Morally Gray
The world is not black and white. Well, it can be but it is not often overtly so. Paper thin moral dilemmas were always a poor trope of video game storytelling.
In Knights of the Old Republic, most decisions were the choice of helping and old lady across the street or pushing her in front of the oncoming bus. There was very little real character development because all of the choices were so simplistic. Even Mass Effect's choices were very simple.
My favorite RPG of recent memory is The Witcher. Almost every choice in that game is picking between two shades of gray. The two main factions in The Witcher are some second class citizens oppressed to the point of becoming terrorists and a knightly order that is often racist but helps keep the peace and protect the citizens.
You can choose to support either side in the game or often just stay neutral. Neither side is the "good" choice but staying neutral can also have some consequences. There are many decisions like this in the game and The Witcher is the only time I have actually had to walk away from the game for a while to contemplate my decisions.
I know Bioware is always heralded as great RPG story tellers but in the past their story telling has resorted to the paper thin moral dilemmas. This all comes to mind since tonight I will get to start playing Dragon Age: Origins. Hopefully Bioware took storytelling further in this game since I know there are multi-hour long origin stories for each character (unlike Mass Effect which only has a slight change to the intro dialog depending on origin).
Feeling Compelled
I have not felt compelled to play Aion lately. I actually have not logged into it for over a week. Last week was when the free month ended and I had planned on having the subscription auto update but in the last month I got a new debit card so the subscription auto cancelled. I have not felt compelled to go update my payment info.
Aion is a game I want so desperately to love but at this point it cannot hold my interest when I look forward and only see a mountain of grind. To be quite honest, I do not know if any MMO can really hold my interest right now. My will to grind has quickly been slipping. As of right now, the only active subscription I have is World of Warcraft but I doubt I will ever fully cancel that subscription as I often venture back there for a day or two a month.
Call me a simpleton, but I am growing tired of having to work for my gratification in gaming. When I look at my gaming choices I think "I could go grind along a breadcrumb trail for some gratification or I could go play a non-MMO and get my gratification instantly."
Torchlight completely consumed me for the last week and Dragon Age: Origins is unlocking on Steam today (it actually should be unlocked by the time this is posted). Left 4 Dead 2 is coming out in a couple weeks, Mass Effect 2 is coming out in January, and Bioshock 2 is coming out in February. Singleplayer and multiplayer non-mmo games are making it hard for me to even think of MMOs.
I do not think I am falling out with MMOs completely. For me though, I prefer a deep storyline in the games I play. I do not think storytelling and MMO gameplay have to be mutually exclusive. I know Syncaine prefers the sandbox where the players tell the story. Personally, I think sandbox games are just better for those who have time to get into the politics of the game.
I love the story woven into games like Wizard 101 and Guild Wars. I also, though many will disagree, think World of Warcraft has a very compelling story. Perhaps what I really want is massively multiplayer online single player games. I just want the depth of story in a single player game in the environment of an MMO.
Bioware may be able to deliver on this with The Old Republic (I hope anyway). My main drawback on that is that I was never a huge Star Wars fan. It is not that I do not like Star Wars, I was just never "into it" like other people seemed to be. Well, here is to hoping.