Why Aren’t There More Puzzles in MMOs?

If you love MMOs and you love puzzles, you might find it surprising and disappointing just how rarely you encounter a puzzle when you are playing an MMO. You would think that puzzles and MMOs would go together like peanut butter and jam, but alas, this is not the case.

Thankfully, players who are longing for a good puzzle while playing an MMO can always take a break and play online jigsaw puzzles for a little bit. Let’s talk more about the lack of puzzles in MMOs.

MMOs with Puzzles

Despite the fact that puzzles are not all that big a part of MMOs, they are not entirely absent from them either. Here are a few examples of MMOs where users report running into puzzles at some point in the games:

• Guild Wars 2: This game features quite a few jumping puzzles.
• Final Fantasy XIV: There is a really basic puzzle in the first dungeon.
• Dungeons & Dragons Online: This MMO offers riddles, mazes, wheel puzzles, and other puzzles.
• The Secret World: In this game, you can solve puzzles in the form of Investigation missions. These puzzles typically involve doing some outside research.
• TheTravelers.online: This is a text-based puzzle MMO that involves exploring a world and uncovering its lore through solving a puzzle. As you work on solving the puzzle, you can share what you learn with the community if you wish. The map is extremely large, and it is rare to actually encounter another player as you play.

Interestingly enough, there is actually an MMO called Puzzle Pirates that, as the name implies, focuses heavily on puzzle mechanics. For example, you have to solve puzzles to repair your ship or get the sails to perform at their best to speed up your vessel.

So, MMOs are not entirely devoid of puzzles. If you really want to find them, you can.

There is also the possibility to “make one’s own fun.” In some more community-driven online games, players might create puzzles for one another. For example, members of a guild might post code-breaking challenges on their channel for their members to solve, and even offer rewards to those who solve them the fastest.

Why are there so Few Puzzles in MMOs?

So, why don’t MMOs have more puzzles? One reason could be that while many players love puzzles, many others find them frustrating and disruptive. Another reason could involve challenges with implementation and mechanics. Scaling puzzles is not really the same as scaling enemy NPCs for combat. Players may be able to take on harder and harder enemies as they scale up their gear and level up their health. But no amount of better armor or weapons is going to scale up their brains to tackle more challenging puzzles.

Are there solutions to these problems? Probably. Certain types of puzzles might be more “scalable” with level than others. Jump puzzles, for example, might scale up well with improving agility skills. That said, some gamers already feel that jump puzzles are overused. So, that might not be a solution. Then again, perhaps there are some ways to make the classic jump puzzle more interesting through fresh mechanics.

Do Not Neglect the “Social” Aspect of MMOs

Hopefully we will eventually see a renaissance of puzzle development in MMOs. Until we do, however, we will just have to favor MMOs that feature puzzles, or create our own fun, as we mentioned earlier.

If you are playing an MMO where players actively chat with each other, consider giving each other puzzles to solve. And if OOC chat is allowed, you could even share jigsaw puzzle sites with each other where you can all scratch your puzzle-solving itch.