I’m a simple man. If a game is DRM free, I buy (looking at GOG). If a game is indie, I buy. If a game is an anti-cheat infested AAA “blockbuster”, I go sailing.
With MMO-like games and “live service” I understand that the value is in the “now” and that the game is worthless in the future. I loved Destiny once upon a time, but now I avoid all of them.
“Worthless in the future” isn’t really right even for mmos tho. Just depends what sort of person you are.
I mean if someone can spin up their own server and just play with a group of friends (maybe 10-20 people?) that’s basically the bulk of the game’s content available. Sure, stuff like PuG, auction house, etc. won’t have any value but… in my experience those are such minor parts of the games most of the time as to be trashable.
Personally I would prefer playing mmos with a small dedicated group I know over the public at large. Well populated servers tend to be a miserable experience for people who want a group game but not a public group. Even if you stick to your own guild, people in the world are assholes on purpose whenever they can be.
So I’m strongly of the opinion that any game requiring a server should have a server spin-up utility launched free when the official servers go down. At least give people the option.
I perma-quit WoW after 19 years (did a privacy deletion of my entire account), but I would no joke spin-up a local server for my family to play “offline”.
Not exactly what you said since it’s still quite active, but still.
That was actually my exact thought - I used to love wow but I absolutely hated most of the people who played. They ruined the game for me, and I was -dedicated- (not 19 years but 6, from vanilla through second expac, raid leader, raid MH, guild second, had an alt with its own guild and all tabs bought for a personal bank, etc.)
With something like wow I’d actually be willing to buy the server spinner if the official servers are still active (since game is subscription based they aren’t going to drop it free), just to have the option to play with people I like and nobody else. Doesn’t even have to be people I know, I’d be happy to find people in forums/communities/etc. to play with, just a limited group with a barrier of some sort for entry. Oh and the ability to ban.
I miss the social aspect of that sort of game, but I just dislike the general public too much to be willing to play any of them at this point.
