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Way too many MMOs: 2/3rd must die
Elikal
Member UncommonPosts: 7,912
Sounds harsh maybe, I know. But when I look at this forum, you can get the impressing at least every week one new MMO is announced. I mean, ok back then when there was just UO, EQ and DAoC we were considerably less gamers playing MMOs. And even gaming itself has attracted a lot more people than back in, say, 1985, when gaming was for a few Nerds.
Now in our post WOW days, which sounds like post-Apocalypse in the ears of some, and a giant of 11 million supposed subscribers, every Joe-programmer and his mom had an idea for a MMORPG, and ever since they sprang from the ground like mushrooms. Each company trying it's own particular twist.
Of course Asia has produced the largest part of the legion of MMOs. Most of them are for our western eyes entirely out of the question anyway and are by and large played by people from Asia. I cannot judge if it is worth making them, since I can't say if Asian gamers are content with these types of MMOs. But they have flooded into the western market as well, draining away at least some part of MMO players. The result is that were once halfway interesting games like Chronicles of the Spellborn, had their chances, with today's flood everything but triple AAA seems to have little to no chance to survival. With so many new MMOs pumped out, they just drown in the flood of gamers hopping from one Asia F2P MMO to the next in terms of a few months.
Then we have had the serveral approaches to catch some of the so called original MMO spirit. Games like Vanguard, Dark and Light and Darkfall have tried in various ways to recapture the MMO gaming spirit of the old days. Alas, all of them were mired by their own problems. It has always been my opinion, that merely recreating the "good of the past" just doesn't work. What made UO and EQ great was connected to that time. Just as you can not bring back Dinosaurs into our era, since they just have no niche, so is it just impossible to make another UO or EQ1. What could be done would be to transport some of the good features, like vast open world, many races and classes into a new MMO, the freedom of these vast games. But putting 1999 hardships into present day MMOs just will doom them to niche games, and ultimately to wither and die.
Others, like Cryptic, have thought to make MMOs with minimal effort, just adding the bare minimum of a game and then launch it. It has it's playerbase, just like the hardcore UO/EQ clones mentioned before. All those niches have some players. But in essence it splits the playerbase further and further. Those minimal effort MMOs are in themselves a good idea but produced with no real effort and esprit. With another 2 years really decidated work STO and CO would have been really good games. But what Cryptic did was a mere copy-paste content way of creating a MMO, and it's just a very cheap way of entertaining.
Finally we have companies approaching to make a triple AAA game, but failing to realize what it needs. Games like Warhammer and AoC are examples for this, and the reasons of their failing have been discussed enough.
All these games are niche games. They are broken, incomplete, cheap and not really satisfactory to play, if not for more than a few months maybe. Nothing to sink your teeth into and play for years. That was and IS the measure of a really good game: can you imagine to play it for years? Or is it something you play for 2-3 months then hop to the next new plaything? And this is a real bane of gaming, since it allows no company and no game to get a momentum, to built on something. Players move on because every 2nd month some new MMO launches. It is a sort of gold rush feaver which companies have caught. Ever since WOW, every small minded programmer thought he could get rich by making a MMO. And we the gamers have paid dearly with legions of mediocre MMOs, and where the effort and vision would have been good to make 10 good MMOs, it was all rushed and split to make 1000 mediocre ones. People are overfed with fast food, they have fattened minds, proverbially speaking. It hasn't done us any good. If I would have a say in it, 2/3rd of all existing MMOs would shut down, even halfway ok ones. They just drain away gamers. What we DON'T need is a new MMO every new month. What we DON'T need is another half assed, fast food MMO. What we certainly DON'T need is another experiment to copy the old success of previous game X.
I want MMOs of the future be both vast in scope like the old MMOs and have something for every level of dedication. I want quality and quantity and not only one of these. I want MMOs with many classes and races, with big landmasses, with a REAL crafting market, with much social and superfluous things to entertain ourselves with outside of mere pew pew. And I have enough of making experiments. Like the Spellborn combat wheel. And I want freedom and open worlds and not the limitation to some quest tunnel and being hook-nosed along some preset paths all the time!
Two third of the existing MMOs just must die. And 90% of the current underway projects have to be shut down for good. The market should focus on making less but better games instead of more fast food trash all the time.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
Comments
Regardless what YOU say, regardles that I agree with many of your points, what you want seems similar to what I want but I will never deny that what we want is still only for a niche market. Hasn't WoW proven this? Shall we just ignore what the masses want, we all know what "Freedom" will do to those unable to use that freedom, which many games have proven to get the masses into becoming bored due to lack of handholding.
Also didn't see you mention Fallen Earth, have you given that game a true try-out?, for me it's the first MMORPG that has captured me and playing since launch, where no other of the so-called 3triple A MMO's has done this for me, but then again I know I am a niche gamer when it comes to playing MMORPG and know I want my MMORPG to be different than what the new majority of people into this genre seem to want.
if you include F2P MMOs, I'd say that 99% MMOs must die. lets just keep P2P MMOs please...
The dust biting has already begun. See just the most recent - Spellborn, Earth Eternal, Three Kingdoms.
I also condone the downfall of all those anime flashy mmos that come with absolutely zero innovation and 100% greed (read Microtransactions). Enough is enough.
If only 0.1% of the developers, coders, quality assurance engineers, scrum mastes, project managers etcetera etcetera would really put gamers' interests before marketing revenues, we would have less games but they'd really be next-gen (as all those crap clones call themselves even if the only new thing they came up with are... armor models and quirky mounts).
Give us a game where PK has a meaning. Do a crazy thing and introduce permadeath. Go wild with politics. Invest a bit in long term in-game technology advancement. Give us a reason to play other than gear up for the next level. Let the player base decide their worlds future!
Better to be crazy, provided you know what sane is...
I would say that 4/5 of the free to play MMOs could die and hardly anyone would miss them.
@ Beermangler: When did the Spellborn MMO die?
All those memories will be lost in time, like tears in the rain.
Agreed... I would say that 75% of all MMO's that are listed are terrible, and it goes to show that it doesnt' take much to keep them afloat.. Sorta reminds me of the fat auto industry, that recently had to slim down.. People talk about bad mmos and good mmos, and first thing that comes to mind, other then McDonalds was the death of beta tapes. I remember the battle between VHS vs Beta, and VHS won..... Was VHS better? OH HELL NO.. a big NO NO NO.. but because of stupid customers and good marketing, Beta (the better product) was pushed to the trash bin..
As one of my ole college profs used to say.. "Sometimes a majority just shows that all the stupid people are on one side".. LOL Think about it..
Fallen Earth... wasn't that with a post apocalyptic setting? Hm, that generally isn't my thing, but maybe I do try it out.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
Everybody should play only WoW, and the problem will be solved
http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/game/207/view/forums/thread/286963/spellborn-shutting-down.html
Your link doesn't work.
All those memories will be lost in time, like tears in the rain.
try this
Just continue discussion in the other 5+ threads about it.
You'll take my Fallen Earth sniper's hand-crafted scoped rifle away from her when you pry it from her cold, dead fingers. Everybody should play only Fallen Earth, and the problem will be solved.
While I agree with a lot said in the OP, how should this narrowing down be accomplished? You certainly can't pass a law that says a certain percentage of MMOs must go, then pass more laws governing which ones get to stick around and which ones get the axe! Apparantly, people like having lots of choices, and a lot of them seem to like hopping from game to game every few weeks or months. Do you want to beg Blizzard and all the other big companies to buy out all these little companies and stomp their MMOs into dust? Or should we perhaps break out the sniper rifles (hand crafted, with scopes) and start taking out servers? I'm pretty sure we're stuck with the current MMO glut, whether it's good for us as gamers or not.
I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy, accompanied by an educational system which would be oriented toward social goals.
~Albert Einstein
That or get a lobotomy .. oh wait.. same thing.
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