Thoughts on Online Gaming

Okay so in the last week or so it came to my attention that DCUO is going free to play.  Now for me this might be trouble, because I have a history of allowing myself to be eaten by online games.  Plus about a month ago I was on the brink of buying into DCUO, so now that I have the potential option to do it for free I know I'm getting in on it.  But when I heard this it made me think about my past of paying for online games and the whole idea of paying memberships for an online experience, and what better place to flesh out my thoughts then right here on the bloggle right? So here we go.


First up is my old friend World of Warcraft, because you can't have a conversation about paying for games without bringing this guy up.

When I played Warcraft in my high school years my membership was being payed for by my parents, so I was free to just sit and play whenever I wanted without feeling like I needed to get my money's worth.  After a year or so of playing and getting to about level 50, I know that's low for a years worth of playing but I said I didn't play a ton, I started to lose interest.  Most of my friends had already quit the game by then and my parents were not mad that they could cut off the 15 dollars a month that the membership had been costing them.  About 3 years later I got nostalgic for the game and decided that I would get back into it.  I had gotten over the anxiety of playing with people who I didn't know, a large factor in my lessened play time during high school, but soon learned that I was not willing to shell out the needed cash for the game.  As a college student who had class, work, and the shambles of a social life I started to feel pressured to play the game because I was paying for it.  This idea started to bug me, why should I feel pressured to play a game? It was supposed to be fun.  The idea that a game was becoming more of a hassle for me then something I did to blow off some steam or just enjoy myself really didn't sit well with me.  I know some people REALLY get behind this game, but in this guy's opinion: The money and amount of time it takes are too much for a single game.

Moving on to my other big online experience, X-Box Live.  Because what is more fun then swears and slurs from the mouth of a 13 year old.

Now I have been a member of live since the first Xbox came out way back in the early 2000's.  At the time I was younger and live was not my favorite thing to do on the Xbox.  I much preferred the fabled LAN party or even just local multiplayer.  In 2006 the first Gears of War came out and a pretty good sized group of my friends were playing it so I decided to give the game a shot.  I ended up regretting this discussion almost right away.  I was not super awesome at the start of the game and holy balls did the community suck.  When I wasn't playing with my friends I was playing with people who had never heard the term teamwork.  Gears did not do much for my interest in online gaming, and I would remain a casual online player until the release of Halo 3.  Halo 3 was the first time i was incredibly excited to play a game online, and it wasn't too long before CoD 4 was released.  These two games and their sequels  have made up the bulk of my online playing on Live.  The other big focus of online gameplay has been the ability to download add-ons for games, although this too has sparked small debates. I know some people have complained that if a game had extra content why wouldn't it be on the disc at launch.  And I do think some games do the whole add-on mechanic in the wrong way but there are some games that use the add-ons perfectly.  My main example would be Borderlands, which I got maybe an extra 4 months of gameplay out of because of their add-ons. So in closing my main thoughts on Live would be that the online community and competitiveness of some games rubs me the wrong way, but live is also a place for some group play and awesome extra content.

So in the end I think online play has opened some doors that years ago people never thought possible, but some of those rooms we let ourselves into are homes of 12 year old headshot machines with a habit of teabagging.  Online play is always going to be what you make of it, and the fact of the matter is that everyone can find something of an online experience that they can enjoy.  I love almost every element of online gaming I've touched and i can't wait to branch into more, like DCUO when it goes free to play and giving the PSN a shot with the release of Uncharted 3.  More to come on those game related topics when they pop up in my life but for now I hope you guys enjoyed reading my mind thoughts about games.

See you all next time,
Will