Y'know the current unreal engine embeds in flash for browsers, right?
Unity as well can launch both in and from a browser.
Not trying to correct anything else about yer argument, just that graphics even on a web page can be very scalable and flexible (granted it doesn't really apply to this case it seems).
"The knowledge of the theory of logic has no tendency whatever to make men good reasoners." - Thomas B. Macaulay
"The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge." - Daniel J. Boorstin
Originally posted by Grixxitt What facts? That not charging for something means that it is free? Do you want a breakdown on the cost analysis of grilled cheese sandwiches for the amount of time that said developers were working on games and not charging for their services? Do you think that such a cost analysis would approach 6 million dollars? You come here saying that it costs 6 mill to make an MMO. That is a false statement. I've shot it down, proven otherwise, even used your own god damn article to prove that you misrepresented facts and yet here you are denying the truth.WTF?
You've proven nothing. You've provided no examples and no information other than what's in your head. The examples of games that were being produced on the cheap you either have no information on (MO and DF) or the funding for the games was to produce tech demos, so the developers could secure more funding.
You find an MMORPG that's actually reached release status for less than six million dollars since 2003, Indie or otherwise, and I'll be happy to say you were right. Of course, you can't, because you won't have any information to back it up, so I don't suppose that it will ever be necessary to say you were right. Or probably what you'll do is point to games like the browser game you linked to below. If that's your proof, then yes. If a developer doesn't have to produce any 3D graphics, network or server code, and doesn't have to create a virtual, visible, shared world, then yes, it can be done for less than six million dollars.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
Originally posted by Deivos Y'know the current unreal engine embeds in flash for browsers, right?Unity as well can launch both in and from a browser. Not trying to correct anything else about yer argument, just that graphics even on a web page can be very scalable and flexible (granted it doesn't really apply to this case it seems).
Watch the video. There is no download or plugin required aside from Flash. He's not using Unity or Unreal.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
Hence me comment 'doesn't really apply to this case it seems'.
Aside from that, this is why I mentioned Unreal embeds in flash. It doesn't require an extra executable/donwload, it loads the content through the flash plugin.
Terribly inefficient in my opinion, but apparently it works.
"The knowledge of the theory of logic has no tendency whatever to make men good reasoners." - Thomas B. Macaulay
"The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge." - Daniel J. Boorstin
Why not? Who is to say that the overlapping area is small? In this particular case, maybe it is huge. People have enjoyed WoW for years now. By any definition that makes the game deep. I wouldn't think it impossible.
You asked me to explain what watering down means, so I did. If you want to make the claim that people playing WoW are as engrossed as people playing a more targeted game like SWG or UO, go ahead. But I don't think that's an easily defensible position.
But you are claiming that SWG and UO are more targeted games? On what basis?
Judgement. The features are designed to appeal to a more specific target audience. As far as I can tell nobody disputes this and actually typically uses it as an argument against them, saying appealing to a smaller audience such as that isn't economically viable.
Your judgement is tainted by your venomous hatred of WoW.
UO and SWG don't really have much competition in their niches. How do you know majority of the players in those games don't just settle for them?
I hear people left UO in droves when EQ launched. Clearly players were better served by EQ. Is EQ a more targeted game then? And what does it speak of WoW when it has endured despite fierce competition?
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been-Wayne Gretzky
Why not? Who is to say that the overlapping area is small? In this particular case, maybe it is huge. People have enjoyed WoW for years now. By any definition that makes the game deep. I wouldn't think it impossible.
You asked me to explain what watering down means, so I did. If you want to make the claim that people playing WoW are as engrossed as people playing a more targeted game like SWG or UO, go ahead. But I don't think that's an easily defensible position.
But you are claiming that SWG and UO are more targeted games? On what basis?
Judgement. The features are designed to appeal to a more specific target audience. As far as I can tell nobody disputes this and actually typically uses it as an argument against them, saying appealing to a smaller audience such as that isn't economically viable.
Your judgement is tainted by your venomous hatred of WoW.
UO and SWG don't really have much competition in their niches. How do you know majority of the players in those games don't just settle for them?
I hear people left UO in droves when EQ launched. Clearly players were better served by EQ. Is EQ a more targeted game then? And what does it speak of WoW when it has endured despite fierce competition?
What do any of these questions have to do with anything aside from you having some desire to argue with me in particular? Try to stay on topic.
And aside from what you claim to know about my judgement, do you deny that most people agree that UO and SWG are more targeted games than WoW and other similar modern themeparks? Do YOU think they are? Do you think they aren't?
Why would people leaving UO for EQ make EQ a more targeted game? People leave games for other games all the time for many different reasons. I never said people moving from one game to another makes the latter game more targeted. You're not even coherent at this point.
UO and SWG don't really have much competition in their niches and so.... what's your point? I brought up UO and SWG because you said people have been playing WoW for years so that somehow makes it deep (it doesn't) and that we can't know if the overlapping of people's interest for WoW is bigger than for other games. I brought up UO and SWG as examples of more targeted games where the average player was probably more engrossed than the average WoW player... a shortcut for determining how much overlap there is in people's preferences for that game.
1 - Blizzard had a large enough following from an audience that extended past what had up to then been known as the MMO player base, enabling them to invite a considerably larger audience into the genre than western gaming had been familiar with.
2 - Even with the troubles at launch, the production quality of the game was high enough to stand strong against the competition it had at the time.
3 - The MMO crowd was known for a long time to have a long terms basis of player retention, that only became a progressively harsher issue with modern titles. Sure, people migrated between titles when the first few MMOs came out, but there were fewer titles to skip about between and they offered distinct enough styles that people could pick the one(s) they liked and stick it out to a degree.
It was only when those titles experimented with adapting their play to accrue a larger crowd that they met their strongest retention conflicts. Trammel, NGE, ToA, etc. A turning point that rewrote some fundamental aspects of the game that alienated the up to then rather loyal user base and causing a subsequent decline in numbers over the long term rather than the increase (not counting the temporary increase from expansion time/sales).
4 - Marketing was stronger than it had been for previous titles in the MMO sphere.
Other reasons are floating about, but any who.
EDIT: To clarify though, I do not think UO, EQ, or any other early title was in any way a 'targeted' game (beyond the obvious factors of it being an always online rpg). At least at launch. The genre was still rather young and the titles available had enough distinctive factors that any metric you'd pull outside of raw numbers was going to be a vague piece of information at best, and parsing what many numbers actually meant was exceptionally fuzzy.
This is also rather why you have those hallmark expansions and updates that the community of these titles hate (aside from the fact it's the internet and everything is hated on the internet). It's because those are points in time where the games had been out long enough that people considered enough data available to try and address issues they saw, making a choice to change their games in a manner to try and make it appealing to a broader audience than they originally made them. What they didn't account for was the backlash from the present user base and the general 'don't tread backwards' mentality many consumers seem to have about looking at older games.
"The knowledge of the theory of logic has no tendency whatever to make men good reasoners." - Thomas B. Macaulay
"The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge." - Daniel J. Boorstin
EDIT: To clarify though, I do not think UO, EQ, or any other early title was in any way a 'targeted' game (beyond the obvious factors of it being an always online rpg). At least at launch. The genre was still rather young and the titles available had enough distinctive factors that any metric you'd pull outside of raw numbers was going to be a vague piece of information at best, and parsing what many numbers actually meant was exceptionally fuzzy.
This is also rather why you have those hallmark expansions and updates that the community of these titles hate (aside from the fact it's the internet and everything is hated on the internet). It's because those are points in time where the games had been out long enough that people considered enough data available to try and address issues they saw, making a choice to change their games in a manner to try and make it appealing to a broader audience than they originally made them. What they didn't account for was the backlash from the present user base and the general 'don't tread backwards' mentality many consumers seem to have about looking at older games.
Just so you know, when I say that UO and SWG are more targeted games than WoW or other modern themeparks, I'm saying their target audience is smaller from the get-go. The features in UO and SWG are more "extreme" and targeted towards a more specific group of people than modern themeparks, especially WoW.
I don't at all mean that they are the result of any kind of focus group or other demographic testing and designed around appealing to those groups. I think UO in particular was made as a natural, organic next step in the Ultima series, and it was the game that the devs wanted to make, not the game that they thought was gonna set the world on fire or appeal to as many people as possible.
Well in that manner, there wasn't really any alternative for those titles. A game that had to be played solely over the internet was inherently something that was going to cater to a relatively finite audience at the time on top of their gameplay choices.
You definitely had some adaptations I'd agree, as the games had to stand with some kind of longevity to their play in order to keep people from wandering off.
So yeah I understand in that context, such titles had a pretty finite audience to which they were developed for and catered to. I think that's more a byproduct of the developers trying to pioneer some elements of gaming though more so than them setting their sights on any particular audience.
Driven foremost by ambition, more or less.
And to beat a dead horse, it's a quality that's increasingly lacking within the developer base.
"The knowledge of the theory of logic has no tendency whatever to make men good reasoners." - Thomas B. Macaulay
"The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge." - Daniel J. Boorstin
Well in that manner, there wasn't really any alternative for those titles. A game that had to be played solely over the internet was inherently something that was going to cater to a relatively finite audience at the time on top of their gameplay choices.
You definitely had some adaptations I'd agree, as the games had to stand with some kind of longevity to their play in order to keep people from wandering off.
So yeah I understand in that context, such titles had a pretty finite audience to which they were developed for and catered to. I think that's more a byproduct of the developers trying to pioneer some elements of gaming though more so than them setting their sights on any particular audience.
Driven foremost by ambition, more or less.
And to beat a dead horse, it's a quality that's increasingly lacking within the developer base.
This is ultimately what myself and many others are driving at when we debate these things here. It feels so much like games nowadays are just trying to follow a formula and appeal to as many people as possible, as opposed to just having a vision of a game and making it.
Can anybody point me towards a source that shows the MMO genre is increasing? Also I'd be curious to know what games they're including... specifically if they're including MOBAs.
Even if the genre is increasing, I don't think that is necessarily evidence of anything, certainly not evidence that they're good. But I am curious to see the numbers because a lot of people throw that fact around without backing it up.
Back when "old school" MMOs were at their top - EQ, UO and AC1 - less than a million total players for all of them.
Do I really need to continue?
No, but I will.
Less than a million with too much time on their hands. I suspect it's the same number of people today who want that old time-sucking gameplay back.
Take the casual crowd out of the equation and it's starting to look like the "true" (as they like to call themselves) MMO gamer population hasn't grown at all in 14 years.
Gee, maybe that's why smart game developers don't make those types of games any longer. No market for it.
Well, maybe there is a market for it...DFUW, MO...wait, nevermind.
I think you're confusing "too much time on their hands" with having an attention span. The real difference in game type is how long you play that game on a macro scale. Ie do you quit after a few weeks like narius? Seems to me that games like WoW and other carrot-on-a-stick grindfests can cause people to spend just as much time PER day as other, more long-term games.
Tldr: playing 12 different games in a year, each for a month, doesn't mean you have any less time on your hands than somebody who plays 1 game for the whole year.
No, I meant "too much time on their hands". That's why I said it. I'm not confused about it at all.
Can anybody point me towards a source that shows the MMO genre is increasing? Also I'd be curious to know what games they're including... specifically if they're including MOBAs.
Even if the genre is increasing, I don't think that is necessarily evidence of anything, certainly not evidence that they're good. But I am curious to see the numbers because a lot of people throw that fact around without backing it up.
Back when "old school" MMOs were at their top - EQ, UO and AC1 - less than a million total players for all of them.
Do I really need to continue?
No, but I will.
Less than a million with too much time on their hands. I suspect it's the same number of people today who want that old time-sucking gameplay back.
Take the casual crowd out of the equation and it's starting to look like the "true" (as they like to call themselves) MMO gamer population hasn't grown at all in 14 years.
Gee, maybe that's why smart game developers don't make those types of games any longer. No market for it.
Well, maybe there is a market for it...DFUW, MO...wait, nevermind.
I think you're confusing "too much time on their hands" with having an attention span. The real difference in game type is how long you play that game on a macro scale. Ie do you quit after a few weeks like narius? Seems to me that games like WoW and other carrot-on-a-stick grindfests can cause people to spend just as much time PER day as other, more long-term games.
Tldr: playing 12 different games in a year, each for a month, doesn't mean you have any less time on your hands than somebody who plays 1 game for the whole year.
No, I meant "too much time on their hands". That's why I said it. I'm not confused about it at all.
Oh ok. So are you saying games like UO were more of a time-sink than games like WoW? Because if I'm not mistaken, WoW is the one that is known for its heavy emphasis on grind.
Why not? Who is to say that the overlapping area is small? In this particular case, maybe it is huge. People have enjoyed WoW for years now. By any definition that makes the game deep. I wouldn't think it impossible.
You asked me to explain what watering down means, so I did. If you want to make the claim that people playing WoW are as engrossed as people playing a more targeted game like SWG or UO, go ahead. But I don't think that's an easily defensible position.
But you are claiming that SWG and UO are more targeted games? On what basis?
Judgement. The features are designed to appeal to a more specific target audience. As far as I can tell nobody disputes this and actually typically uses it as an argument against them, saying appealing to a smaller audience such as that isn't economically viable.
Your judgement is tainted by your venomous hatred of WoW.
UO and SWG don't really have much competition in their niches. How do you know majority of the players in those games don't just settle for them?
I hear people left UO in droves when EQ launched. Clearly players were better served by EQ. Is EQ a more targeted game then? And what does it speak of WoW when it has endured despite fierce competition?
What do any of these questions have to do with anything aside from you having some desire to argue with me in particular? Try to stay on topic.
And aside from what you claim to know about my judgement, do you deny that most people agree that UO and SWG are more targeted games than WoW and other similar modern themeparks? Do YOU think they are? Do you think they aren't?
Why would people leaving UO for EQ make EQ a more targeted game? People leave games for other games all the time for many different reasons. I never said people moving from one game to another makes the latter game more targeted. You're not even coherent at this point.
UO and SWG don't really have much competition in their niches and so.... what's your point? I brought up UO and SWG because you said people have been playing WoW for years so that somehow makes it deep (it doesn't) and that we can't know if the overlapping of people's interest for WoW is bigger than for other games. I brought up UO and SWG as examples of more targeted games where the average player was probably more engrossed than the average WoW player... a shortcut for determining how much overlap there is in people's preferences for that game.
I am trying to point out how ridiculous claim it is to say one game is more targeted than another when you have only your judgement to base on. How does player migration fit your argument? How does any concrete event or piece of data fit your hypothesis?
You don't know. You have no evidence. You merely float to a conclusion that fits your view. UO and SWG might be as well be watered down in the same sense you say WoW is. Why should size matter? And it is a terrible assumption that a player who enjoys WoW is not as engrossed as someone playing either UO or SWG.How dare you even suggest that.
If only a minority of players enjoy open world PvP, and even fewer enjoy FFA PvP, then if no game offered FFA PvP those players could be expected to migrate to a game with open world PvP, right? It still makes their game a niche, and the player who would enjoy FFA PvP are settling with a game which is watered down to them, aren't they? A niche within a niche.
Are you qualified to say which game is watered down and which isn't? You seem to make awfully many claims which are based on your judgement alone, and when confronted you insist that you don't know any better than anyone else. What should we make of that?
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been-Wayne Gretzky
I think you're confusing "too much time on their hands" with having an attention span. The real difference in game type is how long you play that game on a macro scale. Ie do you quit after a few weeks like narius? Seems to me that games like WoW and other carrot-on-a-stick grindfests can cause people to spend just as much time PER day as other, more long-term games. Tldr: playing 12 different games in a year, each for a month, doesn't mean you have any less time on your hands than somebody who plays 1 game for the whole year.
Implying that someone might have ADD comes awfully close to flaming. Tread carefully.
grimgryphon was obviously referring to the tedious and time consuming nature of old school MMOs. Not to be confused with how many games you play in a year or anything of the sort.
Just wanted to note that having ADD is not a deterrent to playing MMORPGs, with or without medication. People say stuff like "having an attention span" to make themselves feel better about spending so much time playing and talking about something that, let's be honest here, isn't really all that hard to do. The only real requirement is a sixth grade reading level and some time to kill.
Agreed. Don't tell Eve players though. Their entire self-image hinges on the fantasy that Eve attracts more intelligent types.
1 - Blizzard had a large enough following from an audience that extended past what had up to then been known as the MMO player base, enabling them to invite a considerably larger audience into the genre than western gaming had been familiar with.
2 - Even with the troubles at launch, the production quality of the game was high enough to stand strong against the competition it had at the time.
3 - The MMO crowd was known for a long time to have a long terms basis of player retention, that only became a progressively harsher issue with modern titles. Sure, people migrated between titles when the first few MMOs came out, but there were fewer titles to skip about between and they offered distinct enough styles that people could pick the one(s) they liked and stick it out to a degree.
It was only when those titles experimented with adapting their play to accrue a larger crowd that they met their strongest retention conflicts. Trammel, NGE, ToA, etc. A turning point that rewrote some fundamental aspects of the game that alienated the up to then rather loyal user base and causing a subsequent decline in numbers over the long term rather than the increase (not counting the temporary increase from expansion time/sales).
4 - Marketing was stronger than it had been for previous titles in the MMO sphere.
Other reasons are floating about, but any who.
EDIT: To clarify though, I do not think UO, EQ, or any other early title was in any way a 'targeted' game (beyond the obvious factors of it being an always online rpg). At least at launch. The genre was still rather young and the titles available had enough distinctive factors that any metric you'd pull outside of raw numbers was going to be a vague piece of information at best, and parsing what many numbers actually meant was exceptionally fuzzy.
This is also rather why you have those hallmark expansions and updates that the community of these titles hate (aside from the fact it's the internet and everything is hated on the internet). It's because those are points in time where the games had been out long enough that people considered enough data available to try and address issues they saw, making a choice to change their games in a manner to try and make it appealing to a broader audience than they originally made them. What they didn't account for was the backlash from the present user base and the general 'don't tread backwards' mentality many consumers seem to have about looking at older games.
My attempt was to indulge with his hypothesis enough so that I can poke holes in it. Only the player migration was relevant. Other facts weren't. I think the notion that one game is more targeted and another less (in the sense he's using those terms) is nonsense.
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been-Wayne Gretzky
Why not? Who is to say that the overlapping area is small? In this particular case, maybe it is huge. People have enjoyed WoW for years now. By any definition that makes the game deep. I wouldn't think it impossible.
You asked me to explain what watering down means, so I did. If you want to make the claim that people playing WoW are as engrossed as people playing a more targeted game like SWG or UO, go ahead. But I don't think that's an easily defensible position.
But you are claiming that SWG and UO are more targeted games? On what basis?
Judgement. The features are designed to appeal to a more specific target audience. As far as I can tell nobody disputes this and actually typically uses it as an argument against them, saying appealing to a smaller audience such as that isn't economically viable.
Your judgement is tainted by your venomous hatred of WoW.
UO and SWG don't really have much competition in their niches. How do you know majority of the players in those games don't just settle for them?
I hear people left UO in droves when EQ launched. Clearly players were better served by EQ. Is EQ a more targeted game then? And what does it speak of WoW when it has endured despite fierce competition?
What do any of these questions have to do with anything aside from you having some desire to argue with me in particular? Try to stay on topic.
And aside from what you claim to know about my judgement, do you deny that most people agree that UO and SWG are more targeted games than WoW and other similar modern themeparks? Do YOU think they are? Do you think they aren't?
Why would people leaving UO for EQ make EQ a more targeted game? People leave games for other games all the time for many different reasons. I never said people moving from one game to another makes the latter game more targeted. You're not even coherent at this point.
UO and SWG don't really have much competition in their niches and so.... what's your point? I brought up UO and SWG because you said people have been playing WoW for years so that somehow makes it deep (it doesn't) and that we can't know if the overlapping of people's interest for WoW is bigger than for other games. I brought up UO and SWG as examples of more targeted games where the average player was probably more engrossed than the average WoW player... a shortcut for determining how much overlap there is in people's preferences for that game.
I am trying to point out how ridiculous claim it is to say one game is more targeted than another when you have only your judgement to base on. How does player migration fit your argument? How does any concrete event or piece of data fit your hypothesis?
So I see that you haven't answered my question. Do you think UO and SWG are designed to appeal to a smaller amount of people than WoW and other modern MMOs? Because like I said, EVERYBODY seems to agree that oldschool MMOs and in particular sandboxes naturally have a smaller audience. That's where these arguments about economic viability come into play.
How does player migration fit into my argument? Which argument exactly? Player migration can happen for any number of reasons. Besides, UO and EQ were both growing at the same time for a good while before UO started to decline almost indefinitely (about a year after trammel was implemented). So I'm not even sure what point you're trying to make about player migration.
You don't know. You have no evidence. You merely float to a conclusion that fits your view. UO and SWG might be as well be watered down in the same sense you say WoW is. Why should size matter?
How about then make the case for that! If you think that UO and SWG are more watered down or as watered down as WoW, then make the case for it. You're just saying that it's possible, even though we both know it's not true. Can I PROVE that UO's ow pvp and full loot is more targeted than WoW's "everybody wins" gameplay? No, but do you disagree? Can I PROVE that SWG's deep crafting and leveling systems are more targeted than WoW's linear progression? No, but again, do you disagree? It seems pretty intuitive that these games, like most sandbox games, are appealing to a smaller subset of players, because in general that's how you serve people best.
And I've already told you why size matters but you clearly just don't want to listen. Aside from things like bugs and polish, you HAVE to piss some people off in order to appeal to others. We've been through this but I guess we're going through it again. To appeal to players A, B, and C, you have to find common ground between all 3 of them. By only going after players A and B, there's a good chance A and B are going to have more common preferences than if you also had to include C. People have different preferences, so as a general rule NICHE titles are serving people better than MAINSTREAM titles, they're just serving less of them. This is such a simple concept, I have no idea how you can so bitterly deny it.
And it is a terrible assumption that a player who enjoys WoW is not as engrossed as someone playing either UO or SWG.How dare you even suggest that.
I don't know what assumption you're talking about. It's an observation and I never said it was a fact. I said you can try to claim that WoW's players are as engrossed as, say, SWG's players, but I don't think it's an easily defensible popsition. I'm not sure how you can take such offense at that. "How dare I"? Really?
In reality, I'm either right or I'm wrong. The average SWG or UO player either was more engrossed as the average WoW player or less. There's no way it would be equal, that's probably statistically impossible. So I'm not sure why it's so appalling for me to make an educated guess based on years of observation. But I'll just ask you: Do you think the average SWG fan was more "diehard" than the average WoW fan?
If only a minority of players enjoy open world PvP, and even fewer enjoy FFA PvP, then if no game offered FFA PvP those players could be expected to migrate to a game with open world PvP, right? It still makes their game a niche, and the player who would enjoy FFA PvP are settling with a game which is watered down to them, aren't they? A niche within a niche.
Yes, they would be settling for a watered down version of the game they want. Remember the TWO times I pointed out that the best way to serve somebody would be to make a game specifically designed for them, but that's not economically viable? I fully understand that any game that gets made will have some amount of compromise in order to make it viable and appeal to more than a small handful of people. I just think it's a ridiculous thing to assume that we're currently at that point. I think WoW's success had a huge impact on the way companies make games, and it caused a lot of developers to try and reach out to that same crowd, instead of making a SMALLER, more targeted game.
Are you qualified to say which game is watered down and which isn't? You seem to make awfully many claims which are based on your judgement alone, and when confronted you insist that you don't know any better than anyone else. What should we make of that?
I laugh whenever I see a post about 'wanting to return to more hardcore games'. The whole argument is a joke. Games are a business and as businesses, the companies will do whatever caters to the desires of the largest number of players possible. If most players want their games super easy or casual, that is what the developers will make. If most games are casual-centric, blame the millions of gamers who demand casual games, not the game companies.
If you play games and/or have more than 2 hours of free time per day, chances are you are a hardcore player despite what you may think (and if you play more than 8 hours a day and are not somehow medically chair bound or paid to do it, you are likely addicted to games / play too much... and that is not 'hardcore', that is unhealthy). If you are reading and writing on these forums, you are very likely to be one of those people who can play games more than 2 hours a day and the very fact that you read any kind of gaming forums makes you more 'hardcore' than your average gamer.
Super hardcore is nich gameplay these days so don't expect many if any of the major game publishers to make AAA quality super hardcore games, it just won't make them the money they so desire. You want hardcore? Look to the indie and small game studios as they will make these games with less emphasis on profit and, in truth, usually because they simply cannot compete in the casual MMO market. Unfortunately, these smaller companies often do not have the budget / manpower / experience required to make a game with the same polish as companies like Blizzard, Trion, Bioware, Sony or even Perfect World.
That being said, most players complain about a lack of 'hardcore' just for the sake of complaining. Even games known to be super casual like World of Warcraft have game modes (hard mode raids) that most players cannot complete. FFXIV has the Binding Coil of Bahamut, Endless Eclipse in Rift, SWTOR has heroic mode flashpoints, none of which I have seen any indication of being completed by more than 10% of the game's population. So many people 'conveniently' forget about hardcore content that is present in games that have any casual content at all.
Oki doki, just answered the query as it was phrased. Why WoW would be able to establish itself in contrast to it's competition, passing point on why early titles would see player migration, etc.
Not really anything else to add, as I'm not particularly in disagreement.
"The knowledge of the theory of logic has no tendency whatever to make men good reasoners." - Thomas B. Macaulay
"The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge." - Daniel J. Boorstin
Oki doki, just answered the query as it was phrased. Why WoW would be able to establish itself in contrast to it's competition, passing point on why early titles would see player migration, etc.
Not really anything else to add, as I'm not particularly in disagreement.
This is one of our Massive Multiposter Threads, a couple of lines where you don't disagree about anything just does not cut it. Think of the expectations you have let down as our posters were preparing a raid to counter your argument.
The arguement is moot when it comes to sandbox vs themepark. All players want to have houses, be able to terraform a cave in the ground and search for minerals, and construct a city that attracts all the greatest crafters in the lands as a social hub.
Casuals ruined the genre because they are easily impressed and generally just care about instant gratification and no risk to their stuff. I'm not saying a mmorpg should be a second job, but when it only takes you a week to max out your character and the game has nothing to do other than raiding the same dungeon on a gear treadmill then whats the point in even playing? On that point it shouldn't take a year to finally max out your character either; like in Darkfall online. There needs to be a balance.
Risk vs reward always makes game have a more appealing atmosphere, because the player can't easy mode everything without fear. Want to know why the AAA themepark games are flopping left and right? Its because it is a dying model. Everyone is tired of the WoW clones with endless gear grind and meaingless gameplay elements. Players want to be able to impact the game world and leave their mark.
The bit about hardcore games not gaining any players is wrong also. Those players that are burned out on the WoW mold have started to venture off into different archtypes of mmorpg; hence why most veteran players prefer sandbox, and sandbox with full loot. Hence why Eve has been constantly growing in uniqie players and subcriptions. This is why AAA companies are starting to fund sandbox mmorpgs now as well.
The reason why Mo, Dfo, Xyson, and every other recent sandbox game has failed is not the player base's fault; if anything it has been rising, but rather the developers with their low budgets, horrible work ethics and general lack of structure. Once a AAA sandbox mmorpg with or without full loot comes out ; ala EQNext; we will see a silver age of sandbox mmorpgs.
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I personally feel full or at least partial loot always generate a better community, atmosphere and game, but also more reason to keep playing. There needs to be balance though, between the different play types; such as exploreres, pvpers and pvers; as well as; player driven content(such as bounty hunting)and game driven content(Such as building houses or cities). A gear treadmill is a horrible way to keep players supporting the game and for most it is not fun.
A game should have skills with a skill cap to promote different playstyles and limit the time it takes to max out your character, so casuals don't complain and the whole experience should be enjoyable.
Kindgom conquest is a great way to get players to interact with each other as long as the rewards and risk is great enough.
Darkfall online was as closet to what myself and many other full loot mmorpgs players have been wanting for a while now, but it has very many great flaws, like a huge grind, no sandbox elements, no skill cap, and a few other things. If they fixed these things and added more sandbox content to the game it would have flourished greatly. It had close to 200,000+ sales at launch. My guild alone had 300-400 players at launch and we were midsize. Gladly the veterans are starting to get the mmorpgs they want.
Hardcore has different meanings. On one scale a player that does a 6 hour WoW raid for the teir 1002.5 gear is hardcore. A player that wants to be able to kill, loot and then destroy an enemy guild's city is a different form of hardcore.
1 is time consuming; while the other is risk vs reward. Most themepark players are the time consuming hardcore, while the sandbox are risk vs reward.
Anyways just read the veteran player's rants; we all have the same thing in common. We've been saying the same thing for 5 years now.
Originally posted by Deivos Hence me comment 'doesn't really apply to this case it seems'. Aside from that, this is why I mentioned Unreal embeds in flash. It doesn't require an extra executable/donwload, it loads the content through the flash plugin. Terribly inefficient in my opinion, but apparently it works.
Huh. Unreal in Flash. What will they think of next? It would be a more efficient delivery mechanism, and if they had fairly restrictive environments they could just download it as the players moved around, or download a certain area around the player with hard restrictions on view distance, a la Minecraft.
Even with something like that though, a developer would still have to create the rest of the game. City of Steam is a Unity based MMORPG that runs in the browser. It's probably the closest thing to a sub six million dollar MMORPG, but I can't find any information on what they spent to make it. Not surprising, given that developers don't really publish that information.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
I am trying to point out how ridiculous claim it is to say one game is more targeted than another when you have only your judgement to base on. How does player migration fit your argument? How does any concrete event or piece of data fit your hypothesis?
So I see that you haven't answered my question. Do you think UO and SWG are designed to appeal to a smaller amount of people than WoW and other modern MMOs? Because like I said, EVERYBODY seems to agree that oldschool MMOs and in particular sandboxes naturally have a smaller audience. That's where these arguments about economic viability come into play.
How does player migration fit into my argument? Which argument exactly? Player migration can happen for any number of reasons. Besides, UO and EQ were both growing at the same time for a good while before UO started to decline almost indefinitely (about a year after trammel was implemented). So I'm not even sure what point you're trying to make about player migration.
You don't know. You have no evidence. You merely float to a conclusion that fits your view. UO and SWG might be as well be watered down in the same sense you say WoW is. Why should size matter?
How about then make the case for that! If you think that UO and SWG are more watered down or as watered down as WoW, then make the case for it. You're just saying that it's possible, even though we both know it's not true. Can I PROVE that UO's ow pvp and full loot is more targeted than WoW's "everybody wins" gameplay? No, but do you disagree? Can I PROVE that SWG's deep crafting and leveling systems are more targeted than WoW's linear progression? No, but again, do you disagree? It seems pretty intuitive that these games, like most sandbox games, are appealing to a smaller subset of players, because in general that's how you serve people best.
And I've already told you why size matters but you clearly just don't want to listen. Aside from things like bugs and polish, you HAVE to piss some people off in order to appeal to others. We've been through this but I guess we're going through it again. To appeal to players A, B, and C, you have to find common ground between all 3 of them. By only going after players A and B, there's a good chance A and B are going to have more common preferences than if you also had to include C. People have different preferences, so as a general rule NICHE titles are serving people better than MAINSTREAM titles, they're just serving less of them. This is such a simple concept, I have no idea how you can so bitterly deny it.
And it is a terrible assumption that a player who enjoys WoW is not as engrossed as someone playing either UO or SWG.How dare you even suggest that.
I don't know what assumption you're talking about. It's an observation and I never said it was a fact. I said you can try to claim that WoW's players are as engrossed as, say, SWG's players, but I don't think it's an easily defensible popsition. I'm not sure how you can take such offense at that. "How dare I"? Really?
In reality, I'm either right or I'm wrong. The average SWG or UO player either was more engrossed as the average WoW player or less. There's no way it would be equal, that's probably statistically impossible. So I'm not sure why it's so appalling for me to make an educated guess based on years of observation. But I'll just ask you: Do you think the average SWG fan was more "diehard" than the average WoW fan?
If only a minority of players enjoy open world PvP, and even fewer enjoy FFA PvP, then if no game offered FFA PvP those players could be expected to migrate to a game with open world PvP, right? It still makes their game a niche, and the player who would enjoy FFA PvP are settling with a game which is watered down to them, aren't they? A niche within a niche.
Yes, they would be settling for a watered down version of the game they want. Remember the TWO times I pointed out that the best way to serve somebody would be to make a game specifically designed for them, but that's not economically viable? I fully understand that any game that gets made will have some amount of compromise in order to make it viable and appeal to more than a small handful of people. I just think it's a ridiculous thing to assume that we're currently at that point. I think WoW's success had a huge impact on the way companies make games, and it caused a lot of developers to try and reach out to that same crowd, instead of making a SMALLER, more targeted game.
Are you qualified to say which game is watered down and which isn't? You seem to make awfully many claims which are based on your judgement alone, and when confronted you insist that you don't know any better than anyone else. What should we make of that?
What are you talking about?
You just don't get it, do you? What if WoW is perfectly targeted toward its audience; only, their audience is much, much bigger than that of any other game? You assume that only because its huge, it cannot offer a deep experience.
To use a Venn diagram as an aid, you automatically assume area ABCDE is small. That is where you err. Nothing says that only because your game is big, it has to be watered down (that area is small) and nothing says that just because you're small doesn't mean the game is more targeted (that area is big).
No I don't think UO or SWG are more targeted. They are what they are, and people who are interested in those sort of games are few. Some niches are simply smaller than others.
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been-Wayne Gretzky
I am trying to point out how ridiculous claim it is to say one game is more targeted than another when you have only your judgement to base on. How does player migration fit your argument? How does any concrete event or piece of data fit your hypothesis?
So I see that you haven't answered my question. Do you think UO and SWG are designed to appeal to a smaller amount of people than WoW and other modern MMOs? Because like I said, EVERYBODY seems to agree that oldschool MMOs and in particular sandboxes naturally have a smaller audience. That's where these arguments about economic viability come into play.
How does player migration fit into my argument? Which argument exactly? Player migration can happen for any number of reasons. Besides, UO and EQ were both growing at the same time for a good while before UO started to decline almost indefinitely (about a year after trammel was implemented). So I'm not even sure what point you're trying to make about player migration.
You don't know. You have no evidence. You merely float to a conclusion that fits your view. UO and SWG might be as well be watered down in the same sense you say WoW is. Why should size matter?
How about then make the case for that! If you think that UO and SWG are more watered down or as watered down as WoW, then make the case for it. You're just saying that it's possible, even though we both know it's not true. Can I PROVE that UO's ow pvp and full loot is more targeted than WoW's "everybody wins" gameplay? No, but do you disagree? Can I PROVE that SWG's deep crafting and leveling systems are more targeted than WoW's linear progression? No, but again, do you disagree? It seems pretty intuitive that these games, like most sandbox games, are appealing to a smaller subset of players, because in general that's how you serve people best.
And I've already told you why size matters but you clearly just don't want to listen. Aside from things like bugs and polish, you HAVE to piss some people off in order to appeal to others. We've been through this but I guess we're going through it again. To appeal to players A, B, and C, you have to find common ground between all 3 of them. By only going after players A and B, there's a good chance A and B are going to have more common preferences than if you also had to include C. People have different preferences, so as a general rule NICHE titles are serving people better than MAINSTREAM titles, they're just serving less of them. This is such a simple concept, I have no idea how you can so bitterly deny it.
And it is a terrible assumption that a player who enjoys WoW is not as engrossed as someone playing either UO or SWG.How dare you even suggest that.
I don't know what assumption you're talking about. It's an observation and I never said it was a fact. I said you can try to claim that WoW's players are as engrossed as, say, SWG's players, but I don't think it's an easily defensible popsition. I'm not sure how you can take such offense at that. "How dare I"? Really?
In reality, I'm either right or I'm wrong. The average SWG or UO player either was more engrossed as the average WoW player or less. There's no way it would be equal, that's probably statistically impossible. So I'm not sure why it's so appalling for me to make an educated guess based on years of observation. But I'll just ask you: Do you think the average SWG fan was more "diehard" than the average WoW fan?
If only a minority of players enjoy open world PvP, and even fewer enjoy FFA PvP, then if no game offered FFA PvP those players could be expected to migrate to a game with open world PvP, right? It still makes their game a niche, and the player who would enjoy FFA PvP are settling with a game which is watered down to them, aren't they? A niche within a niche.
Yes, they would be settling for a watered down version of the game they want. Remember the TWO times I pointed out that the best way to serve somebody would be to make a game specifically designed for them, but that's not economically viable? I fully understand that any game that gets made will have some amount of compromise in order to make it viable and appeal to more than a small handful of people. I just think it's a ridiculous thing to assume that we're currently at that point. I think WoW's success had a huge impact on the way companies make games, and it caused a lot of developers to try and reach out to that same crowd, instead of making a SMALLER, more targeted game.
Are you qualified to say which game is watered down and which isn't? You seem to make awfully many claims which are based on your judgement alone, and when confronted you insist that you don't know any better than anyone else. What should we make of that?
What are you talking about?
You just don't get it, do you? What if WoW is perfectly targeted toward its audience; only, their audience is much, much bigger than that of any other game? You assume that only because its huge, it cannot offer a deep experience.
To use a Venn diagram as an aid, you automatically assume area ABCDE is small. That is where you err. Nothing says that only because your game is big, it has to be watered down (that area is small) and nothing says that just because you're small doesn't mean the game is more targeted (that area is big).
No I don't think UO or SWG are more targeted. They are what they are, and people who are interested in those sort of games are few. Some niches are simply smaller than others.
First of all, you seem to be getting hung up on the false premise that I think the idea of "watered down" is some absolute, binary state. Every game is to some degree watered down or not watered down. So I'm simply saying that because WoW is "huge" that it technically makes it watered down. I'm saying aside from things like polish, fixing bugs, etc, the way to increase your base is to water down your game.
Second, it's nothing short of ABSURD to think that WoW is perfectly targeted towards an audience. No game is. You really think that each of the 8 million players shares the exact same set of preferences? You don't think that adding features that some people would like NECESSARILY make the game less attractive for others? Are you seriously trying to make the case that WoW targets a certain group perfectly?
What exactly do you mean UO and SWG aren't more targeted, but the amount of people who are interested in them are few? That's what I'm saying. They're going after fewer people, so it's easier to serve those people more deeply. That doesn't mean every small game is better than any game that is larger, but that's why I said "holding most things constant" at the very beginning of this discussion.
I am trying to point out how ridiculous claim it is to say one game is more targeted than another when you have only your judgement to base on. How does player migration fit your argument? How does any concrete event or piece of data fit your hypothesis?
So I see that you haven't answered my question. Do you think UO and SWG are designed to appeal to a smaller amount of people than WoW and other modern MMOs? Because like I said, EVERYBODY seems to agree that oldschool MMOs and in particular sandboxes naturally have a smaller audience. That's where these arguments about economic viability come into play.
How does player migration fit into my argument? Which argument exactly? Player migration can happen for any number of reasons. Besides, UO and EQ were both growing at the same time for a good while before UO started to decline almost indefinitely (about a year after trammel was implemented). So I'm not even sure what point you're trying to make about player migration.
You don't know. You have no evidence. You merely float to a conclusion that fits your view. UO and SWG might be as well be watered down in the same sense you say WoW is. Why should size matter?
How about then make the case for that! If you think that UO and SWG are more watered down or as watered down as WoW, then make the case for it. You're just saying that it's possible, even though we both know it's not true. Can I PROVE that UO's ow pvp and full loot is more targeted than WoW's "everybody wins" gameplay? No, but do you disagree? Can I PROVE that SWG's deep crafting and leveling systems are more targeted than WoW's linear progression? No, but again, do you disagree? It seems pretty intuitive that these games, like most sandbox games, are appealing to a smaller subset of players, because in general that's how you serve people best.
And I've already told you why size matters but you clearly just don't want to listen. Aside from things like bugs and polish, you HAVE to piss some people off in order to appeal to others. We've been through this but I guess we're going through it again. To appeal to players A, B, and C, you have to find common ground between all 3 of them. By only going after players A and B, there's a good chance A and B are going to have more common preferences than if you also had to include C. People have different preferences, so as a general rule NICHE titles are serving people better than MAINSTREAM titles, they're just serving less of them. This is such a simple concept, I have no idea how you can so bitterly deny it.
And it is a terrible assumption that a player who enjoys WoW is not as engrossed as someone playing either UO or SWG.How dare you even suggest that.
I don't know what assumption you're talking about. It's an observation and I never said it was a fact. I said you can try to claim that WoW's players are as engrossed as, say, SWG's players, but I don't think it's an easily defensible popsition. I'm not sure how you can take such offense at that. "How dare I"? Really?
In reality, I'm either right or I'm wrong. The average SWG or UO player either was more engrossed as the average WoW player or less. There's no way it would be equal, that's probably statistically impossible. So I'm not sure why it's so appalling for me to make an educated guess based on years of observation. But I'll just ask you: Do you think the average SWG fan was more "diehard" than the average WoW fan?
If only a minority of players enjoy open world PvP, and even fewer enjoy FFA PvP, then if no game offered FFA PvP those players could be expected to migrate to a game with open world PvP, right? It still makes their game a niche, and the player who would enjoy FFA PvP are settling with a game which is watered down to them, aren't they? A niche within a niche.
Yes, they would be settling for a watered down version of the game they want. Remember the TWO times I pointed out that the best way to serve somebody would be to make a game specifically designed for them, but that's not economically viable? I fully understand that any game that gets made will have some amount of compromise in order to make it viable and appeal to more than a small handful of people. I just think it's a ridiculous thing to assume that we're currently at that point. I think WoW's success had a huge impact on the way companies make games, and it caused a lot of developers to try and reach out to that same crowd, instead of making a SMALLER, more targeted game.
Are you qualified to say which game is watered down and which isn't? You seem to make awfully many claims which are based on your judgement alone, and when confronted you insist that you don't know any better than anyone else. What should we make of that?
What are you talking about?
You just don't get it, do you? What if WoW is perfectly targeted toward its audience; only, their audience is much, much bigger than that of any other game? You assume that only because its huge, it cannot offer a deep experience.
To use a Venn diagram as an aid, you automatically assume area ABCDE is small. That is where you err. Nothing says that only because your game is big, it has to be watered down (that area is small) and nothing says that just because you're small doesn't mean the game is more targeted (that area is big).
No I don't think UO or SWG are more targeted. They are what they are, and people who are interested in those sort of games are few. Some niches are simply smaller than others.
First of all, you seem to be getting hung up on the false premise that I think the idea of "watered down" is some absolute, binary state. Every game is to some degree watered down or not watered down. So I'm simply saying that because WoW is "huge" that it technically makes it watered down. I'm saying aside from things like polish, fixing bugs, etc, the way to increase your base is to water down your game.
Second, it's nothing short of ABSURD to think that WoW is perfectly targeted towards an audience. No game is. You really think that each of the 8 million players shares the exact same set of preferences? You don't think that adding features that some people would like NECESSARILY make the game less attractive for others? Are you seriously trying to make the case that WoW targets a certain group perfectly?
What exactly do you mean UO and SWG aren't more targeted, but the amount of people who are interested in them are few? That's what I'm saying. They're going after fewer people, so it's easier to serve those people more deeply. That doesn't mean every small game is better than any game that is larger, but that's why I said "holding most things constant" at the very beginning of this discussion.
I'll admit I have not followed this particular conversation and only read bits and pieces, but if I get the gist of it, I'd say that what devs are trying to do now is attempting to create an MMO that would encompass the entire white background of that diagram thus trying to fully appeal to everyone but the games are spread too thin.
Because WoW is the epitome of "casual friendly". Even at launch that was the whole idea. to mitigate or remove the things that took "a long time", that made previous games difficult.
WoW was so easy at launch, so casual friendly, removing so many things that made other games "trying" that to use it as an icon of "non casual friendly" almost turns your post into a troll post.
You didn't lose a lot of xp at death, you didn't drop items or have your body looted, leveling was fast compared to other games that came before (in Lineage 2 it took me 2 weeks i extremely hardcore playing just to get to level 20. And that was all grind).
I think you need to re-evaluate your stance.
I was there at launch and your statements here are very wrong. Wow leveling was much slower than it is today or what other mmo's are today. It didn't give you little circles to show you where to go, dungeons and raid were a lot harder than they are today, even on hard mode. Just don't think you played Vanilla wow if you are making statements like this, they are just wrong dude, sorry.
Comments
Y'know the current unreal engine embeds in flash for browsers, right?
Unity as well can launch both in and from a browser.
Not trying to correct anything else about yer argument, just that graphics even on a web page can be very scalable and flexible (granted it doesn't really apply to this case it seems).
"The knowledge of the theory of logic has no tendency whatever to make men good reasoners." - Thomas B. Macaulay
"The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge." - Daniel J. Boorstin
You've proven nothing. You've provided no examples and no information other than what's in your head. The examples of games that were being produced on the cheap you either have no information on (MO and DF) or the funding for the games was to produce tech demos, so the developers could secure more funding.
You find an MMORPG that's actually reached release status for less than six million dollars since 2003, Indie or otherwise, and I'll be happy to say you were right. Of course, you can't, because you won't have any information to back it up, so I don't suppose that it will ever be necessary to say you were right. Or probably what you'll do is point to games like the browser game you linked to below. If that's your proof, then yes. If a developer doesn't have to produce any 3D graphics, network or server code, and doesn't have to create a virtual, visible, shared world, then yes, it can be done for less than six million dollars.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
Watch the video. There is no download or plugin required aside from Flash. He's not using Unity or Unreal.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
Hence me comment 'doesn't really apply to this case it seems'.
Aside from that, this is why I mentioned Unreal embeds in flash. It doesn't require an extra executable/donwload, it loads the content through the flash plugin.
Terribly inefficient in my opinion, but apparently it works.
"The knowledge of the theory of logic has no tendency whatever to make men good reasoners." - Thomas B. Macaulay
"The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge." - Daniel J. Boorstin
Your judgement is tainted by your venomous hatred of WoW.
UO and SWG don't really have much competition in their niches. How do you know majority of the players in those games don't just settle for them?
I hear people left UO in droves when EQ launched. Clearly players were better served by EQ. Is EQ a more targeted game then? And what does it speak of WoW when it has endured despite fierce competition?
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been -Wayne Gretzky
What do any of these questions have to do with anything aside from you having some desire to argue with me in particular? Try to stay on topic.
And aside from what you claim to know about my judgement, do you deny that most people agree that UO and SWG are more targeted games than WoW and other similar modern themeparks? Do YOU think they are? Do you think they aren't?
Why would people leaving UO for EQ make EQ a more targeted game? People leave games for other games all the time for many different reasons. I never said people moving from one game to another makes the latter game more targeted. You're not even coherent at this point.
UO and SWG don't really have much competition in their niches and so.... what's your point? I brought up UO and SWG because you said people have been playing WoW for years so that somehow makes it deep (it doesn't) and that we can't know if the overlapping of people's interest for WoW is bigger than for other games. I brought up UO and SWG as examples of more targeted games where the average player was probably more engrossed than the average WoW player... a shortcut for determining how much overlap there is in people's preferences for that game.
At few things off the top of my head, Quir.
1 - Blizzard had a large enough following from an audience that extended past what had up to then been known as the MMO player base, enabling them to invite a considerably larger audience into the genre than western gaming had been familiar with.
2 - Even with the troubles at launch, the production quality of the game was high enough to stand strong against the competition it had at the time.
3 - The MMO crowd was known for a long time to have a long terms basis of player retention, that only became a progressively harsher issue with modern titles. Sure, people migrated between titles when the first few MMOs came out, but there were fewer titles to skip about between and they offered distinct enough styles that people could pick the one(s) they liked and stick it out to a degree.
It was only when those titles experimented with adapting their play to accrue a larger crowd that they met their strongest retention conflicts. Trammel, NGE, ToA, etc. A turning point that rewrote some fundamental aspects of the game that alienated the up to then rather loyal user base and causing a subsequent decline in numbers over the long term rather than the increase (not counting the temporary increase from expansion time/sales).
4 - Marketing was stronger than it had been for previous titles in the MMO sphere.
Other reasons are floating about, but any who.
EDIT: To clarify though, I do not think UO, EQ, or any other early title was in any way a 'targeted' game (beyond the obvious factors of it being an always online rpg). At least at launch. The genre was still rather young and the titles available had enough distinctive factors that any metric you'd pull outside of raw numbers was going to be a vague piece of information at best, and parsing what many numbers actually meant was exceptionally fuzzy.
This is also rather why you have those hallmark expansions and updates that the community of these titles hate (aside from the fact it's the internet and everything is hated on the internet). It's because those are points in time where the games had been out long enough that people considered enough data available to try and address issues they saw, making a choice to change their games in a manner to try and make it appealing to a broader audience than they originally made them. What they didn't account for was the backlash from the present user base and the general 'don't tread backwards' mentality many consumers seem to have about looking at older games.
"The knowledge of the theory of logic has no tendency whatever to make men good reasoners." - Thomas B. Macaulay
"The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge." - Daniel J. Boorstin
Just so you know, when I say that UO and SWG are more targeted games than WoW or other modern themeparks, I'm saying their target audience is smaller from the get-go. The features in UO and SWG are more "extreme" and targeted towards a more specific group of people than modern themeparks, especially WoW.
I don't at all mean that they are the result of any kind of focus group or other demographic testing and designed around appealing to those groups. I think UO in particular was made as a natural, organic next step in the Ultima series, and it was the game that the devs wanted to make, not the game that they thought was gonna set the world on fire or appeal to as many people as possible.
Well in that manner, there wasn't really any alternative for those titles. A game that had to be played solely over the internet was inherently something that was going to cater to a relatively finite audience at the time on top of their gameplay choices.
You definitely had some adaptations I'd agree, as the games had to stand with some kind of longevity to their play in order to keep people from wandering off.
So yeah I understand in that context, such titles had a pretty finite audience to which they were developed for and catered to. I think that's more a byproduct of the developers trying to pioneer some elements of gaming though more so than them setting their sights on any particular audience.
Driven foremost by ambition, more or less.
And to beat a dead horse, it's a quality that's increasingly lacking within the developer base.
"The knowledge of the theory of logic has no tendency whatever to make men good reasoners." - Thomas B. Macaulay
"The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge." - Daniel J. Boorstin
This is ultimately what myself and many others are driving at when we debate these things here. It feels so much like games nowadays are just trying to follow a formula and appeal to as many people as possible, as opposed to just having a vision of a game and making it.
No, I meant "too much time on their hands". That's why I said it. I'm not confused about it at all.
Oh ok. So are you saying games like UO were more of a time-sink than games like WoW? Because if I'm not mistaken, WoW is the one that is known for its heavy emphasis on grind.
I am trying to point out how ridiculous claim it is to say one game is more targeted than another when you have only your judgement to base on. How does player migration fit your argument? How does any concrete event or piece of data fit your hypothesis?
You don't know. You have no evidence. You merely float to a conclusion that fits your view. UO and SWG might be as well be watered down in the same sense you say WoW is. Why should size matter? And it is a terrible assumption that a player who enjoys WoW is not as engrossed as someone playing either UO or SWG.How dare you even suggest that.
If only a minority of players enjoy open world PvP, and even fewer enjoy FFA PvP, then if no game offered FFA PvP those players could be expected to migrate to a game with open world PvP, right? It still makes their game a niche, and the player who would enjoy FFA PvP are settling with a game which is watered down to them, aren't they? A niche within a niche.
Are you qualified to say which game is watered down and which isn't? You seem to make awfully many claims which are based on your judgement alone, and when confronted you insist that you don't know any better than anyone else. What should we make of that?
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been -Wayne Gretzky
Agreed. Don't tell Eve players though. Their entire self-image hinges on the fantasy that Eve attracts more intelligent types.
My attempt was to indulge with his hypothesis enough so that I can poke holes in it. Only the player migration was relevant. Other facts weren't. I think the notion that one game is more targeted and another less (in the sense he's using those terms) is nonsense.
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been -Wayne Gretzky
So I see that you haven't answered my question. Do you think UO and SWG are designed to appeal to a smaller amount of people than WoW and other modern MMOs? Because like I said, EVERYBODY seems to agree that oldschool MMOs and in particular sandboxes naturally have a smaller audience. That's where these arguments about economic viability come into play.
How does player migration fit into my argument? Which argument exactly? Player migration can happen for any number of reasons. Besides, UO and EQ were both growing at the same time for a good while before UO started to decline almost indefinitely (about a year after trammel was implemented). So I'm not even sure what point you're trying to make about player migration.
How about then make the case for that! If you think that UO and SWG are more watered down or as watered down as WoW, then make the case for it. You're just saying that it's possible, even though we both know it's not true. Can I PROVE that UO's ow pvp and full loot is more targeted than WoW's "everybody wins" gameplay? No, but do you disagree? Can I PROVE that SWG's deep crafting and leveling systems are more targeted than WoW's linear progression? No, but again, do you disagree? It seems pretty intuitive that these games, like most sandbox games, are appealing to a smaller subset of players, because in general that's how you serve people best.
And I've already told you why size matters but you clearly just don't want to listen. Aside from things like bugs and polish, you HAVE to piss some people off in order to appeal to others. We've been through this but I guess we're going through it again. To appeal to players A, B, and C, you have to find common ground between all 3 of them. By only going after players A and B, there's a good chance A and B are going to have more common preferences than if you also had to include C. People have different preferences, so as a general rule NICHE titles are serving people better than MAINSTREAM titles, they're just serving less of them. This is such a simple concept, I have no idea how you can so bitterly deny it.
I don't know what assumption you're talking about. It's an observation and I never said it was a fact. I said you can try to claim that WoW's players are as engrossed as, say, SWG's players, but I don't think it's an easily defensible popsition. I'm not sure how you can take such offense at that. "How dare I"? Really?
In reality, I'm either right or I'm wrong. The average SWG or UO player either was more engrossed as the average WoW player or less. There's no way it would be equal, that's probably statistically impossible. So I'm not sure why it's so appalling for me to make an educated guess based on years of observation. But I'll just ask you: Do you think the average SWG fan was more "diehard" than the average WoW fan?
Yes, they would be settling for a watered down version of the game they want. Remember the TWO times I pointed out that the best way to serve somebody would be to make a game specifically designed for them, but that's not economically viable? I fully understand that any game that gets made will have some amount of compromise in order to make it viable and appeal to more than a small handful of people. I just think it's a ridiculous thing to assume that we're currently at that point. I think WoW's success had a huge impact on the way companies make games, and it caused a lot of developers to try and reach out to that same crowd, instead of making a SMALLER, more targeted game.
What are you talking about?
I laugh whenever I see a post about 'wanting to return to more hardcore games'. The whole argument is a joke. Games are a business and as businesses, the companies will do whatever caters to the desires of the largest number of players possible. If most players want their games super easy or casual, that is what the developers will make. If most games are casual-centric, blame the millions of gamers who demand casual games, not the game companies.
If you play games and/or have more than 2 hours of free time per day, chances are you are a hardcore player despite what you may think (and if you play more than 8 hours a day and are not somehow medically chair bound or paid to do it, you are likely addicted to games / play too much... and that is not 'hardcore', that is unhealthy). If you are reading and writing on these forums, you are very likely to be one of those people who can play games more than 2 hours a day and the very fact that you read any kind of gaming forums makes you more 'hardcore' than your average gamer.
Super hardcore is nich gameplay these days so don't expect many if any of the major game publishers to make AAA quality super hardcore games, it just won't make them the money they so desire. You want hardcore? Look to the indie and small game studios as they will make these games with less emphasis on profit and, in truth, usually because they simply cannot compete in the casual MMO market. Unfortunately, these smaller companies often do not have the budget / manpower / experience required to make a game with the same polish as companies like Blizzard, Trion, Bioware, Sony or even Perfect World.
That being said, most players complain about a lack of 'hardcore' just for the sake of complaining. Even games known to be super casual like World of Warcraft have game modes (hard mode raids) that most players cannot complete. FFXIV has the Binding Coil of Bahamut, Endless Eclipse in Rift, SWTOR has heroic mode flashpoints, none of which I have seen any indication of being completed by more than 10% of the game's population. So many people 'conveniently' forget about hardcore content that is present in games that have any casual content at all.
Oki doki, just answered the query as it was phrased. Why WoW would be able to establish itself in contrast to it's competition, passing point on why early titles would see player migration, etc.
Not really anything else to add, as I'm not particularly in disagreement.
"The knowledge of the theory of logic has no tendency whatever to make men good reasoners." - Thomas B. Macaulay
"The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge." - Daniel J. Boorstin
This is one of our Massive Multiposter Threads, a couple of lines where you don't disagree about anything just does not cut it. Think of the expectations you have let down as our posters were preparing a raid to counter your argument.
The arguement is moot when it comes to sandbox vs themepark. All players want to have houses, be able to terraform a cave in the ground and search for minerals, and construct a city that attracts all the greatest crafters in the lands as a social hub.
Casuals ruined the genre because they are easily impressed and generally just care about instant gratification and no risk to their stuff. I'm not saying a mmorpg should be a second job, but when it only takes you a week to max out your character and the game has nothing to do other than raiding the same dungeon on a gear treadmill then whats the point in even playing? On that point it shouldn't take a year to finally max out your character either; like in Darkfall online. There needs to be a balance.
Risk vs reward always makes game have a more appealing atmosphere, because the player can't easy mode everything without fear. Want to know why the AAA themepark games are flopping left and right? Its because it is a dying model. Everyone is tired of the WoW clones with endless gear grind and meaingless gameplay elements. Players want to be able to impact the game world and leave their mark.
The bit about hardcore games not gaining any players is wrong also. Those players that are burned out on the WoW mold have started to venture off into different archtypes of mmorpg; hence why most veteran players prefer sandbox, and sandbox with full loot. Hence why Eve has been constantly growing in uniqie players and subcriptions. This is why AAA companies are starting to fund sandbox mmorpgs now as well.
The reason why Mo, Dfo, Xyson, and every other recent sandbox game has failed is not the player base's fault; if anything it has been rising, but rather the developers with their low budgets, horrible work ethics and general lack of structure. Once a AAA sandbox mmorpg with or without full loot comes out ; ala EQNext; we will see a silver age of sandbox mmorpgs.
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I personally feel full or at least partial loot always generate a better community, atmosphere and game, but also more reason to keep playing. There needs to be balance though, between the different play types; such as exploreres, pvpers and pvers; as well as; player driven content(such as bounty hunting)and game driven content(Such as building houses or cities). A gear treadmill is a horrible way to keep players supporting the game and for most it is not fun.
A game should have skills with a skill cap to promote different playstyles and limit the time it takes to max out your character, so casuals don't complain and the whole experience should be enjoyable.
Kindgom conquest is a great way to get players to interact with each other as long as the rewards and risk is great enough.
Darkfall online was as closet to what myself and many other full loot mmorpgs players have been wanting for a while now, but it has very many great flaws, like a huge grind, no sandbox elements, no skill cap, and a few other things. If they fixed these things and added more sandbox content to the game it would have flourished greatly. It had close to 200,000+ sales at launch. My guild alone had 300-400 players at launch and we were midsize. Gladly the veterans are starting to get the mmorpgs they want.
Hardcore has different meanings. On one scale a player that does a 6 hour WoW raid for the teir 1002.5 gear is hardcore. A player that wants to be able to kill, loot and then destroy an enemy guild's city is a different form of hardcore.
1 is time consuming; while the other is risk vs reward. Most themepark players are the time consuming hardcore, while the sandbox are risk vs reward.
Anyways just read the veteran player's rants; we all have the same thing in common. We've been saying the same thing for 5 years now.
MurderHerd
Huh. Unreal in Flash. What will they think of next? It would be a more efficient delivery mechanism, and if they had fairly restrictive environments they could just download it as the players moved around, or download a certain area around the player with hard restrictions on view distance, a la Minecraft.
Even with something like that though, a developer would still have to create the rest of the game. City of Steam is a Unity based MMORPG that runs in the browser. It's probably the closest thing to a sub six million dollar MMORPG, but I can't find any information on what they spent to make it. Not surprising, given that developers don't really publish that information.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
You just don't get it, do you? What if WoW is perfectly targeted toward its audience; only, their audience is much, much bigger than that of any other game? You assume that only because its huge, it cannot offer a deep experience.
To use a Venn diagram as an aid, you automatically assume area ABCDE is small. That is where you err. Nothing says that only because your game is big, it has to be watered down (that area is small) and nothing says that just because you're small doesn't mean the game is more targeted (that area is big).
No I don't think UO or SWG are more targeted. They are what they are, and people who are interested in those sort of games are few. Some niches are simply smaller than others.
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been -Wayne Gretzky
First of all, you seem to be getting hung up on the false premise that I think the idea of "watered down" is some absolute, binary state. Every game is to some degree watered down or not watered down. So I'm simply saying that because WoW is "huge" that it technically makes it watered down. I'm saying aside from things like polish, fixing bugs, etc, the way to increase your base is to water down your game.
Second, it's nothing short of ABSURD to think that WoW is perfectly targeted towards an audience. No game is. You really think that each of the 8 million players shares the exact same set of preferences? You don't think that adding features that some people would like NECESSARILY make the game less attractive for others? Are you seriously trying to make the case that WoW targets a certain group perfectly?
What exactly do you mean UO and SWG aren't more targeted, but the amount of people who are interested in them are few? That's what I'm saying. They're going after fewer people, so it's easier to serve those people more deeply. That doesn't mean every small game is better than any game that is larger, but that's why I said "holding most things constant" at the very beginning of this discussion.
I'll admit I have not followed this particular conversation and only read bits and pieces, but if I get the gist of it, I'd say that what devs are trying to do now is attempting to create an MMO that would encompass the entire white background of that diagram thus trying to fully appeal to everyone but the games are spread too thin.
I was there at launch and your statements here are very wrong. Wow leveling was much slower than it is today or what other mmo's are today. It didn't give you little circles to show you where to go, dungeons and raid were a lot harder than they are today, even on hard mode. Just don't think you played Vanilla wow if you are making statements like this, they are just wrong dude, sorry.
Peace
Lascer