The Flaws of the "Fantasy" MMO Genre

Exploration

A lot of fantasy MMOs seem to lack what fantasy is all about: Exploration. Worlds feel small in most MMOs and lack life. My ideal fantasy MMO needs to have vast open lands to explore, and most fail in this category. A lot don't get buildings and structures quite right to a character's body proportions. What I mean when I say this is that buildings often seem too small, even castles, making them feel wholly unrealistic (and not in a good unrealistic "fantasy" way).

Mounts

Most fantasy MMOs seem to think that they can add any mounts into their game, willy-nilly, with not a care on the impact it makes to the realism of that said world. They add ridiculous mounts like flaming horses to fill the world (or even worse the overly cute ones that make me think they're trying to add a bit of Maplestory to their game), and make everyone look like an awesome hero. It makes it very hard to submerge yourself into the beauty and lore of games when there is a player going around riding on a crocodile mount. And don't get me started on the sparkling mounts...

I mean really... A giant pink bunny? Why... Why?!

Races (or lack-of)

The fantasy genre is a huge one and there are tons of races to be had that are not trade marked and yet what race do we continue seeing in almost every single fantasy MMO?

What's that? Oh yeah, elves... That and dwarves. Why when there is the use of amazing races such as dragons, centaurs, fairies, unicorns, brownies, genies, and so many more are fantasy MMOs consistently using elves?! I know it's not because players are clamoring for it. I'm fairly sure most of us are sick of seeing the uninspired "humans with pointy ears" trope. Developers do it because it is easy to do and doesn't require any use of the imagination.

Overly Ridiculous Fluff-Items

Somethings just shouldn't belong in fantasy MMOs... Developers don't seem to be able to wrap their heads around that one though and continue adding over-the-top fluff items that only contribute to making fantasy MMOs leave sour tastes in some player's mouths.

As an example above, as you can see Vindictus seems to think guys in medieval settings wore tight heart boxers... I understand that F2P MMOs need to earn cash somehow so they do it through fluff-items, but they could at least try and make their fluff-items make some sense in the fantasy MMO setting. Of course I somehow doubt that will happen anytime soon (if ever).

Those folks, are my the big reasons why I am starting to hate the fantasy MMO genre. Which is also sad because it's my favorite genre. Unfortunately it's continuously being ruined by most developers and gaming companies. I hope in the near future we see a fantasy MMO that brings something unique to the table. I was happy to see Guild Wars 2 had such unique races, but it's pretty pathetic when it's one of the only newer AAA MMOs to have unique races and an explorable world that isn't ruined by unrealistic mounts running around everywhere (and hopefully that won't change).

Comments? Share away please (keep it clean though or your comment will be deleted, thanks).