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Free MMORPGs: Sucks/Rules

JoeSomebodyJoeSomebody Registered User regular
edited January 2008 in MMO Extravaganza
These are ones I've tried in the last few days. I've yet to find a playable one.

Wolrd of King Fu: Sucks.

Zu Online: Sucks.

9Dragons: Good, but bugs make it unplayble.

Fiesta: Ages 12 and under. Sucks for adults.

JoeSomebody on

Posts

  • DhalphirDhalphir don't you open that trapdoor you're a fool if you dareRegistered User regular
    edited December 2007
    Runescape:

    Sucks if you like playing with other people regularly, rules if you love your own company when grinding, and like to be able to congregate in a city with hundreds of people.

    Dhalphir on
  • EvilBadmanEvilBadman DO NOT TRUST THIS MAN Registered User regular
    edited December 2007
    I got a free copy of Guild Wars at PAX06. It was installed once.

    Does this count?

    EvilBadman on
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  • HallowedFaithHallowedFaith Call me Cloud. Registered User regular
    edited December 2007
    http://domo.aeriagames.com/ (Dream of Mirror Online)

    It isn't bad. It really isn't.

    HallowedFaith on
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  • ShadowfireShadowfire Vermont, in the middle of nowhereRegistered User regular
    edited January 2008
    Is Anarchy Online staying free? Do we have -any- idea yet?

    Shadowfire on
  • His CorkinessHis Corkiness Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    Someone make a Venn diagram illustrating the overlap between Free MMOs, Shitty MMOs, and Korean Grind-fest MMOs.

    His Corkiness on
  • RialeRiale I'm a little slow Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    Someone make a Venn diagram illustrating the overlap between Free MMOs, Shitty MMOs, and Korean Grind-fest MMOs.
    That's not a Venn diagram. It's just one big circle. They are all one and the same.

    Riale on
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  • JaninJanin Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    Gunz was a fun MMO combat game, though it stopped being fun when I got out of the newbie sandbox and started fighting lunatic bunny-hopping Koreans with rocket launchers.
    Dhalphir wrote: »
    Runescape:

    Sucks if you like playing with other people regularly, rules if you love your own company when grinding, and like to be able to congregate in a city with hundreds of people.

    More like world's first MMO cooking simulator.

    Janin on
    [SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
  • ZombiemamboZombiemambo Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    Someone make a Venn diagram illustrating the overlap between Free MMOs, Shitty MMOs, and Korean Grind-fest MMOs.

    Pick any two of those and you have described every free MMOG (and Korean MMOG) out there. It's either free and shitty, free and a grind-fest, or shitty and a grind-fest (*cough* Lineage II *cough*).

    Zombiemambo on
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  • DhalphirDhalphir don't you open that trapdoor you're a fool if you dareRegistered User regular
    edited January 2008
    Janin wrote: »
    Dhalphir wrote: »
    Runescape:

    Sucks if you like playing with other people regularly, rules if you love your own company when grinding, and like to be able to congregate in a city with hundreds of people.

    More like world's first MMO cooking simulator.

    That too.

    Its a lot easier now, with Cook X right-click menu options.

    Although since I restarted WoW in September (54-70 in two weeks, raiding SSC tonight, woo me) I haven't played it.

    Dhalphir on
  • leafleaf Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    Navyfield is fun if you like the oldschool look, but even I haven't played that in ages. Don't even know what the PA fleet is doing, or in number.

    Gunbound COULD have been fun, if the community wasn't utter shit.

    leaf on
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  • AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    There's a few nice games on the list in my sig, I appreciated Wurm Online and Lunia and there's a few other games steering away from the grindfest-shitfest. There's so much free stuff out there, you can't really generalize all those games with a "lol korea" and a "you get what you pay for".

    Of course, most popular games are shitty grindfests, apparently there's enough unimaginative cheapskates out there playing these games.

    Aldo on
  • NerdgasmicNerdgasmic __BANNED USERS regular
    edited January 2008
    www.kingdomofloathing.com is a great free one, even the donation rewards are capable of being bought with in game currency.

    Nerdgasmic on
  • SimianNationSimianNation Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    I used to play MUDS about 10 years ago. I had a ball.

    Then I played EQ and I don't seem to be able to shake the 3D virus. No 3D no play. Which basically means not playing free MMOG. The 3d in them always blows chunks - you would be better off with text?!.

    If you are in the same boat, I would advise just buying. For the amount of time you are required to invest, why spend it in a rust bucket with the wheels falling off?

    SimianNation on
  • DhalphirDhalphir don't you open that trapdoor you're a fool if you dareRegistered User regular
    edited January 2008
    The main problem with free MMOs:

    Paid MMOs are not really prohibitively expensive. If you can afford a computer, Internet, and a house to put the computer in, chances are you can afford WoW.

    The main people who free MMOs are attractive to are kids like I used to be, whose parents either won't pay for the game, or won't allow their credit card to be used online. For the latter case, they can at least buy gamecards, but this does nothing to help the former group of kids. So, they play free MMOs.

    This means that said free MMOs are infested with these kids. Now, I'm not sayin that all kids are are immature and annoying, we have the 11 year old son of a raider who raids with our raiding guild, and he's more mature and thoughtful than most of the adults I've run into in my life, either my WoW-life or real life.

    However...they're kids, and so a large proportion of them are going to be immature and annoying, and if they have only been on the Internet for a year or two, they are probably still in the phase where " I R INTERNET TALK OLOL NUB" is "cool".

    Spend some time in the guild chat of a decent guild thats focused and progressing in endgame content, and you will see mostly adults, and very little "net-chat". This is because that usually (again, exceptions to the rule abloo bloo), kids lack the attention span and focus required to be successful at raiding. Many of them probably make it into Karazhan a few times, maybe even down a couple bosses, but I don't think you'd find all that many kids (you'd find some) who would have the dedication to knuckle down for months at a time and progress through raid instances, one boss at a time, especially if they weren't getting much loot.

    tl;dr - i blame kids. throw them all into volcanoes

    Dhalphir on
  • AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    I used to play MUDS about 10 years ago. I had a ball.

    Then I played EQ and I don't seem to be able to shake the 3D virus. No 3D no play. Which basically means not playing free MMOG. The 3d in them always blows chunks - you would be better off with text?!.

    If you are in the same boat, I would advise just buying. For the amount of time you are required to invest, why spend it in a rust bucket with the wheels falling off?
    There's at least a dozen free MMOs with graphics that put WoW to shame. :|

    Aldo on
  • delrolanddelroland Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    Aldo wrote: »
    There's at least a dozen free MMOs with graphics that put WoW to shame. :|

    I don't doubt you, but you should quantify that statement.

    delroland on
    EVE: Online - the most fun you will ever have not playing a game.
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  • Der Waffle MousDer Waffle Mous Blame this on the misfortune of your birth. New Yark, New Yark.Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    What happened to Voyage Century?

    The on-foot portions were torture, but the sailing part was pretty darned fun.

    Der Waffle Mous on
    Steam PSN: DerWaffleMous Origin: DerWaffleMous Bnet: DerWaffle#1682
  • SimianNationSimianNation Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    Aldo wrote: »
    There's at least a dozen free MMOs with graphics that put WoW to shame. :|

    Really? You must enlighten me because I have looked??

    Without any evidence, I am SERIOUSLY doubting you here.

    The other possibility is that you mean there are graphical MMO's out there that are better "games" than WOW, but that have the enevitable crappy graphics. My point was that I can't seem to get past the crappy graphics.

    It is a known phenomenon in books also.
    No graphics == massive imagination in a vacum

    Graphics == little to no imagination

    In case two, the graphics have to be great for me because they switch off your imagination.

    SimianNation on
  • AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    2moons
    Archlord
    CABAL Online
    Dream of Mirror Online
    Dark Eden
    Exteel
    Fury
    Gunz
    Irth Worlds
    Perfect World
    Rappelz
    RF Online
    Tantra
    Silkroad Online
    Sword of the New World
    Xiah

    I am talking about graphics, most games are utter shit and I'd rather put a nail through my dick or play WoW than installing those games. But they do have prettier graphics or more advanced graphics.

    Aldo on
  • BlueDestinyBlueDestiny Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    Exteel

    Rules: It's like Gunz if Gunz was better balanced and without goddamn glitchmoves. Also, anime-style giant robots.

    Sucks: Not very much part variation besides medium/light/heavy. Takes forever to get enough cash and XP to get new things.


    I always wonder, if an MMO is free to play why make it take so long to get to high levels? You're not getting cash for time played, AFAIK.

    BlueDestiny on
  • NorgothNorgoth cardiffRegistered User regular
    edited January 2008
    Exteel

    Rules: It's like Gunz if Gunz was better balanced and without goddamn glitchmoves. Also, anime-style giant robots.

    Sucks: Not very much part variation besides medium/light/heavy. Takes forever to get enough cash and XP to get new things.


    I always wonder, if an MMO is free to play why make it take so long to get to high levels? You're not getting cash for time played, AFAIK.

    To make people pay for the add-ons to make it go quicker. I guarantee one of the cash items is an XP boost of some sort.

    Norgoth on
  • SimianNationSimianNation Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    Aldo wrote: »
    I am talking about graphics, most games are utter shit and I'd rather put a nail through my dick or play WoW than installing those games. But they do have prettier graphics or more advanced graphics.

    Firstly, thanks for the long list!? :)

    It would appear many are "pay for items" play. Not entirely "free" it seems, although that would depend on how the game is organised. (would have to actually play it, rather than read their marketing guff)
    I remember a game a long while back (can't remember the name, was famous) which was a space MMOG that claimed you could "make" money. You could buy game cash with real cash, but it was possible to fleece others of their game cash and convert it back into the real stuff. (maybe, assuming you waited 10 years for them to get around to it apparently)
    They also claimed they were "free". Problem was you could not do ANYTHING unless you bought a certain amount of things. Basically the game was pretty much unplayable unless you did.


    But in any case, if they really do suck so badly, that sort of leaves me back a square one, doesn't it?? My point was really that VERY GOOD games (like the muds I used to enjoy so much) have been spoilt by my lust for good looking 3d graphics.
    But you are correct though, some of those games do look like they have nice graphics! Perhaps some of the projects out there should share their knowledge or something...?

    Are there any on that list worth a try? Or are they all pretty hopeless beyond reason?

    SimianNation on
  • LemmingLemming Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    Exteel

    Rules: It's like Gunz if Gunz was better balanced and without goddamn glitchmoves. Also, anime-style giant robots.

    Sucks: Not very much part variation besides medium/light/heavy. Takes forever to get enough cash and XP to get new things.


    I always wonder, if an MMO is free to play why make it take so long to get to high levels? You're not getting cash for time played, AFAIK.

    Exteel is remarkably shitty. A large contributor to this is that you don't actually shoot anything. "Bullets" come out, but only hit if you're locked on to the enemy and have the reticle over them. So if you're locked onto one guy and shoot another, nothing happens.

    Lemming on
  • JinxSightJinxSight Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    Dhalphir wrote: »
    The main problem with free MMOs:

    Paid MMOs are not really prohibitively expensive. If you can afford a computer, Internet, and a house to put the computer in, chances are you can afford WoW.

    The main people who free MMOs are attractive to are kids like I used to be, whose parents either won't pay for the game, or won't allow their credit card to be used online. For the latter case, they can at least buy gamecards, but this does nothing to help the former group of kids. So, they play free MMOs.

    This means that said free MMOs are infested with these kids. Now, I'm not sayin that all kids are are immature and annoying, we have the 11 year old son of a raider who raids with our raiding guild, and he's more mature and thoughtful than most of the adults I've run into in my life, either my WoW-life or real life.

    However...they're kids, and so a large proportion of them are going to be immature and annoying, and if they have only been on the Internet for a year or two, they are probably still in the phase where " I R INTERNET TALK OLOL NUB" is "cool".

    Spend some time in the guild chat of a decent guild thats focused and progressing in endgame content, and you will see mostly adults, and very little "net-chat". This is because that usually (again, exceptions to the rule abloo bloo), kids lack the attention span and focus required to be successful at raiding. Many of them probably make it into Karazhan a few times, maybe even down a couple bosses, but I don't think you'd find all that many kids (you'd find some) who would have the dedication to knuckle down for months at a time and progress through raid instances, one boss at a time, especially if they weren't getting much loot.

    tl;dr - i blame kids. throw them all into volcanoes


    This pretty much nails it. Kids ruin shit.


    But it's not just that. When people make free MMOs, they expect people simply not to expect much with a free MMO so obviously they're not going to include shit like ones that you pay for. They're free for a reason... Because the quality lacks, you don't get updates with cool shit every few months (or when you do, it's really lacking), the graphics (the majority) blow, and the gameplay is as much fun as doing as doing your taxes especially when it's repetitive as shit.

    WoW, CoX, and EQ (as well as others) are just simply better... Because they're getting cash flow and have an actual customer-player base.

    JinxSight on
    "Remember when the platform was sliding into the fire pit and I said 'Goodbye' and you were like 'NO WAY!' and then I was all 'We pretended we were going to murder you'? That was great!"
  • Asamof the HorribleAsamof the Horrible Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    The graphics for some those games technology wise, yeah sure. Quality though? Either the same or less. A lot of it is preference of style

    Asamof the Horrible on
  • AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    Firstly, thanks for the long list!? :)

    It would appear many are "pay for items" play. Not entirely "free" it seems, although that would depend on how the game is organised. (would have to actually play it, rather than read their marketing guff)
    I remember a game a long while back (can't remember the name, was famous) which was a space MMOG that claimed you could "make" money. You could buy game cash with real cash, but it was possible to fleece others of their game cash and convert it back into the real stuff. (maybe, assuming you waited 10 years for them to get around to it apparently)
    They also claimed they were "free". Problem was you could not do ANYTHING unless you bought a certain amount of things. Basically the game was pretty much unplayable unless you did.


    But in any case, if they really do suck so badly, that sort of leaves me back a square one, doesn't it?? My point was really that VERY GOOD games (like the muds I used to enjoy so much) have been spoilt by my lust for good looking 3d graphics.
    But you are correct though, some of those games do look like they have nice graphics! Perhaps some of the projects out there should share their knowledge or something...?

    Are there any on that list worth a try? Or are they all pretty hopeless beyond reason?
    Fabulous graphics and the same in-depth gameplay as the muds of yore? That's not even the case for Pay to Play MMOGs, now is it?

    It's like they are mutually exclusive, it's like the creator had to chose between beautiful graphics or beautiful gameplay. Some games do try to add some depth or give you a lot of freedom to pick your stats/skills/etc. but when you're a few levels in the game you notice that there's one cookiecutter build and when you do something different you're only shooting yourself through the feet.

    If you're still looking for a new free game I would advise you pick Dream of Mirror Online, because some PA'ers and some Goons enjoyed it. There's even a PA thread.

    Aldo on
  • HevachHevach Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    Norgoth wrote: »
    Exteel

    Rules: It's like Gunz if Gunz was better balanced and without goddamn glitchmoves. Also, anime-style giant robots.

    Sucks: Not very much part variation besides medium/light/heavy. Takes forever to get enough cash and XP to get new things.


    I always wonder, if an MMO is free to play why make it take so long to get to high levels? You're not getting cash for time played, AFAIK.

    To make people pay for the add-ons to make it go quicker. I guarantee one of the cash items is an XP boost of some sort.

    Ashen Empires does this, but even with it, it takes prohibitively long to get a reasonable level. Even after they reduced the experience needed for level 100 from 22 billion to 2 billion to 250 million to 123 million, they also reduced experience gains in between by a good bit. Last I touched it, a casual player could hope for 50-100,000 exp a day.

    There was even a thread on their message boards that they hadn't had a new level 100 character in months, and the average newbie quit after 2 months at an average level of 20.

    Hevach on
  • AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    Hevach wrote: »
    Ashen Empires does this, but even with it, it takes prohibitively long to get a reasonable level. Even after they reduced the experience needed for level 100 from 22 billion to 2 billion to 250 million to 123 million, they also reduced experience gains in between by a good bit. Last I touched it, a casual player could hope for 50-100,000 exp a day.

    There was even a thread on their message boards that they hadn't had a new level 100 character in months, and the average newbie quit after 2 months at an average level of 20.
    And this wouldn't matter if the actual gameplay was fun, but it probably wasn't. If combat consists of only pushing 1 button every now and then, people *will* get bored.

    Aldo on
  • HevachHevach Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    Aldo wrote: »
    Hevach wrote: »
    Ashen Empires does this, but even with it, it takes prohibitively long to get a reasonable level. Even after they reduced the experience needed for level 100 from 22 billion to 2 billion to 250 million to 123 million, they also reduced experience gains in between by a good bit. Last I touched it, a casual player could hope for 50-100,000 exp a day.

    There was even a thread on their message boards that they hadn't had a new level 100 character in months, and the average newbie quit after 2 months at an average level of 20.
    And this wouldn't matter if the actual gameplay was fun, but it probably wasn't. If combat consists of only pushing 1 button every now and then, people *will* get bored.

    It consists of clicking the left mouse button. Meelee combat consists of clicking the left mouse button an monitoring your HP. Ranged combat consists of clicking the left mouse button and then monitoring distance from your target. Magical combat consists of clicking your spells and clicking the target alternately.

    And don't even start on crafting. Let's say you want to craft a new sword. Get a pickaxe, go to a mountain. Click pickaxe, click mountain. After that you can press U and click the mountain to save time. Once you have ore, go to a forge. Click ore, click forge. The game rolls if you succeed or fail - you lose one ore, and may gain one ingot (Success rate is about 10-15% at level 1 skill). When you're done, go to an anvil. Click your hammer, click the ingots, select an item, and again, hope for success. Failure consumes 1/2 the materials used. Rinse/repeat. The skill does produce some reasonbly useful items at very high level. In the meantime, you have to produce several hundred thousand small daggers. Not only is the game clickie-click click click, the crafting system (Be it cooking, farming, leather, wood, metal, runes, construction or alchemy) is just a black hole you pour materials into for experience.

    Hevach on
  • SimianNationSimianNation Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    Aldo wrote: »
    Fabulous graphics and the same in-depth gameplay as the muds of yore? That's not even the case for Pay to Play MMOGs, now is it?

    While being a cynic, I would agree with you and , most likely as you would, point out the many really neat features muds had 7-10 years ago(?!?!) that today's main MMOGs have not even tried. I would also dance merrily around the fact that many of these feature, being implemented in txt only, would have been TRIVIAL to implement in today's major MMOG. (I am sure some of the tinny, shite ones have pulled a few rabbits out of hats to try and be original...shame about the rest of the game etc)
    e.g. (from my memory of long ago)
    - reclassing and being set back 30/50 levels but ending up more powerful at the end.
    - better classing: e.g. 7 base classes, 38 subclasses (or better yet NO CLASSING)
    - level-less fantasy systems
    - Roleplaying Guild/Kingdoms alongside PVP versions
    - Common guild halls with perks the guild could collectively buy
    - pit traps (ok, so this sucked)
    - flying areas in clouds and so forth
    - player run cities (ok, so SWG tried this...)
    - Criminal status in above cities
    - NPC areas where NPCs did battle with each other and you helped out (or like me scavenged)

    And you know what?

    All the above (barring level-less systems) was contained in ONE of the muds I played. Obviously the feature list contained pretty much everything apart from polygons and crafting the MMOGs of today have to boot.

    However I would give Kudos to WOW and LOTRO (only played a couple of days as yet) as they do seem to have a rather rich world. LOTR has a really deep story line also. Crafting in SWG (ashame about the rest of the game) was very advanced as was their auction house/market.
    One can't forget to mention the graphics of course....ooohhhh the sweet immersive 3d polygons...drool...

    SimianNation on
  • MazerMazer Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    I've tried out various free MMO's. For the most part, they are boring grindfests with super laggy servers. I play UO on a freeshard that dummies any MMO (free or p2p, yes that includes WoW). Check out my signature if you want to see what I'm talking about

    Mazer on
    UO: Divinity - UO freeshard based on the T2A era with over 1,000 players online daily. Check it out:
    http://forums.penny-arcade.com/showthread.php?p=3721523#post3721523
    www.uodivinity.com
  • AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited January 2008
    While being a cynic, I would agree with you and , most likely as you would, point out the many really neat features muds had 7-10 years ago(?!?!) that today's main MMOGs have not even tried. I would also dance merrily around the fact that many of these feature, being implemented in txt only, would have been TRIVIAL to implement in today's major MMOG. (I am sure some of the tinny, shite ones have pulled a few rabbits out of hats to try and be original...shame about the rest of the game etc)
    e.g. (from my memory of long ago)
    - reclassing and being set back 30/50 levels but ending up more powerful at the end.
    - better classing: e.g. 7 base classes, 38 subclasses (or better yet NO CLASSING)
    - level-less fantasy systems
    - Roleplaying Guild/Kingdoms alongside PVP versions
    - Common guild halls with perks the guild could collectively buy
    - pit traps (ok, so this sucked)
    - flying areas in clouds and so forth
    - player run cities (ok, so SWG tried this...)
    - Criminal status in above cities
    - NPC areas where NPCs did battle with each other and you helped out (or like me scavenged)

    And you know what?

    All the above (barring level-less systems) was contained in ONE of the muds I played. Obviously the feature list contained pretty much everything apart from polygons and crafting the MMOGs of today have to boot.

    However I would give Kudos to WOW and LOTRO (only played a couple of days as yet) as they do seem to have a rather rich world. LOTR has a really deep story line also. Crafting in SWG (ashame about the rest of the game) was very advanced as was their auction house/market.
    One can't forget to mention the graphics of course....ooohhhh the sweet immersive 3d polygons...drool...
    It sounds like you should check out EVE. They have a 14d trial, I believe.

    Aldo on
  • NorgothNorgoth cardiffRegistered User regular
    edited January 2008
    I was actually playing Archlord yesterday, and it was infact, rather good. Its very guild-warsy, but with open pvp, castle sieges, guild warfare and its not instanced. I might make a thread later to see if theres any intrest.

    Norgoth on
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