you will never see another UO/swg again. i hate to say it but it's true. WOW changed everything ...for the worst.
1. developers chase it's success
2. it now takes millions upfront to begin making the game and
3. investment capitol firms are reluctant to give out money for a new untried idea
4. before wow mmo games were the realm of hardcore pc gamers. nobody else would pay a monthly sub just to play a game...or play the same game for years. now mmorpg is a household term. games are made to appeal to the masses....and have lost that unique flavor.
i suppose it was bound to happen. our little hobby has become corporate.
You have 50 mio $/€ in your pocket. The only thing you know is that WoW is an unbelievable success. Whom of the following do you give the 50 mio to?
1. Team A wants to make a WoW clone but only better. Goal: WoW players will see that the new game is similar and better than Wow and change. Chance of success seems to be high.
2. Team B wants to make a game that is not like WoW but innovative. There is a 75% chance though that the project fails because the game is not like WoW.
The investors WANT the devs to create a better WoW. If your boss tells you to create a second Wow, then thats what you will do. The devs and the programmers are simply doing what they where contracted for. If you want to see games that are not like Wow then make it so that noone buys a Wow clone and hope that WoW becomes unpopular. At the same time buy the crappy alternative MMOs with bad graphics and lots of bugs. Only cash and numbers count to the investors. No company cares for what a minority customer group wants. Its all about targeting the biggest part of the customer base to maximize the number of potential customers.
Our only hope is that some smaller independend dev team makes a small gem that grows rapidly (Eve online would be a good example).
@OP: I do like the game you envision. Its a sandbox with realistic features and true consequences. Do not forget though that most of the MMO players do not want realism but pure entertainment in a fantasy world. In simulations you will always have winners and losers just like in real life. Noone likes to lose and thats why realistic games never really succeed. People have to deal with a lot of crap in the real world already. Imagine logging into your game after a bad day at work just to see your house with all of your possessions destroyed or looted by some uber guild that consists of players that are online 24/7.
--- Insanity: Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
You have 50 mio $/€ in your pocket. The only thing you know is that WoW is an unbelievable success. Whom of the following do you give the 50 mio to? 1. Team A wants to make a WoW clone but only better. Goal: WoW players will see that the new game is similar and better than Wow and change. Chance of success seems to be high. 2. Team B wants to make a game that is not like WoW but innovative. There is a 75% chance though that the project fails because the game is not like WoW.
The investors WANT the devs to create a better WoW. If your boss tells you to create a second Wow, then thats what you will do. The devs and the programmers are simply doing what they where contracted for. If you want to see games that are not like Wow then make it so that noone buys a Wow clone and hope that WoW becomes unpopular. At the same time buy the crappy alternative MMOs with bad graphics and lots of bugs. Only cash and numbers count to the investors. No company cares for what a minority customer group wants. Its all about targeting the biggest part of the customer base to maximize the number of potential customers. Our only hope is that some smaller independend dev team makes a small gem that grows rapidly (Eve online would be a good example).
@OP: I do like the game you envision. Its a sandbox with realistic features and true consequences. Do not forget though that most of the MMO players do not want realism but pure entertainment in a fantasy world. In simulations you will always have winners and losers just like in real life. Noone likes to lose and thats why realistic games never really succeed. People have to deal with a lot of crap in the real world already. Imagine logging into your game after a bad day at work just to see your house with all of your possessions destroyed or looted by some uber guild that consists of players that are online 24/7.
If your option are true then i would give 40 milion to the first team to make a clone better then wow and 10 milion to the second team to make a game complitly different that could become a good job to the eyes of hard core players. If "XXXcompany" would make a game that the hard core players like , you would become a good company to the eyes of the good players and all your products ,olso the crappy one close to wow would have a bigger chance of succes becouse the light players would read magazine or hear hard core players friends that suggest games made by teh "XXXcompany" wich is able to satisfy every taste.Bytheway, i dont think that your options are complitly correct. Whene you say that "WoW players will see that the new game is similar and better than Wow and change " i dont think you are right. Im afraid that wow players with a lvl 70 lvl prist will never choose to change for Warhammer online whene a new expanscion of WOW is close to exit.If you add olso that players who want to stop plaing WOW ,are bored of that tipe of game, im not complitly sure that they will choose a game so close to WOW. Peronaly i would not waste money giving 40 milion to the first team. I would risk pointing 50 milion on the second team , for the fact that Players that need to choose between WOW and a new clone WOW stay with WOW and players that stop to play WOW WANT SOMETHING DIFFERENT. Oltrought after so many years of WOW the players that want something different are realy much
For your final part of your post i must admit that you found the center of the problem.I'm one that like to risk .Im a player that without the risk of loosing, not get fun.I have played many years to age of empire and the only thing that was letting me play more and more was loosing and trying to get better. I dont want a game where everybody are happy Always. I'm one of the players that, like you was saying, was getting to home late from work and as soon as i was logging in my Neocron i was checking that the Op had been stolen from a bigger guild looged more then mine. This was a bad feal but this is what was letting me have fun: i was feeiling the taste of a future Vendetta.I was starting to find alley between guild not very strong . We was fighting each other to get use to the fight and then we was fighting the big guild all togheter. Then whene you arrive to point that a guild is getting too big The GM shoud help the lower side in some way without helping them too much , just enought to let the things be fair.what i think is that you will never have real fun untill you will cry for the lost of something. In neocron ppl where able to loot you after they had killed you. I lost many weapon in this way some of them where rare too but was too wonderful the taste to kill the F...ker that had looted me the day before finding in his Belt ,with big suprice, the weapon he had take to me the day before .Those are feeling that a WOW will never give me. Why i was talking about Call of duty in my first post? Becouse that game is getting every time better and better. Would not be too far from appling an economic systemt and let ppl Live inside that world ... / probably some year before(during the peace time) than the world where CoD is programmed.
it happend to the music business, it happed to the movie business, it happed to the tv business.....etc. etc. etc. and now ( probably even earlier but people are starting to realize it now) it happens to the gaming industry.
as soon as big money is involved, its calculated success > inovation and creativity most of the time.......
to the OP: if you like that kind of stuff, go do it in rl im not interessted in a "second life" at all and as far as i know, most people arent.
it happend to the music business, it happed to the movie business, it happed to the tv business.....etc. etc. etc. and now ( probably even earlier but people are starting to realize it now) it happens to the gaming industry. as soon as big money is involved, its calculated success > inovation and creativity most of the time.......
to the OP: if you like that kind of stuff, go do it in rl im not interessted in a "second life" at all and as far as i know, most people arent.
Exactly why I hate G4 TV. They've basically MTVized gaming. Used to, playing games was for nerds who had no life (which was one retarded stereotype in and of itself, but at least they left well enough alone.) Now... thanks to the American version of Playstation (XBOX) and such games that warrant money-mongers' attention (Halo), it's considered cool to be a gamer.... unless you're an MMO gamer... then you're still a nerd, because now it's inconceivable for anyone to spend a lot of time at their computer playing a game when they could be out living an interesting life like they do, even though they fail to grasp the concept that some people just don't care about the same shit they do, which usually consists of being popular amongst the masses.
Everytime I see an episode of X-Play with that retarded balding dude and that hot chick (who isn't really that hot), or an episode of Attack of the Show with the "I don't really like games, but they make me money!" host, or that show where gamers "FACE OFF" in SOCOM or UT, hosted by that wanna-be pro wrestler jock who gives the show it's fake overly emphatic play by play "OOOO! HEADSHOT!" John Madden football announcing flare... i want to throw up, especially when that jock asks the question "What was your strategy for winning?" as if the guy who plays an online FPS for most of his time in a day has secretly devised an unbeatable strategy instead of just doing what he always does - dominate with extreme prejudice.
It's the same crap that made CNN dumb, instead of a serious news outlet. Everyone wants to talk about marketing strategies, and give their opinions on what could happen if someone doesn't plan a campaign strategy correctly. Turn on CNN now, and instead of News... you get people's opinions and why you should agree with them, and why you are stupid and mindless if you don't - Thanks Bill O'Reilley for all your hard work! I realise Bill O'Reilley is on FOX News and not CNN, but FOX is even worse.
*sigh* I absolutely hate mainstream media and everything it has done to the things people enjoy. And then I hate those people who say "Well then, don't watch it!" as we had any other option when we turn on the TV.
In response to OP's title, I don't think programmers are to blame so much as the development team as a whole, certainly the story and gameplay developers are to blame equally if not more then the programmers, modellers, and etc etc.
The problem is, games are designed and directed by people in an office, people that probably never played a game. Thats the problem. A good developers makes whatever you ask him to do.
I've played quite a few very good MMOGs, so I believe your theory is false.
I agree with you. There are a lot of "good" games out there. I would not hesitate to recommend LotRO, EVE, EQ2, WoW, or WAR to someone if I thought it would fit their playstyle.
I think the largest problem here is that a "good" MMORPG has not been made recently that fits the playstyle of the majority of people that visits this website.
"Those who dislike things based only on the fact that they are popular are just as shallow and superficial as those who only like them for the same reason."
Just to find a better solution to our questions why you dont go here www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm to vote? At the moment ppl that watch this website( and for the most are ppl very inteersted in MMOPRGs) say that 0% want to play WOW 80% a very realistic game as i described in this post and 20% something else. At the moment there are only 10 vote so please log in and vote. We will have our little statistic
I've played quite a few very good MMOGs, so I believe your theory is false.
I agree.
Does anyone else find it funny that the OP and his followers are wanting the next big great thing and yet the devs they are bitching about are really just doing the same thing.
I've played quite a few very good MMOGs, so I believe your theory is false.
I agree.
Does anyone else find it funny that the OP and his followers are wanting the next big great thing and yet the devs they are bitching about are really just doing the same thing.
i find funny that someone that has found what was looking for ,have fun to see that someone else didn't found it. this is funny... probably if you have time to leave message like this ,you dont like to play so much your game either you would not waste your time in this way... oo you are right "the istance raid " start later....
Only one sentence is needed to properly and completely answer your title question
"Because they do not listen to what their potential customers tell them what they want in a game" !
And what do potential customers want in a game ?
You make it sound like all players are in agreement in what makes a good MMO. Of course, in reality it's different, and everybody has different opinions / expectations. So who should the developers listen to ?
Maybe you dislike WoW, but you're probably in a minority, as there are millions of players who enjoy it.
Did it cross your mind that maybe developers, by following WoW's path, are exactly doing that today: giving players what customers tell them they want ?
That is the real problem IMO. Few developers have a vision and are ready to go for a niche market, even if that means reduced revenue. MMOs and games, nowadays, are no longer a work of art: they've become an industry.
Only one sentence is needed to properly and completely answer your title question
"Because they do not listen to what their potential customers tell them what they want in a game" !
And what do potential customers want in a game ?
You make it sound like all players are in agreement in what makes a good MMO. Of course, in reality it's different, and everybody has different opinions / expectations. So who should the developers listen to ?
Maybe you dislike WoW, but you're probably in a minority, as there are millions of players who enjoy it.
Did it cross your mind that maybe developers, by following WoW's path, are exactly doing that today: giving players what customers tell them they want ?
That is the real problem IMO. Few developers have a vision and are ready to go for a niche market, even if that means reduced revenue. MMOs and games, nowadays, are no longer a work of art: they've become an industry.
You are probably right whene you say that "MMOs and games, nowadays, are no longer a work of art: they've become an industry." but i dont think is true the fact that if someone play Wow is becouse he like WOW. I have played WOW too, for 2 years ,and i have played it just becouse there wasnt anithing different and i was playing it olso becouse i ahd some real life friend playing it too , and i had a lvl 60 player , and there was an expansion near to exit ... many reasons why i decided to go on playing wow. But the more important thing is that i was playing a game that was boring and i was going on for other reasons.
In my opinion, programmers aren't able to make good MMO's because most MMO's continue to try and copy WoW. The next "big" MMO will not be a WoW clone - it will be something new and different that totally consumes its playerbase. Other factors why programmers aren't able to make good MMO's include the rush to market, unfinished games, broken promises, lack of fun factor, and primarily the feeling of deja vu.
Actually the next big MMO would be a WoW clone. Just like the next big MMO was an EQ clone - WoW.
Comments
you will never see another UO/swg again. i hate to say it but it's true. WOW changed everything ...for the worst.
1. developers chase it's success
2. it now takes millions upfront to begin making the game and
3. investment capitol firms are reluctant to give out money for a new untried idea
4. before wow mmo games were the realm of hardcore pc gamers. nobody else would pay a monthly sub just to play a game...or play the same game for years. now mmorpg is a household term. games are made to appeal to the masses....and have lost that unique flavor.
i suppose it was bound to happen. our little hobby has become corporate.
You have 50 mio $/€ in your pocket. The only thing you know is that WoW is an unbelievable success. Whom of the following do you give the 50 mio to?
1. Team A wants to make a WoW clone but only better. Goal: WoW players will see that the new game is similar and better than Wow and change. Chance of success seems to be high.
2. Team B wants to make a game that is not like WoW but innovative. There is a 75% chance though that the project fails because the game is not like WoW.
The investors WANT the devs to create a better WoW. If your boss tells you to create a second Wow, then thats what you will do. The devs and the programmers are simply doing what they where contracted for. If you want to see games that are not like Wow then make it so that noone buys a Wow clone and hope that WoW becomes unpopular. At the same time buy the crappy alternative MMOs with bad graphics and lots of bugs. Only cash and numbers count to the investors. No company cares for what a minority customer group wants. Its all about targeting the biggest part of the customer base to maximize the number of potential customers.
Our only hope is that some smaller independend dev team makes a small gem that grows rapidly (Eve online would be a good example).
@OP: I do like the game you envision. Its a sandbox with realistic features and true consequences. Do not forget though that most of the MMO players do not want realism but pure entertainment in a fantasy world. In simulations you will always have winners and losers just like in real life. Noone likes to lose and thats why realistic games never really succeed. People have to deal with a lot of crap in the real world already. Imagine logging into your game after a bad day at work just to see your house with all of your possessions destroyed or looted by some uber guild that consists of players that are online 24/7.
---
Insanity: Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
If your option are true then i would give 40 milion to the first team to make a clone better then wow and 10 milion to the second team to make a game complitly different that could become a good job to the eyes of hard core players. If "XXXcompany" would make a game that the hard core players like , you would become a good company to the eyes of the good players and all your products ,olso the crappy one close to wow would have a bigger chance of succes becouse the light players would read magazine or hear hard core players friends that suggest games made by teh "XXXcompany" wich is able to satisfy every taste.Bytheway, i dont think that your options are complitly correct. Whene you say that "WoW players will see that the new game is similar and better than Wow and change " i dont think you are right. Im afraid that wow players with a lvl 70 lvl prist will never choose to change for Warhammer online whene a new expanscion of WOW is close to exit.If you add olso that players who want to stop plaing WOW ,are bored of that tipe of game, im not complitly sure that they will choose a game so close to WOW. Peronaly i would not waste money giving 40 milion to the first team. I would risk pointing 50 milion on the second team , for the fact that Players that need to choose between WOW and a new clone WOW stay with WOW and players that stop to play WOW WANT SOMETHING DIFFERENT. Oltrought after so many years of WOW the players that want something different are realy much
For your final part of your post i must admit that you found the center of the problem.I'm one that like to risk .Im a player that without the risk of loosing, not get fun.I have played many years to age of empire and the only thing that was letting me play more and more was loosing and trying to get better. I dont want a game where everybody are happy Always. I'm one of the players that, like you was saying, was getting to home late from work and as soon as i was logging in my Neocron i was checking that the Op had been stolen from a bigger guild looged more then mine. This was a bad feal but this is what was letting me have fun: i was feeiling the taste of a future Vendetta.I was starting to find alley between guild not very strong . We was fighting each other to get use to the fight and then we was fighting the big guild all togheter. Then whene you arrive to point that a guild is getting too big The GM shoud help the lower side in some way without helping them too much , just enought to let the things be fair.what i think is that you will never have real fun untill you will cry for the lost of something. In neocron ppl where able to loot you after they had killed you. I lost many weapon in this way some of them where rare too but was too wonderful the taste to kill the F...ker that had looted me the day before finding in his Belt ,with big suprice, the weapon he had take to me the day before .Those are feeling that a WOW will never give me. Why i was talking about Call of duty in my first post? Becouse that game is getting every time better and better. Would not be too far from appling an economic systemt and let ppl Live inside that world ... / probably some year before(during the peace time) than the world where CoD is programmed.
it happend to the music business, it happed to the movie business, it happed to the tv business.....etc. etc. etc. and now ( probably even earlier but people are starting to realize it now) it happens to the gaming industry.
as soon as big money is involved, its calculated success > inovation and creativity most of the time.......
to the OP: if you like that kind of stuff, go do it in rl
im not interessted in a "second life" at all and as far as i know, most people arent.
Exactly why I hate G4 TV. They've basically MTVized gaming. Used to, playing games was for nerds who had no life (which was one retarded stereotype in and of itself, but at least they left well enough alone.) Now... thanks to the American version of Playstation (XBOX) and such games that warrant money-mongers' attention (Halo), it's considered cool to be a gamer.... unless you're an MMO gamer... then you're still a nerd, because now it's inconceivable for anyone to spend a lot of time at their computer playing a game when they could be out living an interesting life like they do, even though they fail to grasp the concept that some people just don't care about the same shit they do, which usually consists of being popular amongst the masses.
Everytime I see an episode of X-Play with that retarded balding dude and that hot chick (who isn't really that hot), or an episode of Attack of the Show with the "I don't really like games, but they make me money!" host, or that show where gamers "FACE OFF" in SOCOM or UT, hosted by that wanna-be pro wrestler jock who gives the show it's fake overly emphatic play by play "OOOO! HEADSHOT!" John Madden football announcing flare... i want to throw up, especially when that jock asks the question "What was your strategy for winning?" as if the guy who plays an online FPS for most of his time in a day has secretly devised an unbeatable strategy instead of just doing what he always does - dominate with extreme prejudice.
It's the same crap that made CNN dumb, instead of a serious news outlet. Everyone wants to talk about marketing strategies, and give their opinions on what could happen if someone doesn't plan a campaign strategy correctly. Turn on CNN now, and instead of News... you get people's opinions and why you should agree with them, and why you are stupid and mindless if you don't - Thanks Bill O'Reilley for all your hard work! I realise Bill O'Reilley is on FOX News and not CNN, but FOX is even worse.
*sigh* I absolutely hate mainstream media and everything it has done to the things people enjoy. And then I hate those people who say "Well then, don't watch it!" as we had any other option when we turn on the TV.
Anyway... back on point...
/finishrant
In response to OP's title, I don't think programmers are to blame so much as the development team as a whole, certainly the story and gameplay developers are to blame equally if not more then the programmers, modellers, and etc etc.
The problem is, games are designed and directed by people in an office, people that probably never played a game. Thats the problem. A good developers makes whatever you ask him to do.
I agree with you. There are a lot of "good" games out there. I would not hesitate to recommend LotRO, EVE, EQ2, WoW, or WAR to someone if I thought it would fit their playstyle.
I think the largest problem here is that a "good" MMORPG has not been made recently that fits the playstyle of the majority of people that visits this website.
"Those who dislike things based only on the fact that they are popular are just as shallow and superficial as those who only like them for the same reason."
Just to find a better solution to our questions why you dont go here www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm to vote? At the moment ppl that watch this website( and for the most are ppl very inteersted in MMOPRGs) say that 0% want to play WOW 80% a very realistic game as i described in this post and 20% something else. At the moment there are only 10 vote so please log in and vote. We will have our little statistic
I agree.
Does anyone else find it funny that the OP and his followers are wanting the next big great thing and yet the devs they are bitching about are really just doing the same thing.
I agree.
Does anyone else find it funny that the OP and his followers are wanting the next big great thing and yet the devs they are bitching about are really just doing the same thing.
i find funny that someone that has found what was looking for ,have fun to see that someone else didn't found it. this is funny... probably if you have time to leave message like this ,you dont like to play so much your game either you would not waste your time in this way...
oo you are right "the istance raid " start later.... 
this is the result of the poll i did in this other link www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/206036
Forum Poll
which game you prefer?
Like Wow EQ2 etc....... 25.0%
A full realist game 46.9%
Something else 28.1%
Based on 32 votes.
And what do potential customers want in a game ?
You make it sound like all players are in agreement in what makes a good MMO. Of course, in reality it's different, and everybody has different opinions / expectations. So who should the developers listen to ?
Maybe you dislike WoW, but you're probably in a minority, as there are millions of players who enjoy it.
Did it cross your mind that maybe developers, by following WoW's path, are exactly doing that today: giving players what customers tell them they want ?
That is the real problem IMO. Few developers have a vision and are ready to go for a niche market, even if that means reduced revenue. MMOs and games, nowadays, are no longer a work of art: they've become an industry.
Infinity: The Quest for Earth, space-sim MMO with a seamless procedural galaxy.
And what do potential customers want in a game ?
You make it sound like all players are in agreement in what makes a good MMO. Of course, in reality it's different, and everybody has different opinions / expectations. So who should the developers listen to ?
Maybe you dislike WoW, but you're probably in a minority, as there are millions of players who enjoy it.
Did it cross your mind that maybe developers, by following WoW's path, are exactly doing that today: giving players what customers tell them they want ?
That is the real problem IMO. Few developers have a vision and are ready to go for a niche market, even if that means reduced revenue. MMOs and games, nowadays, are no longer a work of art: they've become an industry.
You are probably right whene you say that "MMOs and games, nowadays, are no longer a work of art: they've become an industry." but i dont think is true the fact that if someone play Wow is becouse he like WOW. I have played WOW too, for 2 years ,and i have played it just becouse there wasnt anithing different and i was playing it olso becouse i ahd some real life friend playing it too , and i had a lvl 60 player , and there was an expansion near to exit ... many reasons why i decided to go on playing wow. But the more important thing is that i was playing a game that was boring and i was going on for other reasons.
Actually the next big MMO would be a WoW clone. Just like the next big MMO was an EQ clone - WoW.
Successful companies and risk don't mix.