Game wide characters, games with a lot of servers should have the option to take your character and log into any of them, this would solve SOOOO many of the socializing problems. It takes time to grow and understand a game, and your own needs within it, by that time you may well find yourself very alone. The option to join any guild or group of people regardless of server for example would solve a LOT of the community problems you are referring to. It would be a whole lot easier to find a group of people that are like you within the whole 4 million players of Wow then with the 20k or so people on whatever server.
Somewere in the world a network engineer is laughing at you
Imo the problem is not to get new players, it's to get new games, because as far as it is now, we have only maybe 2 or 3 different types of games, and most people who play since the beginning (like me since 1998) are totally bored to do the same old grind in every game. If u take EQ1 up to WoW u don't have much difference, u'll spend a lot of time grinding xp, killing mobs, with more or less features, like pvp for example but which is not revolutionary since DAoC created RvR. I could even add that the pvp in nowadays games is like 4x less fun than it was in UO where u could kill a dude and rob everything from him, just cuz he annoyed you.
Now with games like Pirates of the Burning Sea, coming soon (tm), maybe we'll have much more interesting games in the fact that they are different, and not just EQ clones that claims to be top of the line.
And to answer to this article, when you claim that there isn't enough players, this is quite wrong, the success of WoW for example is due for 80% to the new players, cuz this is where this game found its customers.
You're a Hardcore Survivor!
You not only survived the zombie apocalypse, but did it with style! Your mastery of zombie knowledge, survival tactics, and weaponry is nearly unmatched. Congratulations, for you are hardcore!
Somewere in the world a network engineer is laughing at you
Well I am, but not because it would be hard to implement; Guild Wars already did it actually, you can switch between servers any time. The reason I'm laughing is that the impact was to reduce the value of reputation to nothing, and making it extremely unlikely to meet the same people twice. If you have 4 million people online at the same time, you hardly want to go through 3.5 million before finding any people you want to play with. If you have only a few hundred people on one server, people HAVE to get along, so you are likely to form relationships 10+ times as often as in that cluster server design.
Originally posted by Cosi I would like to just say that I agree with Mr. Wood's article. He has done an exemplary job of describing the dilemma of the "new" and "casual" players in the MMORPG genre. As our society moves faster and faster with less and less time for family, recreation, etc., people will value what free time they DO have even more and will be choosier and choosier about how they invest that free time each week. While "social" is indeed the draw to MMORPG's, it is also the main deterrent. As Mr. Wood aptly pointed out, people won't want to spend money or time that is scarce to begin with playing a game FOR SOCIALIZATION purposes where they end up being put down, bullied, and generally treated badly by the very population they want to socialize with--it is a paradox that game developers somehow have to breach. There are NO EASY ANSWERS! This is human nature. The best that the industry can hope to do is revolutionize and change the avenues given to online game communities for communication and interaction somehow. For example, the board systems alone make alot of people cringe. The best approach a new player can take to an MMORPG is to AVOID the boards entirely!!! Most community board systems consist, to a large extent, of politics, personal vendettas, and people grandstanding for attention either individually or in groups. While one can find good game information on the boards, it takes alot of reading "between the lines" to find the valid information amidst all the (for lack of a better word) "crap". If there were a way for game developers and game companies themselves to police their own board systems and really do a thorough job of this, with consequences levied against "negative behavior", then things might begin to turn around. It is merely one place to start albeit the "core" of most online game communities' communication centers. There also needs to be alot of monitoring and consequences in games themselves in addition to the boards, but starting with the board communities would be an effective place to start. The mode of operation of most of the negative stuff: bullying, vendettas, etc. starts and then is perpetuated on the Boards themselves. In game, there is not, up to this point in time, significant community ties to facilitate this type of community interaction....yet. If, in future, something like a Board system in game is developed, it will need to be monitored closely for "negative behavior outbreaks" and then have significant, meaningful consequences levied against offenders for these negative interpersonal situations to be prevented from happening. People coming to these MMORPG's to "relax and have fun" need to be able to do just that: relax and have fun!! It is not a hard principle to understand really. They have less and less time to expend for personal enjoyment and the last thing they need is "personal drama" when they log in. It is , after all, a virtual world. Drama and problems of real life far exceed those of online games or should...yet I have seen drama in games and more specifically on the board communities of online games happen to the extent that people have been driven away from games and gaming altogether mainly by the behaviors of their own fellow gamers. While this variable of online gaming is exceptionally hard to control, there are rules and sanctions that gaming companies could initiate in online worlds that would simply mirror the same types of rules and sanctions exercised in real life by employers and companies, for example. I could see many gamers reacting negatively to such a premise, but, alot of the very people who would react would also, upon closer inspection, tend to be the offenders in the first place. The principle would be very simple: treat others with the same respect that you would wish to be treated with yourself without exception. Disallowance of "flames" on messageboards along with poor in game treatment of people (that would be monitored and logged by game developers themselves) would be but a couple of examples where this principle could best be applied. In my years spent in online games, I have seen people devastated emotionally, longstanding friendships ruined, reputations of successful guilds massacred by people in online communities who seem to have personal needs to "be better than" others in order to elevate their own self-esteem. The online environment permits this kind of thing to go on only because of the sense of anonymity that exists here. People feel "safe" taking on attitudes and carrying out behaviors that they NEVER would take on in the real world say in a job situation. In real life, to tear someone apart "for fun" as is often done on MMORPG community board systems, would result in that same individual being fired from a job if such behavior were practiced in the job setting against a co-worker, for example. So, what I am suggesting is practice of enforcement of the same principles practiced by many employers in job situations. This would clearly be an initial step to improvement of the genre for "new" and "casual" players. Everyone deserves personal respect and dignity and people who are paying to play an MMORPG for "entertainment" are just as deserving of respectful, kind treatment as are fellow employees in any job situation. These players are paying hard-earned money and expending limited amounts of personal free time playing the game they are playing for the express purpose of positive social interaction with other people in the game they are playing with the expectation of and hope for such positive social outcomes as making new friends, engaging in fun game specific activities such as raiding a dungeon for treasure, leading a quest for a specific trophy, attending a guild meeting, etc. If knowledge that such standards for behavior in a given MMORPG existed and were rigorously enforced would, IMHO, draw a great many more players to that specific game as players would feel "safer" from possible negative social experiences there. It would admittedly take time and publicity to demonstrate this reality to the gaming public at large. It would also cost game companies a fair share of game resources to monitor and implement such rules and sanctions but, in the long run, I believe that such investments would potentially pay off in a big way for the game company that made this effort towards interpersonal change in online gaming virtual worlds! Furthermore, in the longterm, I also believe that this sort of rule/sanction system against disrespectful player behavior would ultimately benefit the MMORPG genre at large because, once it was successfully implemented by one company in one game successfully, with subsequent positive results upon that game's demographics and subscription numbers, eventually it would "catch on" and become integrated into other MMORPG's in development, ultimately becoming a "new standard" for all MMORPG's. Such a shift in standards for interpersonal compliance would only serve to bolster the genre as a whole and pull MMORPG's to the forefront of popularity in the gaming industry itself as more and more people would flock to such games in the assurance of consistently pleasant, positive social experience in such games WITHOUT the "drama and negative experience" that MMORPG's are known for now!!!
Very long post, but a very good post. I agree with it fully. Some sort of more in depth policing of forums and in the games themselves would benefit the industry tremendously. If people were chastised for antisocial behavior more, with direct IP bans or credit card bans, this might even benefit society as a whole. People who behave negatively might correct their behavior while in game, before they manage to screw up their own lives and hurt other people in real life.
It's time for some of these companies to start spending the money we give them on serious in game GM's in greater numbers to do these type of things, instead of just spending all OUR money on making their stockholders and CEO's rich.
P.S. I did spell check and it only fixed mistakes by the O.P.
You couldn't have wrote this at a better time. With energy prices surging how many of us will have to leave MMO fees, if not internet fees, as well, out of our budget. Also, how many newcomers will balk at the idea of adding another bill? Only time will tell if the MMO market takes a hit from shrinking pocket books and rising bills.
The Editorial: MMORPGs Need "New Blood" by Jon Wood wanders off topic from the third paragraph.
We are presented with a number of solutions to attract more people into playing MMORPGs. Sure, if these solutions were presented as part of a longer article, then they would be relevant to the title, but instead it meanders off in the third paragraph never to return to the point.
The article should have been only two paragraphs long. I spent time reading the remaining text expecting discourse to prove what I saw as an interesting hypothesis. I wanted to hear arguments for and against why the industry needs new blood; what that would mean to the industry; how it would assist or stifle innovation in the genre; examples of developers who have sucked away market share at the expense of other, smaller developers and so on.
However, my arguments fall on deaf ears because more likely, the title for the article is wrong. As the writer talks a lot about what to do to get "new blood", and so little about WHY, I'd suggest the article should be titled:
John, You got to the point but you missed the solution. It's funny, I've been playing these games for years, and have played many of the games, but the first one I played was the one that got community building right. That was the original Asheron's Call. In Asherons Call, experienced players were given a reason (a slight experience point bonus) for befriending newbs and helping them out. This was formalized within the game as a patron/vassel relationship. The vassel usually received equipment, or money and advice. In return, a portion of the xp he earned was passed up to his "patron". It was a system that built communities. It had its growing pains, but many a title I can think of, would be improved by a similar system. Other games actually encourage ganking by making pvp all the time, everywhere. Simply providing safe zones for newbs, or an on/off switch for pvp would remove much anti-social behavior. Lineage 2 is a game where I paid mucho money for a particularily bad experience. In the end, this kind of poor game design is usally self-resolving (game games out of business). Have a good one...
I agree with a lot of what you said. It's often hard to get into a new community, especially to find new players to group with (or just talk with). I've been trying Final Fantasy XI the past few days, and it's gotten boring since very few people have come forward and asked me to join their Linkshell (something I needed to learn about). I still don't know how to add a friend in that game, it's not on the list of commands they give in the manual and that hurts. I'd like to know more people that do parties, and more people that craft for sure (actually enjoying what little crafting I can do). Anyway, thanks for the article, it's much needed.
You are right there are signifigant barriers to entry for "newbs" and that is a huge problem for the genre. Your listed solution won't help simply because MMORPGs as they currently stand are built from the ground up to encourage exclusion. Your reward for spending hours "grinding" in the game is that you don't have to play with the "newbs" anymore. Think about that for a second. This carrot chasing achievement cycle that is supposedly so "addictive" is exactly what prevents the genre from expanding.
What is needed is new thinking. Achievement is important but it is NOT more important than inclusion. Yes mister 80+ hour a week MMORPG gamer, I am suggesting that you will have to actually PLAY with those lesser beings that can only commit 10 or even 5 hours to the game. And *gasp* be on equal footing with them. Make a game where the acheivement doesn't equate to leaving those who haven't acheived as much behind. We are only stuck in this mode of game play because the community worsphips this concept of exclusion.
what am I suggesting? Eliminate the barriers created by player acheivement. Design content to have a certian window of life for the ENTIRE community. Everyone starts playing it on this date and everyone outlevels it on this date, etc. Let the fast levelers get a little ahead but at the same time drag along the slow levelers so that they can participate in the community at an equal level. Community > Personal Acheivement. Let everyone play togeather, play the same content togeather, play at the same level, participate in viable ways. Design for inclusion NOT exclusion.
Great article. A solution to the community problem could be combining the CCP players that act as 1st line support system (and are granted a special status for it) and the DAOC newbie guild system. While typing this I realize that CCP did that as well with the newbie corps.
Typing as I think here, the CCP approach (help channel in default interface, Ingame 1st line support through appointed players and the newbie guilds (corps)) could well be explaining the huge growth they are making atm (yes i know they handed out 20k free trails at a gamers convention).
There is a lot of marketshare to gain from WoW (judging from the ever stronger buzz that the end game in WoW is extremly boring after a couple of months) and it looks like CCP is profiting very strongly from it (partly from it being a totally different genre (most old wow players are new to mmorpg scene so tend to pick a title/genre outside of the one they just got fed up with) but surely through their welcoming newbie atmosphere as well.
Daoc could profit from these WoW players as well, since the game and especially the endgame is a mile better then that of WoW (in my personal opinion I should add here). With a small step of adding a help channel to their chat interface and assigning support staff/special selected gamers as GMs of newbie guilds they could break open the new player vs. existing community barrier.
I'm pretty sure this would apply to other MMORPGs as well.
I humbly apologize if this was allready said in a previous reply. I originally went in to reply to the author how much I liked the read and felt that it was spot on but got kind of carried away...
New players need a way to get jumped into a group of people and start to integrate into "society" as early as possible. It's a lot easier to come back to a game knowing you'll have someone to talk to. Those games where someone feels lonely get boring, even if it's a good game. I won't lie, I have no idea how to make something like that work and it would be difficult, but it would also be worth the time invested in it.
Second, though I often get into big arguements over this with people on forums, it has to be said: the cost. Here in Canada, it's harder than ever to pay for an MMORPG. Everything is on the raise. Every food item, every litre of gasoline, taxes on land and the cost of homes/renting... well, ok, there is one thing not rising. Salaries Seriously though, it's getting hard to afford any of life's luxuries let alone computers and gaming. Along with the constant evolution of games (thus the need for a better vid card and more ram) and the rising MMO costs ($15 American is the average now, no?) it's all stacking up much faster than I'd like.
In my opinion, the #1 reason MMOs don't get much new blood is this: people don't understand the reason for playing. They see MMOs as games, just like any other, but with a monthly fee. They don't see the community or the constant evolution of the game. Even experienced gamers see things this way. Many of my friends don't understand why I like to play MMOs. Somehow they need to tell people what they're missing. I'm positive that would help.
P.S. I'd like to see the prices go down $15 American is too much for the awful customer support and buggy updates that this genre of game has become famous for.
Comments
Hi all,
Imo the problem is not to get new players, it's to get new games, because as far as it is now, we have only maybe 2 or 3 different types of games, and most people who play since the beginning (like me since 1998) are totally bored to do the same old grind in every game. If u take EQ1 up to WoW u don't have much difference, u'll spend a lot of time grinding xp, killing mobs, with more or less features, like pvp for example but which is not revolutionary since DAoC created RvR. I could even add that the pvp in nowadays games is like 4x less fun than it was in UO where u could kill a dude and rob everything from him, just cuz he annoyed you.
Now with games like Pirates of the Burning Sea, coming soon (tm), maybe we'll have much more interesting games in the fact that they are different, and not just EQ clones that claims to be top of the line.
And to answer to this article, when you claim that there isn't enough players, this is quite wrong, the success of WoW for example is due for 80% to the new players, cuz this is where this game found its customers.
You're a Hardcore Survivor!
You not only survived the zombie apocalypse, but did it with style! Your mastery of zombie knowledge, survival tactics, and weaponry is nearly unmatched. Congratulations, for you are hardcore!
Well I am, but not because it would be hard to implement; Guild Wars already did it actually, you can switch between servers any time. The reason I'm laughing is that the impact was to reduce the value of reputation to nothing, and making it extremely unlikely to meet the same people twice. If you have 4 million people online at the same time, you hardly want to go through 3.5 million before finding any people you want to play with. If you have only a few hundred people on one server, people HAVE to get along, so you are likely to form relationships 10+ times as often as in that cluster server design.
Very long post, but a very good post. I agree with it fully. Some sort of more in depth policing of forums and in the games themselves would benefit the industry tremendously. If people were chastised for antisocial behavior more, with direct IP bans or credit card bans, this might even benefit society as a whole. People who behave negatively might correct their behavior while in game, before they manage to screw up their own lives and hurt other people in real life.
It's time for some of these companies to start spending the money we give them on serious in game GM's in greater numbers to do these type of things, instead of just spending all OUR money on making their stockholders and CEO's rich.
P.S. I did spell check and it only fixed mistakes by the O.P.
You couldn't have wrote this at a better time. With energy prices surging how many of us will have to leave MMO fees, if not internet fees, as well, out of our budget. Also, how many newcomers will balk at the idea of adding another bill? Only time will tell if the MMO market takes a hit from shrinking pocket books and rising bills.
The Editorial: MMORPGs Need "New Blood" by Jon Wood wanders off topic from the third paragraph.
We are presented with a number of solutions to attract more people into playing MMORPGs. Sure, if these solutions were presented as part of a longer article, then they would be relevant to the title, but instead it meanders off in the third paragraph never to return to the point.
The article should have been only two paragraphs long. I spent time reading the remaining text expecting discourse to prove what I saw as an interesting hypothesis. I wanted to hear arguments for and against why the industry needs new blood; what that would mean to the industry; how it would assist or stifle innovation in the genre; examples of developers who have sucked away market share at the expense of other, smaller developers and so on.
However, my arguments fall on deaf ears because more likely, the title for the article is wrong. As the writer talks a lot about what to do to get "new blood", and so little about WHY, I'd suggest the article should be titled:
"For MMORPGs That Need New Blood "
Or
"How MMORPGs should get new blood".
I hope my views are of interest to the writer.
John,
You got to the point but you missed the solution. It's funny, I've been playing these games for years, and have played many of the games, but the first one I played was the one that got community building right. That was the original Asheron's Call. In Asherons Call, experienced players were given a reason (a slight experience point bonus) for befriending newbs and helping them out. This was formalized within the game as a patron/vassel relationship. The vassel usually received equipment, or money and advice. In return, a portion of the xp he earned was passed up to his "patron". It was a system that built communities. It had its growing pains, but many a title I can think of, would be improved by a similar system. Other games actually encourage ganking by making pvp all the time, everywhere. Simply providing safe zones for newbs, or an on/off switch for pvp would remove much anti-social behavior. Lineage 2 is a game where I paid mucho money for a particularily bad experience. In the end, this kind of poor game design is usally self-resolving (game games out of business). Have a good one...
Rigghawk
Rigghawk
I agree with a lot of what you said. It's often hard to get into a new community, especially to find new players to group with (or just talk with). I've been trying Final Fantasy XI the past few days, and it's gotten boring since very few people have come forward and asked me to join their Linkshell (something I needed to learn about). I still don't know how to add a friend in that game, it's not on the list of commands they give in the manual and that hurts. I'd like to know more people that do parties, and more people that craft for sure (actually enjoying what little crafting I can do). Anyway, thanks for the article, it's much needed.
Sincerely,
Dimitri ashling
You are right there are signifigant barriers to entry for "newbs" and that is a huge problem for the genre. Your listed solution won't help simply because MMORPGs as they currently stand are built from the ground up to encourage exclusion. Your reward for spending hours "grinding" in the game is that you don't have to play with the "newbs" anymore. Think about that for a second. This carrot chasing achievement cycle that is supposedly so "addictive" is exactly what prevents the genre from expanding.
What is needed is new thinking. Achievement is important but it is NOT more important than inclusion. Yes mister 80+ hour a week MMORPG gamer, I am suggesting that you will have to actually PLAY with those lesser beings that can only commit 10 or even 5 hours to the game. And *gasp* be on equal footing with them. Make a game where the acheivement doesn't equate to leaving those who haven't acheived as much behind. We are only stuck in this mode of game play because the community worsphips this concept of exclusion.
what am I suggesting? Eliminate the barriers created by player acheivement. Design content to have a certian window of life for the ENTIRE community. Everyone starts playing it on this date and everyone outlevels it on this date, etc. Let the fast levelers get a little ahead but at the same time drag along the slow levelers so that they can participate in the community at an equal level. Community > Personal Acheivement. Let everyone play togeather, play the same content togeather, play at the same level, participate in viable ways. Design for inclusion NOT exclusion.
Great article. A solution to the community problem could be combining the CCP players that act as 1st line support system (and are granted a special status for it) and the DAOC newbie guild system. While typing this I realize that CCP did that as well with the newbie corps.
Typing as I think here, the CCP approach (help channel in default interface, Ingame 1st line support through appointed players and the newbie guilds (corps)) could well be explaining the huge growth they are making atm (yes i know they handed out 20k free trails at a gamers convention).
There is a lot of marketshare to gain from WoW (judging from the ever stronger buzz that the end game in WoW is extremly boring after a couple of months) and it looks like CCP is profiting very strongly from it (partly from it being a totally different genre (most old wow players are new to mmorpg scene so tend to pick a title/genre outside of the one they just got fed up with) but surely through their welcoming newbie atmosphere as well.
Daoc could profit from these WoW players as well, since the game and especially the endgame is a mile better then that of WoW (in my personal opinion I should add here). With a small step of adding a help channel to their chat interface and assigning support staff/special selected gamers as GMs of newbie guilds they could break open the new player vs. existing community barrier.
I'm pretty sure this would apply to other MMORPGs as well.
I humbly apologize if this was allready said in a previous reply. I originally went in to reply to the author how much I liked the read and felt that it was spot on but got kind of carried away...
New players need a way to get jumped into a group of people and start to integrate into "society" as early as possible. It's a lot easier to come back to a game knowing you'll have someone to talk to. Those games where someone feels lonely get boring, even if it's a good game. I won't lie, I have no idea how to make something like that work and it would be difficult, but it would also be worth the time invested in it.
Second, though I often get into big arguements over this with people on forums, it has to be said: the cost. Here in Canada, it's harder than ever to pay for an MMORPG. Everything is on the raise. Every food item, every litre of gasoline, taxes on land and the cost of homes/renting... well, ok, there is one thing not rising. Salaries
Seriously though, it's getting hard to afford any of life's luxuries let alone computers and gaming. Along with the constant evolution of games (thus the need for a better vid card and more ram) and the rising MMO costs ($15 American is the average now, no?) it's all stacking up much faster than I'd like.
In my opinion, the #1 reason MMOs don't get much new blood is this: people don't understand the reason for playing. They see MMOs as games, just like any other, but with a monthly fee. They don't see the community or the constant evolution of the game. Even experienced gamers see things this way. Many of my friends don't understand why I like to play MMOs. Somehow they need to tell people what they're missing. I'm positive that would help.
P.S. I'd like to see the prices go down
$15 American is too much for the awful customer support and buggy updates that this genre of game has become famous for.