Jul 18
Why WoW Is Good for Massive Games
Tobold and Tipa have had lists of desired feature, while Lum laughs at a general one and Angus laughs at Lum. I’m kinda-sorta with Mark on all this finger-pointing: I think we have it pretty good nowadays. Most people want to play WoW, it seems, and that’s cool. There are going to be WoW clones launched in the next five years; many of them will be poorly done. You can launch an orcs n’ elves game without being WoW, though; WAR is definitely not going to be WoW, again.
I’m with a lot of the other bloggers insofar as wanting some different things out there. However, I think I’m in the minority by thinking that things are pretty much going okay. Not only do we have it pretty good right now, we’ve got it pretty good coming down the pipe. Today I want to lay out why now is such a great time for MMOGing, and why folks who want ’something different’ have absolutely no reason to complain about the future.
Hey, guess what? World of Warcraft is more popular than most of the other Massive games put together; certainly more popular than all the other big-budget subscription titles put together. That’s okay. Know why? Because it deserves it.
As I wrote crankily last month, I have a heard time understanding all the kvetching. All these features that make WoW ‘too easy’ are also what make it ‘popular’. Most people are not us, the hardcore mentality is a blinding one, etc. We’ve been over this before.
The bigger issue, though, is the one in the Massive genre as a whole: some folks see World of Warcraft as dominating the genre as a whole. With the long tail on MMOGs, even if Blizzard stopped development on it right now, and never sunk a single dime into it, it would take years for the game to get depopulated enough to pull the plug. And, of course, Blizzard will be supporting this game with patches and expansions for years to come; I might be playing World of Warcraft with grandkids for all I know.
Probably the most visible of these statements comes to us from Richard Bartle in his recent Guardian interview; I’m sure you’ve already read it, but just in case you haven’t, here’s the last question in the piece:
If you could take over control of one major MMORPG - which would you choose and what would you do with it?
I’d take over World of Warcraft and I’d close it. I just want better virtual worlds. Sacrificing one of the best so its players have to seek out alternatives would be a sure-fire way to ensure that unknown gems got the chance they deserved, and that new games were developed to push back the boundaries.
Now, Richard explains what he meant by that, and it’s all in good fun, theoretical exercise and all that. For a full exploration of this topic, the ongoing discussion at Broken Toys is your best bet.
I knew what he meant the first time he said it, but it still gave me pause. Is World of Warcraft bad for the industry? Is it bad for all the other Massives out there that could be something wonderful but end up squashed in their crib because WoW scootched too far to the left on a given day?
If it’s truly bad for the industry, then all we would see are WoW-alikes coming down the pipe. The future of MMOGdom would be nothing but derivative schlock. And guess what? It’s not!
Just this year alone we’ve got Perpetual’s Gods and Heroes, Flying Lab’s Pirates of the Burning Sea, and Destination Games’ Tabula Rasa.
- GnH tweaks the fantasy with the greek, makes some fairly interesting changes to gameplay with minions, and adds kickass animations into the mix. It has more in common with Guild Wars than WoW.
- PotBS is a wholly unique experience. Right now there are absolutely no games on the market at all like this. Gameplay is a mix of console-ish swordplay and a stately game of predator and prey at sea. It has a grander, more noble aesthetic, and there’s not a cyclops, elf, orc, or centaur to be found.
- TR mixes the elements of Guild Wars with components of Quake 4, and is (again) a wholly unique experience. The first MMOFPS that will likely be taken seriously by genre fans, it’s even doing some innovative things with world persistence and the ‘meaning’ that a player can impart into the world. You know, exactly what every single MMOG player (myself included) has been asking for all these years? No, it’s not going to be just what you want, but it’s a first step.
Even if none of these games interest you personally, you have to admit that not one of them is a WoW clone. So the question becomes, are these titles going to benefit or suffer from WoW’s shadow across the landscape? Given their nature and the time these games are due out, I am of the opinion they’ll benefit, greatly.
Burning Crusade’s content petered out months ago. We don’t even know what the next expansion is yet, though it’s like to be announced at Blizzcon next month. Any possible release date for whatever it is, *cough*Northrend*cough*, has to be sometime early next year. This gives games released in August a full five months, or longer, to attract the attention of World of Warcraft players extremely tired of running Karazahn and fighting with their guildmates.
Assuming that the next expansion for WoW launches in February again, developers are going to have to expect there to be a drop in subscriptions early in the year. That’s just going to be a given; everyone heads back to Azeroth for their yearly fix of new content and the new raiding season. In the meantime, though, you’ve got millions of bored players who now know they like Massively Multiplayer games … but don’t want to play WoW anymore.
Do I think GnH, TR, and PotBS are going to be huge successes as a result of this timing? Not really. I hope they’ll do well, but I don’t really see any of them cracking a million players. The question isn’t if they’ll do better than WoW, the question is: Will they do better because of WoW?
I think the answer to that question is an unmitigated yes. World of Warcraft has introduced so many people to the Massive genre that I firmly believe more people will be playing new releases than otherwise would have. Again, it’s hard to underestimate the impact of 7-8-9 million people worldwide.
As for the genre beyond this year, I think we’re pretty good. WAR looks to Blizzard’s most serious contender; by being ‘kinda’ like WoW but completely different in almost every way, they’re going to attract a bunch of players looking for their old flame in a new dress. Down the pipe we have two more superhero games, Star Trek, whatever the hell BioWare and Raph are doing … I don’t even think a single one of those is going to be in the fantasy genre, like alone a WoW-alike.
The developers say it all the time, WoW has been good for the industry. The reason people are confused and upset, I think, is because these things take so damn long to make that there have only been a handful released since 2004.
At the end of the year I’ll try to revisit this topic and look back at how things went. We’ve got three MMOG launches coming before we crack 2008. By then we’ll know for sure whether Bartle’s quip was just that, or a prescient forecast of doom.
9 Comments so far
Leave a comment
Just thought I’d mention that you neglected Age of Conan (releasing October 30th). Fantasy, yes, but different combat and a much darker/more adult tone than WoW. Could be a flop, certainly (ie, its high system requirements etc), but it’s still a player on the field.
Otherwise, I agree. I think the telltale sign of WoW’s influence will be if most or all of the new MMOG’s that successfully launch (with an adequate game that works, which, unfortunately, is hardly a given in this business) can maintain a significant number of subscriptions/players. Considering that EQ, at its height with fewer alternatives (and no online console competition), pulled something like 400k, if the new games can each garner something comparable I think WoW has to take the credit for that. I look forward to your end-of-year synopsis.
(Really enjoy the site, thanks for all your work.)
I think you’re right on the money with this blog entry. I think one other reason that WOW is good for the MMOG genre is the raising of the bar for what to expect with a release. The level of polish WOW launched with and the smoothness of that launch has only really been done once before in the MMO history that I know of. That launch being Cryptic/NCSOFT’s City of Heros. I think before WOW though most MMO developers would try to get a beta quality product out the door to start realizing their potential revenue rather than sucking it up for a one or two more itterations of bug fixes and content adjustments.
Mark
WoW is good for the genre because it basically sets the bar for iterative DIKU PvE. You want to make another EQ1? You need to spend scores of millions of dollars and have a strong IP.
This actually FORCES innovation because most people a) don’t have that much confidence in their ability to maximize this platform; and, b) don’t have access to an IP that resonates with gamers as strongly as Warcraft-from-Blizzard does; and, c) don’t have the guaranteed worldwide reach that VUG does.
Age of Conan, Tabula Rasa, Star Trek, Huxley, Pirates of the Burning Sea, these are big-budget games all trying something different, some because of nacent creativity, and some because of WoW. Heck, even Pirates of the Caribbean is a pretty different experience play-wise.
But that’s just the AAA DVD-ROM purchase-at-retail variety.
The REAL innovation is coming from the Web/Web 2.0 crowd, the folks who’ve figured out ways to make massive online persistent world communities for less money than Blizzard spends on a free content patch. These people are not bound by the expectations of hardcore gamers who’ve been around since people still argued whether Lineage 1 was relevant. These experiences are not targeting players who don’t do anything unless it’s 3D Elves and spells. And they aren’t bound by a business model for a group of people that still think RMT=microtransacations=profanity.
We talk about the difference between “game” and “virtual lifestyle” while ignoring the vast majority of MMOs coming are virtual lifestlye. But they’re browser-based or not sold at retail and therefore fall below the conventional radar.
Which is a shame.
From my personnal point of view, WoW was both good and bad.
Good because it made the MMO genre very famous. Everybody knows about WoW and by extension, everyone started to wonder what these MMO games were all about. It’s also good for Dev Studios (even tho they would tell you it’s bad :)) because by becoming the Emperor of the Easy Gameplay, WoW prevented other Devs to do the same easy thing over and over, they’ll soon have to come up with better ideas, and take some risks to walk paths where WoW hasn’t gone…yet. Will they go there? That’s the question…which leads me to my “Bad†point
Bad mainly for niche games because everyone suddenly realised “omg, these WoW guys make so much money.†And so they want to do the same. And they’ll fail, and meanwhile, the small independant studio who are trying to do something for a niche market, or try to get ahold of 300K players will have one hell of a hard time to get published. And when they will self-publish, people will discard most of them saying; “damn crappy products…the graphics are aweful”.
It’s never been a better time to be an MMO fan. We bitch and moan and complain about the lack of innovation in games today– but we’re bloggers. It’s what we do. Same with forumites. Complaining comes as naturally as breathing on a forum.
Lets be realistic here, though. There are a TON of fun games out there, and WoW has really shown developers the potential of an MMO (although using it as your textbook is much better than carbon copying it). More games than any of us can realistically play given a limited amount of time. And there’s only more to come. Will there be flops? Sure. Will there be more hits? Most definitely.
And in the meantime, we can all go play WoW.
Very well said, Michael. I just wish this fall didn’t seem so far away. I am positively itching for something new. It’s really a great time to be an MMO gamer. I just hope one among the throng strikes me well enough to keep me interested for a year or two.
WoW has drawn so so many people to the Massive genre. Sometimes, I think it is actually killing all the other niche games, but if you think about it.
As people get bored of WoW (like I did), my thirst for MMO was still there and thus, I actively started searching for a new MMO to play. What I am trying to say is that as WoW gets subscribers, there are subscribers that leave it, wanting to play a new MMO.
This is as you can see, a good thing!
WoW hasn’t been just good, it has been IMMENSELY good.
It finally forced other companies to adapt and ditch their fucked UIs and controls. It forced them to completely revise the games’ flow, it forced them to finally NOTICE the gigantic elephant mistakes in the room.
Without a WoW MMO game companies would sit back doing nothing at all, milking old, obsolete concepts. Still using unoptimized, poor clients with terrible UIs, a slev of /slash commands and opaque, overcomplicated game mechanics for a small niche of geeks who still have to suffer poor support, unstable clients, and poor quality overall.
WoW has been so good that its HUGE progresses now are so standard that they became invisible to all players and most of the dedicated bloggers. It became a canon of expectations.
Don’t balme WoW for the lack of variety and plenty of copycats. Because that’s a problem outside of WoW, a problem that was there before WoW. Without WoW we would have the same lack of variety but poorer quality overall.
Don’t blame WoW for incompetency and lack of creativity outside it. WoW is one game and its duty is to do its task the best way possible. And it did.