The Best (and Worst!) Community MMO games of 2009

Daniel Tack has been playing MMO's since they came into existence and loves competitive online gaming. With a degree in Journalism from Michigan State University, the only thing Dan likes more than playing games is writing about them!

As the year draws to a close it's time to take a look at the games that are great to sit down to with a cup of hot cocoa and a stash of Bawls, and your best E-friends.  Any game is great when you play with people you already know, but we're going to look at which games scored big for having great communities with people you don't already know, or are places that anyone sane should think twice before entering the wasteland of the internet.

1)Lord of the Rings Online (THE GOOD)

Whether you love Turbine's PVE-centric LOTRO or not, it definitely has the friendliest MMORPG community out there from the get go.  You will have friend requests, guild invites, and people offering to help from the second you leave the Shire, cheap Lord of the Rings gold on your quest to stab little boars, bears, and wolves on your way up to becoming a Nazgûl slayer.

The LOTRO community is hands down the best out there, seemingly comprised of refugees from other games where l33t-dudes and e-thugs have taken over.  If you're looking to escape from the cries of “OMFG NOOB your GEARSCORE is too low to group with me!” then you may want to explore the lands of Middle Earth with this game.

Unlike many other games the community in LOTRO really gets into things, and it's very common to see high level characters spending their time literally just helping out lowbies through dungeons and quests, and the real shocker is if you're looking for help or have a question in general chat, you'll likely get it instead of being trolled by half the server.

2)World of Warcraft (THE AVERAGE)

This is a real hit or miss, and experiences may differ greatly from server to server and guild to guild.  Depending on where and who you end up with, WoW is either a great community game or somewhere down in the dregs with some of the other title's we'll discuss later.  If you find a good guild to hang out in, you'll probably have a great time exploring Azeroth...  If you don't, you'll be relegated to what is known as The Pug Zone, and this is a place of sheer terror and suffering.

The Pug Zone is not a place for cute little toy dogs, buy wow gold but a place where “pick up groups” will determine your community interaction.  You will likely be grouped with the standard denizens these groups seem to attract without fail – a lootwhore raid leader with an e-peen as big as a bus, his e-girlfriend who won't stop complaining, and about 20 people who have no idea what they are doing but will place the blame of any failure on everyone but themselves.  Three of the people will go afk for dinner approximately halfway through the boss pull, and come back when it's time for the loot to be handed out (if you are lucky enough to get to that).

The Pug Zone is not unique to WoW and should be avoided in any game that it exists in – Your mileage in WoW's community environment will vary greatly depending on who you end up playing with.

3)League of Legends, Heroes of Newerth, DOTA (THE UGLY)

If you're looking for a title that won't raise your blood pressure you may want to steer clear, as these titles share a lot of the same community.  If you're looking to find out what the definition of nerd-rage is, all you have to do is join a game of one of these and you'll be treated to flaming, trolling, probably a few death threats or comments about your mother and what they'd like to do with her with a rusty rake.  And that's just on the hero selection screen!

Explanations of why the community is so poor in these MOBA titles are varied – It's a competitive game, you only play with the same people for about an hour, and there's a good degree of anonymity to it, so it really brings out the inner demons in people when a poor new player stumbles into an enemy ambush.

The MOBA genre is incredibly rewarding, but it gets a negative 9000 for community – if you're going to jump into one of these games you'll want to bring a flame retardant vest and a sturdy bat to defend yourself with.  Basically, just imagine you're in a prison cell with a bunch of people who really, really don't like you, and then the power goes out in the cell block.  That's what your first foray into these kind of games will likely feel like.

So this holiday season jump into a game that's right for you, whether you're a fun loving elf or a pwner of noobs, there's a community out there for you in today's MMO world.