Back at it again with another top 3 hexbear favorites: this time your favorite top 3 mmorpgs.

For me its:

Ultima Online
Final Fantasy XI
Ragnarok Online

UO was a game I just recently discovered and it's fantastic, best sandbox experience I've ever had in a game.

FFXI was another recent discovery. It took the formula from Everquest and made it better. The game is even less grindy today with the QOL changes.

RO was a big part of my teenage years. I love the look of the game, it reminds me of Final Fantasy Tactics. It's a great casual game to just pop into and grind out some levels or explore.

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EVE-Online
Path of Exile
Ragnarok Online
Why yes, I am an excel wizard.
- I forgot about PoE, but I don't count aRPG diablo esque games to be quite MMORPG (largely bc you can't completely ignore multiplayer besides trading)
- Ragnarok Online
  Fellow RO head.
  
  LotusRO was my server back in the day.
- First Runescape of I imagine many lol
- Oldschool, or just from playing pre eoc? Or do you like rs3
I'm an oldhead that stopped playing mmos around the time WOW got popular... so:
Pristontale
Ragnarok Online
Runescape (classic)
- Pristontale
  TIL South Korea was really pumping out the mmos in the aughts, sadly most of them turned out to be poop.
  
  Yeah it was a great time for a young teenager to play free games. I use to search for free MMORPGs all the time and there were new games like every week lol.
  R.O.S.E, Flyff, lineage 2, etc etc
Unfortunately the only traditional MMO I've put any significant time into is SWTOR - which I did enjoy playing as a singleplayer experience, or going through storylines in coop with a friend. The voice acting and storylines for the classes could be great, though there was a lot of variance in quality between them. Too bad it was held up by pretty mediocre gameplay.
I've played a little bit of FFXIV and while I believe what the fans tell me about it, going through early A Realm Reborn stuff was a boring slog which didn't compel me to play more.
If Warframe counts as an MMO then it's my favorite, ez.
The only mmo I've ever played was Toontown
- Toontown
  Any good? Never tried it but it looks cute.
  
  All I remember is that I had fun, but I was like 12. I've been meaning to check out Toontown rewritten
Guild Wars 2
Dofus (retro) / Wakfu (basically the same)
Path of Exile
Any other French/Spanish zoomer who skipped WoW because everyone played the Ankama MMOs?
I'm totally a casual tho I don't think I spent more than 60 hours on GW and PoE each
- even if the game can sometimes feel too compact to feel like a world and more like a theme park instead.
  Pretty standard fare for mmorpgs since WoW, the whole themparkization of questing.
LOTRO? Anyone at all?
- Played it with my brother for a bit after launch, I think I stopped playing around when they added Forochel?
  My main was a Human Champion
- I tried a bit of it a looong time ago and I never got into it, I should try it again.
  
  If you want someone to play with, just DM me. I can never find anyone else interested
FFXIV. While it's been awhile, due to life circumstances, it will always hold a place in my heart.
Rift. I only started after it went F2P, but I had an absolute blast running around in that game. I still adore the Chloromancer/Stormblade as a class concept, running around whacking shit with my electric sword to heal back health.
Florensia. This one is probably a bit obscure, these days. It was a F2P MMO with an added focus on ship building and combat alongside your standard dungeon crawling and such. Cartoony graphics, grindy as hell, and where some early cracks probably started forming in my egg.
It's high up on my list, but I have to admit, it wasn't for the game itself. There was a community there like no other, one that I really felt like myself in. Every day, the same names, the same faces, most of us doing more chatting than anything else.
- I just don't mesh with the overall vibe I get from XIV otherwise I'd give it a try on a trial account.
I've only played a handful. Let's see if I can rank them accurately by fondest memories:
World of Warcraft
Everquest
Ultima online
Guild wars and the old Republic are the runner ups
in a few months i will have put 20 years of my life into world of warcraft, starting at age 7.
so idk what the best mmo is, but i can say with absolute certainty that its not WoW
Star Wars Galaxies (pre-CU/NGE)
???
???
- Star Wars Galaxies (pre-CU/NGE)
  I played on the Basalisk emulated server a couple years ago, classic SWG got me interested in Ultima Online since so much of it's inspiration was taken from that.
  
  The EMU servers are great, I just don't have that kind of time to spend on games anymore.
  In the OG, I played a Bounty Hunter / Carbineer / Ranger chasing down motherfuckers in the middle of nowhere and leading Krayt Dragon hunts. Back when hunting a jedi actually meant something because there was only like a dozen of them on any given server and they were all sweaty no-lifing weirdos.
  I have yet to see any MMORPG with a more robust class or crafting system than OG galaxies.
Classic EverQuest (pre Luclin)
Classic FFXI
Classic WoW
- Classic EverQuest (pre Luclin)
  Fond and painful memories of grouping in Blackburrow and Crushbone and getting killed by trains. I recently tried out modern EQ and there's so much content, plus you can have an npc companion for heals which makes soloing viable.
  
  I can't get into modern, I did project 1999 for awhile but modern sweaty gamers really ruin what it once was. A big part of the fun was logging in and playing with DnD nerds who had no idea that they didn't need to take everything very seriously (socially)
I dont think ive played 3 mmos total
Ff14
2007scape
I loved FFXIV although I last played it during Shadowbringers and I only got a touch through the MSQ there.
As a dad I just have zero time for daily login bonuses. If China ever bans them and it ripples through the industry in a way that makes MMOs quit doing that toxic shit I'd consider coming back, but these days I just don't have the time or energy.
The quests/story were very cool though, and all three roles were pretty fun to play, in the more casual content at least, never touched the really hard stuff, even back in the day I didn't have that amount of time to commit.
- I mean if what you liked in FFXIV was the story, you can be pretty chill about it and not do the daily roulettes (specially since they only really give exp and take time to do). You can even do all the dungeons (and most recent trials) with an npc party, so no need to wait for queues.
  
  No, I do. Also like the gameplay, I just didn't like having up-to-date gear being gated behind either playing an unreasonable amount, or having to play several days of the week to hit cap on tomestones.
Tibia
Monster Hunter Frontier
Dragon's Dogma Online
Anyone who has played Ultima would probably like Tibia. Very similar vibes but Tibia is a game well past its prime.
Honorable mention to Dragon Quest X
- Dragon Quest X
  How is that? I know there's a small english speaking community that plays it but it's still never been localized right?
  
  Correct. See my other reply for more general info on translation. I've pretty much been entirely solo since the game has been out for so long and recommend waiting for private servers to solve some pain points.
- I keep wanting to try DQX or Dragon's Dogma online but assume the installation and translation process is a hassle. Frontier would be amazing to play too, but I don't know if that has an active translation.
  
  DDON is making massive strides right now with both private server feature implementation progress and the English translation has good coverage and improving quality. Check back in like a month or so and I bet it'll be a rock solid experience.
  Frontier is basically ready at this point for most people to check out and play. I'd either play on Renewal or Mezelounge. Many of the Meze people are the same group behind DDON and Meze has a classic server for an older experience.
  DQX uses a mix of manual and realtime translation and is in the worst state of the 3 (as it's on real servers). Once it gets private servers I imagine custom clients will start better solving translation problems.
Phantasy Star Online. I really wanna' try FF11 some day since I seem to like that era of MMORPG more than what's happened since. Would also like to try the SMT Imagine MMO someday if the private servers ever come back.
- I really wanna' try FF11 some day since I seem to like that era of MMORPG more than what's happened since.
  Now's a good time to try! There's private servers that replicate all different eras of the game from classic to modern retail. Or you could give retail a spin as there's a 2 week free trial. I used to play PSO too but only offline.
  
  Is the FFXI signup process still a mess?
Old school RuneScape (or RuneScape 2)
RuneScape (classic)
RuneScape 3
- ok but between MMOs i've played recently it's probably:
  OSRS
  Eve Online
  Albion Online
Tibia??!
Guild Wars
Guild Wars 2
Guild Wars Nightfall
the only MMO I play regularly these days is OSRS, but I did like WoW when I used to play it. I tried playing it again a while ago but every public chat is just a giant klan rally so I had to turn it off.
FFXIV, Guild Wars 1 and 2.
FFXIV the only one I still play. I own GW2 Secrets of the Obscure, but I dunno if I'll ever bother to play it.
- If you play for the story, Secrets of the Obscure will make you quit GW2 for good.
  
  Yeah, I haven't heard great things. I'm hesitant.
1.FFXIV: the only mmo that actually grabbed me, and I tried a lot back in the day 2. Guild Wars 2 : fun open world, combat is refreshing but class fantasy doesn't hit the spot for me. Also have a lot of other small gripes with the game 2 Star Wars The Old Republic: dress up your own jedi game, can't speak for much else other than playing it feels like a dead game, specially on the Republic side.

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