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Massively Multiplayer Online Role-playing Games are dying. At least, the spirit of what originally made them so appealing is. But before I talk of MMOs, I want to speak of standard PC or even console games with limited (or even non-existant) multiplayer support.

There was once a time where when we "beat" a game, we had to actually get into the game, figure out how to beat it and actually do it. And no matter whether or not we wanted to brag after having done so, more often than not, we carried away from the experience the enjoyment of the game itself.

Not anymore...

Now, in the MMO age, we play the game to rub our peers' noses in our "leetness" at every stage of the game. We no longer play for the enjoyment of the game. We play to be the first to achieve the best... The first to reach the end. In many cases, this is done at the cost of enjoying the game itself.

By now, you are probably wondering just what this has to do with Star Trek Online. The answer to that question is "Nothing and everything." There was a post made recently on the forums by community member Thrax73. And in a way, he's touched on a bit of what I speak of. And I want to address his comments here.

That is a good question. Let us consider for a moment the first recognized commercially successful MMO, Ultima Online. A game where from the moment you created your character and directed his or her first steps in the virtual world of Britania, you were in full control over who that character was, and what paths would be taken. You weren't lumped into a pre-existing character class and led from A to B to C on some pre-defined path, like a train running on a one-way track. From the moment you started playing, you were free to explore as you wished.

Ultima Online was a very community-oriented game. And back then, there was no specialized system for grouping together. You simply drug a buddy's status box off to the side, next to yours and just helped him out. The game treated every single player as an individual at all times, even when players were playing together. But because there were places in the game that were populated by extremely challenging foes, there was a reason to join forces with others. PvP was open and free at any time, so it was not often wise to travel alone unless you were equipped to handle yourself. Granted, that did present some problematic situations for some people who refused to grasp the concept of playing an MMO together with others. Ultimately leading to the splitting of the virtual world into two facets, one with all the risk associated with the original game, and the other where PvP was more or less dis-allowed.

There was loot. But there were no "go here, kill this many of that type of monster, collect a reward". The goal of our gameplay was what we wanted it to be. And the game was designed so that we could progress as fast or as slow as we liked. Yes, there was some degree of bragging rights associated with having braved the depths of a dungeon and come out woth some fancy piece of gear, but it was more often than not the thrill of the journey that was the reward which players carried away with them.

The end-game content was PvP-oriented more than anything else, as through actions during the advancement phase, one became viewed as on either the side of Order or of Chaos. Even players who chose strictly non-combat playstyles were able to contribute to the end-game, by supplying weapons, armor and other goods for their guildmates... I'll never forget the time when I was following someone around who was marking runes inside an enemy guild's territory. Later on, I heard that his guild was divided into attack groups, each one given a specific gate rune. And when the enemy guild was online in significant numbers, the moongates were opened and the attack groups charged through... I can only imagine what it must have looked like from the defenders' point of view. Gates opening up all around an enemies pouring through.

We can't do any of these sorts of things in today's MMOs. We advance on a leveling treadmill. We do quests, quests and more quests. End-game content usually takes the form of raids or pre-defined PvP battlefields. All static. We ultimately end up playing our characters the way the developers want us to play, not how we want to. And by design, the gratification comes from the loot we carry away from the objectives rather than the experience itself of achieving the objective. And typically, the way gameplay in today's MMOs is designed, you have to run a raid multiple times to get a full set of gear which will give enough of a stat boost to be able to take on the next raid. And the same thing happens with that raid.

I hate to admit it, but these words are very true. I have seen it happen in every MMO where content becomes so level-centric and gear-centric that only those who have managed to achieve the highest status can hope to participate together. In Ultima Online, while it was true that you sort of had to master a combat skill and know how to play that determined how successful a group would be when they did a dungeon crawl. And yes, you didn't want to go in there without good sturdy gear. And while some epic loot gear was generally considered "the best," A master blacksmith could make swords and armor of sufficient quality. The epic loot might shave a few hits off of the boss fight, but it wasn't needed to be effective. And mastering skills was less about reaching endgame than it was about defining the path your character walked. In short, anyone could participate in ANY of UO's content and generally have a good time doing so.

I get it. The problem is that very few MMO developers who make a game based on a pre-existing IP actually make a game based on the IP. They just slap an IP-recognizable skin on MMO gameplay rules and call it "X Online", where X is the name of the IP. So far, only Turbine Entertainment has put fort any serious effort to make their "Lord of the Rings Online" worthy of the name. While it is true that they do not have World of Warcraft's massive subscriber base, theirs is large enough that the game is alive and enjoys content updates on a semi-regular basis. You see, unlike Sony Online Entertainment and Cryptic, Turbine recognized the need to attract the fans of Lord of the Rings first and foremost. Because they understood that the fans would remain loyal to the game while the non-fans would play only until the next big MMO came out. To them, loss of the non-fan audience was preferable to losing the fans, even if it meant fewer total subscribers. They knew that the Lord of the Rings fanbase among gamers was large enough to sustain a viable subscriber base. And as they head into their third year of delivery, they are still going strong.

I truly wish that Cryptic would have taken the same path. Because as Star Trek Online is at the moment, I do not feel that it does the IP justice enough to be worthy of the name it carries. Oh, there is, as Thrax73 said, a lot of great potential. But until they start treating the game like Star Trek, they will not achieve that potential.

Yes, that is a very good statement. Unfortunately, an overwhelming number of people chose to attack Thrax and accusations were thrown around that he was just a noob who wanted an easy button because "Infected" is too hard for him to learn to play.

The thing is that he never said anything about the mission being too hard. His complaint was concerning the uncharacteristic way the challeges were presented, and how the problem-solving aspect relied on players mashing a key at the exact same time... Don't the devs realize that latency makes such coordinated actions extremely problematic?

I agree with Thrax's position. There must be ways for STO's writers to create content that makes our experience play out as if we were in a Star Trek episode. And it is my opinion that if the current writing team cannot figure out how to do this, then they need to be fired and replaced by someone who can. Heck, I can do a better job in coming up with ways to make the player feel like they are living out a Star Trek adventure. So could a lot of people in the community who have put forward good ideas. But Cryptic in their arrogance has taken the "our way or the highway" position. Well, every day there are multiple farewell letters posted on the forums. And for every forum poster who feels the need to announce his or her departure, there are likely severaln people who never used the forums, but just leave. So a lot of people are choosing the Highway.

The thing is that STO is no longer just Cryptic's game. It is now public. They expect the public to subscribe and pay a monthly fee to play the game, yet they refuse to pay attention to what the public is telling them. They have convinced themselves that the Trek name will be enough. Maybe enough that they can tread water, but they aren't going to get anywhere that way.

The core mechanics of STO work. But how those mechanics are being used in terms of the content that is being delivered is wrong in my opinion.

Next Article: My Commentary on "Proposal: Metagames, Economy, Crafting, Fleets, Exploration and PvP" by Trace Thorne