Gaming Success and Failure in MMOs

http://www.bit-tech.net/gaming/pc/2009/05/22/success-and-failure-in-mmos/1

Last year saw the launch of many highly hyped MMOs, all hoping they could replicate World of Warcraft's success. Sadly, their plan to gank WoW failed and few survived. We take a look at why so many MMO games fail so quickly and whether Word of Warcraft will ever be beaten.



DIGG MEH!

 

Just had a flashback to the first MMO I ever played; Neocron had the most amazing 'outpost ownership' PVP mechanics but it was plagued by a really horrible engine...

*edit* wow its still going... going to have to try the trial!

 

IMO comparing every MMO to WoW is stupid. WoW is ludicrously successful, you don't need to beat WoW to have a successful MMO. It would be like saying every PC game is a failure because it's not outsold the sims.

Games like EVE are still going on strong and are highly successful. I would say WoW is like the Halo of MMOs, yeah, it's good, but it's nothing amazing, it's just up to a good standard and it's what most people play. People play WoW because it's popular, not because it's good.

 

That makes no sense what so ever. People play it because it is good. and it's popular for the same reason. I'm not a fanboi, I'm merely suggesting people that aren't 14-20yo geeks don't play a game for it's graphical merit. They play because it's engaging and the story line is compelling.

One of the most interesting fact of WoW is the demographic. Almost 20% of the player are women, and the average age is close to 30. Hell, my wife plays it. If someone like her can be captivated by a computer game, then in my mind the designers did something right, and it makes the game good. That they have managed to keep her captivated for years means it's insanely good. Crysis is popular, but she wouldn't even know what that meant. That should tell you something about why WoW is the success that it is.

 

The focus needs to be on creating a unique, engaging and creative universe for Gamers to game in.
If the focus is on "how can we make 47 million euros this quarter" then you will fail.
Making games is an Art, not a business model from some MBA's business course.

Yours in Artistic Gaming Plasma,
Star¤Dagger

 

I think there's an element of truth in what Veles says - it's a kind of critical mass. At first, people join it because it's good - then after a certain point it spreads beyond that into a market of people who aren't always such heavy game players. These people don't play it because it's the best MMO (they may not have even played another MMO), but instead play it because it's popular, they have friends that play it and they know they can use it as a social tool. The fact they have friends who play it makes it relateable to them, and therefore attractive and so they play even though the game itself may not be totally perfect.

It's like the Spice Girls - they sold a lot of records and a lot of people listened to them. Hell, my dad listened to them - but not because he liked their music or they were close to the celtic folk he's mostly a fan of. Instead, it's because they were a popular thing and he fell in with the hype of it all.

 

WoW is a very, very directed game. It's simple, in most senses, you don't need to spend hours working on it to understand enough to make it to 80 and to get into a guild of raiders or pvpers - Which, eventually, teaches you enough to keep up with the rest of them.

To beat WoW at this stage is going to be hard, because it's had so long to 'mature' and develop. To best WoW you'd need to release WoW better than Blizzard release it - Which hasn't been done.

The 'rivals' have been mostly failures because they took the directed gameplay experience of WoW and tried to build player choice into it. That will simply never work. The WoW gameplay mechanic has been very specifically designed to be guided at every step of the way. As soon as you introduce the players decisions and choices to that, the mechanic stops working.

The Eve approach is working simply because it is entirely player decisions. There is no 'guided' gameplay. You do what you want, and whatever you do can change other peoples/corps opinions towards you, for better or worse. It's a truely 'realistic' (so far as space sims can be) experience. Since the game is built from the ground around this idea, it works. Everything has been designed to work in this way, and it does.

Both Eve and WoW have got their target audiences down to a tee, and there is going to be a hell of a battle to dislodge either of them from their current spots. That's why the 'rivals' have run in, and fallen over. They've not done sufficient market research to understand their audience.

 

Suprised APB wasn't mentioned in the article where they have all the ideas and everything, but for a few years now, not muh has happened. Heck they're still looking for people to work for them after around 3 or 4 years.

http://www.apb.com/

 

I keep asking my friend for a good game to get into, and ask him about the MMOs. I tell him, I've paid for WoW 3 times but never bothered extended the subscription. He said that the big draw to WoW and every other MMO out there is just being with friends, cool people, the social interaction.

Conclusion: no, WoW isn't good , its just that there are plenty of people playing it so you get to socialise. The problem I have with it is I don't have any friends on there and I can't be arsed joining a guild and making some .

 

Wow's success is based on three things:

1: History and reputation of the developer (which attracted some of the players from other mmorpgs, but more important, it could attract non mmorpg gamers).
2: Feeling of success for casual players, lets face it, wow is the first game since tetris where some 30 year old woman who never played a game before can actually feel like succeding at something, every other mmorpg forces you to play regularly for hours in order to at least keep up to some extent.
3: First game that contains violence, yet is not seen as evil by the general public, the bitter truth is, pretty much every game that contains some sort of violence has been put in a negative spotlight by politicians and or the media, even though wow is no less violent than other games, some how it managed to slip under the radar of the politicians and the media that try to ban gaming.

 

Whta's the thing with WoW?

I would say it's because it was the first to attract lots of people because of its playability. I still play Ultima Online, but by the time of WoWs launch there was no competitor at its high. We didn't have good MMORPS with good graphics by the time? perhaps, but it was no "Blizzard" stuff. I am no fanboy (well, perhaps a little), but everytime a Blizzard game is lauched a big fuzz an lots of hype are created. Because they are good.

But WoW isn't that great anymore. What happens now? We can compare the success of the game to the mac fanboys. 10~15 years ago, mac was different and better in what was related to graphics. They had a native pallete of color for printing that was lot more accurate than the PC version (but you could buy it sepparately for PC and still pay less than a Mac). Now theres absolutelly no difference between a mac and a pc in term of hardware. But why ppl insists in buying the MAC? Besides the fact that apple sells status and not computers, this status was created a decade ago and still persists.

We can create lots of medieval-like MMORPG, but it's impossible to NOT compare to WoW. Even if technically they are better, WoW is now very well stablished. Lots of players, lots of hype and a BIG community.

I think the fact that EVE became a great franchise lies in the fact that besides the game being good, it is not a direct concurrent to WoW. It's "something else".

Besides that, paying isn't that great if you think you payed once for the game, now you need to pay monthly to play. So whats the solution?

I am now playing a game that managed to be free and mix the beauty of UO free shards. The game is really well made, have a strong focus on comunnity and guild and survive with "donations". "Donations????" you may say... What happens is that you can be rich in the game without never giving the developer a cent, but there are LOTS of things in the game that can be obtained just through donations (like a definitive mount). And you can level your char faster through donations. I always played in the free shards of UO, played WoW with credits and EVE just the "free" time. But this one is the first ever online game that I am actually paying real money for some portions of it. Thats the beauty of it, you buy only what you want.

The games name? Runes of Magic. Take my word, it is well worth! Not as fantastic as Torment nor Ultima VII but a nice game. You can have your house, deco it and even a Guild Castle that is build and upgraded with guild members donations (in-game donations, not irl money)! Thats totally amazing!

Lots of combinations to create your unique weapons and armor too. Very interesting.

 

If the thing is just to socialize, why not play Second Life? It used to be a huge success. Now i barelly know anyone that plays it.
I think WoW is still there because you can socialize AND play. Besides that, the community is huge and kinda old. Not as old as UO, but old.

 

It's a shame really as Auto Assualt and Tablua Rasa I really enjoyed, if only they could bring them back as free 2 play via advertisement sponsoring or something.

 

Why does every MMO want me to donate a kidney before I can start enjoying it?

 

If you have your Jump clones properly placed you have plenty of Kidneys, now get back into 0.0 !!

If I want to "socialize" I'll goto a bar or a trendy cafe (or in germany a nice FKK place
I game not to win friends online but to play a complex form of "let's pretend". Let's pretend that I am a Romulan captain (Riov) or a spy or a space marine or a Jedi Master.

I couldn't care less about "casual gamers" and how easy things might be for them, because in all likelihood a well designed game can appeal to the hardcore grognards like me and the Sally Soccer moms.

As I have mentioned, more than once recently, games should be designed to be better than sex, and then let the dice fly. Money should not be the primary driving force of the games development: Excellence should be. This will, of course, earn them money but they need to be mindful of creating an immersive, exciting universe. Not so much a game as a World.

S*D

 

Does anyone play warhammer online here? I played it for the first couple of months but stopped, in part due to my halls internet being shoddy, but also that the servers never seemed very full.

Was wondering if its active much at all? Well i know the figures, but does it feel active?

 

No i don't think that's the reason instead people play because it is good and most of all it entertains the people and that's why it is popular.

 

I've never understood why WoW is more successful than Guild Wars since Guild War's graphic's are better, the game play is better and theres no monthly fee.

 

Im surprised runescape was mentioned either. Its very very basic yet because it was free it appealed to a younger age than WoW. I usually play wow when im on msn but if my subscription is up then I would drift back to runescape. I never payed for the extra stuff It was the 1st MMO I played

 

Because Guild Wars isn't a full MMO and isn't as free as WoW is. You can't just meet up in the middle of a mission and decide to help yourselves, and also Guild Wars gets fairly repetitive quickly. Don't get me wrong I like the game, I just prefer WoW more due to the type of land you are in, and how immersed within the game you can get.