Suggest me an MMO.

I've been thinking about getting into an MMO. I've never played MMOs before, so, right now, I'm leaning in Star Wars: The Old Republic, but I'm open to other ideas, and with that I have some questions.

How's Final Fantasy XIV going? Can the free trial show me everything I need to familiarize with that game?

Can you really get into World of Warcraft in the year 2017 and how?

Is there any other MMO I should consider?

Thanks in advance!

SWTOR for story, for sure. Might wanna drop a fiver or so to get bumped to preferred status though, as last I recall the free-to-play restrictions were a bit much.

FFXIV is fantastic and what I mostly play these days (it's also got a great story, but nowhere near as engaging as the SWTOR stuff, which plays like a BioWare RPG with dialogue options and all). The free trial lets you try out every base-game job (not the expansion stuff as far as I know) up to level 35, so you should be able to get a sense of if the game's your cuppa or not (both with regards to gameplay and types of content). There's no time restriction and the game's also available on the PS4 (works great with a controller either way). Also worth noting that you can play every class/job with a single character.

Guild Wars 2 went free-to-play I think. I had fun with it for a while when it first came out. Might be worth checking out. Combat's more action-y, and it's not really quest-based (more focused on public events) and doesn't follow the standard MMO trinity when it comes to classes (i.e. tank, DPS, healer). FFXIV and SWTOR both roll with the trinity, as does WoW. GW2 back when I played tried to get away from that by making roles more versatile and yadda yadda. I dunno, it's fun enough.

Secret World is also a thing. I think it's called Secret World Legends now, and has (or is about to) relaunch as free-to-play. I never got as deep into it as I wanted (the character creator kinda sucks, and if I can't make a cool-looking character I lose interest unfortunately), but it's got a fucking fantastic vibe and some really great quest design.

It's all modern world conspiracy theory/horror stuff. Illuminati, Knights Templar, shotguns and spells, eldritch monsters, all that fun stuff. There are investigation quests that sometimes require some pseudo-cybersleuthing on the in-game web browser that are great, particularly if you choose to avoid the quest walkthrough links you'll inevitably come across while searching for stuff. Like FFXIV you can play every class with one character, if I remember correctly. I remember the way you build your character out being particularly interesting too. I think you could mix n' match passives in a way that could benefit weapons different from the weapon the passive came from. Anyways, that might also be worth looking into.

Visually, Secret World's pretty dated. I think FFXIV looks the best, followed close by SWTOR. Character creation-wise, FFXIV and SWTOR are both great, with FFXIV edging it out again, in my opinion. Both also have great costume systems. I dunno if that stuff's important to you, but part of the fun for me is playing dress-up with my characters. Gameplay-wise I enjoy the jobs in FFXIV most, and after that it's SWTOR again. There are some classes in SWTOR that are all about taking cover, which changes skills you've access to, which is neat. Also it's a Star Wars game, so turning your lightsaber on and off is fun enough on its own lol.

Secret World and Guild Wars 2 both have like, straight up third-person action control schemes though. So yeah.

If you're leaning towards SWTOR, just roll with that and see how it treats ya. After that I'd recommend the FFXIV free trial. Good luck!

If you care about the story then SWTOR is the best.

SWTOR is pretty good although the F2P implementation is pretty garbage; I'd go ahead and just buy a month's membership if you want to not be frustrated by the inability to get around quickly.

WoW is still pretty great and has a fairly full-featured trial membership that'll let you get to level 20! I'd say it's still pretty easy to get into, although the difficult part would be later in the game when add-ons become more important. But I'd give it a whirl!

There's a free weekend going for Elder Scrolls Online. I recently picked it up on the cheap, and it's an Elder Scrolls MMO, that's for sure.

FF14 is a pretty freaking solid MMO.

Yep, ESO has a free week. I've been playing for a year with breaks and I love it. It's Buy to Play, so you just buy the game and there are no monthly fees. It helps that I love the Elder Scrolls Series but I find ESO really easy to get into and a very fun experience both solo and with other people. It changed a ton since release and it's much much better.

Overall, depends what you're into I guess, what genres or types, Sci-Fi, Fantasy etc. WoW and FFXIV are probably the most popular right now. I feel like you can't really go wrong if you go with any of the games mentioned above. They're all fun games and fairly easy to get into. If you're drawn to SWTOR then go with SWTOR!

Of all the MMOs have have played which is a lot including SWTOR but not including WoW oddly enough, FFXIV is my top recommendation.

The free trial allows you to hit 35 on the 10 jobs in the base game you can even dip into the crafting and gathering systems. It is definitely enough to get more than a feel for the game. One downside of the cutoff is that is just about where the story picks up. So if you find yourself not totally digging do feel rest assured that it just keeps getting better and better. Another downside is some of the jobs are really designed for play at the level caps of 50, 60, and now 70. So for some of the jobs you might not get a good representative feel. Black Mage and Dragoon in particular are notorious for this.

Marvel Her- Oh, right. As obvious as it sounds I'd give my vote to World of Warcraft. It's by no means graphically phenomenal now but they've had a lot of time to create a smooth, fine-tuned MMORPG and I think they still have a very well-realised world and active player base in there.

FF14 is in a really really good state right now, and has one (if not the) best story lines of an MMO. FF14 has a good free trial with like easy a hundred hours of content between all 10 classes available, although as someone mentioned some of the jobs since the new expansion came out feel really clunky at lvl 35. It will at least let you know if you like the speed of combat as it isn't as frantic as some other more mashy MMOs like WoW, SWTOR or GW2. If you do want to play, hop on the GB guild on Ultros server. There is a thread somewhere around here with all the info, or PM me since I'm an officer

Also I haven't kept up with it, but I think there's some sort of free-to-try option for Guild Wars 2? Easily the most fun I've had moment-to-moment in an MMO, what with fun combat, a gorgeous look, and constant rewards.

Also it's pay-to-own, no subscription.

Honestly, WoW is the only way to go in my opinion. It has never been more friendly for new players.

If you want a soft landing, WoW is definitely the way to go. Like mentioned, it's friendly towards new players (almost overly so these days, one could say) and you can play it for free 'till lvl 20. It was my first MMO back in the day, unless we count those few hours of me being completely confused in Anarchy Online. During about 8 years of active WoWing, the only proper break for another MMO was when Warhammer Online came out, but sadly that thing was a technical mess. I had some high hopes for Wildstar, but that really didn't do it either.

I've personally been interested to try Guild Wars 2 every now and then over the years, but each time I've tried to play it, that installer has fallen apart in some different way. I suppose WoW doesn't want other mistresses.

That said, I haven't played WoW actively since the last year either. It probably feels good to a new player, but it has certainly run it's course for a veteran like me. I'll probably be back with the new expansion, as of usual.

I would really try to play WoW,it really has the most content and better community than the others MMO iv played likw gw2 and ffxiv.

OK. I'm gonna try to be as objective as possible and give you a rundown of the current MMO situation.

As of 2017 there are 6 MMOs that are still going strong:

• FFXIV
• Elder Scrolls Online(ESO)
• WoW
• SWTOR
• Guild Wars 2
• Black Desert Online

I'm gonna also talk about other MMOs such as Tera and Secret World because they're both notable in different ways.

Gameplay:

Games with the standard, hotkey based, WoW-style gameplay:

• WoW
• FFXIV
• SWTOR

None of these games do anything interesting or innovative with the moment to moment gameplay. Outside of a raid you can play these games in your sleep.

Games with hybrid action/hotkey gameplay:

• ESO
• GW2
• Secret World

These games still have a hotkey bar, but mix things up by adding the abilitiy to dodge enemy attacks and/or manually aim your own attacks. ESO is notable here because it allows you to play in first person mode and swing your weapon/block/bash in realtime, independent of hotkeys or cooldowns(like an Elder Scrolls game).

Games with true third-person action combat gameplay ala Devil May Cry:

• Black Desert Online
• Tera

These games are almost completely divorced from hotkey/cooldown based combat. They are the most innovative gameplay-wise.

Narrative:

Games that have a strong focus on narrative:

1. Secret World
2. SWTOR
3. FFXIV

This is the only place I'm gonna do a numbered list. If you like Stranger Things, Stephen King, or Urban horror/paranormal stuff then Secret World is for you. It is, by far, the best narrative in MMOs.

In SWTOR each class has a unique, Bioware-style branching story with dialogue wheels and light/dark side choices. There are also companions you recruit with stories of their own and romance options. Just like a Bioware game. Some of these class stories are excellent, some of them are boring. Sadly the expansions get rid of class stories and companions entirely.

FFXIV is only game in this list that puts a heavy emphasis on story with less than favorable results. The voice acting is horrendous. Everyone sounds bland and bored. It's so bad that they replaced almost all the voice actors in the first expansion. Quite a few of the main characters are boring and in on notable instance, downright unlikable. Again this was acknowledged and fixed in the first expansion where they gave these characters new arcs/motivations and changes of heart. The story of the base game is also full of filler quests. An imminent threat approaches, but the people who know the secret to defeating it will only tell you if you do hours worth of errands for them in a seaside resort.

The most egregious problems with FFXIV's narrative is limited to the base game. Things get markedly better with each expansion.

Games with a largely overlooked narrative element:

• GW2
• ESO

Both these games have voice acting and story. But, no one really talks about them. In my experience, GW2's story is largely forgettable. ESO actually has a pretty decent story. You can talk to random npcs and go through a dialogue tree. Its a weaker Elder Scrolls game but its still mostly an Elder Scrolls game.

Games indifferent to narrative:

• WoW
• Black Desert Online
• Tera

BDO and Tera have actual bad stories. I haven't played much of these games but everyone I've talked to had nothing but bad things to say. WoW is WoW. 90% of the story is delivered through quest text. If you have the patience to read through all that you'll find what amounts to a Saturday morning cartoon.

*Sidenote: Both BDO and Tera are Korean MMOs and as such are extremely grind focused.

@qrowdyy: hotkey based MMO gaming was invented before 2004 lol

@frodobaggins: That's true. Total brain fart on my part. I'll edit that part.