Does it exist? And if so where can I find it? That mythical game with no PvP.
I am reading over at The Ancient Gaming Noob about how Rift is now traveling invariably down the same path that crashed Warhammer and Fallen Earth. That is, turning your MMORPG into an a competitive 3rd person whack-a-skill-watch-the-dps-meter-and-create-some-macros paradise. Granted, Rift is not there yet, because they haven’t, say…changed their entire damage and armor mechanic because it wasn’t good for PvP, or scaled their XP progression primarily around how many matches it would take to cap level. But its the beginnings of those paths.
I’m beginning to wonder if its a foregone conclusion for any MMO that decides to saddle itself with the burden of PvP. Its like a cancer that eats away at the heart of the game. I wonder how many developer hours are wasted on balancing and fine tuning classes/skills/macros/3rd party support that could instead be used to generate new content.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not anti-PvP, or World of Tanks would not loom large in my life. Nor would I have spent as long as I did in EVE. But the games I play for PvE content always seemed to be subjugated for some bizarre PvP dominance, as it that were the lifeblood of the games players. And perhaps it is, which leads me, for yet another reason, to ask the question about the PvE sandbox. Even TOR does not seem immune to its effects, as the earliest indications of patch 1.1.2 indicate.
Just for once, I’d like to see some PvP players crying a developer said “no” to their desired changes on the reasoning that it would disrupt the rest of the game world who are playing (::gasp::) an MMO.
Harbinger Zero 