times has changed and so has mmorpg.rebooted mmorpg in mobiles making more then WoW

hercules

i read all the time mmorpg are dead
i recall maybe 2012  (about time tablets were really beginning to make some noise and smartphones were well established) i wrote here about how i felt mobile mmorpg would be the future and generally got told by most that it will never kick off
however anyone remember a mmorpg called legends of mir?old and pretty much dead on pc
well on mobile  its making 100m$ a month
now that figure is only rivalled by Wow when it had 10m+ subs
https://www.techinasia.com/mobile-game-earning-100m-month-china
while i still feel mmorpg can work on the pc(and honestly still looks nicer on pc) the days of AAA mmorpg  as they are done
i recall back in early 2000s most developers agreed that 50k paying subs was a success
sadly when the teams swelled to 100+(believe it or not most of the legendary mmorpg were made with 20 and under teams) with cooperate putting significant pressure,it became 100k+ overnight and then even 500k+ as in the case of swtor
can't recall how much bioware spent on voice acting but it was nearly twice the budget to make WoW,yet could not be bothered to make an engine and bought a rubbish third party one
so maybe its time big companies left mmorpg and we can have small devs make their passion and be content with 50k subs again

tawess

hercules said:

can't recall how much bioware spent on voice acting but it was nearly twice the budget to make WoW,yet could not be bothered to make an engine and bought a rubbish third party one

Or did they feel confident in investing that much in to VO because they where sold a engine solution that they thought would work... We will never know. 

Anyway, while i find it impressive that a mobile MMO have hit it so big in a place that have few PC units with reliable internet (comparatively) but almost everyone have a mobile unit i wonder how well it would translate (literally as well as figurative) to the west. Not only do the gaming traditions differ but there is also many more computers with a good solid internet connection. 

So while i agree that you are right, mobile MMO´s are here to stay.... It might still take years before they make the transition properly and by then we might be able to run WoW on a tablet.

hercules

well its certainly getting there
albion online is pretty popular and cross platform
order and choas online is popular in the west
so not sure we have years to wait to get to wow standard

iixviiiix

Let wait until WOW port to mobile .

Warlyx

iixviiiix said:

Let wait until WOW port to mobile .

yeah rotations are almost there 1-2-3-4 /loop

Phaserlight

Holy paragraph returns, Batman!  It's like reading... poetry?

Anyway, here's my favorite mobile MMORPG, brought to you by some anonymous internet youngling:

Theocritus

You can only take mobile sales with a grain of salt.....Like 98% of the poulation has a smart phone now so they are going to sell some games, even though every one I have ever seen is total garbage.

Axehilt

Warlyx said:

yeah rotations are almost there 1-2-3-4 /loop

Think you might've mixed up all other games' rotations with WOW's.  WOW's rotations remain some of the deepest in MMORPGs.

Gdemami

hercules said:
can't recall how much bioware spent on voice acting but it was nearly twice the budget to make WoW

...source please.

Deivos

Axehilt said:

Warlyx said:

yeah rotations are almost there 1-2-3-4 /loop

Think you might've mixed up all other games' rotations with WOW's.  WOW's rotations remain some of the deepest in MMORPGs.

Didn't line up the hotbar right then.

filmoret

iPhone gaming makes tons of money this is no secret.  That market is too big and brings people into gaming that would otherwise never touch a computer or console.

nariusseldon

hercules said:

so maybe its time big companies left mmorpg and we can have small devs make their passion and be content with 50k subs again

 

Or just play the new fun AAA MMO hybrids?

MMORPG is a very old idea by now. For me, newer online games are much more fun.

Deivos

Are people supposed to argue it? Mobile gaming has been the largest growing trend in gaming for a while now, so opening low cost option on that market are inevitably going to catch one of the largest present user-bases for gaming.

WoW was "dethroned" some time ago by other genres, that a new competitor in the mobile market and MMO genre has popped up is interesting, but it doesn't really say a whole lot beyond that which we didn't already know when it comes to the migration of gaming markets.

That among plenty of other reasons have shifted about the development of big budget MMOs or removed them from the AAA market.

This all said, I would actually love to see more mobile integration with full-fledged PC/game titles. Pulling aspects from the games into a persistent framework that allows you to create an "always on" element of the game that players can continue to interact with, if not a deeper integration/porting like the aforementioned Vendetta Online.

josko9

Gdemami said:

hercules said:
can't recall how much bioware spent on voice acting but it was nearly twice the budget to make WoW

...source please.

I'm no expert, but I'm willing to bet voice acting costs a lot of money. Probably more than anything when developing a new game. Obviously you need to spend a lot of money to get the famous actors too. WoW is perhaps 0.1% voice acted, so there is also that.

With all that said, I have no doubt WoW expansions don't cost more than between 20-30mil EACH. That's just based on the quality that you see ingame, and the amount of content. It's barely worth mentioning when comparing it to a new-gen MMO. However I'm pretty sure Blizzard spends 200+ mil on marketing EACH expansion as well. This is a company that heavily relies on marketing budget, rather than making high quality games. They can afford to get away with it.

hercules

Deivos said:

Are people supposed to argue it? Mobile gaming has been the largest growing trend in gaming for a while now, so opening low cost option on that market are inevitably going to catch one of the largest present user-bases for gaming.

WoW was "dethroned" some time ago by other genres, that a new competitor in the mobile market and MMO genre has popped up is interesting, but it doesn't really say a whole lot beyond that which we didn't already know when it comes to the migration of gaming markets.

That among plenty of other reasons have shifted about the development of big budget MMOs or removed them from the AAA market.

This all said, I would actually love to see more mobile integration with full-fledged PC/game titles. Pulling aspects from the games into a persistent framework that allows you to create an "always on" element of the game that players can continue to interact with, if not a deeper integration/porting like the aforementioned Vendetta Online.

I think one of the points i wanted to make is that some developers like legends of mir  think outside the box and made a killing from it.
15 year old mmo making twice more then WoW
as i said some years ago some games like EQ would see new life in a mobile form.

Deivos

Somewhat true. The issue is how compatible the given type of gameplay is to the platform it's being used with.

As an isometric title, the one shared in the article ends up working rather well. Similarly Vendetta online can take advantage of simple control scheme to avoid any need for a suite of key commands. Titles like EQ, WoW, etc do have a bit of issue in the context of trying to fit the full range of a class' powers and the user controls to the game. 

This has been the stumbling block for a while now, as the screen size and options generally need to be streamlined and refitted into a different scheme.

Aspects of this can be overcome by automating a few more features of combat, embedding powers into a radial wheel so you can quick-access a wider range of powers than a fixed menu, adding a small set of options to immediately grab certain powers without menu-diving or macro certain combat chains, etc.

It'd be doable and it would see a new market with broad reach, but it's a question of just how much has to change and if the resulting game has much in relation to the original version or if it should be taken more as a sequel or side-grade (which isn't a bad thing, it;s just recognizing that the type of user experience will be rather different).

Deivos

Because Superdata is at best a western market analytics company and the data they aggregate has to be requested by them and then provided by the company.

Company refuses to provide the data, then they are basically looking at external metrics only and making vague inferences from published quarterly reviews.

Sephiroso

That article doesn't say shit about how they're making money. Is it all through IAP for p2w cash shop purchases that are necessary to flourish? Is it from a subscription type system? Is it because china has radically different payment models than the western world does?

It just gives you a number, which is more than WoW makes, but plenty of F2P games do that already like LoL so that's nothing new because it isn't 1. on the same platform and 2. same payment model.

Flyte27

I don't really understand how people enjoy playing games on a small touchscreen where their finger is blocking part of the screen.  My only conclusion is most people care more about playing with their friends than having an enjoyable game.  Then again you could spend time with your friend doing something more enjoyable then playing a touchscreen game.

Vermillion_Raventhal

They already have a WoW clone on mobile. 

nariusseldon

Flyte27 said:

I don't really understand how people enjoy playing games on a small touchscreen where their finger is blocking part of the screen.  My only conclusion is most people care more about playing with their friends than having an enjoyable game.  Then again you could spend time with your friend doing something more enjoyable then playing a touchscreen game.

may be they play games on a big 10" touchscreen?

Hearthstone is MUCH better on a tablet than a PC. It is much more natural to touch and move cards than click and drag. 

Theocritus

Hearthstone is garbage...cant believe anyone fell for Blizzard's marketing again

nariusseldon

Theocritus said:

Hearthstone is garbage...cant believe anyone fell for Blizzard's marketing again

Do i detect a hint of sour grapes?

You know millions are having fun playing Hearthstone, right?

noxmonk

Sukiyaki said:

The thing that everyone denied would ever happen for years and everyone else was waiting for to happen for years and everyone hoped for would happen to the new MMO he was waiting for finally happend.

WoW dethroned by the most significant objective metrics established over the past 10 years next to measured playeractivity aka earnings with a large gap by a mobile port of a 15 year old Chinese F2P MMO earning roughly twice (between US$92 million and US$107 million each month)  as much as WoW (average US$59 million each month in 2015) over half a year after its Mobile launch, not even including the PC version of the game.

7 ontopic replies, 2 of them act like nothing happend and trying to play it off, 1 of them doesn't realize it happend, 1 disputes it happend even when there is not much to argue about revenue numbers unlike some "100 Million WoW accounts! *cough* including free trials *cough*" announcement.

Kek. I expected at least some more denial. Some "Chinese people only like grinder" and are not real people an have no souls drama. Some "Its Mobile/F2P you cant just compare what I don't like" excuses. WoW isn't that dead yet! Come out fanboys!

[citation needed]

How to cite: https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/717/05/