Massively^™

Players and pundits alike have been pointing to NPD figures as an indicator that PC gaming is in a decline compared to console sales. However, as pointed out by Randy Stude, PC Gaming Alliance president and Intel gaming program director in a recent interview, these figures ignored MMO subscription sales, something NPD hadn't been tracking until earlier this year. "And lo and behold, after just a quarter of research, they found -- under a rock that they hadn't looked at before -- a billion dollars."

While Stude was essentially calling for the PC gaming industry to come together to clear up this sort of confusion, there is more at work here than simply saying that PC gaming is hale and healthy based simply on MMO subscription numbers. For one thing, MMOs are merely one arm of the industry, not the industry itself. World of Warcraft alone must count for a significant total of those NPD numbers, not to mention virtual worlds like Club Penguin.

The TIGSource Procedural Generation Competition is nearing it's finish, and one of the more polished entries takes a fascinating look at MMOs. Titled MMORPG Tycoon, it gives you an MMORPG and demands that you fix it to please the player base. And that's easier said than done.

You have the ability to control most aspects of the game world, from where towns are placed, to how high which stats are per class, to where players respawn, to which levels can use which zones. You can also name your MMORPG anything you like as well, meaning that if you want to have your game be called "World of Warhammer EVE Rasa", you can do so!

There's always a lot of discussion about what's going to be the next big thing in the MMOs industry. We all love to talk about the future and that's largely because it's a very interesting topic. So we just had to attend the "Online Games in 2013" panel at ION 08. This panel was actually introduced by Peter Freese, the ION Conference Director. It was easily one of the most packed panels I've been to thus far which is saying a lot since all the panels have been pretty well populated already.

The panel consisted of Erik Bethke (GoPets Ltd), Scott Jennings (NCsoft), Bridiget Agabra (Metaverse Roadmap) and Damion Schubert (BioWare). With a group of people like this I was expecting some varied and compelling conversation on the topic of MMOs in 2013. In the end we got just that and a quite a bit more.

The Torque MMO kit, first published last year by Prairie Games and GarageGames, has recently announced their newest version of the open-source engine which developer TalentRaspel describes as "completely revised". In this version 1.1 SP3 of the engine, TalentRaspel is proving that their continued support of this product since they took it over late last year promises a step in the right direction for independent game developers.

Not only that, but this could be good news for those smaller companies looking to spend more resources on other aspects of running an MMO, and kicking it off with an established, well-maintained engine. The Torque MMO kit engine was first responsible for powering Minions of Mirth, which is said to have 70,000+ users. Plus, with a price tag of $199 to $999 (depending on sales expectations) for the kit combined with Faust Logic's Arcade FX effects library, you just can't beat that.

Multiverse's Corey Bridges spoke at the SXSW conference about the effects digital distribution and the democratization of advanced development tools will have on the industries of gaming, social networks, and virtual worlds.

Gamasutra put together a great summary of the talk. The thesis: just as they are stripping the entrenched establishments of the music and film industries of much of their oligarchical power, new technologies will transform online gaming and virtual worlds. According to Bridges, virtual worlds are just getting started. "WoW is not a fad," he said, "it's a harbinger." Furthermore, the virtual worlds will be in the hands of indies, not the major conglomerates, and they'll be synergized with social networks.

Bridges also touched on the notion of a more splintered industry made up of smaller projects catering to lots of niche tastes, as opposed to the huge Hollywood-budget productions we see today. A while back someone said that it would take at least a $1 billion super project to take on World of Warcraft. But maybe, as it was with the Roman Empire, the wolves at Blizzard's gate will be countless smaller tribes made up of the so-called unwashed hordes.

If World of Warcraft or Lord of the Rings Online didn't have levels or gear, would you still play? Would you still spend several hours fighting Murlocs or servants of the White Hand if the point was the battle itself, and not the XP and loot rewards?

At MIGS 2007, indie game developer Jonathan Blow talked about differentiating between gameplay that hooks players with fun or an emotionally affecting story, and gameplay that hooks players with an addictive rewards system.

"MMOs are notorious for having relatively empty gameplay, but keeping players hooked with constant fake rewards. This creates the treadmill," he said. "Rewards are a way of lying to the player so they feel good and continue to play the game ... but I am forced to put forth this question -- would they still play a game if it took out all the scheduled rewards?"

Gamasutra wrote up the highlights of Blow's presentation. It's a lengthy article that reaches far beyond MMOs, and is a must-read for people who are serious about gaming. But what's the answer to his MMO question? Does World of Warcraft (or any other game like it) feed a hunger for fun gameplay, or is it just a quick-but-empty fix? We have to tackle that question if the MMO is ever going to move past the grind and become something substantial.

There are few (if any) names more prestigious in the culture of online games development than those of Richard Bartle and Jessica Mulligan. Bartle was one of the original creators of MUDs (out of which MMORPGs were born), and is a leading theorist on the subject. Mulligan is also an experienced developer and consultant in the field. Both of them spoke at the 2007 EVE Online Fanfest, and Ten Ton Hammer pulled them aside for an interview.

It would be impossible to list here all the interesting points they made in the two-page interview, of course, but topics worth highlighting included investor behavior and the problems the American industry faces with regards to finding and utilizing creative talent. If you're interested in the business side of the industry, it's worth a read.

Both Bartle and Mulligan had a lot of praise for CCP and EVE Online. For example, Mulligan essentially said the future belongs to games like EVE that take chances and serve a medium-sized, more niche-like player-base, and Bartle suggested that CCP's next game could do very well.

After the success of IMGDC 1.0 (the Indie MMO Game developers conference) in Minneapolis in April, things are moving forward again for the 2008 session of IMGDC 2.0 at the end of March.

The conference will take place in Minneapolis again, at the Minneapolis Convention Center from March 29-30. Early bird registration is available, with registration costing only a hundred dollars (US) until 15 November.

Word is that the last conference was great, and I'm told that folks are really looking forward to attending this next one. There's a terrific lineup of speakers, and I'm wishing I could be there.