can play well with both a lvl 1 or lvl 50 soldier.
They need to remove this god complex from multiplayer games. In single player it makes sense as you do become the god of your own story. Like two shotting dragons in Skyrim.
My main issue is the method and process of quitting one mmo to play another. Its a very harsh process and quite emotionally and mentally taxing. After committing countless hours you are going to rinse and repeat on another mmo with slightly different enemy designs, areas and spells but the overall skeleton is the same and once again bam countless hours.
Main reason is dissatisfaction at some level or another. We cannot be satisfied knowing that we are not entirely special or unique. As humans we may or may not be satisfied but we want our characters in the game to definitely be perfect. Everyone is creating their version of the perfect man and woman in the game their Adam and Eve.
In the end it feel baseless because the journey to it just distractions and illusions of grandeur, new armor, new spells, feeling like a boss but bam you realise woah there are few million of you around who are the same.
MMOs have not reached that state where it can actually provide us an infinite hope. There is always a numerical end to the game in terms of how the game was created and there is an incalculable point as to where the player wants to go or what he/she wants. Even if the game gave you that ultimate end game thing we could come away dissappointed. It all comes down to how players deal with it and how we play the game and what we expect of the game.
Unfortunately the way MMOS are structured today they always tease you into the god complex without you even knowing you have it.
I'm no expert on the MMORPG scene but isn't the alternative to having heroes is having games like Runescape (I haven't played it in 9 years, so who knows what stuff they've added since) where you just grind and don't have any real abilities?
I guess I'd agree there's too much scaling in MMOs though. Part of what puts me off them is the grind and difference between levels. I like games that put players on even terms, which is why I'm heavily into Dota. You can be nearly godly, but you'll need to earn it. And within 40 minutes, it'll be gone.
I think having each player be utterly unique is really difficult, beyond apperances. At best, you can just offer more forms of expression.
The best MMO I ever played was Asheron's Call, precisely because it was broken.
For example, you could easily create totally gimped character builds, the world was large and diverse and required a lot of personal skill to get around, combat required that you actually know a monsters weakness in order to kill it easier, etc, etc, etc.
Of course, the negative side was that people who tried the game and didn't delve into it enough, had a real tough time playing it because it was so hard, unlike current games.
The only MMO I am looking forward to is Star Citizen. The rest I am sick of.
I used to play every MMO, now I don't even care.
If you want a MMO that has action, world events and everyone is on the same playing field, Guild Wars 2!