Why is it that WOW is always cloned but Runescape isn't?

[Forsaken Wanderer]

Correct me if I'm wrong but there are not any Runescape-like MMOs out there right? It's all the WOW type of MMO where the entire game is grinding on KILL X or COLLECT X BY KILLING X over and over again. Runescape proved in the late 90s (along with some other early MMOs) that you can have proper quests and also make the various non combat skills feel different and not be a quick distraction like they usually are in the WOW-likes. The excuse that players eat up content too quickly must be bullshit because Runescape has players and the quests are not all KILL X. Why has the MMO world done this? (And I know WOW was built on top of Everquest)

 

[Mr.Miyagi]

WoW had massive popularity and success that made it a prime target for imitation and chasing the dragon of being the Next Big Thing. I also imagine the sort of "theme park" style of questing and being shepherded from zone to zone is a lot easier to scale up and make large amounts of content, rather than the more sandbox-y and bespoke nature of Runescape content, where you can just run around doing whatever and making your own goals. While Runescape's had a revival over time with OSRS and all, it never really was as giant as WoW, so there probably weren't that many companies trying to follow its examples (not to mention that, as far as I know, Jagex's financials haven't really been stellar, even back in its heyday.) Most RS players would probably stick with what they know rather than try out a new MMO, which also makes it harder to break into the scene (but I wasn't still around in the old EoC days when people started getting iffy on the direction of the game, so there might have been some attempts back then.)

I agree with you on the quests part. You can't really get something like Recipe for Disaster or Song of the Elves in a WoW-style MMO without involving grinding for X drops or just doing a dungeon. I think FF14 does a bit more with its quests and professions and all than WoW, but I haven't touched it in ages, so somebody more familiar with its nuances could probably give a better write-up.

 

[I'm Really Feeling It]

Correct me if I'm wrong but there are not any Runescape-like MMOs out there right?

 

[Battlefield2142EU]

Video game industry ran by dumb cunts.

 

[Cat tit bingo]

It's a lot easier to farm out thousands of generic monsters to kill from a constant rotating pool of modelers then to think of and implement even a dozen unique quest.

 

[Otis Mallebrok]

Studios will emulate what is financially succesful.

 

[User names must be unique]

Runescape is kept afloat by nostalgia and bots and is so incomprehensible to newcomers they have to have an in game button to look things up on the wikia.

 

[Angel of Death]

cuz wow is addictive and runescape is not

 

[Party Hat Wurmple]

"Buying gf 10 mil" just isn't the same in Warcraft currency

 

[SandyCat]

Oldschool Runescape has about ~100k concurrent players, give or take. Remember that probably a good 15 or 20% of that is bots. RS3 is about 20k. WoW (before they stopped doing subscription numbers) had 7 to 10 million or more active subscribers paying $15 a month, including microtransactions.

If you're a stuffy out of touch money grubbing long nosed oy veying corpo jew looking to maximize profits which of those two would you like to copy?

 

[Forsaken Wanderer]

Well god damn I stand corrected. I was envisioning something with slightly more originality than that haha.

 

[Forsaken Wanderer]

WoW had massive popularity and success that made it a prime target for imitation and chasing the dragon of being the Next Big Thing. I also imagine the sort of "theme park" style of questing and being shepherded from zone to zone is a lot easier to scale up and make large amounts of content, rather than the more sandbox-y and bespoke nature of Runescape content, where you can just run around doing whatever and making your own goals. While Runescape's had a revival over time with OSRS and all, it never really was as giant as WoW, so there probably weren't that many companies trying to follow its examples (not to mention that, as far as I know, Jagex's financials haven't really been stellar, even back in its heyday.) Most RS players would probably stick with what they know rather than try out a new MMO, which also makes it harder to break into the scene (but I wasn't still around in the old EoC days when people started getting iffy on the direction of the game, so there might have been some attempts back then.)

I agree with you on the quests part. You can't really get something like Recipe for Disaster or Song of the Elves in a WoW-style MMO without involving grinding for X drops or just doing a dungeon. I think FF14 does a bit more with its quests and professions and all than WoW, but I haven't touched it in ages, so somebody more familiar with its nuances could probably give a better write-up.

That is a great write-up. When I played a druid in WOW the only quest that really stuck with me is the one where you have to find two treasure chests in sunken ships by following clues given to you, and that quest gives you something most people aren't interested (from memory anyway) and is apparently strongly disliked. It was at the very least something a bit different.

There is this mindset that is especially strong with WOW-likes in that your grind to max level is not actually the game but the pre-game setup, and the end game content is the real game. The grinding part in modern MMOs is now so streamlined you can usually do it solo and it's not very difficult so it removes the MMO element from the MMORPG.

I enjoyed a bit of old WOW and I've enjoyed some other MMOs but I can't stand the mindless grind they expect you to do, and the grinding is just to allow you to do more grinding. An MMORPG can surely be much more than that. When I was a kid and heavily into Runescape 20 years ago what kept me invested was the quests and having things to do other than killing mobs. (And locking noobs in the room with the chaos monks after they take the wine).