MMORPG's: GAME IMBALANCE

You hear a lot of talk about game balance in MMORPGs. Specifically as it applies to 'Class' and to a smaller degree, crafting. You hear statements like, "Class A has such and such a spell and it's overpowered because Class D's spells can't counter the effect in PvP." Or perhaps something along the lines of "Class C has the ability to do x, y, and z, and they totally own Classes B and E when it comes to engaging in PvE activities.. they need to be nerfed!"

What ever happened to game imbalance? Where is it written that all players must be equal? Game balance is like political correctness.. a malignant virus that eliminates any controversial elements in a game that makes it fun and worth playing, and replaces them with a non-offensive blanket of 'blah blah blandness'. As long as every player has an equal opportunity to make the same choices that other players can make, isn't that really all the game balancing that we need developers to do?

If I am provided with the same information that you are, isn't the game balanced at that point? Perhaps the bigger issue with game balance isn't really balance at all. Maybe it's the choices players make after being provided the same information as other players. Specifically, the bad choices.. i.e. my character isn't as powerful as yours so the game must be imbalanced.

So what if Player A has the ability to bring down the big bad wolf in melee quicker than any other class. There can be many paths to the big bad wolf's demise. And each can be as interesting as melee combat IF the developers deem it to be so.

In a game where everything and everyone is balanced, there are neither winners or losers, only non-winners and non-losers. Now when's the last time you searched online for a game in which you could have fun, but wouldn't win or lose?

Instead of developers spending countless hours ensuring that we are all exactly as powerful as each other, shouldn't we be screaming at them to stop wasting time on that and encouraging them to create unique and interesting alternatives to "balance"... regardless of whether they are balanced or not!

 #MMORPG   #RPG   #GameDev   #MindsGaming    #Indie