Originally Posted by Morgander
I've said it for years, one of THE NUMBER ONE KEY REASONS PEOPLE PLAY MMORPG's IS FOR SELF-BETTERMENT.
This mostly means loot, period. If it doesn't mean loot, it means prestige a player can acquire through whatever alternative means that particular game allows such as visual appearance in City of Heroes, total kill count in Planetside, or pvp statistics in World of Warcraft.
People play for other reasons, but at the end of the day, everyone wants more; something they don't have right now, that's what keeps them logged in every day, that's what keeps them logging in another day.
I believe that it doesn't matter if only 1% of the player base can achieve the top end accomplishments a game has to offer because for the remaining 99%, the mere idea that those accomplishments exist for their eventually acquisition is what's keeping them coming back for more.
I know why Everquest enthralled us so much in 99. I know why us old schoolers beg developers to reinstate those feelings back into a future mmo, it's because Everquest appealed to our sense of desires, our desire to accomplish and achieve and be rewarded for our efforts.
You may not have had the best equipment your mmo of choice had to offer, you may not have accomplished the highest rank, had the final armor graphic you always sought after, but that's the trick of it all anyway; you kept logging in because you didn't have it, and even for those who did, games like Everquest where so dynamic that no matter how hardcore you were or how affluent with the game you were, you always had SOMETHING else you wanted that was just out of your reach, even if it was only because it was ultra rare, you were unlucky, or the creature that dropped it was contested, or a combination of all three.
So sure, only 1% of the player base might actually achieve the top end, but the other 99% feed off what the other 1% are already experiencing. Why do you think guilds such as Fires of Heaven became so dominantly famous? Their website still gets more hits per day than ANY single Everquest or Everquest II sight in the world. That's first and foremost because what they were doing, everybody else was dreaming of doing. They experienced those things through those people, just as we do in real life.
You wouldn't mind being rich would you? Or powerful? Owning a mansion? Eating with the elite? Fine dining? Exquisite clothing perhaps? It's funny how prominent shows like Cribs are, and proves my theory in many regards.
Only the top of the world's elite hold the majority of the world's money and power, but we all wish we were those people. In fact, the American dream is to in fact work towards our own little fortunes, to inspire ourselves on to fame and wealth, and seeing that others out there have achieved it push us further and spur us on.
As they do in the mmo's we play.
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