every MMORPG imagined by light novel writers is the dumbest game imaginable
much like the light novel writers trying to write otome game isekai, I have to assume that a lot of them have just... never actually played an MMORPG and just want to follow the latest light novel trend
(fun fact: otome games generally don't actually have a villainess who's engaged to the male lead, presumably because
A)NTR scenarios are kind of unpopular, and
B)players looking for escapism probably don't want to be bullied in the game)
+2
MorninglordI'm tired of being Batman,so today I'll be Owl.Registered Userregular
I want to play Glory, actually. It legit sounds fun.
(PSN: Morninglord) (Steam: Morninglord) (WiiU: Morninglord22) I like to record and toss up a lot of random gaming videos here.
0
Munkus BeaverYou don't have to attend every argument you are invited to.Philosophy: Stoicism. Politics: Democratic SocialistRegistered User, ClubPAregular
every MMORPG imagined by light novel writers is the dumbest game imaginable
much like the light novel writers trying to write otome game isekai, I have to assume that a lot of them have just... never actually played an MMORPG and just want to follow the latest light novel trend
(fun fact: otome games generally don't actually have a villainess who's engaged to the male lead, presumably because
A)NTR scenarios are kind of unpopular, and
B)players looking for escapism probably don't want to be bullied in the game)
Most just extrapolate from a single player RPG into an MMORPG. Even .hack does this.
Humor can be dissected as a frog can, but dies in the process.
0
MorninglordI'm tired of being Batman,so today I'll be Owl.Registered Userregular
edited October 2
I should state that I'm talking about Kings Avatar. I think Glory was partly based on a real mmo though, and it's an esports novel so it needs to actually feel competitive.
Morninglord on
(PSN: Morninglord) (Steam: Morninglord) (WiiU: Morninglord22) I like to record and toss up a lot of random gaming videos here.
every MMORPG imagined by light novel writers is the dumbest game imaginable
much like the light novel writers trying to write otome game isekai, I have to assume that a lot of them have just... never actually played an MMORPG and just want to follow the latest light novel trend
(fun fact: otome games generally don't actually have a villainess who's engaged to the male lead, presumably because
A)NTR scenarios are kind of unpopular, and
B)players looking for escapism probably don't want to be bullied in the game)
Most just extrapolate from a single player RPG into an MMORPG. Even .hack does this.
Given the absolutely wild claims they make about RPGs and gamer behavior, it's difficult to believe they even do that. More like they extrapolate from what they saw in SAO or whatever other garbage got them keyed in to chasing this fad. God, I hope it's a fad.
MorninglordI'm tired of being Batman,so today I'll be Owl.Registered Userregular
edited October 2
I remember jumping into Everquest 2 after it had many, many expansions under its belt and man it was layered with stuff. There was the new intended progression path, but there were also literal years of ancient vaults and dungeons, secret quests you could uncover from finding a random book on the ground in a field that nobody points you at, that led you to abandoned ruins of terrifyingly strong enemies that required a party or a totally overpowered soloing build (which I was) to delve into. You didn't need to do any of it and there was no reason to do it, it was all old content, but they didn't remove any of the old stuff.
It felt like being an archaeologist.
These old places often had interesting housing stuff in them. Nothing super fancy, just, I'd bring back an urn from my laborious expedition and I could put it on my house mantle and the completed book (you would complete books by doing the quest) in my bookshelf, and that was that. No super item, no gear relevant loot (new progression gear made the old content redundant). It was just an adventure for the sake of it. I thought it was really cool that they left it all in.
Morninglord on
(PSN: Morninglord) (Steam: Morninglord) (WiiU: Morninglord22) I like to record and toss up a lot of random gaming videos here.
every MMORPG imagined by light novel writers is the dumbest game imaginable
much like the light novel writers trying to write otome game isekai, I have to assume that a lot of them have just... never actually played an MMORPG and just want to follow the latest light novel trend
(fun fact: otome games generally don't actually have a villainess who's engaged to the male lead, presumably because
A)NTR scenarios are kind of unpopular, and
B)players looking for escapism probably don't want to be bullied in the game)
Most just extrapolate from a single player RPG into an MMORPG. Even .hack does this.
Here's the thing, though: even the ones that take place in a single-player RPG (or take upon the trappings of one - your typical isekai-with-RPG-stats) don't seem to actually be based on single-player RPGs as much as they're just... well, what ArcTangent wrote. An incestuous slurry of regurgitated misunderstandings of game mechanics.
You have your exceptions, of course, and there's definitely examples where the person writing it clearly has put some thought into things (or just stolen it outright from D&D - looking at you, 1HP wizard isekai)... but for your typical Syosetu->Light Novel->Manga->Anime pipeline? Nah. Tastes move too fast and chaotically to not just chase the latest fad.
...As for .hack, that one kind of had a thing where part of it was meant to be a PS2 MMORPG. It just got some design change to be single-player and then a big ol' multimedia franchise push. It had a ton of money behind it, unlike your average light novel which tends to be snapped up and edited popular web novels.
(Kazunori Ito and the staff also researched MMORPGs at the time... but that meant Phantasy Star Online, Final Fantasy XI, and Ultima Online, so, well. Not exactly how things look today.)
0
Munkus BeaverYou don't have to attend every argument you are invited to.Philosophy: Stoicism. Politics: Democratic SocialistRegistered User, ClubPAregular
Let me rephrase that a bit.
Most of the ones I've seen
Humor can be dissected as a frog can, but dies in the process.
Munkus BeaverYou don't have to attend every argument you are invited to.Philosophy: Stoicism. Politics: Democratic SocialistRegistered User, ClubPAregular
I think part of it is that modern MMOs are designed to be primarily accessible by anyone. Which means there is equal opportunity to get certain things. The last time I can really remember a "this one singular person gets something amazing" was the AQ gong in WoW and even that was achievable once per server and multiple people could get the gong reward if they all turned in at the same time (or within twenty four hours)
And most of the "MMO Isekai" shit which feature a horribly designed MMO that I've seen (Overlord, S:AO, that one where the girl eats the things to name a few) run under the 'protagonist gets something that makes them super duper special' akin to a hero from an RPG. Like a destined or chosen hero. And MMOs just aren't like that, at least they haven't been for at least twenty years.
Humor can be dissected as a frog can, but dies in the process.
I do love Log Horizon’s take and how the players start exploiting all the leftover game systems.
I give log horizon a pass because the parts that are leftover from it being a game seem somewhat believably like a real MMO, it's just they got mashed up onto a suddenly real version of the game's fantasy world
every MMORPG imagined by light novel writers is the dumbest game imaginable
much like the light novel writers trying to write otome game isekai, I have to assume that a lot of them have just... never actually played an MMORPG and just want to follow the latest light novel trend
(fun fact: otome games generally don't actually have a villainess who's engaged to the male lead, presumably because
A)NTR scenarios are kind of unpopular, and
B)players looking for escapism probably don't want to be bullied in the game)
Most just extrapolate from a single player RPG into an MMORPG. Even .hack does this.
Here's the thing, though: even the ones that take place in a single-player RPG (or take upon the trappings of one - your typical isekai-with-RPG-stats) don't seem to actually be based on single-player RPGs as much as they're just... well, what ArcTangent wrote. An incestuous slurry of regurgitated misunderstandings of game mechanics.
You have your exceptions, of course, and there's definitely examples where the person writing it clearly has put some thought into things (or just stolen it outright from D&D - looking at you, 1HP wizard isekai)... but for your typical Syosetu->Light Novel->Manga->Anime pipeline? Nah. Tastes move too fast and chaotically to not just chase the latest fad.
...As for .hack, that one kind of had a thing where part of it was meant to be a PS2 MMORPG. It just got some design change to be single-player and then a big ol' multimedia franchise push. It had a ton of money behind it, unlike your average light novel which tends to be snapped up and edited popular web novels.
(Kazunori Ito and the staff also researched MMORPGs at the time... but that meant Phantasy Star Online, Final Fantasy XI, and Ultima Online, so, well. Not exactly how things look today.)
was .hack supposed to originally be based on those PS2 games? I thought it was a fantasy story first then they tried to make a tie-in actual game based on it.
I think part of it is that modern MMOs are designed to be primarily accessible by anyone. Which means there is equal opportunity to get certain things. The last time I can really remember a "this one singular person gets something amazing" was the AQ gong in WoW and even that was achievable once per server and multiple people could get the gong reward if they all turned in at the same time (or within twenty four hours)
And most of the "MMO Isekai" shit which feature a horribly designed MMO that I've seen (Overlord, S:AO, that one where the girl eats the things to name a few) run under the 'protagonist gets something that makes them super duper special' akin to a hero from an RPG. Like a destined or chosen hero. And MMOs just aren't like that, at least they haven't been for at least twenty years.
I think part of it is that modern MMOs are designed to be primarily accessible by anyone. Which means there is equal opportunity to get certain things. The last time I can really remember a "this one singular person gets something amazing" was the AQ gong in WoW and even that was achievable once per server and multiple people could get the gong reward if they all turned in at the same time (or within twenty four hours)
And most of the "MMO Isekai" shit which feature a horribly designed MMO that I've seen (Overlord, S:AO, that one where the girl eats the things to name a few) run under the 'protagonist gets something that makes them super duper special' akin to a hero from an RPG. Like a destined or chosen hero. And MMOs just aren't like that, at least they haven't been for at least twenty years.
Sure, but the conceits they ask to make are just so far beyond belief that they beg to ask if the people making them have any actual knowledge of video games at all. Like this VRMMO one in particular, and it is literally named "A Dude Plays a VRMMO." It says "bows aren't meta, so literally NOBODY uses bows. NOBODY." He not only knows the meta, but every single other player in the world does too, and the thing that makes him unique is that he chose to... use a bow. In a fantasy game. And then he spends like an hour working on one cooking skill and that alone vaults him into super stardom and the richest bitch around because not a single other person in the entire game, EVER, has taken or attempted to use that skill, or put in the HERCULEAN effort of grinding it for an hour or two.
+1
Andy JoeWe claim the land for the highlord!The AdirondacksRegistered Userregular
ILTV 01
Ah, that put a big smile on my face. It didn't even look quite as cheap as I feared!
The VRMMO show isn’t anything special, so far, but I enjoyed it enough. There are at least reasons why his cooking and potions became popular, which is mostly because it seems like the game devs are huge trolls. They implemented a taste system, but all of the NPC food is bland and tasteless, so the few people willing to waste a skill slot on cooking get to have an advantage there. Potions sold by NPCs are cheap and plentiful…up until they all run out of stock at the same time a few days into the game without warning, making the few people who were willing to waste an ability slot on medicine very in demand.
It’s like the game devs decided to be as antagonistic as possible to their player base by waiting for the early “meta” for the game to develop, and then alter the game to completely invalidate it. It must be a Fromsoft MMO (I joke, I joke!).
It sounds more like FFXIV...1.0.
This is not a compliment.
Also, the protagonist is 38, which I appreciate. That’s older than several other shows’ protagonists combined!
I wish I could remember where I saw it, but a Japanese game developer pointed out that one of the reasons it was good to have a Western studio make Ghost of Tsushima was because they were able to make the main characters appropriately aged.
There's one reason why the game world of the VRMMO anime seems hacked together, though it's a pretty late spoiler.
It's not being designed as a game, it's actually intended as a method for actual AI, as in fully thinking and autonomous AI, to interact with humans in order to gain social skills.
These AI are the rulers of the in-game countries and some of the named NPCs that wander. The "game" is only intended to last for a year or two, long enough for the AIs to hopefully be ready for introduction into greater society. Every "update" is tweaking things so the AIs can get a broader experience of humans under the guise of game patches.
The protagonist meets and befriends several of these AI, though like all the players he doesn't know what they actually are just that they respond like real people. The reader knows because there's several scenes of the developers talking about how the AI are responding and what their requests for the game are.
every MMORPG imagined by light novel writers is the dumbest game imaginable
much like the light novel writers trying to write otome game isekai, I have to assume that a lot of them have just... never actually played an MMORPG and just want to follow the latest light novel trend
(fun fact: otome games generally don't actually have a villainess who's engaged to the male lead, presumably because
A)NTR scenarios are kind of unpopular, and
B)players looking for escapism probably don't want to be bullied in the game)
Most just extrapolate from a single player RPG into an MMORPG. Even .hack does this.
Here's the thing, though: even the ones that take place in a single-player RPG (or take upon the trappings of one - your typical isekai-with-RPG-stats) don't seem to actually be based on single-player RPGs as much as they're just... well, what ArcTangent wrote. An incestuous slurry of regurgitated misunderstandings of game mechanics.
You have your exceptions, of course, and there's definitely examples where the person writing it clearly has put some thought into things (or just stolen it outright from D&D - looking at you, 1HP wizard isekai)... but for your typical Syosetu->Light Novel->Manga->Anime pipeline? Nah. Tastes move too fast and chaotically to not just chase the latest fad.
...As for .hack, that one kind of had a thing where part of it was meant to be a PS2 MMORPG. It just got some design change to be single-player and then a big ol' multimedia franchise push. It had a ton of money behind it, unlike your average light novel which tends to be snapped up and edited popular web novels.
(Kazunori Ito and the staff also researched MMORPGs at the time... but that meant Phantasy Star Online, Final Fantasy XI, and Ultima Online, so, well. Not exactly how things look today.)
was .hack supposed to originally be based on those PS2 games? I thought it was a fantasy story first then they tried to make a tie-in actual game based on it.
I’m not familiar with the idea of it being planned as an actual MMO in the vein of PSO or such, but the basic deal with .hack was it was going to be a big multimedia franchise from publication start; .hack//SIGN is a prequel to the first set of PS2 games, which was the main centerpiece of the franchise, and meant to set up the start of the goings on in The World (the diegetic MMO that everyone was in). Each volume of the game story came with an additional episode of another tie in OVA, .hack//LIMINALITY
There then came spinoffs like the Legend of Twilight manga, which was popular enough that it got it’s own anime adaptation
Then they decided to make a sequel series of games, the //G.U. Trilogy, so there’s those three volumes (four now, with the remaster), and it has it’s own prequel/lead in anime, //ROOTS
I'd actually like to play one of these 'generic fantasy but anime designs' MMOs that every anime uses, but they don't really exist. They're just all mobile games that pretend to be MMOs.
the two MMO anime I actually like are Log Horizon and Bofuri
Log Horizon for having fun characters and a setting that feels much more like an actual fantasy world that had the MMO combined with it, and Bofuri for not being an isekai and just being completely unhinged all of the time
I'd actually like to play one of these 'generic fantasy but anime designs' MMOs that every anime uses, but they don't really exist. They're just all mobile games that pretend to be MMOs.
All the Genshin lands are kinda fucked in various ways. I haven't played since mid-Sumeru content but it's a tossup between Izanuma and Sumeru for "Most Fucked Place to Live" that isn't Monstadt.
Monstadt wins by default due there being no major authority or law enforcement other than the local police force who are comprised of one workaholic, a literal child, a librarian, and owner of the world's Most Punchable Face
All the Genshin lands are kinda fucked in various ways. I haven't played since mid-Sumeru content but it's a tossup between Izanuma and Sumeru for "Most Fucked Place to Live" that isn't Monstadt.
Monstadt wins by default due there being no major authority or law enforcement other than the local police force who are comprised of one workaholic, a literal child, a librarian, and owner of the world's Most Punchable Face
They've got some others! Like the blonde map expert lad, the sociable plushie-loving archer, a noble, a weird alchemist, a maid knight, a less-weird alchemist
The issue is that a lot of those MMO anime are based on anime based novels based on Ragnarok Online, that it was basically vanilla WoW levels of unbalanced and grindy, but people didn't knew the meta back then. Then people did found out about the meta, and classes started to get balanced since "I grinded for days for an useless class" became a problem.
Or they are just doing Dragon Quest and calling it an MMO.
.hack is like computer-mysticism where druids pray at servers. As they should, since their crops will probably fail if the web-gods are angry.
I don't know. That just sounds like how real world IT people act
+1
cj iwakuraThe Rhythm RegentBears The Name FreedomRegistered Userregular
edited October 3
Finishing my re-watch of UBW, it's even more striking how the epilogue episode sets up far more interesting narrative hooks than the rest of the series, and then it just... stops.
Give me a show about Shirou and Rin's wacky Hogwarts Clock Tower adventures, dang it. The Mage's Association is ripe for good storytelling.
Well, and power-bombing.
Even the bit with Waver and Shirou sets up for a more interesting spin-off than the one he already got(El Melloi Case Files).
Not to mention the dynamics of, gasp, depicting a relationship, what a concept.
the two MMO anime I actually like are Log Horizon and Bofuri
Log Horizon for having fun characters and a setting that feels much more like an actual fantasy world that had the MMO combined with it, and Bofuri for not being an isekai and just being completely unhinged all of the time
Bofuri is wonderfully, stupidly unhinged and I enjoy it. It makes little sense, the Devs are terrible at their jobs and suffer for it constantly, and it's hot funny and upbeat.
The issue is that a lot of those MMO anime are based on anime based novels based on Ragnarok Online, that it was basically vanilla WoW levels of unbalanced and grindy, but people didn't knew the meta back then. Then people did found out about the meta, and classes started to get balanced since "I grinded for days for an useless class" became a problem.
Or they are just doing Dragon Quest and calling it an MMO.
You can tell when the people behind it actually play games or at least understand them but also want to tell a story.
Bofuri for example doesnt want to do any of those things. The characters dont care about the world lore because there is none. It gets stale after a while
I have a podcast now. It's about video games and anime!Find it here.
Someone once suggested that the devs in Bofuri were just a bunch of techbros who'd never played an MMO and just used AI and procedural generation to build much of their game, and well...that adds up.
Thinking about it, .hack and digimon are like one step removed in how a lot of stuff just isn't designed, and nobody knows how it works. Also how the internet will sometimes come to kick the real world's butt for cryptic reasons.
Someone once suggested that the devs in Bofuri were just a bunch of techbros who'd never played an MMO and just used AI and procedural generation to build much of their game, and well...that adds up.
The Devs in Shangri-la Frontier are actually characters extremely minor but they have personalities and are humans in an office not weird avatar blobs
I have a podcast now. It's about video games and anime!Find it here.
Posts
much like the light novel writers trying to write otome game isekai, I have to assume that a lot of them have just... never actually played an MMORPG and just want to follow the latest light novel trend
(fun fact: otome games generally don't actually have a villainess who's engaged to the male lead, presumably because
A)NTR scenarios are kind of unpopular, and
B)players looking for escapism probably don't want to be bullied in the game)
Most just extrapolate from a single player RPG into an MMORPG. Even .hack does this.
Given the absolutely wild claims they make about RPGs and gamer behavior, it's difficult to believe they even do that. More like they extrapolate from what they saw in SAO or whatever other garbage got them keyed in to chasing this fad. God, I hope it's a fad.
It felt like being an archaeologist.
These old places often had interesting housing stuff in them. Nothing super fancy, just, I'd bring back an urn from my laborious expedition and I could put it on my house mantle and the completed book (you would complete books by doing the quest) in my bookshelf, and that was that. No super item, no gear relevant loot (new progression gear made the old content redundant). It was just an adventure for the sake of it. I thought it was really cool that they left it all in.
Here's the thing, though: even the ones that take place in a single-player RPG (or take upon the trappings of one - your typical isekai-with-RPG-stats) don't seem to actually be based on single-player RPGs as much as they're just... well, what ArcTangent wrote. An incestuous slurry of regurgitated misunderstandings of game mechanics.
You have your exceptions, of course, and there's definitely examples where the person writing it clearly has put some thought into things (or just stolen it outright from D&D - looking at you, 1HP wizard isekai)... but for your typical Syosetu->Light Novel->Manga->Anime pipeline? Nah. Tastes move too fast and chaotically to not just chase the latest fad.
...As for .hack, that one kind of had a thing where part of it was meant to be a PS2 MMORPG. It just got some design change to be single-player and then a big ol' multimedia franchise push. It had a ton of money behind it, unlike your average light novel which tends to be snapped up and edited popular web novels.
(Kazunori Ito and the staff also researched MMORPGs at the time... but that meant Phantasy Star Online, Final Fantasy XI, and Ultima Online, so, well. Not exactly how things look today.)
Most of the ones I've seen
And most of the "MMO Isekai" shit which feature a horribly designed MMO that I've seen (Overlord, S:AO, that one where the girl eats the things to name a few) run under the 'protagonist gets something that makes them super duper special' akin to a hero from an RPG. Like a destined or chosen hero. And MMOs just aren't like that, at least they haven't been for at least twenty years.
I give log horizon a pass because the parts that are leftover from it being a game seem somewhat believably like a real MMO, it's just they got mashed up onto a suddenly real version of the game's fantasy world
was .hack supposed to originally be based on those PS2 games? I thought it was a fantasy story first then they tried to make a tie-in actual game based on it.
>_>
<_<
Sure, but the conceits they ask to make are just so far beyond belief that they beg to ask if the people making them have any actual knowledge of video games at all. Like this VRMMO one in particular, and it is literally named "A Dude Plays a VRMMO." It says "bows aren't meta, so literally NOBODY uses bows. NOBODY." He not only knows the meta, but every single other player in the world does too, and the thing that makes him unique is that he chose to... use a bow. In a fantasy game. And then he spends like an hour working on one cooking skill and that alone vaults him into super stardom and the richest bitch around because not a single other person in the entire game, EVER, has taken or attempted to use that skill, or put in the HERCULEAN effort of grinding it for an hour or two.
Ah, that put a big smile on my face. It didn't even look quite as cheap as I feared!
It sounds more like FFXIV...1.0.
This is not a compliment.
I wish I could remember where I saw it, but a Japanese game developer pointed out that one of the reasons it was good to have a Western studio make Ghost of Tsushima was because they were able to make the main characters appropriately aged.
These AI are the rulers of the in-game countries and some of the named NPCs that wander. The "game" is only intended to last for a year or two, long enough for the AIs to hopefully be ready for introduction into greater society. Every "update" is tweaking things so the AIs can get a broader experience of humans under the guise of game patches.
The protagonist meets and befriends several of these AI, though like all the players he doesn't know what they actually are just that they respond like real people. The reader knows because there's several scenes of the developers talking about how the AI are responding and what their requests for the game are.
I’m not familiar with the idea of it being planned as an actual MMO in the vein of PSO or such, but the basic deal with .hack was it was going to be a big multimedia franchise from publication start; .hack//SIGN is a prequel to the first set of PS2 games, which was the main centerpiece of the franchise, and meant to set up the start of the goings on in The World (the diegetic MMO that everyone was in). Each volume of the game story came with an additional episode of another tie in OVA, .hack//LIMINALITY
There then came spinoffs like the Legend of Twilight manga, which was popular enough that it got it’s own anime adaptation
Then they decided to make a sequel series of games, the //G.U. Trilogy, so there’s those three volumes (four now, with the remaster), and it has it’s own prequel/lead in anime, //ROOTS
Log Horizon for having fun characters and a setting that feels much more like an actual fantasy world that had the MMO combined with it, and Bofuri for not being an isekai and just being completely unhinged all of the time
it's called Genshin Impact
I didn't know we had a deluge of wuxia/xianxia MMOs in Japanese anime though.
Genshin did just add a region based on France/Italy/Spain!
Monstadt wins by default due there being no major authority or law enforcement other than the local police force who are comprised of one workaholic, a literal child, a librarian, and owner of the world's Most Punchable Face
They've got some others! Like the blonde map expert lad, the sociable plushie-loving archer, a noble, a weird alchemist, a maid knight, a less-weird alchemist
Or they are just doing Dragon Quest and calling it an MMO.
I don't know. That just sounds like how real world IT people act
Give me a show about Shirou and Rin's wacky Hogwarts Clock Tower adventures, dang it. The Mage's Association is ripe for good storytelling.
Well, and power-bombing.
Even the bit with Waver and Shirou sets up for a more interesting spin-off than the one he already got(El Melloi Case Files).
Not to mention the dynamics of, gasp, depicting a relationship, what a concept.
Bofuri is wonderfully, stupidly unhinged and I enjoy it. It makes little sense, the Devs are terrible at their jobs and suffer for it constantly, and it's hot funny and upbeat.
Steam: https://steamcommunity.com/id/TheZombiePenguin
Stream: https://www.twitch.tv/thezombiepenguin/
Switch: 0293 6817 9891
You can tell when the people behind it actually play games or at least understand them but also want to tell a story.
Bofuri for example doesnt want to do any of those things. The characters dont care about the world lore because there is none. It gets stale after a while
The Devs in Shangri-la Frontier are actually characters extremely minor but they have personalities and are humans in an office not weird avatar blobs
Hopefully the update to Manga Plus tomorrow doesn't somehow prevent me from reading this series.