What MMORPG should I try with my daughter?

The Game Room
21

I’ve been playing FFXIV for the past year, and I enjoy it a lot – the graphics are gorgeous, and the story is very good (particularly in the expansions). However, there are a few things about it that might make it less appealing for the OP and his daughter:

  • The game does force you to regularly participate in multi-player content (dungeons, trials) in order to advance in the storyline. For most of those, you have to be in a balanced group of four players (one tank, one healer, two DPS). Since it’s the OP and his daughter (i.e., a group of two), they’d probably be winding up having to group up in PUGs to complete them. As they’ve played WoW, if they’re experienced in dealing with PUGs (and the occasional troll or jerk in them), and don’t have a big issue with it, it wouldn’t be a worry. But, unless you have a set group of four (or more) players that you know, with the right roles, FFXIV does make you play content with strangers.

  • There’s a very wide range of difficulty levels across the combats in the game. Yes, many of the dungeons are pretty easy (esp. if you’re already an experienced MMO player), but there are certain fights with notably unforgiving mechanics. What I, personally, have found frustrating are some of the “solo duties” – fights that you must complete on your own. Some of those are downright brutal, particularly for certain class types, and to beat them, may require a lot of attempts, and figuring out odd mechanics or unstated victory conditions that must be met. The OP indicates that his daughter is very good at gaming, so maybe this one isn’t a big issue for them, but I’ll note that several of my adult friends who play FFXIV (as well as myself) have gotten so frustrated by certain fights in the game that they’ve had to walk away from them for a while, before trying again later. The OP will know better than any of us if that sort of frustration with a game is something that would impact his daughter’s (or his own) enjoyment of it.

  • There’s no free-to-play option for it. You can try the game out without subscribing for up 30 days, but while you’re on trial, you’re limited in being able to communicate with other players (i.e., you can’t send tells, you can’t initiate a group, etc.) If the OP and his daughter want to try it out together, before they commit to subscribing, that limitation may be a bit frustrating.

22

Given that they’re specifically requesting MMO games, I think we can take it for granted that they don’t mind playing with pubbies.

23

You may very well be correct. OTOH, he noted in his original post that SWTOR was a game that he (or they) had already played – SWTOR was the one MMO that I played extensively before moving to FFXIV, and running group content was never necessary in order to complete that game’s main storylines. When there were Flashpoints (four-player content) built into the story progression, there was always the option to run those as a solo player.

As a result, in three-plus years of playing SWTOR, I virtually never had to PUG. That said, I had little interest in running Operations (raids), or PvP, which had no bearing on playing the game’s storyline (but for which pugging would have likely been required).

24

OP, now that I think about it, do recommendations really need to be MMORPG? There are a ton of cooperative games you both will enjoy.

And just to be clear, you both play on computers, correct?

25

While that is true, FTP isn’t the fullest experience, you can buy the game and the 2 expansions and not spend another dime and still get the updates to living story and any of the many holiday/ special events that go on.

26

There is no monthly fee for anyone, the free players are playing completely free while the others paid for the game a single time. There is no special monthly subscription tier.

27

I would recommend LOTRO because:

  • the storyline is so strong (and ties in with the books and films)

  • you can play for free

  • your character can choose to specialise in combat, exploration, crafting or trading (or a combination of all four)

  • reports I get from people who’ve played both WoW and LOTRO is that LOTRO players offer far more advice and help

28

Rickjay, if you and your daughter would like to take a break from MMOs, there are other types of games that might be of interest.

Stardew Valley just recently received a Multiplayer co-op mode. Players choose one person to host the game, and then it’s played cooperatively to help build the farm and interact with the town.
Terraria has a multiplayer mode as well, with multiple people joining to explore, fight & craft on a single world.

Path of Exile is a Diablo-style fighting game. It’s more action than narrative, but it’s wildly fun multiplayer game and it’s a entirely free.

These might not suit your daughter, but I thought I’d just mention some alternatives.

29

Yes, we both have pretty good gaming rigs. She has my old desktop rig with some upgrades, and I have a newish laptop gaming rig; there are no PC MMORPGs we can’t run.

MMORPGs are definitely what I’m aiming at. Not that other games aren’t fun, but that is what we are looking for right now.

30

I’m not currently playing any MMOs, so take mine opinion as dated but the ones I’ve enjoyed in the past are: World of Warcraft and Guild Wars 2, as others of mentioned.

I also liked RIFT, which is similar to WoW, but a lot more flexible on character builds. Basically each talent tree is a class and every character gets three, so lots of interesting combos available.

I liked Champions Online for a supers-oriented theme park game. Lots of options in choosing your powers. With a dedicated duo, you could really optimize for each other. Lots of costume fun, too.

I liked Star Trek Online for scifi fun. Every character has their own space ship, which you fly around to do space missions. There’s also ground missions which are more like your typical MMO gameplay. Great customization options, for both characters and space ships.

MMOs I’ve played but don’t recommend: Secret World. There’s lots of customization for powers and appearance, which is good. But the gameplay just didn’t work for me. And the missions can be very hard. Also, the character models really hit the eerie in the uncanny valley. Might be intentional but I hate playing a character I don’t like to look at.

Also, I did not like Final Fantasy XIV. Too difficult to play and a klutzy interface.

The MMO I’m waiting for is City of Titans, which is a successor to City of Heroes, the supers game. But early beta won’t start until late this year, and actual live play will be (I’m guessing) late next year. Something to keep in mind.

For a non-MMO game I highly recommend is Crusader Kings 2. It’s a strategic war game, but it very character focused. You are the ruler of some plot of land, who has to marry, produce an heir, handle your court and vassals, and deal with your liege-lord. And then play as your heir when die of war, assassin, or maybe even old age. It has multi-player, which can be played competitively or cooperatively. To start I’d recommend you both play as vassals to the same king (England, France, or HRE are good choices). You’ll have internal politics to deal with, and external wars to fight. Once you can handle a whole kingdom, you can try to depose your king. Glorious fun! (And if you play, I highly recommend you get the CK2Plus mod to vastly improve the gameplay.)

31

One more plus for Guild Wars 2:
Respeccing your characters skills and gear is nearly unlimited. You never feel locked into a fixed progression path that you may regret later. Progression is mostly an unlocking of skill varieties that you can slot. I was turned off from several other MMOs, such as LOTRO and DDO, because of the much more rigid fixed templates.

My knock against GW2 are the grind to get legendary weapons. There is no way casual playing, even over years, will get you anywhere near to those.

32

I have been casually playing since launch, and I think I am currently about a week away from crafting my first legendary - HOPE. It’s taken a long time to work through the process of precursor crafting and then gathering the various stuff for the actual build itself, but gold is much, much easier to come by than it used to be.

It’s not been short, but none of it has been difficult. The hardest part for me was the Gift of Battle for the WvW stuff, but that’s mostly because I just didn’t enjoy that part of the game and you’re basically forced to play around 8 hours or so of it.

Buying a precursor and then crafting the legendary from it, like you do for the first raft of legendaries, probably is out of range of casual play. I’ve found this one to be a good long-term goal.

33

Thanks. From the responses so far, GW2 sounds like a winner :slight_smile:

34

GW2 is really good, and so is TESO, but I would have to say, LOTRO, because it manages to capture the feel of the books & movies so well. A very-literate 12 year old will find a lot to appreciate in that game. This would be a great time to get her the Hobbit and watch the LOTR movies, if you haven’t already.

The way it works is, the players are operating a separate story alongside the events of LOTRO. So it’s not just repeating what’s in the book. The players get to travel in a complimentary quest that’s all their own.

35

I’ll also recommend GW2. One thing I haven’t seen mentioned about it (unless I missed it upthread): for PvE, your server doesn’t really matter. You can seamlessly play with people on other servers. (The only difference is that EU and NA servers can’t cross-over.)

36

Not MMOs but Hunt and Monster Hunter might appeal.

37

I think I’ll fire up GW2 too, just for fun.

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38

I didn’t even think of DDO. I haven’t played it in 4-5 years. I had some characters that were higher levels but most of the missions in those ranks required 8 or more people. There were rarely enough people to do them so I just repeated other quests and got bored.

Maybe I should introduce my kids.

39

We are trying GW2 to start. It’s not too bad, though we are flying through stuff without really learning the mechanics.

It’s a bit off topic, but one thing I cannot help but notice about most MMOs is how damn easy they are, I picked up WOW myself out of nostalgia and gave up are leveling to 20 in maybe a week of very casual play and never dying once. By level 10 I had hundreds of gold, too; there’s so much money around that everything is ludicrously inflated. Simple copper mining was pulling me 50 gold per hour of gameplay. Raids and stuff are tough but you could max level and never do a raid.

When I played EverQuest back in the day, it was HARD. If you died you lost XP, and you died a lot. It was hard in ways that were unfair and stupid - the game had few working quests, despite the name, and was poorly documented - but when you made it to a new level it was a legit accomplishment. I’d like an MMO that’s an actual solid challenge.

40

Central Tyria isn’t particularly difficult as you level through, but the Heart of Thorns expansion is a definite step up in combat difficulty. Once you get up towards level 80 and go into the 3 zones that make up the Orr continent, it gets significantly tougher as well (although not really tough once you get decent gear).

It’s a lot easier to make money in GW2 than it used to be, but they haven’t seen the rampant inflation of some other games - 1g is still a fair amount.