death_valley

Yeah, unfortunately Ragnarok kinda got hit by the good ol' "streamlining" that most long-running MMORPGs get. It got turned into a really linear "grab quests and move to the next area" type of game. Of course the core gameplay isn't that different but the freedom of progression is gone. Which is a shame because the the new class upgrades are really neat. But the other changes were a deal breaker to older players which lead to a bunch of pre-renewal private servers. :u

Yeah FF14 is a fairly casual game but it's definitely a timesink. Especially if you want to do endgame stuff, lots of time sinks with dailies and stuff to get further on the gear treadmill. xD But generally it's great, I mean it's an FF game so it has great art direction, music and an awesome story. Like the story kinda starts off slow but really picks up and gets very interesting As for Ragnarok Online...It was definitely a very oldschool Korean MMO, but what set it apart was the artstyle, music, huge class tree and level of customization you can do when it comes to building characters. Every class was unique and very viable, things got taken a little further though by the sheer amount of unique builds you could use with each class. Like just because you played a priest you weren't limited to being a heal slave or something, undead enemies are damaged by heals so you could be very successful playing solo if you just stick to maps with high amounts of undead enemies. Like there was one very popular map called Glast Heim that you'd basically see death squads of healers running around on to level. xD Which was another thing I forgot to mention. There wasn't really a linear path to leveling, you seriously could go wherever you wanted...that's in your level range at least for most classes, some classes had the advantage of being able to farm stationary enemies that are much higher level due to being ranged attackers. But yeah, all in all it was so loved because of that freedom of progression it offered.

Same, I kinda stopped playing MMOs because of work as well. I still play Final Fantasy XIV though, and I play a Runeblade in Maplestory 2. I play it really casually though because I was more interested in non-combat related features to be 100% honest. xD Though back when I had so many hours of free time I played basically every MMORPG at some point. With the first one I ever played being Ragnarok Online. I still have some very rose-tinted nostalgia goggles when it comes to that game. xD