That's just wrong.

Yeah I've noticed this, what happened to having something different or exciting? Seems people like "grinding" 100 murlocks a day.

I programmed part of a mudlib back in 1995 ...

You kids and your newfangled graphical MUDs, get off my lawn!

Yup, it's pretty damned depressing:

"Recreating the freedom Elder Scrolls players expect within the World of Warcraft-style mechanics Zenimax Online is using for this MMO..."

Ah well looks like the people who are making this MMO don't really care about innovation.

I agree most are bad clones of wow who also stole most of its ideas.

However world pvp and lootable player corpses sounds fun in theory but does not work well in an actual game.
90% or more of the players will hate getting ganked and quit playing fast, yes its an fun idea but require that everybody is in good well organized guilds, surprise new players are not.

it's an fun idea for some areas, like going on an raid and run into an enemy raid party, here the groups will be pretty well matched. Not an good idea in the open world where you run into an ganker in an area with lots of low level players.

That's why EVE Online has "empire space" (which is mostly safe) and "0.0 space" (where all the good loot is, but where you can get killed and looted by anybody, anytime).

Traders stick to mostly safe space areas, miners only go into lower-security space when they calculated the odds and/or hired someone to watch their backs, and the huge PvP events happen mostly between people, corporations and alliances who want to do PvP, not your regular carebear Joe.

Sorry but .. seriously...
You look like the kind of players that wants to win at all cost, no challenge whatsoever.
A lot of games has free pvp and you can very well go outside of a city (actually, i never play a MMORPG if it doesn't have free PVP) you just need to watch out for people in the same way you watch out for strong monsters.
And ... you would really invite to your house a bunch of people that poison your food or kill you?
Just a little bit of common sense and that would not be a problem.

i agree with op on most points. I played mmos for 7-8 years now(on and off), and seriously tired of same stereotype wow-copy games with no originality on neither gameplay nor world interaction. Elder scrolls series has amazing potential, its one of the few true rpg series that's left since the fall of black isle. And if bethesda wants to make a good mmo they need to make it original, just look at all copy style mmo's. Just look at them they all get good start at first but not even after a year they lose most of their business.

Im gonna add things i'd like to be in this game
I'd like game to not have hotbar style combat(it's seriously limiting and boring) they should revise and polish melee combat and should go really wild when it comes to spells. And players should be able to choose any profession or position there was in previous es games, like blacksmith or court wizard or even a politician(this would work if you give players free reign in game). For example let me be able to apply for towns guard. I wanna work my way up, and quests for example for that guy shouldnt be in "quest farming" mentality. You log in and your captain gives you a duty, it could be boring patrol, or it could be investigation. What you get should be interactive. Depending on what's going on in the world.(and eventually players should be able to give other players quests if you outrank him or somethin) And players should be able to be in high positions like yarl or captain of guards or even archwizard.(there should be only 1 archwizard ofc) If towns guard is inefficient in their duties then unlawful people could set a base in that city it may even lose reputation. They should let players govern the world not the other way around. Its why games like eve online still have solid ongoing subscriptions even after all these years(even though learning curve makes it near impossible for new players to join). Players have real weight in the world, you cannot convince a guy that he is a hero because storyline makes an npc tell him so.(wont gonna work on a mmo because he knows there are thousand guys like him who goes through same thing, which makes him feel fake. Real achievements have much more weight). You can make a fun and balanced gameplay if you let players do whatever they wish with minimal governing from gms (gms can always tilt the scales if things are going out of control).And each realm should have its own reality. That i described in my opinion the perfect sandbox gameplay. I really wish betheda goes through this road because i think game would sell really well and would have steady subs since it goes with Elder scrolls spirit. But i know they most likely wont gonna listen to random guy on a forum. Most likely game's gonna have little difference regarding gameplay compared to other mmo's, they'r gonna try to put their weight on elder scrolls universe and try to dress tESO with a mmo shirt and break all our hearts. I really hope im wrong but ive been disappointed so many times in mmo's (swtor newest and biggest dissappoint of late just watch they'r gonna lose even more people and its gonna take way too much effort for them to keep the subs) that i dont expect anything.

Sandbox MMO's scare off casual players. Frustration levels high, casual players out, bad profit margin for executives investing millions of dollars expecting the next WoW.

Do I agree? Definetly, not, I miss old-school UO. But the industry evolved to hand hold every sort of player, especially those who can only play one or two hours daily and expect rewards, not corpse fetching trips. And it's not going back. Ultima Online was a prototype for a new type of industry, and Blizzard offered a winning formula. Until that formula ceases to be profitable, you won't see companies taking great risks. Sadly.

you dont necesserily need casual players to make money. just look at eve. that game is even older than wow. it survives despite not being a noob friendly game because it lets players govern the worldand gameplay is rich as hell. And unlike standard mmos this is an area very few mmo's touch right now. its ripe for the taking. i hope bethesda seize that opportunity.

blizzard's formula only works for them, reasons?
1. blizzard is the only company i know that hasnt ever done a single average game, all of their games are above great. They are "the" beast.
2. games going on for 8 years now, and its ever evolving also it has crazy amounts of content a new game cant even compare with.
3. they do not even worry about money for a long time, wow subs paid off its own, starcraft's and diablo's development costs. bethesda doesnt have their financial strength
4. they have the originality. all the other games you see are copy of wow, unlike some people claim its winning formula they fail to see that their winning formula is that they make gameplay that is fitting to game itself. they'r not trying to be someone they'r not. thats why so far its been successful. and they are not afraid to change the game completely if they believe its necessery.
5. most players play the game for the social aspect. alot of guilds formed of friends and families and their ties goes way back. its just convenient place for them to talk and play. they'r not gonna leave wow for another game, they can buy and play it on the side but whole guild's not gonna shift games no way

You may not need casual players to keep a gaming like this running, but you don't base your business model on a particular type of gameplay. These games are very expensive to make, and like blockbuster movies, they try to make it friendly to every sort of costumer. So compromises are made. If by the end of the day, you only get a handful of very specific types of players, you no longer need to streamline and your design becomes more focused. For now, it must be appealing to casual and hardcoe players running all sorts of hardware.

Good thing you posted this. I'm sure that none of the development team have ever played an MMO. Most of them probably don't even know what it stands for...

So many experts, so few coders.

/signed

gimme that and i be happy... dont care much about combat systems... raids what ever...

give me a big open world... free to explore everywhere... and RP policies concerned Naming and behavior.

problem is can you make a game casual friendly and original? that would be ideal for them. Problem is i did not see such a game that has both for a long time. City of heroes was good but devs failed to create good content. Gameplay was great and pvp loads of fun. But there wasnt much you could do in the game.(btw i didnt play gw so cant comment on that). Also one thing you forget, elder scrolls series sell well enough. And people buy those game for a reason. If you take that reason away then why should they play it? It would be just another copy-paste game with elder scrolls title on it. Besides its not like elder scrolls is not a noob friendly game, its just different and it has different strengths and weaknesses.

frankly i would hate it if this game had raiding mentality. Just spamming **** loads of abilities on one big boss type of guy. Parties would be nice for example to roamin in the country to hunt game or just be a highwayman to rob other players. but whatever happens old school role playing should be in this game. it'd lose much if thats ignored or not emphasized enough.

The quickly thrown together points in the OP were more exciting ideas than anything in the game informer article.

i think Game designers would do a better job than some one saying they are a 'MMO Veteran',

You say you're an MMO expert yet you sound like you have never played new WoW content on a PVP server before. For months after Cataclysm came out, every new zone was littered with skeletons at the site of every ore node. Even now, it can be dangerous at certain times of day.

This.

None of the mmo developers have a single original thought, with the possible exception of CCP (EVE).

"Don't copy other MMO's as they are boring and it's been done to death"

"Skills should be like Ultima Online, it's kewl"


...

I've never played Ultima Online so I can't claim the experience of the OP, but I have yet to see an MMO that doesn't have that raiding mentality. Is there, in truth, any other kind? Your argument sounds to me like the genre confusion I hope everyone can avoid. MMOs are fundamentally different than open-world RPG. They are not and cannot be interchangable in any way. If you don't like the style, then MMOs aren't for you.

You can say a lot about Blizzard but they score a zero on originality.