Gordon inspired me to talk about old-fashioned MMOs one of which I visited in 2007. I thought my comment there was worth repeating here:
One of the worst experiences for me was trying DAOC in 2007. I had missed this game first time round and I thought it would make a great replacement for WoW after I'd burned out for the first time.
I pootled around doing some quests until I got one that sent me to a cave. North of the village. Now north of the village covered an area about half the size of The Barrens and I dutifully went off hunting. Couldn't find it. Logged off in disappointment.
Logged back on the next day feeling determined. Searched every inch of the north part of the zone for 3 hours. Would have found a freaking rabbit hole had it been in the north part of the zone. Logged off in disgust.
Logged on the next day. Decided to hunt for it online. Read strat sites for about an hour before finally getting a clue in the comments of some ancient wiki that pointed me to the solution.
You see when they used the word "North" what they actually meant was a compass direction about 1 degree above due West. Not N, not NW, not even WNW but WWWWWNWWWWW.
It was at that point I realised I could never play an old-fashioned MMO again.
Hm, terrible quest writer or did they go a level further and make quest NPCs not omniscient? That sure would be fun, quest givers who did not know where you had to go or what you had to do.
ReplyDeleteIt actually happened quite a lot in the old days. Quest text would be written wrong or they'd write the quest text then redesign the zone without updating it.
ReplyDeleteI really don't think I would consider it fun. "Go find a needle in a haystack!"
"Which haystack?"
"Oh dunno."