kongkim wrote: »

Its my favorit mmo to date. But will say that EVE Online come close

Majic wrote: »

ESO: Number Two Never Looked Better

In the modern MMO genre (i.e., not counting MUDs, MUSHes, multiplayer FPSs, etc.), aside from ESO, I've played Asheron's Call 2, Star Wars Galaxies, Lord of the Rings Online, EVE and Guild Wars 2.

When the Guild Wars 2 Beta Weekend Events came out in the summer of 2012, I was still plugging away in LotRO after getting bored of EVE (PVE to PVP, yo). I was interested in GW2 because it focuses on bringing players together without forcing them to group or punishing them for playing solo if they prefer. It was during that very first BWE that I realized I had finally found the best MMO for me, and it has remained my favorite game ever since.

ESO has a newer engine, first-rate art and sound, great writing, beautiful maps, Elder Scrolls lore (I've played Morrowind, Oblivion and Skyrim and loved them) and a combat system without autoattacks that rewards players for approaching warfare as an art form. It is, in my opinion, the very best Elder Scrolls game so far.

Unfortunately, it suffers from a single-player zero-sum design mentality which dictates that players must compete for everything in the open world: kills, resource nodes, even quest items. The result is an open world which is most enjoyable when no other players are around, and where the most logical thing to do upon seeing another player is to run the other way.

On The Turning Away

In ESO, as you add more players what you end up with is a barren, farmed-out wasteland offering nothing to do but wait around a ridiculously long time for respawns or move on to the next farmed-out wasteland. It's as exciting as chasing the fleeting banner of the Ante-Inferno -- but with standing around instead of chasing. And no banner.

ESO is a game in which friendliness is punished. Not a good design.

Contrast that to Guild Wars 2, where spawn rates and difficulty scale to the number of players present, and you never have to fight other players for resources or quest objectives. In GW2, the more players, the better it gets.

GW2 is a game in which friendliness is rewarded. Best. Design. Ever.

GW2 has also had level scaling from the start, meaning you were never consigned to an "End-Game Ghetto" when you leveled up. You could always go back to any zone, even starter zones, play there if you wanted, still get good loot and still enjoy the camaraderie of playing alongside others without having to race them to nodes or objectives.

ESO is now adding this with One Tamriel, which scales everyone up to allow essentially the same thing, but goes a step farther to allow lower-level players to play higher-level content, which is something GW2's level scaling doesn't do (it's just downscaling). This is a brilliant move and in one stroke eliminates a lot of the problems that came with the unimaginative, crusty old MMO mechanics ESO launched with.

Meanwhile, GW2 has been suffering from a long content drought which itself is a lingering effect of an ill-fated "living world" model that generated an entire year of one-shot events that can no longer be played, leaving nothing more to show than some now-unobtainable swag, events you can only see on YouTube and a bunch of smoking craters. Not a good design.

So for now, ESO is at an advantage, and it's where I'm spending my MMO time these days.

The Road Ahead

However, in the long-term, ESO lacks repeatable content in the open world. Once you finish all the quests, bosses and dolmens in a zone, that zone is "done" and doesn't offer any reasons to return. Thus the end result still becomes an end-game ghetto, just one with softer edges. Due to its repeatable dynamic event structure in every zone, GW2 has the advantage in the long-term. Even if repeatable content becomes boring, it can at least be replayed, whereas one-shot content doesn't even have that going for it.

One Tamriel is a huge step forward for ESO and creates a strong foundation for future content. When I heard it was coming, it gave me much-needed hope for the game's direction. But ESO (the game, not the players) is still unfriendly and needs to shed its single-player skin if it is to truly succeed as an MMO.

Do These Things...

1. Eliminate unfriendly PVE mechanics like competitive resource nodes and quest objectives, and scale spawn rates so it's not possible to walk through empty delves or other areas just because a single player walked through them ahead of you. The game does appear to scale spawn rates to some extent already, but it clearly needs adjustment. Overall, redesign ESO to be more enjoyable, not less, when more players are present. Reward spontaneous cooperation. Please the crowds.

2. Convert existing one-shot content to repeatable content and add more repeatable content to open world zones. Add dynamic events that change based on what players do. Give players a reason to go back and use existing maps more efficiently. Breathe life into a lifeless world. Keep us coming back for more.

...and ESO may finally become my favorite MMO.

If not, hey, Number Two still isn't shabby, but I know ESO has the potential to be Number One.

I would love to see that happen.

KochDerDamonen wrote: »

I've played Runescape, GW2 and ESO. I've spent the most time on eso seconded by runescape.

NewBlacksmurf wrote: »

There are other MMO games that I like and some that I'm playing now over ESO TU so...

Keep in mind all of those aren't a typical MMO like WoW but neither is this even tho they're trying to be different, changes are making it more and more like an MMO which is why it's began to drop lower and lower for me.