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Do developers even care anymore?
Erhun
Member Posts: 170
I've noticed this over the past year, ALL games are getting worse. Not just the MMO's but console games are getting pretty pathetic too.
I've wondered why this is and this is the only thing I have come up with. The developers just don't care about making good games anymore. Everything is turning into money. "Let's make a game that brings in a lot of money!" What happened to "Let's make a cool game"
Been going through MMO's for 6-7 years now and they are getting worse. I'm upset and I'm sad. Why can't they go back to making good games which will just bring them money instead of focusing completely on money.
What happened to make all this happen?
Agree/Disagree? Why or why not?
Comments
I agree it's been a long time since I have played a good game, although I just recently played the first prince of persia for the first time and that was good.
As for MMOs its been crap since WoW.
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Achiever 20.00%, Explorer 86.67%, Killer 60.00%, Socializer 33.33%
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What happened is videogames became mainstream, and then mmorpgs starting coming close.
I don't believe their truly mainstream despite their subscription #s simply because your still picked on when you brag about playing one. But almost anyone can go up to almost any other young guy and be like "Dude did you play TF2/L4Dead/Halo3 it was fricken awesome omfgwtfpwns!!".
it's normal that when something becomes mainstream it must change to the point of not being true to itself.
I have to agree, games simply turned mainstream, are about big money and are made for mindless salivating masses. Computer games were at their best in the 1997-2000 era I believe, genres defined in the decade before that each got several quality games taking it to almost perfection. After that the clone era began, combining random engine with trash content and gameplay for a quick buck. Most sequels simplified things.
I don't know when we will be able to enjoy games for thinking people again, if ever.
Subscribtions: EVE, SWTOR WOW, WAR, DDO, VG, AOC, COV, FFXI, GW, RFO, Aion
+plenty of F2P, betas, trials
Female Dwarf player: WOW, VG, WAR, DDO
.
Due to the recent economic crisis and spending cuts the light at the end of the tunnel was turned off. Sincerely, God.
I'm telling you the they all must die!!
No but really, the market needs to crash, or games need to hurry and speed up their rate of suckishness so their not mainstream anymore.
Then like a beautifull flower pushing it's way through molten volcanic ashes the mmorpg world will be reinvented and games will have to adapt special methods to adapt and survive each other while still having lots of dedicated fans who respect quality.
ALSO it has become to easy to make an mmorpg. that's right to easy!! Everyone thinks they can do it!!
Well maybe not to easy tomake one, but to easy to pursue that option. I h8 that any regular joe can go to college 4 years and then work with some company on an mmorpg. It's become a mainstream acceptable sort of major and that isn't helping the quality, and it's no longer at the point where ithelps the industry.
Tell me out of the millions of boys that pick up a guitar in high school, how many can actually play a quality song with correct timing and yada yada every time? not many...people need to stop trying or actually spend a few years after they graduate practicing at this stuff..to many young people not enough experienced pros in the field who know what they're going to do and how they're going to do it.
simply put, developers stopped caring when making an mmorpg went from something done out of a love of gaming and fun, to simply a means to potentially make millions.
agree. developers are more concern with making money than actually making a good game. this is especially true in MMOs. We can see that most of them are more like WOW clones with no particular diffirence that is worth to distinguished them apart.
I think you need to be a little more fair to developers. I doubt very many become one with the mindset "I want to create a game for the sole purpose of getting rich". Rather that design is dumped upon them by the investors and publishers required to make games these days.
Developers are out of ideas. It's the end.
This is nothing more than a case of nostalgia run amok.
The late 90s were a disaster for games. Developers had just discovered how to make things 3D, and many of them rushed off madly to do so. In their rush to get 3D graphics in place, they often neglected gameplay. Often they even neglected graphics, by failing to consider how to let players see what's going on well enough to make a decent game of it.
Looking back, I can't find a single truly great game that was released in that time span. Civilization 2 was very good, I guess. Red Alert was pretty good. But great? No. There had been great games released before (albeit generally for consoles), and there have been great games released since, but the late 90s was a terrible time for gaming.
Developers fail because they never think like gamers nor do they ever take the time out to understand gamers. There hasn't been a mmo that captured the hearts of players since WOW. Mostly everything has been subpar and disappointing.
This is nothing more than a case of nostalgia run amok.
The late 90s were a disaster for games. Developers had just discovered how to make things 3D, and many of them rushed off madly to do so. In their rush to get 3D graphics in place, they often neglected gameplay. Often they even neglected graphics, by failing to consider how to let players see what's going on well enough to make a decent game of it.
Looking back, I can't find a single truly great game that was released in that time span. Civilization 2 was very good, I guess. Red Alert was pretty good. But great? No. There had been great games released before (albeit generally for consoles), and there have been great games released since, but the late 90s was a terrible time for gaming.
Huh? You can't find a single game, are you serious? Some of the most notoriously known games many of which survive until today were born in that era. Starcraft. Half-Life. Counterstrike. Baldur's Gates, Fallouts, FF VII-IX, DIablos, Quake 2, Xwing, GTA, Gran Turismo, Metal Gear, The Sims, Deus Ex, sport and racing games as we know them today were shaped in that era, today's iterations offering almost nothing new.
Edit: Forgot to mention Ultima Online OMG
Subscribtions: EVE, SWTOR WOW, WAR, DDO, VG, AOC, COV, FFXI, GW, RFO, Aion
+plenty of F2P, betas, trials
Female Dwarf player: WOW, VG, WAR, DDO
.
Due to the recent economic crisis and spending cuts the light at the end of the tunnel was turned off. Sincerely, God.
Uh?
This year is great. We got WOTLK (still playing), Mines of Moria, Call of Duty, Force Unleashed, Halo 3 (out in 2007??), Gear of War, Fear 2 .. there are lots of good games .. too little time to play.
No doubt, I agree. The introduction of the patching process really fucked us all over. In MMOs, since the devs can patch things in like unwithheld features, they can say "Don't worry! The one thing that made this game fun to play and seperated it from all the others will be here some day!" Now, with the X-Box Live service, even console games are beginning to pick this up.
Whoever makes the decision how the game will be built for an MMO, and decides what gets cut and what doesn't, when they release and how they release... whoever does that should be replaced in every MMO company. (I don't think the developers do all of that, but I could be wrong).
In a time where the concept of "easiness" is taking over mankind, and a time where moneybag corporates are running the show, it is a shame to see the creativity level of almost ALL videogames plummit down into a death hole.
HOWEVER, there are a few games coming out that change things up - Global Agenda, dare I say Darkfall, Fallen Earth, Earthrise (2 opposite titles, kinda funny), and SW:KOTOR.
You know what I blame? Graphics.
Back in the day of SNES / N64, there were games that could be about ANYTHING. And thats just what the devs did, because they knew it was fun to have a game where you control a character named "Obloublalba" who was going through hard troubles accepting the death of this pet Tiger when he is attacked by Ninja Zookeepers backed by an army of 2 headed ghost lions. Obloublalba then finds himself in a parrellel universe filled with rainbow colors and stars on the Earth rather than the sky. His pet Tiger is Emperor of the Earth in this parrallel universe and Obloublalba has to return his Tiger to the way he was before being corrupted by money and terrible MMOs.
Everyone and their mother can make a story better than that, yet the game developers seem to be challenged.... sorry, disabled, in this area of the brain.
Nostalgia strikes again!!!
Ever since the Atari 2600 days 90% of all video games released have been pure crap. Also, they were pure crap because they were made by people looking for a quick buck.
In case you forgot the video game industry is a BUSINESS. You stay alive by making money.
This is not a new trend nor is it exclusive to the MMORPG genre. The only thing that has changed is you finally woke up and saw it for the first time.
Its the price of success. Once WoW showed the world how much money could be made, the shareholders took over. I doubt developers have much control or say over the final product anymore.
See, it used to be developers developed, publishers would buy and publish. Now publishers hire/buy developers.
You know, I hate when people simply go "it's a BUSINESS, they're supposed to try and milk you for money because that's totally ethical!" Last I checked, a business was supposed to earn money by providing a quality good or service to it's customers. That's how things used to be. In more recent years however, businesses on the whole, not just the gaming industry, have been all about selling absolute shit, finding some micro transaction/management/something to rip you off, or otherwise sell things you shouldn't even be able to sell in the first place, and just market/hype them until it's programmed into peoples brains. It's scary that more money gets shoved into marketing than development these days.
Bans a perma, but so are sigs in necro posts.
EAT ME MMORPG.com!
I doubt it is an issue of developers not caring, or even an issue of developers not understanding gamers.
Most developers ARE passionate gamers. They would not have entered the industry otherwise. Unfortunately, at the games become more mainstream, they are being forced to dumb the games down to appeal to the masses. This is not a slight on the developers, they have little control over it. It is simply a fact that in order to deliver a game of the quality that people expect, they must sell a huge number of games to recoup their expenses, and that is only possible by appealing to ever larger and more jaded audiences. New games are judged against the content and polish of games that have been active for 5 - 10 years. A near impossible standard.
Your typical non-gamer (as defined prior to WoW) has no interest is a game that might make him feel less than uber. He does not want to die to mobs, gets easily dicouraged by even mild death penalties, and expects to be gently led by the hand from quest hub to quest hub (spending an entire evening having to look for something might discourage them.)
A prime example of this is WoW, and by virtue of its success, most other MMO's. WoW took Everquest and made everything simpler, easier, and solo friendly. No longer did you need to work with others to get to max level, no longer were the consequences to constantly dieing due to a lack of skill or poor gear, no longer were the choices you made while leveling up something you had to live with (just respec). Neon signs were added about questgivers to make sure people without the patience to actually talk to NPC's knew where everything was, maps were provided with quest locations clearly maked so there was little need to actually explore the world
The new buisness model for games is targeting a far more generic audience than the old games used to, one that expects to be frequently rewarded for even modest effort while rabidly avoiding any penalties that might in any way infringe upon gameplay if the person makes a mistake or is just not very bright. Instant gratification is very much in fashion with this crowd, long difficult, hard earned achievements are not.
Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain and most fools do.
Benjamin Franklin
Before:
Developers loved games and made money because of it.
Now:
Developers love money and make games because of it.
I am afraid that you are right, I blame Blizzard for it. Still there are some small companies that make games because they love making games like Arenanet (if they were about money they would have monthly fees or an itemshop).
Let's hope we get more games that the devs make because they make what they want to play themselves.
I also have high hopes for the game CCP are making together with the pen and paper RPG maker White wolf, lately it felt like the companies have forgotten the roots of MMORPG and taken away the RPG feeling, White wolf might just be the ones that can give us that back
Err... i have to disagree. If the game is not good, it will not make money, it's as simple as that. If it's a good game, it will make money :P
Disagree. Just take a look at Valve, BioWare, and Bethesda (there are countless others) and you will find quality companies with great games released (and planned to be released). There will always be good games, crappy games, and games that truly shine. Just wait for it...we're in for a great game soon
I blame 9/11.
I have no real reason to. It just seems that's about the time the creativity in movies, music and video games- all forms of entertainment really (the rise of reality TV) took a nose dive.
It's like we've been living in fear and it's affected our artistic expression in some sort of mass psychosis. *shrugs*
Hope you got your things together. Hope you are quite prepared to die. Looks like we're in for nasty weather. ... There's a bad moon on the rise.
How about we take off our rose tinted goggles first
Valve is good at what they do, no doubt, they can come up with a great gameplay idea, like Portal, but that's pure gameplay innovation (which is also very good and important, no doubt).
Bioware, I would say very nice example of the simplification actually. While their games are still above the average spectrum and very good, the actual complexity is taking a nose dive as well. Just check the complexity of Baldur's Gate series, compare it to KOTOR and then at last to Mass Effect. While ME is a good game, it is less complex than BGs I dare say by orders of magnitude.
Bethseda I can't really comment on, since I never played any of the Elder Scroll series, but if I compare their latest Fallout 3 to the previous Fallouts, guess what, not even close again.
Games now are just simplified rehash of previous releases for the most part.
Subscribtions: EVE, SWTOR WOW, WAR, DDO, VG, AOC, COV, FFXI, GW, RFO, Aion
+plenty of F2P, betas, trials
Female Dwarf player: WOW, VG, WAR, DDO
.
Due to the recent economic crisis and spending cuts the light at the end of the tunnel was turned off. Sincerely, God.
FULLY Disagree.
Just because gamecompany´s or developers make games that didn´t or don´t appeal to me does NEVER means that developers don´t care anymore.
The reason why it´s hard to get back is thanks to tha masses who don´t want what we had back then, as they didn´t like it back then and I doubt they will like it today.
I know what I want, but my problem is I also see what the majority seems to want.