Why Modern MMO's Suck - Josh Strife Hayes Reacts

Patreon: / joshstrifehayes
Twitch: / joshstrifehayes
Discord: / discord
Twitter: / joshstrifehayes
Reddit: / joshstrifehayes
#####
Was I wrong?
4 years ago I made a series of opinion videos discussing the MMO genre and its development and place in the gaming landscape.
Now I am 4 years older, and 2 and a half years wiser, so will I still agree with my past opinions?
Thanks as usual to the Twitch chatters and Patreon supporters who allow me to make the videos I make :)

[@androsh9039]

It's very smart of Josh to react to Josh's content. This way Josh's content will get views, and Josh's reaction will also get views, it's an absolute win for both channels.

[@patrickstar1164]

Josh investigated. Josh and found that Josh did nothing wrong

[@MassiveDestructionSP]

Hopefully one day Josh can react to Josh reacting to Josh. Then all three channels can benefit!

[@tankfarter]

​@@patrickstar1164government moment

[@KrakkenXXX]

Yeah like Asmongold used to steal his content

[@chaosgyro]

Josh pays himself with exposure

[@barrymckockinner8476]

Josh becoming a react andy and shamelessly profiting of the hard work of the original creator is heartbreaking. I will buy a third monitor and watch your content from there!

[@whatno774]

He even has the gall to not link the original video, it’s really messed up

[@maxentirunos]

@@whatno774 I am not proud to say it taken me 25 minutes in to see that he was reacting to his own video

[@baddragonite]

So sad I bet he didn't even ask the original video's creator if they were okay with him reacting

[@kody.wiremane]

@@baddragonite Well, the simpliest way to not get a bad answer is to not ask. )

[@nerra5408]

@@baddragonite i mean the original creator was 3 years old josh.... like they know how to copyright strike ... or maybe

[@thewilliamrah]

If Josh did 'raids' of dead MMOs where 50+ people gathered to all start and explore the games at the same time, I'd join.

[@peterhousen7974]

This would require a really strong community, but itd be pretty interesting

[@CJ00014]

​@@peterhousen7974I'd be part of tjat community

[@Metalbirne]

That would be magical. Imagine going into a dead but good mmo josh creates a guild and we play it for a few months and see how far we can get into it as a guild pushing each other to overcome the adversity of the game.

[@bigfoottamer]

there are some mmos that that would break the servers.

[@hanelyp1]

@@bigfoottamer Speaking as a software developer, I easily believe a lot of online games can't handle Massive well. It requires techniques which are really easy for a second rate developer to botch. Then I look at the glitches in games from major studios and I'm surprised how many can handle player volume.

[@Allen2142]

That morrowind map thing is real. There's a book in the game called "Rare Artifacts of Tamriel". After I found the book, I put up the map on the wall and then proceeded to mark every location where I had found an artifact. I checked the list I pulled from the book, and I tried to figure out all the information from rumors and quests that might pertain to the artifact. It was maddening work, but I remember it all so fondly.

[@bitingmylipsoff864]

I love this about that game, special artifacts that you only hear mention of in a book or rumors, super cool. I remember swimming around trying to find the underwater cave that hid the dragonbone cuirass. Great memory. :)

[@PkmnLegendMaster]

Man, this reminds me of watching a sprout in FFXIV in early ARR recently. They were trying to figure out fishing and accidentally unequipped all their gear so they ended up screaming: "Ah, I'm naked, why am I naked!?!" It was amazing and I'm sure they'll remember the experience too lol.

[@im50yearsold]

The idea and design behind 1.0 was amazing it was much more fun than what current XIV became, it was an honest attempt to recreate the feeling of XI. It's a shame it was completely broken on the technical layer full of un-repairable spaghetti code that ended up having to be scrapped. Good ol unresponsive UI and a lot of features being plain broken

[@PkmnLegendMaster]

@@im50yearsold It didn't help that a lot of game mechanics in 1.0 were broken too. Having everyone have a 'hit' stat? really? This is an mmo. I could understand maybe having the DPS have a HIT stat, but tbh, there are few things less irritating than having a solid player that knows what they're doing be useless because their HIT stat of all things is too low. It also means that a tank is going to have to choose suboptimal gear just to smack the foe to keep the enemy's attention. That sword that has +30 Atk over your current one? You can't use it because it has -1 HIT. Cooldowns don't reset after wipes, (So the 5 minute 'stay alive' cooldown of tanks is just going to infuriate everyone.) As good as 11 was for the time, 11 came out in 2002, and 14 came out in 2013. That's an 11 year time gap. Players will expect evolution, growth and changes. Not all change is necessarily good, but streamlining an experience to help onboard new players isn't a bad thing. Plus, If you made 14 to be as close to 11 as possible, it creates a few crucial and game killing problems. 1: 11 players won't migrate to a 'new' MMO that's just trying to copy its own game. (Which isn't a loss for SE, but it doesn't help 14) 2: New (and old players that left 11) will have no reason to go to a fledgling MMO that doesn't trade favorably with the established one. They'll stick to 11, which is a win for 11, but doesn't help the new game that's trying to get off the ground. Your MMOs need to have their own identities. You can use a lot of the same themes, sure, but it needs to be able to stand as a truly unique experience to the other. This helps both games. Now, you can play and love 11 for what it is, or you can go to 14, and have a very different experience. Tldr: the idea of 14 1.0? Not bad. The execution? Utter Train wreck. I will give you this though: Maybe 1.0 could have been salvaged but by the time it was salvaged, the game would be dead on arrival. It took a 'hey we're remaking the entire game!' to get people to go 'yeah, let's give 14 another chance'. Sad? Yeah, but understandable? Definitely.

[@lalaleyna2283]

HE TOLD US HE WOULD DO IT AND HE ACTUALLY DID IT. We didn't deserve it, yet here we are. Best reaction streamer out there.

[@powerdude_dk]

Yeah, it's so dumb he can just react to his own content now 😂 and then make more great content 😂😂

[@HeisenbergFam]

Its a historic moment, Josh went from reviewing to reacting, bet he could turn 1 minute trailer to 2 hours like MatPat

[@johnbastion747]

The mmo maptpat

[@flyingfajitas]

I recall a react-ception where a 20 min video got turned into 3hrs (?) of content. I do not believe your scenario to be unattainable.

[@banks3388]

Reacting to your own video seems like the most narcissistic thing a KZbinr can do...

[@Hel1mutt]

@@banks3388 no, putting your own opinion on another person's hard work is definitely more so, critiquing your own work is good, as he does in the video

[@wile123456]

Hopefully without the awful and repetetive "humor" that matpat has

[@TheCloudCreation]

Your New World example a little over half way through was perfect. I hopped on day one, joined a guild and started recruiting as many people as possible to max out that guild. Started a sister guild , maxed that out then as a mega guild we conquered the first 2 zones, and it was awesome. For the first time ever in my 15 year MMO history, I was part a a community and even a leader of it. I would log on and people in general chat would welcome me and ask me to play with them. Unfortunately, it was New World so that experience only lasted about 2 weeks before everyone got bored and stopped playing, including myself.

[@DeadTried]

yeah same thing except we built out and had a full guild from just the beta, then we recruited more people afterwards ended up with 2 sister guilds i think, before 3 weeks after release. It was great doing wars every night organised with multiple different leaders of other guilds in the faction

[@connarperry]

I was pleasantly surprised you touched on something I realised almost a decade ago now. It was a major paradigm shift for me and over time has become a bit of a saying of mine, that being "you can only truly experience something once." After the first time, it's not as special since that experience is already a part of you, your memory, and your history. You can do it over and over again to gain mastery over something, gain profit or reminisce to help resolidify a memory that has become patchy and/or full of holes over time however, the core lessons, concepts, information, and any other rewards have already been gained from the first time expierence. There's no reason to experience it again if there's no personal gain or motivation to do so. Our brain just says its no longer fulfilling to do so and would be a waste of time.

[@mattpace1026]

Sounds like an utterly miserable mindset. "Oh, I did this once, now I can never enjoy it again." It also sounds like an excuse to never give anything a second chance.

[@arosonomy]

Aye, but as someone who has gone through several FF to 100% them 5+ times... lack of motivation has more to do with your mental state than playing a game. Games are what I do when my dysmythia peaks. Its just like how Josh can keep going back to Runescape. You dont have to look for that first experience feeling if you dont let go of the feeling. If I had a more stable internet connection- I'd be playing mmos again. Which one, I'm not sure. I've played WoW, EQ2, Rift, Aion, Tera, Archage, ESO, Vanguard (*sobs uncontrollably*) FFXI/XIV, Neverwinter, GW, GW2.... I can keep going, but these were the most impactful. I'm still looking for an MMO that looks nice, but prioritizes the gameplay. Pvp for those who want it. Crafting where auto works for people who hate it. A reason to explore past the main route ( puzzles, challenges, etc...).oh, and probably the most important: Character diversity. I need something more than EQ2s AA trees, and Archages "only a handful of class combos are viable". I'm tired of games like FFXIV where the only difference between me and another SMN is who has better latency and remembers the skill rotation.

[@EmiTheyThem]

10:57 That's exactly what happened to me when I started playing FFXIV. Played it for a few days and barely reached lvl 20 or something like that, and already felt the urge to go back to the starter city to help newcomers and welcome them. Felt kinda like roleplay even. The kind community helped a lot too.

[@guy124]

Josh is a certified reactor now

[@thatguy1809]

patrick basedman pfp, i love it 😂

[@StarContract]

"I'm not good at reacting to things, despite what the first few hours of my streams would suggest." - Azmongold

[@tomkoch3495]

Yeah he reacts to himself. It’s so many Joshes. I think Josh needs to fight himself for the right to use the name Josh.

[@darth_dan8886]

We haven't had any timeloops this time, have we?..

[@Frankthegb]

Nuclear?

[@OrenjiArms]

mans sounds more put together reacting live than he does in the original vid despite it being scripted. He's improved so much in three years lol

[@gedece]

We did a dungeon in ESO with 3 real life friends. and we didn't check any guide, we just went trough it and every time we were stuck, one of us said "i think it's this way" and we continued the exploration. It was simply awesome. But I know it's not the same for everybody and a lot of people would say it was inefficient, but we don't care, we had a lot of fun doing it that way.

[@Megalomaniakaal]

That's the spirit!

[@jigzyonline]

ESO is a good game for that. The locations are awesome.

[@paulw5039]

@@jigzyonline ESO is a bad game for a lot of other reasons, many of which are touched on in this vid. One of the biggest issues for me is how it's become a 'single-player MMO'. Other than that this kind of defeats one of the main purposes of an MMO (community, deep multi-player interaction), the main issue I have with this is that Elder Scrolls if founded on single-player games, which are SO much better at providing a single-player experience than ESO. An MMO simply can't be as good at the single player experience as a dedicated single-player game, for so many reasons. So it seems counter-productive to try to push an MMO in that direction.

[@Allen2142]

I spent 4 hours in Carn Dum in LotRO that way :D

[@deadman6749]

What dungeon, because most dungeons past the base game content is essentially tunnel boss design.

[@lavirankin100]

I have nostalgia for the authentic, organic community interactions. Now a day's they ALL feel like business exchanges.

[@luheartswarm4573]

josh turns a 20 minute video into a near 2 hours reaction I cannot complain, I love him

[@oBCHANo]

Only a self important prick would stick his full name in front of everything he does despite being an absolute nobody.

[@SiothieGaming]

These long react videos are really nice for playing in the background while working on model terrain/trains. Keep em coming

[@juozasg]

good for coding work on an adhd day too

[@vyktorzhuravlev8304]

And the voice is beautiful and the diction is good. Useful for English learners )

[@jeffkoenig7402]

or - you know - playing MMOs lol. I've been crafting in EQ the entire time I've been watching this

[@ellentheeducator]

"When you were playing, and you think 'maybe I should open the wiki'" That was the part that cut. I do inefficient things all the time in MMOs, and I think lots of people do. But the part we all do is look at or think about the wiki. Even if we decide not to do the efficient thing, we look at it and think about it.

[@thechugg4372]

That really does depend, in OSRS I feel like I can't achieve anything without the wiki, but I've been playing Guild Wars 2 for 30 something hours and I have absolutely no intention to use the wiki, so I guess some games are doing this a lot better when it comes to information.

[@Shmandalf]

Same here, pet battles were my addiction in WoW for a while lol. Felt like open-world pokemon and I had lots of fun with it, but that did involve looking up where rare pets were and stuff (Though I found plenty randomly on my own).

[@GimmeSomeCookiez]

@@thechugg4372that’s wild as Gw2 actually has really good ingame wiki integration and a great wiki. Maybe it depends on what you’re doing, I for example can never remember Mystic Forge recipes

[@BloodyArchangelus]

Because developers want to get money from your challenge and force you to buy a way to get shi* done. They want to sELL YOU THE WIKI as they did in the past. Game industry is dead, nothing would change for the better. When gabe would leave us and from would be corrupted + larian would be dead - everything would die. Coz big corp would not allow indie to take their real part of the market.

[@TheAzureGhost]

As someone who never even glimpsed at a guide/wiki in his wow time (started in beta, barely played after Wrath of the B****queen and totally stopped with panda invasion), did not watch a single information video and with the exception of a simple aggrometer (under pressure of some groups i played with) only used RP mods (stuff to display a character description and such) , i can not really relate to that. (And yeah i did endgame raiding , usually as tank or healer) Though people frequently abused me as a wiki or guide 😆

[@sjwarhammer4039]

This video of Josh reacting off the cuff was so much better than the scripted original. That's got to be a point of pride to have grown that much over three years at your craft. Well done!

[@xanderthecommander7491]

There are so many quotes in this video that really helped me. I think I've realized I've been holding onto the past a lot in life recently due to certain trauma, but Josh's way of speaking and how profoundly brilliant he is, has helped me see past that. I can't say I'll have a whole new life by tomorrow, but I think this has gotten me working towards a better future. Thank you Josh.

[@danieln6700]

Same. It's a good video. Thinking of all the old runescape memories. This video hits so true, especially about convenience. All the old achievements and things I done in the game. It's been ruined by this obsession with efficiency, guides, meta and stuff. I want to get my motivation to play back again

[@jacobg8373]

This reminds me how I, as a kid, would write down Minecraft recipes and basically make a softcover book for them. Taking a4 paper, folding it in half and staple it together. I let my brother use it whenever he wanted to play and he was so proud when he found something I hadn't and got to write a page.

[@zangl2955]

Thats beautiful. I used to write my planned out pokemon teams on notebook paper.

[@kaosunokami]

i remember writing down a daily mystery box sequence in Dragon City. It was a "click any of the 9 boxes in a 3x3 grid" and clicking one box would reveal all the other boxes' content on what they would have rewarded you if you clicked them instead. And I wanted to get the right box that contained a rare dragon egg so I manually drew 3x3 grids and placed an X mark on where the position of the dragon egg was for 7 straight days. As soon as I hit day 8(the next week) the rotation looped! on day 1 the egg was at the bottom left and on day 8 it was also at the bottom left. So I hypothesized that if day 1 corresponds to day 8 then therefore, day 2's position would also correspond to day 9 And it did! I got the rare egg and hatched a Wyvern Dragon It's not an op dragon now since there's Legendary dragons and Unique ones and stuff but it's the best dragon in my bestiary because of the journey i went through to obtain it Those were good times.

[@Kryynism]

For me it was designing custom Age of Empire maps at school with pen and paper so my limited gametime at home could be spent more efficently.

[@josephhiggins1070]

The conversation about things that take a long time to do (around 35 minutes) is a direct reflection of the financial stress and pressure that we all face. No one feels like they have enough time to grind, or do side content, because we're all so rushed and under so much pressure all the time

[@MordethKai]

I dunno, to me it's more like laughing about the dumb shit that almost got you killed the other night when you were drunk, it's funny now but it wasn't at the time and you don't want to repeat it.

[@OokamiTez]

Information as a premium: I had this back in DDO. There is this one infamous dungeon called the Pit. It is long and confusing and not really worth the XP you get from it. But one guy had learned it quite well and though me to run it through as well. We got so efficient in it that we could run a group through it in like 5-10 minutes when usually it was over 30 minutes making it actually really good XP per minute dungeon. Also it had the added bonus it had a chance to spawn a rare mob that could drop one of the best weapons for Slime killing (Slimes break your weapons so having good anti-slime weapon was nice). It was so much fun to show of the knowledge of just that one dungeon.

[@Kaidrenn]

thank you for recognising the plight of us Aussie mmo gamers, I feel seen

[@dizzyheads]

This is pain

[@maxwell4809]

We get WoW servers. Also remember rerolling when we got SWTOR servers years ago, what a day.

[@angamaitesangahyando685]

The AI revolution will finally make Oceanian players not feel alone. - Adûnâi

[@chubmouse]

*Cries in forgotten African continent while it burns down*

[@cericat]

@@maxwell4809We also have FF XIV, Runescape, Albion, Planetside 2 (on PC on console nope you're going on Ceres [EU]) and Ultima. But if you want to play with friends you're going to the others. *sighs*

[@sweepingtime]

"I started my research by going to Reddit" the acknowledgement of that displays a maturity that redditors will never achieve.

[@zareven]

I love the description of significance of items being important because of the journey. Reminds me of my first MMO I played, SWTOR, and getting my real lightsaber for the first time, having a training stick for several missions and then going on a big mission to forge my own lightsaber was such a highlight of the game.

[@Topcatyo.]

That rivalry story made me much happier than I thought it could. Also, in regards to the phenomenology that Josh talks about, it reminds me of a quote that I like very much from G.K. Chesterton. "Do not free a camel of the burden of his hump; you may be freeing him from being a camel." And in regards to things being handmade being worth more (a very relevant topic with the advent of AI), Mae West said "Anything worth doing is worth doing slowly."

[@Rahnonymous]

Shut up (I wonder how many people I can trick without context)

[@farkasmactavish]

Except on the topic of AI, the quote would be about doing it at all, instead of having a robot do all the work for you.

[@SquaulDuNeant]

Yeah and no

[@firstreality3867]

I'm 100% committed to the belief that roleplayers will be the only people who genuinely enjoys MMOs and frankly the last few people who knows how to actually play an MMO. I rarely hear of roleplayers telling their friends to play "efficiently" and when clearing a dungeon that requires heavy mechanics, everyone is patient and just having fun. RPers are heavily community-focused and their shared interest in RP gives everyone a sense of connection outside of just grinding and raiding. But no one will ever cater to their tastes so MMOs will never improve.

[@haberak3310]

The moment you start thinking "I'm doing a quest" rather than "I'm going on a quest" is when an mmo loses 90% of its luster. At that moment, you've disconnected yourself from the world and your character in a way that isn't very easily repaired. And often, it isn't really the fault of the game itself; it can have amazing worldbuilding, interesting stories, fun characters, but if the community encourages a certain approach to the game or real life pressures get to be too much, eventually you will crack. Eventually you'll start focusing more on creating an optimal character than a character you like, taking the road that is quicker or gives the best rewards rather than the road that sounds the most intriguing, all in the effort to ensure you get to experience the game you've invested yourself in. But yeah, if you're taking the approach of roleplaying your adventure in the game, none of the common complaints really matter, whether it be too inconvenient or convenient, you are still immersed, the cool sword is still a cool sword even if a million and one other people have it because you have your story in your mind.

[@Morpheus-pt3wq]

@@haberak3310 this is not due to outside world pressure, but more like the game pressures players to be like that. The game devs/publishers are not interested in players having fun, but in players being hooked, so they will play, even if they will be bored to death. The endgame content often underlines this - you have tons of repeatable quests (which you have to do over & over & over again) and tons of repeatable instances. There is also FOMO - you have to do it daily, or you will be left behind and unable to catch others. Over the course of leveling, the player is pressured to turn into "efficiency mode" - this, in turn, also affects your personal life, as it will change YOU as a person. It´s even worse, now, as MMOs essentially turned into "single player online". You no longer have to talk with others, nor work together. Just log into a in-game matchmaking and do your job. Over the course of the instance, you don´t have to utter a single word.

[@youtubedeletedmynamewhybother]

@@Morpheus-pt3wq I dare say learning to be efficient playing MMOs is a good life skill. The issue it it takes some of us 10 Thousand hours to actually start applying it to real life. At which point we are often getting towards 30+ years old and everythings fu cking ogre. anyway.

[@an_imminence]

I once stumbled into a bar in Wildstar and a large group sat around the corner table RPing. I felt compelled to sit down at the bar to provide some backdrop, bring some life to the location. It was such a weird feeling, being wordlessly sucked into someones play by just walking through a random door. I can totally see RPers being the last people to enjoy MMOs.

[@MarkFin9423]

I think none of it matters. The vast majority of people still playing mmos are in their late 20s-early 30s. Gen-Z and Zoomers do not play mmos, they play games that give them instant gratification like fortnite, or a mobile game. within the span of 10 more years, a good chunk off mmo players will need to give up gaming to get a job because they can no longer put their responsibilities on hold. Their parents are getting old or on their deathbed, they got to support themselves now or their families. MMOs are simply on their way out because the next generation do not have the same attention span as we do. Best people are going to get is more ff14, fortnite, and always live, always online P2W garbage.

[@gogetta159]

I really like you bringing up players optimizing the fun out of something and its something I've been more aware of myself doing as I got older. I feel like mentioning one of my favorite memories of a mmo. I wasn't a avid PvP player in runescape, but I liked safe combat like the dual arena or player owned hose fights, and also watched alot of WWE at the time. I found a clan of players that basically had matches with the clan every week or so, they would pair us up with players at similar levels and have matches for everyone to watch. Since I didnt PvP much I lost, but the group inspired me to get better, to learn and train my skills and get better gear. I went out on a journey, I leveled up made money through whatever means I found. I got gear and hit like 80 strength which seemed impossible at that time and age, I came back and won a match in the combat arena and felt like my effort had been rewarded. I wish I could talk to the creator of that group and the people I met then to say what a transformative experience that was for me to accomplish something on my own in a MMO like that.

[@wesleywheeler7891]

You bit about making mistakes, and adding to the journey is so real for me. It wasn't in an MMO, but it was in Zelda 2. There is a late game dungeon that is basically all locked doors. I knew you could get by them with the 'Fairy' spell but i had no idea i was supposed to find the hidden village and get the skeleton key. So i painstakingly made my way through it with the spell only to find out later when i needed a spell you get from the same village to beat the mini boss in the final dungeon. There's a sense of pride knowing i beat a dungeon in the wrong way and i wouldn't trade that for anything

[@Cojoke]

In Brandon Sanderson's Stormlight Archive, Journey before Destination is a major idea in the books and I greatly agree with it. Things suck if you are just given them, they are worthless.

[@farkasmactavish]

I can never escape The Stormlight Archives , but neither can I be mad about that.

[@it-s-a-mystery]

Josh out here transforming his own content, more than xqc transforms others. Crazy times.

[@ImortalZeus13]

Reminder that it's not just XQC, its basically any mega popular streamer. Hasan, Asmon, Poki, Destiny, and all the rest, they do that too.

[@D1ne-O-SAur]

​@@ImortalZeus13asmon id the only one I'm familiar with, and I think (at least so far) that he does add up at least a bit, it's funny watching him debate his braindead chat ngl

[@VinatsuYT]

I'm only really familliar with AsmonGold and atleast he addresses concerns or remarks from his chat to make a general discussion about the video apart from other streamers who are reacting with a few IRL emotes and opinions that were repeated

[@lothara.schmal5092]

@@ImortalZeus13There is a very big difference between the likes of Asmongold and XqC, Asmon spams the original link in chat and always asks for ppl to sub n like, XqC isn’t even there half the time

[@terraglade]

the react to this in 3-4 years gonna be lit AF

[@GrumpyJake]

I'm at the part where you talk about not giving a new player everything in the beginning, and that is absolutely right. I never thought I'd enjoy playing an ironman, but it has been such a great time. The progression and the feeling of getting items of my own, on my own, bears so much weight and it makes it much more rewarding

[@Pit_Wizard]

I used to run around World of Warcraft collecting noncombat pets (later battle pets). My friends were all having a miserable time bashing their heads against the latest raid, and I was just soloing ancient content for pets. I also remember frantically running around the world, desperately trying to get the Explorer title at the last minute before Cataclysm dropped and introduced flying mounts to the original areas. Good times.

[@bl8388]

I remember the days of raids that would take 12-15 hours, multiple nights. They were fun for a few hours, but awful for a personal life. Then the "leeroy Jenkins," skit came out on youtube and many of us could empathize with that kind of raid dynamic. Some of those raids you would have to be end game geared up and have a great raid balance of skills , with strict raid rules and little room for mistakes. They were grueling and perfectionist raids that were awful when you kept team wiping, having to start over earlier in the dungeon.

[@Feracitus]

@@bl8388 filthy casual

[@M4xFr4gg]

Folding Ideas has made also a video about WoW especially, how the available information helps players to optimize the fun out of the game. Going on about raid-tools and so on. I would love to see you two discuss this topic together

[@nicolascordier12]

Regarding rarity, I would add that the moment you make a rare item plain and simply unobtainable, it loses all it's value, because as you removed the object, you removed the challenge. This means it becomes not something that is perceived as a great achievement, but as a question of "Ok, you were there at the moment it was available" because people can't experience the challenge anymore.

[@jeremygreen8423]

It's due to exploiting people's fear of missing out

[@SingmetheSea]

It doesn't lose all value. It becomes priceless since you literally can't buy it anymore if account bound., or super expensive otherwise. That's how scarcity works xD

[@ZianaSue]

In GW2, I've have come across this situation many times: complete a hard task, get the reward, but the reward itself is worthless and the only reason I worked so hard to get it is because that item is part of collection that I need to complete to get an item that is very much worth the effort put into getting it (ie. legendary trinkets, gear, etc.). I call them stepping stone items, and I don't feel accomplished when I get them.

[@UltimortalMoth]

Yeah. I played GW2 for years and while I do have lots of good memories I always remember hating that kind of reward structure. I got a couple legendary backpieces, a weapon, couple pieces of armor, tons of other stuff, but I realized the effort that went into it was not really being rewarded until the very, very end and at that point it wasn't worth it. Not to mention almost all of it boiled down to grinding for gold because nearly everything that wasn't achievement-related busywork was most efficiently progressed via gold. Even then some collections you could also just buy.

[@MrVeps1]

Yeah, I would be a lot more excited about getting a precursor if they had some quality (apart from skin) that set them apart from any of the ascended items you get from the fractals by the dozen. Legendary collections feel like two rounds of wasting money for nothing before you can start the actual grind for the reward you want.

[@gilney.mathias]

I dropped gw2 cause of those damn collections 😅

[@ZianaSue]

@@gilney.mathias I love most of the collections, it's just the legendary/precursor ones that annoy me. The other ones are like fun little scavenger hunts.

[@Fydron]

For me why i love GW2 is there is no mandatory crap like gear grind i can just go out and actually play the game hell it took me actually years to get stuff like griffon because i just didn't feel any need to have it mostly because i spend most of my time in either WvW or in open world running around. To me GW2 is just almost perfect game as 15 years in wow made me really hate gear grind hamster wheel.

[@wynnefox]

On the tedium vs reward thing, I personally feel the more tedious the journey, the more fun the game play must be along the journey and the reward needs to be guaranteed. But if the reward is going to be a slot machine (like a drop from a boss) then less tedium the better because pulling the lever because the tedium and it has be fun to farm it.

[@HappyBeezerStudios]

Yeah, if the only reward is the random loot from the boss, the dungeon itself must be fun to play. The mechanics must be interesting, because the reward is boring.

[@cynthiahembree3957]

I agree with this. I'm all for grindy or tedious thing if the reward is good. For example leveling every class to 80 in FFXIV gets you a mount that is only attainable by leveling every class to 80. It's tedious sure but I think the reward is worth it.

[@wynnefox]

Just to note: I have over 10,000 hours of game time in Warframe, 6,000 hours actually in missions going by internal clock of the game. Warframe is one of the grindiest games out there. But it is just so much damn fun to play. I choose what I do based on trying to cross many rewards at once on top of each other. This way I maximize my activities in there. But the game itself is still a lot of fun.

[@TECHN01200]

Your point on information is a good one. Whenever I play an MMORPG and it has deterministic crafting, I gravitate towards it because of the fun of finding out how to maximize what you get out of crafting, and subsequent selling of what you've made and figuring out what is efficient to make and I usually do so only with the tools provided in game. The fun isn't in immediately being efficient, it is in finding out how to be efficient.

[@UHavABadConnection]

I very much agree with this sentiment. The line from the creator of Sim City about players optimizing the fun out of a game is the fun for me. Discovering, breaking down, reverse engineering a game from the outside (with no knowledge of how to code) just black boxing it with the information the game gives you to figure out how to get the most out of it is my fun and reward. Truthfully once optimal gameplay is found I get bored pretty quickly if there isn't a continuing challenge to keep me in. The journey to optimal is my fun

[@NoraNoita]

what the hell is deterministic crafting? like when you press a button and from 1 wood you get 4 planks and then from 4 planks you can then craft other stuff? and you make a spreadsheet for how many wood it takes you to craft the most item for the most profit? that sounds really lame to me. FF14 has fun crafting, you press buttons in the right order, have HP bars on said craftable to worry about, it's not a one-click deal, I couldn't care less about the prices you get for the items if the crafting was super boring and not engaging.

[@youtubedeletedmynamewhybother]

I agree with this, but this line of thought is also what made me actually quit WoW and realise im doing EVERYTHING i can to min-max a fu cking video while i do NOTHING to min-max my actual life. And further realizing the amount of time ive put into MMOs has actually affected the way i think. In some ways its good, but in other ways i could have just done this shit when i left school in real life..... Learning to enjoy being efficient is NOT exclusive to video games.

[@silverlight6074]

This is the first time I've seen this man pop into my feed, and I immediately started resonating with the message. I started thinking about a year back, when some friends and I picked up DDO and had a lot of fun making our way through the various quests, enjoying the slightly janky control and the interesting character build options. Working our way forward with a bunch of quests geared towards either finding special equipment we really want, or building favor with a faction that will unlock something new that we'd love to use later. There was always something interesting to do next, and we'd play several times a week together (by some magic, our schedules aligned, which is usually the opposite of what happens with anything related to D&D). The point that MMORPGs need to balance the MMO and the RPG, and add value through the "massive multiplayer" part, is especially compelling.

[@figloalds]

I do actually play MMORPG with people, and i have a lot of fun chatting on Discord and doing raids, playing multiple different games together and streaming our gameplay to those who just want to watch. I have played many games on and off with my closest friends, and I have played in guilds with discord, raidcall, etc, and though I find it hard to socialize sometimes, I know for a fact that playing together is better. I love that GW2 allows me to participate in multiple guilds, so I mostly socialize with the my small, cozy guild of casual old people, but I have the large guilds there at arms length anytime

[@PatrickOchoa8a]

I was playing Manic Mechanic with my young nephews recently and got a tad bit frustrated that they weren't "playing properly" and contributing to the main goal, until I realized they were just playing their own game within the game. They were coming up with their own imagined roles and actually "playing" with the game like it was a toy. I was too focused on doing what the game wanted when they were using the game as a tool/toy to play how they wanted.

[@Forsakei]

Going on the idea of items actually being those of myth, I feel like there needs to be a distinction made between being difficult to obtain and being tedious to obtain. One tests your actual skill and knowledge as a player, the other just tests how much of your sanity are you willing to put down the drain. A good example of the latter are the infinite potions in Black Desert Online. Those are not difficult to obtain as the enemies that drop the pieces for it are fairly mid-game, but they are tedious. More often than not, you are stuck in one of three grind spots for upwards of 20 IRL weeks running the same mobs for just one piece of the crafting materials.

[@mad-eel]

But... many things in MMO back in the ol' good days were exactly that. Farming day by day, week by week for stuff - that's why those games was always described as grindy. I started my proper journey with MMOs with WoW in 2006. It was sometimes hard, but most of the game - that I still enjoyed - was easy and chill. Grinding levels, farming reputations (in TBC especially), gathering ores for money, etc. Things of course were different - this whole world of Azeroth was something I never saw before. Exploring it was at the same intimidating and fascinating. Even mining ores and then crafting a cool epic weapon from that was something new and exciting. Fast forward to today and that sort of experience alone is not new, exciting or mystical anymore. That's why MMOs of today need to do something "different" if they want to truly succeed. The same "different" what I think happened with WoW. I personally don't know what that is, but I know it's not just better raids, cooler classes or more engaging combat. I hope someone someday will figure it out, though. On that note, I'm actually currently enjoying BDO. But I'm new to the game, so there's this whole new world and engaging combat system for me to explore. But at the same time I know it's nothing revoluationary.

[@mikkeljensen9488]

I always saw those tedious grinds as a patience check. When classic wow released I spent about 6 months grinding the Winterspring frostsaber. It was tedious. But in the end i got the mount that i without a doubt deserved, because there is no RNG involved. Of course there's also the infamous R14 grind which is just straight up madness.

[@chaosgyro]

​@@mad-eelThe flaw in your thought process is that WoW wasn't different from the games that preceded it either. It just happened to be the first for a great many people. I also feel like I should point out that maintaining commitment over weeks and/or months is its own type of difficulty - often much more so than a single, high intensity test of reflexes and memory. Any activity, no matter how "difficult", can be conquered and rendered routine. Being disciplined enough to maintain that routine is truly backbreaking.

[@samwise1790]

@ukaszadamczyk4730 I think 2 design choices could help, even if they dont solve the issue. One oart of this that in particular I view as a problem with WoW, but necessarily many other mmos (being heavily based on/competing with WoW) is that 'rare' items are simply not rare anymore. Right around wrath but even as far back as BC and even further back to certain later periods of classic (and ever more so post wrath), the color coded rarity and quality of items (blue, purple, legendary) stopped having as much significance, as the game designers threw ever increasing quantities of those items at you for less and less time and effort. Smaller digression but as time went on the stats on these items was optimized so that every item you get can be nearly maximally useful; remember when blue and even sometimes epic rarity items were in fact rare as far as drop chance, but sometimes not necessarily stat-roll optimized for your class or spec? This strategy of giving out more 'rare' items worked initially being popular with players as many came from a place where they remembered them being truly somewhat rare, so it was rewarding to get them, but over time it cheapens it and now blue items are as commonly seen as green items, and you get so many so frequently that many characters even while leveling normally or just having reached level cap are already almost if not completely full slotted rare and epic quality gear. There is no more rarity, items are hardly rewarding at all. So one thing which could easily be done is make ostensibly rare items actually rare again, it makes the 'carrot' more attractive. The other design idea might be to introduce more randomness with items into these games. Make tiers of groups of dungeons have more shared loot even across dungeons. This has the effect of lessening the effectiveness of optimizing gameplay. It would make ad naseum running of specific dungeons or bosses for specific items which only drop from one boss less viable, and this is I think arguably a negative type of gameplay which encourages burnout, frustration, and lessens engagement with the world and community. Same could be done with crafting, introducing a little RNG element to crafts so that the calculus is a little more fuzzy that 'x craft is always better or worse than y drop, so it is never/always worth it to craft'. Last I dont know if it's even feasible technologically, but to limit wherever possible, the ability to datamine and publicly and exhaustively test unreleased content so that it is already metagamed and optimized before it is even new. Not sure if that genie can be put back in the bottle after all these years without an essentially whole new game which employs some advanced server and client side encryption.

[@louieberg2942]

Agreed! There is a difference between tedium and difficulty and sometimes these elements are conflated. One is just "I know I will get to the mountain if I walk for 5 hours straight.", the other is "I need to climb a cliff, defeat a troll, and convince the mystic in order to get to the mountain." Grinding is not difficulty, it's a guarantee after spending X amount of hours.

[@BenRK90]

I found your content in 2021. My grandpa had just passed away, and we were preparing for the funeral. In person, I tend to be reserved and keep to myself. And of course in that situation, I was an emotional mess, just hiding in spare rooms of my grandpa's house. I found your content then, and binging it helped get me through that sad time. Just wanted to say thank you.

[@lliamthrumble]

Sorry for your loss

[@pontusvongeijer1240]

Faert?

[@nauscakes1868]

I had my wake-up moment from Starcraft 2 years ago. I remember doing skirmish missions and trying to farm the AI for exp points, and realized that I fundamentally started playing the game differently to "progress," instead of just enjoying an RTS like I normally do. Now I just play older games like Command and Conquer, and Age of Empires, and play for fun. I can play 500 games of Command and Conquer, and not get any progress for it. After the 500th game, I have nothing new to show for it than I did before I started my first game. But the important thing is that I play games for fun now.

[@dwadwa22]

1:10:54 there a lyric from Piano man that i always loved: "Yes, they're sharing a drink they call loneliness But it's better than drinkin' alone"

[@clintbeastwood5116]

Look at Josh reacting to, commenting on, and adding so much value to a video he made himself. Fancy that.

[@legendaryfrog4880]

One of my favorite memories of WoW was the Rhok'delar quest for hunters. It was a challenge just to find the tree you needed to talk to. Then you had to track down 4 demons and solo each of them. Each demon was a puzzle. You needed to find the right abilities and utilize all the core abilities of hunters. Kiting, shooting, trapping, burst dps. You needed to learn all the skills to conquer them, but when you finally did the reward wasn't just an amazing weapon, but a badge of pride.

[@stryke-jn3kv]

I can't remember the specifics as it's yonks back now but I remember in doing one part myself I ended up messing up someone else's attempt, and what not helped was that I had a guild mate helping for that (distracting mobs I think) which spoke against my character for not doing it fully solo I was absolutely dragged over the coals on the Blizz forums as the absolute scum of the earth.

[@legendaryfrog4880]

@@stryke-jn3kv I'm sorry that happened. It was a badge of honor, but like many game related things people took it too seriously.

[@youtubedeletedmynamewhybother]

@@legendaryfrog4880 People take it seriously when you waste their time, thats even before the era of efficiency. Time is money friend.

[@lionart5230]

@@youtubedeletedmynamewhybother Time is life. And life doesn't last forever.

[@KingLich451]

@@youtubedeletedmynamewhybother then dont play a game where you literally pay every month just to have the "privilege" of playing it.

[@hazmatvt]

Man, the idea of leaving a mark or becoming a known entity in a virtual world is something that really resonates with me. Even things as small as leaving a book in an in-world library that other players can read (shout-out to Project Gorgon) just feels ... Magical.

[@SaberToothPortilla]

It's the exact same feeling as leaving a carving in a tree or something, but I think what's heightening about it is that it's both more *and* less available for people to find. Of course it's in an MMO, so only people playing that MMO could ever find it, but those people playing could potentially be from anywhere, which is unique from, say, a tree, which has a fixed physical location.

[@Mattedatten]

In Tibia, players can write notes in books, letters, on parchments, etc. I have a dedicated storage space in my deposit box on one of my characters where I've kept random things players have written. We are talking 2010+-5 years. At this point most of the characters who wrote the messages are gone. The messages I have are trolling, cursewords, random spam. But they are from a different era. And every now and then I log back into Tibia, and end up having a stroll through memory lane of the random old player-unique items I have stored. Notes written as something silly just dumped on the ground to be gone either by someone throwing it away, or by the server cleanup.

[@LuaanTi]

@@Mattedatten There was _so much_ content written by everyone in Ultima Online. People wrote diaries, notes, short stories... built up their own settlements, inns... there's very few MMOs that are actually suited for role playing. UO had little more than role playing... and PKs, of course. It's a shame noone still figured out how to make a world you can change as a player, with complex sandbox interactions... that isn't going to be utterly ruined by people being awful. Also, legal. Because of course, any MMOs that give you the ability to creatively express yourself also incur the wrath of lawyers, since of course, if you can write a song and play it in a game, what's preventing you from playing a song someone else wrote, right? Horribly infringing on their rights and all that.

[@SvengelskaBlondie]

1:27:42 Instead of a toolbelt, you have tool gnomes that you can talk to and get your tools from. I think that's alright since they pretty much just are a local storage unit that can help save an extra trip to the bank in case you forgot something farming related. When it comes to inventory itself, Runescape oldschool already has so much extra inventory it's crazy. Compare it to classic Runescape where you had 30 inventory slots but no special inventory slots for gear. Runescape oldschool also added extra inventory items like the fish barrel, the coal bag, the gem bag, the seed box, the herb pouch, the rune pouches (the biggest one can hold a whopping 60 rune essence), the special bolt storage unit. You could even argue that in some cases, tablets give extra inventory in terms of being able to shrink down the amount of runes needed for a spell into a stackable consumable (since 1 type of tablet only uses 1 inventory slot).

[@barockwerneck]

Being alone together is called Parallel Play, and it's a love language of several neurodivergent, mostly autistic, people. It's a complicated experience to explain to someone that doesn't see it the way we do, but it is very important to us, it has importance and matters. Same way that we pay more attention to what you're saying when we do not force ourselves to look you in the eyes.

[@NecroBanana]

This is a good way to react to content, react to your own. Love it when creators do that.

[@Wierie_]

Josh not a leech

[@SpydersByte]

@@Wierie_ ......but he's describing exactly what Josh did? lol

[@BloodyArchangelus]

@@SpydersByte it is a remake of the video. It is still.. not new video, but it is not leeching.

[@cynthiahembree3957]

@@BloodyArchangelus well duh it's kinda hard to leech off yourself.

[@exciting-burp]

Convenience only becomes a problem when it goes beyond repetitive busy-work, I believe. Running to the *same* dungeon 50 times is not fun, but getting there the first time is. This is even more exaggerated if the journey lacks quests (because you've completed them) or challenge (because you're too high level).

[@TheStingling]

God, i could listen to Josh for literally hours (and actually had) talking about what makes games click with people, also in this videos theres so much rea life implications in your points that is just makes sense, weirdly enough you became my therapist, thank you Josh

[@kurtslavain]

36:40 - Good point. In this context, I can also interchange "Novelty" with exploration. For example planet scanning in Mass Effect 2. The first time I did it, it was epic. I was overwhelmed with excitement and curiousity, especially when I heard the plannet scanner pick up an anomaly. I was eager to go down and explore what's happening. But once you go through it all, on a 2nd playtrough, the exploration/novelty is no longer there. You already know what's there. So the novelty is awesome, but obviously it has no replay value.

[@Lazywall19]

You made a point that was so spot on. All the content created on games really limits the discovery and creativity people have in the games. I remember buying the guide book for my games because if you got stuck and did not have the book, you had no way of progressing. and the books were written well enough to not directly give the answer at times. I miss playing through a game like elden ring without a meta build or exploits or fear that I am missing out on something. I miss playing games blind and trying things out to see what is good and bad. Now creators find out what is good, with hundreds of hours of gameplay, and tell us what is good, tell us the tier list, tell us the meta. I miss finding that out myself.

[@mattpace1026]

First of all, you can easily just ignore that "spoiler" content, so this problem is your own damn fault. Second, this dude of all people has zero right to talk about game information being spoiled.

[@radaro.9682]

I made a name for myself in WoW for a long time by knowing stuff. I was the go to in my guild for years because I could explain every tiny aspect of the game from raid strats to item drop locations to gathering loops and respawn timers. Was fantastic.

[@manboy4720]

what happened?

[@shiina29]

I went to watch fireworks the other day and everything went wrong. We got drenched in rain just before the fireworks, etc. And it was the most fun I've had in a long time. And I was thinking about how I definitely had a lot more fun and made a lot more memories than all the people who watched from their hotel rooms.

[@madeyoulookretard6205]

says you

[@terraglade]

one of my favorite memories growing up was in middle school. I woke up around 8am and walked across the neighborhood to a friends house. We dicked around in the garage, went to a park, went to a gas station for snacks, went swimming, we listened to hatsune miku for 10 hours to see who would tap out first, i passed out at like 6am tired and sore and sweaty but it was a magical day.

[@josefmendez8524]

​@@madeyoulookretard6205 No shit, because they posted it...

[@naiustheyetti]

@@josefmendez8524 i think what he means is that the OP said they had more fun than those watching from the hotel room, while those in the hotel room would say they had more fun because they avoided the rain and got to watch the fire works in comfort.

[@Raviis]

I spent almost 3 hours last night trying the jump puzzle in Kugane in FFXIV refusing to look up a guide because I wanted to do it for myself. So much more satisfying not being efficient and just having fun.

[@Sangheilitat117]

As someone who completed it first try about a month ago, what the hell do you need a guide for for that jumping "puzzle"? You just find the next beam and jump to it. Do you (or others) need a guide to tell you how long to hold down the W key before jumping?

[@Raviis]

@@Sangheilitat117 this is hella condescending. Not sure why the flame, dude.

[@Sangheilitat117]

@@Raviis Of course it’s condescending. The fact that people need a “guide” to tell them to hold W and jump to a wooden beam is wild but you’re right, I looked them up and they do exist.

[@Raviis]

@@Sangheilitat117 an honor to be in the comments section with the god of gaming himself. Crazy people would need a guide for bosses (since people tell others to "watch a video" all the time) to stay out of red marks on the ground. 🤷

[@Sangheilitat117]

@@Raviis Ah, what an honor to finally be recognized. It’s true, I run blind P12 clear groups in PF. I say blind because every time I clear P12, I wipe my memory with one of those Men-In-Black gadgets so I can go back in and complete it first try blind again. Literally just don’t stand in the orange circles and instantly learn complex mechanics that require intricate group strats. Exactly the same thing as looking at a wooden beam and pressing space.

[@Evanz111]

One of my favourite videos from Josh yet. Loved the discussion on how we’ve moved away from enjoying games unless we’re making progress. It’s one of the reasons I think people like Bethesda games. The prevailing statement is “I’ve been playing for hours and made no progress” - because people just get stuck in, immersed and let their heart guide them over their head. It’s not about making progress.

[@MmeHyraelle]

Me in morrowind and oblivion, must have spent days exploring seyda neen before moving to balmora/ exploring imperial city before joining thieve guild. I truly miss radiant AI.

[@terracat474]

I rarely watch very long videos (1 hour+) but this one was VERY informative and very well put together, combined with my love for mmorpgs as a whole turned out to be a very enjoyable watch. Keep up the good work

[@simplybenjamen]

The nostalgia I feel for PSO2 base game is unreal, I had a small group of people that used text chat emotes and symbol art to communicate with one another. We played for hundreds of hours all the way through the game as it released it's 8+ years of content from the JP version to the US version in the span of a year. The large urgent quests and concerts that happen in game as people gather up and talk before they start was something I've never seen in any other game and it was magical. This sadly ended once NGS came out and many of the players faded away from the game and groups disbanded to other games due to how bad it was compared to base game with the lack of good story or the slowed down lackluster combat, it had lost it's charm that the base game had and with no new concerts apart from one added into NGS we've had nothing to look forward to or gather around for. The base game had so many concerts and urgent quests coming out that it even had a schedule for every week listing what to expect every hour and people could plan around it and meet up for the content and talk for awhile before a concert started then urgent quest with a large epic boss battle would start 30 minutes later as you'd see 100+ people in each instance of almost every block that was in the stands of the concert move over to the prep area to talk about things and setup for the boss battle. I don't think a single MMO will ever live up to that feeling and I've been chasing it ever sense in other games.

[@ainadagurmawth6616]

I think I left this comment on the original video or similar... but the devaluation of something through convenience is something I felt first hand in one of the games I played. In Mabinogi, nowadays you can become a Paladin within a few hours of starting (or days), and it's somewhat expected of you to get it as part of your standard playkit. I was playing back when it had came out, and the quests to do were so close to impossible... I had one friend who was a Paladin, and I was in Awe every time they transformed. They became a gleaming white, unstoppable force... today, paladins are on every street, just transforming for a little extra exp.

[@glenmoody-elias1040]

Mabinogi. That was an experience. Whoa, what was that attack, Final Hit? I want that. As much as I hate the Ideals bit of G2, it does seem to ring true with this video.

[@Dreznin]

I didn't play Mabinogi, but I did play Vindictus AKA Mabinogi Heroes... it was quite similar. Back in the day you really had to work for your levels and grinding out each zone was really a feat. Yes, you could launch missions in a solo mode for extra rewards, but that was also quite harder since you had to balance your very limited HP and Stamina against a lot of enemies and a moderately tough boss, so teaming up was definitely the preferred way to go. You'd run the same bosses time and again to get their drops so you could craft new weapons and armor, with full sets of later gear being something to admire and aspire towards. These days you rocket through everything, you can be forgiven for not even knowing that armor can break or that stamina is a thing for the first 2-3 weeks of playing the game, and the entire experience feels like cutting through chaff until a boss fight that is the only enemy in the level that requires neuron activation. They throw gear at you to the point that you never need to craft anything and the crafting materials just jam your backpack space... All the challenge is gone until late-game and nothing at all feels rewarding, as everything is just handed out now.

[@ainadagurmawth6616]

@@Dreznin I haven't played that since the beginning. They've butchered it that much?! I loved the intensity and armor break... made you feel epic ending a hard run looking actually battle worn.

[@heartless_gamer]

I feel like New World was a speed run in MMO history. It actually launched with a lot of old style of systems: local trading posts, lots of running, "loot 10 crates" (aka kill ten rats), punishing death penalty (relative to the current market). They quickly reversed on so many of those "friction" areas and the game is infinitely better for it. It is a microcosm of everything you highlighted.

[@Reece8u]

Thank you for the life advice Josh, I know you were talking about games but I need to put more effort into my friendships if I want to form strong bonds with my friends, and I havent been keeping up

[@murlend8455]

The prime example of: you die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain. Would be very funny for you to just do director's commentary on ever JSH video.

[@Catheidan]

Then once he's done he can react to his reacts. Then it's reacts all the way down

[@leonardceres9061]

The last part about how older MMO‘s force people to bond and play together because there wasn’t another MMO around that you could just go and jump ship is pretty true. When I played EverQuest at that time there was literally nothing else maybe if I wanted to I could play the Ultima online, but even though I tried to play that game, it was not the same experience as EverQuest I just couldn’t get into it so I was stuck I had to make the best of it.

[@riventheexile7387]

22 minute video turned into a 1 hour 49 minute video is a certified Asmongold classic, provided by Josh this time around, love it.

[@mcshartypants]

Except Josh has genuinely interesting and thought-provoking takes, nor is he a manchild whose entire real world experience comes from within the confines of his parents' spare bedroom.

[@justcus]

@@mcshartypants attic* not bedroom (even better)

[@insensitive919]

@@mcshartypants Asmongold is very genuine and down-to-earth for how popular he is, I suspect ur just triggered somehow. Rightie or Leftie? Tough to tell at a glance these days Asmongold earns the total value of that house in less than a year, his mom lives with HIM. I could find a flat-earther who probably owns a nicer house than you, does that make him smarter? 🤣 I'm just gonna assume you're a teenager who spends too much time online and forget I ever read this. Maybe have a lie down lol

[@shelltoe_soul]

@@insensitive919 His mom died a year ago just FYI. Hes a good dude, I don't understand why people are always trying to attack him.

[@ImortalZeus13]

@@shelltoe_soul Because he "reacts" to people's videos and floots the youtube algorithim with competing content that is basically just the OG video with minimal commentary.

[@srolaguer]

The delivery from 1:02:53 1:03:43 is superb. Your theatre background is really coming through.

[@estelladee]

A teacher once gave my class an advice one time, they said "if you really love someone, you waste time with them. Because when you are able to waste your time with someone, it must mean you really love them, otherwise you'd be with someone else."

[@joshm.2954]

For me personally. I love the solo experience. Give me that EVERYTIME. I love ff14. They added bots to dungeons and i want to say i didnt notice a difference but i did. The bots were better than players. They didnt die needlessly, explained what to do as it was happening. None of my time was wasted. The story was amazing. I felt like the anime chosen one. I felt more connected to the npcs than 99% of people i have played mmos with and ive played since vanilla wow. As i got older i dont have time to waste as i work 8-10hr days. I have to do shit for myself as an adult. I have to wake up for work ontime. Life is the mmo i never wanted to play and im forced too. Full of grind, needless social interaction, stupid ineffective systems i MUST use daily. So i like my solo adventure with other ppl being there when its convenient, QoL and convenience that lets me get to the good bits. I work a job, i dont want to work another i pay for.

[@Sorain1]

Now that's a familar sentiment. RIL/Outdoors is the MMO I don't have a choice in playing, where choices are shockingly restricted, any mistake or bad luck is brutally punished and accomplishments are ignored and/or vanish in seconds. Filled with tedious busywork required simply to not die.

[@Wyzai]

I tried bots in FF14. Pretty sure it took me 1 hour to do a dungeon I did in 30 minutes with only 1 other person.

[@joshm.2954]

yea when i was playing tank or healer but when i dps it goes by fast and smooth. way better than wiping to easy fucking mechanics due to randos being randos. As a solo mmo player taking longer for a smooth enjoyable experience is worth it.@@Wyzai

[@pseudonayme7717]

I feel the same about single player, way more appealing to me. After 3 years of Neverwinter I grew to hate the creeping expense and growing grind. It was fine when I started but it eventually felt like someone was just maliciously chopping down trees to block my path to progression. Every day stuff got pricier and further out of reach, and since I never really had a clique on there that was the end for me.

[@Mattedatten]

I have several screenshots from some years back, when I, using a single harpoon, dragged a boat into the main city of Archeage, and then continued to harpoon my way up the highest building and just... hung there. In more recent time, in New World, I enjoyed the exploration. Reaching the edge of the world, seeing what's there - seeing what the game did when I left the current world, seeing what the game did when I pushed myself through the ground. Same goes even more years back, in Allods Online. And these are fond memories. There are different ways of enjoying the downtime in an MMO, but they do boil down to the community aspect. Dragging a boat into the capital, a slow, monotonous and glitch-prone task would be silly in a single player game, but doing it in a lively city where players hang around, made it that much more fun. I didn't say much myself, introverted and focused on my stupid task; but receiving that "lol" or /laugh made it so worth it. And the screenshots of the cityscape are kind of cool on their own. Finding the way to the edge of the world is nice, but it's made better if you later can show somewhat what ridiculousness you've found. - Man, I burnt myself out with the daily loop of New World. Even with friends we simply had no way to progress, nothing new to do with the resources and time schedules we had for playing. But watching videos like these, does really make returning to the genre soon an alluring idea. Just, got to find that perfect game. The one that brings all the players together. The one that doesn't X, Y and Z, while perfectly doing A, B and C!

[@aprilmeowmeow]

my husband tells me stories about archeage every year. He really loved that game, lol

[@leonardceres9061]

while playing EverQuest around the year 2000 I remember camping a spot in a dungeon with a group for 36 hours to make it past what was called a hell level. Meaning that the experience to get from level 49 to 50 was so high it took a ridiculous amount of hours, grinding just to get through it, we rotated different members out of the group but I stayed there the whole 36. I was about dead when the group was over.

[@CarburetorThompson]

That’s crazy, I think longest I ever made grinding was ~10 hours straight.

[@Mashangi]

I didn't do 36 but in EQ I was in a group grinding, I started about 8am Sunday morning. When I had to use bathroom I did, I ate food and drank as needed but didn't pay attention to the time. People gradually rotated in an out of the group but I stayed, eventually I got tired and figured I'd take a break. When I finally looked at the clock it was 5:30am Monday morning.

[@heartless_gamer]

You did that because you didn't have a choice to be honest. If this sort of game is what you wanted to play then EverQuest was it. If there was a hundred other games on the market like there are now that didn't require 36 hours you'd be gone in a heartbeat.

[@leonardceres9061]

@@Mashangi yeah man those things definitely happened to me more than a few times while playing that game. And just to be specific when I did that long ass camp I was in Solusek B , Window room. I remember another time while playing on my warrior in that game camping LGuK for the pair of SSoY’s.

[@AeriFyrein]

@@leonardceres9061 One of my best "memories" - though not really a singular memory - is people actually respecting camps, back in the EQ days. People violating camps got bad reputations on the servers.

[@benfoote9945]

An MMO called "Eden Eternal" had a great solution to the Wikipedia dungeon issue. You could play any class, so you would start new dungeons as a damage dealer, then learn what the support/tank roles had to do by watching them. It was a great way to learn the dungeon without the risk of getting your party killed.

[@aj.j5833]

I remember times just hang out in MMO not really doing anything and just chatting a few people do something silly or stupid. Decide go on a raid, get wiped and not care. It was the social part that matter more. Same reason for having LAN Party, going local comic book shop or game store to play, or going to bar and such with friends. Doing things most efficiently make best character or strongest for me sucks all fun out of any games not just MMOs. I like to build characters based on story I have of them in my head.

[@LittleMissGuillotine]

As I'm listening to this m realizing I have a completely disparate experience playing games from josh, and maybe from the MMO community as a whole. Hes talking with great conviction about the value of experiences over what the literal reward you gain for them is in gaming. and while I can acknowledge the theory behind that. I cant think of a single time in any game I ever valued the experience in absence of a reward fitting for the effort spent. I've always felt like the biggest barrier to enjoying a game is how well that game balances its effort vs reward system, the game being enjoyable is a static background value that I will stop playing if it doesn't reach my expectations. But the 'quit momement' in most games I end up dropping is when I put in a lot of effort for a lackluster reward, or sometimes vice versa. The mechanical value as well as the storytelling value are both important, but the experience to get them never is. I've had plenty of challenges in games I've enjoyed, bosses I liked fighting and complicated questions Ive answered, but if I put in a lot of effort only to gain something that doesn't matter, in the context of both the narrative and the gameplay. I will never voluntarily face that challenge again. This was the reason I ultimately quit the MMO I spent the most time with, guild wars 2. because after reaching the level cap on a character, working diligently to explore maps, level up crafting, work through the outdated story quests. and got to the pinnacle of the vanilla experience with 3 expansions ahead of me. I found there was nothing meaningful to do. The gameplay for guild wars 2 was good enough for me to enjoy when it meant I was improving in meaningful ways, but not enjoyable enough for me to challenge myself for no reward. the storytelling quality of the main line quests had fallen off enough that I was no longer narratively invested. and the rewards I was gaining mechanicly had very little value, materials for timegated minor gear upgrades and occasionally cosmetics I didn't feel I had enough freedom of expression to enjoy. For me the important thing isn't that I didn't enjoy the experiences, its just a matter of pure effort. because moving forward with tasks in GW2 was difficult and unrewarding I fell off. I still had fun playing it to a fair degree, even a similar degree to other games I played instead of it. but because I felt like the things I was earning by spending my focus and dedication didn't matter, I couldn't keep playing it. If the game was more convenient, easing up the pace of mild progression, I would have probably continued playing it for a longer time. The experience would be the same or lesser, but demanding less of me for a reward that had some value to me in a way that the countless extensive tasks I had yet to do didnt would have made it something more enjoyable for me. Something I could come back too, something I could ingrain myself in. I thought that was the goal of a MMO. Regardless of if my experience is rare or common I do wonder if it makes it functionally impossible for me to enjoy a MMO. I've been trying to get into one for a long time, thinking that the problems with the existing titans of the industry are what kept me from ever really getting it. but maybe its just a difference in values that drives me to play games in a different way then those games are prepared to supply.

[@htenerf137]

It’s super interesting to hear your take. I don’t disagree but I guess I just understood Josh’s point differently. In my opinion his point in saying “the reward is the experience” can sort of be understood as “if I had the choice to go back in time would I wish I hadn’t played” In that light there are a lot of games I quit when the challenge to reward ratio got outside of my preferences. I don’t want to take back the time I spent on them though. I won’t keep playing a game because I used to have fun. But I won’t hold it against the game either. Curious if that gels with your experiences as well. Either way enjoyed the comment. Thoughtful read 👍👍

[@restlessfrager]

I'm the other way around, I don't care about the story or rewards as long as I am mechanically taxed at every turn by an engaging system, which is why I fall off MMOs, because they tend to be very slow burners and only offer proper challenged in the end-game, which takes too long to reach. In fact most rpgs just don't push me to become a better player and can't hold my attention for that reason.

[@billmore6486]

Old Josh Strife: "I usually stream 5 times a week" Current Josh: "That's a lie" I love when creators roast themseleves like this. rofl

[@PrimroseParadox]

The point at 1:07:00 or so.. Even singleplayer games can be a social experience for me. With BG3's release lately I've been excitedly sharing everything with a group of friends on discord who are also playing it for the first time, and we're having a blast. \\\ The majority of my recent time in FFXIV has just been me sitting around a hub city, usually Ul'Dah and chatting to my friends and the people who also hang around and talk there.

[@MinusMadi]

I've been playing WoW hardcore and I've essentially dedicated the entirety of my playthrough to playing inefficiently. I go out of my way to help people pretty much any time I can. They may not necessarily need my help, but things can get tough and you never know when something could happen. People are always appreciative of the help and I've made several friends. When my main character died, it really hurt. Not because I lost character progression, but because it felt like a journey had come to an end. Everything had more weight behind it not necessarily because of permadeath, itself but because of the way permadeath affected how I engaged with the game.

[@NorthWolf97]

One thing I still remember was the Green Fire questline for Warlock during peak MoP. That final boss fight was hard even with a guide telling you how to manage yourself. Years later, Green Fire still felt epic as it was still a hard fight to overcome. But to also overcome it during it's initial release and having the achievement date to prove it felt so badass.

[@TheKalazar]

I love everything here except the whole "I want to do a dungeon without knowing what the dungeon is about, so I dont read anything about it online, but then expect the people in the dungeon to tell me what the dungeon is about" thing. I do a lot of blind prog with friends and alone. But I dont expect people to handhold me through it. I get into the dungeon I dont know anything about and will wing it. If people wanna explain stuff, cool. If not, also cool. But I think the expectation that they should go out of their way to explain the dungeon to me because I want to go in blind is p weird.

[@admbrink]

In the outdoorsy community, and especially in Alaska, there are two types of fun. Type 1 fun is just fun fun. Fun in the moment, fun after the fact. Type 2 fun is fun only after the fact, it sucks to go through, but afterwards you can reminisce about it. You succinctly described Type 2 fun through the course of your video. Love it.

[@Towelgravy]

Ohh I know exactly what you mean about being given free items. There was (is? maybe?) a game I used to play called rpgwo. The world was made up of 20x20 plots of land you could claim beyond the npc towns. It was all hard though, you needed to buy skills with skill pts earned from leveling so I'd cheese it and have 1 character be a full warrior and then play for a few hours until I had enough cash to buy some land, then hide it somewhere and remake as a character that had masonry, mining, blacksmith, carpentry, fishing, cooking and farming so I could actually build a house and start a base and not die of hunger. The best servers were servers that had stealing enabled. That way I could roam the server (training my running skill also) looking for old abandoned bases or bases that weren't sealed. Half the fun was getting a base with walls set up quick so you could be safe. Oh yeah. The point of that story. The game kinda died and had such a low population that every time I tried to play, some higher leveled guy would find me and try and buff me and give me the best items and tons of gold.. but I would just run. If they persisted I would log out. I wanted to earn that stuff. Yeah I'll have fun with the tier 9 stuff at my house but when I go out and only find tier4 stuff.. kinda makes me bored.

[@scotthoover1568]

A word about not being efficient in MMOs: I've been playing WoW Clssic again with the release of Hardcore servers. Every person I've ever randomly teamed up with for a task uses an add-on that tracks quest objectives and adds quest locations to your map and such. And I know they're using it because it automatically posts in party chat when someone completes a quest objective. And this genuinely baffles me because some of the most fun I have in Classic is wandering into an area I know nothing about and discovering what is there. It adds so much adventure to the game which would otherwise be mindless fetch quests.

[@jj48]

I think it depends, honestly. There are many different parts to games, and different people will enjoy some parts and dislike other parts. When we do something for convenience or efficiency in a game, the question to ask is, "Does this make the game more fun and satisfying, or less?" And that question may be answered differently by different players. For instance, whenever I play a Bethesda RPG (at least, the single-player ones), one of the first things I do is mod carryweight to give myself a nearly infinite inventory. I do this because I've played their games both with and without limited inventories, and I find that the challenge of managing an inventory is not the type of challenge I enjoy or find satisfying to overcome. Meanwhile, I know other folks who find overcoming that challenge very satisfying, but may not care for other sorts of challenges, like logic puzzles (which happen to be my favorite challenges to face). I guess what I'm saying is, removing a challenge doesn't necessarily indicate a desire to remove all challenges; and just having a challenge doesn't automatically mean overcoming that challenge contributes positively to the player experience.

[@danthewatcher9681]

Josh, I will give you this, inconvenience is better in the long run. IRL I just changed jobs, going home fromwork now I have two options, walk in a fast pace for 20 min and cut 10 min out of my over-all travel time home, or take the troly and sit in a wagon with AC and not bother for 60 min. Walking is by far less convenient, especially during this hot summer, but it's by far more efficient, and I get to use it as bragging rights and burn calories in the process. Convenience has no bragging rights. Sometimes, doing something hard is good.

[@littltheyjack]

How does this bounce with the “Just play 100 hours and it’ll get good” discussion? I am interested in holding these things in concert.

[@NoraNoita]

Oh, I just got 100 hours in Persona 4 Golden and I have had a very great time, haven't had this much fun with a new game in years, this one is truly a gem of a JRPG I spent 700 hours just in ARR in FF14, before buying any expansion packs, I then bought Heavensward and spent about 600 hours in that, and there's still endgame stuff I can do in those parts of the game, because I want them cleared in a certain way, most people say "just get people to run you through it", well I've let people run me through the Bahamut Coils, and that was the least amount of fun I ever had with the game, because I didn't learn anything, I didn't earn anything for being there, it would probably taken 100 hours alone to get a group and then another 100 to clear that content with them, but the time would've been enjoyable and great, but unless you're a popular streamer you can't find like-minded people who join you on the same level as you are with said content.

[@shockmethodx]

The conversation around time investment did resonate. Time passes no matter what one does. You can only experience time, you can't invest it, you can't justify it. I've played a handful of games that are dead now and I did enjoy them. I remember the Quit Point being, usually, because of the micro transactions. Interesting commentary. I also like how this video serves as commentary on react videos.

[@terradraco1312]

On efficiency part - there is a good video about how people pretty much optimise fun out of the game

[@Masquerade404]

14:10 Several years ago (10+ years) on vanilla WoW (before Burning Crusade or Cross-Server PVP or "Classic WoW") I had a rival in PVP.. I played Horde (Undead Warlock) and he played Alliance (Human Mage).. I started playing either right before or during the opening of the gates to Ahn' Qiraj event (bugs and sand everywhere).. Back then, I did PVP regularly to maintain my Legionnaire title (you de-rank for inactivity from PVP) which is when I met the ever-so-elusive Yomshlom.. I quite often did kill him whenever I did catch him, but there lies the problem.. IF I COULD CATCH HIM!! Of course, warlocks were pretty OP before Burning Crusade so I didn't need the best gear to win against a mage which typically fared poorly against the match-up to begin with.. So he would troll and kite me for days all while making me look like an idiot in every match we got into together.. I would rarely use the succubus named Selaith for PVP and primarily use my felhunter named Lukuun.. Felhunters are the bane of casters due to their buff eating and silencing abilities.. So every match, Lukuun would sniff out wherever Yomshlom was hiding and proceed to give chase to the tasty mage.. Of course, I wasn't too far behind my felhunter.. If we were in Warsong Gulch, the music might as well have been that one Benny Hill chase tune.. At least, that is how it felt.. So, shout out to that absolute legend of a mage! Yomshlom of the Greymane server! Well, the Yomshlom on the Greymane server 10 or more years ago, anyways.. I don't know if there is a pretender trying to usurp the throne these days.. I know I am posting to a 7 month old vid, but I just wanted to share my story!

[@ViktorErikFade]

30:59 a perfect example is fighting Red atop the mountain in Soul Silver, The reward was not just finding our stoic silent protagonist but you earned a CHANCE at fighting him and his team as the music gets serious ans his sprite slides across the screen saying Red challenges you and seeing him send out Pikachu. Compared to the shiny gyarados being offered in the lake of rage, everyone knows about shiny Pokemon but their rarity was part of their charm, that one being a freebie makes it feel like a tainted experience

[@leespiderpod]

Star Wars Galaxies was the best MMO for me. Every manufactured product was totally unique because every mined resource was unique so layers own shops and city's actually meant something

[@Sorain1]

The launch state of that game was amazing. I literally made a character with zero combat applicable skills and loved the crap out of it. (Doctor/Dancer) I didn't even bother with combat, I just frequented a bar in a town on Tatooine and while I fixed peoples stat damage, had them tell me how they got that damage. Was the most fun I'd had in a MMO and I was basically a living NPC. Hell, I ended up an escort quest NPC at one point because a group that was trying to down a Kyait dragon got so beat up they asked me to come out and fix them... so they had to get friends to escort me into the area, keep me safe and then post dragon kill marched back into town with me in triumph.

[@Starsetter90]

I have found that a lot of guilds come to the starting areas to pick up sprouts in ff14 and then leave them alone to grind. My guild has done that to me but I’m focusing on clearing areas as much as I can so it could get really tedious for those experienced players. At level 19 I’m not ready for raiding anyway. I also enjoy the rpgmmo style that ff14 brings to the genre. I’ve tried WoW a few times but really couldn’t get into it because of the fact that there was almost no story and unless you were capable of raiding everyone just gave you crap right away. WoW needs a sprout icon I feel so new players don’t get shit on.

[@masterplusmargarita]

Honestly I think having a sprout icon would get you more insults in WoW, not less. It's more about the community culture than anything else - 14 players understand there's people who are just here for the story since that's what brought most of them in to begin with, which makes them more tolerant of mistakes, while WoW is all about optimizing and raiding.

[@NoraNoita]

what? questing and exploring the world on foot was the most lore you can get out of WoW, I have not really done any Raiding in that game of my own accord, and got so much understanding of the game, which you don't get from doing any raiding or dungeon rushing.

[@SaberToothPortilla]

​@@NoraNoitaI think what they're referring to is the more traditional narrative "Here's the story we're telling to you" kind of story that FFXIV has, i.e. it's pretty heavily dialogue and cutscene focused compared to other MMO's, and you can pretty easily imagine it being reformatted into a book, film, etc. Not to say that's better or worse than the more "lore sandbox" focused kind of story telling of something like WoW, but bear in mind that a lot of people who check out FFXIV are used to JRPGs, often specifically Final Fantasy, so that's more familiar and enjoyable for them. At the very least, I don't think it's a stretch to say that fewer people are interested in WoW's story than FFXIV.

[@Starsetter90]

@@NoraNoita I think ESO makes the idea of open world storytelling a little better then WoW does. Granted I have a couple thousand hours in that game and only like 300 in WoW

[@Skenjin]

For the old Secret World mmo I took notes, sometimes compared them with friends to figure out the different quests. I really miss that game. SWL may wear its skin, but it's a completely different game

[@MistahBryan]

30:30, I keep thinking of WoW, how the Hunter had to Tame an animal to learn a Skill so they could teach that Skill to their Primary Pet. LOVED that Mechanic! They had to Feed the Pet to keep it Happy, had to carry Ammo for their Weapon. Hunter was called "Easy Mode" but the Hunter had one less Bag Slot(due to the Ammo Pouch most of us used), we had to carry Food for the Pet and Ammo for our Weapon. Had to worry about Aggro for TWO Characters and until Lvl 10 you HAD no Pet, you were "crippled". I would LOVE to play that style Hunter again, it made the Hunter and Pet a TEAM.

[@peka2478]

World of Warcraft: I remember reading the patch notes of them levelling up Onyxia and removing the Quel'Serrar questline (leading to the epic lvl60 tanking sword) in a few months time, so I spent the summer levelling up my lvl 2 warrior (with the Compendium of Dragon Slaying in his pocket, which I bought off someone for like 5g), in an internet cafe, where i spent the nights, first downloading the English WoW language pack, installing it, playing it (and doing it all over next time, because they would reset the computers every night), thus levelling my warrior to 60, getting two friends together and beating Onyxia on the last reset before she would get the level up. It was the best of times.

[@Dackad]

I'm glad Josh is reacting to Josh's 3rd monitor content and elevating it to 2nd monitor content. Hopefully Josh can react to this and elevate it even further to 1.5 monitor content.

[@-cat-..]

1.5 monitor content - just make sure the half of the video with his facecam is still on the second monitor 😂

[@gallonofcats1097]

1:08:22 This is interesting point to me, because my favorite memory in ESO is getting into random group of inexperienced people in veteran version of my favorite dungeon. Because I actually took time to explain all the mechanics I later felt so good when we actually beaten it. It may have taken 2 hours more then usual run but it was worth it. There's value in teaching someone mechanics. It feels good.

[@keystep8669]

I find that sort of experience to be very fun. Something that always bugged me about dungeons like that in ESO and Destiny is that people essentially do their best to speedrun it every time they go through it. I sometimes want to explore them and look at environmental stuff.

[@kari2570]

I miss the grind of old mmo's. You were constantly progressing, at a very slow pace, you could grind all day long one day, and the next day do nothing and it didn't feel bad. Now days with dailies, you feel like you have to do the dailies each day, and you don't want to skip a day or else you're missing out, but when the dailies are complete for the day, there's nothing left to do. I made more friends and had more fun interactions doing the old grinds, compared to spending 10 minutes in 1 area doing dailies before moving onto the next area.

[@miriammimicvt8816]

TERA was my first MMO and it means so much to me. I even have a tattoo of it lmao This video made me feel so emotional. I miss that time! Until the end I was so proud of my Death Charger. So many Nexuses. So many teaming up 2 hours before the start of the Nexus, so many chilling with people and getting a single hit while FPS dropped to 6. Dying for hours in Argon Corpus but doing it all over again because it's fun! And finally getting all the kills and getting that +9 weapon and having everyone on the server congratulate you because it was impressive! And then being able to 4-man Nexus and people didn't trust me because "warriors can't tank" and I'll just kite tank the adds without any heals and never felt so proud. We would leave Nexus 20 minutes after everyone else, but who cares? I wasn't there to be the best, I was there to have fun, and I still got better because of it. I would do anything to experience that again. This video hurts. lmao

[@alexiapri]

about the conveniece stuff, i have a story that fits! when i was 13 i went with my parents to climb a mountain for the first time. it was supposed to be a relatively easy trek, but about halfway up, it started raining, hard, as in, torrential downpour. i remember the whole forest getting dark, and stopping next to this big tree, and its trunk was completely enveloped by pouring water. we were all soaked, the ground turned into mud, the path was a winding river now. i was absolutely furious. i wanted to go back down. my dad refused to let us turn back, though, and we sat there until the rain calmed down and started climbing again. i was climbing and fuming and the same time. then, one part of the path had caved in due to the rain and was just a steep mudbath. while trying to cross, i slipped and couldn't move at all. i was frozen, there was a steep drop to my right and i knew if i moved i would fall. i immediately started bawling my eyes out out of pure terror and exhaustion. my dad pulled me to safety eventually and we made it to the top, where i proceeded to sulk, like a true 13 year old. i promised him that day that i would never be climbing a mountain ever again. then when next year came around, *i* was the one asking which mountain we were trekking this time. since then it's been a yearly tradition and we've gone on harder and harder treks every time, and it became one of my favourite parts of summer. that initial horrible experience was almost a rite of passage. i don't think i would be as excited to do those mountain climbing exercises if it hadn't happened, and yet i HATED it at the time. so yeah, josh is absolutely right, i think it applies to games too.

[@ChrisWhiton]

I have rivals in ESO, I'll check to see what's listed and they are always undercutting me slightly so I go back and forth with them. We specialize in the same kind of market and it's just funny that even though no dialogue is ever exchanged, you get to know them just by seeing their name all the time.