Eliminating Grind in MMORPGs
Playing an MMO can be a time-consuming, life-encompassing past-time; especially if you have an addictive personality. Sitting on a desk chair for hours on end grinding your character like a maniac won’t help you keep fit, but it does get you that much closer to the almighty level cap. But is this really the purpose of playing such a game? Should it not also be about the journey as much as the destination?
There’s no doubt that nearly every player wants to be the best. There are few people content to meander through their virtual life, leveling so slowly that several expansions are released before they reach level six. No, most want to crack on and watch the levels skyrocket, but sometimes this can mean sacrificing fun for boar-slaying monotony.
Sword 2 – Level Up!
Quest Experience
There are some MMOs, such as 4Story, that are stupidly grind-heavy and others that tend to make leveling either quick and easy or not the main focus of the game. Guild Wars is a pretty good example of the latter, as leveling tends to just happen as a result of questing, eliminating much potential grinding. The game’s focus on story means that, although ultimately important, leveling takes a back seat. Unfortunately the trade-off for this, and one of the main gripes people have about the game, is that the level cap is so low, meaning you’ll be hitting the ceiling in no time, leaving little else to accomplish aside from acquiring fancy new tools to maim people with. It’s fun to pretend maim.
Iris Online – Quest Description. Questing For XP
Binging on XP
One of the more obvious ways of scooping the grind out of an MMO is to pour experience points down player’s throats so in the first 10 minutes they’re 8th level. Atlantica Online, Eudemons Online and Sword 2 are good examples of titles that pile on the levels with minimal effort. The upside to this method of character progression is that the ‘one more level’ syndrome takes over the player’s mind, forcing them to keep playing to the next level – after all, it’s only 300xp away! This way ultimately conditions the player to keep trudging on with the promise of a level reward. The downside is that this just creates the illusion of less grind, when in reality there’s probably the same amount as any other game expect that it’s on a faster ‘drip’ than the others. There’s no difference between a game that has medium grind time with a 50 level cap and a game that levels double the speed with a 100 level cap.
Florensia Online – Grinding
I, Grind Bot
A more sophisticated method of reducing, or even eliminating the need to grind was implemented in Magic World Online. Strangely enough, this game utilities a built-in bot to allow the player to automatically take actions while away at the computer. Ordinarily, bots are an annoyance to MMO developers, but here they have used it to create a unique game. Magic World Online isn’t the only game with a “built in bot” either. Jade Dynasty, Godswar Online and Voyage Century all have built in bots too.
Magic World Online – Built in auto-leveling Bot
It’s not wrong for MMOs to ask players to while their time away by grinding, but when experience points are few and far between things start to get ridiculous. It’s all about hitting that sweet spot where grinding makes you feel like you’re getting somewhere.
Let us know what you think. Are you happy to grind away, or do you prefer high xp rates in your MMOs? What do you think about the in-game bots in some MMORPGs?
By, Scott Malthouse
November 26, 2010
#
Personally I kind of like Guild Wars system. I bore easily, and that makes grinding a problem for me, but I also need something to look forward to. In Guild Wars, I don’t have to grind, and the story keeps me going. There are also new skills at every town to try out.
November 26, 2010
#1
Guild wars 2 is gunna be even more cooler
November 26, 2010
#2
It depends on the game for me. If i’m not seeing any type of cool reward for leveling up or if i don’t unlock any cool skills or get cool weapons/armor then i’m more inclined to just try a different game.
i used to be addicted to Cronous which is an entirely grind based game and if you’re with a group of friends the grind aspect really is less of an issue because you’re having fun and time flies when ur having fun!
November 26, 2010
#3
Mmo’s should have high xp rates, mostly pvp ones.
I like pvp, and i hate when there are good mmo’s that has very good pvp but the leveling is slow. Ex. Archlord, 4story, Aika, etc. Thats why lame private servers are made
Guild wars is great because leveling is fast and i can jump right into pvp, even if the level cap was higher it wouldnt mean much. Very high Rates FTW.
November 26, 2010
#4
Grinding is annoying for a person like me too, since I get bored. It’s why I’m a fan of skill-based games.
November 26, 2010
#5
I used to play lineage2 and it was the best game i have ever played with the eception of the grind where at lvl 70+ u had to be hunting for hours just to get 2%,and it only got harder 75+ ,after that i tryed guildwars ,and i beat the game so fast even did the pvp, and i felt empty playing gws,also dont like where some games will have you going from point A to point B,so many times back and forth killing hundreds of mobs just to get a few quest items,takes the fun out of the game 4 me,Im curently playing Vindictus and i love it, again this game is lacking something like not being so repetitive or may be an open world not just dungeouns, but u cant have everything i guess, overall is like 9/10 for me.
November 26, 2010
#6
I mainly just dislike it when a game is quest based, but you have to grind a lot just to get the next quest. I like games that keep me busy with more and more quests. Mabinogi, Guild Wars, Vindictus, and a few other have all been good about never leaving me without some quest that I can complete.
And as far as in-game bots go, that’s just kinda a sad workaround. :V
November 26, 2010
#7
I agree. The in game bots in these games is indeed a very sad way to deal with the issue. Makes the game feel “Throw away”
November 26, 2010
#8
I also forgot to mention that,I like haveing a sense of comunity that many games dont give and if haveing a game with a sense of comunity like lineage2 where clans are VERY important. makes grinding less painfull lol.
November 26, 2010
#9
In Mabinogi you do levelup really fast after your first rebirth because you keep all your skills. You basically start much stronger.
so its not really grinding… because once you stop lvling quickly you just wait till rebirth. mabinogi has enough of a storyline to keep you happy as well.
November 26, 2010
#10
Reading this article made me think about MapleStory. That game used to be really grindy, but they sped up the game, A LOT with the Cygnus Knights update. So many more quests and quest rewards are a lot better (XP wise)
December 8, 2010
#11
With Big Bang coming out, leveling in Maplestory is going to get A LOT faster.
November 26, 2010
#12
yea whats the point in playing a game if some 1 is just going to sleep and wake up his char is 100 lvl,just an example.when i played Jade Dynasty thats how it felt like to me.
July 29, 2011
#13
tahts 100% not true i used the bot in jade dynasty and it didnt even lvl me up 3 times over night at lvl 40 the only thing i got was 3 gold
November 26, 2010
#14
You forgot Tales of Pirates. Questing shouldn’t be done, its terrible after level 20. All you do is grind for a long time, level up once, spend REAL money, and rinse, repeat.
November 26, 2010
#15
I used to like maplestory because level 200 seemed so out of reach (at the time I played, the highest level of any player was 165 or something). Therefore, there were the extremely hardcore players, and then there was everyone else. Basically, the end game was so out of reach that people just gave up on it and enjoyed the journey instead. Leveling just accompanied the fun. Now, there are at lest 1000 max players that people are constantly searching for the end game.
November 26, 2010
#16
People have different ways of looking upon grinding; some think of it as the leveling process, others as the time in-between quests. What’s essential about grinding is not the grinding itself, but what it leads too. For instance, I played to the maximum levels in Allods Online, and I dare say there was a bit of grinding along the way. I was annoyed at times, but it was still interesting for one reason only: Going to the Astral with friends in player-made space ships. That was the only reason I played the game in the first place, and as long as that’s interesting enough, the grinding doesn’t matter. On a side note, the Astral ended up being a disappointment, and I quit after having checked it out thoroughly.
In one way, grinding can be a good thing. There’s some sort of achievement that you made it to the end through hard work. But it can also be a horrible activity that’ll make you quit the game or avoid it in the first place, especially if the goals aren’t interesting enough. So it very much depends on the game itself. I don’t think we’ll see the end of grinding in the near future. At least not until one game presents some new, evolutionary system that changes the way we play MMOs.
November 28, 2010
#17
Me too. I barely play Allods because it’s boring. I just want to do PvP, which is awesome. Leveling is way to slow, questing too crazy, it makes the only reason it’s still on my computer that I might go back to it and level up for PvP.
November 26, 2010
#18
Making XP rates higher only means that it’s not an accomplishment to grind levels anymore; that takes the purpose out of even having levels in the first place.
November 26, 2010
#19
i perfer to gain exp kinda fast have alot of skills with some grind and questing
November 26, 2010
#20
Grinding can be fun or bad, its not always about hitting that sweet-spot in-between. There are many things that make it much more tolerable, like how some games do “Power jumps” (where you get huge surges of power for a while to grind or fight with when you need it) it normally has a huge cool down, but not related to buffs. What I like is when the game pulls your attention away from how hard you are grinding with other rewards, actions and events while you are grinding which makes it soo much more bearable by lessing the strain of frustration that comes with grinding for too long, specially when you don’t get the results that you’ve sent hours trying to receive.
“Dynamic action game-play” is one of those things, because it makes you feel like you have more control over your characters actions and movement, it also feels so much more fluid,It takes your attention away from how many more “miceling” you have to off by making you feel more involved, this can only last so long tho.
There are many over ways but I need to get going.
November 26, 2010
#21
this is why i like racing mmos XD no need 2 grind, just race race and race
November 26, 2010
#22
MMO Shooters / Racing games have their appeal because of the lack of grind. That’s true. I guess that’s why I still play a bunch of random MMOs….
November 29, 2010
#23
You could argue that MMO shooters and racing games are nothing but grinding. Depends where we draw the line, if grinding is solely connected to doing the same activity or if it’s for the purpose of leveling up (or some kind of similar activity, which you need to do in order to proceed in the game).
November 26, 2010
#24
I better like to have some goals when leveling like quests. Even if they don’t give that much exp, at least it gives you something to do. The only games that I enjoy the grind are games like Diablo or maybe Battle of the immortals where the gameplay is quite fast paced without any pause and the mobs die and come to you fast in big numbers.
November 26, 2010
#25
Five words: Star Wars The Old Republic.
November 27, 2010
#26
I like a game with lots of quests but with a variety of quests. One thing that helps is an Achvment system that lots of games are putting in but failing with, i like it when they put like an achvment for 20 quests then for completing 50 quests and so on so you have some sort of goal for questing or what ever else you do.
November 27, 2010
#27
Everytime i join a new mmorpg i like to try out, after leaving the tutorial zone (if it has one) or loading into the starting town, im always struck with the sight of some very high level guy. The first thing on my mind is how long has that guy grinded just to get that high level and that awesome gear. So I rush out of town after picking up my first quest, then after a few minutes or hours of grind, I log out and delete the toon.
The reason: I would never grind enough to reach that guy’s level.
TL;DR: I get jealous by some random high level guy, and wonder how much time he grinded to that level knowing i will never get there myself.
November 27, 2010
#28
Grinding is just plain boring, Guild Wars the levels arent even important, and if all your playing the game is to level then you should play some generic korean grindfest
November 27, 2010
#29
I have noticed I have flipped what i like to do in mmo’s sense ive gotten older.I used to love grinding back in the day and i hated doing quest and would only do them if a skill or map ect was a reward.Now that im older all i do are quest and when I start to have to grind a lot to lev thats when I get bored and quit.
AS far as in game bots to help you lev thats just stupid to me.Whats the point of even playing if the game is leving for you? Theres no sense of accomplishment if you dont do it yourself.
November 27, 2010
#30
I may be oldschool, but I’d take grind any day over running from npc A to npc B just to hand in a quest. Besides, you can’t really party and socialize while questing. At a point someone is bound to be left behind. Whereas grinding, everyone gets exp/drop regularly, and you can all chat away freely.
November 27, 2010
#31
Thats true, questing makes the game a solo experience, like LOTRO, the only chance for partyng is dungeons and the occasional pvp. I think that Grinding can be fun if u actually make the combat funny enough to be enjoyed. I liked Rohan Online, i was playng cleric and being so wanted made em lvl up like a thunder.
November 27, 2010
#32
a good example of a balanced game (in my oppinion) is BoI.
it’s really quest-based, so you can pretty much only quest plus you have an afk zone, where you can use seeds that grant you 1 hour of exp gaining while you’re there.
November 27, 2010
#33
grind isn’t so bad if they they find a reasonable balance. questing without motivation is also useless. hell if they create a cinematic for every quest they give out i’m sure people don’t mind grinding an our for the quest.
November 27, 2010
#34
I am tired of grinding, that is because I am out of MMORPGs (not MMOs).
November 27, 2010
#35
What the games need is making grinding fun. Shooters and racing MMOs also have grinding but thats the point of those kind of games. A MMO racing game with no races would not be possible so a MMORPG has to have some mob killing quests/grinding.
I hope grinding gets funnier and the rewards get better xD
November 28, 2010
#36
I don’t enjoy games that are grind heavy, nor do i enjoy games that let you level so fast that it seems like there is no “journey”. I like to watch my character go from some low good for nothing, to something that i can be proud of. I don’t mind lots of quests as long as they give the quests some variety. Now, i don’t mean quests that send you out to kill 30 monsters or what have you. That’s just grinding with an added bonus after you’re done.
IGG seems like the worst company for putting in those stupid bot systems. I get so tired of games that cater to the players, l want to raise myself to the level of the game, not the game come down to my level.
November 28, 2010
#37
Please. I haven’t seen an IGG game with a bot yet. Don’t even try them, they’re all terrible if they have IGG as they’re publisher. I mean, in Tales of Pirates, they were actually trying to sell some pixels that were fancy armor for $22,500 in real cash.
November 28, 2010
#38
In Atlantica after lvl 95 is veri hard to level so its half easy grinding game.
November 28, 2010
#39
oh..and now max lvl is 140.
November 28, 2010
#40
Grinding used to be fun for me when i was playing during the Ragnarok Era…where you really have to grind for that 1% of experience. Then it got boring to me.
Quest oriented games is my forte now a days because level exp is not repetitive. You are bound to travel a lot and kill different monsters in different maps extinguishing the boredom where you have to kill 1000 XX monster or stay in the same dungeon/instance just to gain a certain percentage of exp.
In-game bots or any AFK systems is stupid for me because you reach the end-game contents without being the sole purpose of reaching it. Also, it takes away the RPG part of the game, where you are part of the interacting with the community.
I still will choose MMORPGs other than any FPS or RTS games because these games tent to be repetitive.
November 28, 2010
#41
In my opinion, it’s the grind that pretty much destroys any game for me, because of flyff, i just couldn’t sit down to another grindfest.
December 5, 2010
#42
Yeah I agree with that. I enjoyed Flyff a lot but once you hit the 40s the grind becomes intense and the game doesn’t even try to hide it. Plus it seems like the areas get larger and more spread out so you’re not even grinding near people like you were back in the 20s and 30s (or maybe it could be that fewer people were around in those higher level zones because they quit).
November 28, 2010
#43
I dont mind grind. aslong as its not so boring.
however i think you should mention s4. Alot of people want to finally reach the rank”s4″ (level 100) noone has. because, the exp it takes, is equivlent to 7+ years of gameplay.( i mean, total time spent ingame. so thats alot of matches.)
highest level right nwo is S1.
November 28, 2010
#44
Well everyone knows that Grinding is here to stay but so is questing.There is no true way to eliminate Grind because it’s caused by wanting to have a higher level but you can choose to not Grind.I believe that is the only way to eliminate it,even though it is only partially eliminated.
November 28, 2010
#45
Grinding is a matter of personal perspective, and asking a question about how to eliminate “grind” isn’t going to gather a penultimate conclusion that would satisfy everybody.
I myself find grinding can be passed easily if you have social aspects with you, or if you have some good music. Or sometimes the game’s soundtrack, if you’re lucky, might be jumpy enough to help.
This is why I still find myself coming back to RuneScape time and time again. Super, super grindy. But I get a sense of accomplishment from it. I love trying to aim for my goal of completing all the quests. And it allows me to have my IM open for talking my way through the AFK-able skills.
November 28, 2010
#46
Very true. Grinding is easy if you’re playing with friends or try to be more social. I’ve grinded for hours on end without realizing it when I’m in a nice group or guild to chat with.
November 28, 2010
#47
Grind shouldn’t exist. At the same time, F2P quests aren’t the most polished or varying. Vindictus is a good show of how to do questing and fighting. I think FireFall will be a good example of a game that is dynamic.
November 29, 2010
#48
If just silkroad had faster leveling… It would be the most AWESOME game ever.. I just love the skills and trading,hunting,thief jobs! Such a great game except botters and the slow leveling ;(
November 29, 2010
#49
Well, the only way to have fun in a MMORPG is if your in a decent high level like everyone else. So what do you do? You use a bot to do the job for you! I did that one time in Runescape, when their security was pretty low back then. But yeah, looking back at it was pretty pointless. The only MMORPG that I know that doesn’t encourage grinding is LEGO Universe. All the other MMORPGs that “doesn’t have grinding,” has grinding! Because some of the quests are just stupid. Its just fedex quests.
November 29, 2010
#50
Grinding’s bad, but it doesn’t have to be the end of the world. I don’t mind grinding if the grind is going to get me somewhere, like if I’m going for rep points or levels. And if you really think about it, a lot of games, even quest based ones, basically are grinding, it’s just grinding out killing monsters or collecting magic herbs.
November 29, 2010
#51
Grinding is not a problem for me as long as there is a progression
like in Diablo II, i can pick a skill and just hold down right mouse button and kill everything in path until I get to end of level
but many games make it horrible because there is no progression and mobs are all the same except of different monster model -_-
November 30, 2010
#52
I think people just suck at gaming and are too lazy to grind these days is the problem. But the other problem is games suck at balancing between grind and quests. I don’t like questing really, so I prefer grinding to give more XP. Questing bores me more than grinding… but I find that the real problem is – most of the games don’t give enough experience for killing enemies. It would be better if MMO’s learned to balance this out… if I want to kill things for 2 hours it should give the same experience as questing for 2 hours. They should be two equally fulfilling paths. Who cares about storyline? I just want to kill things… and people like me shouldn’t have to pay because other people just want to walk around and meet NPCs and kill smaller amounts of enemies. THAT IS BORING!!!!! The grind is not boring, unless it’s designed to be inferior to questing. Ok so I got a little off track here… what I was trying to say is it seems like the games that give you more xp for grinding than quests…. still don’t give you nearly the kind of xp that you’d get for questing in other games. So it seems like… either the game has good xp for questing… or it simply has terrible XP… but never good XP for killing stuff? Maybe just a result of Generation Lazy coming into gaming.
November 30, 2010
#53
you say grind is bad or boring, but maybe that’s because you did it alone, for me it never been bad or boring if i’m always in a group with my guildies on ts/vent or w/e else, there is always someone cracking jokes and pretty much every single time i had fun while doing anything in any game like that, so yes being alone gets boring, being a part of a large group will make you see the game a lot different.
i will never forget Lineage2, because there will never ever be something even nor near similar to what that game had to offer, too bad a lot of years passed and all i can see is worse mmos then ever before, how come they could make such a great game so many years ago and now after so so many years after there are still very few games that can offer something at least similar, i still have major issues at picking mmos to play after playing lineage2 for years it’s really really hard to find something that enjoyable and believe me i tried almost every single mmos that came out since 95 and still the one and only mmo that i have ever enjoyed the most was and i’m pretty much will be only lineage.
the same example can be found in the nowadays movies, i have seen way better movies a bunch of years back then the new ones, they just sux, same goes with the mmos
believe me you wont get that much fun from any game like managing an entire alliance fully grouped for multiple castle sieges in l2, you just can’t beat that, no matter what shiney crap mmo they will come up with, even if they copy the same things and the same ingame systems, lineage will always remain EPIC, it’s just Classic.
and no, WoW is not even in the same league. don’t bother mentioning that crap.
one thing many don’t understand is gaming metality on different parts of this globe, like asia and us/europe, you simply cannot compare them, they asian don’t just make their games grindy so they annoy you, otherwise they would release all their games first here and no in asia and let them out after a couple of years, they making em like that because that’s what they like, and what you think about em it’s pretty much only your opinion, because after they had their share of fun, only then you will get to have it, even tho atm they starting to release their games in this side of the globe almost in the same time, but that’s all about money and not about the game itself.
also keep in mind that 90% of the mmos are either made in asia or coded/deved/designed by asians, no matter what logo you see or from where is the company whom is publishing, so before hating, think twice because if they werent making any, you will still be playing runescape and text based mmos ffs
December 9, 2010
#54
EWEWEWEWW!!!!!!! RUNESCAPE AND TEXT BASED T.T IT SHOULD BE ILLEGAL TO SPREAD THIS FILTHLY KINDA OF LANGUAGE IN PUBLIC >:O
mods please make those words Asterisks D: those should defly be filtered -_-
EW >….< they are justified…)
November 30, 2010
#55
this is why Lineage2 will always be EPIC
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ms8lx–KBXc&feature=related
November 30, 2010
#56
Some mmos do suck because of too much grind. Especially when you are just hitting one monster and he is hitting you back and you are just taking turns, there is no strategy to it and that why it is boring. If a game is fast paced but has a lot of grind it is more fun to play than a slow grind game. I prefer fast paced and fast leveling.
November 30, 2010
#57
personally i hate grinding . I think the most rewarding is actually doing fast easy quests that dont get you killing 20 of each mob or something like that, more like 6 here 5 there and then you turn in 5 or 10 quests and jump awhole level.
The main reason i dont play korean or aion like games is because of the insane grinding fest. People play games to have fun not to feel like they are working so grinding should definately be chopped off and thrown out. or heavily reduced in all games.
December 2, 2010
#58
well personally i like the idea of the secret world..no levels..u can get any skills u want plus has alot of things to do and is fun..u dont need to wait for alooooong time to jump into some action nor is to have bots or anything to make that rpg essence go away..y the heck do i have to lvl up any way >.<..i want an mmoRPG and its not really necessary to have levels although provided it does have a really good and difficult gameplay that is interesting as well. many of us have lives and hence we cannot spend alot of time in games especially doing boring stuff…and lets admit it most of these games want us to play for years but we jump from game to game every 6 months starting all over again…
i believe the idea of the superiority should be the player's skill and not how much time they spend in the game ( if its skill vs mindless grinding for hrs.. wat would u choose) plus it doesnt help or benefits us in any way ..like honing our strategic approach..having calm mind..hand and eye coordination and proper team management….trust me if a scripted program(bot) can do wat we r doing and stand at the same position where we stand…we r just wasting our time
now i would imagine a game which is a mixture of secret world(with its level less gameplay) , gw2(with is dynamic events system) , archeage(with its extremely community based gameplay and rpg essence) and tera(with its non target system and the difficulty to beat monsters with their good AI)…
its not impossible to create a good mmorpg but its just that the (most) devs till now were so lazy in trying to innovate new ideas and implement them that they r happy to copy some other decent mmo, make it p2p and extort money.
money doesn't come easy and if they want to be millionares with our money they better use their heads instead of just copy pasting the same scripts that were designed 10 yrs ago… and lets face it the mmos today r coming like a tsunami so its hopeless for them to trhink we r gonna stick for years.. it would be a much better approach to just build a small but extremly fun to play with mmo…which has a gameplay for lets say 6 months play time..then close it and move to another..frankly with such busy lives thats all we have time with ..
and if they want to have us play for more time ..they better come up with something darn good intreresting
December 2, 2010
#59
There is a game called MILMO there are no levels but a lots of medals many cusomization choises cool weapons and many quests!Try it
December 4, 2010
#60
AE Team games have 0 grinding. I was high level, but I never cared to do it. Every week, I would finish what was in the update and be done. I played for the storyline and hilarity. I don’t play anymore because I’m busy.
December 9, 2010
#61
Artix Entertainment unquestionably makes teh best games ever…
(kept me sane thru HighSchool -_-)
considering i have a very developed palette for gaming and i could still go play those games any day and be completely happy
They have all browser based games so i mean its a drawback back that also means i could play them at school
AQ was still godly to me<3 never seen a better 2D
AQ worlds is a great 2.5D MMORPG for being browser based id say they top most client based (and for people who say AE isnt good… its teh only game iver EVER payed for and i dont regret it in the least -_-)
if they made a totally F2P #d MMORPG thatd be my endgame… O.o..
but back to teh topic
–
The grinding today is becoming more of a chore than a privet considering 98% of all games out are grind based to really have "fun".
This kinda just after you earn teh title of "Hardcore Gamer" you can play any game really and have them jsut mesh together .. :/
its sad.
I recently got really into PvP and found some games like Fantasy Earth Zero which is basically a full RvR (Nation-Nation Wars) and thats how you level but the leveling is sort of seamless with the gameplay.
All the players have same HP just dif Def and Atk Mods (with the skill points from leveling system making level have a few benefits)
but its really skill based and theres no real "Grind" Feeling to it. Sorta like most MMOFPS games where you just fight for respect and skill but theres the hidden level system of Medals and ranks and blablabla
FEZ would be a good game but they put little effort into the game so far and teh playerbsae is TERRIBLE… not to mention the player atmopshere is….. not right in that game.. it had potential but oh well.. sitlll fun
Pandora Saga from Atlus Online is one of the upcoming PvP based (seemingly?) that im looking forward to.
Grindfests are just really losing their sparkle so i hope games start getting some more unique systems
ah im rambling now xD
kbai
______
Rawr
December 5, 2010
#62
Grinding……
Ugh I dont want to go back to those days
I just gaze at the screen with my dull eyes
i push “attack”, “move” “attack”, repeat.
If only finding friends to grind with was that easy.
Famous grinding areas are mostly taken, b@stards might come by with their own team and kill steal all your monsters even the ones that drop a rare item and drive you out.
Grinding i hate it….
But i cant complain since i play games with grinding like maplestory(quit unti lthe big bang comes) wonderking, luna online, flyff(couldnt get my first job advancement since something in my system wasnt letting the monster drop the materials i need for quest.). and many other mmo’s
December 5, 2010
#63
Rumble fighter, lost saga, and other fighting games like that have no grinding…
but they have people who spend real cash on it to get items to win……
How are we supposed to (for example) win against a tank with a tiny rock??
thats pretty much how much cash items ruin some games similar to those……….
grinding is also a waste of ur life.. spending 5-20 hours a week grinding when it can be used for something more annoying and shiitty like school since its actually good…. I HATE SCHOOL!
December 9, 2010
#64
Q.Q you scare me -_-
did you jjsut say youd rather go to schoool than play games?……………tahts not right..
reword that before i Q.Q
December 5, 2010
#65
I feel like there is no hope anymore in MMOG. It’s just grind, grind, grind. There are very few games that actually let you do something other than grind.
I know FusionFall and Guild Wars have minimal grind.
What I’d like to see more is less grind. Let’s take FusionFall for example. You barely have to grind, it’s either go talk to that NPC, or go finish this obstacle course and collect the item and bring it back to me.
There may be a grind quest here and there, but they are incredibly quick and you only have to kill about 2 monsters.
Of course, I’d like to see more of this. The obstacle courses and the minimal grind.
I don’t think out wishes will ever be fulfilled, but there’s nothing we can do.
I feel like these games just come out to make us pay for games.
Well, it can’t be helped. Perhaps one day an MMOG worth while will come out.
December 8, 2010
#66
Omer,what game would you recommend us to play?
December 8, 2010
#67
Look around on the MMOHut games list, sort by highest rated and try those
December 10, 2010
#68
You know that, that’s exactly what I’ve been doing since I found MMOHut, going to the highest rated games, and have never been happier. Right now, I’m running AVA, LOTRO, Genesis A.D., Dragon Saga, and Vindictus, oh and Battlefield Heroes. To me, these are the games to play. They never feel grindy to me, they are just blasts to play and immersive in their own ways, which is perfection. Only that would be better is epic coop in my shooters. COOP is there, but not perfected yet. Anywho, I suggest to any that are looking to avoid the grind in various ways to check these out.
December 8, 2010
#69
I love me some grinding, PvE style. Especially in games where there’s PvP.
Questing (Or as I call it, Quest Grinding), is the lamest way to level in my opinion, you put 0 work into your character, talk to some guy, turn this in, or go over there, etc etc. This is why people keep shouting OP OP! Or Imba! People don’t know their characters and skills anymore, nobody bothers since you can just casually play and level killing a few mobs to finish a quest.
tl;dr. Opinions!
December 9, 2010
#70
I actually kind of wish there was a well developed game that didn’t really have quests…. where you had to go out in the world and figure out on your own what to fight and grind on…. but had a wide enough variety (as in thousands or tens of thousands) of enemies that you could fight so it would keep it interesting. I am really tired of “walk here, go there” quests…. and wtf is the point of a quest that you only have to kill like 20 enemies? screw that. I rather not have the quest, and kill 100 for the same xp just so I didn’t have to keep walking back to an NPC. The people who want quests to be the main way to level should play some little kid’s game like Putt Putt Goes to the Moon or something flamboyant like that… that’s where those people belong, instead of trolling whining crying and failing on every MMO forum that exists.
December 9, 2010
#71
The quests systems in games are pathetic.
Kill 19380912381038129 of these and bring me 12i381092381023 of these with a 2% drop rate -_-
OMG IM HAVING SO MUCH FUN! <,,<
more games need to approach as a Halo_ Online (xbox live) concept of gaming with a modified to fit leveling system and stuff like that.
actaully…. just make the Halo series with levels -_-
with grindable options for like EQ and $ and stuff with decent exp… not your only choice tho
December 10, 2010
#72
You want grinding, play Kalonline, when you hit level 35 monsters give you.05% of a bar.
There are only like, 40 quests in the game, and they are spread out so many levels.
Once you play Kalonline, you’ll want to play anything else to get rid of the boredom!
December 11, 2010
#73
Griding would be better with better/intelligent or more random/unpredictable ai
December 13, 2010
#74
oops, Sorry pressed enter by mistake :/ ANYWAYS, my opinion is for MMOS to be kinda unique in their own ways. One MMO you need to grind alot. Another MMO focus on Storyline and Combat Gameplay Such as Guild wars 2 and there are others that focus on both. The reason i Favor GuildWars alot because Its one of those FEW mmorpg where you dont have to grind that much and puts alot of efforts on storyline and gameplay. also, Mmmorpgs are boring these days because most of them have the same system or Gameplay or etc… We need more MMORPGS which are special and unique in their own way and not making the player think ” oh i think played this kind of game” blah i’m demanding >:D
December 14, 2010
#75
Vindictus I believe is the most grind fee MMO out there, the way to get rid of grind is make the game about things like raiding and huge boss battles, you know, the things everyone is grinding in order to level high enough to do.
December 17, 2010
#76
I play jade dynasty and i love the bot. Some quest in JD require you to be a certain level so you have to grind. So in stead of clicking for hours you setup bot to kill mobs, which i love. I think all MMO’s need a bot for grinding, but if you dont like it you dont need to use it.
December 22, 2010
#77
The key is to promise good rewards (like WoWs mount system) at various levels but keep the reward levels far enough apart so one more level syndrome doesn’t kick in
December 30, 2010
#78
i really hate grinding cause i get bored very easily and that makes mmorpg difficult for me but mmos and mmofps and mmorts doesnt really bore me and some mmorpgs also dont bore me but make me “happy” instead of bored. thats why i love bright humorus athmospheres in mmorpg cause dark athmospheres make me kinda bored.
SORRY FOR MY BAD ENGLISH!!
-rasmus
January 15, 2011
#79
I hate grinding,but i think that’s the whole purpose of games.
I think you have to kill and beat up all of those orcs and ogres and giant monsters to surpass everybody and make your way to the top.This can REALLY bore you.
Instead of just a grind fest i would like to enjoy a game where i can just do a bunch of quests and level that way.Repeatable quests are boring,i like quests that go in a chain.Games that have these are perfect games for me
April 27, 2011
#80
Well, I think levels should be excluded from mmorpgs, and replaced with skillbook. The idea is that you go do dungeons, kill different monsters, explore the world, and try your luck to get a book that will teach you a unique skill. It’s more fun than just killing monsters around for nothing.
September 2, 2011
#81
I have an idea that completely eliminates grinding,farming,leveling etc… The problem is the game developers believe in those systems for two reasons. One, they believe a system of relentless grinding for years to achieve max characters and continual daily grinds to maintain those levels entices people to spend real money to short cut the character max or to maintain daily grinds. This is a proven approach and it makes a ton of money! The biggest enemy is the botters and multi accounts. The second reason the developers believe in these grinding systems is feed back from coiners. If you spend 10,000 dollars and this is not an exaggeration people spend that and much more for top level characters, you dont want someone creating a new account and over the course of one weekend he is kicking your 10k characters tail!
The solution for making money from the games is rather simple! There are so many ways to entice people to spend its not worth discussing. The second problem of balancing the interaction between top level characters and newly created characters is much more difficult because people are so protective of there hard earned accounts. Theres two ways to solve this problem. One is to simply keep the newer accounts from interacting with the older or higher level accounts until they have put the so called (time in). The problem there is you have sort of a game in a game where your surrounded by characters you cant interact with and since your not grinding and your not spending money to up your character to a level it can interact with higher level players your sort of stuck playing the lowerl levels and being top character is simply a dream that never happens. The second way to solve the problem is to have a system where a 10,000 dollar account WOULD play a newly created account at the risk of losing his 1st place title to a newbie who doesn’t spend or grind! Who would do such a thing and why? Well believe it or not in real life it hapens continually and there is no reason it can’t happen online too! If your interested in the system that works shoot me an email and a figure for what it would be worth! No hate mail please!
September 5, 2011
#82
Thanks for tris interesting information! I found it very useful =)
November 9, 2011
#83
Actually, i found that grinding are boring, I’m used to play hardcore Lineage 2 till lvl 85 as a cardinal. Lineage 2 is great game, when you hit lvl 70++ you can grind using party or solo, when you hit certain level in L2 you can solo (depending on your job) BUT party leveling are LOTS effective than solo. (in L2 there’s no MP pots, you must rely on healer to heal your MP), so you will find a good community and chatting with the others. The other’s need you, and you need them. When you find a bad / annoying player, you just can simply quit your party, post “This player suck” in online in game board message and solo till you find the better ones. When you find your healer in low mana you can sit and chatting to kill some time.
L2 design interface are good, the most interesting is about chatting, you can split the guild chat, yell and, normal chat, and when you whispering the nickname is not case sensitive, which is good, you never find annoying to wisp xXx4n0yY1N9P3rS0nxXx
Quest leveling are good, you don’t have to kill same monster all over the time. Wow is a good example, you can kill monster quickly if you got some nice skills and good build.
The most boring thing about MMORPGs where you go solo and poke about 10000 “ABC monster” to gain levels. It just plain annoying and simply boring. I want something like disgaea, you can grind easily into lvl 9999 and back into lvl 1 but when you use some nice equipment / skill you can OHKO lvl 3000 and gain 1000 level at once, and you can troll the monster by mobbing them and use AoE OHKO till they all dead. It’s fun to see that F@#$ “ABC monster” die. Or if you feel bored you can kill lvl 9999 monster as lvl 1. (sound fun enough?).
Or maybe something like the level resetting the level each week / month. So at first you can kill lvl 100 monster as lvl 100, then next month you can kill lvl 100 monster as lvl 50, the next month you can kill lvl 100 as lvl 25, and the next month again you can kill lvl 100 monster as lvl 12. Idk if you can kill lvl 100 monster as lvl 1.
November 9, 2011
#84
The most bad thing about mmorpgs, when you hit cetain level you can’t interact with lower levels or veteran players can’t play with new players. Okay let see about lineage 2, lineage 2 are fun, until I hit lvl 85, everything seems so pointless, dull and boring.
PS: sorry if my english bad.
February 25, 2012
#85
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May 7, 2012
#86
i don’t like grinding, but if game has avearge grinding i don’t mind. the problem is with bost and combat. how am i playng a game if a bot doest for me? or how do i enjoy combat if all i do is press a single button and character performs combos/attacks? only Tera is close to the combat i want