I’ll admit it. I just like talking about handling multiple MMOs so that I can spend a half-hour Google image searching the most crazy juggling picture.
So if you have any semblance of a life, school, or work responsibilities, chances are that it’s a little difficult to handle more than one of these time-sucking MMOs at once. Many people stick to just one at a time, and I’ve certainly done that. But I usually can’t resist dabbling in a buffet of online goodness, and because of that I’ve had to experiment with different methods of juggling MMOs.
Over the years, I’ve found that there’s really four different ways for a time-strapped gamer to engage in multiple titles, and wanted to share those along with the pros and cons of each.
1. Game by the hour
This method tries to get the best of all worlds every day by dividing up your available game time by the number of MMOs you want to keep tabs on. So if you have three hours and three games, you give each one hour apiece for that day. Two hours and four games? 30-minute play sessions.
Pros: You keep all of the games fresh in your mind, since you’re logging in daily to each of them. You experience a wide variety on a daily basis. You make some progress in all games daily.
Cons: Advancement will be slow. You won’t be able to do time-intensive activities, like dungeon runs. You’ll often just be getting into one game and then have to switch to another. It’s hard to shift mental gears like that so often.
2. Different day, different MMO
This is a little like number one, except that you divvy up your days instead of hours. Three days a week for WoW, two for STO, one for Aion, and one as a wild card.
Pros: You get to devote your full attention to just one game for that day. A longer play session allows you to do more activities, including dungeon runs.
Cons: It’s more difficult to keep track of progress and goals, since it could be days between logging into a particular title. You may really want to spend time with a game but have to wait days to go back to it.
3. Group play
In this method, you join a dedicated group or team that meets on a regular basis (usually weekly) to tackle the game together at a cooperative pace.
Pros: You’re always assured of having a group. It’s great for games that you’re okay with only playing once a week. Lots of community and socializing.
Cons: You won’t be able to go at your own pace or play that character otherwise. Playing weekly means that it will be hard to remember how to play your character or what you were doing.
4. Do whatever you feel like
This is the least structured out of all of these methods. In it, you simply decide that night what games you want to play, whether it be one or several.
Pros: This allows for the most flexibility according to your moods, schedule, and desires. You’re not forcing yourself to play a game that you don’t feel like playing at that moment. If you have strong personal discipline, you could use this method to give equal time to all of the titles in your umbrella of interest.
Cons: Very easy to allow one title to dominate, time-wise, and to allow others to slip into obscurity. Could lead you back to a single-game playstyle much easier than the other methods.
Right now I’m going for a #1, but #4 keeps pressuring me. Some nights all I want to play is RIFT right now, while others are balanced with LOTRO. Starting this weekend, I’m going to be tossing TSW into the mix for a while at least, so I’m giving this juggling thing a lot more thought. I may need to structure my time more than I’m doing so right now.
Bio Break 
I’ve been doing #4 for many years. Even when I’m mainly playing one MMO I’m often splitting my time between several servers.
What I often do is have my main play session in one MMO, then play another for a shorter period at the end of the evening. I have a range of “bite-size” MMOs I’m dabbling in, often betas and F2Ps, that I pop into for 30-60 minutes late at night.
At the moment I am going for #2 and #3, depending on the game. I generally don’t forget how to play a character or lose track of what we are working on, but I do have some issues with game controls. For the most part I try to have keybinds the same between games. After playing Guild Wars, though, the next MMO playtime usually finds my character jumping around like a fool as I try using the spacebar to attack. >.<
Now, that picture. What the heck is the middle critter? Is he juggling a sloth?
Or you could draw an MMO name from a hat. That’s what I actually do, and not just limited to games. I let drawing from a hat dictate my other activities too.
I have the following game ‘slots’
1) guild game – main game I commit most time too
2) static game – a second game I play with two RL friends when we can schedule an evening
3) solo casual – one or two games I play by the hour to explore for ‘promotion’ to 1 or 2 above or just because I like them.
So at moment: 1) SWTOR. 2) DDO and Vanguard 3) LoTRO
I also have done a combo of #2 and #3. It kept me playing WoW longer than I would have otherwise, but was fun to play in a regular group. Now I’m a shaky #4: dabbling, but more of a serial mono-gamer.
For me there’s a couple of other factors: what’s going on in the house that night & what I need to get done in each game. When I know I’m going to be distracted a lot (houseguests like the past few days, or watching a movie on TV), I prefer to play Wurm, because I can work on crafting easily by queueing up actions. If it’s fairly quiet and I can immerse myself in a game, I prefer the theme-parkish quest-based MMOs (Rift or WoW). I’ve even managed to multi-task games at times – crafting in Wurm while questing in Rift or WoW – although that can make your brain hurt if you do it for too long. 😉
I tried to do #2 for a while, but then came the fact that I just can’t play games every day. So then, when I next got the chance, could I play the game I played last? This lasted for about two weeks, and then I fell out of the mood, and didn’t play a single game for a week. Once back into it, I reverted to #4. I’d try #3, but between and hour or two is all I usually get.
Whoops, I meant in the last sentence, I’d try #1, but between an hour or two is all I usually get. I am doing #3 right now, too, but I’m not really good at scheduling the time to be open to play.
#4 for me. The way I see it, you should play what you feel like playing, otherwise why play at all? MMOs are there for fun, not as a job.
I think I’m picking a combination of #1 and #4. I have been involved with several browser games, but I was missing…. quests and real stories and such. So it’s back to Lotro for now (getting back in there after computer problems 😀 ). So, although it’s not multiple games at the moment I have to juggle, I am looking for a balance between work, household and husband, Lotro, blogging and reading blogs. I think the Per hour might be good and then depending on the mood, whichever I’m in the mood for most, comes first.
Thanks for the insight, Syp!
Or you can try playing more than one at the same time. EVE Online is great for this as a lot of stuff only requires a few seconds attention every few minutes. I used raid in WoW and SWtOR while mining or ratting in EVE on the other screen(s). Early on in TOR I got a reputation for jumping off cliffs and ledgers and now I can accidently do it due to not looking at the right screen and people don’t even notice 🙂