Different people have different playstyles. And when you’re trying to draw in several hundred thousand players, from all parts of the world, all social classes and genders, and keep them playing from month to month, you need to try and please as many people as possible. So, to me, when you’re making an MMO, it doesn’t make sense to have one set of rules for everyone.
PvP servers are the exception to the rule. A few developers have caught on and realized that this issue is game breaking, for some people, and have tried to satisfy both sides. But that just makes me wonder why things like this aren’t more commonplace. By slightly modifying the rules on one or two servers, you attract a much greater audience.
Take the decay of equipment, for instance. Some players don’t like to be bothered by those distractions, as it doesn’t add anything to the game for them, it just wastes their hard earned money. Other players like this realistic touch and believe that an improved economy is more important than constant action. The two sides have always had their extremists battling it out on the forums and they’ll never settle on a middle ground. The developers are guaranteed from the start to piss off one of them.
A simpler solution would be to have different rules for different servers. If the issue isn’t important to you, then it wouldn’t matter either way. But if it is, it could be the difference between a two month subscription and a year long one.
And then look at Star Wars Galaxies. Has anyone ever agreed on how Jedi should have been handled? Should there be an “Alpha” class in an MMO? How should you unlock it? Should you even need to unlock it? Should there be penalties for dying? Do they even fit in with the storyline? I’m not saying that I expect to be offered a choice on every last detail, but given an option on a few of these issues could have had a large impact on the way people viewed this situation. Things like this don’t need to be game-breaking problems.
That’s one of the things I’ve always enjoy about private servers. I can look around and hunt down one that offers exactly what I want out of my game. I pick the population, the experience rates, the modifications, and so on and so forth. A game like Ragnarok Online is nearly unplayable in its original form. It’s an enormous grind. Two days in and you’re starring at your experience bar, literally watching it go up by a hundredth of a percent every kill. Sure, MMOs are designed to keep you around for long periods of time, but things like this prevent me from even starting. Now, most people’s objection to this idea is that, given a choice between a high XP server and a low one, everyone would just flock to the easiest one. But that’s not really true, and you can see it for yourself. For all the Ragnarok private servers that give you thirty levels per kill, there’s one with normal rates or, I swear they actually exist, reduced XP servers. It might take a lot more time to get to the end, but it gives you something to really be proud of. And there’s plenty of people out there who are willing to take that kind of punishment.
I’ve always thought that choice is an important issue personally because I know how many times I’ve quit a game over a minor issue. And, seeing as I’m more obsessed with gaming gossip than the games themselves, I’ve seen how often a community can become divided over a simple difference of playstyle. And there’s rarely a middleground on these things. One side wins or both sides come out disappointed. It really doesn’t have to be that way. Some companies have opened up to the idea of sandbox gameplay, and trust us to make our own content. But, so far, no one has really given us the option to pick the rules we want to use to actually govern that gameplay.
They have all the infrastructure to allow a subscriber to tailor make their experience, yet they insist on making changes apply to all.
Specific server rules could solve so many problems, and I've been saying for years that this is an ideal way to solve the TS/vent/text only problem. Just make a note on some that it's set aside for those who use TS, on others for those who use Vent, and some for those who refuse to use voice. You wouldn't even need to enforce it in any real sense, because the people would naturally gravitate to those servers that support their preference.
Focus 
