We’ve noted before that while our awards are pretty good at identifying the big modern MMORPGs and the indie gems, it’s much harder to properly reward “classic” MMOs – those MMOs that have been around a reaaaaally long damn time. Some of them even get more content updates than the “big five” games, but because they’re old or small or even (I’ll say it) ugly, they’re just not the games we think of when we’re voting for the biggest and best.

So a few years back, MOP commenter Agemyth proposed this topic for a Leaderboard, and now it’s become one of our staple polls for the end of the year as we try to collectively determine which MMOs are best at “gracefully aging.” Traditionally, we’ve left World of Warcraft off this poll, seeing as it’s usually a top contender for formal awards and would invalidate the vote, but this time around, we’re going to include WoW Classic. We’ve also restricted the voting to just older MMOs that are technically still living – and this year, that includes City of Heroes, since it seems likely it’s only a matter of time until it’s legitimized.

Yes, we know that the definition of the word “classic” is hard to define. We’ve done our best to pick out MMOs from the first couple of generations. Unless you guys really do just want to have an Ultima Online and EverQuest face-off for all eternity, this seems like a lot more fun. To the polls! Oh yeah, and you get three votes, so spend ’em wisely!

Leaderboard: What's the best classic MMORPG still running at the end of 2019? Age of Conan (1%, 83 Votes)

Anarchy Online (1%, 75 Votes)

A Tale in the Desert (0%, 11 Votes)

City of Heroes (28%, 2,512 Votes)

Dark Age of Camelot (2%, 193 Votes)

Dofus (1%, 58 Votes)

Dungeons and Dragons Online (2%, 199 Votes)

EVE Online (4%, 320 Votes)

EverQuest (5%, 450 Votes)

EverQuest II (2%, 176 Votes)

Final Fantasy XI (4%, 377 Votes)

Guild Wars (4%, 338 Votes)

Lineage (0%, 12 Votes)

Lineage II (1%, 81 Votes)

Lord of the Rings Online (5%, 485 Votes)

Meridian 59 (0%, 22 Votes)

RuneScape (21%, 1,937 Votes)

Ryzom (0%, 13 Votes)

Second Life (1%, 69 Votes)

Ultima Online (2%, 199 Votes)

WoW Classic (12%, 1,098 Votes)

Wurm Online (0%, 30 Votes)

I can't believe you forgot X! I'm going to go down to the comments and politely suggest it right now! (3%, 296 Votes) Total Voters: 7,618