I decided to play some destiny 1 after leaving it in disappointment from its disastrous launch and found myself appreciating the format a lot more than most MMOs around today.
Due to Bungies contract with Activision they had to make a sequel so D1 was abandoned after 3 years of content and left in stasis which I now believe is the best way for an MMO to be. This means the game has an end, a clear story arc, doesn’t attract people who seem to foam at the mouth when there isnt something new to play and is generally chill. If you wish to experience it again you can just make a new character and play a new class its all pretty well paced. All three years of content seem to have somebody playing its not the most populated game ever but I havent had any trouble doing some strikes or raids and there’s no creeping sense of fomo, no rush just chill and enjoy the game.
This is how all MMOs should be instead of tacking on piece after piece until the entire thing falls over either from a technical perspective, narrative perspective or community perspective or maybe even all three.
MMO players seem to be the more neurotic of the bunch driven entirely by fomo and logging new content the millisecond it releases and dropping anyone who had to go poo before coming on to raid because if you dont do the stuff the second its out everyone dies or something. I think out of all the MMOs i have played ESO does it better mostly because the additions to the game are distinct portals into other places with their own storylines but it will never overcome the fact that old content will just be barren or that new players cant join without paying for level boosts if they want to play with friends because legacy content gets in the way.
Thoughts? I think D1 accidentally was what MMOs should be, much shorter more concise experiences with a definitive ending that can be easily replayed and isnt too long. Most of the magic that comes from these types of games is a bunch of people coming together to figure out and experience it for the first time so recreate that first time over and over instead of making it once then dumping crap after crap for 20 years until you only have addicts playing.
OSRS gets a pass
Guild wars 2 is like this (I haven't read your entire post, too sleepy, but I think I understand what it's about); you can play through the entire campaign of the game solo and actually finish it, defeating the last boss of the story and even get a credits sequence, but then there's also the rest of the game where you can do dungeons and raids and such. I liked this aspect as it gave me a story to experience and didn't put me in a position where I needed others to help me and force me to rush the campaign's storyline without enjoying it.
If you like OSRS and want an idle game that was designed SPECIFICALLY to mimic it and is actually quite fun, I highly recommend Melvor idle; you can leave your character skilling and switch off the game and come back and it'll calculate how much your character accomplished in that time; I don't think I'll ever play runescape, but this game absolutely made me consider it. If you know OSRS well you probably won't need my thread on Melvor idle, but here it is: https://hexbear.net/post/6508849
Genuinely enjoying the heck out of Melvor idle.
Melvor is good, but the 3rd expansion was so glacially slow that I dropped it.