What I'm hearing a lot of around this forum is how boring, how generic, how TES:O couldn't be further from being innovative and it will crash and burn because of it. However these arguments are fundamentally flawed, and are quite ignorant coming from the mouths of these so called MMO veterans and [censored].

Let's start off this argument with recent games.

Rift: Planes of Telara - I was involved with this game for a very long time before launch, and was also a very early tester as well. I was able to play with developers / their family / friends and very excellent alpha testers, and was in the game where the only Rifts were Death Rifts, and was surprised and fascinated as each rift, battleground, and zone became available. I helped test and shape some classes even, more specifically in the Mage calling. However much I loved the game though, Trion based the majority of it around the hope that people would continue to do Rifts even after max level, and that it wouldn't go stale. Their major innovative features involved a highly customizable class system and public quests in the form of Rifts. However this didn't quite work out so well. People blew through levels and some even found Rifts kind of stale. The class system turned into a highly specific raiding tool for optimal dps, tanking, or healing / etc. The game didn't have quite much else. PvP was fun but didn't really have many incentives besides gear. There was one raid available (I was with Fires of Heaven at launch, at one point we had Greenscale down to 1% and wiped, that killed me that we were so close) and it was killed shortly after launch. The game was innovative, but after a little bit people took the innovations and it didn't mean quite so much to them, it was just a part of the game. Even now, TES:O is featuring anchors that are guarded by Daedra. They randomly fall out of the sky and adventurers have to battle them back. Sound familiar?

Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures - Now this was a fun game. Funcom's innovation here is that there was a revolutionary combat system never before seen in an MMORPG, and there would be Voice Acting and tavern fighting and more. The island of Tortage was, arguably, one of the best experiences I've ever had in an MMO. For 20 levels I was engaged in a compelling plot, great PvP, and to be honest, really fun combat. However I soon ran into a couple problems. After level twenty I left Tortage, eager to see more of the lore and world. I was unpleasantly surprised to see that 90% of the NPC's weren't voiced anymore. Finding people to PvP with meant going to their land, so I spent the majority of my time in opposing lands and not really leveling so much. I did eventually get to level 60, but content literally stopped there. While the level cap was 80, there were simply no more quests in those last 20 levels, so you would grind mobs the entire time. There was no more night time single player leveling and day time multiplayer action at will, it was all merged. The PvP system fell through, as it was horribly designed. One race had all of the casters, one race had a ridiculously powerful melee healer, and the other was kind of generic. So much was spent hyping the combat system, and while it was fun, there was literally not much else to the game. It completely lacked consistency. But worst of all, they lied about the tavern fighting.

I could go on and explain how each MMO for the past couple years was trying to be so innovative that it lost sight of everything else. I loved Warhammer Online, and my Engineer was blasting Chaos beasties with his shrapnel from level 1 to level 40, but the PvE was terrible and mobs would rubberband all the time despite a great internet connection. Endgame PvP pigeonholed everyone into either battlegrounds or highly specific areas for PvP. But Keep Fights were, at least, fun. And the tanks could Guard people, Hold The Line to protect squishies, and other fun things. But PvE was literally terrible.

However I would like to take a look at one last game, the most controversial of all.

World of Warcraft - This game took the world by surprise. At the time, EverQuest and Dark Age of Camelot were highly acclaimed in the MMO world, and EverQuest 2 was slated to launch at the same time as WoW. In fact, EverQuest 2 was largely considered to stomp WoW and every other game into oblivion. Everything was voice acted. Sequel to the MMO that started all current MMOs as we know them. Awesome graphics. Wasn't going to start with PvP but would add it in a future expansion, not a big deal. But here comes World of Warcraft, a humble game that really didn't introduce any innovations at all. Talents? In EQ2 you could customize your own stats, resists, and even upgrade certain spells made by crafters to a really high degree. Player controlled Economy. Crafting? Laughable at best, EverQuest 2 came loaded with a harvesting and highly in depth crafting system, complete with tradeskill levels and abilities. EverQuest 2 had player housing. No, what WoW did offer was consistency, simplicity, and ease of use.

All of the PvPers in the MMO world steered clear of EverQuest 2, as it wouldn't have PvP until 2 expansions later. Leveling was still a bit lengthy, but it was a new world and you didn't have to grind monsters as much anymore. Instead the majority of experience came from quests. When you died, and everyone dies, you didn't lose all of your stuff. Instead your armor took damage and you ran back to your corpse in ghost form. No more losing levels. Every game has bugs, even Warcraft, but WoW is, and everyone can agree on this, the smoothest game in the history of MMORPGs. I'm hard pressed to find bugs in that game, everything works like a well-oiled machine. While you couldn't customize resists and stats, your character had a plethora of choices in talents and races. The game could play on pretty much every computer out there. The game wasn't too terribly fun, probably about the same as EverQuest 2. Blizzard wasn't trying to innovate anything, they were just trying to make an MMORPG that was enjoyable, adaptable, and just simply worked.

And that is exactly what I wish for The Elder Scrolls: Online. Make me a world that's fun, that I can explore a bit, and can PvP with. Make me a world that works, I don't care if it doesn't have flames actually burning me in real life when I get hit by a fireball. I want to log in and be able to enjoy an experience that's not laden with bugs and errors. Include innovations from past games that worked, they were fun too. I like fighting Rifts, and I'll probably like fighting anchors too. I loved Dark Age of Camelot's three faction system, and more than likely I will love fighting back the smelly Ebonfarters and the Laggerfall. I don't want to see Zenimax focus so much on some great new innovation that the rest of the game suffers because of it. What is needed is a strong new game that's up to date and available to its fans. I want a game that is adaptable to the times, and that I can log in to see thousands of other people exploring, fighting, and ready for my slaughter.

Stop bringing logic here!

Everquest 2 had play housing? : C

This was an enlightening read, thank you.

Yeah it's true. For me MMOs as they are now are not fun at all.
I think that's my gripe, I'll try the game and hate it just because of it's MMO nature.

Look if the game floats your boat that fine good for you.

But the game doesn't have anything interesting to me to care about.

If it wasn't a subscription based game (which I'm pretty sure it will be) I'd be less critical but I'm sorry theres nothing in it I care about.

My opinion won't be popular, but I agree with you. I am not against getting the tried and tested as long as it's done right.
And who knows? Perhaps they'll actually succeed in abating the negative aspects of typical MMO communities? That would certainly make me happy.

TES games are the best because they make a very realistic and fun sandbox. Will this translate to a MMO? Is all that they can transfer is the lore, which in my opinion is at times a bit weak?

I think they really really needed to keep that open world sandbox and be who you want to be concept in the mmo. That practically defines what a TES game is there. Without that it's just another mmo.

Yes becuase being forced to join factions and being forced to do certain things in a specific order = sandbox?

The ES series are open-world games, but they are not sandbox games.

Garry's mod, now THAT is a sandbox game.

Well they are pretty much. 300+ hours in Skyrim and I've yet to join a faction. How do you mean forced to do certain things? Even if it comes up in your menu you can just ignore it.

Very true, however if you are not inventive why should people play your game and not wow?
You has to do something as inventive that enough players prefer your game.

Quests are laughably linear, as they have been in all ES games, your confined to one path to be able to complete them. The MQ in partiual is linear, no options no choise. things in general, quest or not, are only completable through one specific action.

These are sandbox games
Minecraft - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minecraft
Garry's Mod - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garry%27s_Mod

This is a open world game
Elder scrolls - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elder_Scrolls


The ES games have NEVER been sanbox games, ever. they are open-world games. Sandbox games are defined as having no right way to do things, the ES is full of having specific right ways of doing things.

Except with modifications and roleplay it literally becomes sandbox. I can spend days roaming around doing literally nothing but roleplay. Maybe a little hunting and fishing followed by a shopping trip to solitude....

I can't quite imagine that on the MMO, unless there are RP servers of course and still then... i'm not sure it would be the same

The construction kit is its own program, an entierly seperate one from that of the games themselves, to say that the games are sandbox becuase a second program lets you put things in them is wrong. The ES games themselves are not sandboxes.

If the construction Kit was built into the game itself you would have a point, but it isnt.

By your logic Half-Life 2 is a sandbox game becuase of Hammer that lets you mod your own stuff into the game. A secondary modding program does not make the game it modifies a sandbox game.

I am probably missing the point of your argument but your first paragraph attempts to give you a certain credability which I find hard to believe. Your opening statement is an Ad Hominum which imo takes all the credability out of your argument right away. I honestly don't think you helped design a class or alpha tested the game as that's usually done internally on any project. You can have early beta testing which is done outside of the studio but alpha testing occures almost exclusivly within the studio. That being said I also suggest you choose a more modern MMO launch such as Star Wars:The Old Republic instead of Age of Conan. AOC is several years old now and has had time to add content and is currently enjoying a steady increase in subscription numbers thanks to it's free to playmodel. Rift has also been out for a while and has had time to add content. A year is ancient in the MMO circles and a year and a half plus is even more so. Oh, and well there's also Tera. I suggest you use Tera and Star Wars the Old Republic for your choices.

Well I don't know but all I know is that the mmo certainly won't be a sandbox game.

Well the SP games wern't sandbox and a real Sandbox MMO would just be minecraft online, and a TES MMO that is just Mincraft would be.... boring.

So then we are looking for a uh, open world mmo right? I'd like to see that, but they've already restricted areas already How will exploration be handled will it even be there? That is a big part of TES for me.

Hopefully gameplay shows more cause its just speculation now

Honestly, take Minecraft, give it a few quests and a story, throw in some M&B combat, and up the graphics a bit and you have me sold to my last penny.

Well according to the GI leaks you wont be told about a large number of places, and player exploration is something they are focusing on.


Once you start giving games stories and quests they stop being sandbox.

Stories and quests impose constraints, due to the inablity for Devs to take into account every possible play-style.

they impose a "there is a ight way to do this", hich makes the game not a sandbox.

Fair enough, take the quests out, but let players make up their own quests, with the rewards comming out of their own in game pockets.

In a mmo setting that would be exceidngly difficult and would mean only gold farmers who have lots of money would be able to make quests else people run out of cash instantly.

Star Trek online was able to due it half assed with its foundry, but thats only becuase the world isnt continuious, and each user made map it its own instance.

About 5 min ago I logged into World of Warcraft. Got bored and came on here instead. I completely agree with you. I want people to be excited for this. It's something new.
Thank you for the enlightenment.

Looking back I'm not sure what word I used to get censored, but nevermind. And yes, it may be a tad ad hominem as I have been around the MMO circles for a while and seen a lot of ignorant people, but to be honest that's what your entire paragraph is. Ad hominem. You can doubt if you wish, but the fact remains. I was very lucky to be a part of that testing and it's something I pride myself on as I loved that game and that I was given the opportunity to watch that world being made before my own eyes.

As for using more recent MMO's you have a point but history repeats itself. My argument thankfully seems to have been received or at least acknowledged. I could say how SWTOR spent so much time on story the rest of the game was actually quite dumbed down and laggy, but I chose MMOs I was more comfortable with.

Excuse me? I wasn't attacking you...an Ad Hominum is an argument against the man. My argument was simply attacking your crediblity and I'm sorry if you seem to think that my attacks are personal.