Come home, chill, chop some trees, level some skills, be a mage and kill some bad guys
Well, that sounds a lot like what I found in Albion Online, though I can’t speak for how it’s changed. From what I understand, it has some extensive guild/clan systems too, where you can work together to build larger projects and wage war with rivals.
Bit of an interesting game, when I tried it a long time ago, but it was too much of a grindfest for me. Then again, I never got into Runescape either for similar reasons.
I can’t possibly roll my eyes any harder at this statement, with gaming companies practically competing to go under as fast as possible over the past decade.
Eh… It’s more than just paying, but that a lot of the stuff which is now a standard microtransaction used to be integrated into the total experience, so you’d unlock outfits and such for finding secrets or completing challenges. That sort of content was integral to the over all experience, not just an extra to tack on as an afterthought.