Non Gamer looking for WoW alternatives

[Discus]

WoW is the only game I've seriously played. However, myself and our remaining guildies are playing less and less. We'd like to move to something new together but don't know where to start. Rift looks good but is it just a better looking WoW? We need a big change. What about Eve? Anyone played it? It looks very different but is it all PVP?
Starcraft 2 maybe?

We'd like something where we can play together, preferably with a large PVE component, with group runs. For me something that doesn't involve bloody Elves n Pixies n stuff would be good too.

[Masumi]

http://mmohuts.com/
reviews for free MMOs you can try

[Kelaan]

Rift looks good but is it just a better looking WoW? We need a big change. What about Eve? Anyone played it? It looks very different but is it all PVP? Starcraft 2 maybe?

We'd like something where we can play together, preferably with a large PVE component, with group runs. For me something that doesn't involve bloody Elves n Pixies n stuff would be good too.

How many are you wanting to migrate with? SC2 has a large SKILL gradient, in that some people are Very Good and others (like me) are abysmally bad, and the two groups will derive very little fun from playing together.

Eve has some PvE, I hear, but mainly it's either an economy+politics game, or a piracy game - or both at once. If you don't like getting ganked, or don't like PvE deaths to bend you over a barrel as well, you might not like it.

D&D Online is Yet Another MMO; no realy PvP, and lots of dungeoning. Worth a try, as it's free to play. (You can pay for subscriptions or for specific quest/dungeon packs, too. You can buy most of the good ones for the cost of roughly three+ months, but then even the free to play stuff is both fun and challenging, so far. I've enjoyed it.)

Have you considered moving away from an MMO to something like a cooperative shooter game (left 4 dead, or team-based games like CS or Call of Duty)? You say you're a "non-gamer" so I suspect that might not appeal to you, but it has the advantage of letting you balance teams somewhat, and play with more than only a few friends at a time. I thoroughly enjoyed Borderlands, but it's only for up to three friends, and after a while it loses its shiny as it's basically Yet More Item Collection once you beat all of the content.

Look at some of the indie games offered on the Humble Bundle ( http://www.humblebundle.com/ ) or as part of the Portal 2 promotion on Steam -- some look like fun, and cooperative... but not really on the scale of a guild. Almost the only thing I can think of that supports that is a team-based shooter, or Yet Another MMO.

Or playing a virtual stock market, but then I don't even know if that exists.

[bldavis]

if you are looking for something completely different from wow, then you could try World of Tanks
its a pvp based tank battle sim, but its not a direct sim of the tanks, but more arcadey

it does have a bit of a skill gradient, like SC2, but not as severe
you start out in light PoS tanks, and work your way up to the heavies like Tigers and Shermans (ok ok shermans are a high-mid tier medium tank w/e)

its generally the higher tier of tank = more skill (just cause it takes a while to get the highest tier of tanks)
the game play encourages teamwork, and there are different roles to play

best of all it is F2P

i have played it since closed beta, and am now playing it live

the only bad thing is you have to pay real money to start a clan (WoT for guild)

[sahiel]

I found LotRO was pretty excellent and would definitely recommend it to people looking for another MMO, there was a metric ton of free content for it and more is being released regularly, you can buy 'adventure packs' one at a time so it's not even much to get the full thing if you wanted. The gameplay was solid and I really enjoyed it, Tippo (D503) played it a bunch as well I recall so he may have something to add, good or bad. It certainly helped I had read and was a fan of the books because halfway through the story quests i'd stop and go "Oh shit... that distant flaring fire I can see has to be Aragorn and the hobbits fighting the ring wraiths on Weathertop... amg!" Lots of those moments where you're doing something close to or in the background of important book events really made me feel like a part of the story.

Rifts... I cancelled my sub and so did a few other friends, it looks lovely, I like the ease of switching souls and the versatility it gives you, love the Rifts and the whole public quest style they adapted and grew from Warhammer but in the end... to me it just ended up seemingly like a less challenging WoW, you could literally just stand there and beat most dungeon bosses to death, same for Rift bosses. Once I hit level 50 the game lost a lot of appeal, not for lack of content, for lack of challenge in the content that was available, that said, it certainly didn't help that for PvP my server was basically a free win for the other side almost every match given they'd have 2-3 healers in a 10 man game, we'd be lucky to have 1 off spec healer, which clearly may not be problem on other servers depending on population and class makeup.

[Lightbeard]

League of Legends

[Hokahey]

We'd like something where we can play together, preferably with a large PVE component, with group runs. For me something that doesn't involve bloody Elves n Pixies n stuff would be good too.

Overall, from your description, LoTRO is probably what you're looking for, your elf bias aside. It is substantially different from WoW, but it is still a PvE-centric, small group oriented game (even moreso than WoW). The clincher details to me, if there are any, is that LoTRO has a strong following, and has been around for several years. Basically, its reasonably successful and very stable. If I were to leave WoW for another MMO, it would almost certainly be LoTRO, at this point.

[Euphoria]

League of Legends

This.

[bldavis]

League of Legends

This.

easy to pickup

insanely difficult to master
but fun as hell once you learn a few tricks

[Discus]

Thanks all, some great well informed advice as I thought I'd get.

Before WoW the only games that hooked me at all (and nothing like to the extent of WoW) were real time strategy games. Most other games leave me cold.

I'm not a fan of very hard games, I'm too old. But I do like games where time played = non reversible improvement (be that in a civilisation you are building or a character through levelling and gear).

I have no interest in a game that makes you start from scratch each time you are killed (Eve? looks that way from the ads, silly idea).

Basically I have an addictive personality and want something as addictive as WoW used to be. Complexity and the ability to grind out skills/farm and get better gear.

LoTR sounds tempting and I used to love Tolkien. What I'd ideally like to see though is a space version of WoW - you upgrade a ship with weapons/armour instead of a character. There seems quite a demand for this but no one's yet nailed it as I'm hearing Eve is a gankfest for pvpers and SC2 far too hard for the masses. Someone's going to get really rich when they work out a space version of WoW. Maybe I should just hang on 'til then...

[bldavis]

SC2 is hard if you make it hard

if you ladder and dont have the twitch reflexes, it could be tough
but the campaign is VERY fun, and infuriating at times

overall a great RTS
its almost like having 3 different RTS games in one with the races
coming from a game like AoE, this was a nice shock and change for me at least

[Kelaan]

What about multiplayer Minecraft?

[Fivelives]

In Eve, you only start from scratch if you're pod-killed and don't have insurance. But yeah, you can lose trillions because hey, your ship just got shot out from under you.

And the gankers are relatively easy to avoid in high-security areas, but it's a risk/reward thing - if you want the low risk/low return options, stay in high-sec. Low-sec areas are high risk and usually insanely high rewards.

[Discus]

Not sure if it ever made it across the pond but I guess I'm looking for an MMO version of a game called Elite, a 25 year old space levelling game I once played on my BBC micro (yes I am that old).

Thinking about it Elite has a lot to answer for, probably why I ended up playing WoW too

[PsiVen]

Team FPS games like the Left 4 Dead series and various other online shooters are great for a group of friends. But since you're looking to "replace" WoW, only an MMO will really work.

I don't recommend bothering with the various free ones, or games like LotRO/Rift/etc. that sound similar to WoW. They sound that way because they are, and especially if you're sick of high fantasy settings you won't be getting anything different out of them. Switching to these games would make sense if you were tired of WoW because the content was getting stale.

Unfortunately there just aren't many good options for MMOs outside of high fantasy. Star Trek Online could work if you're a big Trek fan (but you wouldn't be asking), and the various superhero MMOs all have major design flaws but would appeal if you like that sort of thing. The closest thing I've found has been toying with Spacebuild in Garrysmod. With a few friends you can really burn away hours designing sophisticated spaceships. But again, that won't replace an MMO and the only saved progress you have is your own design work.

You're right, the world is just waiting for a space MMO as mainstream and quality as WoW. Maybe The Old Republic will give us that, or maybe we'll have to wait for Blizzard's secret project.

If you've never played Civilization, that might cover your fix for a different setting, but it really works best in singleplayer unless you can get, say, your wife to play with you for 12 hours at a time.