Are MMO Gamers Getting Smarter?
Massively multiplayer online games, as a genre, are still pretty new. But, some players have counted MMO gaming as their primary hobby for about a decade, and others even more still. We, as gamers, are getting wiser to the ways of the online world, and we’re learning to line our expectations up with something at least resembling reality. The point is, I think players are getting smart enough, or at least experienced enough, that they are beginning to react much less impulsively when something unforeseen occurs. Case in point: Warhammer Online’s beta has shut down, due to reopen in a couple months.
There are always doom and gloom posts claiming that the game is being canceled or “delayed indefinitely,” but just as many people are somewhat positive about it. They feel like EA Mythic is taking it down to polish the game and get it done right without the distraction of a rabid beta community. They may very well be. I meant to ask Paul Barnett about it when I saw him recently, but he surely wouldn’t have been able to give me an answer anyway.
Is this a turn for the better? Are gamers actually getting smart from all of their MMO experience? People are beginning to realize just how much has to go into an MMO for it to even be competitive these days. In particular, games like WAR that are a little more on the traditional side, or at the very least are being directly compared to WoW, have a tremendously high bar set as their baseline.
For a game to do at least decently well while being similar to World of Warcraft, it has to be at least as good as that beast in almost all aspects and better in at least one major category. It has to be just as polished, just as visually stimulating, and then it has to go the extra distance somewhere else. WoW was in development for several years, and has been in development for a few years longer since launch. The bar is getting higher and higher for the traditional MMO, and players realize that.
When I see game delays followed by players freaking out, I just think it’s more of the same. When I see game delays followed by players thinking it’s okay and that their favorite game will only get better, I freak out myself. It’s pretty wild to see this shift lately, but I hope the industry doesn’t take advantage of it. “When it’s done” is a great mantra as long as the delay is to make the game completely polished and great and not to cram more unpolished junk into it… which will lead to another one of my lessons at some point.
Do I think gamers are getting smarter? I think so, and I feel like it’s a good thing for the genre as long as we don’t take advantage of those smart players.
Hmm,
Gamers are getting smarter, kind of implies that gamers are getting older more experianced. If gamers are getting older, why do we keep developing games for the players with little experiance. It would be interesting to see the demographics, I’m of the opinion that the market is much older than people realize or would admit to, but we still see games being developed for teens rather than adults.
“I’m of the opinion that the market is much older than people realize or would admit to, but we still see games being developed for teens rather than adults.”
I agree. But there is a lot of inertia in the system, development teams can have a tendency to make the same sort of game today as they made 10 years ago when the market was younger. How else can you explain continuing to make time-sink grindfests targeted towards players without jobs or children?
“How else can you explain continuing to make time-sink grindfests targeted towards players without jobs or children?”
Because when you have a subscription based game, the cheapest way to keep your subscribers is to draw out your content by placing artificial time sinks in your game play. And by cheapest, I mean the least challenging to the developer. The longer it takes your player base to move through content, the less time/money a game developer has to spend.
I think as the genre (and player base) matures however, developers are, or are going to have to, find ways to make the time consuming grind fest “fun”. Otherwise the players are at some point going to move on to a different game that provides them with the same things, only in a more fun or time-effective manner.
Grinds are not marketed to ‘kids’. They are in the game to make sure they get the most amount of time frome each play style.
I still think that if you remove too much of the “grind,” a lot of the same people who complain about it will think it sucks more without it. If you shoot past content and are handed everything, would you really feel like you accomplished anything?
I personally think MY ideal leveling pace would be something like WoW divided by 2 or 3. Is that the ideal pace for people who actually play often? Maybe, maybe not.
Gamers may or may not be getting smarter but I think the shutdown of the WAR beta is due to the Vanguard. Vanguard stands as a great example of what “not to do” to Game Makers. The guys WAR learned from the VG failure.
It is simply really. Now all any MMORPG maker has to do it look at Vanguard and then do the opposite. Easy.