A Green Mushroom

I'm totally burned out on MMOs at the moment. So, I have a question for all of you out there currently playing MMOs.  What keeps you coming back day after day?  What makes you excited to play your MMO of choice? I need to hear some positive things about MMOs to get back into the mood.  Every time I think about them all I can think of is the grind and it's a complete turn-off from the genre. Let me know, what do you love about your current MMO?

After discussing leveling the playing field while adding new content I want to mention another option for expansion packs.  Instead of adding content and levels, these expansion packs (and sometimes patches) can add new features to the game. People may have different definitions for features and content.  For my purposes, features are things which add new ways to play the game.  These are also known as horizontal gameplay options. Content, on the other hand, adds new options for vertical advancement through the game. Here are some quick examples of my working definitions.  The looking for dungeon tool that was added to WoW in a recent patch is a feature.  It gives players a new way to organize and play the game at all levels.  But, when WoW patches in new high-end raids they are adding content.  Players need to be at the top levels to continue into the new raid, which will then gain them better gear.  This is a type of vertical advancement. ...

I have mentioned before that I like achievements.  They add replayability and diversity to game play.  It's nice to see one pop up while playing the game normally, but there is a huge sense of accomplishment when I complete an achievement that I've been striving for. I replayed Portal last night because of achievements . Portal is a great game in its own right but I haven't thought about replaying it for quite some time. That changed last week when Valve released an update for Portal which added hidden radios throughout the game.  The player needs to retrieve the radios and then take them to an unspecified location in the level, then the radio tunes and gives a secret message.  There is an achievement for doing this with all 26 radios.  These messages have led to an entire mystery surrounding Portal 2. Now the community has a mystery to solve, players have new goals to achieve, and Portal 2 is building some hype.  As usual with achievements, everybo...