At its root this is an argument for quality in MMOs, something that has been sorely lacking for years now. But if we are prepared to grasp the nettle of lower quality graphics a Kick Starter game may raise the banner yet for us.
As long as you can create bejeweled clone #34 or farmville clone #118 and put it on mobiles and in browsers, making a ton of money with a very low investment, there should be no reasonable expectation for the "come-back of quality MMORPG's".
Reemerging implies that it actually emerged at some point.
Since it didnt, your question is nonsense, and only VALID one is:
When will mmoRPG FINALLY EMERGE.
Actually, "when will an mmorpg genre REEMERGE?" is the proper question... On the basis that quality mmorpgs did once exist, in the sense that they did at least attempt to move in the proper direction (toward actualizing the p&p/tt rpg player character experience within a world), when considering the technology at the time. So it is not nonsense. Or are you stating that today's technology is not capable of accomplishing what was accomplished well over a decade ago?
I would wager it is the people currently at the top of the mmo industry whom are at the core of the issue being questioned here. They are not people that genuinely appreciate the mmorpg, but instead chase where they can make the most money. I would also wager, that it will be an issue corrected, eventually. The only question is when.
SWTOR, ESO and GW2 are most mmoRPG-ish games ever made.
And there is another line in UO-SWG-EvE. They are a bit different than p&p but still more mmoRPG-ish than anything other than mentioned above.
INTENT do do something is NOT same of actually MAKING it.
So, if you want to stick to it your question is:
When will INTENT to make mmoRPG reemerge.
But since last batch of mmos were closest to mmoRPG.....are you THAT much impatient?
The title's premise includes an unprovable assumption: The genre has gone (somewhere, away, up in smoke?) unstated.
Many here have been parroting this firmly-held belief for so long that they'll readily accept it as a given. But constant repetition does not create truth.
Originally posted by Yanocchi Many people are fed up with current games but fortunately some western developers are fed up with them too and are genuinely attempting to make new and very different triple AAA games as we speak. The MMORPG genre will re-emerge in 2017-2020.
You mean MOBAs, card games and shooter like what Blizz is developing?
Or like the Japanese companies all going to mobile (even Nintendo is talking about that)?
You are right about projects of really big and established corporations and publishers but the gaming industry is also showing signs of very innovative newcomers.
For example, there is a next-gen project in the making by western developers who were lead developers of Auto Assault, Rift and some projects at Blizzard and Electronic Arts. Their company is working on Star Citizen but they have also initiated a project and dedicated a team of developers to making a triple AAA dark fantasy horror MMORPG that is supposed to revive the MMORPG genre. They've named the project Revival to reflect this goal. They had worked for big corporations and were lead developers on Rift, Auto Assault and some other game projects but they left disappointed how original visions changed through compromises of big companies.
The Revival project has been only six months in real development but throughout this whole time the lead developers and company's CEO have been extremely open with the community about all aspects of the project. They have grown disappointed in MMORPGs and have decided to solve the question of when MMORPG genre will reemerge by starting to work on such a project themselves.
Time will tell if they succeed or fail but at least now you know that there are some western developers out there who are not happy about the current situation themselves and want to do something about it.
If their project becomes a huge success, maybe expect MMORPG genre to reemerge as MEOW.
Since their game will be quite different from MMORPGs, they've coined a new acronym to reflect the nature of their project, a Multiplayer Evolving Online World.
In any case, I believe that MMORPG genre will reemerge not through the work of conservative, corporate money-making developers, but through the work of developers who dare to stay true to their uncompromising vision and who truely understand the situation and how games feel from the gamers' side and who have finances and technical know-how to develop a project that breaks status quo.
You know who thought there was only one way to design an MMORPG? Those who carried the WOW/Themepark design through the last decade or so as the only viable design.
You know who thinks only one design was good? A Fanboi...
It's this type of thinking that has led to the Stagnation we see today...
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Time will tell if they succeed or fail but at least now you know that there are some western developers out there who are not happy about the current situation themselves and want to do something about it.
We certainly will see about that.
However, i don't see why innovative devs have to confine themselves to MMORPG at all. There are plenty of new ideas of online games ... no one needs to adhere to the old MMORPG design, particularly if they want to innovate.
The online features of MMORPGs are being co-opted and rolled into other games. MMORPGs co-opted their RPG features from RPGs, so really the only thing that MMORPGs have that other games don't is a persistent, shared world. I expect at some point this distinction isn't going to exist any longer. There will be MMORPGs, but people aren't going to call them MMORPGs because most games will have the same online mechanics.
For instance, in Dragon Age players can group together for dungeon runs. In GTA V, players can join each other in a shared world that is persistent as long as everyone is logged in. It even has housing. This (I bet) is making developers think they can start doing the same thing because the online aspects of these games is giving them longevity and keeping players invested in their games. GTA more than DA I think.
Originally posted by Yanocchi Many people are fed up with current games but fortunately some western developers are fed up with them too and are genuinely attempting to make new and very different triple AAA games as we speak. The MMORPG genre will re-emerge in 2017-2020.
You mean MOBAs, card games and shooter like what Blizz is developing?
Or like the Japanese companies all going to mobile (even Nintendo is talking about that)?
You are right about projects of really big and established corporations and publishers but the gaming industry is also showing signs of very innovative newcomers.
For example, there is a next-gen project in the making by western developers who were lead developers of Auto Assault, Rift and some projects at Blizzard and Electronic Arts. Their company is working on Star Citizen but they have also initiated a project and dedicated a team of developers to making a triple AAA dark fantasy horror MMORPG that is supposed to revive the MMORPG genre. They've named the project Revival to reflect this goal. They had worked for big corporations and were lead developers on Rift, Auto Assault and some other game projects but they left disappointed how original visions changed through compromises of big companies.
The Revival project has been only six months in real development but throughout this whole time the lead developers and company's CEO have been extremely open with the community about all aspects of the project. They have grown disappointed in MMORPGs and have decided to solve the question of when MMORPG genre will reemerge by starting to work on such a project themselves.
Time will tell if they succeed or fail but at least now you know that there are some western developers out there who are not happy about the current situation themselves and want to do something about it.
If their project becomes a huge success, maybe expect MMORPG genre to reemerge as MEOW.
Since their game will be quite different from MMORPGs, they've coined a new acronym to reflect the nature of their project, a Multiplayer Evolving Online World.
In any case, I believe that MMORPG genre will reemerge not through the work of conservative, corporate money-making developers, but through the work of developers who dare to stay true to their uncompromising vision and who truely understand the situation and how games feel from the gamers' side and who have finances and technical know-how to develop a project that breaks status quo.
While I am a fan of Revival, and will definitely give it a go, among their good ideas are a number of bad decisions including aim based combat (falsely referred to as "skill based") and a F2P model. I am under no illusion that they have a real grasp on what makes for a good mmorpg regardless if they seem to understand a few of the finer points like the need for dynamic content and a persistent world.
"A core concept, whether it’s desired or not, of the traditional MMO playspace is the idea that time means success. This makes sense from the business side of the industry, doesn’t it? The longer one spends in your game the more likely they are to spend money on it (or if they are paying a subscription, the longer they keep paying)... RPG style stats play their part in Revival, but they are not the great equalizer as they would be in other, less sophisticated, MMOs. Instead, Revival is a game that rewards skill." More rhetoric. What games don't require or reward at least some skill? Their game tenets and philosophy are filled with strawmen of that sort trying to justify twitch combat over traditional combat systems (all of which require as much or more skill than aiming with a mouse).
"The currency players can buy [with Real Life money] is called the SP, or Standing Point. As you might expect, you can use SP in lieu of in-game gold when needed, but that’s not really what SP is for. As the name suggests, SP is a way to track who is invested in the world: People with SP are people who have a standing in Theleston and care about its future.
Maybe that’s a bit of a hard sell, considering that people can buy SP with real money, but maybe that’s just a matter of perspective (oh please). After all, people who invest real money to purchase SP have, in their case literally, invested in the world of Theleston, haven’t they?
Oh come now. That screams scam louder than AA's marketplace. Somehow its bad for time and devotion to the game/character (and thus subscription) to determine who the top players are, but its ok for RL money to enter the equation directly? Sell that shit to somebody else.
When I get my million(s) from a lottery I have yet to win.
millions are not enough .. you probably need tens of millions. And even if you have the money, do you have the know-how to manage a large multiple disciplinary team?
What is the answer? What is it people want to stop making these types of posts? Do you want another 1998 MMORPG with better graphics? Do you want an SWG clone? Will that make you happy and stop all the doom and gloom BS? All the upcoming games obviously aren't enough so please tell us the game that will finally make you happy. Why does nostalgia hold people back so much?
Originally posted by maybebaked What is the answer? What is it people want to stop making these types of posts? Do you want another 1998 MMORPG with better graphics? Do you want an SWG clone? Will that make you happy and stop all the doom and gloom BS? All the upcoming games obviously aren't enough so please tell us the game that will finally make you happy. Why does nostalgia hold people back so much?
You wouldn't understand because you relegate our love for older games to something as ludicrous as nostalgia.
Originally posted by maybebaked What is the answer? What is it people want to stop making these types of posts? Do you want another 1998 MMORPG with better graphics? Do you want an SWG clone? Will that make you happy and stop all the doom and gloom BS? All the upcoming games obviously aren't enough so please tell us the game that will finally make you happy. Why does nostalgia hold people back so much?
You wouldn't understand because you relegate our love for older games to something as ludicrous as nostalgia.
Unfortunately, I did not enter the realm of MMOs until the launch of WOW. But after reading post after post, year after year, from those that entered the fray much earlier than myself, I have to wonder: is it really such a stretch that you guys genuinely preferred those experiences over what is offered now? No, it's not.
I've been playing EVE for more than a decade, and I have played games such as DarkFall extensively; if these titles give but a taste of what those old school games provided I have no doubt that your lot are not wearing the ridiculously played out "rose coloured fucking glasses".
"Mr. Rothstein, your people never will understand... the way it works out here. You're all just our guests. But you act like you're at home. Let me tell you something, partner. You ain't home. But that's where we're gonna send you if it harelips the governor." - Pat Webb
Originally posted by maybebaked What is the answer? What is it people want to stop making these types of posts? Do you want another 1998 MMORPG with better graphics? Do you want an SWG clone? Will that make you happy and stop all the doom and gloom BS? All the upcoming games obviously aren't enough so please tell us the game that will finally make you happy. Why does nostalgia hold people back so much?
You wouldn't understand because you relegate our love for older games to something as ludicrous as nostalgia.
"love for older games" .. wow .. and i thought these are just games.
I played the "older games" too (UO beta, EQ ....). Using the word "love" is a bit creepy ... at least for me. And you are right. I don't understand "love for older games" which are more like jobs than games ... at least for me.
Originally posted by maybebaked What is the answer? What is it people want to stop making these types of posts? Do you want another 1998 MMORPG with better graphics? Do you want an SWG clone? Will that make you happy and stop all the doom and gloom BS? All the upcoming games obviously aren't enough so please tell us the game that will finally make you happy. Why does nostalgia hold people back so much?
You wouldn't understand because you relegate our love for older games to something as ludicrous as nostalgia.
"love for older games" .. wow .. and i thought these are just games.
I played the "older games" too (UO beta, EQ ....). Using the word "love" is a bit creepy ... at least for me. And you are right. I don't understand "love for older games" which are more like jobs than games ... at least for me.
I'm going to go out on a limb here and assume English is not your first language (this is not an insult, it's totally cool if it's not).
In our language "love" is often used more casually as in "yeah, that movie was awesome, I loved it"; it's not used strictly to describe your "love" for your wife or kids. Hopefully that clears things up so you're not referring to someone as "a bit creepy" for enjoying something more than you did.
"Mr. Rothstein, your people never will understand... the way it works out here. You're all just our guests. But you act like you're at home. Let me tell you something, partner. You ain't home. But that's where we're gonna send you if it harelips the governor." - Pat Webb
Lol, well there's a WoW movie coming out next year. PnP games still haven't returned to REAL niche games since they got all that negative publicity (thanks media and Mazes & Monsters) back in the 80s. Soooo, the answer is NEVER.
My suggestion? Follow around some hipsters and see what they're playing. Chances are it'll be niche and something that most people hate, so you can feel that sense of exclusivity.
Originally posted by ArtificeVenatus Still... Waiting...
It's fine where it is, thx.
Casual high profile IP themepark quest grinders for the mainstream, more narrowly focused games in development for the more attentive, and niche older games for those that look for something more traditional.
The best thing to happen to this genre was the death of the 100 million AAA title.
I translate that title as "when will someone make a game just like {x}"?
You've already played {x}. The genre only moves on or improves by asking for {y}.
Exactly.
Nevermind the fact that "MMO" by itself means nothing ("Give me a red." "Uh...a red what?") and that all of the existing crop of MMORPGs are just as RPG as any videogame RPG of the last 35 years.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
I think in order to talk about the conditions of an MMORPG "re-emergence", we have to talk about the time when MMOs "emerged". Because these games didn't become popular for no reason...there were reasons they became popular.
Gaming in the 90's was all about the "action/adventure" title. This was the time of Resident Evil, Tomb Raider, Metal Gear Solid and so on. The 3D hardware plus the addition of the cutscene narrative made the Action/Adventure title the sine qua non of the disc-console age....and the studios couldn't churn out enough.
There was only one problem: longevity.
These games were absolutely brilliant, but you'd finish them in a weekend of hard play and put it on the shelf to collect dust. And the studios were churning out bad sequel after bad sequel, bad franchise after bad franchise, just to stave off boredom. Quality went down, but the price didn't. It actually saved a couple of industries from the axe (software retailers and video rental stores), but the genre was just...stale.
So when the internet got better, and UO and EQ hit, they hit at a time when the action/adventure looked like an expensive, increasingly repetitive option with little replay value. Why run to the store every weekend spending $40 to get Parasite Eve 3 or Resident Evil 24 or Final Fantasy XCVIII that would last you one weekend when you could get one game that offered months of fun for the same price and $15 a month? It was simply a better value.
Because not only did the MMORPG in the 2000s replace your action/adventure genre. It also replaced several other genres in your library.
Star Wars Galaxies wasn't just an RPG. It was all of these other games:
1) It was full of animated action, replacing my need for games like Resident Evil and Metal Gear.
2) It was a progression-based game, replacing my need for Final Fantasy and Xenogears.
3) It was a flight simulator, replacing my need for Wing Commander or Decent:Freespace.
4) It was a virtual dollhouse or fishbowl, replacing my need for The Sims.
5) It was a PvP game, replacing my need for Counterstrike.
6) It was a LARP game, replacing my need for GOPHER MUSHs.
7) It was an economic and logistic simulator, replacing my need for 4X games, Sim City and RTS.
And the best part about this was all the elements fed off of each other and influenced each other under one...shall we call it..."metaphysics" of the game's dynamics. The PvP elements made a difference in my progression. The RP elements coincided with the flight simulator elements, and so on. In the aughts, MMORPGs were just better than other genres...they gave you everything the other genres gave you, but in a better, cheaper and more efficient way.
Can we say the same today?
In fact, we can say the opposite today: single player action/adventure can do the things that MMORPGs can do better than MMORPGs. Grand Theft Auto V, Destiny, Assassin's Creed can do multiplayer plus give you all the goodies you expect from a top-shelf product. Plus, with DLC, the games have content additions so that you don't have to run to the store everyday to buy a new game to try something new. Heck. Many games now have active mod communities that allow you to upgrade your games perpetually. Things like Steam have turned mods from things that required technical knowlege to things any old consumer can install.
For clans and PvP, there's MOBA, which gives them what they want w/o all the MMORPG RP baggage they never liked from the start. These games get you in the action right away and are, also, infinately upgradeable and cheap to use, by comparison.
By comparison, MMOs look...well...tired.
All the stuff that used to make them different from other games have been taken out...the roleplay tools, the emotes, the /walk function. All well and good, because there's really nothing else for characters to do other than go on quests and PvP...no tools for intriguing, character to character interactions. You couldn't weave plots like Game of Thrones even if you wanted to, as everything is designed just to rush you past scenery in pursuit of some quest chain.
Building games like Minecraft and Space Engineers do construction better than MMOs can...and more cheaply for the end-user. Moddability on things like Steam Workshop makes the games have staying power....a power that (as recent closures of MMOs have shown) MMOs no longer can guarantee.
And so, the only real good thing that MMOs did well that those other genres didn't do is LARPing...and the tools to LARP have been lobbied out of the genre to the point where they aren't even designed with basic things like a walk function or chatt bubbles. Everything else just looks like some tired, low quality action/adventure script with bad production values (no cutscenes, no decent dialogue). The fact is that these games are so bad, they can't even give them away for free anymore. They charge for DLC but, quite frankly, their DLC is so much more sleezy and a bad value compared to DLC in...say...Mass Effect or Destiny.
In short, a revitalized action/adventure, RTS (MOBA) and building simulator culture gives your entertainment consumer much better experiences than the MMO. It is like every other genre gives you the Bellagio, while MMOs offer you a couple of rigged slots in a gas station outside of Reno.
TL,DR:
The problem with an MMO resurgence is that the MMO is now competing with better, cheaper, more stable and higher quality offerings from other genres which do the things that MMOs used to do better than the MMO can.
__________________________ "Its sad when people use religion to feel superior, its even worse to see people using a video game to do it." --Arcken
"...when it comes to pimping EVE I have little restraints." --Hellmar, CEO of CCP.
"It's like they took a gun, put it to their nugget sack and pulled the trigger over and over again, each time telling us how great it was that they were shooting themselves in the balls." --Exar_Kun on SWG's NGE
The problem with an MMO resurgence is that the MMO is now competing with better, cheaper, more stable and higher quality offerings from other genres which do the things that MMOs used to do better than the MMO can.
well .. i seldom agree with Beatnik59 .. but i guess I do in this case.
I also want to add that with the internet, it is much easier to distribute, and there is less of a need for "catch all" games. Modern online games, like what Blizz is putting out now (MOBA, card games, online shooter) are much more focused because people don't need to find everything in one game, they can just switch games if they fancy another experience.
I've been playing EVE for more than a decade, and I have played games such as DarkFall extensively; if these titles give but a taste of what those old school games provided I have no doubt that your lot are not wearing the ridiculously played out "rose coloured fucking glasses".
To tell you the truth, I think a lot of old-school player played those old games in spite of the PvP, not because of it.
The thing that's missing are the details...walking when you want to walk. /Emoting what you want your character to do. Bars. Hangouts. A kind of narrative intrigue that is more literary than lulz.
Most of the new games don't even have chat bubbles anymore or a /walk command. There's no point in building large spaces because, frankly, there's nowhere interesting to go and no reason to go there. The Counterstrike crowd didn't get it--they never got it--and they lobbied hard to take those details out. As a result, there's really nothing interesting that goes on in MMOs that's any better than what Destiny can offer, or Grand Theft Auto multiplayer.
__________________________ "Its sad when people use religion to feel superior, its even worse to see people using a video game to do it." --Arcken
"...when it comes to pimping EVE I have little restraints." --Hellmar, CEO of CCP.
"It's like they took a gun, put it to their nugget sack and pulled the trigger over and over again, each time telling us how great it was that they were shooting themselves in the balls." --Exar_Kun on SWG's NGE
I think in order to talk about the conditions of an MMORPG "re-emergence", we have to talk about the time when MMOs "emerged". Because these games didn't become popular for no reason...there were reasons they became popular.
Gaming in the 90's was all about the "action/adventure" title. This was the time of Resident Evil, Tomb Raider, Metal Gear Solid and so on. The 3D hardware plus the addition of the cutscene narrative made the Action/Adventure title the sine qua non of the disc-console age....and the studios couldn't churn out enough.
There was only one problem: longevity.
These games were absolutely brilliant, but you'd finish them in a weekend of hard play and put it on the shelf to collect dust. And the studios were churning out bad sequel after bad sequel, bad franchise after bad franchise, just to stave off boredom. Quality went down, but the price didn't. It actually saved a couple of industries from the axe (software retailers and video rental stores), but the genre was just...stale.
So when the internet got better, and UO and EQ hit, they hit at a time when the action/adventure looked like an expensive, increasingly repetitive option with little replay value. Why run to the store every weekend spending $40 to get Parasite Eve 3 or Resident Evil 24 or Final Fantasy XCVIII that would last you one weekend when you could get one game that offered months of fun for the same price and $15 a month? It was simply a better value.
Because not only did the MMORPG in the 2000s replace your action/adventure genre. It also replaced several other genres in your library.
Star Wars Galaxies wasn't just an RPG. It was all of these other games:
1) It was full of animated action, replacing my need for games like Resident Evil and Metal Gear.
2) It was a progression-based game, replacing my need for Final Fantasy and Xenogears.
3) It was a flight simulator, replacing my need for Wing Commander or Decent:Freespace.
4) It was a virtual dollhouse or fishbowl, replacing my need for The Sims.
5) It was a PvP game, replacing my need for Counterstrike.
6) It was a LARP game, replacing my need for GOPHER MUSHs.
7) It was an economic and logistic simulator, replacing my need for 4X games, Sim City and RTS.
And the best part about this was all the elements fed off of each other and influenced each other under one...shall we call it..."metaphysics" of the game's dynamics. The PvP elements made a difference in my progression. The RP elements coincided with the flight simulator elements, and so on. In the aughts, MMORPGs were just better than other genres...they gave you everything the other genres gave you, but in a better, cheaper and more efficient way.
Can we say the same today?
In fact, we can say the opposite today: single player action/adventure can do the things that MMORPGs can do better than MMORPGs. Grand Theft Auto V, Destiny, Assassin's Creed can do multiplayer plus give you all the goodies you expect from a top-shelf product. Plus, with DLC, the games have content additions so that you don't have to run to the store everyday to buy a new game to try something new. Heck. Many games now have active mod communities that allow you to upgrade your games perpetually. Things like Steam have turned mods from things that required technical knowlege to things any old consumer can install.
For clans and PvP, there's MOBA, which gives them what they want w/o all the MMORPG RP baggage they never liked from the start. These games get you in the action right away and are, also, infinately upgradeable and cheap to use, by comparison.
By comparison, MMOs look...well...tired.
All the stuff that used to make them different from other games have been taken out...the roleplay tools, the emotes, the /walk function. All well and good, because there's really nothing else for characters to do other than go on quests and PvP...no tools for intriguing, character to character interactions. You couldn't weave plots like Game of Thrones even if you wanted to, as everything is designed just to rush you past scenery in pursuit of some quest chain.
Building games like Minecraft and Space Engineers do construction better than MMOs can...and more cheaply for the end-user. Moddability on things like Steam Workshop makes the games have staying power....a power that (as recent closures of MMOs have shown) MMOs no longer can guarantee.
And so, the only real good thing that MMOs did well that those other genres didn't do is LARPing...and the tools to LARP have been lobbied out of the genre to the point where they aren't even designed with basic things like a walk function or chatt bubbles. Everything else just looks like some tired, low quality action/adventure script with bad production values (no cutscenes, no decent dialogue). The fact is that these games are so bad, they can't even give them away for free anymore. They charge for DLC but, quite frankly, their DLC is so much more sleezy and a bad value compared to DLC in...say...Mass Effect or Destiny.
In short, a revitalized action/adventure, RTS (MOBA) and building simulator culture gives your entertainment consumer much better experiences than the MMO. It is like every other genre gives you the Bellagio, while MMOs offer you a couple of rigged slots in a gas station outside of Reno.
TL,DR:
The problem with an MMO resurgence is that the MMO is now competing with better, cheaper, more stable and higher quality offerings from other genres which do the things that MMOs used to do better than the MMO can.
I applaud this comment, absolutely spot on.
So called MMORPGs published in the last decade have lost scope, functionality and, consequently, value in comparison with the ones from 1998-2004. As simple as that.
Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you.
Comments
SWTOR, ESO and GW2 are most mmoRPG-ish games ever made.
And there is another line in UO-SWG-EvE. They are a bit different than p&p but still more mmoRPG-ish than anything other than mentioned above.
INTENT do do something is NOT same of actually MAKING it.
So, if you want to stick to it your question is:
When will INTENT to make mmoRPG reemerge.
But since last batch of mmos were closest to mmoRPG.....are you THAT much impatient?
Many here have been parroting this firmly-held belief for so long that they'll readily accept it as a given. But constant repetition does not create truth.
Wobbly support for a rickety shack.
You are right about projects of really big and established corporations and publishers but the gaming industry is also showing signs of very innovative newcomers.
For example, there is a next-gen project in the making by western developers who were lead developers of Auto Assault, Rift and some projects at Blizzard and Electronic Arts. Their company is working on Star Citizen but they have also initiated a project and dedicated a team of developers to making a triple AAA dark fantasy horror MMORPG that is supposed to revive the MMORPG genre. They've named the project Revival to reflect this goal. They had worked for big corporations and were lead developers on Rift, Auto Assault and some other game projects but they left disappointed how original visions changed through compromises of big companies.
The Revival project has been only six months in real development but throughout this whole time the lead developers and company's CEO have been extremely open with the community about all aspects of the project. They have grown disappointed in MMORPGs and have decided to solve the question of when MMORPG genre will reemerge by starting to work on such a project themselves.
Time will tell if they succeed or fail but at least now you know that there are some western developers out there who are not happy about the current situation themselves and want to do something about it.
If their project becomes a huge success, maybe expect MMORPG genre to reemerge as MEOW.
Since their game will be quite different from MMORPGs, they've coined a new acronym to reflect the nature of their project, a Multiplayer Evolving Online World.
In any case, I believe that MMORPG genre will reemerge not through the work of conservative, corporate money-making developers, but through the work of developers who dare to stay true to their uncompromising vision and who truely understand the situation and how games feel from the gamers' side and who have finances and technical know-how to develop a project that breaks status quo.
* more info, screenshots and videos here
You know who thought there was only one way to design an MMORPG? Those who carried the WOW/Themepark design through the last decade or so as the only viable design.
You know who thinks only one design was good? A Fanboi...
It's this type of thinking that has led to the Stagnation we see today...
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
We certainly will see about that.
However, i don't see why innovative devs have to confine themselves to MMORPG at all. There are plenty of new ideas of online games ... no one needs to adhere to the old MMORPG design, particularly if they want to innovate.
The online features of MMORPGs are being co-opted and rolled into other games. MMORPGs co-opted their RPG features from RPGs, so really the only thing that MMORPGs have that other games don't is a persistent, shared world. I expect at some point this distinction isn't going to exist any longer. There will be MMORPGs, but people aren't going to call them MMORPGs because most games will have the same online mechanics.
For instance, in Dragon Age players can group together for dungeon runs. In GTA V, players can join each other in a shared world that is persistent as long as everyone is logged in. It even has housing. This (I bet) is making developers think they can start doing the same thing because the online aspects of these games is giving them longevity and keeping players invested in their games. GTA more than DA I think.
** edit - forgot some words
While I am a fan of Revival, and will definitely give it a go, among their good ideas are a number of bad decisions including aim based combat (falsely referred to as "skill based") and a F2P model. I am under no illusion that they have a real grasp on what makes for a good mmorpg regardless if they seem to understand a few of the finer points like the need for dynamic content and a persistent world.
"A core concept, whether it’s desired or not, of the traditional MMO playspace is the idea that time means success. This makes sense from the business side of the industry, doesn’t it? The longer one spends in your game the more likely they are to spend money on it (or if they are paying a subscription, the longer they keep paying)... RPG style stats play their part in Revival, but they are not the great equalizer as they would be in other, less sophisticated, MMOs. Instead, Revival is a game that rewards skill." More rhetoric. What games don't require or reward at least some skill? Their game tenets and philosophy are filled with strawmen of that sort trying to justify twitch combat over traditional combat systems (all of which require as much or more skill than aiming with a mouse).
"The currency players can buy [with Real Life money] is called the SP, or Standing Point. As you might expect, you can use SP in lieu of in-game gold when needed, but that’s not really what SP is for. As the name suggests, SP is a way to track who is invested in the world: People with SP are people who have a standing in Theleston and care about its future.
Maybe that’s a bit of a hard sell, considering that people can buy SP with real money, but maybe that’s just a matter of perspective (oh please). After all, people who invest real money to purchase SP have, in their case literally, invested in the world of Theleston, haven’t they?
Oh come now. That screams scam louder than AA's marketplace. Somehow its bad for time and devotion to the game/character (and thus subscription) to determine who the top players are, but its ok for RL money to enter the equation directly? Sell that shit to somebody else.
millions are not enough .. you probably need tens of millions. And even if you have the money, do you have the know-how to manage a large multiple disciplinary team?
You wouldn't understand because you relegate our love for older games to something as ludicrous as nostalgia.
Unfortunately, I did not enter the realm of MMOs until the launch of WOW. But after reading post after post, year after year, from those that entered the fray much earlier than myself, I have to wonder: is it really such a stretch that you guys genuinely preferred those experiences over what is offered now? No, it's not.
I've been playing EVE for more than a decade, and I have played games such as DarkFall extensively; if these titles give but a taste of what those old school games provided I have no doubt that your lot are not wearing the ridiculously played out "rose coloured fucking glasses".
"Mr. Rothstein, your people never will understand... the way it works out here. You're all just our guests. But you act like you're at home. Let me tell you something, partner. You ain't home. But that's where we're gonna send you if it harelips the governor." - Pat Webb
"love for older games" .. wow .. and i thought these are just games.
I played the "older games" too (UO beta, EQ ....). Using the word "love" is a bit creepy ... at least for me. And you are right. I don't understand "love for older games" which are more like jobs than games ... at least for me.
I'm going to go out on a limb here and assume English is not your first language (this is not an insult, it's totally cool if it's not).
In our language "love" is often used more casually as in "yeah, that movie was awesome, I loved it"; it's not used strictly to describe your "love" for your wife or kids. Hopefully that clears things up so you're not referring to someone as "a bit creepy" for enjoying something more than you did.
"Mr. Rothstein, your people never will understand... the way it works out here. You're all just our guests. But you act like you're at home. Let me tell you something, partner. You ain't home. But that's where we're gonna send you if it harelips the governor." - Pat Webb
Lol, well there's a WoW movie coming out next year. PnP games still haven't returned to REAL niche games since they got all that negative publicity (thanks media and Mazes & Monsters) back in the 80s. Soooo, the answer is NEVER.
My suggestion? Follow around some hipsters and see what they're playing. Chances are it'll be niche and something that most people hate, so you can feel that sense of exclusivity.
Crazkanuk
----------------
Azarelos - 90 Hunter - Emerald
Durnzig - 90 Paladin - Emerald
Demonicron - 90 Death Knight - Emerald Dream - US
Tankinpain - 90 Monk - Azjol-Nerub - US
Brindell - 90 Warrior - Emerald Dream - US
----------------
It's fine where it is, thx.
Casual high profile IP themepark quest grinders for the mainstream, more narrowly focused games in development for the more attentive, and niche older games for those that look for something more traditional.
The best thing to happen to this genre was the death of the 100 million AAA title.
Exactly.
Nevermind the fact that "MMO" by itself means nothing ("Give me a red." "Uh...a red what?") and that all of the existing crop of MMORPGs are just as RPG as any videogame RPG of the last 35 years.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
I think in order to talk about the conditions of an MMORPG "re-emergence", we have to talk about the time when MMOs "emerged". Because these games didn't become popular for no reason...there were reasons they became popular.
Gaming in the 90's was all about the "action/adventure" title. This was the time of Resident Evil, Tomb Raider, Metal Gear Solid and so on. The 3D hardware plus the addition of the cutscene narrative made the Action/Adventure title the sine qua non of the disc-console age....and the studios couldn't churn out enough.
There was only one problem: longevity.
These games were absolutely brilliant, but you'd finish them in a weekend of hard play and put it on the shelf to collect dust. And the studios were churning out bad sequel after bad sequel, bad franchise after bad franchise, just to stave off boredom. Quality went down, but the price didn't. It actually saved a couple of industries from the axe (software retailers and video rental stores), but the genre was just...stale.
So when the internet got better, and UO and EQ hit, they hit at a time when the action/adventure looked like an expensive, increasingly repetitive option with little replay value. Why run to the store every weekend spending $40 to get Parasite Eve 3 or Resident Evil 24 or Final Fantasy XCVIII that would last you one weekend when you could get one game that offered months of fun for the same price and $15 a month? It was simply a better value.
Because not only did the MMORPG in the 2000s replace your action/adventure genre. It also replaced several other genres in your library.
Star Wars Galaxies wasn't just an RPG. It was all of these other games:
1) It was full of animated action, replacing my need for games like Resident Evil and Metal Gear.
2) It was a progression-based game, replacing my need for Final Fantasy and Xenogears.
3) It was a flight simulator, replacing my need for Wing Commander or Decent:Freespace.
4) It was a virtual dollhouse or fishbowl, replacing my need for The Sims.
5) It was a PvP game, replacing my need for Counterstrike.
6) It was a LARP game, replacing my need for GOPHER MUSHs.
7) It was an economic and logistic simulator, replacing my need for 4X games, Sim City and RTS.
And the best part about this was all the elements fed off of each other and influenced each other under one...shall we call it..."metaphysics" of the game's dynamics. The PvP elements made a difference in my progression. The RP elements coincided with the flight simulator elements, and so on. In the aughts, MMORPGs were just better than other genres...they gave you everything the other genres gave you, but in a better, cheaper and more efficient way.
Can we say the same today?
In fact, we can say the opposite today: single player action/adventure can do the things that MMORPGs can do better than MMORPGs. Grand Theft Auto V, Destiny, Assassin's Creed can do multiplayer plus give you all the goodies you expect from a top-shelf product. Plus, with DLC, the games have content additions so that you don't have to run to the store everyday to buy a new game to try something new. Heck. Many games now have active mod communities that allow you to upgrade your games perpetually. Things like Steam have turned mods from things that required technical knowlege to things any old consumer can install.
For clans and PvP, there's MOBA, which gives them what they want w/o all the MMORPG RP baggage they never liked from the start. These games get you in the action right away and are, also, infinately upgradeable and cheap to use, by comparison.
By comparison, MMOs look...well...tired.
All the stuff that used to make them different from other games have been taken out...the roleplay tools, the emotes, the /walk function. All well and good, because there's really nothing else for characters to do other than go on quests and PvP...no tools for intriguing, character to character interactions. You couldn't weave plots like Game of Thrones even if you wanted to, as everything is designed just to rush you past scenery in pursuit of some quest chain.
Building games like Minecraft and Space Engineers do construction better than MMOs can...and more cheaply for the end-user. Moddability on things like Steam Workshop makes the games have staying power....a power that (as recent closures of MMOs have shown) MMOs no longer can guarantee.
And so, the only real good thing that MMOs did well that those other genres didn't do is LARPing...and the tools to LARP have been lobbied out of the genre to the point where they aren't even designed with basic things like a walk function or chatt bubbles. Everything else just looks like some tired, low quality action/adventure script with bad production values (no cutscenes, no decent dialogue). The fact is that these games are so bad, they can't even give them away for free anymore. They charge for DLC but, quite frankly, their DLC is so much more sleezy and a bad value compared to DLC in...say...Mass Effect or Destiny.
In short, a revitalized action/adventure, RTS (MOBA) and building simulator culture gives your entertainment consumer much better experiences than the MMO. It is like every other genre gives you the Bellagio, while MMOs offer you a couple of rigged slots in a gas station outside of Reno.
TL,DR:
The problem with an MMO resurgence is that the MMO is now competing with better, cheaper, more stable and higher quality offerings from other genres which do the things that MMOs used to do better than the MMO can.
__________________________
"Its sad when people use religion to feel superior, its even worse to see people using a video game to do it."
--Arcken
"...when it comes to pimping EVE I have little restraints."
--Hellmar, CEO of CCP.
"It's like they took a gun, put it to their nugget sack and pulled the trigger over and over again, each time telling us how great it was that they were shooting themselves in the balls."
--Exar_Kun on SWG's NGE
well .. i seldom agree with Beatnik59 .. but i guess I do in this case.
I also want to add that with the internet, it is much easier to distribute, and there is less of a need for "catch all" games. Modern online games, like what Blizz is putting out now (MOBA, card games, online shooter) are much more focused because people don't need to find everything in one game, they can just switch games if they fancy another experience.
To tell you the truth, I think a lot of old-school player played those old games in spite of the PvP, not because of it.
The thing that's missing are the details...walking when you want to walk. /Emoting what you want your character to do. Bars. Hangouts. A kind of narrative intrigue that is more literary than lulz.
Most of the new games don't even have chat bubbles anymore or a /walk command. There's no point in building large spaces because, frankly, there's nowhere interesting to go and no reason to go there. The Counterstrike crowd didn't get it--they never got it--and they lobbied hard to take those details out. As a result, there's really nothing interesting that goes on in MMOs that's any better than what Destiny can offer, or Grand Theft Auto multiplayer.
__________________________
"Its sad when people use religion to feel superior, its even worse to see people using a video game to do it."
--Arcken
"...when it comes to pimping EVE I have little restraints."
--Hellmar, CEO of CCP.
"It's like they took a gun, put it to their nugget sack and pulled the trigger over and over again, each time telling us how great it was that they were shooting themselves in the balls."
--Exar_Kun on SWG's NGE
I applaud this comment, absolutely spot on.
So called MMORPGs published in the last decade have lost scope, functionality and, consequently, value in comparison with the ones from 1998-2004. As simple as that.
Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you.
/slower clap
"This may hurt a little, but it's something you'll get used to. Relax....."