Why I Play

I was this close to saving myself a lot of time by finishing this article with only a few simple words: Why do I play PlanetSide 2? Because it's fun. I'm pretty sure my boss would want me to expand on it just a bit, however, but let me drive those three words home: Because it's fun. I think we are all familiar with the word "fun," but it's something that we really don't hear enough about in MMOs. I don't think we play MMOs mainly because they're fun; I think we play them because they pull out other emotions in us, emotions like wonder or awe. They might help fill in social needs that are sometimes hard to fill out in real life. These are all positive and worthy reactions, but they're different from sheer fun.

I have oodles of fun in PlanetSide 2. Gobs of it. Barrels of fun. The fun is powerful in this one. You get the point. PlanetSide 2 actually makes me laugh to myself, makes me yell at the screen -- you know, those noises you hear from someone who is having a blast. Of course, there are a few other reasons I play PlanetSide 2 as well, so I'll fill you in on those.

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Villagers and Heroes, formerly called A Mystical Land, surprised me. I had gone several weeks if not a few months without logging in to the game for longer than a half an hour, so you can imagine my surprise when I realized that the game not only had been improved but had added systems that I thought it never would. In other words, the game was suddenly a world, a fully realized browser-based MMORPG. Despite my feeling that the game was going to languish in state of semi-completion, suddenly it had housing, more crafting, a better UI, and a fully stocked cash shop.

I've streamed the game before, but now I find myself logging in a lot more than ever. And now, after hosting a livestream with associate designer Cameron England (embedded after the cut), I'm really having fun with the game and have noticed that it offers a lot more than games that are much more well-known.

This is why I play Villagers and Heroes.

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I'm Jef, and I love Star Wars. This is the part where the rest of you addicts chime in with "hi Jef," before we go about trying to cure ourselves of a life-long obsession. Except we're not going to do that today, are we? In fact, I'm going to dangle another death stick that you may not have considered as of yet.

It's called Clone Wars Adventures.

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There is something about the cold of space and the hum of my faithful ship that makes Star Wars: The Old Republic feel like home. Or wait, it might actually be the hum of my lightsaber and the cold attitude of my companion.

Oh, forget it: Star Wars is awesome, and I'm going to tell you why. I'm a member of Massively's Stream Team, which produces live coverage of MMO titles every week with commentary and special features. So you won't be surprised to find out that this is an unconventional edition of Why I Play in that it's actually a livestream-style video rather than an article. Have a look and listen after the cut!

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A year ago I came to Massively as an odd-man-out of sorts. I had very little experience with MMOs, but for the previous two years I had podcasted and blogged about Star Trek Online. That being my only experience with the genre, I had very little interest in (read: I was fearful of) trying any other game. Trying another game meant that I was leaving my comfort zone and also, maybe, risking the perception that I was being disloyal to the game that gave me so much enjoyment.

However, a new friend and co-worker, Justin Olivetti, changed my mind. Because of him and his great The Road to Mordor columns here at Massively I decided to take the plunge and give Lord of the Rings Online a try. So in June of last year I took the plunge and I have found myself smitten by yet another MMO based on a powerhouse franchise that I adore.

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When I was a child, I was obsessed with space. In elementary school, I'd spend my library time reading books with titles like "The Moon" or "Space for Kids." It wasn't so much that I planned to be an astronaut (poor eyesight and math incompetency quickly blocked this ambition) but that I wanted to know what was out there, among the stars and moons and planets. "It can't," I reasoned as a very precocious second-grader, "be empty."

Unfortunately, I never did make it to space. I haven't walked on the moon, flown a starship, or engaged in a series of humiliating and challenging physical conditioning challenges (oh, The Right Stuff, how I love thee). What I did do, however, was discover EVE Online.

It's sort of the next best thing. And here's why.

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I grit my teeth and issue a soft sound of anguish as my character dies yet again. I corpse run back, revive, and carefully plan my next approach. I dart in, tag an enemy cultist, and then pull him out of the path of his patrolling friends. I know I can take one at a time, but more than that will end me. I've found that out through bloody and bruised experience.

The fight is tough; it takes me a good half-minute to put him down. The quest counter inches forward, mocking me with the fact that I'm still just on the first part of a six-tier mission. And I've been doing it for 45 minutes now.

I focus. I triumph. The next stage has me figuring out a code and then attempting to open a door while mummies burst from sarcophagi all around me. I blow every cooldown I have and invent a few more tricks to survive. The door opens. I step through. There before me is a giant monster from the pit of hell watching me with blood-red eyes. I'm nervous because if I fail here, I have to do the last stage all over again. I mutter a curse at Funcom's developers and then run in screaming.

And I'm loving every minute of it.

This is The Secret World, the title that bowled me over to become one of my all-time favorite MMOs. Despite plenty of noticeable flaws, its daring approach to a stuck-in-the-mud industry more than compensates for that. This is why I play it.

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Batman.

He's why I initially played DC Universe Online. He's why I bought the collector's edition pre-launch, and he's generally why I got worked up into a sweaty lather of fanboy expectation that couldn't possibly be met by an MMO with a finite budget.

A couple of years on, I've rediscovered DCUO, and now the reason I play it (a lot) boils down to three letters: SOE.

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I'll be the first to admit that I've been one of The Secret World's biggest fanboys ever since Funcom first announced its horror-flavored entry to the MMO space. I spent many a conversation extolling the game's many virtues to my gaming friends. "It's like real life if the universe were written by horror authors," I enthused, rambling on and on about the innovative investigation missions, the unique skill wheel progression system, the fresh modern-day setting, and so on and so forth. Then finally the fateful day came that TSW went live, and I loved it... for a while. But for some reason, it just didn't click, and so TSW sat unloved, guilt-inducingly staring at me from my desktop.

Last week, I finally gave into the guilt and hopped back into the game. I had kept my subscription running, as I knew that even if I wasn't actively playing, I still wanted to support Funcom's endeavors with what I felt was a remarkably refreshing entry into the stagnant MMO marketplace. Last I left my Illuminati agent Rouage, he had hit something of a brick wall in Blue Mountain thanks to a very short-sighted and subpar character build. I figured I'd probably be replaying Kingsmouth and/or Savage Coast just to get the AP to rectify my build anyway, so I scrapped him and started from the beginning. This time, it clicked. So here I am to tell you why it clicked, and of course, why I play The Secret World.

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I am not good at video games. It's really no secret -- anyone who's ever tuned in for one of my livestreams can confirm that I spend much more time blown up and in the process of being blown up than triumphantly dominating the battlefield. That's just what happens when I'm responsible for my own survival.

So you'd think that a game like World of Tanks, in which victory is based heavily on your skill with a massive gun, would be a turn-off for me. After all, where's the fun in sitting in a smoldering heap while your team attempts to make up for your buffoonery? What exactly is enjoyable about getting repeatedly reduced to scrap metal?

Sit back a spell and I'll tell you. This is why I play World of Tanks.

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Those of you who have followed me on this quaint little internet of ours for any reasonable amount of time know that I'm a sandbox guy. I love freedom, choice, and the leg room to explore and build to my heart's content. I'm not a big fan of PvP, general chat, bored griefers, or people acting like idiots. But in direct contrast to this claim, APB: Reloaded is one of my all-time favorite MMOs.

APB: Reloaded is one of those games that I happily jump into when I'm feeling bored with other games or just miss real action. When I'm solo, it's a bit of an outlet for any stress or frustrations I might have because I can just be a complete jerk and it's part of the game. But when I'm with a group, the dynamic changes completely. Sure, the game has its problems and is notorious for the lag and cheater issues, but that doesn't really affect why I play the game.

Then why do I play APB: Reloaded?

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I've played pretty much every superhero MMO that has come out since 1999. That means City of Heroes, Champions Online, Marvel Super Hero Squad Online, Hero Smash, and of course, DC Universe Online. There's something about superhero culture that speaks to all of us, and I think the feeling of roleplaying better or cooler versions of ourselves is the key. I tend to roll characters who are almost too much like me. They're superheroes, sure, but a bit weaker, smaller, and thinner than your usual caped crusader. Fortunately, almost every title has let me experiment, although sometimes my character has to resemble me... after working out for many years and wielding cosmic rays.

At first, DC Universe Online did not impress me as much as some of the others. It did have several issues when it launched, some that are still in need of fixing, but over time, SOE has shown just what a priority continuing development is. Patches are frequent and robust, the item mall is restocked with cool items often, and the transition to free-to-play gives players more choices than ever before.

But that's all technical mumbo-jumbo. This column is called Why I Play, not "Here Are Some Details About This Game." So why exactly do I find myself logging into DC Universe Online every week?

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Free Realms has been going really strong, as far as I can tell, since the beginning. I definitely remember the distinct buzz that came from the beta, and I remember bloggers and podcaster friends proclaiming that the game was going to go gangbusters. We MMOers often forget just what sort of impact certain titles have made on the market. As soon as these special titles are released into the world, we become used to them and often take them for granted.

Free Realms has always been one of those special titles. But think about it: We hear from it regularly but often forget to notice just how packed with players it can be and how much variety in gameplay it offers. In fact, Free Realms is probably one of the least appreciated sandboxes in the world of MMOs right now because it has been so successfully integrated into the MMOsphere.

Yes, I said sandbox. Yes, I'm serious. I'd go so far as to say that Free Realms is almost a perfectly designed sandbox, although some of its design is not for everyone. Like Mabinogi, another underappreciated open world of a game, Free Realms might turn off the typical sandbox aficionado, who might not like its graphics or young audience. That's unfortunate because the world of Free Realms is more vast that many of us think.

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For those of you who desperately need to know why I play RIFT in one line, I'll make it easy for you: I play RIFT because I really used to like World of Warcraft.

When World of Warcraft first launched, it was difficult to explain just how astonishing the game really felt. The innovations that it brought to the table have become so commonplace over the years that we forget how stunning they really were. And when I first logged in, I had visions of what the world could support, the things that could be done, and the ways that players would get to explore hidden vistas and small corners of the world.

As it happened, World of Warcraft went along quite well for several years, but somewhere along the line the magic faded for me. I can point to exactly when, but that's not the goal because RIFT seems to catch a lot of those dropped promises and put them into the game. And it's a game of extremes, with summits and valleys aplenty, but there's enough to like that I don't mind the bad so much.

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Sci-fi MMO EVE Online is possibly the most polarising online game in existence. It has some of the genre's most loyal fans and spawns some of its biggest news stories, but most people just can't stand the user interface and gameplay. It's been called boring, overcomplicated, and a griefer's paradise, but even those who don't play it often still watch from the sidelines as each insane story of theft or corruption emerges from the sandbox. Most games can only keep my attention for a few months at a time, but somehow I've played EVE for over eight and a half years.

I've heard it said that EVE is a long-term commitment, a statement I find hard to argue with as at only 26 years old I've been playing EVE almost continuously for a third of my life. It's not just been a game to me; at times it's been a way of life, a refuge from stress, a way to stay in touch with friends, and even a place to learn skills that can apply to the real world. Thanks to Massively, my attachment to EVE has even grown from a hobby to a career in writing and games journalism. I've had numerous periods of low activity in EVE and even quit for months at a time, but something always brings me back to the world's biggest sci-fi sandbox.

In this article, I look back at what drew me to EVE initially, some of the unusual factors that have kept me playing EVE over the past eight years, and the reason I'm still motivated to subscribe to this day.

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