You are right. Games are crippled by greed. By hold an arms race in dumbing down MMO's to attract the most players they are hoping to copy the success of WoW. WoW offered the lowest barrier of entry to the genre by taking many of the complex things you could do in an MMO, and dumbing it down to 15 buttons required to play, and making it look pretty for the period. This resulted in losing many fun features but by gaining mass appeal and acceptance by non-gamers who were hooked on their first MMO experience.
Companies tried to compete by dumbing it down more, or by buying licenses that hold wide spread awareness. When these things failed, they went a step further and cut money out of the equation = F2P. While many cash shops were started, rewarding people who spent money (their actual customers) with advantages that made them more powerful, or quicker to reach their goals.
The freeloaders (or leeches as another poster labeled them) complained that it was unfair and stopped playing. Without sheer numbers to advertise, those game worlds grew empty. Instead of seeing the problem that money is required to fund the games, developers saw the problem as a loss player as the actual problem.
Along come games were paying players in a free to play setting don't get any advantages over the freeloaders. They actually advertised this and the models failed as who had reason to spend money at this point (unless simply to support a product they liked out of pitty more than anything). That only goes so far as the dumbed down experience gets boring as nothing is new, nothing is added, and nothing a players does truly means anything.
I think companies are finally realizing that if you make a fun and deep game, people will pay to play it. The novelty of being new only lasts until you are not the new kid on the block, and you have to have gameplay to fall back upon. Success can't be measured in WoW terms as that was a being in the right place at the right time situation. Developers see the continued profit of the few games like EvE and slowly increasing player base and see not another failure, but a long term success. If they start accepting reality that you might not make billions and be happy with millions, quality games may indeed return. Until then, pick your least crappy MMO and enjoy as much as possible until a fun one comes along, and if its worth the price of admission, people will gladly pay it for the experience. At the same time the leeches will have the option to shell out some cash as well, or find a new hobby. At that point, growth may or may not occur, but success can be had.
I'm 48, married. $15/month is not always justifiable, because it can be tough making ends meet. I play F2P because they're free.
I beta-tested UO and played it during the pre-Trammel days. I stuck with it only because it was the only game of its kind (that I knew of anyway). I had all the time in the world then (no family, decent job) and I still hated PKs, corpse runs and all the work that went into trying to have fun.
I also played EVE for several years. Despite it being PVP-anywhere, I never felt like other people were in charge of my fun, and on the few times I got ganked it was because I went where I should have known not to go, or stayed too long, or got greedy.
I know that lots of people see things differently and want that old-school feel back. I'm not weighing in on the debate over F2P vs P2P, or FFA OW PVP or sandbox vs. themepark or any of that. I play games that are fun. Eve was fun. Wow (vanilla, on a pvp server) was fun.
I'm just offering the opinion that putting the whole thing on underage players is pretty shortsighted. I know you don't want to accept the fact that "old-school" gamers (ever played the old text-based Star Trek on an IBM selectric converted into a teletype?) are not all hardcore/sandboxy.
Originally posted by karbonista OP:I'm 48, married. $15/month is not always justifiable, because it can be tough making ends meet. I play F2P because they're free. I beta-tested UO and played it during the pre-Trammel days. I stuck with it only because it was the only game of its kind (that I knew of anyway). I had all the time in the world then (no family, decent job) and I still hated PKs, corpse runs and all the work that went into trying to have fun.I also played EVE for several years. Despite it being PVP-anywhere, I never felt like other people were in charge of my fun, and on the few times I got ganked it was because I went where I should have known not to go, or stayed too long, or got greedy.I know that lots of people see things differently and want that old-school feel back. I'm not weighing in on the debate over F2P vs P2P, or FFA OW PVP or sandbox vs. themepark or any of that. I play games that are fun. Eve was fun. Wow (vanilla, on a pvp server) was fun.I'm just offering the opinion that putting the whole thing on underage players is pretty shortsighted. I know you don't want to accept the fact that "old-school" gamers (ever played the old text-based Star Trek on an IBM selectric converted into a teletype?) are not all hardcore/sandboxy.
True true, and thank you for the respectable input. The reduced mmo fee would probably be an idea to propose for the players like you then.
Never fear, your dream MMO will be here.... just give me a decade or two to finely hone my Game development and design abilities as well as start a Game Design Studio. Thank you for your patience.
MMOs want some of the FPS market share. FPS games are B2P. B2P doesn't pay for constant fixes and content generation (let alone monitoring the game of exploits, that FPS games don't do themselves, MMORPGs do it inhouse -- not via third parties).
It costs money. So F2P is a means to get otherwise reluctant FPS types to play.
Downside of this is MMORPGs resemble MMOFPS games (anyone know of another PvE with optional PvP other than the 2004 titles like WoW and EQII?). FPS players aren't about character development, it's K/D and unlocks. They also aren't going to stay around to play for long, as they'll hop onto another game. So right from the start the next MMO with PvP destroyed having a community and population at the gate (but the devs did get some money).
The "don't care as long as the game delivers" choice is asshattery at best. We all want the game to deliver. So everyone will pick that, but it matters not to the vote.
Ah, sweet old times when companies tried to appeal the potential customer instead of emptying his/her wallet
You mean new times.
F2P is not getting into my wallet, unlike what sub-only MMO used to do. And yeah .. free appeals to me, instead of trying to get $15 from me every month.
Comments
Companies tried to compete by dumbing it down more, or by buying licenses that hold wide spread awareness. When these things failed, they went a step further and cut money out of the equation = F2P. While many cash shops were started, rewarding people who spent money (their actual customers) with advantages that made them more powerful, or quicker to reach their goals.
The freeloaders (or leeches as another poster labeled them) complained that it was unfair and stopped playing. Without sheer numbers to advertise, those game worlds grew empty. Instead of seeing the problem that money is required to fund the games, developers saw the problem as a loss player as the actual problem.
Along come games were paying players in a free to play setting don't get any advantages over the freeloaders. They actually advertised this and the models failed as who had reason to spend money at this point (unless simply to support a product they liked out of pitty more than anything). That only goes so far as the dumbed down experience gets boring as nothing is new, nothing is added, and nothing a players does truly means anything.
I think companies are finally realizing that if you make a fun and deep game, people will pay to play it. The novelty of being new only lasts until you are not the new kid on the block, and you have to have gameplay to fall back upon. Success can't be measured in WoW terms as that was a being in the right place at the right time situation. Developers see the continued profit of the few games like EvE and slowly increasing player base and see not another failure, but a long term success. If they start accepting reality that you might not make billions and be happy with millions, quality games may indeed return. Until then, pick your least crappy MMO and enjoy as much as possible until a fun one comes along, and if its worth the price of admission, people will gladly pay it for the experience. At the same time the leeches will have the option to shell out some cash as well, or find a new hobby. At that point, growth may or may not occur, but success can be had.
OP:
I'm 48, married. $15/month is not always justifiable, because it can be tough making ends meet. I play F2P because they're free.
I beta-tested UO and played it during the pre-Trammel days. I stuck with it only because it was the only game of its kind (that I knew of anyway). I had all the time in the world then (no family, decent job) and I still hated PKs, corpse runs and all the work that went into trying to have fun.
I also played EVE for several years. Despite it being PVP-anywhere, I never felt like other people were in charge of my fun, and on the few times I got ganked it was because I went where I should have known not to go, or stayed too long, or got greedy.
I know that lots of people see things differently and want that old-school feel back. I'm not weighing in on the debate over F2P vs P2P, or FFA OW PVP or sandbox vs. themepark or any of that. I play games that are fun. Eve was fun. Wow (vanilla, on a pvp server) was fun.
I'm just offering the opinion that putting the whole thing on underage players is pretty shortsighted. I know you don't want to accept the fact that "old-school" gamers (ever played the old text-based Star Trek on an IBM selectric converted into a teletype?) are not all hardcore/sandboxy.
True true, and thank you for the respectable input. The reduced mmo fee would probably be an idea to propose for the players like you then.
Never fear, your dream MMO will be here....
just give me a decade or two to finely hone my Game development
and design abilities as well as start a Game Design Studio.
Thank you for your patience.
It's bound to have happened.
MMOs want some of the FPS market share. FPS games are B2P. B2P doesn't pay for constant fixes and content generation (let alone monitoring the game of exploits, that FPS games don't do themselves, MMORPGs do it inhouse -- not via third parties).
It costs money. So F2P is a means to get otherwise reluctant FPS types to play.
Downside of this is MMORPGs resemble MMOFPS games (anyone know of another PvE with optional PvP other than the 2004 titles like WoW and EQII?). FPS players aren't about character development, it's K/D and unlocks. They also aren't going to stay around to play for long, as they'll hop onto another game. So right from the start the next MMO with PvP destroyed having a community and population at the gate (but the devs did get some money).
.:| Kevyne@Shandris - Armory |:. - When WoW was #1 - .:| I AM A HOLY PALADIN - Guild Theme |:.
You mean new times.
F2P is not getting into my wallet, unlike what sub-only MMO used to do. And yeah .. free appeals to me, instead of trying to get $15 from me every month.