I don't know any site that accepts over 1.5 Megs. Does Photobucket do that? I forgot the password there do. And right now I'm back to slow connection so I won't be doing any upload business...
For the record... I PMed you but you obviously didn't get it. Basically always stay on hamachi please. I'll log off if you want me to but I don't care if your on hamachi but not really there...
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"Cards and flowers on your window, your friends all plead for you to stay,
sometimes beginnings aren't so simple, sometimes goodbye's the only way."
Alright... here is my list for current (last 10 years) influential games.
System Shock 1 & 2 - If I have to explain, you don't know. BioShock - Gorgeous, incredibly immersive, really a brilliant game all round. Portal - Yeah you guys think it's stupid but you couldn't be more wrong. It's a masterpiece in story telling. Humorous to boot.
... That's it.
Now games that will change the way things are done from now on are easy to find.
Project Gotham Racing 4 - Incorporates real-time weather, a feature that will surely appear in many racing games from this point on. Dirt - Complex damage system is fantastic and very realistic. Sega Rally Revo - Real-time track deformation.
As far as RPGs and Strategy games go, there has been little if any progress at all. The best RTS's today are simply rehashed classics. Supreme Commander is Total Annihilation and C&C3 is just a prettier version of the same old stuff.
Alright... here is my list for current (last 10 years) influential games.
System Shock 1 & 2 - If I have to explain, you don't know. BioShock - Gorgeous, incredibly immersive, really a brilliant game all round. Portal - Yeah you guys think it's stupid but you couldn't be more wrong. It's a masterpiece in story telling. Humorous to boot.
... That's it.
Now games that will change the way things are done from now on are easy to find.
Project Gotham Racing 4 - Incorporates real-time weather, a feature that will surely appear in many racing games from this point on. Dirt - Complex damage system is fantastic and very realistic. Sega Rally Revo - Real-time track deformation.
As far as RPGs and Strategy games go, there has been little if any progress at all. The best RTS's today are simply rehashed classics. Supreme Commander is Total Annihilation and C&C3 is just a prettier version of the same old stuff.
bioshocks good? i heard some good things about it an ive toyed with the idea of buying it but i also heard it was really short
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
He who learns must suffer. And even in our sleep pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart, and in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom to us by the awful grace of God.
~Aeschylus :cool:
Can you give me the specs please, maybe gonna buy a new computer.
Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo 6600 2.40GHz
Video Card: Saphire Radeon X1950 Pro
Motherboard: some Gigabyte motherboard
Memory: Seagate Barracuda 2 GB of RAM
Portal IS the way videogames should go to... videogaming as Art !
I think so about french developers team named Cryo which gave me amazing games such as Dune (the FIRST not the RTS) and Captain Blood (very old, very experimental and great) and so on.
Ocarina of Time. It's biased because the N64 was the first system I bought when it was new. But Ocarina was the first game I could play over and over again and probably the only game I've totally completed.
Pokemon
Mortal Kombat Advanced (it was one of the first games i recognized that really utilized the graphics the gba could generate)
oh and the lost vikings XD
For T games:
Tony Hawk ( i added t games just to put th in here)
For E games:
Mario for sure
Zelda
and DK because it's intertwined with Mario from the beginning anyway.
Zelda:windwaker, i dont care what anyone says the pixel shading graphics were AWESOME and i loved the whole thing
For M games
Metal Gear Solid
Grand Theft Auto
Halo
Mortal Kombat
ARMY OF TWO, this is definitely going to change the face of coop games, and in the future this series is going to get even more popular
For Comp
Diablo
SC
WC
EverQuest
WOW
that seems pretty good
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"I want to say something but I'll keep it to myself I guess and leave this useless post behind to make you aware that there WAS something... "
-Equinox
"We're like the downtown of the Diablo related internet lol"
-Winged
There is only one game worth mentioning here which completely changed gaming both for me as well as for the entire industry.
It started around eleven years ago. During this time many were into Diablo, Warcraft 2, Age of Empires, and the soon to be released Quake2. It was a good time for everyone. The entire industry was maturing in its diversity. Both the FPS and the RTS, established years prior, was expecting additional games to add to its arsenal, pleasing many around the world. With the release of Diablo earlier in the year, a new genre was born, the ARPG. At first glance, many of these genres, the FPS, RTS, and the ARPG, appeared to be distinct and separate from one another. With respect to gameplay and strategies employed by gamers, it no doubt was. However they all shared common traits with one another. These traits include a single-player element, as well as a multi-player aspect to them. Gamers could choose to play the game on their own, usually following the storyline, all the while without interacting with other players. They could also participate in small multi-player group sessions, which added an additional fun dimension to their gaming experience. Both these elements were of course expected for games of the time. The winning formula generated many successful franchises, and there appeared no reason to change things.
This was certainly true, until one particular game came out during this time which almost did.
This game was based on an older series of games, which spanned nearly two decades. Most of those in the series followed one of the elements mentioned, single-player. Gameplay was standard-fare RPG. When it was developed, the company constructing the game decided to change things a little. There would no longer be a single-player aspect to the game. The sole focus was going to be on multi-playing, but not in the typical sense featured in all other games. Multi-playing here was going to be drastically different. The aim was to gather thousands of players into one persistent continuous world where every single player will be able to impact the world and one another. It was also going to be different from all other games in another aspect, players had to pay a monthly fee in order to experience this world.
The genre was of course the massively multiplayer online role-playing game or MMORPG, and the title of the game was Ultima Online. Unfortunately Ultima Online could not claim the title of the first MMORPG ever released, that title belonged to other less well-known titles released years prior. What UO can claim however is the first to improve on and popularize the genre.
So what exactly did UO have that other titles lacked? Typical multi-play sessions were short for most other games, and the world created only existed for that time. If anything was created during the time frame, it would not exist when all other players within the session went offline. This was not the case with MMORPGs like UO. The persistent world ensured that players could engage in activities within, that would still be apparent when they logged back in the next day. It was a true virtual world.
There was also another aspect to UO that differed to most other popular games of the time. Like its predecessors, Ultima Online was an open-ended "sandbox" world. Gamers were not restricted to playing according to what developers had decided during development. Players were free to do and play however they liked. With respect to characters, there were no fixed 'class' templates in the same sense of Diablo. Gamers were in fact completely free to create their own character 'class' as it were, based on what skills they chose to acquire. The concept was simple. Give players a maximum of 700 skill-points, and allow them to distribute these to any of the dozens of skills available of their choosing. All skills ranged from 0.0 to a maximum of 100.0, or a 'Grandmaster' level. This means that players could only have a maximum of seven full skills at any one time. Likewise they could choose to have dozens of skills, at less than Grandmaster level for each of those skills... a Jack-of-Trades in other words. While many abilities would be available by going this route, this comes at the cost of how well one could do those abilities, as well as access to improved versions of those abilities. Stats also followed the same formula, gamers had 225 points to distribute to their stats, Strength, Dexterity, and Intelligence. The cap on both fronts ensured that characters would not become abnormally powerful over time.
Creative players created a great many templates, based solely on what they felt they needed. Many were odd choices certainly, but they were so unique, one could not help but admire the thought and effort put into those characters. There were Warriors who could bake bread, Bakers who could tame animals, Tamers who could mine, Miners who knew how to fish and cook, Cooks who knew how to work with wood, Carpenters who could wield magic, Mages who could hide when in danger, hiders who could chop wood and make scrolls, Tailors who could poison weapons for those who could pay for it, and everything in between and beyond. There was a market for everything, and everything was possible. The choices were close to endless. My first character was a typical Swordsman, skilled at getting killed by Moonbats, snakes, and rats. But I did also have Spiritspeak, which allowed me to communicate with ghosts. Ghosts were the 'spirit' of deceased players, and which can be resurrected by Healers or powerful Magicians.
While the possibilities were certainly interesting, many at the time worried about the skill and stat cap. Used to most level-based games where the sole purpose was to continually gain more 'levels' and 'experience', folks wondered whether such caps would mark the end of their gameplay, and that they would need to create a new character for new skills. Fortunately this was not the case. In order to extend the experience of gamers, to close to infinity, should gamers at any time feel tired of one of their skills, and would like to acquire a different skill, they can choose to do so. It was simple, train the skill you needed the most, and halt training for the skill you needed the least. The process was not instantaneous, it should take exactly the same amount of time as it would when a new character attempted the skill. In practice however it was not as easy. The problem was that as you trained the new skill, other skills you wanted to keep at their respective levels would also need to be trained in order to prevent them from going down. This was unfortunately remedied years later with skill locks, as players found it too 'hard' to deal with. But what was great about the older system was how similar it was with reality. Should one not 'use' it, one would sadly 'lose' it. On a side note, one finds it surprising how such a simple, auto-balancing, and effective respec system has yet to make it in later games such as Diablo2 and so forth.
Skill and stat acquisition and improvement was not the end-goal however. In fact it marked the starting-point where players could really start experiencing the open-ended world. The first and foremost goal many at the time had was gathering enough money to buy their very own home. Owning a home was more than just a means to store ones junk and items, it was a status symbol of wealth and power. Those who owned homes in the early days were seen as natural leaders, experienced in the art of wealth generation. With a home, one could start their very own guilds. This then led to the creation of some of the oldest and most powerful of all UO guilds. Owning homes of course led to one of many popular pastimes within the game, home decorating. Although it sounds pansy, home decoration was difficult and challenging. In order to achieve the right 'look', one had to spend hours and hours understanding how the many item sprites interacted with one another, and how one was to achieve the correct stack arrangement to create something entirely out of the ordinary. Decorating was one of those things which took developers a bit by surprise, since it was not intentionally hard-coded into the game. It was the open-ended nature of the game which allowed players to develop their own meta-game as it were, and this was a very welcome development to all involved with the game, but especially for one type of gamer. Home-decor typically utilized easy to find items scattered around the world, they ranged from pieces of wood, metal ore, or metal ingots, to furniture such as cupboards, tables, boxes, chairs, beds, and pentagram carpets all of which are craftable by players, to unusual junk such as money, weapons, animal fur, and so forth. But what many really wanted was casual every-day items found in real-life homes. Unfortunately these were not available to players from the onset, even though the graphics for such items were.
Meanwhile a small group of players earlier discovered a range of items that were generated erroneously in the world, and which were not available anywhere else. Some of these items were rather common-place, everyday items, and gave players no distinct advantage on any front, except for one... their rarity and thus their value. These were therefore called 'rares', and thus a whole in-game industry was born. Rares included all sorts of items ranging from glass jars, fruit baskets, tiles, statues, even mows and other assorted junk. A number of rares suited home-decor perfectly, not to mention further increase their status symbol, and so suddenly everyone wanted such items for themselves. A new goal was set, and gamers were willing to pay hundreds of thousands for some rares, and even trade the largest homes (castle) for a single item. Rare hunters kept the locations of many of their priced artifacts secret in order to protect their trade. Many of these hunters became very very rich. This was another one of those things that took developers by complete surprise.
The trade of rares and vast amounts of commodity resources including wood, cloth, metal, and reagents which is required for Magery, spawned a vast in-game economy. The primary currency used was gold pennies, although many also traded with homes and rares, depending on their current market-value. Although one could acquire resources on ones own, this usually took hours, and in many cases player-killers or PKs would complicate things by killing and robbing their victims of their valuable resources acquired in the wilds. Those who needed such resources in order to train their skills, were also not very experienced in combat, neither in melee, ranged, nor in magery-related skills. Thus the safest way to acquire them was through marketplaces scattered around, either in-game, or through websites. And contrary to reality, large bulk resources almost always fetched a much higher price than smaller numbers of the same resource. Gold was a valued commodity. At a time when PKs ran rampant, gold was difficult to come by, and this made it valued to the point where it was used as a primary currency to trade everything else in. Gold was itself traded for real-life money, and at one point it was more valuable than the Italian Lira.
Besides wealth acquisition, players also indulged in other activities. There was of course the usual monster killing, but there was also the high-intensity player versus player or PvP aspect of the game. Those with fast connections participated in combat, and on a mass scale. One finds them everywhere, in massive guild wars - where two or more guilds have dozens or hundreds of members fighting each other simultaneously all over the in-game world, in competitive one on one competition - where two or four combatants fight each other in a make-shift 'ring', in faction wars - where players join either one of the competing factions belonging to the two Lords of the land, in dungeons and wilds - where mentally insecure gamers kill defenseless players for fun, and in Bounty Hunting - where experienced PvPers hunted down PKs in mass groups.
PvPers had to use strategy and intelligence to outwit their opponents. Combat required the use of all manner of tools, from magic wands, to potions, to weapons, and even boxes, in addition to Magery spells. Unlike Diablo, there were no mana potions one could chuck in order to regain ones institution. Once mana is used up, one had to wait until it replenished itself. This meant that combat was a skill of timing. The use of wands is not as spectacular as it appears either. It is used mainly to disrupt the spells being cast by the opponent, allowing for time to escape certain death, or to cast a spell of your own, but it can also be used to de-buff them. The precise nature of all manner of weapons also needed to be taken into account. One has to consider how fast weapons were, and how much damage it dispenses. One then had to decide in a split second which tool to utilize, when to utilize it, after which tool to use it after, which tool to use against an attack, and sequence them all in a way that utterly destroys the opponent. But of course there are opponents who resorts to the use of boxes and other blocking mechanisms. These block the advance of opponents for dealing a final killing blow, and gives the weakened combatant time to recover and launch a counter-attack. A difficult and challenging meta-game which many enjoy, and only play UO for.
Besides combat, house-decor, skills and commodity and wealth trading, players participated in actual role-play. Taverns were created in order to host in-game events. Activities in such events include races - where participants had to run through heavily monster-infested racetracks completely naked, crafting competitions - where blacksmiths for example were timed on how fast they could create a full plate armor using rare Valorite metal, lucky draws - where visitors could win rares, magic weapons, and even a whole house, opera and stand-up routines - where actors and actresses performed in front of audiences, and even weddings - where GameMasters became involved.
The release of UO shook the whole industry. Many gamers were reluctant at the idea of paying to play a game, but nevertheless UO proved to be very popular. Around six months after launch, the 100,000 membership mark was passed, and this continued to increase to around 200,000-250,000 active and paid-for accounts after several years. The venture was so successful in fact, providing the company with millions every month, that other companies decided to release their own hacked up versions of their own. First among these was EverQuest. An unfortunate game which heavily relied on the acquisition of loot and levels, it offered players little else in the way of fun. Other MMOs followed in the footsteps of EQ, each of them providing small incremental improvements over the last. It wasn't until development of Star Wars: Galaxies that any MMO could truly claim to have surpassed the near endless possibilities offered thanks to the open-ended nature of UO gaming, where crafting is not just a gimmick, and where an actual thriving in-game economy and role-playing community existed and thrived. SWG was to be the next major step in the improvement of the genre, and for a while it probably was. Unfortunately, it did not last. Sony decided to change things for the worse, and that was that.
Ultima Online today is more of a shell of its former glory, and following the release after release of regrettable expansions, it is not worth paying to play for. I cannot speak for WoW, since I have yet to touch that game, but if the screams and disdain of people around the web are any indication, it does not appear to be as revered by players as UO once was. Personally, I've almost given up on the genre, but I have hope that someday an open-ended true MMORPG would once again grace us with its presence.
I forgot to say MGS
that game changed gaming for me, i loved that whole series. And since its been around since the 2d pixel days im sure it has changed the industry as well in many ways
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"I want to say something but I'll keep it to myself I guess and leave this useless post behind to make you aware that there WAS something... "
-Equinox
"We're like the downtown of the Diablo related internet lol"
-Winged
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night < -- Revolutionized the world of game music through innovative themes that were all distinct, refreshing from one another, and achieved tones that fit the atmosphere.
"Cards and flowers on your window, your friends all plead for you to stay,
sometimes beginnings aren't so simple, sometimes goodbye's the only way."
System Shock 1 & 2 - If I have to explain, you don't know.
BioShock - Gorgeous, incredibly immersive, really a brilliant game all round.
Portal - Yeah you guys think it's stupid but you couldn't be more wrong. It's a masterpiece in story telling. Humorous to boot.
... That's it.
Now games that will change the way things are done from now on are easy to find.
Project Gotham Racing 4 - Incorporates real-time weather, a feature that will surely appear in many racing games from this point on.
Dirt - Complex damage system is fantastic and very realistic.
Sega Rally Revo - Real-time track deformation.
As far as RPGs and Strategy games go, there has been little if any progress at all. The best RTS's today are simply rehashed classics. Supreme Commander is Total Annihilation and C&C3 is just a prettier version of the same old stuff.
Vote:
http://www.diablofans.com/forums/showthread.php?t=17929
bioshocks good? i heard some good things about it an ive toyed with the idea of buying it but i also heard it was really short
~Aeschylus :cool:
Vote:
http://www.diablofans.com/forums/showthread.php?t=17929
BioShock was such a good story teller.
If you picked up the tapes, you could really hear each level's story.
I loved the part where you fall in that "room"
With the chalkboard and "Would you kindly" written across it.
I had this chilling scary feeling, that it looked familiar.
Then when you face off with Andrew Ryan...that scene was so dramatic.
I don't think any game like BioShock had this effect on me.
great game.
BioShock was such a good story teller.
If you picked up the tapes, you could really hear each level's story.
I loved the part where you fall in that "room"
With the chalkboard and "Would you kindly" written across it.
I had this chilling scary feeling, that it looked familiar.
Then when you face off with Andrew Ryan...that scene was so dramatic.
"OBEY!"
lol
I don't think any game like BioShock had this effect on me.
great game.
Video Card: Saphire Radeon X1950 Pro
Motherboard: some Gigabyte motherboard
Memory: Seagate Barracuda 2 GB of RAM
Assassin's Creed
Halo 3 (though my Xbox 360 bbroke after a week, so I took it back and got a ps3)
Age of Mythology
Cod4
and God of War
I think so about french developers team named Cryo which gave me amazing games such as Dune (the FIRST not the RTS) and Captain Blood (very old, very experimental and great) and so on.
For hand held:
Pokemon
Mortal Kombat Advanced (it was one of the first games i recognized that really utilized the graphics the gba could generate)
oh and the lost vikings XD
For T games:
Tony Hawk ( i added t games just to put th in here)
For E games:
Mario for sure
Zelda
and DK because it's intertwined with Mario from the beginning anyway.
Zelda:windwaker, i dont care what anyone says the pixel shading graphics were AWESOME and i loved the whole thing
For M games
Metal Gear Solid
Grand Theft Auto
Halo
Mortal Kombat
ARMY OF TWO, this is definitely going to change the face of coop games, and in the future this series is going to get even more popular
For Comp
Diablo
SC
WC
EverQuest
WOW
that seems pretty good
-Equinox
"We're like the downtown of the Diablo related internet lol"
-Winged
It started around eleven years ago. During this time many were into Diablo, Warcraft 2, Age of Empires, and the soon to be released Quake2. It was a good time for everyone. The entire industry was maturing in its diversity. Both the FPS and the RTS, established years prior, was expecting additional games to add to its arsenal, pleasing many around the world. With the release of Diablo earlier in the year, a new genre was born, the ARPG. At first glance, many of these genres, the FPS, RTS, and the ARPG, appeared to be distinct and separate from one another. With respect to gameplay and strategies employed by gamers, it no doubt was. However they all shared common traits with one another. These traits include a single-player element, as well as a multi-player aspect to them. Gamers could choose to play the game on their own, usually following the storyline, all the while without interacting with other players. They could also participate in small multi-player group sessions, which added an additional fun dimension to their gaming experience. Both these elements were of course expected for games of the time. The winning formula generated many successful franchises, and there appeared no reason to change things.
This was certainly true, until one particular game came out during this time which almost did.
This game was based on an older series of games, which spanned nearly two decades. Most of those in the series followed one of the elements mentioned, single-player. Gameplay was standard-fare RPG. When it was developed, the company constructing the game decided to change things a little. There would no longer be a single-player aspect to the game. The sole focus was going to be on multi-playing, but not in the typical sense featured in all other games. Multi-playing here was going to be drastically different. The aim was to gather thousands of players into one persistent continuous world where every single player will be able to impact the world and one another. It was also going to be different from all other games in another aspect, players had to pay a monthly fee in order to experience this world.
The genre was of course the massively multiplayer online role-playing game or MMORPG, and the title of the game was Ultima Online. Unfortunately Ultima Online could not claim the title of the first MMORPG ever released, that title belonged to other less well-known titles released years prior. What UO can claim however is the first to improve on and popularize the genre.
So what exactly did UO have that other titles lacked? Typical multi-play sessions were short for most other games, and the world created only existed for that time. If anything was created during the time frame, it would not exist when all other players within the session went offline. This was not the case with MMORPGs like UO. The persistent world ensured that players could engage in activities within, that would still be apparent when they logged back in the next day. It was a true virtual world.
There was also another aspect to UO that differed to most other popular games of the time. Like its predecessors, Ultima Online was an open-ended "sandbox" world. Gamers were not restricted to playing according to what developers had decided during development. Players were free to do and play however they liked. With respect to characters, there were no fixed 'class' templates in the same sense of Diablo. Gamers were in fact completely free to create their own character 'class' as it were, based on what skills they chose to acquire. The concept was simple. Give players a maximum of 700 skill-points, and allow them to distribute these to any of the dozens of skills available of their choosing. All skills ranged from 0.0 to a maximum of 100.0, or a 'Grandmaster' level. This means that players could only have a maximum of seven full skills at any one time. Likewise they could choose to have dozens of skills, at less than Grandmaster level for each of those skills... a Jack-of-Trades in other words. While many abilities would be available by going this route, this comes at the cost of how well one could do those abilities, as well as access to improved versions of those abilities. Stats also followed the same formula, gamers had 225 points to distribute to their stats, Strength, Dexterity, and Intelligence. The cap on both fronts ensured that characters would not become abnormally powerful over time.
Creative players created a great many templates, based solely on what they felt they needed. Many were odd choices certainly, but they were so unique, one could not help but admire the thought and effort put into those characters. There were Warriors who could bake bread, Bakers who could tame animals, Tamers who could mine, Miners who knew how to fish and cook, Cooks who knew how to work with wood, Carpenters who could wield magic, Mages who could hide when in danger, hiders who could chop wood and make scrolls, Tailors who could poison weapons for those who could pay for it, and everything in between and beyond. There was a market for everything, and everything was possible. The choices were close to endless. My first character was a typical Swordsman, skilled at getting killed by Moonbats, snakes, and rats. But I did also have Spiritspeak, which allowed me to communicate with ghosts. Ghosts were the 'spirit' of deceased players, and which can be resurrected by Healers or powerful Magicians.
While the possibilities were certainly interesting, many at the time worried about the skill and stat cap. Used to most level-based games where the sole purpose was to continually gain more 'levels' and 'experience', folks wondered whether such caps would mark the end of their gameplay, and that they would need to create a new character for new skills. Fortunately this was not the case. In order to extend the experience of gamers, to close to infinity, should gamers at any time feel tired of one of their skills, and would like to acquire a different skill, they can choose to do so. It was simple, train the skill you needed the most, and halt training for the skill you needed the least. The process was not instantaneous, it should take exactly the same amount of time as it would when a new character attempted the skill. In practice however it was not as easy. The problem was that as you trained the new skill, other skills you wanted to keep at their respective levels would also need to be trained in order to prevent them from going down. This was unfortunately remedied years later with skill locks, as players found it too 'hard' to deal with. But what was great about the older system was how similar it was with reality. Should one not 'use' it, one would sadly 'lose' it. On a side note, one finds it surprising how such a simple, auto-balancing, and effective respec system has yet to make it in later games such as Diablo2 and so forth.
Skill and stat acquisition and improvement was not the end-goal however. In fact it marked the starting-point where players could really start experiencing the open-ended world. The first and foremost goal many at the time had was gathering enough money to buy their very own home. Owning a home was more than just a means to store ones junk and items, it was a status symbol of wealth and power. Those who owned homes in the early days were seen as natural leaders, experienced in the art of wealth generation. With a home, one could start their very own guilds. This then led to the creation of some of the oldest and most powerful of all UO guilds. Owning homes of course led to one of many popular pastimes within the game, home decorating. Although it sounds pansy, home decoration was difficult and challenging. In order to achieve the right 'look', one had to spend hours and hours understanding how the many item sprites interacted with one another, and how one was to achieve the correct stack arrangement to create something entirely out of the ordinary. Decorating was one of those things which took developers a bit by surprise, since it was not intentionally hard-coded into the game. It was the open-ended nature of the game which allowed players to develop their own meta-game as it were, and this was a very welcome development to all involved with the game, but especially for one type of gamer. Home-decor typically utilized easy to find items scattered around the world, they ranged from pieces of wood, metal ore, or metal ingots, to furniture such as cupboards, tables, boxes, chairs, beds, and pentagram carpets all of which are craftable by players, to unusual junk such as money, weapons, animal fur, and so forth. But what many really wanted was casual every-day items found in real-life homes. Unfortunately these were not available to players from the onset, even though the graphics for such items were.
Meanwhile a small group of players earlier discovered a range of items that were generated erroneously in the world, and which were not available anywhere else. Some of these items were rather common-place, everyday items, and gave players no distinct advantage on any front, except for one... their rarity and thus their value. These were therefore called 'rares', and thus a whole in-game industry was born. Rares included all sorts of items ranging from glass jars, fruit baskets, tiles, statues, even mows and other assorted junk. A number of rares suited home-decor perfectly, not to mention further increase their status symbol, and so suddenly everyone wanted such items for themselves. A new goal was set, and gamers were willing to pay hundreds of thousands for some rares, and even trade the largest homes (castle) for a single item. Rare hunters kept the locations of many of their priced artifacts secret in order to protect their trade. Many of these hunters became very very rich. This was another one of those things that took developers by complete surprise.
The trade of rares and vast amounts of commodity resources including wood, cloth, metal, and reagents which is required for Magery, spawned a vast in-game economy. The primary currency used was gold pennies, although many also traded with homes and rares, depending on their current market-value. Although one could acquire resources on ones own, this usually took hours, and in many cases player-killers or PKs would complicate things by killing and robbing their victims of their valuable resources acquired in the wilds. Those who needed such resources in order to train their skills, were also not very experienced in combat, neither in melee, ranged, nor in magery-related skills. Thus the safest way to acquire them was through marketplaces scattered around, either in-game, or through websites. And contrary to reality, large bulk resources almost always fetched a much higher price than smaller numbers of the same resource. Gold was a valued commodity. At a time when PKs ran rampant, gold was difficult to come by, and this made it valued to the point where it was used as a primary currency to trade everything else in. Gold was itself traded for real-life money, and at one point it was more valuable than the Italian Lira.
Besides wealth acquisition, players also indulged in other activities. There was of course the usual monster killing, but there was also the high-intensity player versus player or PvP aspect of the game. Those with fast connections participated in combat, and on a mass scale. One finds them everywhere, in massive guild wars - where two or more guilds have dozens or hundreds of members fighting each other simultaneously all over the in-game world, in competitive one on one competition - where two or four combatants fight each other in a make-shift 'ring', in faction wars - where players join either one of the competing factions belonging to the two Lords of the land, in dungeons and wilds - where mentally insecure gamers kill defenseless players for fun, and in Bounty Hunting - where experienced PvPers hunted down PKs in mass groups.
PvPers had to use strategy and intelligence to outwit their opponents. Combat required the use of all manner of tools, from magic wands, to potions, to weapons, and even boxes, in addition to Magery spells. Unlike Diablo, there were no mana potions one could chuck in order to regain ones institution. Once mana is used up, one had to wait until it replenished itself. This meant that combat was a skill of timing. The use of wands is not as spectacular as it appears either. It is used mainly to disrupt the spells being cast by the opponent, allowing for time to escape certain death, or to cast a spell of your own, but it can also be used to de-buff them. The precise nature of all manner of weapons also needed to be taken into account. One has to consider how fast weapons were, and how much damage it dispenses. One then had to decide in a split second which tool to utilize, when to utilize it, after which tool to use it after, which tool to use against an attack, and sequence them all in a way that utterly destroys the opponent. But of course there are opponents who resorts to the use of boxes and other blocking mechanisms. These block the advance of opponents for dealing a final killing blow, and gives the weakened combatant time to recover and launch a counter-attack. A difficult and challenging meta-game which many enjoy, and only play UO for.
Besides combat, house-decor, skills and commodity and wealth trading, players participated in actual role-play. Taverns were created in order to host in-game events. Activities in such events include races - where participants had to run through heavily monster-infested racetracks completely naked, crafting competitions - where blacksmiths for example were timed on how fast they could create a full plate armor using rare Valorite metal, lucky draws - where visitors could win rares, magic weapons, and even a whole house, opera and stand-up routines - where actors and actresses performed in front of audiences, and even weddings - where GameMasters became involved.
The release of UO shook the whole industry. Many gamers were reluctant at the idea of paying to play a game, but nevertheless UO proved to be very popular. Around six months after launch, the 100,000 membership mark was passed, and this continued to increase to around 200,000-250,000 active and paid-for accounts after several years. The venture was so successful in fact, providing the company with millions every month, that other companies decided to release their own hacked up versions of their own. First among these was EverQuest. An unfortunate game which heavily relied on the acquisition of loot and levels, it offered players little else in the way of fun. Other MMOs followed in the footsteps of EQ, each of them providing small incremental improvements over the last. It wasn't until development of Star Wars: Galaxies that any MMO could truly claim to have surpassed the near endless possibilities offered thanks to the open-ended nature of UO gaming, where crafting is not just a gimmick, and where an actual thriving in-game economy and role-playing community existed and thrived. SWG was to be the next major step in the improvement of the genre, and for a while it probably was. Unfortunately, it did not last. Sony decided to change things for the worse, and that was that.
Ultima Online today is more of a shell of its former glory, and following the release after release of regrettable expansions, it is not worth paying to play for. I cannot speak for WoW, since I have yet to touch that game, but if the screams and disdain of people around the web are any indication, it does not appear to be as revered by players as UO once was. Personally, I've almost given up on the genre, but I have hope that someday an open-ended true MMORPG would once again grace us with its presence.
Making Controversial points one post at a time!
It's the decisions you make when you have no time to make them that define who you are.
that game changed gaming for me, i loved that whole series. And since its been around since the 2d pixel days im sure it has changed the industry as well in many ways
-Equinox
"We're like the downtown of the Diablo related internet lol"
-Winged
Mario
Zelda Series
Starcraft
MGS Series
Its what I can think of right now