What are people's favourite pre-WOW MMOs that are still worth playing today? (sh.itjust.works)

submitted 1 year ago by MrScottyTay@sh.itjust.works to c/mmorpg@lemmy.ml

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I long for the days of yore, but I never really got into MMOs until WOW and I've always been jealous heating the stories of people playing MMOs prior.

At some point in the future I'm going to be making an XP era PC build where I plan to play some older games from my childhood as well and any MMOs from that era that I missed out on

Also going to try and get properly into FFXI at some point too but I'm wanting to hear other suggestions too.

I've tried everquest but the way they center the character in the 3rd person view starts to mess with my motion sickness a bit feeling like I have to look at the ground a lot more than I'd normally prefer.

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[-] Die4Ever@programming.dev 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Ragnarok Online was pretty great and you can still play it with private servers. This is a very chill game, mostly about the vibes and hanging out, you'll probably need a friend to enjoy this with because IDK if you'll get much out of it just grinding with random people. When you pick a private server you should probably find one with low exp rates, like 10x or less, if you've never played before.

Phantasy Star Online isn't really an MMO (it's pretty much a clone of Diablo except 3rd person and sci-fi) but it was heavily marketed as one. Grab the "Blue Burst" version for PC and play on a private server. You'll probably want to use a controller for it. This one you could play with randoms.

[-] ExtraordinaryJoe@reddthat.com 2 points 1 year ago

City of Heroes was awesome and it holds up today, but is only available on private servers.

[-] Die4Ever@programming.dev 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

CoH was so cool. I'm not typically a big MMO fan but that was definitely a good one. I did also play on the private server briefly when that came out. This thread was about pre-WoW though so it doesn't qualify.

[-] ExtraordinaryJoe@reddthat.com 2 points 1 year ago

CoH was released before WoW. In fact, WoW pretty much killed CoH. The servers went to full all the time to barely populated. I migrated over to WoW myself.

[-] Die4Ever@programming.dev 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Holy crap that's surprising to me lol, CoH seems so advanced. I never got into WoW

[-] zebus@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I used to love FFXI but I feel like out of all my nostalgia MMOs it’s aged the worst, even EQ has aged better.

As far as EQ, I’m not familiar with motion sickness but I know it has camera controls and different modes, I was thinking there was a hotkey or console command for raise and lower camera.

My other nostalgia MMOs were Rift and Ragnarok Online but I’m pretty sure both of them have gone to shit.

Oh, and EVE Online

[-] Tiffany@lemm.ee 3 points 1 year ago

I still play Ultima Online to this day, albeit not on the official EA servers.

Currently playing on UOAlive, which is a casual non-PvP-focused shard that's pretty chill. I used to be more into the PvP aspect of the game, but these days I'm over it.

[-] meldrik@lemmy.wtf 2 points 1 year ago

The original Guild Wars. I initially only bought it because I couldn't afford the subscription for WoW, but oh boy did it end up a good idea to buy GW :D

[-] MrScottyTay@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 year ago

I bought factions before I got WoW but my amount is lost, no idea what email I used for it :(

Might have to get it again at some point and okay the others too. Thanks for reminding me

[-] meldrik@lemmy.wtf 2 points 1 year ago

Do you still have the game box? You can probably recover your account by providing the CD key and some other information?

[-] MrScottyTay@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 year ago

I think I have the box but lost the manual. It's probably back at my mam's house somewhere in some childhood box. Might have to go spelunking at some point.

[-] Krazix@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

There are City of Heroes pirate servers out now, that's a fun game but not really a good one to go into for a long haul as the end game is limited and getting to max level is trivial even on "hard" servers. But still fun to mess around on every once in awhile.

I also am an EQ fan and always end up playing EverQuest at some point. I'll play on live, I'll play on pirate servers, i just enjoy the game. But I try not to get sucked into it. Too easy for me to lose myself in that game.

[-] Myro@lemm.ee 0 points 1 year ago

I love DAoC, though just on freeshards.

[-] MrScottyTay@sh.itjust.works 0 points 1 year ago

What's DAoC?

[-] Myro@lemm.ee 2 points 1 year ago

Dark Age of Camelot. Old school MMO from 2001. It still has a love server, however, it moved too far from the DAoC I knew back then, so I limit playing to freeshards. The great thing about it is PvP, or rather, RvR: Realm vs. Realm.

There are three realms that fight each other in a large zone. It has a low number of skills, yet a high skill ceiling. CC has a true impact - you could be unable to do anything for 1 minute if you are not careful, have no defenses up or no healer in your group. It is engaging to play in a team in groups of 8 vs 8,to decide which target to pick etc.

See here from minute 1: https://youtu.be/GruFJD_b918