[...] I want to make sure to point out Nefbat’s Retroactively ‘New’ Features. He just moved, so he couldn’t be here, but he made sure to send that over wrapped in a thermal pad. Good luck with that green monster, Blackguard! The Wizard of Duke Street has a tasty Comparison of WoW and EVE, and Tobold’s got a great big pile of Guild Management in World of Warcraft under that napkin over there. Brent brought some of the Almighty /Tell he made for VirginWorlds last month. Hmm … smells good too. What did you do, put it in a ziplock baggie? Nice. Then we have Foton, who brought us … ‘If This is Wednesday This Must Be Naxxramas‘? Naxx? Foton, you brought Naxx to a Christmas dinner instead of yams? Jeez. I know you’re a non-traditionalist, but c’mon. [...]

The whole clothing thing in UO was awesome…I LOVED being able to put a robe over my plate mail and run around pounding mages who thought I was a noob. Magic Resistance FTW! You can shove Corp Por!

And going back to the looting rant, what about UO’s looting policy? Anything and everything you had on you was fair game, and it was up to the winner to take what he wanted from your corpse. Player collision? Not a problem, if someone was being an ass and blocking a door, you simply killed him (or got killed yourself if you weren’t powerful enough). Survival of the fittest. Yeah, it’s annoying when people do stuff like that, but if you know that eventually someone will come along and pound your ass for it, you probably won’t stay there too long.

Something else I loved about UO was the fact that thieves could actually be thieves! Yes, they are annoying. Yes, it makes it hard to keep cool stuff, but guess what? That’s a level of realism I liked. A thief could steal stuff out of your bank if you had it opened while he was around (not sure that was intended tho). If you didn’t have some kind of guard in your house, or lock everything down, a thief could come along and steal all your shit. I know because I used to do that too. And when did it become acceptable to “choose a side” permanently in pvp? I loved being able to turn on people after gaining their trust. It made the whole rogue thing more fun. Hiding in the trees near the crossroad to Yew and ganking a few people, then aiding the stronger group that comes out to kill the PKer’s…so much fun!

The things that EQ1 brought to the table were equally cool (even if most of the UO features fell by the wayside) with the whole 3D world and universal chat system (without the need for the walkie-talkie crystals they eventually came out with in UO). Nothing in UO was more annoying than having to constantly alt-tab to ICQ to try to find my friends. And God forbid someone outrun you, you could never find them again!

As an aside, the funny thing about playing UO 9 years ago was that I thought it ran like crap on my PC which, at the time, was a P2 233MHz w/ 500MB SDRAM, Voodoo 3 (i think?) and SoundBlaster 16, but I tried logging on 6 months ago with my Athlon 64 3500, 3GB Corsair, GeForce 7800 GT OC PCI-E, 250GB SATA and it was STILL crappy gameplay.

Still, EQ1 had some cool features, such as the bazaar (which pissed off a lot of the East Commons 1st torch / Shady guys hehe), a guild system that had some nifty features, and a grouping system that allowed you to actually see what was happening to people in your party, and once they fixed the raid system, that was awesome as well. And yes, I’m going to leave it at that because most of the rest of the features became fundamental parts of every MMO.

I think the things I hate most about the latest MMO’s is this artificial zone barrier…WoW did a very good job making the world nearly completely traversible. So what if I want to climb all the way up on the tippy-top of some mountain? Why put a barrier up so I can’t do that? It’s absurd and annoying when you try to run through Nektulos forest, are in the middle of the zone and hit an invisible wall that prevents you from climbing over a rock that stands between you and the NPC you need to talk to, which means you have to run the equivalent of 3 miles around the rock when you could have just climbed over it.

And what about cool fantasy shit like flying and teleports? EQ1 did a decent job with Druid / Wizzy ports and then PoK came out and the taxi business more or less died, and UO had a good idea with the Recall stones, but it still kinda limited the player. EQ1 levitation / DMF spells were cool, but I would still like to see a wizard be able to actually fly up off the ground without needing a mount. Levitation was fun when you could run off of something high up with Spirit of Cheetah and manage to get on top of something that other players couldn’t get on top of…and it’s stuff like that that makes a game interesting to me.

Now I love playing EQ2, but it seems like so much cool shit was sacrificed in the name of super-duper graphics. I really hope Vanguard is going to at least make an attempt at allowing players to roam the countryside unimpeded and implement more of this kind of stuff. Flying mounts are cool, but there is just something way more impressive about a wizard lifting off and flying away to me.

Anyway, I suppose I have run my mouth (or fingers, as it were) enough.

The point is that it shouldn’t be trivial. Ryan’s focus on UO as somehow being special actually diminishes his point. He’s complaining that people are ignoring games that came before while simultaneously encouraging people to do the same by essentially claiming there were no “major” MMOs before UO. This is the wrong attitude to take, especially on a topic like this.

This is important for a lot of reasons beyond any ego investment I have in pre-UO games. Ignoring history diminishes our discussions. Creating arbitrary distinctions doesn’t help us confront the issue Ryan brings up: that some “new” features have been in previous games and that marketing has gotten out of control.

You can still purchase UO at retail outlets, unlike M59 or MUD1. That says something.

Yes, that says that EA thinks UO players are still stupid enough to pay extra just to play the game. M59 no longer uses a retail distribution model for the client (that would just jack up the price), and MUD1 uses the telnet program that comes with Windows; that is, they have no specialized client software to distribute in a box. So, you have just created another arbitrary, ad hoc distinction, being available at retail, that does not help the discussion at all and actually makes no sense whatsoever given the two games you mentioned.

Focus on the point and stop making meaningless distinctions in the context of the discussion.

Well, since you brought it up, most younger gamers don’t even know what the hell M59 is. I know that I certainly didn’t until VERY recently… UO, to me, and quite a few others, seems to be the first mainstream MMO that comes to mind when the subject comes up. You can still purchase UO at retail outlets, unlike M59 or MUD1. That says something.

…and those books… well you’re absolutely right, but that’s a topic all and of it’s own.. Of course it wouldn’t be a “new” feature, but it is definitely an “oldie but goodie”. =)

Another item that I really miss, from UO, is player written books. These led to an amazing amount of creative writing. People would write stories of their in game travels, histories of their characters or guides to game loctaions or crafting. Every UO shard had at least one public library. Some had hundreds of player written books to be read. I think that’s a feature that would add greatly to the “newer” MMOs.

BTW, SWG did have “Boats”(well Subs) as the “Water” for SWG was space, and the boats(wich came out a year latter) where Space ships, both single seaters and Multi-Player ships. Though you did have to goto a cut seen to disembarc and Land.

Not that that has anything to do with what game had what feature and whatnot, but I thought I’d throw that in.

[...] The Grouchy Gnome’s appearing a bit grouchier than normal lately- that’s good- he’s at his best when bitching about something.? He’s taking issue on all the “all new, never done before” stuff that… well… really has been done- sometimes rather frequently- in the past. [...]