Most games are considered a failure when they see a huge number of players leave within that first month, and a subscriber count that just gradually dwindles away. Sure, the game might be surviving, but anyone can see that it could have been much more. To me a failure is simply a game that didn't live up to what it should and could have been.
The actual reason is a multitude of things, but I've noticed that most people are generally coming to accept that the biggest problem is the publishers forcing devs to do things to the detriment of the game in the interest of making more money. They push for releases too early and force devs to cut corners and cut content entirely. They have no interest in maintaining subscriptions, they simply do their best to over-hype the games and make a big number of box sales after which they just leave the devs to it.
In other words: greed.
The only MMOs that are going to be successful in the current market are small budget indie MMOs and those from the huge developers without a publisher breathing down their neck. SquareEnix's FFXIV has the potential to break out of the current trend of failures since they really do have unlimited resources. Bioware and Blizzard may well do the same with their future releases but both are now rather ominously attached to a publisher (EA and Activision) so I'm really not too sure what to make of them. Given Bioware's past success and Blizzard's huge income from WoW I'd say they both look hopeful.
Originally posted by elocke I tried to think of all the reasons that the recent crop of games have sorely disappointed me and have put them in this poll. Feel free to choose and discuss your reasoning.I put this in the wrong forum. Meant to throw it in the pub. Bah!
Lol! If you crossed out community, that would be mixture of all those factors. It's to hard to point one of them, as all are the cause, but for different games each reason would have different weight. But in most cases there are multiple of them contributing to failure if not all.
you also need to consider that the culture change.... a few years back when i was in highschool, tons of peeps used to visit ebgames, and gamestop and such... but now I see the new generation of school students in their usual packs with their uniforms in the street, mocking and having fun of the one or two looking to get into gamestop... something is going on... or the next generation doesnt like games, or they simply dont like the crap games... dunno which one to finger point... and yeah all money still stands...
dam you had to wear uniforms in school? Most of Gamestops customers I would wager are not MMO users
...I still can't see why they are supposed to be a fail. AoC, WaR, Aion - all have somewhere +100k subs. How does this can not be considered as success?
the funny thing is say you sub to xxx game day 1 and never reup your sub you are still then and forever more counted
what would be great is to see a sub list of only player that have logged in with in the last 7 days if the count was still 100k + that would be impressive
...I still can't see why they are supposed to be a fail. AoC, WaR, Aion - all have somewhere +100k subs. How does this can not be considered as success?
the funny thing is say you sub to xxx game day 1 and never reup your sub you are still then and forever more counted
what would be great is to see a sub list of only player that have logged in with in the last 7 days if the count was still 100k + that would be impressive
Lack of creativity and immersion. I can deal with bugs and instances. But if the game put me to sleep like Fallen Earth did, I won't even bother playing the whole free month. To the trash it goes.
Blizzard is huge. Strike that, MASSIVE. They're making billions off of WoW every year, between purchase price, subscription costs, licensing, it's an epic money maker. But that side, Blizzard has always, and I mean ALWAYS paid more attention to the quality of their games than to making a profit. I've heard many arguments that WoW is as popular as it is because of marketing, etc. I wholly disagree with such statements. WoW is a popular as it is because Blizzard is known, world-wide, for making quality games, and listening to their players. And on top of that, they never seem to abandon a game, either. Take Diablo II for example. Diablo II was released in 2000, ten years ago! It's not an MMO, it's ten years old, and Blizzard is STILL supporting the product, and it's still hugely popular. The same goes for StarCraft. They're still supporting it, and it still has a huge player base. In addition to all of this, let's take a look at Diablo III. Diablo III wen't into development in 2001, just one year after Diablo II was released. And here we are, nine years later, and their still working on it. Why? It certainly isn't money issues, that's for damn sure. The reason is simple: Blizzard has always maintained that they will never release a game that is not up to their standards, which are pretty damn high. In my opinion, other developers, and especially publishers, should be taking a LOT of notes from Blizzard in regards to game development. If you just take the time necessary to make the game great, it WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. I'd like to point out here that Blizzard has, for more than 15 years, consistently made quality titles that have met and exceeded the expectations of the players. Yes, this post contains a lot of praise for Blizzard. But I'm not a "fanboy", I promise you. I could care less about the company, it's their products that I am hailing. Blizzard is one of very, very few developers that still "gets it". Hopefully, they'll continue to produce quality titles for years to come. And even more hopefully, other developers and publishers will take a real long hard look at what Blizzard is doing right, instead of trying to copy their ideas and slap their own name on it. It isn't because of their games' success that Blizzard pays such attention to detail. Their games are a success because they pay so much attention to detail.
Five years ago I would have agreed with every word of this.
Today however, I fully disagree with the statement that Blizzard releases quality content, let alone focuses on quality.
Since the release of WoW, they have been slowly backsliding in the quality of their games. They have been adding more and more forms of veiled RMT into the game in hopes of milking just a little more from their playerbase. For as long as they take to produce new content, each release seems like less and less actual content being added. That's not even to mention that they have dropped a lot of content from the development cycle entirely.
What you have to realize, is that the WoW development team has shrunk significantly. Activision-Blizzard has pulled the majority of the senior developer and put them to work on their new currently unannounced MMO. The majority of the people who made WoW, no longer work on it, or for Blizzard at all. This is true for every one of their "hit" franchises.
I won't even go into server and client stability, which to be quite honest, is no better than most other MMOs, if not arguably considerably worse than many other MMOs.
Blizzard is growing into the "maturity" of being yet another SOE or EA.
Someone else does it better so why play a new game with less content.
“It's unwise to pay too much, but it's worse to pay too little. When you pay too much, you lose a little money - that's all. When you pay too little, you sometimes lose everything, because the thing you bought was incapable of doing the thing it was bought to do. The common law of business balance prohibits paying a little and getting a lot - it can't be done. If you deal with the lowest bidder, it is well to add something for the risk you run, and if you do that you will have enough to pay for something better.”
WTF?!! Then WoW would be out of business already if greed made an MMO fail.
Greed isn't the driving force behind the decisions that make up warcraft.
Waiting to release a product until it is ready, is not greedy. Blizzard could rush out an expansions every 9 months like some other games so they could make more money, but they don't.
I tried to think of all the reasons that the recent crop of games have sorely disappointed me and have put them in this poll. Feel free to choose and discuss your reasoning. I put this in the wrong forum. Meant to throw it in the pub. Bah!
So you want us to vote on why the recent crop of games has disappointed you(which wasn't the definition of failing last time I looked it up)? Gee. I don't know... why don't you tell us?
There's an option not on that list that noone here has even pointed out, and it's something I've thought of a lot recently more and more as I re-consider WoW myself -- content.
Say what you want about WoW. The style isn't for you. It's too easy. You're sick of the carrot on a stick. The community sucks.
I'll tell you what separates it from most, and did immediately from the opening of vanilla, and that's content. I don't mean the thousands of [meaningless] quests. I mean raw content. When I think about my first days in WoW, it's always a very nostalgic thing, and not because I'm looking at it through rose-tinted goggles. It's because the world was so extremely well-developed right out of the gate. I made the wonderful mistake of rolling a Night-Elf Druid as my first char in WoW back in 2004, and to this day I get goosebumps even thinking about the initial environment I spawned into. The world was sharp, clear, smooth, and natural. The music was absolutely perfect for the setting, and aside from server hiccups back then, things were seamless. I remember my first gryphon flight to Darkshore, crossing the bay - briefly thinking I was actually supposed to control the flight, hah. I especially remember my first trip into Ashenvale, and the music there, and the way the game just felt.
My experiences as a noob in WoW aside, the game was huge, right off the bat. Before I ever left my NE starter area, I remember participating in a non-instanced dungeon where you had to fight your way to the bottom for a quest. Back then it was difficult enough that grouping was all but essential for success. From there, the game had a flow(not a funnel feeling, as if you're forced here or there, ie; Aion), and for every area there was a dungeon to explore, new mobs, rare spawns that were actually harder, to a fair degree, than the normal ones around them. There were quests that I had absolutely no issue taking the time to read through and go do with absolutely no guide whatsoever because you actually needed to pay attention to get the thing done. Forget the lack of a quest guide - they were worth reading, and the game pulled you in in such a way that you wanted to. 1-60 was MMORPG done right. There was grouping, there was social interaction, the world was massive compared to what else I'd seen before, and it was all of it fun.
Anymore, the games released really shouldn't even bother if they're not going to produce solid content. I bought into the hype of Aion during its beta, and ended up taking the 1-50 ride. Man, what a joke. That game fails to have in its entire world what WoW started out with 2/3rds of one continent. It had polish, and pretty graphics sure. Areas I wanted to explore? Nothing you wouldn't get ushered through by the normal leveling process. Dungeons? Yeah, but then there's so few, and even though well-designed, you were practically forced to re-run them so many times you'd rather never see them again (Steel Rake anyone?).
Sure, your list of options covers many of the factors that go into recent disappointment, but end of the day I see content as the underlying factor to much of the problems. Like I said, like WoW or not, it had content-a-plenty. Think of one time where you felt like you re-did something that you had to. I can't, from my vanilla experience. Each area was new. Each level had different places to go. Each quest hub was different, with new surroundings, new mobs, new quests, and new dungeons - all with their own unique feel, right down to the music, all the while feeling natural and seamless. Even your most highly instanced MMOs of late don't even manage that somehow - they just replicate content throughout.
With an experience like mine, it's absolutely no wonder nothing has matched up since. It's not even something I realized about my own gaming experience until very recently, but it has obviously been a sub-conscious standard all along, and I'm betting that it's the case for more than just me....
"The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it." George Bernard Shaw
What is a cynic? A man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing. Oscar Wilde
Blizzard is huge. Strike that, MASSIVE. They're making billions off of WoW every year, between purchase price, subscription costs, licensing, it's an epic money maker. But that side, Blizzard has always, and I mean ALWAYS paid more attention to the quality of their games than to making a profit. I've heard many arguments that WoW is as popular as it is because of marketing, etc. I wholly disagree with such statements. WoW is a popular as it is because Blizzard is known, world-wide, for making quality games, and listening to their players. And on top of that, they never seem to abandon a game, either. Take Diablo II for example. Diablo II was released in 2000, ten years ago! It's not an MMO, it's ten years old, and Blizzard is STILL supporting the product, and it's still hugely popular. The same goes for StarCraft. They're still supporting it, and it still has a huge player base. In addition to all of this, let's take a look at Diablo III. Diablo III wen't into development in 2001, just one year after Diablo II was released. And here we are, nine years later, and their still working on it. Why? It certainly isn't money issues, that's for damn sure. The reason is simple: Blizzard has always maintained that they will never release a game that is not up to their standards, which are pretty damn high. In my opinion, other developers, and especially publishers, should be taking a LOT of notes from Blizzard in regards to game development. If you just take the time necessary to make the game great, it WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. I'd like to point out here that Blizzard has, for more than 15 years, consistently made quality titles that have met and exceeded the expectations of the players. Yes, this post contains a lot of praise for Blizzard. But I'm not a "fanboy", I promise you. I could care less about the company, it's their products that I am hailing. Blizzard is one of very, very few developers that still "gets it". Hopefully, they'll continue to produce quality titles for years to come. And even more hopefully, other developers and publishers will take a real long hard look at what Blizzard is doing right, instead of trying to copy their ideas and slap their own name on it. It isn't because of their games' success that Blizzard pays such attention to detail. Their games are a success because they pay so much attention to detail.
Five years ago I would have agreed with every word of this.
Today however, I fully disagree with the statement that Blizzard releases quality content, let alone focuses on quality.
Since the release of WoW, they have been slowly backsliding in the quality of their games. They have been adding more and more forms of veiled RMT into the game in hopes of milking just a little more from their playerbase. For as long as they take to produce new content, each release seems like less and less actual content being added. That's not even to mention that they have dropped a lot of content from the development cycle entirely.
What you have to realize, is that the WoW development team has shrunk significantly. Activision-Blizzard has pulled the majority of the senior developer and put them to work on their new currently unannounced MMO. The majority of the people who made WoW, no longer work on it, or for Blizzard at all. This is true for every one of their "hit" franchises.
I won't even go into server and client stability, which to be quite honest, is no better than most other MMOs, if not arguably considerably worse than many other MMOs.
Blizzard is growing into the "maturity" of being yet another SOE or EA.
World of Warcraft is but one title from Blizzard. Just one! And while I wholeheartedly agree that the content is becoming more scarce with each patch and expansion, I must reiterate that WoW is just one single title.
The entire Warcraft franchise is made up of 5.5 games in all: Warcraft: Orcs vs Humans, Warcraft II/Warcraft II BNET, Warcraft III, Warcraft III: FT and finally World of Warcraft.
Then we also have Diablo.
And many other games Blizzard has produced over the last fifteen years.
So while one of their games may be less appealing then it was in 2004 when it was released, I still believe that Blizzard, as a whole, is one of the best game developers out there.
They have scrapped quite a few games over the years (Diablo III was scrapped twice, StarCraft II was scrapped once, etc) because the final product did not live up to their standards. They have fired entire teams, and sent others back to the drawing board after years of development, because they refuse to release sub-par games. That says a LOT for Blizzard, imo.
True mages don't die. They strategically miscalculate.
Uncanny valley: people are demanding so much from MMOs these days, it as if they are starting to be judged as virtual reality simulations rather than as games.
There are many reasons why. Although the onethat stands out the most to me as of late in a lot of newer mmos is a severe lack of effort in customer service/support by some companies.
1. For god's sake mmo gamers, enough with the analogies. They're unnecessary and your comparisons are terrible, dissimilar, and illogical.
2. To posters feeling the need to state how f2p really isn't f2p: Players understand the concept. You aren't privy to some secret the rest are missing. You're embarrassing yourself.
3. Yes, Cpt. Obvious, we're not industry experts. Now run along and let the big people use the forums for their purpose.
I don't think the 'batch' is failing at all. If 10 games release and 1 is good for me that doesn't mean the others failed it just means they were aimed at 1 of the 9 others who didn't like the one I did.
----- The person who is certain, and who claims divine warrant for his certainty, belongs now to the infancy of our species.
Originally posted by Shiymmas There's an option not on that list that noone here has even pointed out, and it's something I've thought of a lot recently more and more as I re-consider WoW myself -- content.Say what you want about WoW. The style isn't for you. It's too easy. You're sick of the carrot on a stick. The community sucks.I'll tell you what separates it from most, and did immediately from the opening of vanilla, and that's content. I don't mean the thousands of [meaningless] quests. I mean raw content. When I think about my first days in WoW, it's always a very nostalgic thing, and not because I'm looking at it through rose-tinted goggles. It's because the world was so extremely well-developed right out of the gate. I made the wonderful mistake of rolling a Night-Elf Druid as my first char in WoW back in 2004, and to this day I get goosebumps even thinking about the initial environment I spawned into. The world was sharp, clear, smooth, and natural. The music was absolutely perfect for the setting, and aside from server hiccups back then, things were seamless. I remember my first gryphon flight to Darkshore, crossing the bay - briefly thinking I was actually supposed to control the flight, hah. I especially remember my first trip into Ashenvale, and the music there, and the way the game just felt.My experiences as a noob in WoW aside, the game was huge, right off the bat. Before I ever left my NE starter area, I remember participating in a non-instanced dungeon where you had to fight your way to the bottom for a quest. Back then it was difficult enough that grouping was all but essential for success. From there, the game had a flow(not a funnel feeling, as if you're forced here or there, ie; Aion), and for every area there was a dungeon to explore, new mobs, rare spawns that were actually harder, to a fair degree, than the normal ones around them. There were quests that I had absolutely no issue taking the time to read through and go do with absolutely no guide whatsoever because you actually needed to pay attention to get the thing done. Forget the lack of a quest guide - they were worth reading, and the game pulled you in in such a way that you wanted to. 1-60 was MMORPG done right. There was grouping, there was social interaction, the world was massive compared to what else I'd seen before, and it was all of it fun.Anymore, the games released really shouldn't even bother if they're not going to produce solid content. I bought into the hype of Aion during its beta, and ended up taking the 1-50 ride. Man, what a joke. That game fails to have in its entire world what WoW started out with 2/3rds of one continent. It had polish, and pretty graphics sure. Areas I wanted to explore? Nothing you wouldn't get ushered through by the normal leveling process. Dungeons? Yeah, but then there's so few, and even though well-designed, you were practically forced to re-run them so many times you'd rather never see them again (Steel Rake anyone?).Sure, your list of options covers many of the factors that go into recent disappointment, but end of the day I see content as the underlying factor to much of the problems. Like I said, like WoW or not, it had content-a-plenty. Think of one time where you felt like you re-did something that you had to. I can't, from my vanilla experience. Each area was new. Each level had different places to go. Each quest hub was different, with new surroundings, new mobs, new quests, and new dungeons - all with their own unique feel, right down to the music, all the while feeling natural and seamless. Even your most highly instanced MMOs of late don't even manage that somehow - they just replicate content throughout.
With an experience like mine, it's absolutely no wonder nothing has matched up since. It's not even something I realized about my own gaming experience until very recently, but it has obviously been a sub-conscious standard all along, and I'm betting that it's the case for more than just me....
Interesting. I see where you are coming from, but I've noticed that maybe in 1 or 2 games is the content itself an issue. Namely AoC and any Cryptic game, due to lack of enough content to even fully level up.
Vanguard, considered a failure by many, even though it has suffered through and is a much better game now, has a HUGE amount of content. Same with EQ2. I think even Warhammer has a ton of content, although its very streamlined and doesn't vary enough to make it "good" content.
Perhaps type of content is the factor? Is it this sudden push towards PVP games lately? That could be another reason.
As you can see, my poll can only have 10 options, but the more we discuss this, and its been great reading each of your opinions, there seems to be many more factors here than I had first imagined. Which was my point for this post all along. To see where the collective thinking of those here at mmorpg.com are on this issue.
Uncanny valley: people are demanding so much from MMOs these days, it as if they are starting to be judged as virtual reality simulations rather than as games.
This is ironic since that's what MMOs were originally supposed to be; world simulations. It's only since WoW that the genre as a whole has been entirely about combat, combat and more combat.
Most games suffer from one of a variety of issues, but one it comes down to is a bad choice by the developers and that's it-
1. Graphics > Gameplay - stupid mistake. If you adverstise "massive battles" then make 100% sure those massive battles work on a PC that meets the recommended system requirements, including average latency times. Graphics > gameplay almost always leads to instancing and the world "feeling" a lot smaller due simply to the limitations of technology at the moment.
2. Two faction PvP - balanced? yeah right. you need at LEAST 3, any idiot knows that an odd number is required to create true balance. You also NEED to have balance mechanisms in place, like "you cannot make a Horde character on this server" too bad, pick another one or join a queue. Unfortunately, too many MMOs stick to rigid IP's that tell them they have to have 2 factions, when having 3/5/7 etc. with proper population balancing restrictions will garauntee a better PvP experience.
3. Focusing on a "hook" rather then actual gameplay - Aion, WoW with wings and half the content. Focused on a hook, fell flat on its face. AoC, their hook was boobs and blood, yeah, that worked (not) and don't forget WAR, the hook was RvR, but they failed to realize point number 2 above and made what SHOULD have been the ultimate RvR game into a linear roller coaster ride with "good guys" versus "bad guys" and oops, fail.
4. Trying to do too much and failing at all of it - SWG, for all the fanboi love pre-NGE and such, was a terribly balanced game with no functional developer content, was massively full of bugs, and it took them months/years to put the stuff in game that was on the box. Anyone else remember the combat medic month? the commando month? the creature handler phase? what a joke! they tried to do way too much with too little talent and resources (including time). And anyone remember WAR cutting like 4 classes from launch? like 4 capital cities? bit off more then you can chew!
*pro-tip* focus on a few things and make them absolutely amazing, then see what you can squeeze in for launch (as long as it's done) and add the rest in as you go via expansions and updates to keep the game fresh and the population steadily increasing.
5. Don't pick impossible IPs - every gaming company in the world could have come together to try and make a single Star Wars or Star Trek MMO and they still wouldn't get it right. You can't put 30-40 years of rabid fan-boi love into a few years of MMO development and come out the other side with a happy population. WoW worked becuase it was 10 years of IP and the producer/publisher/developer/IP holder was all the same company, and even then people stil think they've destroyed the IP.
6. Server types! - pvp can be fun for some, others hate it. make your game focus on PvP, and you've lost half your potential player base. What did WoW have to do to make PvP servers? Add a few lines of code (i'm sure more just making an example kids) to say "ok you can attack these people here but not here" and bam, you can potentially appeal to both crowds.
You don't have to have complex systems of alignments and rules and status changes and physical locations etc. etc. like so many other games do, you simply give players a choice. A switch to flip. Two or more server types.
7. Stay with the trends - this is the hard one because these games take so long to make. Console games and most PC games (even strategy) are moving towards faster and faster game play. Audiences for games and movies expect a faster pace because we've all been de-sensitized to it. You simply cannot make a game with impossibly slow and boring animations (WAR) or rediculous grinds (Aion) anymore. People in general are on the move, everything is mobile and faster then light text messaging instant messages internet phones etc.etc. games have to keep up. You can't sit and wait for a group for an hour to play 5 minutes and have it break up.
You simply CANNOT create enough content like quests/missions/story to keep players entertained for more then a few weeks or at most a month. That takes years to make and then players burn through it so fast what do you do? Nothing. You promise more content later and you create grinding treadmills to artificially slow things down.
But look at other online games like FPS games. People still play Starcraft and Halo games and CoD games religiously day in day out because they are FUN!
The developer content, the single player story lines and even the maps themselves, are played out and burned through in a month. It's the SKILL and the STRATEGY and the fun that keep players going.
MMOs have to catch up and figure out a way to do the same. I'd suggest focusing LESS on the reward for doing something and more on the very reason to do a thing in the first place - it's suppose to be fun!
I don't think the "latest crop of games" are failing at all actually. The genre is merely evolving and they're taking what has worked and trying to expound on it. Everything has been working like this for a while now with any product/medium etc. Look at how many times the same basic formula is used and rehashed in movies, yet they still sell and many sell very well. Same idea with video games and it takes time to evolve these things.
The one major difference is that MMORPG's are so new and it includes one huge monkey wrench for many companies which is the social aspect, hell, the existence of the Internet has become a huge monkey wrench in regards to the way its socially in general and has shaken our culture so much and so fast.
So, no, I don't think its failing at all, its merely evolving with the times and the difference between the "latest crop" and the "older crops" is development. Obviously the older games are going to feel more complete and polished because they had more time. Many of these companies are entering the industry for the first time and carry a lot on their plate trying to even develop an MMORPG yet alone learn the kinks around it.
Give it time and those same games would become as great and remembered as the older ones of today.
Comments
Most games are considered a failure when they see a huge number of players leave within that first month, and a subscriber count that just gradually dwindles away. Sure, the game might be surviving, but anyone can see that it could have been much more. To me a failure is simply a game that didn't live up to what it should and could have been.
The actual reason is a multitude of things, but I've noticed that most people are generally coming to accept that the biggest problem is the publishers forcing devs to do things to the detriment of the game in the interest of making more money. They push for releases too early and force devs to cut corners and cut content entirely. They have no interest in maintaining subscriptions, they simply do their best to over-hype the games and make a big number of box sales after which they just leave the devs to it.
In other words: greed.
The only MMOs that are going to be successful in the current market are small budget indie MMOs and those from the huge developers without a publisher breathing down their neck. SquareEnix's FFXIV has the potential to break out of the current trend of failures since they really do have unlimited resources. Bioware and Blizzard may well do the same with their future releases but both are now rather ominously attached to a publisher (EA and Activision) so I'm really not too sure what to make of them. Given Bioware's past success and Blizzard's huge income from WoW I'd say they both look hopeful.
Lol! If you crossed out community, that would be mixture of all those factors. It's to hard to point one of them, as all are the cause, but for different games each reason would have different weight. But in most cases there are multiple of them contributing to failure if not all.
http://www.teraonline.info.pl Polski Poradnik Gry Tera Online
dam you had to wear uniforms in school? Most of Gamestops customers I would wager are not MMO users
the funny thing is say you sub to xxx game day 1 and never reup your sub you are still then and forever more counted
what would be great is to see a sub list of only player that have logged in with in the last 7 days if the count was still 100k + that would be impressive
the funny thing is say you sub to xxx game day 1 and never reup your sub you are still then and forever more counted
what would be great is to see a sub list of only player that have logged in with in the last 7 days if the count was still 100k + that would be impressive
WHAT!!! There is a XXX game where??
Lack of creativity and immersion. I can deal with bugs and instances. But if the game put me to sleep like Fallen Earth did, I won't even bother playing the whole free month. To the trash it goes.
Five years ago I would have agreed with every word of this.
Today however, I fully disagree with the statement that Blizzard releases quality content, let alone focuses on quality.
Since the release of WoW, they have been slowly backsliding in the quality of their games. They have been adding more and more forms of veiled RMT into the game in hopes of milking just a little more from their playerbase. For as long as they take to produce new content, each release seems like less and less actual content being added. That's not even to mention that they have dropped a lot of content from the development cycle entirely.
What you have to realize, is that the WoW development team has shrunk significantly. Activision-Blizzard has pulled the majority of the senior developer and put them to work on their new currently unannounced MMO. The majority of the people who made WoW, no longer work on it, or for Blizzard at all. This is true for every one of their "hit" franchises.
I won't even go into server and client stability, which to be quite honest, is no better than most other MMOs, if not arguably considerably worse than many other MMOs.
Blizzard is growing into the "maturity" of being yet another SOE or EA.
WTF?!! Then WoW would be out of business already if greed made an MMO fail.
you missed two of the biggest reasons.
Bad game mechanics that are not fun.
Someone else does it better so why play a new game with less content.
--John Ruskin
They're failing because we've defined failure to be any performance less than WoW's subscription numbers.
WTF?!! Then WoW would be out of business already if greed made an MMO fail.
Greed isn't the driving force behind the decisions that make up warcraft.
Waiting to release a product until it is ready, is not greedy. Blizzard could rush out an expansions every 9 months like some other games so they could make more money, but they don't.
See the difference?
So you want us to vote on why the recent crop of games has disappointed you(which wasn't the definition of failing last time I looked it up)? Gee. I don't know... why don't you tell us?
Active: WoW
Semi-retired: STO
Fully retired: UO, EQ, AC, SWG, FFXI, DDO:EU, PoTBS, AoC, EvE
Tried: EQ2, Tabula Rasa, Auto-Assault, Isteria, LotRO, Wizard 101
Looking forward to: Star Citizen
There's an option not on that list that noone here has even pointed out, and it's something I've thought of a lot recently more and more as I re-consider WoW myself -- content.
Say what you want about WoW. The style isn't for you. It's too easy. You're sick of the carrot on a stick. The community sucks.
I'll tell you what separates it from most, and did immediately from the opening of vanilla, and that's content. I don't mean the thousands of [meaningless] quests. I mean raw content. When I think about my first days in WoW, it's always a very nostalgic thing, and not because I'm looking at it through rose-tinted goggles. It's because the world was so extremely well-developed right out of the gate. I made the wonderful mistake of rolling a Night-Elf Druid as my first char in WoW back in 2004, and to this day I get goosebumps even thinking about the initial environment I spawned into. The world was sharp, clear, smooth, and natural. The music was absolutely perfect for the setting, and aside from server hiccups back then, things were seamless. I remember my first gryphon flight to Darkshore, crossing the bay - briefly thinking I was actually supposed to control the flight, hah. I especially remember my first trip into Ashenvale, and the music there, and the way the game just felt.
My experiences as a noob in WoW aside, the game was huge, right off the bat. Before I ever left my NE starter area, I remember participating in a non-instanced dungeon where you had to fight your way to the bottom for a quest. Back then it was difficult enough that grouping was all but essential for success. From there, the game had a flow (not a funnel feeling, as if you're forced here or there, ie; Aion), and for every area there was a dungeon to explore, new mobs, rare spawns that were actually harder, to a fair degree, than the normal ones around them. There were quests that I had absolutely no issue taking the time to read through and go do with absolutely no guide whatsoever because you actually needed to pay attention to get the thing done. Forget the lack of a quest guide - they were worth reading, and the game pulled you in in such a way that you wanted to. 1-60 was MMORPG done right. There was grouping, there was social interaction, the world was massive compared to what else I'd seen before, and it was all of it fun.
Anymore, the games released really shouldn't even bother if they're not going to produce solid content. I bought into the hype of Aion during its beta, and ended up taking the 1-50 ride. Man, what a joke. That game fails to have in its entire world what WoW started out with 2/3rds of one continent. It had polish, and pretty graphics sure. Areas I wanted to explore? Nothing you wouldn't get ushered through by the normal leveling process. Dungeons? Yeah, but then there's so few, and even though well-designed, you were practically forced to re-run them so many times you'd rather never see them again (Steel Rake anyone?).
Sure, your list of options covers many of the factors that go into recent disappointment, but end of the day I see content as the underlying factor to much of the problems. Like I said, like WoW or not, it had content-a-plenty. Think of one time where you felt like you re-did something that you had to. I can't, from my vanilla experience. Each area was new. Each level had different places to go. Each quest hub was different, with new surroundings, new mobs, new quests, and new dungeons - all with their own unique feel, right down to the music, all the while feeling natural and seamless. Even your most highly instanced MMOs of late don't even manage that somehow - they just replicate content throughout.
With an experience like mine, it's absolutely no wonder nothing has matched up since. It's not even something I realized about my own gaming experience until very recently, but it has obviously been a sub-conscious standard all along, and I'm betting that it's the case for more than just me....
"The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it."
George Bernard Shaw
What is a cynic? A man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.
Oscar Wilde
Five years ago I would have agreed with every word of this.
Today however, I fully disagree with the statement that Blizzard releases quality content, let alone focuses on quality.
Since the release of WoW, they have been slowly backsliding in the quality of their games. They have been adding more and more forms of veiled RMT into the game in hopes of milking just a little more from their playerbase. For as long as they take to produce new content, each release seems like less and less actual content being added. That's not even to mention that they have dropped a lot of content from the development cycle entirely.
What you have to realize, is that the WoW development team has shrunk significantly. Activision-Blizzard has pulled the majority of the senior developer and put them to work on their new currently unannounced MMO. The majority of the people who made WoW, no longer work on it, or for Blizzard at all. This is true for every one of their "hit" franchises.
I won't even go into server and client stability, which to be quite honest, is no better than most other MMOs, if not arguably considerably worse than many other MMOs.
Blizzard is growing into the "maturity" of being yet another SOE or EA.
World of Warcraft is but one title from Blizzard. Just one! And while I wholeheartedly agree that the content is becoming more scarce with each patch and expansion, I must reiterate that WoW is just one single title.
The entire Warcraft franchise is made up of 5.5 games in all: Warcraft: Orcs vs Humans, Warcraft II/Warcraft II BNET, Warcraft III, Warcraft III: FT and finally World of Warcraft.
Then we also have Diablo.
And many other games Blizzard has produced over the last fifteen years.
So while one of their games may be less appealing then it was in 2004 when it was released, I still believe that Blizzard, as a whole, is one of the best game developers out there.
They have scrapped quite a few games over the years (Diablo III was scrapped twice, StarCraft II was scrapped once, etc) because the final product did not live up to their standards. They have fired entire teams, and sent others back to the drawing board after years of development, because they refuse to release sub-par games. That says a LOT for Blizzard, imo.
True mages don't die. They strategically miscalculate.
1. Rushed release at behest of shareholders/investors.
2. Failure to deliver what was promised and continuing to lie to consumers in regards to status and future plans.
3. A lack of ingenuity in an effort to clone WoW's success instead of being inventive.
Those are the big ones, IMO.
Uncanny valley: people are demanding so much from MMOs these days, it as if they are starting to be judged as virtual reality simulations rather than as games.
Cryptic is trying a Customer Development approach to MMO creation.
There are many reasons why. Although the onethat stands out the most to me as of late in a lot of newer mmos is a severe lack of effort in customer service/support by some companies.
1. For god's sake mmo gamers, enough with the analogies. They're unnecessary and your comparisons are terrible, dissimilar, and illogical.
2. To posters feeling the need to state how f2p really isn't f2p: Players understand the concept. You aren't privy to some secret the rest are missing. You're embarrassing yourself.
3. Yes, Cpt. Obvious, we're not industry experts. Now run along and let the big people use the forums for their purpose.
disclaimer: read only op
I don't think the 'batch' is failing at all. If 10 games release and 1 is good for me that doesn't mean the others failed it just means they were aimed at 1 of the 9 others who didn't like the one I did.
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The person who is certain, and who claims divine warrant for his certainty, belongs now to the infancy of our species.
Severe lack of quality in all facets.
In general mmos are sucking because some mysterious astronomical disequilibrium....
Interesting. I see where you are coming from, but I've noticed that maybe in 1 or 2 games is the content itself an issue. Namely AoC and any Cryptic game, due to lack of enough content to even fully level up.
Vanguard, considered a failure by many, even though it has suffered through and is a much better game now, has a HUGE amount of content. Same with EQ2. I think even Warhammer has a ton of content, although its very streamlined and doesn't vary enough to make it "good" content.
Perhaps type of content is the factor? Is it this sudden push towards PVP games lately? That could be another reason.
As you can see, my poll can only have 10 options, but the more we discuss this, and its been great reading each of your opinions, there seems to be many more factors here than I had first imagined. Which was my point for this post all along. To see where the collective thinking of those here at mmorpg.com are on this issue.
Good stuff, keep it coming.
This is ironic since that's what MMOs were originally supposed to be; world simulations. It's only since WoW that the genre as a whole has been entirely about combat, combat and more combat.
Most games suffer from one of a variety of issues, but one it comes down to is a bad choice by the developers and that's it-
1. Graphics > Gameplay - stupid mistake. If you adverstise "massive battles" then make 100% sure those massive battles work on a PC that meets the recommended system requirements, including average latency times. Graphics > gameplay almost always leads to instancing and the world "feeling" a lot smaller due simply to the limitations of technology at the moment.
2. Two faction PvP - balanced? yeah right. you need at LEAST 3, any idiot knows that an odd number is required to create true balance. You also NEED to have balance mechanisms in place, like "you cannot make a Horde character on this server" too bad, pick another one or join a queue. Unfortunately, too many MMOs stick to rigid IP's that tell them they have to have 2 factions, when having 3/5/7 etc. with proper population balancing restrictions will garauntee a better PvP experience.
3. Focusing on a "hook" rather then actual gameplay - Aion, WoW with wings and half the content. Focused on a hook, fell flat on its face. AoC, their hook was boobs and blood, yeah, that worked (not) and don't forget WAR, the hook was RvR, but they failed to realize point number 2 above and made what SHOULD have been the ultimate RvR game into a linear roller coaster ride with "good guys" versus "bad guys" and oops, fail.
4. Trying to do too much and failing at all of it - SWG, for all the fanboi love pre-NGE and such, was a terribly balanced game with no functional developer content, was massively full of bugs, and it took them months/years to put the stuff in game that was on the box. Anyone else remember the combat medic month? the commando month? the creature handler phase? what a joke! they tried to do way too much with too little talent and resources (including time). And anyone remember WAR cutting like 4 classes from launch? like 4 capital cities? bit off more then you can chew!
*pro-tip* focus on a few things and make them absolutely amazing, then see what you can squeeze in for launch (as long as it's done) and add the rest in as you go via expansions and updates to keep the game fresh and the population steadily increasing.
5. Don't pick impossible IPs - every gaming company in the world could have come together to try and make a single Star Wars or Star Trek MMO and they still wouldn't get it right. You can't put 30-40 years of rabid fan-boi love into a few years of MMO development and come out the other side with a happy population. WoW worked becuase it was 10 years of IP and the producer/publisher/developer/IP holder was all the same company, and even then people stil think they've destroyed the IP.
6. Server types! - pvp can be fun for some, others hate it. make your game focus on PvP, and you've lost half your potential player base. What did WoW have to do to make PvP servers? Add a few lines of code (i'm sure more just making an example kids) to say "ok you can attack these people here but not here" and bam, you can potentially appeal to both crowds.
You don't have to have complex systems of alignments and rules and status changes and physical locations etc. etc. like so many other games do, you simply give players a choice. A switch to flip. Two or more server types.
7. Stay with the trends - this is the hard one because these games take so long to make. Console games and most PC games (even strategy) are moving towards faster and faster game play. Audiences for games and movies expect a faster pace because we've all been de-sensitized to it. You simply cannot make a game with impossibly slow and boring animations (WAR) or rediculous grinds (Aion) anymore. People in general are on the move, everything is mobile and faster then light text messaging instant messages internet phones etc.etc. games have to keep up. You can't sit and wait for a group for an hour to play 5 minutes and have it break up.
You simply CANNOT create enough content like quests/missions/story to keep players entertained for more then a few weeks or at most a month. That takes years to make and then players burn through it so fast what do you do? Nothing. You promise more content later and you create grinding treadmills to artificially slow things down.
But look at other online games like FPS games. People still play Starcraft and Halo games and CoD games religiously day in day out because they are FUN!
The developer content, the single player story lines and even the maps themselves, are played out and burned through in a month. It's the SKILL and the STRATEGY and the fun that keep players going.
MMOs have to catch up and figure out a way to do the same. I'd suggest focusing LESS on the reward for doing something and more on the very reason to do a thing in the first place - it's suppose to be fun!
Awesome post Heerobya! I agree with every single point you make.
I don't think the "latest crop of games" are failing at all actually. The genre is merely evolving and they're taking what has worked and trying to expound on it. Everything has been working like this for a while now with any product/medium etc. Look at how many times the same basic formula is used and rehashed in movies, yet they still sell and many sell very well. Same idea with video games and it takes time to evolve these things.
The one major difference is that MMORPG's are so new and it includes one huge monkey wrench for many companies which is the social aspect, hell, the existence of the Internet has become a huge monkey wrench in regards to the way its socially in general and has shaken our culture so much and so fast.
So, no, I don't think its failing at all, its merely evolving with the times and the difference between the "latest crop" and the "older crops" is development. Obviously the older games are going to feel more complete and polished because they had more time. Many of these companies are entering the industry for the first time and carry a lot on their plate trying to even develop an MMORPG yet alone learn the kinks around it.
Give it time and those same games would become as great and remembered as the older ones of today.