Is the MMO Genre dead?

nesf

Potatoeman wrote: »

Elite will be out first and Im hearing very good things. SC is getting some flak for all the expensive ship packs.

Elite seems much more focused. Which means a simpler game but also one easier to do right.

Potatoeman

Calhoun wrote: »

A single player mission game , with server hosting abilities, and an mmo, it's like trying to solve world hunger.

Seems very ambitious .

You can play in the universe and only see NPC's or friends. I guess it uses the same maps but you can play on online multiplayer, online single player or online friends only. Well thats what they were initially promising.

Potatoeman

nesf wrote: »

Elite seems much more focused. Which means a simpler game but also one easier to do right.

Well it's coming out first and it seems you have to grind to get ships rather than buying a pack (where I assume it would be far harder to grind). I'm looking into Elite myself as the ship packs seem to be pretty expensive. I'll avoid beta until they release and then it's just 35 bucks too.

thegrayson

Guild Wars ?

witless1

Bit late to the thread but something a lot of people don't really consider when discussing MMO games and the success of WoW is quiet simply the timing. WoW launched and became mainstream at a point where gaming PCs became much more affordable and where most houses started moving onto semi decent broadband. Speaking from my perspective and that of mates who got into WoW within its infancy most of us got our first real gaming PC around that time. Sure one or two of the lads had a somewhat decent pc prior to that but around 2001-2004 gaming hardware became a lot cheaper and opened up genuine online play for people. That fact is often ignored when talking about the success of WoW. Had it launched 5 years previous would it still be around today?

The future of MMO gaming is one which needs to take advantage of the fact the vast majority of gamers have mobile devices and social media presence. It's a new generation of connectivity. It needs to dip into that potential and be innovative. Gamers are no longer platform exclusive and the MMO generation are now mid 20s and beyond. It's a different time commitment now and the longevity of the console generation means a typical gamer will have multiple platforms available to them for several years. That's why casual players are the majority it's a combination of choice and being time limited. A future MMO that allowed you progress your character or world experience on your smartphone while in work or college or on the couch will ensure it gets most of your gaming attention even when you can't commit. WoW dipped into this with the AH app but barely scratched the surface. Get aspects of your game on devices and platforms I interact with daily without making it a necessity (time sink) or a means to get ahead of someone else and you now have a game I want to log into in 8 hours time after work and dinner.

Kiith

witless1 wrote: »

The future of MMO gaming is one which needs to take advantage of the fact the vast majority of gamers have mobile devices and social media presence.

If this is the future of MMO's, than i hope someone takes it out back and blows its brains out with a shotgun.

nesf

Kiith wrote: »

If this is the future of MMO's, than i hope someone takes it out back and blows its brains out with a shotgun.

World of Warcraft: Rise of the Candy Crushers.

witless1

If you are mapping MMO success to the various waves of technology I think it's inevitable that some form, be it minor, of interaction on a handheld device is going to emerge. If they can't charge you subscription fees they sure as hell want to get you on click through / mobile adverts.

Sad reality is our generation of gamers have moved through serious technology iterations and advances. Cheaper gaming is where the next wave of innovation is at. What we class as games Vs what gamers in 5 years class could be poles apart. Interesting to see where this all goes either way.

nesf

witless1 wrote: »

If you are mapping MMO success to the various waves of technology I think it's inevitable that some form, be it minor, of interaction on a handheld device is going to emerge. If they can't charge you subscription fees they sure as hell want to get you on click through / mobile adverts.

Why the need for mobile adverts etc? The microtransaction F2P model of a host of PC based MMOs seems to work perfectly fine right now.

witless1

nesf wrote: »

Why the need for mobile adverts etc? The microtransaction F2P model of a host of PC based MMOs seems to work perfectly fine right now.

Micro transaction is another name for pay to win which the community obviously has issues with. Mobile ads are worth just as much to a company and appear leas invasive or necessary.

Just to be clear I'm not saying MMO games are destined for mobile media just a portion of it or an interaction on a non console / PC basis is just inevitable. How they make that interaction work or how that model makes money is still unknown. What is known though is technology saturation makes mobile a viable interactive medium and there is way too much competition in the gaming market. In the next 3 months I will be playing destiny, fifa, wow, eve, assassins creed and halo anniversary at a guess. Few gamers are monogamous and games companies realise that and want your attention. That means making you interact with them in non gaming interactions. Look at the battlefield app they had from the last game as an example.

nesf

witless1 wrote: »

Micro transaction is another name for pay to win which the community obviously has issues with. Mobile ads are worth just as much to a company and appear leas invasive or necessary.

To the first, that's just a fallacy. Pay to reduce grind is not pay to win or anything close to it and this makes up the majority of microtransactions because they're the easiest ones to sell. It sucks if you've neither time or money but it's not pay to win, I've played games that were genuinely pay to win and without putting cash in you never get the biggest, best stuff and they're nothing similar. To the second, mobile ads aren't worth anything close to the same, the biggest mobile games are microtransaction based for a reason, e.g. Clash of Clans, Candy Crush Saga etc, in-app purchases are the norm amongst the really big players revenue wise .

Venom

witless1 wrote: »

Bit late to the thread but something a lot of people don't really consider when discussing MMO games and the success of WoW is quiet simply the timing. WoW launched and became mainstream at a point where gaming PCs became much more affordable and where most houses started moving onto semi decent broadband. Speaking from my perspective and that of mates who got into WoW within its infancy most of us got our first real gaming PC around that time. Sure one or two of the lads had a somewhat decent pc prior to that but around 2001-2004 gaming hardware became a lot cheaper and opened up genuine online play for people. That fact is often ignored when talking about the success of WoW. Had it launched 5 years previous would it still be around today?

The future of MMO gaming is one which needs to take advantage of the fact the vast majority of gamers have mobile devices and social media presence. It's a new generation of connectivity. It needs to dip into that potential and be innovative. Gamers are no longer platform exclusive and the MMO generation are now mid 20s and beyond. It's a different time commitment now and the longevity of the console generation means a typical gamer will have multiple platforms available to them for several years. That's why casual players are the majority it's a combination of choice and being time limited. A future MMO that allowed you progress your character or world experience on your smartphone while in work or college or on the couch will ensure it gets most of your gaming attention even when you can't commit. WoW dipped into this with the AH app but barely scratched the surface. Get aspects of your game on devices and platforms I interact with daily without making it a necessity (time sink) or a means to get ahead of someone else and you now have a game I want to log into in 8 hours time after work and dinner.

Neverwinter has a website open to any web browser, that allows you to level up crafting and companions along with giving access to the auction house all from outside of the game. While really cool features the game is not the huge success you claim will happen due to having such features.

Also, comparing MMO's to single player games is just silly as one take weeks to get to the end game while the latter is 6-8 hours play at most these days. MMO's are the domain of the PC and no matter how powerful consoles get, there interface is just not suited to such a game style.

nesf

Venom wrote: »

Neverwinter has a website open to any web browser, that allows you to level up crafting and companions along with giving access to the auction house all from outside of the game. While really cool features the game is not the huge success you claim will happen due to having such features.

I knew people who made a lot of use out of WoW Mobile Armory on their phones. They were a bit addicted to auction house trading though. For everyone else it was more for needing to chat in-game to people when you're away from home, i.e. "I'm stuck in work, I'll be late for the raid" or whatever.