Hate to sound like the devil's advocate here but is it not what business is all about? Making money whatever way they can? I mean, they aren't doing charity, their ultimate goal is to make a profit, if they like what they do then that's a big bonus and potential gain for the quality, but it's still about making money.
I don't like the current state of mmos any more than the OP, but it looks like that's how it flies nowdays, we can only hope the next wave of promising mmos in 2011 bring something new to the table.
If you don't like it then don't buy it.
This is why I support Online Piracy. Creation is left to the artists in a world filled with pirates, not soulless businesspeople.
And McDonalds and Walmart are two of the must successful business models in the world and their products and there is no potential gain of quality in these business models. I'd have to argue that major MMORPG producers have the Walmart/McDonalds model.
--When you resubscribe to SWG, an 18 yearold Stripper finds Jesus, gives up stripping, and moves with a rolex reverend to Hawaii. --In MMORPG's l007 is the opiate of the masses. --The absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence! --CCP could cut off an Eve player's fun bits, and that player would say that it was good CCP did that.
i use to be a huge MMO gamer playing them all and spending a lot of my free time in MMO's.......But for the last 2 years i have only been on and off EVE online while trying other MMO's and getting bored of them instantly due to the lack of any innovation. Dont get me wrong I still love logging on to EVE and trying to look for trouble with my corp...but it would be nice to have even ONE more option. I will probably never play another MMO (other than EVE) until World of Darkness which wont come out for a pretty long time. Of coarse in theory i will play earthrise....but i have no faith in that notion due to the reputation of other indie MMO companies making sandbox games. I refuse to play unfinished buggy games. I would rather just not play MMO's.
TLDR - I agree that 99% of MMO's out there do not interest me in the least and its due to the lack of innovation.
Playing: PO, EVE Waiting for: WoD Favourite MMOs: VG, EVE, FE and DDO Any person who expresses rage and loathing for an MMO is preposterous. He or she is like a person who has put on full armor and attacked a hot fudge sundae.
Unfortunately, I'm not sure what exactly can be done other than consumers collectively rejecting such condescending treatment by voting with their wallets...or a visionary developer receiving private funding for their own development firm and showing everyone how things should be done.
What if everyone here pitched in 2 bucks? Then could we make our own game? Seriously.. I'm asking because I don't really know how much it costs to make an A game. Is it a few million? 10's of millions?
Say we purchase an exsisting engine, so as to avoid the time and hassle of making our own... What did it cost to make.. say, STO?
I'm sure there are talented artists and coders out there. I'd be willing to bet if we formed 'Game Forum Studios' and had the same amount Craptic spent on STO, we'd make a far superior product.
This is a dream of mine. Let's make this happen people.
Not sure if OP knows but the average age of a gamer is 32 years old. Im just guessing here but most 32 year olds have lives outside of gaming so gaming to them is just a brief casual escape from the mundane. So developers are just playing to that to try and get the subs up.
The average gamer is a casual gamer. You cant blame the developers for what the average gamer wants.
And yes the average gamer is the vast majority of the 12 million subs of WoW.
The average age of a gamer is 32 years old? really? I highly doubt that where do you get your statistics?
socialism and communism will be great once we get to that level of technology like Star Trek and can just fabricate anything for free. Till then as long as stuff cost money and people expect to be paid for work, idea, or products then yes....they are fail.
Not sure if OP knows but the average age of a gamer is 32 years old. Im just guessing here but most 32 year olds have lives outside of gaming so gaming to them is just a brief casual escape from the mundane. So developers are just playing to that to try and get the subs up.
The average gamer is a casual gamer. You cant blame the developers for what the average gamer wants.
And yes the average gamer is the vast majority of the 12 million subs of WoW.
The average age of a gamer is 32 years old? really? I highly doubt that where do you get your statistics?
Not sure if OP knows but the average age of a gamer is 32 years old. Im just guessing here but most 32 year olds have lives outside of gaming so gaming to them is just a brief casual escape from the mundane. So developers are just playing to that to try and get the subs up.
The average gamer is a casual gamer. You cant blame the developers for what the average gamer wants.
And yes the average gamer is the vast majority of the 12 million subs of WoW.
The average age of a gamer is 32 years old? really? I highly doubt that where do you get your statistics?
I believe that gamespy had published some findings from a market resarch group:
Of interest, NPD found the average gamer is 32 years old, Avid PC and Offline PC Gamers average 42 years old, and time spent PC and console gaming increased this year by 6% and 9%, respectively, with portable gaming dropping 16%.
It sounds somewhat doubtful to me too. But of course 2/3 of Wows players are from China, it is possible that Chinese players are older.
22 or somewhere around there seems pretty likely, this page actually seems to have more older gamer than what I have met in any game, or at least who admit it.
32 sounds pretty likely for RTS players and turn based strategy.
Then why are we capitalists up to our eyeballs in debt to communist china?
Because the government wants to create socialist systems in a capitalistic society and can not get funding for it so they turn to a socialistic society to fund he change here. Socialism is great till the money runs out...i.e. China refusing to give us money one day.
Then why are we capitalists up to our eyeballs in debt to communist china?
Because the government wants to create socialist systems in a capitalistic society and can not get funding for it so they turn to a socialistic society to fund he change here. Socialism is great till the money runs out...i.e. China refusing to give us money one day.
China has a capitalist economy. Im sorry, but if the people making the mmo's are morons, then sign me up for wanting to be a rich moron.
Cheers!
MMO Vet since AOL Neverwinter Nights circa 1992. My MMO beat up your MMO. =S
The discussion is not about whether we should, as a nation, subscribe to a different economic model.
It's about whether mmorpg developers (or rather, their producers) have an ethical obligation to make their products more creative/stimulating versus only appealing to base psychology in an attempt to addict players.
Edit: For my part, I believe there is no such thing as "business ethics." We don't stop being humans when we involve ourselves in some project. An action passing as accepted practice in the sphere of business does not alone justify it. There is ethics for all of humanity, and that's it. So, with that said - the question actually becomes: "is an attempt to addict someone to your product, which offers minimal value to them other than psychological comfort, an unacceptable form of exploitation?"
The discussion is not about whether we should, as a nation, subscribe to a different economic model.
It's about whether mmorpg developers (or rather, their producers) have an ethical obligation to make their products more creative/stimulating versus only appealing to base psychology in an attempt to addict players.
There's no ethical obligation to make games "fun". Some games have failed though like what I've heard from Star Wars Galaxies, but fanboys will continue to pay for it. Most people seem to be addicted to MMOs whether they are fun or not. If I were a developer I'd strive to make the most addictive game possible.
One of the best posts I've read in a long long time. I couldn't agree more with your assessments. I remember being upset with the streamlining of dungeons in the Burning Crusade expansion, it got even worse in WotLK of course. But this is coming from someone whose favorite dungeon of all time in WoW was Black Rock Depths.
Then why are we capitalists up to our eyeballs in debt to communist china?
Because the government wants to create socialist systems in a capitalistic society and can not get funding for it so they turn to a socialistic society to fund he change here. Socialism is great till the money runs out...i.e. China refusing to give us money one day.
China has a capitalist economy. Im sorry, but if the people making the mmo's are morons, then sign me up for wanting to be a rich moron.
Cheers!
Yup. They're pretty much where the US was in the early 1900s.
Personally I would say the US is currently either crony capitalist, or corporatist these days. The government handing money to big corporations because they are "too big to fail", but also because those same corporations fund the politicians.
Besides Tarp, look at Obamacare. What does it do? Forces people to buy insurance from private companies. Brilliant, the way to get people health care is to force them to buy it at gunpoint.
The discussion is not about whether we should, as a nation, subscribe to a different economic model.
It's about whether mmorpg developers (or rather, their producers) have an ethical obligation to make their products more creative/stimulating versus only appealing to base psychology in an attempt to addict players.
Edit: For my part, I believe there is no such thing as "business ethics." We don't stop being humans when we involve ourselves in some project. An action passing as accepted practice in the sphere of business does not alone justify it. There is ethics for all of humanity, and that's it. So, with that said - the question actually becomes: "is an attempt to addict someone to your product, which offers minimal value to them other than psychological comfort, an unacceptable form of exploitation?"
Kudos for reframing the issue in a more humanistic manner. I'd like to see people's response to that question.
Then why are we capitalists up to our eyeballs in debt to communist china?
Because the government wants to create socialist systems in a capitalistic society and can not get funding for it so they turn to a socialistic society to fund he change here. Socialism is great till the money runs out...i.e. China refusing to give us money one day.
China has a capitalist economy. Im sorry, but if the people making the mmo's are morons, then sign me up for wanting to be a rich moron.
Cheers!
Actually, China is a mixed market economy. It perscribes to some general capitalist ideas, but it does so under the scrutiny of a governing body which regulates it.
The countries with more controlled and regulated economies were barely affected by the economic crash. Go ahead and look it up. I know as a globally aware Canadian citizen, that my country was barely touched by the recession compared to how hard the US was hit. Why? Because my government goes to great lengths to scrutinize and regulate the economy. Does is stunt growth? In the short term yes, but it the long run we're not riding the boom bust roller coaster that would otherwise occur, and did use to occur all around the world until governments started becoming more involved in regulating their economies.
The point is, both extremes suck. The MMO industry is stuck in the 'pure capitalist' mindset right now. Yes, a few companies, well mainly really one company, is making gobs of money. A few doing okay, and the rest seem to be flopping about like fish on the ground.
Who wins? The few people who own and profit off of the big successful MMOs, which even then is a small amount of people. And the players? Unless you're one of the sheeples that is content with the status-quo of mediocrity, no-one really benefits for the stagnant mass-market industry.
The industry won't last the way it's been headed. It's already straining as evidence by the growing 'failure' of MMOs, and the speed at which they're doing so. It might take a large contender to crash to shock the industry back into another golden age, but it will eventually happen. But hey if it doesn't, I've got better than to do that to grind 10 more rats for the 1000th time, or the same instance for the 100th time just to get an upgrade that will become irrelevent in a few months.
China has a capitalist economy. Im sorry, but if the people making the mmo's are morons, then sign me up for wanting to be a rich moron.
Cheers!
While Hollywood seems to point to that direction it is a fact that you in fact don't have to be a moron to be rich. Many morons are in fact poor (and like NASCAR or so I heard) and there are smart rich people too, even if they rarely get TV time since idiots seems to take up all the time.
Both capitalism and communism have some good ideas, communism works only if everyone is poor like in Cuba (actually been there). Capitalism work so so, problem is when companies monopolies stuff, then it stops to work.
The thing about capitalism and MMOs is that you can choose to but the best MMO out there. If all MMOs suck you're screwed.
Good MMOs needs both capitalism and some fire souls that actually loves games to work. Just trying to max out income leads to soul less abominations while companies with low funding leads to games that either releases in sad shape or not at all.
I like money as much as the next guy but if all companies turn out like EA I rather play pen and paper RPGs and use my computer to acess pirate bay instead. Fortunatley are there still good companies out there that actually cares both about money and product.
To the original poster, all you need to survive is 2400 calories, which can be gotten with bad cheap food, a bed, and 2 pieces of cloths, shirt and pants. Any thing more then that you should give to another person(s) who do not have those. If you do not you are a greedy bloodsucking capitalist pig. grow up and welcome to the real world.
Companies need to make money. they can not run the games for free and hope that money falls from the sky so they can pay thier employees, or mayby they can get slaves to work for them. Im sure we can easily enslave you since it appears you like the koolaid.
As others have said, you dont like it, then make the game, you go out and secure the financing, hire the employees, find the space to house the employees, and their is much more. learn about what it takes to run a business.
If not shut the effin up.
now that my rant is done.
Game follow market forces. Great example is Star Wars Galaxies. It was a great game, popular among those who pay for the game and the monthly fee. Sony was making alot of money with this game. Then Sony complety changed the game. Market forces showed that players where unhappy and they moved on. Players moving on to somehting differnt and better is the norm. Only a small percentage of a games player base stay for any lenght of time. So companies need to keep more players. With the over saturation of the MMO market compaines have to find ways to get players into the game. So that will mean that games will get easier or dumbed down if you prefer. Look at games that are harder to play. They have small player bases. If the company is small then this isnt that big a problem, they can make just enough to keep game running, though any new content will not be as forthcoming as larger games.
Also games evolve. This includes playstyles, graphics and many other. Companies can not go backwards. Games like Everquest were great in thier time, but many forget the grief of spending hours to get into groups or to raid.
But the basics of MMO's is to design a form of enterainment that allows a company to make money. If they do not they will fail. If you dont like it, move on, or leave gaming.
It is NOT the MMORPG consumer's job to design, build, finance a game. WE are the ones paying for a service. Because we also have our own RL occupations out there.
As for me and some others out there, the service (MMORPGs this case) that's available is utter CRAP these days. Has been going for years.
And yes, I do agree that things change. Evolve. But for the MMORPG genre, the direction it's taken is a "1 Way Ticket To Hell In A Handbasket."
Actually, I take that back about MMORPGs having evolved. They stopped changing several years ago. '04, maybe '05. Because these days they are all the godd*mn same in gameplay. They all follow the same godd*mn formula. The only differences are models and textures. Even the developers of one of the biggest upcoming titles are proudly touting how they're trying to make their game just like WoW, a game that's been out for 6 years.
The MMORPG genre isn't evolving. Hasn't done so in 5-6 years now. It's not changing directions. It's just spinning it's tires uselessly in the mud with nobody trying anything different.
"I have only two out of my company and 20 out of some other company. We need support, but it is almost suicide to try to get it here as we are swept by machine gun fire and a constant barrage is on us. I have no one on my left and only a few on my right. I will hold." (First Lieutenant Clifton B. Cates, US Marine Corps, Soissons, 19 July 1918)
To the original poster, all you need to survive is 2400 calories, which can be gotten with bad cheap food, a bed, and 2 pieces of cloths, shirt and pants. Any thing more then that you should give to another person(s) who do not have those. If you do not you are a greedy bloodsucking capitalist pig. grow up and welcome to the real world.
Companies need to make money. they can not run the games for free and hope that money falls from the sky so they can pay thier employees, or mayby they can get slaves to work for them. Im sure we can easily enslave you since it appears you like the koolaid.
As others have said, you dont like it, then make the game, you go out and secure the financing, hire the employees, find the space to house the employees, and their is much more. learn about what it takes to run a business.
If not shut the effin up.
now that my rant is done.
Game follow market forces. Great example is Star Wars Galaxies. It was a great game, popular among those who pay for the game and the monthly fee. Sony was making alot of money with this game. Then Sony complety changed the game. Market forces showed that players where unhappy and they moved on. Players moving on to somehting differnt and better is the norm. Only a small percentage of a games player base stay for any lenght of time. So companies need to keep more players. With the over saturation of the MMO market compaines have to find ways to get players into the game. So that will mean that games will get easier or dumbed down if you prefer. Look at games that are harder to play. They have small player bases. If the company is small then this isnt that big a problem, they can make just enough to keep game running, though any new content will not be as forthcoming as larger games.
Also games evolve. This includes playstyles, graphics and many other. Companies can not go backwards. Games like Everquest were great in thier time, but many forget the grief of spending hours to get into groups or to raid.
But the basics of MMO's is to design a form of enterainment that allows a company to make money. If they do not they will fail. If you dont like it, move on, or leave gaming.
It is NOT the MMORPG consumer's job to design, build, finance a game. WE are the ones paying for a service. Because we also have our own RL occupations out there.
As for me and some others out there, the service (MMORPGs this case) that's available is utter CRAP these days. Has been going for years.
And yes, I do agree that things change. Evolve. But for the MMORPG genre, the direction it's taken is a "1 Way Ticket To Hell In A Handbasket."
Actually, I take that back about MMORPGs having evolved. They stopped changing several years ago. '04, maybe '05. Because these days they are all the godd*mn same in gameplay. They all follow the same godd*mn formula. The only differences are models and textures. Even the developers of one of the biggest upcoming titles are proudly touting how they're trying to make their game just like WoW, a game that's been out for 6 years.
The MMORPG genre isn't evolving. Hasn't done so in 5-6 years now. It's not changing directions. It's just spinning it's tires uselessly in the mud with nobody trying anything different.
It may be utter crap in your eyes, but there are plenty of dollars coming in from elsewhere.
Lets just call a spade a spade shall we.....you guys are NOT owed AAA sandbox MMOs.
Get over yourselves already. If a company wanted your sub numbers, then they would be building AAA titles to target you.
An Uncle Owen universe doesnt warrant the gamble required to make it. Instead they can make a themepark, and even if they strike out, they know they will get a huge shot of their money back in box sales alone.
We are yrs away from MMOs being able to perform like SPG games. The latency of the internet, combined with servers accomodating folks. just isnt far enough along to handle 1000s of people on the same server.
Thus you arent going to have the responsiveness of SPGs, nor is it going to allow for all the complex combat systems found in non-MMO games.
If you are talking about Uncle Owen related activities....there is Second Life for those with the technical skills to actually create their own items. If not, then there is Facebook apps ala Farmville....they let ya do virtual chores, while having the ability to interact with others online.
Better yet, there are MMO sandboxes that could use sub numbers. Games like Ryzom, for instance, could use subs, and if it was demonstrated that the sandbox market was viable, then perhaps more would be made.
Instead if it the same complaint & different day around here.
Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget.
very good read and absolutely true, its the one main problem with online gameing that ive been ranting on about for the best part of the last 5 years or so in just about all mmo's bar one or two.
eve online is one of those games that i have time for that still offers a chalenge an ongoing challenge.
and swg has enough content and a remarkable crafting system to keep me entertained their too, although it too ha been struck hard with the grind fest developments.
i havnt played a good game since these 2 titles, all the rest are just rubbish. oh yea im playing a f2p called navy field. i would say its a grind fest but it takes so long to level up it wouldnt be an accurate description. so im going to say it requires skill to play and essentially requires some brain movement. its enjoyable for sure.
very good read and absolutely true, its the one main problem with online gameing that ive been ranting on about for the best part of the last 5 years or so in just about all mmo's bar one or two.
eve online is one of those games that i have time for that still offers a chalenge an ongoing challenge.
and swg has enough content and a remarkable crafting system to keep me entertained their too, although it too ha been struck hard with the grind fest developments.
i havnt played a good game since these 2 titles, all the rest are just rubbish. oh yea im playing a f2p called navy field. i would say its a grind fest but it takes so long to level up it wouldnt be an accurate description. so im going to say it requires skill to play and essentially requires some brain movement. its enjoyable for sure.
I'm kind of confused on how "it takes so long to level up it wouldn't be an accurate description" to call it a grind? Isn't that pretty much the entire definition of grind, making you work a very long time for one little carrot on the stick?
And there isn't much truth in this post at all, maybe it's the op's reality but the truth is no one who has ever made an mmorpg has ever given a shit whether someone who they don't know felt that the game they produced "changed their lives". what they do care about is that you pay them money to play the game.
Don't believe me, then answer me why SOE turned SWG on it's head despite the desires of it's original fan base? It certainly wasn't for the love or the artistic value.
I think you guys may find a little more median ground if you all jump off the high horses you ride on thinking one developer is doing this for reasons other than another.
The bottom line is these are all grown people who the parents no longer pay the bills for, maybe a love of producing video games drove them into the field but make no mistake they now do it to support he family.
but yeah, to call this game Fantastic is like calling Twilight the Godfather of vampire movies....
Comments
This is why I support Online Piracy. Creation is left to the artists in a world filled with pirates, not soulless businesspeople.
And McDonalds and Walmart are two of the must successful business models in the world and their products and there is no potential gain of quality in these business models. I'd have to argue that major MMORPG producers have the Walmart/McDonalds model.
--When you resubscribe to SWG, an 18 yearold Stripper finds Jesus, gives up stripping, and moves with a rolex reverend to Hawaii.
--In MMORPG's l007 is the opiate of the masses.
--The absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence!
--CCP could cut off an Eve player's fun bits, and that player would say that it was good CCP did that.
i use to be a huge MMO gamer playing them all and spending a lot of my free time in MMO's.......But for the last 2 years i have only been on and off EVE online while trying other MMO's and getting bored of them instantly due to the lack of any innovation. Dont get me wrong I still love logging on to EVE and trying to look for trouble with my corp...but it would be nice to have even ONE more option. I will probably never play another MMO (other than EVE) until World of Darkness which wont come out for a pretty long time. Of coarse in theory i will play earthrise....but i have no faith in that notion due to the reputation of other indie MMO companies making sandbox games. I refuse to play unfinished buggy games. I would rather just not play MMO's.
TLDR - I agree that 99% of MMO's out there do not interest me in the least and its due to the lack of innovation.
Playing: PO, EVE
Waiting for: WoD
Favourite MMOs: VG, EVE, FE and DDO
Any person who expresses rage and loathing for an MMO is preposterous. He or she is like a person who has put on full armor and attacked a hot fudge sundae.
The average age of a gamer is 32 years old? really? I highly doubt that where do you get your statistics?
According to this page, the average age of people who visit this site are 18-24 years old http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/mmorpg.com#
and to the OP:
I'm sorry but socialism and communism are fail.
socialism and communism will be great once we get to that level of technology like Star Trek and can just fabricate anything for free. Till then as long as stuff cost money and people expect to be paid for work, idea, or products then yes....they are fail.
http://www.theaveragegamer.com/averagegamers/
Drop the next-gen marketing and people will argue if the game itself has merit.
I believe that gamespy had published some findings from a market resarch group:
Of interest, NPD found the average gamer is 32 years old, Avid PC and Offline PC Gamers average 42 years old, and time spent PC and console gaming increased this year by 6% and 9%, respectively, with portable gaming dropping 16%.
http://www.gamespy.com/articles/109/1093408p1.html
Whether or not you accept their numbers is another thing.
From a personal standpoint, I'm pretty old so I think I can skew the average age here a bit higher than 24
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
It sounds somewhat doubtful to me too. But of course 2/3 of Wows players are from China, it is possible that Chinese players are older.
22 or somewhere around there seems pretty likely, this page actually seems to have more older gamer than what I have met in any game, or at least who admit it.
32 sounds pretty likely for RTS players and turn based strategy.
Then why are we capitalists up to our eyeballs in debt to communist china?
the average was 24 10 years ago...
Because the government wants to create socialist systems in a capitalistic society and can not get funding for it so they turn to a socialistic society to fund he change here. Socialism is great till the money runs out...i.e. China refusing to give us money one day.
China has a capitalist economy. Im sorry, but if the people making the mmo's are morons, then sign me up for wanting to be a rich moron.
Cheers!
MMO Vet since AOL Neverwinter Nights circa 1992. My MMO beat up your MMO. =S
The discussion is not about whether we should, as a nation, subscribe to a different economic model.
It's about whether mmorpg developers (or rather, their producers) have an ethical obligation to make their products more creative/stimulating versus only appealing to base psychology in an attempt to addict players.
Edit: For my part, I believe there is no such thing as "business ethics." We don't stop being humans when we involve ourselves in some project. An action passing as accepted practice in the sphere of business does not alone justify it. There is ethics for all of humanity, and that's it. So, with that said - the question actually becomes: "is an attempt to addict someone to your product, which offers minimal value to them other than psychological comfort, an unacceptable form of exploitation?"
There's no ethical obligation to make games "fun". Some games have failed though like what I've heard from Star Wars Galaxies, but fanboys will continue to pay for it. Most people seem to be addicted to MMOs whether they are fun or not. If I were a developer I'd strive to make the most addictive game possible.
One of the best posts I've read in a long long time. I couldn't agree more with your assessments. I remember being upset with the streamlining of dungeons in the Burning Crusade expansion, it got even worse in WotLK of course. But this is coming from someone whose favorite dungeon of all time in WoW was Black Rock Depths.
Yup. They're pretty much where the US was in the early 1900s.
Personally I would say the US is currently either crony capitalist, or corporatist these days. The government handing money to big corporations because they are "too big to fail", but also because those same corporations fund the politicians.
Besides Tarp, look at Obamacare. What does it do? Forces people to buy insurance from private companies. Brilliant, the way to get people health care is to force them to buy it at gunpoint.
R.I.P. City of Heroes and my 17 characters there
Kudos for reframing the issue in a more humanistic manner. I'd like to see people's response to that question.
Actually, China is a mixed market economy. It perscribes to some general capitalist ideas, but it does so under the scrutiny of a governing body which regulates it.
The countries with more controlled and regulated economies were barely affected by the economic crash. Go ahead and look it up. I know as a globally aware Canadian citizen, that my country was barely touched by the recession compared to how hard the US was hit. Why? Because my government goes to great lengths to scrutinize and regulate the economy. Does is stunt growth? In the short term yes, but it the long run we're not riding the boom bust roller coaster that would otherwise occur, and did use to occur all around the world until governments started becoming more involved in regulating their economies.
The point is, both extremes suck. The MMO industry is stuck in the 'pure capitalist' mindset right now. Yes, a few companies, well mainly really one company, is making gobs of money. A few doing okay, and the rest seem to be flopping about like fish on the ground.
Who wins? The few people who own and profit off of the big successful MMOs, which even then is a small amount of people. And the players? Unless you're one of the sheeples that is content with the status-quo of mediocrity, no-one really benefits for the stagnant mass-market industry.
The industry won't last the way it's been headed. It's already straining as evidence by the growing 'failure' of MMOs, and the speed at which they're doing so. It might take a large contender to crash to shock the industry back into another golden age, but it will eventually happen. But hey if it doesn't, I've got better than to do that to grind 10 more rats for the 1000th time, or the same instance for the 100th time just to get an upgrade that will become irrelevent in a few months.
While Hollywood seems to point to that direction it is a fact that you in fact don't have to be a moron to be rich. Many morons are in fact poor (and like NASCAR or so I heard) and there are smart rich people too, even if they rarely get TV time since idiots seems to take up all the time.
Both capitalism and communism have some good ideas, communism works only if everyone is poor like in Cuba (actually been there). Capitalism work so so, problem is when companies monopolies stuff, then it stops to work.
The thing about capitalism and MMOs is that you can choose to but the best MMO out there. If all MMOs suck you're screwed.
Good MMOs needs both capitalism and some fire souls that actually loves games to work. Just trying to max out income leads to soul less abominations while companies with low funding leads to games that either releases in sad shape or not at all.
I like money as much as the next guy but if all companies turn out like EA I rather play pen and paper RPGs and use my computer to acess pirate bay instead. Fortunatley are there still good companies out there that actually cares both about money and product.
It is NOT the MMORPG consumer's job to design, build, finance a game. WE are the ones paying for a service. Because we also have our own RL occupations out there.
As for me and some others out there, the service (MMORPGs this case) that's available is utter CRAP these days. Has been going for years.
And yes, I do agree that things change. Evolve. But for the MMORPG genre, the direction it's taken is a "1 Way Ticket To Hell In A Handbasket."
Actually, I take that back about MMORPGs having evolved. They stopped changing several years ago. '04, maybe '05. Because these days they are all the godd*mn same in gameplay. They all follow the same godd*mn formula. The only differences are models and textures. Even the developers of one of the biggest upcoming titles are proudly touting how they're trying to make their game just like WoW, a game that's been out for 6 years.
The MMORPG genre isn't evolving. Hasn't done so in 5-6 years now. It's not changing directions. It's just spinning it's tires uselessly in the mud with nobody trying anything different.
"I have only two out of my company and 20 out of some other company. We need support, but it is almost suicide to try to get it here as we are swept by machine gun fire and a constant barrage is on us. I have no one on my left and only a few on my right. I will hold." (First Lieutenant Clifton B. Cates, US Marine Corps, Soissons, 19 July 1918)
It may be utter crap in your eyes, but there are plenty of dollars coming in from elsewhere.
Lets just call a spade a spade shall we.....you guys are NOT owed AAA sandbox MMOs.
Get over yourselves already. If a company wanted your sub numbers, then they would be building AAA titles to target you.
An Uncle Owen universe doesnt warrant the gamble required to make it. Instead they can make a themepark, and even if they strike out, they know they will get a huge shot of their money back in box sales alone.
We are yrs away from MMOs being able to perform like SPG games. The latency of the internet, combined with servers accomodating folks. just isnt far enough along to handle 1000s of people on the same server.
Thus you arent going to have the responsiveness of SPGs, nor is it going to allow for all the complex combat systems found in non-MMO games.
If you are talking about Uncle Owen related activities....there is Second Life for those with the technical skills to actually create their own items. If not, then there is Facebook apps ala Farmville....they let ya do virtual chores, while having the ability to interact with others online.
Better yet, there are MMO sandboxes that could use sub numbers. Games like Ryzom, for instance, could use subs, and if it was demonstrated that the sandbox market was viable, then perhaps more would be made.
Instead if it the same complaint & different day around here.
Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget.
Rhetoric!
very good read and absolutely true, its the one main problem with online gameing that ive been ranting on about for the best part of the last 5 years or so in just about all mmo's bar one or two.
eve online is one of those games that i have time for that still offers a chalenge an ongoing challenge.
and swg has enough content and a remarkable crafting system to keep me entertained their too, although it too ha been struck hard with the grind fest developments.
i havnt played a good game since these 2 titles, all the rest are just rubbish. oh yea im playing a f2p called navy field. i would say its a grind fest but it takes so long to level up it wouldnt be an accurate description. so im going to say it requires skill to play and essentially requires some brain movement. its enjoyable for sure.
I'm kind of confused on how "it takes so long to level up it wouldn't be an accurate description" to call it a grind? Isn't that pretty much the entire definition of grind, making you work a very long time for one little carrot on the stick?
And there isn't much truth in this post at all, maybe it's the op's reality but the truth is no one who has ever made an mmorpg has ever given a shit whether someone who they don't know felt that the game they produced "changed their lives". what they do care about is that you pay them money to play the game.
Don't believe me, then answer me why SOE turned SWG on it's head despite the desires of it's original fan base? It certainly wasn't for the love or the artistic value.
I think you guys may find a little more median ground if you all jump off the high horses you ride on thinking one developer is doing this for reasons other than another.
The bottom line is these are all grown people who the parents no longer pay the bills for, maybe a love of producing video games drove them into the field but make no mistake they now do it to support he family.
but yeah, to call this game Fantastic is like calling Twilight the Godfather of vampire movies....