I purchased Everquest II on Steam a couple of weeks ago. I never really gave it a real shot (beyond the neutered trial), but for $5 I figured what the heck. While I can’t really afford to play more than one subscription-based MMORPG at a time, Everquest II does have some cool things going for it. Every so often I would see something that I thought LOTRO could benefit from copying to some degree.
One of these things pops up the second you enter the game world:
Everquest II’s Welcome Screen
As you can see, it contains server news, friends listings, a link to guild recruitment and more. I like the concept of this idea, although in the case of LOTRO certain things could be changed (for example, I’m hoping we never get a marketplace…).I think it helps tie things together and allows members (both new and old) to be fully aware of what’s going on around them.
I especially like the in-game guild recruitment tool:
Everquest II’s Guild Recruitment Screen
I really love this idea, particularly because it does what I think MMORPGs should do: it makes everything you need to do for a MMORPG accessible in-game. I find it frustrating that many MMORPGs rely on outside sources (official or not) to set up guilds/kinships and so forth. I think outside sources should be supplemental, not completely integral to the experience. I’d love to see something more robust in LOTRO that allowed Kinships to advertise themselves and gain new recruits in-game.
I don’t think it even necessarily has to go as far as Everquest II does. As an example, what if major areas had a bulletin board players could check out and see who’s recruiting. This could be by a helper NPC or even in its own little hall. I’ve seen this concept handled in various microtransaction-based MMORPGs like Shin Megami Tensei: Online to pretty good effect.
Does anyone have any input on this idea or have their own system they think would be better?
