Dealing With The Necessary, But Not-Always-Fun, Busy Work In Online Games

It’s Tuesday and, in a lot of online games, that means reset day, which also means a list of weekly chores for players to knock out. Of course, not all of these things need doing at once, but for some folks, it’s best to get them done as soon as possible as there are other things to do. That and if you don’t knock them out now, there’s always a chance you’ll forget. (Or, at least there is for me.)

Now, before I continue, I should note that these aren’t complaints. After all, I made the choice to play. If I don’t want to do it, I can always walk away. That said, it is worth noting that these weekly activities are just a portion of what there is for players to do in an online game, particularly if it’s a long-running game where the content piles up. If you’re someone who is new to MMORPGs with a backlog of content to do, it can be quite daunting – particularly if you have any designs on completing all the things – because the truth is that in addition to all the things that were already there before you got there, there will be more things going forward.

I’m not a full-on completionist, but I am a story hound. In some games, that means doing the content that friends might tell me to skip for expediency's sake. No side quest must be left alone! Story is locked behind content no one is really doing anymore? I must find a way to get that. Of course, there’s dealing with story content that appears once and after that is gone. This is more of a problem in some games than others.

Good examples are the various F2P gacha action RPGs that are kicking around out there. For example, Genshin Impact and Wuthering Waves have been known to introduce characters in some sort of seasonal event. If you miss those and come back later, you’re suddenly interacting with a character you’ve never met before, but acting like you know who they are. Genshin’s solution to this is to offer a summary of who the character is when you actually do run into them for the first time in the game.

The thing is, to avoid this scenario, one has to keep a close eye on content rollouts for any of these games. Technically, the ideal scenario is that you play the game regularly and just don’t miss out on anything. However, that’s easier said than done if you’re playing multiple games.

One might think that the solution is to just limit the number of games played. This is a fine idea, except for the fact that all online games have content droughts – particularly story-related content. With MMORPGs and other similar games, there is often a lot of hurry-up-and-wait going on.

Except, of course, with the busy work – which is where we find ourselves on any given Tuesday. It’s time-consuming and sometimes dull. If you’re working on trying to knock out older content you weren’t there for when it came out, it can sometimes get in the way. But it’s necessary because if you don’t do it, you won’t have the gear, levels, or whatever else it is you need to do the new content you really want to do when it comes around again.

My solution to these issues is to try to stack goals. Typically, I have a few things I’m going after, so when I need to do the busy work stuff – dailies, weeklies, what have you- I look at what else I’m trying to achieve and see if I can do both with one thing. If I can knock out three or more goals at the same time, it’s a good day. It doesn’t always work that way. Of course, RNG is a thing, and it is not kind. Or real life can get in the way. Some things still require you to get a group of people together to knock something out. But overall, this system helps me make the best use of my time, keep up with everything, and get caught up with all the old content, too.

I am curious if there’s an even better way. For now, this is the best way I’ve come up with to deal with the busy work and make sure that I have what I need when that new story content rolls out.