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How many MMORPGs is too many MMORPGs?
Esther-Chan
Member Posts: 288
Today's companies are releasing more and more MMORPGs. Gone are the days of a single entity. Now many companies are going the way of multiple MMOs; sometimes releasing more than one MMORPG a year.
One such company "Cryptic Studios" has been under a lot of scrutiny lately for releasing products that many feel are underwhelming, lacking support, and/or being ignored by their developers. Cryptic Studios has released 3 MMORPGs in the last 6 years. City Of Heroes/Villains (or "CoX" as it's sometimes known by) was recently sold to NCSoft (Source) in November of 2007.
Just a year prior, Cryptic began working on a Marvel themed game that was canceled and in February 2008, was later renamed "Champions" or "Champions Online"
Now, just slightly a year later, Cryptic unveiled yet another MMORPG. Star Trek: Online.
I know; many of you feel I'm singling out Cryptic, but this is not the case, as Cryptic is not the only one to release MMORPGs after MMORPG. Let's take a look at NCSoft.
NCSoft "released" two MMORPGs in the same year (Lineage II and City of Heroes), which to this date is the only company to do so. A year later, NCsoft released the popular Guild Wars.
NCSoft does have a subsidiary company labeled "NCSoft West" ; which released the recently canceled Tabula Rasa. Excluding Aion And Tabula Rasa, NCSoft still has a large and ridiculous amount of MMORPGs.
NCSoft has numerous MMORPGs targeted at the Western and Eastern players that are well known and some that aren't so well known, and some that have been canceled. NCSoft is also releasing the third part to the popular "Lineage" Series; aptly named "Lineage III" and sequel to the Guild Wars franchise titled "Guild Wars 2"
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Should companies find something they are good at and stick to it? Or do you think a "Zerg Rush" approach to gaming is the way to succeed?
My opinion is these companies release large amounts of MMORPGs and target them at niches. The combination of players in each of these games adds up to an impressive number that may not have been possible with a single game.
As a developer of MMORPGs, many people see World of Warcraft as their enemy. How do you deal with such an impossible task? I like to think World of Warcraft as the "Godzilla" of games. To combat "Godzilla" Many companies have tried; and failed at reproducing a "clone", in this case "Mechagodzilla". Sure, it can shoot lazers out of its eyes, but in reality it's never as good as the real thing. I theorize that by releasing many MMORPGs and scooping up large amounts of subscribers, you can get big relatively cheap. The cost? Subpar games that have littlle support, patches that are being delayed as smaller "teams" are assigned to these MMORPGs which lead to bugs that go on for months unfixed; sometimes big bugs.
At what point does quantity pass out quality? And how is this approach affecting the MMORPG genre?
Whether you're a player of a NCSoft or Cryptic Studios' Game or not, you are a MMORPG player. What are your opinions? Feel free to share them!
Comments
The problem isn't so much that companies are releasing too many games. The problem is that companies are releasing too many halfassed game in the hope of taking some of the WoW's subscribers. To compound to this problem, setting up the infrastructure to support the MMO is a logistical nightmare. Now I know this is only a guestimate, but I am willing to bet that Blizzard have at least twice the staff as the next highest game developer. Yet, they only release at 1 or 2 game per year at most and most of those game have a development cycle of 3+ years. So it always amazes me that developer with a much smaller staff think that they can crank out AAA title in a time frame less than that.
--The problem isn't so much that companies are releasing too many games. The problem is that companies are releasing too many half#%#ed game in the hope of taking some of the WoW's subscribers.--
I pretty much covered that portion when I said "Too many games". Basically I tried to be as broad as I could, while leaving room for people to speculate.
--To compound to this problem, setting up the infrastructure to support the MMO is a logistical nightmare. Now I know this is only a guestimate, but I am willing to bet that Blizzard have at least twice the staff as the next highest game developer.--
Possibly; however the team behind Starcraft II and Diablo III are actually small in comparison to most companies. I know; we're talking about completely different genres here, but that was as close to an example as I could get.
-- So it always amazes me that developer with a much smaller staff think that they can crank out AAA title in a time frame less than that.--
I also find this to be a big problem and I think it's the underling issue with the MMORPG genre today. What can be done to fix it though? Many want to milk the genre for as much as they can and move on. Is it about the money or is it about being the "alpha dog"?
I'm sorry but thats like saying Sony should only release one TV and stick to it or microsoft should only have one windows. I know what your trying to say but these aren't small companies, they have a big enough workforce to make those games so yes STO and CO development teams were totally different, NCsoft also didn't rush AIon if thats what your saying since it was one of the most polished games at release.
You didn't bother reading the body did you? Also, please don't insult me by comparing this to TVs. We're talking about an online virtual world. If this was a High-definition vs. normal TV debate; maybe, maybe we could get somewhere.
Also, I'm in no way singling out any game. Nowhere in my post did I say "Aion was rushed", but I'm assuming you didn't get that far enough down before you summarized it. I tried to make my post shorter so more people would read it, but I suppose I failed. Ah well.
Who knows
at the rate of this website, playing poker online will eventually be considered "massive"
provided they pay for advertising here of course.
The definition of a MMORPG is evolving rapidly. It is within reason that we may see things classified as MMORPGs that weren't before.
There's no evolution in what "massive" stands for.
It has a definition.
All people are doing now is classifying things into a genre that they don't quite fit into.
You didn't bother reading the body did you? Also, please don't insult me by comparing this to TVs. We're talking about an online virtual world. If this was a High-definition vs. normal TV debate; maybe, maybe we could get somewhere.
Also, I'm in no way singling out any game. Nowhere in my post did I say "Aion was rushed", but I'm assuming you didn't get that far enough down before you summarized it. I tried to make my post shorter so more people would read it, but I suppose I failed. Ah well.
I did read the entire post, i just don't feel like any company is rushing games out way too fast. You might think cryptic is but half the development time of games is making of the engine which they already had and if i remember correctly they stated there engine lets them make content fairly quickly, no im not saying STO is filled with content but i don't believe it was that rushed. Big companies may seem like there rushing things but no they simply have a lot of teams working on the games, i see NCsoft games being updated all the time. It would be easier to discuss the topic if you give an example of a company that makes a lot of games and doesn't support them. Also i'm not attacking you which i don't know why you think i am since this is a discussion board, just want to get that off the board.
You didn't bother reading the body did you? Also, please don't insult me by comparing this to TVs. We're talking about an online virtual world. If this was a High-definition vs. normal TV debate; maybe, maybe we could get somewhere.
Also, I'm in no way singling out any game. Nowhere in my post did I say "Aion was rushed", but I'm assuming you didn't get that far enough down before you summarized it. I tried to make my post shorter so more people would read it, but I suppose I failed. Ah well.
I did read the entire post, i just don't feel like any company is rushing games out way too fast. You might think cryptic is but half the development time of games is making of the engine which they already had and if i remember correctly they stated there engine lets them make content fairly quickly, no im not saying STO is filled with content but i don't believe it was that rushed. Big companies may seem like there rushing things but no they simply have a lot of teams working on the games, i see NCsoft games being updated all the time. It would be easier to discuss the topic if you give an example of a company that makes a lot of games and doesn't support them. Also i'm not attacking you which i don't know why you think i am since this is a discussion board, just want to get that off the board.
Now that's a more respectable opinion which is what my entire post was about. I'm not singling companies out, nor do I offer a biased opinion about any company in my entire post. What I'm after is the opinions of the players. If it comes off that way, then I'm sorry and I'll try to rephrase the context.
I merely used them as examples to create a point.
Book writers used to just write one book a year, as it was considered the maximum the audience can read from a single writer. Now it's quite popular to write several books a year. Because that's the way of the man, to make more and more money in less time, until something goes horribly wrong and the cycle and starts again from the beginning.
Waiting on Xsyon & betaing stuff
if you can count WOW clones/ Fantasy mmos on all 10 fingures that means the market needs to get laid an open there minds to interesting fresh titles
A Old Friend Once told me " I'll Make ya Famous"
I think a better question is "how many repeats is too many repeats?"
Check out the MUD I'm making!
You have to keep in mind that NCSoft is a publisher and has other company's that do the actual development work. Aion was not produced by NCSoft West but is published by NCSoft West here within the states.
Now Cryptic is a different story. They did pull people off the CO team to work on STO. It was said so in a interview because the STO team was behind schedule. Cryptic is not a large company by any means but they do have different teams working on different things. One team is dedicated to the engine development and one team is dedicated to the art of STO and one to the art of CO. There is also a third team working on the art for there third MMO. Cryptic has 210 employees (atleast from the information I could find http://www.linkedin.com/companies/cryptic-studios )
NCSoft has a total of over 4k employees.
Turbine has a total of 350 employees.
CCP has 470 employees.
Sony has a unknown amount since its development team is factored in with its movie / entertainment industry. So you cant really find good information on just one or the other.
Now considering the above information. Cryptic is very over extended when compared to the sizes of the other companys. Cryptic has 3 games in full development with 210 employees. Where Turbine has two games in full development with 350 employees and CCP has two games in development with 470 employees.
When does to many games become too much for a company? Well I think you might be looking at it the wrong way. It's not the amount of games a company can make but the quality of each game they make. Bioware has shown that its easy to have alot of games in development but still make solid top quality products. (I know there single player games - but its the same concept when it comes down to content)
I don't forsee this changing any time in the future. Atleast not until WE as gamers stand up and talk with our wallets and send a solid clear message that we are tired of all this sub-par crap.
It might seem like I am picking on Cryptic and in part I am because they have came out and said there company goal and the reasion of Atari purchasing them was because they can quickly turn around and pump out MMO's.
You know when you compare say CO or STO to a game like WoW there's little to no comparison. Yes, I am fully aware that WoW has been out for 4+ years now and has had enough time to polish up. But that doesn't excuss the fact that when WoW was released the quality of the product was so high that 500k+ people bought into it at the time and over 11 Million + continue to play and buy into that high quality of a product. Yes, I am also fully aware that WoW has some rough server issues at launch due PURELY to over DEMAND. Yes, I am aware there was only 1 raid dungeon at that time. But the point is the content that was there was polished, worked, and people enjoyed it. They enjoyed it long enough for Blizzard to continue to add more content to the game and they still do to this day.
I could continue to go on about how some companys poorly spend the investment money they are given to make a game with. But that would be extending it to far.
Was nice read but I feel you ignored the fact many company's have many devisions, other studio's working on diffierent games, even set in several country's as a example when the NCsoft label is attached to a game it doesn't have to mean they all where made in the same studio at the same time.
NCsoft
Seoul, South Korea (HQ)
Seattle, Washington (Western HQ), USA
(Subsidiary Companies)
Osaka, Japan
Shanghai, China
Brighton, England
Austin, Texas, USA
Mountain View, California, USA
Orange County, California, USA
Bangkok, Thailand
I know many make that mistake asuming one company's brings to much crap to the table while ignoring it's many devisions at work here.
Count how many there are as of right now and you have your answer IMO.
I did allude that NCSoft has many subsidiaries, but I didn't go into detail. Probably not the best idea, but I was trying to make the content short. Theoretically I could remove the top half of my post and leave the bottom half and it'd still be just as interesting to read.
I don't think there is such a thing as too many MMORPGs. I think that the vast number gives users a niche to strive for. They can find a game that has everything that they are looking for. The smaller number the less likely that they will all be satisfied.
www.ryzom.com
Oh, but there is.
There are so many of them that the greater audience is being split up amongst the dozens of them. There will never be another million mark on a single game again because there are so many options to choose from that even a new entry simply won't last long with high subs. People just quit once they exhaust all the content, or play to the point they get frustrated with it, and walk to a different game - and there are many. The fad at hand is having too much selection, too much time, and not enough patience to actually play a game for an extended period of time.
The MMO genre seems to have hit the "renter's market".
Writer / Musician / Game Designer
Now Playing: Skyrim, Wurm Online, Tropico 4
Waiting On: GW2, TSW, Archeage, The Rapture
Oh, so that's why movies are selling better than books...
Check out the MUD I'm making!
Oh, so that's why movies are selling better than books...
People only read books to seem more intellectual or promise themselves they won't develop some kind of retardation from watching Jersey Shore too much. There's a personality-type behind those that actually read books, because everyone agrees that the visual/audio immersion that TV/movies give are a step beyond books. I don't care what people say about their imagination being more entertaining either, do any of them still play with legos? I highly doubt it, though having said that I am tempted to dig up some lincoln logs or something.
All of it is substituting one waste of time for another.
Writer / Musician / Game Designer
Now Playing: Skyrim, Wurm Online, Tropico 4
Waiting On: GW2, TSW, Archeage, The Rapture
I can design a game that appeals to what other gamers want... But I design games based on what i want from a game.
Some of my wants are the same or exactly to that of others, but most of the time it's entirely different. I'd like to see gamemakers create fun games they want to play, rather than how much money they can bring in.
Godspeed my fellow gamer
<blockquote><i>Originally posted by Esther-Chan</i> <br />
<b><blockquote><i>Originally posted by Yamoth</i> <br />
<b>
<p>The problem isn't so much that companies are releasing too many games. The problem is that companies are releasing too many halfassed game in the hope of taking some of the WoW's subscribers. To compound to this problem, setting up the infrastructure to support the MMO is a logistical nightmare. Now I know this is only a guestimate, but I am willing to bet that Blizzard have at least twice the staff as the next highest game developer. Yet, they only release at 1 or 2 game per year at most and most of those game have a development cycle of 3+ years. So it always amazes me that developer with a much smaller staff think that they can crank out AAA title in a time frame less than that.</p>
</b></blockquote>
<p><strong><i><br />
</i></strong></p>
<p><strong><i>--The problem isn't so much that companies are releasing too many games. The problem is that companies are releasing too many half#%#ed game in the hope of taking some of the WoW's subscribers.--</i></strong></p>
<p><span style="color: rgb(255, 153, 204);">I pretty much covered that portion when I said "Too many games". Basically I tried to be as broad as I could, while leaving room for people to speculate.</span><strong><i><br />
</i></strong></p>
<p><strong><i>--To compound to this problem, setting up the infrastructure to support the MMO is a logistical nightmare. Now I know this is only a guestimate, but I am willing to bet that Blizzard have at least twice the staff as the next highest game developer.--</i></strong></p>
<p><span style="color: rgb(255, 153, 204);">Possibly; however the team behind Starcraft II and Diablo III are actually small in comparison to most companies. I know; we're talking about completely different genres here, but that was as close to an example as I could get.</span><strong><i><br />
</i></strong></p>
<p><strong><i>-- So it always amazes me that developer with a much smaller staff think that they can crank out AAA title in a time frame less than that.--</i></strong></p>
<p><span style="color: rgb(255, 153, 204);">I also find this to be a big problem and I think it's the underling issue with the MMORPG genre today. What can be done to fix it though? Many want to milk the genre for as much as they can and move on. Is it about the money or is it about being the "alpha dog"?</span></p>
</b></blockquote>
<p> </p>
<p>Starcract II and Diablo III do have a smaller staff, but those game are for the most part single player with online experience. Unlink an MMORPG, most of the bandwidth and computing depend on the player computer. Battle.net is nothing more than a tool to connect those player together. MMORPG is a totally different beast than that of that of single player RPG with multiplayer experience.</p>
There are good MMORPGs and bad MMORPGs, but there's not some phantom "limit" to how many good MMORPGs a skilled company might make. If you keep making good fun games, people will keep buyin' em.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver