You can't just blame bureaucracy for the failure of the genre. Square Enix is going to probably be one of the more bureaucratic game dev companies around, that also has one of the most successful MMOs.
Practice doesn't make perfect, practice makes permanent.
"At one point technology meant making tech that could get to the moon, now it means making tech that could get you a taxi."
Yeah right no interest. Decline in popularity uh huh.
Star Citizen is the dream space MMORPG if it ever gets done and look at the financial support it has seen what 250 million?
Even scammy crap that delivers nothing like Chronicles of Elyria made 8 million.
Pretty sure people are interested.
Like someone else said make shit flavored ice cream and say it's ice cream people don't want not shit.
Honestly there is even a demand for shit ice cream in the MMORPG industry, people will buy anything.
The loot box, cash shop, pure greed make the problem sell the solution whale gaming we have today is why classic "sub based" 15 year old games are making a come back.
They are not making better games just monetizing the ever loving hell out of what they have and people are catching on. I hope we are at the bottom of the slippery slope and everyone can now see the cash shop cesspool for what it is.
"You CAN'T buy ships for RL money." - MaxBacon
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
I feel like a lot of it has to do with the fact that a LOT of MMOs feel exactly the same.
Begins with "you are the one single hero - nevermind the thousands who are the one single hero, too - destined to save the world" - then you level through zones, you hit your endgame, and you play DDR: Dailies, dungeons, raids. Then you wait for the expac to drop or move on.
Alternately, have an obnoxious P2W cash shop, and thats most of it.
The market is oversaturated, and while the amount of total players has not gone down, the amount of players per game has gone down. The genre needs to do something new and bold, rather than side-by-side single player with occasional co-op parts, it should focus on building player-driven worlds where you meaningfully interact with each other.
PvP CAN play a role, but it needs to be properly controlled and incentivized to avoid turning it into some griefbox gankfest as other games do. Give objectives for PvP, have civilian roles, or if it's free for all, put strong risks on being a thief etc. Basically discourage just senseless grief-killing just to annoy people. So far games dont quite seem to manage that, thus I'd prefer objective driven PvP, such as open-world faction vs faction zone conquests or fighting over resources.
Joint worldbuilding, settlement creation, one or multiple factions actively expanding territory. Have trade and crafting /matter/, not just for gear, but also for food, settlement upkeep and building. Buildings need stone and lumber? Some player somewhere quarried the stone, cut it, someone felled the trees, someone built the sawmill for it etc. Have it be an /actual/ MMO, not a glorified single player game with occasional coop.
Also, some people just shouldn't be playing rpgs or mmorpgs. They are not for everyone. People that don't like to think or read shouldn't be playing them. People that can't learn to like to think or read shouldn't be playing them.
E
Hmmm, that sounds a little too dorky for my taste.
Like the high school nerd telling the jocks "pheh you play football? That's for morons. I play Dungeons and Dragons a thinking man's game!"
Role playing games can offer a lot of things that inspire players to play. I'm sure there's some guy out there who loves the idea of playing a Barbarian but who doesn't want to theory craft every moment of his play time. He wants to smash things and "hear the lamentations of the women's!"
Which is ironic as you have a character that is primal, visceral but the game should require one to love some level of tedium or mental masturbation?
Role Playing games can offer a wonderful story and prospective player a chance to "play a role." It can then offer deeper game systems for those who really want to bring their A game.
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
I don't get this whole declining notion...I log onto FFXIV it's packed and there are queues, I log onto Neverwinter it's packed, I log onto ESO it's a Ghost Town but that's Zo$ fault, I log onto GW2 it;s packed.
I think MMO's are doing ok personally
WTF are you talking about. Recent numbers for ESO have it around 15M and every time I log in its packed, not to mention the two guilds I'm in shows dozens and dozens of active players 24x7. Stop with the fake news, it's bad enough I see it on Fox.
Speaking of fake news....there are 2.5 million ACTIVE players, your 15 million is how many played since release. But yea, I'm sure CNN and MSNBC would agree with you. smh
I would easily gamble on MMOs having more players and being more profitable globally than ever before. The problem is that MMOs are designed to be long-term game experiences with other people and any genre built on those principles are obviously going to collapse when you flood the market with tons of games.
Given the fact that it wasn't the boom that they thought it would be, large publishers have completely abandoned the genre leaving only shovelware games that rely on initial sales, preorders, and cash shop whales to make a profit and abandon the game shortly after release.
mmorpg's were a place and time and i could not be more grateful that i was there.
Was also lucky enough to have met the right people within the right games EQ2, SWG and experienced real mmorpg's to their fullest.
No one will ever be able to fully understand and comprehend what it was truly like, the synergy of a well oiled machine, the wonder, the awe of it all.
It was all so mind-blowingly-awesome.
My faith is my shield! - Turalyon 2022
Your legend ends here and now! - (Battles Won Long Ago)
I don't get this whole declining notion...I log onto FFXIV it's packed and there are queues, I log onto Neverwinter it's packed, I log onto ESO it's a Ghost Town but that's Zo$ fault, I log onto GW2 it;s packed.
I think MMO's are doing ok personally
Agreed, anyone log in to classic, then try and tell me they are not popular, absolutly PACKED!!! and am on a low pop server ffs.
Problem is no one is making them triple A's anymore so we are all in what we have availaible, which ain't many options overall depending on your tastes.
My faith is my shield! - Turalyon 2022
Your legend ends here and now! - (Battles Won Long Ago)
"One of the things I was amazed about was the initial popularity of that game...My takeaway from that was that World of Warcraft was the most social of all of our games to that point, because you had groups of people experiencing that together.
...but maybe there are other types of games that are able to capture the social experience even more. I would also just observe that as World of Warcraft evolved over the years, it actually kind of became less social, because in an effort to achieve more accessibility, we removed some o the reasons why you need to play with the same group of people over and over."
Less social equals less popularity, the ever increasing solo design of MMORPG's while Co-Op/team play has become common place in other genres has been the biggest factor in their decline.
The ability for players to compete in games thereby increases the importance of cooperation. But most MMORPGs have drastically reduced the ability for players to compete in MMORPGs or removed it altogether. I understand though. A lot of players didn't like the forms of competition present in many of the older MMORPGs because not enough effort was put into making the competition fair.
(Note: Fair Competition does not equal making all classes balanced. Which is practically impossible due to the number of skills classes posses and the different combinations of skills possible in MMORPGs.)
I agree, I should add to my first post that when MMO's first started to go down the solo gameplay route it led to a boom in player numbers. But long term it has led to a decline, so much was removed not just what gave us group and social; while so many solo player games became multiplayer and co-op became a phenomenon. The curious thing is that MMOs are still being released using the solo first and foremost design and then they scratch their heads when the new MMO cannot compete for the players of co-op and team games.
What it really boils down to is that there is only one thing that MMOs can do better and that is massive scale battles whether in PvP or PvE, and a lot of players who play MMOs don't even like that.
Everything else an MMO does can and has been done better in other types of games.
Add to that the fact that the coolness and newness of playing with others around the world is no longer new and 100s of other games do that, as well as all the social networks that didn't exist or were just beginning (Facebook launched the same year as WOW) when MMOs were the new cool thing for the masses.
I agree with whoever it was above who said they are back to being the niche game that they were before WOW brought in the masses and that's not a bad thing for anyone interested in playing them or developing knowing they're not swinging for a home run.
"Social media gives legions of idiots the right to speak when they once only spoke at a bar after a glass of wine, without harming the community ... but now they have the same right to speak as a Nobel Prize winner. It's the invasion of the idiots”
― Umberto Eco
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?” ― CD PROJEKT RED
Just because WoW is less popular doesn't mean MMO's are less popular.
True but they are less popular.
Let's say World of Warcraft went down to 100 people playing. If mmorpg's were still popular we'd still be getting hordes of news from the existing mmorpg's but all those mmorpg's that were being made.
But we're not. Oh sure, there are people who still love them but there aren't a lot of them being made now and those games that are still in existence have smaller crews working on them.
The larger mmorpg's are popular because of several reasons. Spill over from World of Warcraft as they've played the crap out of that game and they want something different or fans of the IP (Elder Scrolls and Final Fantasy).
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
I don't get this whole declining notion...I log onto FFXIV it's packed and there are queues, I log onto Neverwinter it's packed, I log onto ESO it's a Ghost Town but that's Zo$ fault, I log onto GW2 it;s packed.
I think MMO's are doing ok personally
Agreed, anyone log in to classic, then try and tell me they are not popular, absolutly PACKED!!! and am on a low pop server ffs.
Problem is no one is making them triple A's anymore so we are all in what we have availaible, which ain't many options overall depending on your tastes.
So people are playing games like Classic for a lack of anything newer or better?
Sounds pretty much like an industry or genre in decline when everyone returns to their past when everything newer is shit.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
I don't get this whole declining notion...I log onto FFXIV it's packed and there are queues, I log onto Neverwinter it's packed, I log onto ESO it's a Ghost Town but that's Zo$ fault, I log onto GW2 it;s packed.
I think MMO's are doing ok personally
Agreed, anyone log in to classic, then try and tell me they are not popular, absolutly PACKED!!! and am on a low pop server ffs.
Problem is no one is making them triple A's anymore so we are all in what we have availaible, which ain't many options overall depending on your tastes.
So people are playing games like Classic for a lack of anything newer or better?
Sounds pretty much like an industry or genre in decline when everyone returns to their past when everything newer is shit.
While I"m sure there are people playing Classic because they love it (and not necessarily because there isn't anything new) I think there's truth to what you say.
One can't say mmorpg's are thriving when an early incarnation of an early game is "thriving" yet nothing else is coming out.
And what does Thriving mean? Does Classic have 12 million players? or a good healhty 250k? which aligns more closely with the early years of mmorpg's.
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
MMOs are not in decline, it is just people are not willing to play for games that are subpar, copycat, p2w, lackluster, or lacking content.
The genre as a whole has chased after WoW, copying its model again and again. MMOs as a whole has shifted from what was typically a mmo: a never ending game, complex, social, to a new style of game where accessibility, solo centric, and extreme simplicity is the name of the game. To hell with needed groups, time commitments, and the need to think and figure things out.
All in all corporations greed in getting as many subs as a possible / people willing to buy into f2p scams is what has weakened the genre.
Games like Current WoW, Rift, Archeage, Aion, SWToR, and so on are not in decline/dead in some cases because people do not like mmos... they are in decline because people are starting to revolt against garbage decisions. WoW has released 2 absolute trash tier expansions, most people would say classic, BC, and Wrath were the best time in WoW. That means the company in thier misguided path has pushed thier own game down a path the majority of players disagree with. I remember when Blizzard said it is just Nostaligia no one today would like Classic over current, yet it makes up what nearly half of the active players in WoW atm....
FFXIV is touting great success but it is really successful? Their turn over is what 50-60%, they struggle to hold active subs after 3-4 months of an expansion release... if Blizzard did not go full retard with their last 2 expansions would FFXIV still be expanding? Probably not, they are expanding because of another mmo's shortfalls. So is FFXIV as success as it seems. No not really. There is just nothing better on the market right now because all the WoW clones are crappier then FFXIV and Blizzard is slowly killing off WoW.
F2P games are starting to fail because they are being made with making money as the primary goal (Cashshop) and the game's enjoyment being second. The whole f2p games are being designed to funnel people into a cashshop to progress at a decent rate. THEY DESERVE TO FAIL. As a corporation that makes sense, profits = success, but this is the problem with CEO's they only care about money not quality, not longevity, just short term money. And profits do not reflect if a game is good or not. No mmo should be made with money being the focus... if it is good money comes. If you force people into a cashshop over and over and over well people will say to hell with the mmo.
So I horribly disagree with Mr.Morhaime. MMOs are in decline only because of people like him. He is the failure not the genre. This goes for all Blizzards products when they started focusing on money instead of making truly great games... they all started going downhill. Blizzard was a hell of alot better company then Activision Blizzard that is for sure.
Not sure what the subscriber number for FFXIV is but I do know there is always a queue to get in on my server, aand it's not even a popular one. Been that way since before COVID, gotten longer snce.
Not sure what the subscriber number for FFXIV is but I do know there is always a queue to get in on my server, aand it's not even a popular one. Been that way since before COVID, gotten longer snce.
but I think there are two different things here.
Having a giant population for a specific game does not indicate an enthusiasm for the genre as a whole.
World of Warcraft was very popular but not because there was this outpouring of mmorpg players. It was popular with people who wanted to play World of Warcraft.
I remember waiting (twice mind you) for 2 hours in line for a peak at Elder Scrolls online. Of course you get to talking with the people in line. What did I learn?
That the people around me knew World of Warcraft and Star Wars the Old Republic. Didn't know other mmorpg's. There was one guy who was a huge Dark Age of Camelot fan.
So, while I could talk about those specific games I really couldn't talk about the genre as a whole. Of course this is a small microcosm of a PAX East line on two separate days but I felt it was telling.
So mmorpg fans might very well be World of Warcraft players but not all World of Warcraft (or Final Fantasy 14) players are mmorpg fans.
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
MMOs are not in decline, it is just people are not willing to play for games that are subpar, copycat, p2w, lackluster, or lacking content.
T
Then they are in decline because people aren't willing to pay for games that are subpar, copycat, etc etc.
I think people are getting too uncomfortable and thinking that "less interest" = "going away.
It doesn't.
So for example, I'm a huge classical music fan. And not only concert music but Ballet (mostly modern) and Opera as well as early music and hardcore 20th century.
But the interest in that is farrrrr less than popular music. The interest in all sorts of classical music has lessened over the years. But this doesn't mean it's going away.
It's just not going to have the numbers that pop performers have. And that's fine.
So mmorpg's are not going away. They are here to stay. They will just have their ardent fans and the studios willing to make them. Which, at the moment, with the exception of Amazon, are small indy studios.
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
Also, some people just shouldn't be playing rpgs or mmorpgs. They are not for everyone. People that don't like to think or read shouldn't be playing them. People that can't learn to like to think or read shouldn't be playing them.
E
Hmmm, that sounds a little too dorky for my taste.
Like the high school nerd telling the jocks "pheh you play football? That's for morons. I play Dungeons and Dragons a thinking man's game!"
Role playing games can offer a lot of things that inspire players to play. I'm sure there's some guy out there who loves the idea of playing a Barbarian but who doesn't want to theory craft every moment of his play time. He wants to smash things and "hear the lamentations of the women's!"
Which is ironic as you have a character that is primal, visceral but the game should require one to love some level of tedium or mental masturbation?
Role Playing games can offer a wonderful story and prospective player a chance to "play a role." It can then offer deeper game systems for those who really want to bring their A game.
Okay. MMORPGs should not require players to think or read? Obviously their characters can be stupid or illiterate. But is a stupid person or a person that can't read going to be able to play an MMORPG?
"If everything was easy, nothing would be hard."
"Show me on the doll where PVP touched you."
(Note: If I type something in a thread that does not exactly pertain to the stated subject of the thread in every, way, shape, and form, please feel free to send me a response in a Private Message.)
Also, some people just shouldn't be playing rpgs or mmorpgs. They are not for everyone. People that don't like to think or read shouldn't be playing them. People that can't learn to like to think or read shouldn't be playing them.
E
Hmmm, that sounds a little too dorky for my taste.
Like the high school nerd telling the jocks "pheh you play football? That's for morons. I play Dungeons and Dragons a thinking man's game!"
Role playing games can offer a lot of things that inspire players to play. I'm sure there's some guy out there who loves the idea of playing a Barbarian but who doesn't want to theory craft every moment of his play time. He wants to smash things and "hear the lamentations of the women's!"
Which is ironic as you have a character that is primal, visceral but the game should require one to love some level of tedium or mental masturbation?
Role Playing games can offer a wonderful story and prospective player a chance to "play a role." It can then offer deeper game systems for those who really want to bring their A game.
Okay. MMORPGs should not require players to think or read? Obviously their characters can be stupid or illiterate. But is a stupid person or a person that can't read going to be able to play an MMORPG?
There are, presumably, less intelligent people and people who don't read quests playing mmorpg's all the time.
Some very smart people on this very site often state they don't read quests.
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
I feel like a lot of it has to do with the fact that a LOT of MMOs feel exactly the same.
Begins with "you are the one single hero - nevermind the thousands who are the one single hero, too - destined to save the world" - then you level through zones, you hit your endgame, and you play DDR: Dailies, dungeons, raids. Then you wait for the expac to drop or move on.
Alternately, have an obnoxious P2W cash shop, and thats most of it.
The market is oversaturated, and while the amount of total players has not gone down, the amount of players per game has gone down. The genre needs to do something new and bold, rather than side-by-side single player with occasional co-op parts, it should focus on building player-driven worlds where you meaningfully interact with each other.
PvP CAN play a role, but it needs to be properly controlled and incentivized to avoid turning it into some griefbox gankfest as other games do. Give objectives for PvP, have civilian roles, or if it's free for all, put strong risks on being a thief etc. Basically discourage just senseless grief-killing just to annoy people. So far games dont quite seem to manage that, thus I'd prefer objective driven PvP, such as open-world faction vs faction zone conquests or fighting over resources.
Joint worldbuilding, settlement creation, one or multiple factions actively expanding territory. Have trade and crafting /matter/, not just for gear, but also for food, settlement upkeep and building. Buildings need stone and lumber? Some player somewhere quarried the stone, cut it, someone felled the trees, someone built the sawmill for it etc. Have it be an /actual/ MMO, not a glorified single player game with occasional coop.
Excellent Post. 10 out of 10, A+, 5 Stars.
"If everything was easy, nothing would be hard."
"Show me on the doll where PVP touched you."
(Note: If I type something in a thread that does not exactly pertain to the stated subject of the thread in every, way, shape, and form, please feel free to send me a response in a Private Message.)
MMOs are not in decline, it is just people are not willing to play for games that are subpar, copycat, p2w, lackluster, or lacking content.
The genre as a whole has chased after WoW, copying its model again and again. MMOs as a whole has shifted from what was typically a mmo: a never ending game, complex, social, to a new style of game where accessibility, solo centric, and extreme simplicity is the name of the game. To hell with needed groups, time commitments, and the need to think and figure things out.
All in all corporations greed in getting as many subs as a possible / people willing to buy into f2p scams is what has weakened the genre.
Games like Current WoW, Rift, Archeage, Aion, SWToR, and so on are not in decline/dead in some cases because people do not like mmos... they are in decline because people are starting to revolt against garbage decisions. WoW has released 2 absolute trash tier expansions, most people would say classic, BC, and Wrath were the best time in WoW. That means the company in thier misguided path has pushed thier own game down a path the majority of players disagree with. I remember when Blizzard said it is just Nostaligia no one today would like Classic over current, yet it makes up what nearly half of the active players in WoW atm....
FFXIV is touting great success but it is really successful? Their turn over is what 50-60%, they struggle to hold active subs after 3-4 months of an expansion release... if Blizzard did not go full retard with their last 2 expansions would FFXIV still be expanding? Probably not, they are expanding because of another mmo's shortfalls. So is FFXIV as success as it seems. No not really. There is just nothing better on the market right now because all the WoW clones are crappier then FFXIV and Blizzard is slowly killing off WoW.
F2P games are starting to fail because they are being made with making money as the primary goal (Cashshop) and the game's enjoyment being second. The whole f2p games are being designed to funnel people into a cashshop to progress at a decent rate. THEY DESERVE TO FAIL. As a corporation that makes sense, profits = success, but this is the problem with CEO's they only care about money not quality, not longevity, just short term money. And profits do not reflect if a game is good or not. No mmo should be made with money being the focus... if it is good money comes. If you force people into a cashshop over and over and over well people will say to hell with the mmo.
So I horribly disagree with Mr.Morhaime. MMOs are in decline only because of people like him. He is the failure not the genre. This goes for all Blizzards products when they started focusing on money instead of making truly great games... they all started going downhill. Blizzard was a hell of alot better company then Activision Blizzard that is for sure.
I gained a level by reading your post. Very Insightful.
"If everything was easy, nothing would be hard."
"Show me on the doll where PVP touched you."
(Note: If I type something in a thread that does not exactly pertain to the stated subject of the thread in every, way, shape, and form, please feel free to send me a response in a Private Message.)
Also, some people just shouldn't be playing rpgs or mmorpgs. They are not for everyone. People that don't like to think or read shouldn't be playing them. People that can't learn to like to think or read shouldn't be playing them.
E
Hmmm, that sounds a little too dorky for my taste.
Like the high school nerd telling the jocks "pheh you play football? That's for morons. I play Dungeons and Dragons a thinking man's game!"
Role playing games can offer a lot of things that inspire players to play. I'm sure there's some guy out there who loves the idea of playing a Barbarian but who doesn't want to theory craft every moment of his play time. He wants to smash things and "hear the lamentations of the women's!"
Which is ironic as you have a character that is primal, visceral but the game should require one to love some level of tedium or mental masturbation?
Role Playing games can offer a wonderful story and prospective player a chance to "play a role." It can then offer deeper game systems for those who really want to bring their A game.
Okay. MMORPGs should not require players to think or read? Obviously their characters can be stupid or illiterate. But is a stupid person or a person that can't read going to be able to play an MMORPG?
There are, presumably, less intelligent people and people who don't read quests playing mmorpg's all the time.
Some very smart people on this very site often state they don't read quests.
It's also true that many MMORPGs now have voice actors reading the quests while displaying the quest in text form at the same time.
Sometimes I skip reading quests (or even FMV/cut scenes) in an MMORPG or game that has a dull, uninteresting, or just plain stupid story. But I probably won't be playing that game very long if it doesn't have very good gameplay and overall design. Which most likely will not be the case. However, there is a lot more to read in MMORPGs besides quests.
Skill descriptions
Spell descriptions
Weapon, armor, and item descriptions
Help menus
All kinds of things really.
I suppose the players that don't like to read are the ones we find in general or zone chat asking how to complete a quest. When the text for the quest clearly tells them how to do it. These may be kids/teenagers or they may be less intelligent or studious adults as well. Or players asking how to do something that we know the game already explained to them earlier at some point.
Post edited by Ancient_Exile on
"If everything was easy, nothing would be hard."
"Show me on the doll where PVP touched you."
(Note: If I type something in a thread that does not exactly pertain to the stated subject of the thread in every, way, shape, and form, please feel free to send me a response in a Private Message.)
I hate to admit it but the genre asks for alot of time and investment from gamers. Society has been shifting more and more to short bursts of content and interaction that mobile, mobas and br games offer. Media is incredibly splintered compared to the days of network tv and mmorpgs that could be played on dialup. Its possible for an mmo to become huge again but I think that it probably won't brand itself as an mmo, and will have to be innovative or implement a new type of interactive gaming tech. I think a big problem with developers is that they arent building their games around realistic playerbase expectations.
Comments
Practice doesn't make perfect, practice makes permanent.
"At one point technology meant making tech that could get to the moon, now it means making tech that could get you a taxi."
Elyria made 8 million.
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
Love Minecraft. And check out my Youtube channel OhCanadaGamer
Try a MUD today at http://www.mudconnect.com/Begins with "you are the one single hero - nevermind the thousands who are the one single hero, too - destined to save the world" - then you level through zones, you hit your endgame, and you play DDR: Dailies, dungeons, raids. Then you wait for the expac to drop or move on.
Alternately, have an obnoxious P2W cash shop, and thats most of it.
The market is oversaturated, and while the amount of total players has not gone down, the amount of players per game has gone down. The genre needs to do something new and bold, rather than side-by-side single player with occasional co-op parts, it should focus on building player-driven worlds where you meaningfully interact with each other.
PvP CAN play a role, but it needs to be properly controlled and incentivized to avoid turning it into some griefbox gankfest as other games do. Give objectives for PvP, have civilian roles, or if it's free for all, put strong risks on being a thief etc. Basically discourage just senseless grief-killing just to annoy people. So far games dont quite seem to manage that, thus I'd prefer objective driven PvP, such as open-world faction vs faction zone conquests or fighting over resources.
Joint worldbuilding, settlement creation, one or multiple factions actively expanding territory. Have trade and crafting /matter/, not just for gear, but also for food, settlement upkeep and building. Buildings need stone and lumber? Some player somewhere quarried the stone, cut it, someone felled the trees, someone built the sawmill for it etc. Have it be an /actual/ MMO, not a glorified single player game with occasional coop.
Like the high school nerd telling the jocks "pheh you play football? That's for morons. I play Dungeons and Dragons a thinking man's game!"
Role playing games can offer a lot of things that inspire players to play. I'm sure there's some guy out there who loves the idea of playing a Barbarian but who doesn't want to theory craft every moment of his play time. He wants to smash things and "hear the lamentations of the women's!"
Which is ironic as you have a character that is primal, visceral but the game should require one to love some level of tedium or mental masturbation?
Role Playing games can offer a wonderful story and prospective player a chance to "play a role." It can then offer deeper game systems for those who really want to bring their A game.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
Speaking of fake news....there are 2.5 million ACTIVE players, your 15 million is how many played since release. But yea, I'm sure CNN and MSNBC would agree with you. smh
Given the fact that it wasn't the boom that they thought it would be, large publishers have completely abandoned the genre leaving only shovelware games that rely on initial sales, preorders, and cash shop whales to make a profit and abandon the game shortly after release.
Was also lucky enough to have met the right people within the right games EQ2, SWG and experienced real mmorpg's to their fullest.
No one will ever be able to fully understand and comprehend what it was truly like, the synergy of a well oiled machine, the wonder, the awe of it all.
It was all so mind-blowingly-awesome.
Agreed, anyone log in to classic, then try and tell me they are not popular, absolutly PACKED!!! and am on a low pop server ffs. Problem is no one is making them triple A's anymore so we are all in what we have availaible, which ain't many options overall depending on your tastes.
Everything else an MMO does can and has been done better in other types of games.
Add to that the fact that the coolness and newness of playing with others around the world is no longer new and 100s of other games do that, as well as all the social networks that didn't exist or were just beginning (Facebook launched the same year as WOW) when MMOs were the new cool thing for the masses.
I agree with whoever it was above who said they are back to being the niche game that they were before WOW brought in the masses and that's not a bad thing for anyone interested in playing them or developing knowing they're not swinging for a home run.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
Let's say World of Warcraft went down to 100 people playing. If mmorpg's were still popular we'd still be getting hordes of news from the existing mmorpg's but all those mmorpg's that were being made.
But we're not. Oh sure, there are people who still love them but there aren't a lot of them being made now and those games that are still in existence have smaller crews working on them.
The larger mmorpg's are popular because of several reasons. Spill over from World of Warcraft as they've played the crap out of that game and they want something different or fans of the IP (Elder Scrolls and Final Fantasy).
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
Sounds pretty much like an industry or genre in decline when everyone returns to their past when everything newer is shit.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
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Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
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Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
One can't say mmorpg's are thriving when an early incarnation of an early game is "thriving" yet nothing else is coming out.
And what does Thriving mean? Does Classic have 12 million players? or a good healhty 250k? which aligns more closely with the early years of mmorpg's.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
Big brain.
The genre as a whole has chased after WoW, copying its model again and again. MMOs as a whole has shifted from what was typically a mmo: a never ending game, complex, social, to a new style of game where accessibility, solo centric, and extreme simplicity is the name of the game. To hell with needed groups, time commitments, and the need to think and figure things out.
All in all corporations greed in getting as many subs as a possible / people willing to buy into f2p scams is what has weakened the genre.
Games like Current WoW, Rift, Archeage, Aion, SWToR, and so on are not in decline/dead in some cases because people do not like mmos... they are in decline because people are starting to revolt against garbage decisions. WoW has released 2 absolute trash tier expansions, most people would say classic, BC, and Wrath were the best time in WoW. That means the company in thier misguided path has pushed thier own game down a path the majority of players disagree with. I remember when Blizzard said it is just Nostaligia no one today would like Classic over current, yet it makes up what nearly half of the active players in WoW atm....
FFXIV is touting great success but it is really successful? Their turn over is what 50-60%, they struggle to hold active subs after 3-4 months of an expansion release... if Blizzard did not go full retard with their last 2 expansions would FFXIV still be expanding? Probably not, they are expanding because of another mmo's shortfalls. So is FFXIV as success as it seems. No not really. There is just nothing better on the market right now because all the WoW clones are crappier then FFXIV and Blizzard is slowly killing off WoW.
F2P games are starting to fail because they are being made with making money as the primary goal (Cashshop) and the game's enjoyment being second. The whole f2p games are being designed to funnel people into a cashshop to progress at a decent rate. THEY DESERVE TO FAIL. As a corporation that makes sense, profits = success, but this is the problem with CEO's they only care about money not quality, not longevity, just short term money. And profits do not reflect if a game is good or not. No mmo should be made with money being the focus... if it is good money comes. If you force people into a cashshop over and over and over well people will say to hell with the mmo.
So I horribly disagree with Mr.Morhaime. MMOs are in decline only because of people like him. He is the failure not the genre. This goes for all Blizzards products when they started focusing on money instead of making truly great games... they all started going downhill. Blizzard was a hell of alot better company then Activision Blizzard that is for sure.
Having a giant population for a specific game does not indicate an enthusiasm for the genre as a whole.
World of Warcraft was very popular but not because there was this outpouring of mmorpg players. It was popular with people who wanted to play World of Warcraft.
I remember waiting (twice mind you) for 2 hours in line for a peak at Elder Scrolls online. Of course you get to talking with the people in line. What did I learn?
That the people around me knew World of Warcraft and Star Wars the Old Republic. Didn't know other mmorpg's. There was one guy who was a huge Dark Age of Camelot fan.
So, while I could talk about those specific games I really couldn't talk about the genre as a whole. Of course this is a small microcosm of a PAX East line on two separate days but I felt it was telling.
So mmorpg fans might very well be World of Warcraft players but not all World of Warcraft (or Final Fantasy 14) players are mmorpg fans.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
I think people are getting too uncomfortable and thinking that "less interest" = "going away.
It doesn't.
So for example, I'm a huge classical music fan. And not only concert music but Ballet (mostly modern) and Opera as well as early music and hardcore 20th century.
But the interest in that is farrrrr less than popular music. The interest in all sorts of classical music has lessened over the years. But this doesn't mean it's going away.
It's just not going to have the numbers that pop performers have. And that's fine.
So mmorpg's are not going away. They are here to stay. They will just have their ardent fans and the studios willing to make them. Which, at the moment, with the exception of Amazon, are small indy studios.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
Some very smart people on this very site often state they don't read quests.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
Excellent Post. 10 out of 10, A+, 5 Stars.