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Role Playing (Games) Businesses

MMOG Market Mutterings 70

Posted by Zonk from the a-lot-of-news-in-a-little-while dept.
In the past few days there have been several new developments in the Massive Gaming market. Jessica Mulligan's departure from Turbine now has an end destination, with the announcement that she'll be the executive producer for Nevrax's Saga of Ryzom. In a swashbuckling tie-in, Disney announced they'll be adding to their Massive Gaming portfolio, with a Pirates of the Carribean MMOG joining Toontown Online sometime next year. The always excellent CNN Money column Game Over has word that Sony Online is planning a new Action MMOG, a possible strategy title, and some new non-mmog titles. From the article: "Though the numbers for massively multiplayer games aren't bad, they remain a niche in the gaming industry. To expand SOE's potential audience, the company will soon announce smaller puzzle games for two and four players. While those games won't be massively multiplayer or have any sort of persistent world, it's not out of the question for the long term." Finally, there are many stories over on Gametab discussing the "I'm cancelling because of the WoW Honor System" thread on the official World of Warcraft boards. They were likely sparked by this Kotaku post about the thread. I just want to put in my two cents and state that this isn't news. Forums are not an accurate way to get a picture of a game's user base. Doom may be coming to Blizzard's game, but the subscriber charts are the only real way to know for sure.
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MMOG Market Mutterings More

MMOG Market Mutterings

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  • Initial Fallout Comes with Any Media Product (Score:3, Insightful)

    by superultra ( 670002 ) on Wednesday April 27, 2005 @12:00PM (#12360896) Homepage
    If I were a statistician and cool I might have some kind of real data to suggest that every new product endures some kind of fallout after the initial enthusiasm. But since I am neither a statistician or cool, I'll just suggest it without the data in an uncool way:

    New TV shows always seem to have a drop-off in ratings, a cliff in the number of watchers. If the show is decent and watchable, then it'll climb from there at a steady rate. I have no doubt that Blizzard in their infinite wisdom foresaw this, and is probably bidding good riddance under their breath. If WoW is worth its weight in gold (get it, gold?), then it'll begin to slowly accumlate more users through word of mouth while at the same time perfecting the game for upper-level players.

  • WoW is still for the casual player. (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    You DO NOT have to PVP.
    • Not true on a PvP server. If you are under level 60, and you wish to level, you will be forced to PvP.

      Yes, you can use the argument "That's what a PvP server is, dumbass." However, when there are gank squads of 5 people of level 60 patroling a zone of low 50's just in the name of honor points, something is wrong.

      And yes, I could also re-roll on a non-PvP server. But with 16+ days of play time, I don't see that being an option. It would be nice of Blizzard to offer character transfers from PvP to P
      • Well, thats 20 contribution points (cps) between the 5 of them. 5 Each. If they keep this up a whole week they might be able to gain slightly more than the cut-off at 200 cps, meaning they'll have a whooping 'scout' ranking or the equivalent of me and a friend (both 52) killing just 2 60s (200 cps/ 2 * 2 = 200) in a whole week. I don't even have to suit up for this, it just happens anyways.

        In summary, I fail to see the problem, except that those 5 are really wasting their time. Once people actually read
        • Jesus, 4 CPs each. Sorry, I'm sick and not thinking straight.
    • yes, but the honor system has gotten people that wouldn't normally pvp flagging and running around killing npcs in the name of phat lewt. that can make it rather hard to do the non-pvp thing even if you're on a pve server like I am.

  • Nich (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Meagermanx ( 768421 ) on Wednesday April 27, 2005 @12:10PM (#12361013)
    The reason the MMORPG is a nich genre is because nobody in their right mind is going to subscribe to more than possible two titles at a time, whereas most people wouldn't think twice about buying another FPS, even if they already own a few.
  • For any MMORPG to really succeed in keeping it's fanbase happy it will have to have constant expansion. Without new items and quests people get bored quickly. This is why it is good to allow players to create items and even quests so that it's always evolving and not going stale. Second Life has an interesting way of handling this problem. And I won't even bother discussing money issues...
    • Player created quests? Done right? Suuuure... If they release enough content in the game, then when you level enough you'll get to the better quests and equipment, and wont get bored. Player created quests wouldn't work in the modern MMO, IMHO. You would just have a new way to camp monsters.
      • My idea isn't for an actual quest in the same sense as the one's the developers make, but instead make items extremely rare and let players request that other players go out and find it for them in return for other goods/money. Let one character pay other characters to be his bodyguards/mercinaries. Things like that... The only way to have a truely player driven world is to allow conflict and power struggles between the players. This also requires a strict virtual economy. It will be a very tough idea to ma
        • Neocron does this.
          And yes, they have problems with balancing the avatar classes and discouraging senseless PKing. There is a sort of "dishonor" system (Soullight) but it lacks a reasonable mechanism to distinguish between accidents and griefplay.
          The economy also seems "too easy".

          But to all of these problems reasonable solutions have been posted to the Neocron forums, so they seem solvable. Now if Reakktor could only get it done...

    • > For any MMORPG to really succeed in keeping
      > it's fanbase happy it will have to have
      > constant expansion.

      I suggest that in order to force the playerbase to progress, the world must not only constantly expand, but constantly be destroyed. If you don't kill off the old areas, people get bored with them.

      If the world could be generated algorithmically, and areas could "expire", previously expired areas could be resuscitated at later times and reused. Consider your average text MUD: instead of havin
      • Not only that, but some of the more important areas could constantly be changing. In the towns, construction sites should appear, and over time become more and more complete, until finally there's a new building, providing some useful additions/content. Better yet if players can have some direct input into the process, although quality control of design/artwork makes that difficult.

        Second Life as an example provides both pros and cons. The world is constantly evolving, and there are some really talented pe

  • Honor System (Score:3, Informative)

    by scribblej ( 195445 ) on Wednesday April 27, 2005 @12:20PM (#12361139)
    I'm not a player and that link doesn't lead to any information I can use ... can someone explain the problem?

    • Re:Honor System (Score:4, Informative)

      by Moby Cock ( 771358 ) on Wednesday April 27, 2005 @12:34PM (#12361319) Homepage
      The honour system awards points for honourable kills in player vs player comabt. This has lead to massive roving pack of players teaming up against wandering the world killing everything on site. All this in the name of honour. There is no penalty for dishonourable kills. Each week the points are tabulated and people are assigned a rank The higher ranks are able to buy super amour and weapons. Most complain the honour system has caused the PvP aspect of the game to be comepletely devoid of honour and it is inhibiting on quest players from finishing missions because the NPCs are all slaughtered.

    • Re:Honor System (Score:5, Informative)

      by danl125 ( 650073 ) on Wednesday April 27, 2005 @12:38PM (#12361371)
      Basically, the honor system, for the uneducated, is a system in which rewards people for partaking in PvP (or player vs player) combat. If you kill someone within a certain number of levels you get points, and you are statistically ranked against everyone else on the server once a week.

      The problem, mind you, is mainly on PvP (player vs player) servers, and not PvE (player vs environment) servers. On a PvP server, when you are in a higher end zone, you are flagged as PvP-able; in other words, anyone can kill you if they want. On PvE servers, you must specifically enable PvE to be killed.

      Now, the highest level in the game is level 60. When you are level 60, you can receive honor points for killing someone 12 levels below you. SO, you can get honor off of someone who is 48. At 48, simply put, you don't have a chance in hell of killing a level 60. It might have happened, but 99.999999% of the time it's not going to. THAT is the problem. If you are level 60, you are fine. If you are between that magic number of 48 where you can give honor to level 60s by dying to them, you are not fine. People have also resorted to roming groups of level 60's who kill lower levels till they can call out the higher levels.

      Also, there are mass zerg raids happening on all servers. Zerg raids refer to many many many people killing a whole city of NPC's and, on a PvP server, PC's. Things can't get done, people's progress is stopped, people cancel accounts.

      Now, I haven't canceled yet, and I'm 54. I personally enjoy it and know it will calm down eventually. Until then, I'm going to keep going with my account.

      • There are other problems, too. The way the honor system is ranked entirely excludes casual players from the mix.

        Before the honor system in World of Warcraft, there was no goal that a casual player couldn't eventually meet, although it might take them longer than a die-hard player. But now, the top few tiers of honor system rewards are completely inaccessible to casual players because they are given out by percentage. (i.e. Only the top 2.5% can get the rewards, and that 2.5% will *always* be die-hard 16
        • Before the honor system in World of Warcraft, there was no goal that a casual player couldn't eventually meet,

          But if everyone can meet it, it almost doesn't qualify as a "goal" anymore- it has become an "expectation". Consider an objective in relative terms instead of absolute- and relative is really the more accurate way to measure it.

          The power level of items is only really meaningful in comparison to all the other items out there. If all maxxed-out players can get the same "best" items after enough t
      • A few other items of note regarding the "Honor System"

        The rankings you recieved are determined on how you stack up to other players and there contribution points. As well only the top tier of PVPs will have the fancy name and fancy gear that looks pretty.

        From what we have read that might be 10 or 100 people on the entire server with the top tier of gear (depending on population) and yea these will be the guys who play all the time(for whatever reason, not judging here)

        If you dont continue to preform well
      • you forget, the low levels give crap CPs. The effort is not worth it, especially considering that a lone lvl 60 is an attractive target for any group of 50+. Those roving bands will get it, eventually, if a whole week of heavy pvping only nets them lower ranks
    • I wanted to add to the other two replies you have about the system. I have played in PvP based MMOs before and when WoW first launched I was shocked on how little PvP was going on in PvP servers. The peeps who did not know better who are playing in a PvP server are not realising what a PvP server is suppose to be like. Lots of people are complaining, because well, they did not know any better. The PvP servers, with the addition of the Honor system, are now like what I would expect a PvP server to be lik
  • Let's hope Sony learned well from Planetside.

    Simply being profitable wasn't enough for them; they kept pushing for higher sales until, ultimately, the game gave up being a war sim and devolved into MMO Quake with some of the worst net code conceivable, and it's still not any more successful, yet they've alienated most of the original players that weren't there for verbal wanking over kill stats.
    • Planetside is actually pretty good these days - the only real problem is that everyone and their grandmother is Command Rank 5, meaning that there's no real cohesive leadership hierarchy.

    • Planetside makes me sad. It could have been so much more then it was.

      The potential was there. It really was. Unfortunatly they screwed the pooch on a few key issues.

      Well firstly, it took me 1 gig of ram and a new pc before I could play the game at an acceptable frame rate.

      But they really needed to make the game more, unique, i guess.

      It gets very repetative. All of the bases are the same. There are perhaps like 5 or so base variants, repeated, over every continent. While it becomes easy to get around in
  • If you want subscriber charts [mmogchart.com]...
  • being a 46 rogue in WoW, I love the honor system. 'Ganking' is easy as 1-2-flee.

  • "I'm cancelling over the honor system" (Score:3, Insightful)

    by smcn ( 87571 ) on Wednesday April 27, 2005 @01:04PM (#12361679)
    Give me a break. These people who are "quitting" (yeah, sure) are all people who consciously CHOSE a PvP server and are now complaining that they can't quest because people are participating in PvP. Here's your sign.

    This will have zero impact on the big picture.
  • i really wish i had a penny for every i'm quitting thread after some change to a game. I'd be a fricking millionare by now.

    I wonder if more people are 'quitting' WoW over the honor things than people who are 'quitting' eq2 over the exchange server thing, If more wow people are quitting we might see a boost in eq2 :D

  • Logic flaw? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by djdanlib ( 732853 )
    "Forums are not an accurate way to get a picture of a game's user base."

    I find the OP's logic flawed... Accurate or not, a discussion forum is the best way to hear the opinions, rants and ideas of a broad variety of players. Excuse me, I mean "user base." You can even (gasp!) participate, and interview the players there to find out what their experience in one area or another has been.

    If there's a large amount of complaint threads started by unique forum-goers, then that's an indication of a problem.
    • Your head is on straight. :) You may want to straighten your tie, though.

      The issue is that stats have consistently shown that only a very small percentage of the user base participates in any way the the forums. World of Warcraft has hundreds of thousands of English speaking players, but no where near that number participates in the official forums.

      Thus, while every single person on the forums may be saying "boo honor system", they're still a minority of the players of the game.

      Many dubious decisions hav
      • Well said.

        The true majority will speak with their wallets. If the Honour System is indeed as unpopular as the forum-whores would have us believe, then we'd witness a massive drop in the WoW subscribership.

        So far, the AH on my server is as busy as ever. :-)

        /Kafka

    • The problem with listening to discussion forums is the people there represent what is called the "Vocal Minority." People with problems and complaints are more likely to be vocal about them than are people who are content with things the way they are. That is why you tend to see a lot more "BLIZ U SUC I QUIT!" posts than "This is the best game I have ever played please dont change anything." posts.
  • The subscriber charts clearly state "M-O-N-E-Y", I'm pretty sure that's as far away from D-O-O-M as you can get.
  • What such immature babies. You say "The Honor systems sucks- I am cancelling boo hoo" - Why don't you grow up and get youselves a real life. The freaking system has only been in place just over a week. How can you determine that it sucks already? People were cancelling after only 1 day of "Honor" kills. It has not even had a chance yet and you freakin idots cry over it. You cry babies should NOT be playing any MMORPGs because you just look for excuses to quit. Same stuff with Everquest, same crap over Star
    • What such immature babies. You say "The Honor systems sucks- I am cancelling boo hoo" - Why don't you grow up and get youselves a real life. The freaking system has only been in place just over week. How can you determine that it sucks already?

      I would say part of the problem is that it was pushed out in an incomplete form to try to preempt the launch date of Guild Wars. In addition, the lead designer was interviewed about the upcoming battlegrounds, and he demonstrated a shameful lack of understanding

      • I would say part of the problem is that it was pushed out in an incomplete form to try to preempt the launch date of Guild Wars. In addition, the lead designer was interviewed about the upcoming battlegrounds, and he demonstrated a shameful lack of understanding of how PvP actually works in practice on the regular realms ("Alliance outnumber horde? Oh, that's just a misconception, it's not really true. And we're looking to fix that. Massive lag around the massive battle areas? That's all in your head."). Th
        • What does HONOR system and Battlegrounds have to do with each other?

          For one, Battlegrounds has been Blizzard's constant mantra for the last week. "Don't like the current honor system? It's ok, Battlegrounds will fix it. Immense lagfests in Tarren Mill/Crossroads/etc? That's ok, Battlegrounds will draw away the masses of players seeking honor. Level 48 characters can't even poke their noses outside of the towns on PvP servers without getting splattered by level 60 chars seeking honor? That's ok, Battlegr

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