Can the sci-fi genre succeed?
by Seraphina Brennan 
Jan 1st 2009 at 5:00PM
Filed under: Business models, Culture, Interviews, Lore, MMO industry, New titles
Earth and Beyond. Star Wars Galaxies. Auto Assault. Tabula Rasa. For a genre that dominates television and written media, science fiction can't seem to find a good foothold in the MMO industry past EVE Online. Even the upcoming Stargate Worlds is on shaky ground, and it hasn't even stepped over the threshold into the market. With a genre so plagued by failure, what can a company do to succeed like CCP? Can Star Trek Online, Jumpgate Evolution, and Star Wars: The Old Republic shake the curse?These were the topics of a recent interview between Cody Bye of Ten Ton Hammer and Rob Hill and Kevin Beardslee of Trion World Network, the developers behind the Sci-Fi channel's MMORPG/television tie-in game. The interview covers all manner of things, like how Trion seeks to differentiate themselves from the current MMO market, how they want to interact with their community, how they are handling the creation of the game next to the television series, and how Blizzard's polish mantra can really support a well made game. You can check out the full interview over at Ten Ton Hammer.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
UltimateQ said on 5:29PM 1-01-2009
I think Star Wars Galaxies was doing alright until they messed it up.
I don't think that Sci-Fi is "cursed", because MMOs of all genres are failing. The biggest problem is because of funds. They are usually forced to release games early because funds run out. I can name a whole list of games that have failed because of early release.
It takes a lot of money to make a game. It takes a lot more money to make an MMO. It also takes a lot more time. Because of these 2 reasons you don't see many succeed.
It is my sincere hope that Star Trek Online will be released when it is ready and not early. I hope that the funds can keep up, and the game will be successful enough to stay alive.
In the meantime, I've been playing Tabula Rasa. Coming from the BETA experience, the game was horrible. But lately its been a lot of fun with a bunch of fixes and tweaks. I hope that they can somehow save the game, because now its worth saving.
Reply
Zagr said on 6:54PM 1-01-2009
Sci-fi MMOs can succeed very easily.
As long as there is endgame content present (which there wasn't and still isn't in a game like Tabula Rasa, thus there is no reason to actually get to the level cap. Yes, there is a game from lvl 1 and up as well, but if there's nothing to look forward to at the end, people aren't going to bother, simple as that.) and as long as there isn't any huge gamebreaking bugs that prevent people from advancing.
Noone expects a brand new game to immediately match the content of something like WoW, but the devs need to cater to both the hardcore and the casual gamers. Word of mouth spreads like fire in dry grass, and if people aren't happy, the game will likely fail.
Rushing a game and releasing it before it's done = recipe for disaster. Proof? Age of Conan. To a lesser extent, Warhammer Online.
I personally love the sci-fi genre and would love to see an MMO truly push the boundaries and innovate. Problem is that involves risk, which is why a lot of studios opt for a WoW clone instead.
Reply
Jess said on 8:07PM 1-01-2009
As stated above, SWG was doing fine before the absolutely ridiculous changes were made and plunged the game into the state it is now: a propped up corpse awaiting the final coup de grace from SWTOR. The fact that it was a sci-fi MMO had nothing to do with its failure, it was the people behind it.
Reply
cliff said on 9:46PM 1-01-2009
Another important factor for sci-fi MMOs to succeed is going to be to actually MAKE it a sci-fi MMO. I'm sorry, Auto-Assault was only a sci-fi skin laid over the top of a fantasy MMO... I mean, c'mon, cars HEALING EACH OTHER?!?!? That's not the only so-called sci-fi MMO that suffered from that problem, either - and it's the reason I and the folks I know lost interest in them, too... they failed to live up to what they advertised themselves to be.
Reply
Mr. Pickles said on 9:56PM 1-01-2009
One word: Vehicles!
Seriously, that's what keeps Sci-Fi games interesting and is why people play them.
EVE Online does so well because it pushes the idea that vehicles are the central theme for a Sci-Fi game.
Hell, one of the reasons Halo (I know, it's not an MMO and it's not even PC, but there's still a point to mentioning it) did so well is because for the multiplayer parts it had vehicle action like crazy.
The one thing people want/hope for, for Star Trek Online: Taking control of a ship like the Enterprise and fighting in large scale ship battles (oh, the lag).
Looking back at Tabula Rasa, the one thing every player wanted and was looking forward to was the PAUs promised to be only a few months after launch (of course, they only came in recently as far as I know, so that could be a big factor as to why it died because they didn't have what was most wanted and promised).
For Star Wars The Old Republic Online I'm hoping that they'll have planetary battles on the ground with vehicles (old style ones, not new AT-AT designs). I'm also hoping that and having battles in space with ships. One can dream...
Reply
torak said on 12:36AM 1-02-2009
Problem with SciFi MMO's is that there have been so few of them. There have been less then 10 released.
For every one SciFi title there are literally over a dozen fantasy titles.
No one has yet to make a decent SciFi game that is on the scale of SWG that encompasses both Ground and space and has the level of itemization and diversity that it has and this game released in 2003.
But we continue to get elves and dwarves doing kill task mashed down our throats at a pace of over a dozen a year.
Reply
Eric Rice said on 5:24AM 1-02-2009
As long as sci-fi has sword&sorcery, dragons, spells, mana, castles, and elves, of *course* the genre can succeed!
Reply
stkuepers said on 5:41AM 1-02-2009
let me answer with another question:
how much sci do you expect from a sci-fi mmo
i mean look at star treck vs star wars
while star treck would (hopefully) embrace science/ exploration of space and technology as the main motivation i always see star wars as just another fantasy game set in some future setting.
they basicly exchange swords for lightsabers, fireballs with grenates and hobbits with ewoks.
sadly i think the further away the sci-fi mmo is from the "sci" the more popular it will be
Reply
bob said on 10:51AM 1-02-2009
The genre has a big problem when it comes to becomming main stream.
And I believe it stems from all the trekkie and babylon 5 geeks with their conventions.
That is why I also have a huge doubt when it comes to Star Trek as an mmo.
MMO's needs to be somewhat mainstream to succeed, and not geeky.
Geeky games allways fail because of their geekyness. And geekyness mostly comes from lack of social thinking when creating a game. Gaming companies have far too few females working for them too.
I know a game such as AoC failed misserably at this. It was screaming GEEK all over.
Other geek mmo's are Star Wars Galaxies, Vanguard, Tabula Rasa, City of Heroes and it seems to me that Stargate Worlds is a huge geek downturn as well.
City of Heroes had a somewhat success. But I also believe this is solely because of the large number of Marvel heroes in Hollywood blockbusters the past few years.
I believe the alienating of this GEEK term is the cradle to succeeding in the mmo market.
Reply
Derek K. said on 12:33PM 1-02-2009
One word.
Yes.
One more word.
Please?
Reply