Gabriel Runfeldt
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Player Consequences: Movie Magic and MMOs
by Gabriel Runfeldt 
Dec 17th 2008 (10 months ago)
WoW
LotRO
Let's dig into how that applies to MMOs. There has been discussion of a World of Warcraft movie for some time ... what about the rest of them? Read on to explore the connection between Hollywood and Norrath.
Player Consequences: Closing Time
by Gabriel Runfeldt Dec 5th 2008 (11 months ago)
TR
If you look into the history of modern MMOs, you will notice that most games in the genre are still up and running. In over ten years only a handful have failed and been taken offline by their publishers. That's not to say every MMO has had outstanding success. It's just that the minimum cost to keep these game worlds running is actually quite small. As long as current subscriptions can maintain the servers and minimal support staff, there is no real reason to take a MMO offline. In fact, most game publishers realize that shuttering a MMO is a little bit of a public relations nightmare. It's much better to keep a game running as long as there are any players willing to pay for it.
This doesn't seem to apply in cases where a publisher is worried about a MMO negatively affecting the reputation of another product or license. One particular example of this was The Sims Online, which had been slowly losing subscribers since its launch in 2002. How EA managed to make an under-performing MMO out of one of the bestselling video game franchises in history, I will never know. EA eventually attempted to revive the game by renaming it to EA-land earlier this year. However, it seemed that the renaming was just an attempt to dissociate the MMO from the Sims brand name since they canceled it a few weeks later.
This doesn't seem to apply in cases where a publisher is worried about a MMO negatively affecting the reputation of another product or license. One particular example of this was The Sims Online, which had been slowly losing subscribers since its launch in 2002. How EA managed to make an under-performing MMO out of one of the bestselling video game franchises in history, I will never know. EA eventually attempted to revive the game by renaming it to EA-land earlier this year. However, it seemed that the renaming was just an attempt to dissociate the MMO from the Sims brand name since they canceled it a few weeks later.
Player Consequences: Slow and Steady
by Gabriel Runfeldt Nov 24th 2008 (11 months ago)
WoW
I expect this can be partially explained by Blizzard's habit of holding back content from its expansions and then releasing it in later patches. This helps stretch out the expansion content over a wider time period and gives the development team a chance to work on brand new content. However, even this trick can't account for why World of Warcraft keeps its numbers in the face of multiple new MMO releases.
Player Consequences: WAR games, part 2
by Gabriel Runfeldt Oct 21st 2008 (1 year ago)
WoW
EVE
WAR
It's not just the reward systems either, both games also have very different opinions on how to achieve class balance. World of Warcraft has increasingly been balancing its classes towards small-scale combat. Almost every class has methods of crowd control and ways of incapacitating other players. Warfare in the game has become more about timing your special abilities correctly to counter crowd control spells then about actually dealing damage. This may make arena combat more exciting, but it has the price of making larger scale encounters less balanced. Simply having that one extra person with a stun, fear, or root gives enough of an advantage to completely shut down the opposing side. In Warhammer, combat seems more about large-scale combat and sticking with the basics: healing and dealing damage. The only crowd control abilities I have seen so far have been root spells which seem to be given only to cloth wearing casters. There are some interesting knock-back abilities, but these don't stun or incapacitate the target. If want to defeat an opponent then you are going to have to deal enough damage to kill them while they fight back. This would seem to be the better combat system, but it actually encourages running away in small-scale encounters. In particular, any sort of PvP system where the objective is simply to stay alive would last forever. This is probably why we won't be seeing arenas in Warhammer any time soon.
Player Consequences: WAR games
by Gabriel Runfeldt Oct 21st 2008 (1 year ago)
WoW
EVE
WAR
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Did you enjoy this? Make sure to check out our Warhammer guides: Massively's Character Creation Guide and our WoW Player's Guide to Warhammer. Plus, don't miss any of our ongoing coverage as Massively goes to WAR! |
Player Consequences: Are MMOs finished with forums?
by Gabriel Runfeldt Sep 27th 2008 (1 year ago)
WoW
GW
WAR
The creation of the Internet has made communication affordable, fast, and almost completely reliable. It's no wonder that almost every facet of our lives has been affected by it, especially our entertainment. Mainstream entertainment like mp3s and streaming television have only recently found their way online. However, gaming has had a much longer relationship with the Internet. Early developers were practically hobbyists and they worked closely with players to establish some of the first persistent online games called MUDS. These text-based games often had very tight knit communities since there were initially few people who could afford to play them. Players often had direct communication with a game's creators and used early Bulletin Board Systems and Usenet to voice their opinions and offer help. This became the foundation for the relationship between MMOs and gaming forums.
Nowadays, it is much more common for a company to hire community managers to act as intermediaries between developers and players. Games are more complex and it is not just a couple guys in their basement anymore. Think about the opportunities for miscommunication if every developer on a large team posted their opinions on a game forum. It would be anarchy and the game studio would constantly be clarifying statements and putting out fires. When you look at that way, it becomes obvious that community managers serve an important function. Not that every gamer will agree they are necessary. As developers became more removed from gamers there's been an increasing amount of disdain for community managers and the forums they moderate. Over the years, several games have had bad situations on their forums that have some companies wondering if forums are even worth the trouble.
Nowadays, it is much more common for a company to hire community managers to act as intermediaries between developers and players. Games are more complex and it is not just a couple guys in their basement anymore. Think about the opportunities for miscommunication if every developer on a large team posted their opinions on a game forum. It would be anarchy and the game studio would constantly be clarifying statements and putting out fires. When you look at that way, it becomes obvious that community managers serve an important function. Not that every gamer will agree they are necessary. As developers became more removed from gamers there's been an increasing amount of disdain for community managers and the forums they moderate. Over the years, several games have had bad situations on their forums that have some companies wondering if forums are even worth the trouble.
Player Consequences: Getting back to Grouping
by Gabriel Runfeldt Sep 4th 2008 (1 year ago)
WoW
WAR
As long as World of Warcraft remains the top performing MMO on the market most game developers are going to assume that only the minority of players actually prefer grouping. I've seen people compare the subscription numbers of World of Warcraft to games like EverQuest 2 to support this argument. It's obvious that most players would rather keep the solo friendly format then be forced back into the days of required grouping. However, the situation doesn't require that MMOs have to be designed to cater to just one style of gameplay. Some minor changes could be implemented in modern questing and leveling design, which would greatly encourage cooperative grouping. Most MMOs that are oriented on solo questing only discourage grouping by accident and not on purpose. Still some of these "accidents" tend to be very annoying to anyone trying to level with a group of friends.
Player Consequences: Why We Subscribe
by Gabriel Runfeldt Aug 20th 2008 (1 year ago)
There are many different choices when it comes to picking out a MMO nowadays. The genre is no longer limited to only a handful of games based on old Dungeons and Dragons manuals. Players have the options to pilot spaceships, become a superhero, command a pirate fleet, or even fight aliens as a super soldier. While the classic swords and sorcery setting still defines the MMO genre, it is no longer a requirement for being successful in the market. Yet despite having, dozens of different worlds to choose from players still seem to be limited to only one payment method.
It's not that gamers are overly fond of the subscription model. Indeed a lot of console and FPS gamers specifically avoid MMOs because of monthly fees. This hasn't stopped game developers from continually using the subscription model though. Despite all the different payment models being explored by industry, the subscription model continues to be the most popular for AAA titles. There seems to be an underlying notion in the west that subscribing to a MMO is still the most beneficial payment method for the consumer. If you look at the history of early MMOs it's not hard to see how this notion was formed.
Player Consequences: Item Decay, No Way
by Gabriel Runfeldt Jul 10th 2008 (1 year ago)
WoW
EVE
WAR
With the recent announcement of Diablo 3 I felt it might be a good idea to actually look into the series. I don't know how I missed one of the most popular LAN games of all time, but it somehow happened. Since I like starting at the beginning, I tried out the first Diablo last week and imagine my surprise when I started to get flashes of déjà vu. I had heard about how much Blizzard borrowed from the Diablo series to make World of Warcraft, but I didn't know the extent of it. The item durability system in the two games is almost exactly the same. Just like in World of Warcraft I quickly figured out that only the blacksmith in town could repair my broken items. Thinking I had the basics figured out I headed off into the dungeon and start my personal re-enactment of Army of Darkness sans chainsaw. As I took damage, it was nice to see the familiar yellow armor icon pop up on my main screen telling me I still had durability left.
I continued to hack and slash the isometric sprites until I noticed they were starting hit a lot harder. Thinking it was time to repair I checked my inventory and was greeted with the sight of a naked me! Unlike its MMO cousin, the first Diablo actually destroyed armor when its durability reached zero. I felt somewhat sheepish about it, but then I had a funny thought. Could you imagine if World of Warcraft followed the same design? Raiding would take a lot longer as people constantly left to repair after every two or three deaths. Tanks would be even rarer since they would have a much higher chance of losing items. The problems with that scenario quickly mount up and it's easy to see why Blizzard changed the durability system slightly when putting it into MMO form. That's not to say you will never find item decay in a MMO, especially if you explore some of the less mainstream games.
Player Consequences: The Need for Speed
by Gabriel Runfeldt Jul 1st 2008 (1 year ago)
WoW
EVE
AoC
Jumpgate Evolution
There is one underlying reason why travel times continue to be prevalent in MMOs today and it's directly related to player expectations of virtual worlds. Developers are very sensitive to the issue of making their games seem like a real world and not a collection of three dimensional video game levels. Any MMO that has too many instances and separate zones often gets complaints for breaking the feel of a seamless world. This can actually turn players away from the game. As a result, the most successful games are often those with an over-world where players don't find themselves constantly having to load data as they zone. Just look at how World of Warcraft, Lord of the Rings Online, and EVE Online handle their world design.
