First online game I ever played probably was Unreal Tournament. My first MMORPG was probably that shitty RuneScape, but the first MMORPG I really got into was the beta of Ragnarok Online.

Man, Alpha iRO was where it was at.

Most stats did nothing, no critical hits, no skills, 320kbps audio, and only Prontera and Morroc existed. Strength mages ftw!

Man, I can't believe nobody else has mentioned the first online game I really got into. Starsiege Tribes. Prior to it I had played LAN games of Doom II and crap like that, but they just didn't have the teamplay and strategy that I loved about Tribes. Also the huge sets of weapons packs (Renegades is still my favorite) and the ability to play the game on pretty much any computer made it a favorite of mine.

Eventually I got really into Starcraft (hence my username) and into the Use Map Settings games; I remember downloading maps that had broken triggers in them, I'd fix the settings, and then people would quit games I'd create going "WTF, I don't want to download this map again!" And I'd be all. >=\

Eventually got into Diablo 1 and 2 with a bunch of my buddies from battle.net (if you went into Open Tech Support back before they split the domains you might have talked to me).

Then one day I bought Half Life for $10, downloaded TFC and CS (later mods included Front Line Force, Day of Defeat, Opera, FA, Action, Natural Selection, and a few others I'm probably not remembering) and haven't looked back.

It's not an MMO by traditional standards, but it is an online game either way. Phantasy Star Online ver1, 2, Episode I, II, III and BB. 5 years! The community turned into crap with all the cheating, but the replay value of the areas was very high. Tons of rares, and a lot of levels to gain. I loved a lot of the quests it had too, specially Heat Sword and Endless Nightmare #4. A shame I only completed max level on one of the versions.

I started with EverQuest and played that for about 5 1/2 years, then moved onto RO for a little while (I was in open beta) then when WOW released I played that up until this past month when I quit for good. I also dabbled in Diablo 1 and 2 and some EQ2, but nothing was too exciting about those.

EQ1 though while Verant had control of it was absolute magic, the game world was massive and literally nothing was handed right to you at the beginning of the game like it is with so many games now. No maps, no automatic tradeskills, no flight paths to get where you want. It was just a clusterfuck of adventure and exploration. Once SOE took it over (and most of Verant left) just after the Velious expansion, most of it all turned to shit.

I will be playing Phantasy Star Universe when it releases, hopefully it will be enough to capture my attention for a while. I loathe even considering going back to WOW at this point, and would even play EQ1 again on a emulated + progression server than go back there.