Running in the Special Olympics

Discussion of the Evolving Nature of the MMO Industry from an Outsider's Perspective

Author: PhatWOP

Hello again,

Today I would like to touch on a subject I touched upon breifly last month in my initial blog entry. The hunger for new content. In all of the games I have played, the player base, no matter what they think of the game when it initially launches, inevitably wants more and more from the humble designers. Now I have not interviewed every player in every game I have played, and indeed have little deisre to talk to those babbling unwashed masses, so I can not say for certain that EVERY player wants these things, but certainly the friends I have spoken to in person and the posts I read on the forums often lean in this direction.

And why shouldn't they? Most players of an MMO want something implemented the game does not currently have. The Acheivers want more levels, quests or raids, the crafter want more recipes, more slaes options and a stronger economy, the Role-Players want new "social" options, cosmetic changes and mini-games and the explorers want more space and land to explore. I discussed the issues with trying to play to all of these bases at the same time in my blog Pulling up a Seat at the Buffet so I encourage you to read that if you want to hear my opinions on those topics. As the wise sages of Van Halen once said, "Everybody wants some, I want some too."

Enough shameless David Lee Roth promotion.

I am going to assume, for the sake of argument, that the developers can in fact create additional content at a reasonable speed to meet some of these needs. The question then becomes can they do it fast enough?

I submit to you they can not.

Certainly from the moment even the most successful MMO launches the designers realize that their product has a lifespan. Like a new child born into the world, it will eventually grow, mature, wither and die. We have only really seen this progression with a few games at this still relatively early period of development in the MMO world, but several titles are certainly showing their age lines (I'm looking at you UO and EQ).

The goal then of the developers is not to continue creating content ad nauseum, but simply long enough to mee the projected end of the project's lifespan. For this, they must keep people subscribing and the current sentiment seems to be that for people to stay focused, you must introduce new shiny bits for them to play with.

Whether or not you agree with this idea, I think it bears fruit in the industry. Content is pushed, expansions are announced and features are updated, all with the idea that the customers will continue to drop their fees and (hopefully) not go explore a new game.

Now  let me explain why this concept is fundamentally flawed from its very onset.

Galactus, a marvel comics character (sometimes depicted as a big guy in a puplish suit with a moe haircut (see the Hercules 4-part mini-series if you don't believe me) and most recently depicted as what I can only guess was stock footage from ID4 in the most recent Fantastic 4 debacle, is a world eater. The thrust of his character is that he must destroy planets and "eat" them in some way or another, hence wiping out whatever race happens to be using that particular rock at that particular time. The real problem with Galactus is that he can't get full. Apparently planets are alot like Pringles, once you pop, you just can't stop.

In this metaphor, Galactus is the MMO player btw, just in case you hadn't picked up on my subtle innuendo.

No the first attempts to "Galactus" all met with failure until eventually Norrin Radd sacrifced himself to become the herald of the monster. Hoping to delay and stall big "G" or just lead him to an unihabited planet.

That is analagous to our modern theory of how to solve what I will call the "content problem". Instead of defeating the problem, we try to simply feed it more, delay it with promises of future updates or distract it with flashy "updates" that don't really add much to the game or simply fix bugs that were already there.

But that is not how heroes work is it?

To stop Galactus, feeding him more planets is a bad solution, we have to defeat the beast outright! Now I hear what you are saying, "Oh you are so clever and hot and smart and..." wait, that isn't what you're saying, sorry. You are saying that's a silly enough analogy, but the fact is people want more stuff in their games, you can't "slay" that desire.

Nonsense.

In the way we designe current MMOs you can't but if there was a concerted effort in that direction. An effort for more creative programming combined with technologies not currently available (but that may well be available in five to ten years) we could slay the beast.

Imagine repeatable quests that were NOT simply Kill X or take X to Y, but changed everytime you repeated them with different goals and evolving stories. Imagine a deatiled crafting system where the properties of the items created were not set, but the game simply had base guidelines based on materials and through experimentation and creation, new items with new powers were being introduced into the game constantly. Imagine a dynamic Raid area that reacted when it was cleanesed of monsters and its bosses killed. Maybe new monsters and new bosses moved in or better yet, the players overtake the instance and can "stock" it as they see fit.  As I said, these ideas are super-difficult, if not impossible now, but in five years or ten years, this is where the industry will need to go if it ever wants to destroy the beast that is "content craving".

The point of all of these ideas, and I am sure that many of you could take it even farther, is that they would minimize the need for additional content. In effect, the game itself would be CREATING new content through its player base. Only new BASE features would ever be introduced through expansions or updates.

Without this sort of adancement, any game is doomed to run on the treadmill forever and still suffer loses through attrition. Their speed of programming can not possibly keep up with the players speed in accomplishing the tasks. Acheivers and Explorers will constantly shift to new games that offer new challenges while crafters and role-players can essentially "ply their trade" in any game that offers a friendly enviroment for those playstyles.

Until next time, read the sign and Don't Feed Galactus!