MMORPG.com's Jon Wood uses his column this week to talk about the idea of completely re-imagining the way that MMORPGs are constructed.

It's difficult to argue that there isn't at least a little bit of stagnation in the MMO industry right now. There are a lot of theories as to why this might be. Some point to the growing trend toward item shop revenue models and the perceived greed of companies that makes these games. Others point at Blizzard's behemoth World of Warcraft as the source of all of the genre's woes, suggesting that because of its success all games that come after it are copies.

Whatever the specific reason, it is difficult to argue that the MMORPG genre isn't in some kind of decline. The last few years of releases haven't exactly lived up to their hype and scepticism about each and every game that is announced seems to climb as games move closer and closer to launch.

Read Rebooting or Re-Imagining the Genre.

As a pre-tram UO player I compare every new MMO to what UO was - a world where you could do anything...

Take a boat out to explore/fish the sea....get attked by sea monster and get killed. Your a ghost on a island unknown to you and you cant figure out how to come back to life.....the game had housing.....skill based advancment ect.

However I wouldnt go as far as saying the MMORPG genre is in any type of  "decline"...in fact new and innovative titles are being worked on all over the board, the problem is, however, funding for INDIE projects.

Lets face it, a lot of these indie MMORPGs who ARE trying to do something different are NOT popular.

So instead of saying the genres in decline...instead we need to actually buy innovative titles that come out, in numbers that resemble WoW before we start seeing new concepts becoming mainstream.

I don't think rebooting the genre with people who have no MMO experience is the right way to go.  In fact I think that is the opposite of the right way.  People who are familiar with the genre, not only creating MMOs, but strong community members and people who have played a wide variety of the games would be the best people to send this genre in a new direction.

They know what's been done, they know what is old, but there are some who really think outside of the box, who choose to take on alternative solutions to the many problems indicated.  If we start over from scratch, we'll make the same mistakes again and get ourselves no where. 

Innovation comes from what is already there, not knowing history dooms you to repeat it.  This is no different in this medium.  To make good games, you have to think what the player wants, you have to do what your audience wants you to do. 

My understanding may be a little off, but everyone always talks about MMOs being incredibly expensive endeavors.  Why is that?  I can understand how servers could be costly, and people are always expensive on an annual basis, but I just don't understand how these things can cost over 10 million dollars  for a group of people to build the kind of game players want these days (Huge world with a thousand features).

Is most of this money put into advertising?  Then maybe we're hyping too much.  Maybe all these failures are simply due to overhype.  Hype helps nothing but initial box sales, and those aren't what cover the input costs.  Why do MMOs feel the need to advertise and go to conferenses all over the world when their game isn't due out for another 2 or more years?  I think 3 to 6 months prior would be enough time to get all the MMO sites in a stir about a game that has had virtually no press (because they didn't pay for it) to just pop up and start beta testing.

So really, why is all this money needed?  Why can't independent companies make games that are up to par with the AAA MMOs (even though many ARE)?  Why are most MMOs judged before they are even touched?

I think this lack of innovation is just something in our heads because we've become more demanding, and it's not the developers that are missing out on this, it's the investors.

The meaning of MMO can not be changed.  That is - you play with other players. Even tho Massively mutliplayer could be argued in games like WOW compared to games like EVE.

What could change is the way ppl play with and against each other. Levels,  PVE and PVP, quest driven soloplay or grinding seems to be what this genre is all about.  Maybe it doesn't have to be like that.  EVE online did things in new ways when it came to levels - They created one huge gaming universe instead of many servers.  Who is to say that others can't do the same?  How about a MMO game that has more of puzzle elements ?   Or even more of exploration elements like Im hoping Star Trek will turn into.  I loved the old Star Trek games cause they had the feeling of the unknown - going into spacestations that were infected with stuff - or down to diffrent planets.  Hell  - even coming to the planet and scanning it to see the type - name - if it was habbited and what kind of culture was on it.  That was EXITING.  Im actually hoping Star Trek can be more than just a Shootem PVP -PVE style of a game. But tbh it doesn't look good what I have seen so far.  Even the Bridge seems to be turned into a "housing" feature rather than coming up with new things.  

Maybe we will need another Indy company to make something new for this genre.  The big guys seems to only think about money and the safe way to make more money.  Hopefully gamers are willing to give indy companies like CCP (EVE online) some chance to create something diffrent. 

My hope when it comes to something new in MMOs is through Free to play.  Alot of things can be experimented on in these games IF the devs really want to.  How about a game without levels for example ?  How about more of a loyalty or reputation with diffrent factions ?  How about going out of the box with new races? 

Finally, and I think that this is both the most important and the most improbable requirement on this list, we would have to find qualified, competent developers who had never played an MMO, and had their own set of ideas about how best to handle the idea of taking the core of a role playing game, either the electronic version or the pen and paper version, and create an online world that will allow thousands of players to exist and interact within. Just take a minute and consider the possibilities that this might open up. How, for example, would someone who had never head of the concept of instancing decide to tackle their content? How would people unfamiliar with raiding and gear grinding handle the concept of an endgame? The possibilities are endless.

Id like to draw a parallel between this quote and evolutionary convergence. In nature, evolution often finds the same solution to the same problem, and it does this independantly. The common ancestor of the human and the octopus was blind. Men and octopuses evolved seperately for millions of years. Yet, in both cases, eyes were developed, and not only that, but nature built them from the same material, crystalline I believe.

So, to answer what would come out of a mmo if it was developed by people with zero knowledge about how mmos work? chances are we would see something very similar to what we already have today. If they didnt have the concept of instancing, Im almost sure that they would come up with it again. Somethings would be different, sure, but I think the end result would be something we would all recognize.

My 2 cents.

You are right about the "newness" thing, but wrong about how to get it back.  

WOW in large part was a big hit because (1) It had a lot of people who had gone through the good and bad of EQ and (2) it had  staff that had deep experience in producing popular game software which led to (3) don't release anything until you have it right, and have the knowhow to get it right.

And don't tell me WOW wasn't a new step.    The behemoth of MMOs was EQ at the time.   400k subs?   WOW has had, what, 10 million or like 25 times as many?!    Innovation can be how you execute, put the parts together, and make it work.

Great ideas without the exceptional expertise needed to carry them out are pretty useless, except for day dreaming.  Its a pretty old canard that people who are new to a field will somehow bring "fresh air" that will create new breakthroughs.    Nope, its usually the people who have been beaten bloody by the problems and realities of an endeavor that can imagine how to create something special with existing tools.

My guess...the next great MMO will come from...you guessed it....those trolls at Blizzard.   Does anyone else have the wherewithal to even try anything but a clone?    Oh yeah, I would love to see the next new genre coming out of a garage.

(sigh)

Originally posted by bamdorf

My guess...the next great MMO will come from...you guessed it....those trolls at Blizzard.   Does anyone else have the wherewithal to even try anything but a clone?    Oh yeah, I would love to see the next new genre coming out of a garage.

(sigh)

 

 

 

EVE online did not come from any trolls are any ppl that had done things exactly like all the others.  They evolved their game with very nailed down features that they thought woud make a great game.  And it was a TOTALLY new epxerince when it came to the MMO genre.  What other MMO game is beeing played on one server with 50-100 K ppl playing simutaniously ?  None.  

And another thing about EVE that is also very special when it comes to this genre.  I talked about this yesterday and I will do so again today.  They actually evolve their game based on SUB money.  NOT on payed for expansions.  And this has imropved the ENTIRE game of EVE  - from starting experience - up to the top corps.  And this happens with every single expansion.  Right now games like AOC are talking about their payed for expansion that will in no way change the first 20 levels of the game - and just change the next 50 in minor ways.  

Payed for expansions in this case actually PREVENT the games to really evolve over time.  Thats why game like WOW is still stuck with the same starting quests as day one - even tho totally new CONTINENTS have been discovered in the past 5 years. And all because the developers were busy making EXTRA money with new expansions.  Instead of focusing on improving the content they had.  In fact - you can argue that Blizzard has infact REDUCED the value of that content since most dungeons and almost all raids from both vanilla and TBC are now pointless.  New players that are coming to the games today can not enjoy the challenges of that content because the developer isn't updating the game along with the expansions they are throwing out - Just because they are focusing on getting extra money.

Shoudln't subs be enough to maintain a crew to at least evolve the old content of these games ?   How can EVE do it while other games can't ?   

Well Jon, I have asked similar questions on these very boards.. I want to see another "Top Secret" (you remember that project right?) styled attempt where the community of gamers as a whole gets a chance to create a new MMO (just not something silly like a racing MMO)... I think this is where the industry should go.. let's give gamers, independents and other non-big corporations the chance to prove that great games CAN be created by something other than some big moneyed interests.

just my .02 influence.

 MMO's are in a decline and the answers seem simple, the people that play MMO's, the creative people with ideas, they do not possess the skills needed to program a game, nor the resources to develop one. A long time ago, back in the days of MUD's, I realized that the most talented coders seem to code the least imaginative stuff.

 MMO's will re-emerge the day that company's like EA and SOE, decide to take a chance and hire designers with new and possibly difficult to implement ideas(due to them not being done before). I am sure that the current state of computer tech does limit the creation process to a large degree, yet not so much that we keep seeing the same rehashed ideas in a new skin.

 The MMO genre is a widely untapped genre that has so much potential, that I believe people simply do not know what to do with it. Its the same reason why some people do not play games such as Fallout 3. It seems that most people need their hand held while they are forced down a linear path ending up with a re-skin of the same old Korean grind fest (coughAioncough). Where are all the MMOFPS at? Im cant speak for you, but Planetside is the only MMOFPS that I see. Where are all the MMORTS games. Where are the MMOFPSRTS games. A game that allows one side to play like its an RTS, directing the flow of mobs, while another side plays like its and fps, and maybe even another side that plays like the standard MMORPG. A game like this would be intense,

 I have pondered for a long time about a game where multiple kingdoms fight over a land, where playing each kingdom was almost like playing a different game in of itself. A game were one player is controlling his pack of wargs, directing them to attack a small village, and another player is playing his steampunk golem manuall aiming and shooting his steam powered rifle at a pack of wargs attacking his village.

 So much potential, so many ideas, so who is to blame for the stagnation. I guess everyone is to blame...

Originally posted by Toquio3

Finally, and I think that this is both the most important and the most improbable requirement on this list, we would have to find qualified, competent developers who had never played an MMO, and had their own set of ideas about how best to handle the idea of taking the core of a role playing game, either the electronic version or the pen and paper version, and create an online world that will allow thousands of players to exist and interact within. Just take a minute and consider the possibilities that this might open up. How, for example, would someone who had never head of the concept of instancing decide to tackle their content? How would people unfamiliar with raiding and gear grinding handle the concept of an endgame? The possibilities are endless.

 

Id like to draw a parallel between this quote and evolutionary convergence. In nature, evolution often finds the same solution to the same problem, and it does this independantly. The common ancestor of the human and the octopus was blind. Men and octopuses evolved seperately for millions of years. Yet, in both cases, eyes were developed, and not only that, but nature built them from the same material, crystalline I believe.

So, to answer what would come out of a mmo if it was developed by people with zero knowledge about how mmos work? chances are we would see something very similar to what we already have today. If they didnt have the concept of instancing, Im almost sure that they would come up with it again. Somethings would be different, sure, but I think the end result would be something we would all recognize.

My 2 cents.

I think that's a very corret assessment.

And given that nothing exists in a vacuum, take two people who have no idea what an mmo currently is and set them to the task and they will draw upon their past experiences which will most likely have a lot of overlap.

My initial thought is that these games have to be planned by people who aren't developers.

there, I've said it. Now for the explanation before you all chase me up to the windmill with pitchforks in hand.

As an example, no matter what you think of Apple computer or Steve Jobs, there was a point where they were facing a particularly difficult design decision. Apparently Steve Jobs asked for something to be made and all his engineers said it couldn't be done. Well, given that it is essentially his company eventually the engineers put themselves to the task and though they kept saying "it couldn't be done", eventually they actually figured out how to do it.

Added to that example, my own experience with software developrs shows me that they are usually pretty smart people who have very definitive ideas on how something "should" be done. Also, they don't tend to be great at outside the box thinking. In addition, many of these mmo projects seem to suffer from bad management. From my own experience it seems that programmers are not great at documentation and that sometimes one side just doesn't know what the other side is doing.

I'm talking about truly outside the box thinking. They are smart as a whip and can handle all the minutiae of programming but I've never gotten from my programming friends that they are trailblazers in the originality department. It's almost as if you have to force a paradigm change on them.

As one of my friends told me "I don't see why you need to click on icons to run programs when typing in the commands is just as easy".

Obviously not everyone sees eye to eye with that and many people warmed up to computers the more user friendly and accessible they became.

What we need are game creators and writers to imagine worlds. We need players to talk about what they think is fun.

THEN we need the programmers to put those computer like brains in motion and make it happen. It's almost as if the game has to be created prior to the programming and that everything needs to be mapped out so that there isn't a lot of adding and subracting because ideas were not thought through.

To that end, perhaps some sort of prototype that has nothing to do with the graphics or fancy animations needs to be made so that the actual game play can be evaluated purely on game play.

In any case, those are my shoot from the hip thoughts.

Originally posted by UknownAspect

I don't think rebooting the genre with people who have no MMO experience is the right way to go.  In fact I think that is the opposite of the right way.  People who are familiar with the genre, not only creating MMOs, but strong community members and people who have played a wide variety of the games would be the best people to send this genre in a new direction.

They know what's been done, they know what is old, but there are some who really think outside of the box, who choose to take on alternative solutions to the many problems indicated.  If we start over from scratch, we'll make the same mistakes again and get ourselves no where. 

Innovation comes from what is already there, not knowing history dooms you to repeat it.  This is no different in this medium.  To make good games, you have to think what the player wants, you have to do what your audience wants you to do. 

 

I Agree.

Matter of fact, the closest we've had to that in recent years in Age of Conan; ie folks who came from a single player rpg background, and with a good rep in that arena, to boot.  Don't recall that going so well.

SWToR will be another company to give it a first shot.  We'll see how that goes.

IMO, it's not the current concept of a MMO that's failing; it's in the development communities ability to fulfill that concept that's failing.  AoC, WAR, and this year Champions Online are woefully short on content, thus they can't keep subs past 2-3 months.  They have fallen apart where content and/or gameplay rich games like WoW, Eve, and LotRO still hold strong.  There's enough going on in those games to keep people coming back month after month.

  I like to reboot the whole industry -- when I first started to play  Lord of the Rings, my son told me just wait till you get to th endgame. What ,this is a rpg it is not suppose to have an end game.  Yes it does,  well I lke to see it gone ,I believe a game once release should keep installing new story line or missions and quests every two week or every month.  I am an explorer I like to roam around and see the sights from diferent angles  

Some games  limit your  exploration   like Guild Wars,  Dungeon and Dragons online.  In Lord of Rings the Middle Earth what there is of it  yo just about go almost everywhere.   Now that brings me to  Star Wars Galaxies, Been playing it for almost 5 years now seen people come and go and come back.  There is one thing, You can go almost every where.

One thing  I  hate is when  SOE  merge an Card Game with it.  Shudders down my spine.

  To make  a great came KISS and follow  a basic story structure that ihas always an underlying goal but keeps being remove from ones grasp.

Gee to many words

Sololo  of Sliverlode of Lord of the Rings

I also think Blizzard's new IP game is going to be new genre game. I for one would like the ability to create a world and I think Blizzard knows I want to do this. I just need a decent set of tools so it doesn't take me ten years.

I think a reboot would be great. Since no games out today are anything like what was being made in the late 90's, going back to some of those mechanics and gameplay challenges would be new to most players. So in effect old would be new again.

Imagine if someone made a game like UO or EQ today just with much better graphics. Now imagine that there are no message boards like this one where people can be informed and learn about old games. These "new" games might just be lauded as innovative and a breath of fresh air for the genre.

Lets face it millions of players have WoW as their first and in many cases only MMO experience. How would those players fare in a UO or EQ style game? Would they complain that its to hard and quit or would they rise to the challenge and thrive in a challenge rich environment.

Bring back the old and make it new again. That would spice up the genre. May not be a WoW killer but would surely shake things up.

Originally posted by Frobner

Originally posted by bamdorf

My guess...the next great MMO will come from...you guessed it....those trolls at Blizzard.   Does anyone else have the wherewithal to even try anything but a clone?    Oh yeah, I would love to see the next new genre coming out of a garage.

(sigh)

 

 

 

 

EVE online did not come from any trolls are any ppl that had done things exactly like all the others.  They evolved their game with very nailed down features that they thought woud make a great game.  And it was a TOTALLY new epxerince when it came to the MMO genre.  What other MMO game is beeing played on one server with 50-100 K ppl playing simutaniously ?  None.  

And another thing about EVE that is also very special when it comes to this genre.  I talked about this yesterday and I will do so again today.  They actually evolve their game based on SUB money.  NOT on payed for expansions.  And this has imropved the ENTIRE game of EVE  - from starting experience - up to the top corps.  And this happens with every single expansion.  Right now games like AOC are talking about their payed for expansion that will in no way change the first 20 levels of the game - and just change the next 50 in minor ways.  

Payed for expansions in this case actually PREVENT the games to really evolve over time.  Thats why game like WOW is still stuck with the same starting quests as day one - even tho totally new CONTINENTS have been discovered in the past 5 years. And all because the developers were busy making EXTRA money with new expansions.  Instead of focusing on improving the content they had.  In fact - you can argue that Blizzard has infact REDUCED the value of that content since most dungeons and almost all raids from both vanilla and TBC are now pointless.  New players that are coming to the games today can not enjoy the challenges of that content because the developer isn't updating the game along with the expansions they are throwing out - Just because they are focusing on getting extra money.

Shoudln't subs be enough to maintain a crew to at least evolve the old content of these games ?   How can EVE do it while other games can't ?   

Simple answer:They can they're just too greedy to want to do it.

Long answer: It'd be a simply wonderful thing if games would let you get regular content as big as expansions w/o having to pay another dime beyond having to pay for each month of play. That's one thing that's turned me off of wow that plus the gear grind at end game.(scared me away from teh game pretty fast) Now hearing it from yet another person how fun EVE is. I might try it out. If you're currently playing and they have a "refer a friend" like item, feel free to send me the link.

Also most games which are developed are more interested in teh money rather than the enjoyment. It seemed to me, at least, via all the random things i keep hearing about CCP is that they're focused in getting someone, and keeping them. They're nto worried about shoving some random "expansion pack" down your throat to make it so you can't just keep playing but rather know that if you give it away for free players will just keep going.

Also the thing about the Macs. I completely agree with that statement. I looked at the APIs and how they worked from a code standpoint and i swore up and down that no coder actually designed those.  For the other post about a MMOFPSRTS game that'd actually be a REALLY interesting idea if done right.

The industry needs to hire people who haven't already had "traditional ways" shoved down their throats. Innovation is dampered when you're forced to learn "how it's supposed to be done".

Like some of the good gents here, i seriously doubt that hiring strangers to MMO's would bring innovation. The big problem with Blizzard's Antichrist, what makes it so reluctant to go away and leave us alone to rediscover sheer innovation(how i miss Planetside-like risk-taking experimenting), is that it's a generic concept of RPG, there's generic kill 10 rats and collect their testicles, there's simple levels, simple linear dungeons... they were so mcuh strangers that they didn't even know they had to make end-game content... surprise surprise now nobody knows how to handle end-game content. While before WoW we saw games that were BEAUTIFULLY conceived for their end-games but with unpleasant grindy character progression. 

MMO's were good and innovative because those designers were RIGHT BORN for conceiving multiplayer worlds. In my opinion those people conceived MMO's out of the ideal one: Ultima Online. That's a real online world, in a way WoW is not one.

Blizzard people WERE strangers to MMO's and made this 3-headed beast that's WoW.

To do an entirely different game one simply has to play WoW thoroughly for a year and then do an entirely different game.

And it's not even necessary, maybe, that you do a game that's 100% different... you just have to come up with a new way to conceive questing. 

A NEW WAY. And there's probably a MILLION ways to do that.

---

Originally posted by Frobner
 
EVE online did not come from any trolls are any ppl that had done things exactly like all the others.  They evolved their game with very nailed down features that they thought woud make a great game.  And it was a TOTALLY new epxerince when it came to the MMO genre.  What other MMO game is beeing played on one server with 50-100 K ppl playing simutaniously ?  None.  

<snip>

Shoudln't subs be enough to maintain a crew to at least evolve the old content of these games ?   How can EVE do it while other games can't ?   

---

I was just thinking this same thing the other day. Why oh why do expansions & content updates almost always focus exclusively on top end content? Why can't new content be available to players from level 1 ffs? Very few mmos have done this well, only CoH/CoV comes to mind. For some of us casual, time-limited players, new end-game content is about as useful as an ashtray on a motorbike & just as likely to push us away from a game, than see us stay & grind in the hopes that some day we'll get to see where these crumbs thrown at us by the devs lead.

OTOH Frobner, I think EVE leaves a lot to be desired in many other gameplay areas. It's no more 'one server' than GW (& less accessible in any case); has heaps of issues for PvE players or soloers & overall is a ganker's paradise. The free content/exp model based purely on subs seems to work, but personally I'd rather see a pay once only model like GW become more prolific. Another example of greed mixed with stupidity - the reason more mmos don't adopt this model is an utter mystery, given GW is financially a *huge* success, in the top 5 all time mmos anyway last I checked. I guess most devs aren't confident enough of the initial & ongoing sales creating a sustained revenue base that good ol greed wins out - "let's copy WoW's sub model as they're raking it in!". Pfft. Something like ATITD is far more 'one server' (it in fact is) & innovative than most other shootemup/grindfest mmos these days, but seeing it's so retro & you can't kill shit...
Bring on GW2 I say! :)

---

Originally posted by Sololo
 Some games  limit your  exploration   like Guild Wars,  Dungeon and Dragons online. 

---

Very bad example with GW there. It has a *wealth* of exploration & no end game to speak of (in a traditional mmo/raid sense). In fact, it makes the level cap (20th) trivial, so that everything that comes after the first 20 'tutorial' levels is all about gameplay: missions, quests, grouping/socialising, crafting, collecting, not to even mention the entire other half of the game, the PvP aspects, which aren't my cuppa.

LOTRO, as great as it is, is a bit of a grindfest & quite repetitive at lower levels. You don't really start to get into the storyline until you're well into the 20s. It also suffers from a mid-game slump - every character from 25-35 has to do Lonelands/Northdowns/Evendim all over again, which gets tiresome. They should have created more low & mid game content, rather than focused on the past 2 expansions I say. I, for one of many, may never see Moria or Mirkwood.

I do agree that mmos need to allow a lot more freedom of movement/exploration though. Let me climb, fly, burrow, dive to anywhere I can see or imagine getting to if I had the means. GW is very limiting with the 'on-rails' levels & no jumping or climbing over obstacles. AoC has added a nice touch with the climbing skill more recently, but I still want a far more true 360 degrees of freedom, even in fantasy mmos. Gothic 3 id this very well as an offline crpg - a vast world & I could get to any place I could scale or see in the distance on the horizon.
Nothing worse than feeling like your character is more limited than you would be in the real world. I might be getting older & fatter, but I reckon I could climb most of the trees that most mmos simply ignore as an option & relegate to obstacles/scenery.
Outcast mmo anyone? <G>

Things that are sorely missing from these so-called persistent world: persistence!
So few mmos allow us to create & destory content, add our own missions/levels/storylines & generally feel like we have a real impact on the world. The trick is to making us feel like the hero/protagonist while at the same time allowing thousands of players to coexist. I've had some ideas about this kind of mmo for a long time now, but I doubt it will ever see pen to paper, much less the light of day. Oh well, guess I'll just keep hacking & slashing from one mmo to the next, in the hopes that someone, some day, will pleasantly surprise me :).

Btw ppl, stop blaming Blizztard & WoW - as bad & evil as they/it is <g>, you can go right back to EQ (& possibly M59 before it) to blame for this style of gameplay. Nuff said? Game over.

they dont need to reboot or re-image the genre at all, there are some promising games coming out in the next year.

As far as a reboot, I feel that you don't need to throw out the history to encourage new ideas.  It would be kind of like pulling people off the street to design cars or airplanes.  You just don't do it!  They might have fresh ideas, but they also don't know what has been done before and failed horribly.  Adding in people to the TEAM that are fresh is a good thing, but they would still need to have people in charge that have been through the wars.  I totally understand your premise, but I feel that it won't work as stated.

As far as LotRO goes, I love the game and applaud Turbine for the expansions and the redo of Bree and now Lone lands.  Since you haven't played in a while Nostromo, I'd encourage you to go back and see what all has changed.  They have changed Breeland and Lonelands to make everything flow better as you level.  I wish all companies cared about their games as much as Turbine does with LotRO.