Erenshor - a single player MMORPG

[Turn_BASED]

Found on r/pcgaming, tl;dr, it’s a single player game meant to mimic classic MMORPGs with bots inhabiting the world, pretending to be other players.

From the dev’s leddit post:

Erenshor: A Single Player MMORPG?​

“Hey all! I'm excited to share my game "Erenshor" - a "Single Player MMORPG" or, probably more accurately, a "Simulated MMORPG".

Trailer

Erenshor is made to walk in the footsteps of EverQuest- in style, gameplay, and 'feel'. It offers a huge open world, rare items, rare spawn monsters, secret quests, that wonderful 'mmorpg grind', but you do it on your time, along side the dozens of 'simulated players' that populate the game alongside you.

The Capital City Marketplace

The idea behind Erenshor is that a lot of us 90s gamers are getting older. We love MMORPGs, but we can't set aside the time to commit to hours of grouping, raiding, or other things with actual people without the guilt of having to leave in the middle of something and leaving our friends high-and-dry.

Ready for Adventure!

Erenshor lets you experience that MMORPG gameplay, but you can quit whenever you want, and be welcomed back with open arms when you log back in.

The Simulated Players will progress on their own, if you're playing or not. While you're online you'll run into them doing quests, selling items in the city, grouping with one another, camping the exact spawn you wanted to camp (just steal it from them, they're fake... but they'll remember!), and even talking trash in the global channels.

However, they'll stay 'tethered' to your character, so you'll never log back in to seeing all your friends no longer within your level range. No FOMO here.

Battle!

You'll tackle world bosses, and even raids together. You may even accomplish a few 'server firsts' in your game, and be recognized accordingly. This is an MMORPG where you've got a real shot to the be the player who everyone looks up to.

Prepping for a world boss

Every time you log onto Erenshor (it's actually fully offline, by the way), you can do whatever you want. Your friends will be there waiting to hang out.

---

I've dreamt of making this game for a long, long time. I love games where I can log in and just aimlessly 'work on my character' in any way I choose. There's a pretty alpha-based demo on Steam right now that gets regular updates, and I love feedback - I get better from feedback.
If you like oldschool MMORPGs, I bet this is right up your alley. If you were raised on the newer stuff, some systems may feel a bit alien, but I promise they're based on the tried-and-true design of the older games.”

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

why?

 

[Turn_BASED]

why?

Zoomers/Gen Alpha are terrified of human interaction. This is the first MMORPG they'll be able to actually play for more than 10 mins.

 

[luj1]

Erenshor is made to walk in the footsteps of EverQuest- in style, gameplay, and 'feel'.

anvi

 

[Old Hans]

that reminds me, I remember playing a single player mmo type game that reminded me of everquest many many years ago.

 

[Frank Capicoli]

why?

Some people enjoyed Kingdoms of Amalur I guess.

 

[Tyranicon]

But we already have Dragon Age Inquisition.

 

[Baron Tahn]

So it's like a S(imulated)M(ultiplayer)RPG? Not an MMO.

I also find myself wondering why you wouldnt just make a regular party based RPG with cool party members to pick from but make them clever bots that do their own shopping and gear themselves but you can override it. Thatd be pretty cool, pretty dynamic.

 

[Hellraiser]

I wouldn't mind a sandbox RPG that tries to simulate some sandboxy "emergent gameplay" found in some MMOs: inter-guild butthurt/conflict, rising in guild ranks, player-driven economy, PKing making some places unsafe, PKing assholes that piss you off so much you recognize their names, PKing erupting into major guild on guild violence turning an area into a warzone, chat open channel flamewars causing more PvP violence etc.

But I honestly wouldn't throw in the whole MMO experience minus the people into such a thing. Especially the fucking grind, the guy is also quite retarded in that he ackowledges "people don't have the time" but wants to put the grind in. Baffling. And of course the gameplay, which I get some people might be nostalgic for, but some mechanics were built around people having laughable internet connection speeds and a singleplayer game should honestly do something better with combat and other gameplay mechanics that wouldn't work in a normal MMO.

 

[Burgee4150]

Hey folks, Developer of Erenshor here. My google alerts told me about this thread so I thought I'd jump in.

I see a little bit of uh... disagreement with the idea. That's fine, the game's a pretty niche thing. There's been a lot of excitement around it, but there's also a lot of people who ask "why the hell would I ever play that?"

To hit a few of the points so far:

I'm not a zoomer, I'm a 38 year old with a family, kids, and other things that pull me away from gaming. I love MMORPGs... I grew up on EverQuest. As life changed, I got sick of leaving my pals high and dry by having to ditch on a moment's notice. I ended up just soloing all the time, and those games aren't really built for soloing... so I'm making one that is. I love the grind, the dopamine of a rare drop, and all that good stuff.

For folks with social anxiety, I guess yeah... it'd be good for them too.

The game does feature around 100 simulated players, they exist in the game whether you're playing or not. You can gear them yourself, or they'll gear themselves on their own. It's all simulated in real time. You'll need them to have decent gear for high end content, so helping them speeds that along.

The best part? Content doesn't scale to your level

Happy to answer any other questions you guys have. It's a one man project, so I'm the guy with the info!

 

[anvi]

that reminds me, I remember playing a single player mmo type game that reminded me of everquest many many years ago.

Minions of Mirth? I love that game.

 

[anvi]

As for this game I agree with what's said above. Also the graphics are pretty fugly to me. I can enjoy low tech stuff like KOTC but a 3D world like this needs to look nice and this one looks bad. Lego characters with bad environments etc. Even 25+ year old EQ is much better looking.

 

[luj1]

why?

Some people enjoyed Kingdoms of Amalur I guess.

Underrated example

It's essentially TW3 gameplay

 

[Naraya]

I think this is the saddest thing I have seen today.

 

[Cryomancer]

Will be a mindless gear farming, cooldown managing boredom?

 

[Burgee4150]

Will be a mindless gear farming, cooldown managing boredom?

Gear farm, xp grind, cooldown management is part of it, yes.

It plays just like an mmorpg. If you don't enjoy that gameplay and play mmos only for the social aspect then Erenshor is really not going to speak to you.

It's for us weirdos who enjoy mindless gameplay. We're dozens!

 

[Cryomancer]

It's for us weirdos who enjoy mindless gameplay. We're dozens!

Yep. But I like the social aspect of mmos but hate mmo mechanics. Really wish that we got mmos that are akin to multiplayer version of good single player games, like Ultima Online and Dark Sun Online : Crimson Sands

 

[Burgee4150]

It's for us weirdos who enjoy mindless gameplay. We're dozens!

Yep. But I like the social aspect of mmos but hate mmo mechanics. Really wish that we got mmos that are akin to multiplayer version of good single player games, like Ultima Online and Dark Sun Online : Crimson Sands

You're absolutely the majority.

I really started Erenshor because I kept googling "single player mmorpg" and never found a game, but found lots of people asking the same thing.

I started working on it 2 years back, mentioned it on Reddit a few times and here it is with a awesome discord community and a growing steam wishlist chart.

Honestly, I never expected this much attention but I feel a whole lot less weird now that other people have shown the same interest as me.

Im not really here to talk you all into the idea, but I enjoy chatting about it and like to hear what peoples reservations with the idea are.

 

[TedNugent]

It's for us weirdos who enjoy mindless gameplay. We're dozens!

Yep. But I like the social aspect of mmos but hate mmo mechanics. Really wish that we got mmos that are akin to multiplayer version of good single player games, like Ultima Online and Dark Sun Online : Crimson Sands

I don't know if it's the MMO mechanics that make the social interaction so poisonous, but I generally find interacting with players in WoW to be cancer. Guild Wars is definitely a lot less toxic, but people tend to either blob into farming groups to run circuits or run around doing their own thing. At least it's so sandboxy that people tend to be a lot more laid back, even when doing their daily chores. You can't generally chill and interact when strangers when they are literally seething about drop rates, loot allocation, people standing in fire, or having to go to get some progress bar filled before weekly reset in the morning.

The most fun I ever had in WoW was the For the Horde achievements, since they were actually organically organized and executed, and they were actually in the world instead of some stupid dungeon instance.

 

[HappyDaddyWow!]

Hey folks, Developer of Erenshor here. My google alerts told me about this thread so I thought I'd jump in.

I see a little bit of uh... disagreement with the idea. That's fine, the game's a pretty niche thing. There's been a lot of excitement around it, but there's also a lot of people who ask "why the hell would I ever play that?"

To hit a few of the points so far:

I'm not a zoomer, I'm a 38 year old with a family, kids, and other things that pull me away from gaming. I love MMORPGs... I grew up on EverQuest. As life changed, I got sick of leaving my pals high and dry by having to ditch on a moment's notice. I ended up just soloing all the time, and those games aren't really built for soloing... so I'm making one that is. I love the grind, the dopamine of a rare drop, and all that good stuff.

For folks with social anxiety, I guess yeah... it'd be good for them too.

The game does feature around 100 simulated players, they exist in the game whether you're playing or not. You can gear them yourself, or they'll gear themselves on their own. It's all simulated in real time. You'll need them to have decent gear for high end content, so helping them speeds that along.

The best part? Content doesn't scale to your level

Happy to answer any other questions you guys have. It's a one man project, so I'm the guy with the info!

Don't take the harsh comments here too seriously. Kenshi has gameplay and leveling similar to MMO games while being a single player game and it was a massive hit.

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

Gear farm, xp grind, cooldown management is part of it, yes.

look, people suffer that kind of stuff because there's the social aspect of the game. if you take the mmo away you either deliver an exceptional rpg (which you ain't going to do) or provide a stunning amount of systems and upgrades to put atlantica to shame. otherwise you're just selling the worst progress quest ever.

 

[Burgee4150]

Hey folks, Developer of Erenshor here. My google alerts told me about this thread so I thought I'd jump in.

I see a little bit of uh... disagreement with the idea. That's fine, the game's a pretty niche thing. There's been a lot of excitement around it, but there's also a lot of people who ask "why the hell would I ever play that?"

To hit a few of the points so far:

I'm not a zoomer, I'm a 38 year old with a family, kids, and other things that pull me away from gaming. I love MMORPGs... I grew up on EverQuest. As life changed, I got sick of leaving my pals high and dry by having to ditch on a moment's notice. I ended up just soloing all the time, and those games aren't really built for soloing... so I'm making one that is. I love the grind, the dopamine of a rare drop, and all that good stuff.

For folks with social anxiety, I guess yeah... it'd be good for them too.

The game does feature around 100 simulated players, they exist in the game whether you're playing or not. You can gear them yourself, or they'll gear themselves on their own. It's all simulated in real time. You'll need them to have decent gear for high end content, so helping them speeds that along.

The best part? Content doesn't scale to your level

Happy to answer any other questions you guys have. It's a one man project, so I'm the guy with the info!

Don't take the harsh comments here too seriously. Kenshi has gameplay and leveling similar to MMO games while being a single player game and it was a massive hit.

Thanks, I'm not here to fight with folks or to 'sell' people on the game. I just wanted to pop in and be available for the conversation if I could add anything to it. Kenshi looks awesome, it's in my library waiting for me to brave the learning curve I hear so much about.

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

Only Steam? No chance of GOG or Itch.io?

 

[grimace]

Burgee4150
Will there be simulated PVP?

 

[Burgee4150]

Only Steam? No chance of GOG or Itch.io?

It has been accepted on GOG.com, so that's being considered, depending on the distribution agreement they send over.