MMORPG Diaspora?

Keridwan

I don't know how other people feel about this but I have a sense that ever since World of Warcraft was released to huge applause and a fanfair of excitement (I know for example, that lots of people from DAoC left to play WoW); followed in quick succession by the American release of an initially popular Lineage 2 there has occurred something of a a MMORPG Diaspora. By this I mean that ardent and loyal MMORPG fans have been flitting and floating back and forth between different games and never really settled in one place. The number of people who have re-registered with old favourites and then shortly afterwards left again may also be indicative of this.

Perhaps this tells us something of the "state of the art" with MMORPGs right now? It may also be something that developers ought to note. The fact that DAoC, which was a fantastic early product (especially the three realm RvR aspects, as many people note) is still  currently third most popular in the charts (I know they aren't necessarily representative), with new games hitting the charts for a few weeks until the initial impact wears off (Auto Assault is a good example) might also indicate something about the quality of what's out there.

Personally, I reckon that there is a sizeable body of "hard core" MMORPG players who are waiting for that very special MMORPG to happen? This leads to the inevitable hype about WarHammer, Age of Conran, Aion, Chronicles of Spellborn etc etc. Some of you will remember the incredible hype surrounding Dark & Light - and what an Emperors New Clothes that turned out to be. So to cut to the chase. For one, I am waiting in great anticipation for something really special to hit the MMORPG scene. I wonder if there is anything that can ever match up to and have the impact that WoW had; also whether, the novelty of the kind of Eve OnLine genrre will have worn off, and if DAoC will still be in the charts in six months time? If it is then we are surely at a low ebb in terms of gamer satisfaction. Will the MMORPG Diaspora re-convene around something with rare depth and quality to have a lasting shelf life? Or are lasting shelf lives a thing of the past in a world of immediate gratification and short-termism?




* Note posting this again because it seems to have been placed in the wrong discussion group

MajorBiggs

Wow, good point. I agree.

Theodoryk

You didn't get enough responses in one forum, so you posted in another? Tsk tsk.

grimboj

Youre obviously new to this web site so Ill hold the flames for now. This has been discussed many times, in fact, the current popularity of this forum is due to the fact that there have been no good games for about 12 months and there will be none for another 12 months atleast. Personally, I bought an XBOX 360 and am spending the time chilling on that.

Loben

I think most gamers prefer to stay with a single game, but are forced to leave because of inherent problems or lack of content. The gamer market is there to drive development, and I think as more games are produced, people will have lower tolerences for "flaws" in a game. They'll have a point of reference to know better and have more options. Companines will be forced to produce better games to stay competitive. Then maybe someone figures out how to make an "end-game" that never really gets old (and a fun way to get there). It'll become harder and harder to sell "trash" games.

It could also just be that technology is a limiting factor. As tech
progresses, it may be easier for devs to add content to keep the games
fresh. Possibly the reason we see a lot of "short-term" games now could be that
the tech is good enough to produce nice looking online games fairly easily, but the
effort to maintain such a game (adding new content fast enough) is too
difficult to be worth it. I think THE game(s) will happen, it's just a matter of devs learning what people want and the tech being available to satisfy it. I don't think the post-WoW generation of games will be there, but hopefully one step closer. I don't know if anything will have the impact WoW did relatively, but I do know there are more than 6 million people now who are addicted to MMOs and many of whom are getting tired of WoW.

Greyface

The current crop of games just don't have the community features of previous games.  There's no real reason to stick around after you've "won" the game.  Take WoW for example... a fun game, to be sure, but why is it even a persistant-state game?  Instanced dungeons and battlegrounds could've just as easily been done clientside over a matching server, as with Counterstrike and other multiplayer shooters.  The rest of the game could just as well have been single-player.  The players have no influence on the game world.  The only cool "event" to occur, the blood plague, was quickly fixed by Blizzard.  CoX and Guildwars have exactly the same problem.  All fun games, but there's no reason to stick around.

Previous generations of games... UO, DAoC, SWG... all had plenty of "world" but not enough "game."  The current generation has the exact reverse problem.  I'm hoping against hope that the next wave of games can strike a balance.