MMORPG.com : General : The Downfall of MMORPGs - TheHiveLeader

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MMORPG.com : General : The Downfall of MMORPGs - TheHiveLeader

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SBFord

Spot on, Hive. Well said.

Corber

Couldn't agree more. Can't wait for Pantheon...

Spiider

Downfall of gaming in general is for the same reasons all industries go down: Money hungry excel sheet executives enter the field and fk it all up. This is why medicine only treats what is rentable, why banking became industry of crooks, why wars are started... Gaming used to be for gamers, now everyone games... And 'everyone' is, on average, of low IQ and short attention span.

Graveblade

Mmorpg's will never truly disappear. They appeal to those who wish to play as a character within a fictitious world, they used to be "virtual worlds", as opposed to just "games". Think about the amount of people who love the idea of being a fantasy character in lord of the rings, an eleven warrior, a hero perhaps, a bounty hunter in a Sci-fi universe or a superhero... They appeal to the imagination better than any other genre can when done well.

The biggest downfalls of Mmorpg's have been two combined things I think. One is innovation and risk, the other is QoL (Quality of life improvements) and accessibility.

1. It costs a ton of money to make an Mmorpg, and we have these games that were phenomenons like WoW.

This naturally results in many just copying the working model with tweaks thinking it's enough and will create the big bucks. The risk assessment guys go crazy saying you can't take such risks on new products , resulting in a game that has little innovation and closely follows the typical model. The genre slowly gets stale.

2. The other thing is something I think is a bit easier to miss, a little less obvious. As Mmorpg's are expanded upon, patched etc over the years, Quality of life improvements and accessibility gradually make their way into the game. At first this seems great, but eventually there has been so much packed on that this results in a dumbed down product, a shadow of it's former self.

Mmorpg's need a different strategy here. It should be content over QoL by a long long way. QoL should be things like a UI improvements, not actual QoL features that might alter the game a lot. Dungeon finders are a good example. A QoL feature where you can somehow magically teleport to a dungeon for no real reason.

A feature like this might even result in an initial rise in players, people seem to like it. The thing is though, it will slowly lead things down a path of destroying a virtual world, and it just becoming a game. Everything becomes dumbed down, there is no risk vs reward, little feeling of accomplishment and broken immersion.

If too much of this happens, the game will be a shadow of it's former self and it's initial vision. Too much QoL can totally destroy a product. It will no longer be a virtual world, it will just be a game.

[Deleted User]

The user and all related content has been deleted.

doomex

For me it's the rng enhancing system,farming simulator that make it feel like a job(Archeage,Eve,BDO) rather than fun. Warframe,poe are the only exceptions of farming simulators 'sigh but those get stale pretty quickly also. Companies also like to put a price tag of two digits on a virtual item that you can buy a decent but not triple A game unless it's on sale. On an enhance scroll that gives you 100% chance to succeed an enchance yay.Or some god damn pants in Fallout 76.
Now let's gonna see how Astellia the newest mmorpg will fold out to be. Will the 30$ price tag make it better for people or make it like Bless? I will go with the Bless part. Sure they don't have the same performance problems and promises that the devs made(but soon they will). But that enhance to +20 gonna be tempting for company not to exploit. Plus it's an korean mmorpg...

Back to the subject i guess. Mmorpg genre is not ded if you look at the b2p/sub. Sure no new many titles, but they keep making new content. I rather play a good game than to see 10 mmos getting every year that fail to capture the players or put some lolis for "attraction" like Astellia do. Maybe now companies will try to think of better ideas for an mmorpg, aka like a good thing.

GladDog

There are a few games coming out *soon* that should remake the genre a bit. Pantheon is definitely one of them, as is the one I am behind, Ship of Heroes. I would not, however, expect a large studio to develop a $50,000,000+ USD MMORPG any time soon. The smaller teams that are making indy projects are going to have to pave the way. Once the big studios sees what works, they MAY (and I want to emphasize MAY) start researching whether to dip their feet in the MMORPG pool again.

black9ice

The problem that happened with MMORPG's is they got long in the tooth with the whole genre, then all the re-hashes, all at about the same time survival/BattleRoyle/STEAM/mobile all became popular. Another thing that occurred during this same time frame was also bloat in mmorpg's. We moved from 1-2 hotbars to like 6 as a requirement as an example.

Biggest downfall of gaming currently is STEAM, instead of progressing and making better games as whole better, we took 3 steps back and allowed all this indie crap to proliferate the market through steam. There is a ton more to all this industry, but that is the gist of it.

Nilden

The devs are to blame as well... *shows Anthem gameplay*

Yeah that's when I stopped the video.

NOT A MMO.

Seriously you can't even make a video about the downfall of MMOs without including non-MMOs.

/slowclap

Viper482

I get your point, but pardon me if I don't concede to being lumped into the "we" and "us" in this video.

I am not part of a collective. I refuse to take blame as "us" because of things like so many people crying about paying a sub for a quality MMO. I never asked for much of the crap that dumbed down the genre.

McDonalds makes shit food I don't touch as well, but as long as millions eat it business will thrive. I will no more take the blame for the crap people demand in MMO's these days as I will for McDonalds still being around. Or am I still "we" because I am part of a population that consumes food?

Still love ya Hive! 

TheHiveLeader

Nilden said:

The devs are to blame as well... *shows Anthem gameplay*

Yeah that's when I stopped the video.

NOT A MMO.

Seriously you can't even make a video about the downfall of MMOs without including non-MMOs.

/slowclap

"I'd rather argue about what is or isn't an MMO than the actual point of the video."

/slowclap

Viper482

slowpoke68 said:

A few quick thoughts. People need to vote with their wallets, in all things. The mmo community contracting a bit may not be a bad thing for your average game's community. Hopefully some of the old school games will help restore the magic, that is the joy of community and cooperation over getting pixels and achievements. Only mmo in my near future is P99 Green releasing in October. Using this lull in mmos to explore other genres and play some quality single player games.

Always enjoy your videos.

If there is anything I have been guilty of it is throwing my wallet at every one of these trash MMO's in the hopes I find a good one. Not so much anymore because I learned my lesson, but did it for too long.

Theocritus

Remali said:

Don't believe the mmos are loosing population.
Ive been playing since year 2000 or so and I belive there are at least 10x more ppl playing mmos now than then.Back then if you had 100k subs you where a massive success.
Now eso ff14 bdo have millions and even maybe gw2 as well so its just wow that's losing subs.
Well im sorry but wow rode on the blizzard name for its success imo eq2 that released the same time was a lot better its time to see it lose some numbers at last
What really happened is that mmos changed drastically and as with any change some ppl don't accept it or wont accept it.
And while I see that the social factor is almost gone in modern mmos there are some things we gained as well.
So I don't think reproducing the mmorpg of year 2k is a good idea rather use what we ve learned over the years and try to move forward not back.

Here's the difference: BDO, ESO, and GW2 are all B2P/F2P games.....It is much easier to get millions of players that way than using a P2P format....It cost me $5 to play BDO for a year while it cost me well over $200 a year (1999-2005) to play Everquest for a year (expansion included in that)......

JeffSpicoli

TheHiveLeader said:

Nilden said:

The devs are to blame as well... *shows Anthem gameplay*

Yeah that's when I stopped the video.

NOT A MMO.

Seriously you can't even make a video about the downfall of MMOs without including non-MMOs.

/slowclap

"I'd rather argue about what is or isn't an MMO than the actual point of the video."

/slowclap

I have a question Hive Leader, You explained very thoroughly how we got to this point and how gamers shaped the current state of MMO's but you didn't ( or perhaps i missed it) suggest how we, as CONSUMERS , can encourage more creativity and perhaps encourage more risk on the part of studios to create something special and different.



The biggest risk is not taking any risk... In a world that changing really quickly, the only strategy that is guaranteed to fail is not taking risks.

JeffSpicoli

You did mention at the end use you money wisely which i agree with

Pher0cious

"What caused the downfall of the MMORPG?"

Fortnite

[Deleted User]

The user and all related content has been deleted.

Aenghas

My two cents is that a big part of the problem is the lure that they are a persistent world with potentially limitless content. We realize now the promise doesn't live up to reality. Treading the line for commercial reasons means content is often slow, or the engines become outdated or like Mr Hive (Mr Leader?) says risk stifles innovation etc.

Other games have an ending, or aren't story based or are sports games. We accept a Switch game will cost x amount of dollars and don't complain much. I've seen people say things like they bought a buy-to-play mmo for half as much, played a few hundred hours and still feel ripped off and entitled. People manage to complain about free-to-play titles like they were owed something. I guess it often does come down to people are the worst. Shady devs do as much damage as entitled players.

Nilden

TheHiveLeader said:

Nilden said:

The devs are to blame as well... *shows Anthem gameplay*

Yeah that's when I stopped the video.

NOT A MMO.

Seriously you can't even make a video about the downfall of MMOs without including non-MMOs.

/slowclap

"I'd rather argue about what is or isn't an MMO than the actual point of the video."

/slowclap

Well maybe part of the downfall of MMORPGS is the homogenization of the MMO term in general. Where everything is a MMO now.

If I go on steam under MMORPG the first thing I see is Destiny 2. That's not a MMORPG.

If I look at the MMORPG topic on youtube the first game I see is Oxygen Not Included. That's not a MMORPG.

If I go to any site like MMO-byte etc half the games on the list are not actual MMOs.

If I watch a video about the downfall of MMORPGs 2 minutes in I see Anthem.

I think that definitely contributes to the downfall of MMORPGs. You're certainly playing your part in the "us" category.

Areteo

"Spend your money and time wisely."

I'd love to, but how is one to do so when there isn't a single MMO out there worth supporting anymore?

Areteo

Theocritus said:

Remali said:

It cost me $5 to play BDO for a year while it cost me well over $200 a year (1999-2005) to play Everquest for a year...

And, as with so many things, you get what you pay for.

MMOGamer71

I agree with - "Changes in player priorities." More specifically a new generation of gamers known as "content locusts" that want fast and quick content and off to the next game. Nothing can be hard or require a long term commitment to the game.

Watch any high viewer volume Twitch streamer and you'll see exactly what I mean -  it's video game du dour.

knightaudit

Good one Hive. I went back to COH Homecoming and will say that games from back then had a lot more to them than what we see today ... Yes graphics are dated but the gameplay and feel of the game is what really matters. Maybe by going back we can learn as players and developers what not to do going forward.

TheHiveLeader

Nilden said:

Well maybe part of the downfall of MMORPGS is the homogenization of the MMO term in general. Where everything is a MMO now.

If I go on steam under MMORPG the first thing I see is Destiny 2. That's not a MMORPG.

If I look at the MMORPG topic on youtube the first game I see is Oxygen Not Included. That's not a MMORPG.

If I go to any site like MMO-byte etc half the games on the list are not actual MMOs.

If I watch a video about the downfall of MMORPGs 2 minutes in I see Anthem.

I think that definitely contributes to the downfall of MMORPGs. You're certainly playing your part in the "us" category.

Now see... THAT'S adding to the discussion. Outright dismissing an idea because you don't like that what some people consider MMOs are not what YOU consider MMOs, is part of the problem as well. If you'd watched the rest of the video, you would have gotten to the part where I stated that "What an MMO even IS isn't clearly defined anymore" and that "we need to create a new defintion" of MMOs again.

But instead, you'd rather just dismiss it outright because of some footage of a game that the devs totally messed up... on a portion where I'm talking about how devs mess up games. It was just footage. The important part of the video... the WORDS being said... still apply.

You are certainly playing your part in the "us" category as well sir.

Sinsai

Agree 100% Hive.