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  FPS Girl in an MMORPG World (50 comments )
by: Kessandra (1008) | Posted in cluster FiringSquad Editors Challenge Round 1 Prelim 2
Posted 76 months ago ( edited 76 months ago ) in category DEFAULT
I was never a big MMORPG gamer. I was the type of person who preferred to fight with honor, bravery and selflessness in games such as “America’s Army”. I never once thought about playing those horrid and pointless blasphemous atrocities known as MMORPGs.
I have heard tales of marriages breaking, lives destroyed, careers lost, financial bankruptcy and an out of control addiction. Some of these are pure exaggerations but others are real.
Why do I hate MMORPGs? It broke me and my boyfriend up. I played many trials of such horrific creations in the past and grew hopelessly bored with the amount of unrealistic tasks I must complete (whereas my ex loved it). I also grew bored of having to kill hundreds of animals for ‘experience’ or items that seemingly fall off their corpses. (I mean honestly, how does an ultra-powerful Death Star-like Elven sword fall off a boar?)
Unfortunately, me and my clan broke up and we went our separate ways. I grew tired of the same old maps, the same old strategies, the same old weapons and the same old idiotic twelve year old who calls you a hacker for killing him. The FPS genre turned stale…
One afternoon, at my local store, I picked up a copy of a computer journalism magazine known as “PC Gamer”. It contained two demos in one disc, one of which is an RTS called “Company of Heroes” and the other, a 14-day trial of World of Warcraft.
Unfortunately, my computer couldn’t handle the shouts and battle-cries of valorous soldiers of the past giving away their lives for their respective nations. So I decided to give this fantasy RTS turned MMORPG a try.
I created my account, downloaded and installed the game and I was off. I had many races to choose from, but whom shall I be? How about an extremely small, puny creature that you may find in other people’s lawns opposite the plastic pink flamingo? No.
How about an oversized cow? No. An overgrown human-grape hybrid with impossibly long ears? No. But alas, I have found it. The race we are all most familiar with: the human.
Now I must choose my social status. Do I become a valiant crusader fighting for justice? Do I become a malevolent sorcerer of the shadow? Nope. How about a deceitful cloaking rogue, someone who wouldn't think twice before sticking a knife behind your back? Nah, I’ll just go with a medieval version of the modern day infantryman: the Warrior, the backbone of every army.
Now I enter the magical and fantastical world of Azeroth, where lead CAN be turned into gold. I see a heavily armored figure in front of me, someone known as Willem. I wondered what was with the horridly annoying floating exclamation mark on his head, so I asked him. But before he answered my question, he gave me a task. I promptly ignored it, like he ignored my question.
So I ventured within the cathedral and saw more people with exclamation marks on their heads. What kind of crazy fad is going on here? I gave up and decided to do their pointless and menial tasks. I killed one wolf and another popped up to replace it. So I killed that one, but their was no end to the amount of wolves that spawn. So I returned to tell the guy with the exclamation mark that there was no hope and he was completely screwed. Strangely enough, his exclamation mark turned into a question mark. I asked him about it and he gave me some copper and some armor.
Then a column of light burst from the ground and encompassed my warrior. I thought she was a goner to this strange volcanic eruption of bright light but it was all over as soon as it began. Somehow, I leveled. My health increased, my attributes increased and all was swell.
Now I have another task to complete: I must go and kill these candle-worshipping rat mining laborers known as “Kobolds”. Now I can understand killing wolves, most of which are somewhat mindless, violent creatures that would gnaw you limbs off. But why do I have to kill these ugly rodent creatures who are just trying to make a living?
What do the humans of Azeroth have against immigrant rodent laborers? Heck, these poor Kobolds are living in poverty camps whilst the humans are enjoying their nice, luxurious cathedral.
I took off from the land of Northshire. My warrior isn’t a mass murderer. I entered a town known as Goldshire and saw people with silver exclamation marks on their heads. Now these must be the people who are rich enough to afford such glamorous holographic exclamation marks. Strangely, no one is offering me any type of work.
So I take off in hopes of finding someone who will want my services. I wander around, killed a few wolves and bears here and there but I am still unemployed. I am tempted to head back to Northshire but I must stand by my morals. After further wandering, I see a bunch of those ugly poor immigrant rodent laborers working in a mine and asked them if they needed any help. I guess the system works by you talking to someone with a yellow exclamation mark on their heads. But these Kobolds had none.
But I ventured in the mine regardless because these are my friends... or so I thought. One of them came after me and lunged his pickaxe on my hapless warrior. I run further into the mine but alas, I succumbed to the dark void encompassing my vision. It is the end, I have died...
Now I am a ghost, with an even larger ghost in front of me. This larger ghost resembles an angel. So I ask him/her if I am in heaven but he/she ignores me and tells me that they can send me back for a price. Dang monopolistic greedy angels…
What the heck is wrong with this game? Back-stabbing immigrant ‘friends’, Hitler-like guards in cathedrals, holographic exclamation marks? No thanks, I’ll stick to my hardcore FPS games. |
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| 50 User Comment(s) • 14 root comment(s) |
 Kessandra (1008)    Feb 25, 2007 - 06:29 am | Edited on Feb 25, 2007 - 06:52 am
| Wow... Well, my original intention with this article was for it to be an amusing read and not an established viewpoint or argument but I have apparently succeeded with both.
What I have written is an exaggerated (although valid) viewpoint from that of a complete and utter noob. Actually, I have played WoW way before the demo disc with the 14-day trial was in my possession.
I love WoW a lot but it does have some flaws, of which I have mentioned in my article above. World of Warcraft and likewise MMORPGs are very fun and exciting for the first few levels (say 1 - 30) but after that, it becomes the same old thing. Kill Subject A and retrieve Item B if available. Sometimes I have to kill the same creature continuously until one of their body parts drops. And don't Murlocs have two eyes?
Fortunately, developer Blizzard Entertainment made a wonderful expansion named "The Burning Crusade" that offers two new races with their respective starting zones (which are extraordinary and highly exotic IMHO). The quests found with the new content are more original than that of vanilla WoW, even though said examples of such repetitive tasks still exist.
As for my highly flawed opinion on FPS games turning stale, I highly mis-phrased what I meant. What I meant to say was that after playing the same FPS game for many years, it turned stale and boring. There are many different types of FPS games such as run-and-gun games like Quake and Counter-Strike, Sea/Air/Land combat games like Battlefield, tactical/squad based games like America's Army or Ghost Recon/SWAT 4.
The games I mentioned (among others) have brought innovation to the game industry but is the clones of such innovative games that make it stale. Its the lack of NEW innovative games and the constant playing of the old innovative games that makes the genre stale. This is why I am hoping Quake Wars, Halo 3, Crysis, Bioshock and all the other upcoming FPS refreshen everything.
This is just my humble opinion and feel free to criticize it.
And by the way, I am a huge fan of TBS games like Civilization and Galactic Civilizations. I am also a fan of RTS games and hopefully sometime this week, I'll get the new computer I bought from Newegg (nVidia GeForce 8800gtx > nVidia GeForce 4 baby!) allowing me to try out Company of Heroes and future games like Crysis.
I actually don't spend a lot of time playing computer games. I read, go to work, do some exercise, etc.» Login to reply to this Chaostar (1) Feb 25, 2007 - 08:24 pm | Edited on Feb 25, 2007 - 08:28 pm
| » Yup
I really enjoyed playing World of Warcraft and Dark Age of Camelot along with the usual array of FPS games as well. That said, you're completely right about the way that they get really repetitive after a while. Not only that, once you reach the maximum level (and the game really starts), you have to pour in ridiculous amounts of time just to be mildly competitive. I've known many other players who denied this but I just can't see it any other way. I reached a point where I was probably playing about 20 hours a week and I thought that was pretty extreme and it somewhat sickened me how much time I spent in that virtual world. Truth is, though, that 20 hours a week doesn't really cut it. If you manage to get into a big guild that does all the big dungeons, it's not uncommon to log in at any time of day to find the heavy-hitters in your guild to be there...always. I swear, some of these people must not eat, shower or work. It disgusted me enough to throw it down and head back to the world of RTS and FPS games where you can actually have a life and still play at a somewhat competitive level.
Concerning your opinion on stale FPS games, I agree there too. New releases have become more of the same with better graphics. I realize there are slight improvements here and there but I also am hoping for something (in the FPS vein) to come along and really grab my attention.» Login to reply to this |
Droniac (114) Feb 25, 2007 - 01:30 pm | Edited on Feb 25, 2007 - 01:30 pm
| Kessandra, have you ever tried any MMORPGs besides World of Warcraft? It's a rather blunt generalization to say that all of them are enjoyable for the first 30 levels, especially considering the fact that some of them don't even know leveling systems.
I agree that classic MMORPGs like WoW, EverQuest & Lineage grow stale after their initial niceties, but there are other kinds of MMORPGs too. You really can't list games like Guild Wars, Shattered Galaxy & EVE Online along the likes of WoW & EQ...
Any game would turn stale after many successive years of playing it. That's why it's nice to just take a break from playing a particular game (or even genre) and trying something else every now and then.
I don't recall anything innovative about Ghost Recon, SWAT 4 and America's Army, but feel free to enlighten me - I don't know much of anything about those games. BattleField was not truly innovative, it was merely the first popular game of it's sort (Starsiege: Tribes (1998!) anyone?).
I still see plenty of recent innovative FPS games around, but that may be because I seem to enjoy vastly different FPS games than you do. Half Life 2 was undoubtedly innovative, Prey was most certainly innovative, WarSow is a very innovative game, even Quake 4 brought a fair few innovations along with it.
I highly doubt Halo 3 or ET:QW will come forth with anything innovative. Anyone who likes those kinds of games will probably find them to be a breath of fresh air nonetheless... simply because it's new.
I have no doubt future FPS games will bring further innovation, just look at games like Project: Offset & Savage 2... on that note, I can't wait for Project: Offset to come out!
PS: Woa nice video card ;p
You really should give the Supreme Commander demo a spin, if only to see how good it looks & performs on your new system. ;)» Login to reply to this
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