In this week's list, MMORPG.com Managing Editor Jon Wood takes a look at past and present winners of MMORPG.com's Most Anticipated Game awards to see if, in hindsight, those much looked for games lived up to the hype.

Every year, usually sometime between Christmas and New Year, video game sites hand out their hardware. Every site does it different, and we at MMORPG.com has traditionally held two levels of awards. Our editorial awards are chosen by the staff, while the Reader's Choice awards are based on popular vote. More recently, we moved to solely Reader's Choice awards, with our own nominations.

Since 2005, MMORPG.com has given out a number of awards in many different categories. While most of those categories reflect on the year that was, one category consistently looks forward: The Most Anticipated Game.

A number of different games have taken home MMORPG.com's Most Anticipated award, but today we take a look back to see what became of those games when they stopped being anticipated and move into the "launched" category?

Read Most Anticipated Games: Where Are They?

Kudos on good article.

Realistic and eye opening (for some) ... its time to wake up and smell the roses.

MMO development was a disaster , well almost ever since it started

 Indeed a good read,I wonder how it would have looked from say 2000-2004.

Ok that is pre-wow but I just wonder how the hype factor between mmo release's has changed,alot of new players and alot of devs rushing out title's to grab some of the market.

The hype machine is alive and well and I think starts to dig the grave for unreleased mmo's,anyway lets hope the trend changes and 1 of the title's this year manage's to live upto it,I guess in the near future MO and Aion are next in the firing line..

Good reading, and also good to see what was hot then, and what has happened to the games by now ;)

Personally, I've followed the hype twice (AoC and WAR), and I was greatly disappointed, and I was not the only one. Perhaps the hype around games makes the preassure on the developers too big that they release their games way too early..?

Good Article!

Lets hope future games do better than some of thier predecessors.

Just goes to show, making MMORPG's is hard, and few (if any) have met the expectations since WOW launched so many years ago.  The bar is just too high perhaps?

Good article.

Looking at the "winners" from each year and how they turned out it just reinforced a belief that I already held: MMO Awards mean/predict nothing. I've played all the winners (and the runners up if they've launched) and all of them were "incomplete" with respect to my preferences in some major way. Sure, I understand that no game can be all things to everyone, but noone of them had enough of "it" to keep me playing more than a few months. It's not a matter of "you only played a few months you didn't experience everything!". In the first two weeks playing roughly 5 hours a day during the week and 6+ on Sat/Sun you get a good sense of what a game is about.

But, what can you say. "Settling" is the way of the day and as the majority tows that line, well. *shrug*

Originally posted by Kyleran

Just goes to show, making MMORPG's is hard, and few (if any) have met the expectations since WOW launched so many years ago.  The bar is just too high perhaps?

 

WoW never set the bar. It leeched off already provem MMO's gameplay taking the elements many had requested in other games and put them in their own.  World of Warcraft is one of the reasons WAR flopped  as it was spewed from the tongue of Mark Jacobs that part of the design of WAR was to try and draw in WoW subscribers ie the scenario fiasco.. The games with staying power have been out for ages, EQ, DAOC, LOTRO, COH, COV and thats really about it oh yeah EVE. I waited rougly 2 years for the game to save all WAR just to cancel my account after the free month because it  provided me nothing of what i wanted in an MMO. I'm still playing DAOC. Why? There isn't nothing better out or coming out anytime soon. Truth be told all of the big hitters as listed in the opening thread were flops. Yes they have made improvments but first impressions are win or lose anymore because us gamers simply wont put up with unfinished games anymore.  Not at this point in MMO gaming history.

I know what i want in a game. A game like Dark Age of Camelot thats brought up to date with the same RVR combat mechanics that currently exists. graphics, an AH system , more housing and all would be good.  Yeah DAOC 2.0. You listening Mr. Jacobs.

Short version:

Winning Most Anticipated Game = Kiss of Death.

Three years of hoping for greatness and recieving sub-par junk doesn't bode well for 2009's winner...

Looks like the award pretty much has the lead touch.  While some of these games still could be winners it will be a long while before that happens.

I do agree that DAoC had better RvR than War does.  Not sure why Mythic deviated from a successful design.  Maybe they will eventually get the message.

A long string of failures brings us to the present.  No wonder I am so bored and cynical these days. 

I think some of the upcoming games are incorporating elements that many mmo players have rejected in previous examples listed in this article, but because some companies have deep pockets or a popular intellectual property, they feel they can pour money into a game's fancy graphics and dazzle us with high production values.  Well, game design will always trump a pretty presentation, despite all the fancy graphical effects, atleast in the long run.

The other mistake I see being made is the hybridization of mmo's and single player games.  Ofcourse there is a cross over market, as many people play a multitude of games across multiple genres.  But many people play mmo's for very specific reasons, just as people who play single player games also have specific expectations.  By catering to one group, you usually end up alienating the other.

Then there is the other hurdle, which follows my previous point.  Many of the single player crowd WILL NOT pay a monthly sub.  For whatever reason, they can not justify a $15 a month sub.  So game companies institute the cash shops, alienating their mmo base further.

In essence, it seems that game companies have become so intent on growing their player base that they have forgotten how to keep the base they already had.  The most egregious example of this that comes to my mind is SWG's NGE, but there are sadly many more examples of mmo companies abandoning their current player base for imaginary players that never materialize.

And finally and perhaps most profoundly, Blaaaa bla bla blaaa bla bla bla blaaaa.  Because this shit has all been stated before by many people around here who are more intelligent and eloquent than myself, and yet nothing changes.

I take exception to:

"It is far too soon to tell what the future holds for Darkfall, but its development and release has captured the attention, both positive and negative, of many MMO fans."

The game has been out 12 weeks..!  Has 9k players with nearly 50% retainment rate. Darkfall is an utter flop. It's time MMORPG starts to stand up for it's community members (user base) and stop fronting cupcakes to these Developers. Have a backbone for once and just call out these half-wit deveopers. We demand more from you MMORPG.com. Or at least expect you to be honest with us and yourself. 

This publication/website has lost a lot of respect over the last few months. With shoddy reviews and biased reporting.

I can but help seeing all these so-called MMO gurus in their board meetings trying to hype their teams on these wonderful ideas they have for the games mentioned above. Based on recent releases it seems they have no clue, or have lost any clue, on a "successful vision" in making an MMO. That, or they're trying to stay too middle ground in design. I'd like to be a version of the Scottish guy in this video(tv commercial) but instead in those design meetings.

Think, Jimmy!

Erowid420:  I see nothing wrong with the quote, infact it's accurate.  The game made an impact both positive and negative on the community, at least it's not all been positioned as positive spin.

If you feel you want to make a deeper mark then step up and offer your services

Originally posted by Erowid420

It's time MMORPG starts to stand up for it's community members (user base) and stop fronting cupcakes to these Developers. Have a backbone for once and just call out these half-wit deveopers. We demand more from you MMORPG.com. Or at least expect you to be honest with us and yourself. 

This publication/website has lost a lot of respect over the last few months. With shoddy reviews and biased reporting.

 

LOL.  This ain't the New York Times, pal.  (Much to their credit.)

All you have to do is ask yourself ,how many bigtime developers are there in the mMORPG industry?Not many at all,before Blizzard and WOW even they were a low budget operation ,actually losing money.

The ONLY bigtime MMORPG developer was SOE,this is why you get half finished half ass effort put into MMO's.Sorry Square Enix has actually been a giant for some time as they turned their operation around way back in the FF7 days,thanx in part to SOE's Playstation.Maybe one day Microsoft will outsource a MMORPG with an unlimited budget and give us something amazing,we can only dream i guess.

Epic games is a giant when you consider they have decent cash flow,they have arguably the best gaming engine on the planet and have created a pretty good series in the Unrealtournament lineup,all this done with a paltry 70+  employees.IMO EPIC would be a great addition to the MMORPG industry,but as of now they just don't have the interest to expand in that direction,they are forever upgrading their Unreal engine.

So until we see some more giants enter the realm,you can expect some half ass projects,that never reach their full potential.I guess Bethesda has been around awhile and they claim to be spending tons on their next MMO,so perhaps some expectation could be garnered in that direction.Many are waiting for Square Enix to come out with a new MMO and of course Blizzard has their flock of sheep,that expect Blizzard to make something happen.The rest of the developers are groups of employees that were former employees of other orgs and a dabble of others ,so i would not have any great expectations right now.

I don't get hyped by anything or have high expectations,i just wait and see the final product that comes out.Just because some website hypes up a game ,it means nothing to me,i don't let others influence me at all,i make my own decisions.Then what criteria will be shown here?sucess based solely on subscriptions?this means nothing to the individual,unless yo uare a follower and play games just because the masses are.

Originally posted by Erowid420

I take exception to:

"It is far too soon to tell what the future holds for Darkfall, but its development and release has captured the attention, both positive and negative, of many MMO fans."

 

The game has been out 12 weeks..!  Has 9k players with nearly 50% retainment rate. Darkfall is an utter flop. It's time MMORPG starts to stand up for it's community members (user base) and stop fronting cupcakes to these Developers. Have a backbone for once and just call out these half-wit deveopers. We demand more from you MMORPG.com. Or at least expect you to be honest with us and yourself. 

This publication/website has lost a lot of respect over the last few months. With shoddy reviews and biased reporting.

 

Speak for yourself.

And Darkfall trolls have yet another article to make their way into. Just shut up and let the game die if you think it fails so hard, shouldn't be hard to not care about the game if you hate it.

Interesting read, although it's a pretty "what if" question is games had been more succesful released with the content released post-release. The question might be pretty much "no", as players will find flaws and bash through them, and as the developers would have no idea of what the community wants (which happens if you release the game), they wouldn't add the same content. Now releasing a game with tons of bugs and mechanics that don't work as they were supposed in the plans, that's a lack of QA.

I just have the feeling that MMOs should stop charging people for retail cost AND monthly fees and decide to go for one of either ways - expansions every 3 or 6 months with a retail price with new content or monthly fees with no retail price. This, when combined with the lack of trials when a game is released, makes a huge amount of people to pay the retail price while emotionally carried by the hype for the new game and then not re-sub it. It just feels like an evil short-term money maker, MMOs should be more open in this sense, could even go SoE's station thing way.

Originally posted by daylight01

 Indeed a good read,I wonder how it would have looked from say 2000-2004.

Ok that is pre-wow but I just wonder how the hype factor between mmo release's has changed,alot of new players and alot of devs rushing out title's to grab some of the market.

The hype machine is alive and well and I think starts to dig the grave for unreleased mmo's,anyway lets hope the trend changes and 1 of the title's this year manage's to live upto it,I guess in the near future MO and Aion are next in the firing line..

When I visited the site pre-WoW, according to my memory, there wasn't a hype machin. This site wasn't wildly popular like it is now. People seemed to be just fans of the genre instead of rabid fanbois of a certain game.

Now, it just seems like we get these rabid fanbois that refuse to see reason, or have an agenda. The first game I noticed this was D&L then Vanguard, then it was every game. Everything was pointing towards disasters, but the fanbois violently defended the games. I don't know what makes a fanboi. I'm curious, because too many of them take it as a personal assault if you don't love their game.

For some reason fanbois also think that players from other games come in and bash the game. Nope, doesn't happen fanbois. Maybe some fanbois from the past disasters(vanguard, D&L, AOC) can come tell us why they feel this way.

I think we should see an editorial on the rise of these rabid fanbois, and what is the motivating force behind it.

/puts on robe and wizard hat

What's wrong with the MMO industry is the same thing that's wrong with everything in the entertainment industry. Society is changing, and it'll take a few years before advertisers, developers, investors, and "thinkers" catch up to it and figure out how to sell to the new "masses". Look at the state of the world. Things are a shade different now, than they were 12-13 years ago. Rome wasn't built in a day, but it's decline was slow too.