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Is this the end of a genre?
wordiz
Member Posts: 464
A few months back I had a post titled, "Soooo bored...." Come to find out, I wasn't the only one waiting for a mmo savior with nothing play. Well here were are again, and I still have nothing to play.
I've played through Skyrim again and the new Dragonborn xpack. I played Bioshock: Infinite (Incredible game, but short like most shooters), playing Civ 5, bored out of my mind now.
As far as MMOs:
I redownloaded Guild Wars 2 and leveled another character to 80 before finding myself with nothing to do once again.
I can't get myself to go back to SWTOR, which seems to be where most of my gaming buddies have gone, but I wish it would just die already. EA will not see a penny from me.
I'd almost like to play Rift, but not too many people I know play it, and subscriptions have been rejected by most, yet people still pay for WoW. IMO it's probably the best MMO out right now, but not a very good MMO at all in the long run.
TSW, the questing is fun and such and the dungeons are pretty cool even, but classes are crazy imbalanced and I find myself needing to go back and do quests to get enough skill points to switch to spinny blades instead of my squishy caster...but yeah, no, I don't really have an interest to do so, and within a couple weeks there'd be nothing left to keep me busy anyways.
Naturally, there's a slew of other games not worth mentioning. Not insult to anyone that plays any of those games. We're all desperate, I understand.
There's the dated classics, but we're well past the decade mark on a lot of them, those that haven't been shut down or noobified.
Getting to my point:
This next batch of promissing MMOs with 2013 release dates, and some of the other titles coming later are seeming more and more to be a last stab at glory for the genre. I know I'm not the only one that's wasted hundreds on disappointing titles. Not just MMOs, ( I know, I'm soooo STUPID! XD. It's what I get for riding the HYPE TRAAAIN!!! XD. I said it, now you can't flamers. Trolls, feel free.) and I feel a lot of us are too fearful to even buy a game at launch anymore, let alone pre-order.
So to reiterate: Is this the end of a genre? If the games leaving hype station this year happen to fail (ESO, AA, FFXIV, Defiance, Neverwinter...so on) how many of us are going to lose our faith in the genre completely? I'm not saying I will, but there are others more pessimistic than myself. Is the next batch of MMOs gonna make or break this genre we all love? I think it might.
Your thoughts please.
P.S.
Remember, I'm asking a question, not making a statement (other than my gaming preferences). I know my taste in games may differ from many. I don't pretend to be some ultimate authority, so please don't attack me.
Comments
try out age of conan. its f2p without any real restriction until lv 80
great game. i suggest going on PvE server they are better populated. if you want to play a squishy melee caster class, go herald of xotli. great fun, very active playstyle, not easy.
yeah, currently for me its just age of conan, i play it on off since 2008, and always come back because other games just suck. swtor, gw2....
For gen x it was more about the community and being a part of the actual game development and growth.
For gen y it's all about what I want now isn't going to exactly be what I want next month, it's disposable.
This is not an attack on anyone, it's just the end of one generation and the birth of another.
No.
But it certainly needs some new ideas and/or better fleshed out old ideas.
Like I said, I'm not an authority, and as mentioned, this isn't my first post along these lines. The last one got quite a few responses from people that felt the same why I did, so it's not a case of me hating it, therefor everyone else must too. I even said that many peoples taste in games would differ from mine. These things were stated to avoid assumptions like that.
http://thewordiz.wordpress.com/
I could make some degree of argument that we are seeing the after effects of SWTOR floundering and GW2 having some success right now. Developers are retooling and not a lot of new stuff is ready to be announced. I don’t see it as a last stab for glory by some in the genre but rather a silence before the next round. There is money here, love for the games, and they wont give up on it. We may not see a wave of AAA titles like in past years again though. They haven’t figured out how to make them successful and ran dated design ideas into the ground trying.
Only one AAA title is in the pipe for this year and that’s TESO (it might slip to next year.) A lot of smaller niche titles are getting press they otherwise would not in the absence of big name, big budget, contenders. Like some junkie, I am actually having to look at older titles I thought I’d never play again for my MMO fix because EA messed up, got busted, and scared all the little meth labs into hiding. I don’t see it as the end of the genre but a transition period.
I am not giving up. However, I am finding myself looking away from the big publishers for titles to support as they don’t know what to do with themselves. I am looking at games like Elite Dangerous and Star Citizen from places like Kickstarter to get behind. To my surprise I am also looking at the beginnings of a generation of console MMORPG type games with Bungie’s Destiny for example. Everything is changing.
In the mean time I am distracting myself while waiting. Oh god... Am I going to end up taking out another new EVE Online account for a try at things.. *cries.*
That's kind of how I feel on it all right now.
This is what I'm hoping the case is, but you gotta wonder, what if they suck? I'm having a hard time imagining Bethesda, well, Zenimax making a bad game...but we're habit forming creatures, and the industry's pattern of bad products can't be denied.
http://thewordiz.wordpress.com/
I think the genre is evolving and its good. Things like f2p/b2p model becoming more popular and in the case of Star Citizen, releasing the tools necessary for players to fully mod the game and create content. You play on the developers persistent servers while also free to host/play on modded private servers. Best of the best community created content may be integrated into the persistent servers.
No longer does the community need to wait for developer content releases only. Creative minds in the community will generate much of it while players wait for dlc's or expansions. Its a win/win for both the developer and the players because the abundance of content will keep generating box sales and they don't need to nickel and dime me to death.
No, it's not the end of a genre, just the evolution of one.
This happens in most creative genres. You just find yourself on the side that doesn't like where it's going. Pretty understandable.
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
Yup. Just another first-world problem the unwashed masses try and turn into a cataclysmic event.
So you've been happy with the last few AAA titles?
Edit: extend this question to topographic too, if you happen to see it.
As far as it looks, Sov, you're playing Tera, Top's playing LOTRO (great game). Am I right? So, one is a game that recently went f2p due to it's lack of success, and the other is 6 years old. Doesn't seem like either of you should be happy (or are happy) with industry trends either.
I know I'm assuming a lot. Please correct me if needed.
I also wanted to add, that never did I say that because I felt the last few titles failed that I think the next titles are going to follow in those footsteps. I'm asking if it's possible, and what the outcome would be. Also, I think anyone that claims they know the direction the industry is going is lying, because it seems to me they're in the middle of a massive (no pun intended) trial and error period.
http://thewordiz.wordpress.com/
If I'm having fun, then I'm happy.
I played WoW for two hours today. I had fun. I'm happy. I played LOTRO for an hour last week. I had fun. I'm happy. It's just a game, not a religion and making melodramatic "the sky is falling" statements just makes you look sad.
Face it, the genre evolved and it left you behind. Catch up or find something else to replace it.
Neither one of those games is new. I'm talking about the future here. Not the past. You didn't answer my question, but by you not playing the newer MMOs, you pretty much have. You're just flaming at this point. Also, just beacause that's the section you chose to quote, doesn't mean the rest of what I wrote in that post didn't happen.
http://thewordiz.wordpress.com/
Gah...I just got trolled. Should have kept my mouth shut.
Are you trolling by saying I'm a troll? You know, I'm trying to have a discussion here, not a sh*t slinging match. I realize how hopelessly unrealistic this is with some people on here, but come on.
http://thewordiz.wordpress.com/
I am not. TESO might be great. I really want it to be as I want worth while games to play. But I also have to admit that they made a PVP game for a franchse built on PVE exploration, they are out of synch internally and often contradict themselves in public statements, they are retooling the game to add features they think fans want from the announcement backlash at the expense of core game features like the dark brothers and thieves guild and even at the expense of watering down AvA, and seem to be relying on dated mechanic ideas first tried in DAOC. It really could still be good but it has potential train wreck written all over it too.
The industry pattern you describe is a rutt that is taking a beating by means of wallet to sort through. The big investment firms into entertainment are afraid to take risks and funded games as conservative toward the supposedly proven WOW model as they could. Look where that got them? My god man, they f''ed up STAR WARS.... O.o
I think it's going to take some indie success to shake things up and show the money people that some new ideas really can work. More reason to pour some hopes into kickstarter and indieagogo titles. Otherwise with games like Desitny and Defiance or even DUST 514 in the works one has to wonder if they are just going to give up on new MMORPGs like FUNCOM decided to do as "too hard to make." Lord knows I don't want too many more Asian F2P grinders making it over this way as my only option because the market is empty right now.
Obviously by my OP, I'm pretty fearful of the possibilities. "It's just a game." Maybe to some, but it's an artform to me, one that I grew up with and adore. I can imagine so many ways TESO could go wrong, but I'm staying hopeful that it doesn't. With the highlighted comment above, what isn't possible to screw up is the real question. I agree with your Kickstarter sentiment, I personally haven't donated to anything yet, but I like the idea of an indie scene in gaming, after all, independant films and music are some of the best made.
http://thewordiz.wordpress.com/
You possibly did well to steer clear of a few ks... but equally you probably would have done well to have backed a few other.
http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1014633/Classic-Game-Postmortem
If this were an isolated trend within MMO gaming, I'd be inclined to agree. But we see this across the entire game development sphere. The last few years haven't been kind to many developers or publishers, as witnessed with by the many studio closures and publishers taking hits. Also, if you're referring to me, I never said nothing is wrong with the genre, I said it's not ending, which are two quite different observations.
To the OP, please don't take my comment about foibles as a sort of personal attack. However, your question is built on dissatisfaction with the games you recently tried. Even casual observance of this forum will show that many, many arguments hinge on the phenomenon that I mentioned and this conversation is likely to go in that direction, whether you will it or not.
I too did a lot of growing up with the genre. I was 22 when Asheron's Call came out and have played mmo since that point. In many ways the games of old outshined the newer games, because they were built by our peers. Older mmos were made to be graphical MUDs, and had more roleplaying elements within the game.
At the same time, the games of old required a significant amount of time to progress at all. It was easy to get left behind, or have a character stuck at a certain level range because the class was unwated for groups, and it was normal to sit around in game for hours looking for a group if you weren't available to play during peak times.
The newer games have resolved many of the older issues, but they also didn't bring along the wonderful roleplay elements. Additionally, the genre became extremely popular and is now designed to be played by the masses, rather than a few thousand.
To say the genre is ending isn't accurate, because simply put, it's changed. Additionally, considering we've both have probably played a myraid of games over the years, gaming in and of itself has lost some of the magic. Gamers are a pretty sophisticated sort. We understand various game mechanics, learn how to exploit the game's weaknesses to our advantage, and many of us know how to build powerful characters. This comes from years of experience within gaming systems, and learning how to decipher the mystery behind the games.
In other words, we've seen the man behind the curtain, and we simply cannot go back. With indie gaming, we might see some magic come back. Look at Minecraft. That game isn't for everyone, but it also shows how a very simple design (virtual legos built into a survival game) can have a ton of depth (working redstone computers for instance). However, at the very core, we understand gaming mechanics and often care more about how to build the all powerful characters and racing the end game, rather than just enjoying the ride.
I am currently playing GW2, and I am loving my time there. I play a warrior in WvW while leveling, which adds extra challenge and frustration, and I am slowly exploring and crafting my way to 80. I feel no need to race to the end, and my warrior will only be my second level 80. I take gaming for what it is now, a form of entertainment, and relish in my experiences for what they are. When I come across a gem of a game, something that I find special, I feel giddy like a kid again. I forcibly toned down my gaming habits, and have found myself enjoying gaming more now that I don't take it so seriously.
Take that for what you will, but perhaps it's time to get back to your roots of gaming. Take things easy, try to get lost into a game world, and try not to overanalyze. It's what I did, and it's working very well.
I think he's implying most people only care about how fun a game is, not how old it is (being old only matters insofar as it might prevent a game from remaining fun.)
It's like if you said visual media was dead because new platforms haven't surfaced recently -- completely ignoring the fact that existing platforms like youtube, netflix, or cable TV have tons and tons and tons of content to enjoy. But you reject it simply on account of the platform being old, which sounds rather trollish.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
The number of people playing MMO's has increased, the number of MMO's has increased.
Dying might not exactly be the right word here.
And just because you see games fail doesn't mean the genre is dying it just means that there's more competition than ever and players have higher expecations than before.
Even some of the games that failed (read: failed at becoming monstrous multi-million player base games) still have people playing them. TSW, SWTOR, AoC, Aion the list keeps going.