The MMO genre is of course, currently dominated by World of Warcraft, which we all know, love, hate, respect, etc.
However since WoW's release, many other MMOs have risen to the table, and failed (Warhammer: Age of Reckoning, Age of Conan, Lord of the Rings Online, etc.).
Now below I'm going to put 3 quotes from developers of ArenaNet, BioWare, and Blizzard, the 3 contenders as I see having the highest chance of succeeding and/or changing the MMO genre. The games they are developing? Guild Wars 2, Star Wars: The Old Republic, and Blizzards' new-gen MMO code-named 'Titan' (confirmed to be a entirely new franchise).
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Blizzard's new-gen MMO 'Titan', Blizzard CEO Mike Horhaime[PRINT SOURCE] "To break the mold, sometimes you have to start over."
"We're really trying to leverage all the lessons we learned through the years. Some of which we were able to address in World of Warcraft and others that maybe because of the design decisions we've made, you just can't address. So we're kind of taking a step back with all that knowledge to make something that's completely new and fresh."
BioWare's Star Wars: The Old Republic, BioWare developer Greg Zeschuk[PRINT SOURCE] "It [World of Warcraft] is a touchstone. It has established standards, it's established how you play an MMO. Every MMO that comes out, I play and look at it. And if they break any of the WoW rules, in my book that's pretty dumb."
ArenaNet's Guild Wars 2, Guild Wars 2 Manifesto Trailer[VIDEO SOURCE] "We founded ArenaNet to innovate, so Guild Wars 2 is our opportunity to question everything, to make a game that defies existing conventions. If you love MMOs, you'll want to check out Guild Wars 2, and if you hate MMOs, you'll really want to check out Guild Wars 2. Guild Wars 2 takes everything you love about Guild Wars 1 and puts it into a persistent world that's got more active combat, a fully-branching, personalized storyline, a new event system to get people playing together, and still no monthly fees."
"We do not want to build the same MMO everyone else is building, and in Guild Wars 2, it's your world. It's your story. You affect things around you in a very permanent way."
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So, going from the 3 quotes above (and any other sources people desire to put in as long as it's accurate) which company/game do you think will change the MMO genre? Which company (companies) do you support? What do you think is the path the MMO genre will go?
I honestly don't think the MMO genre will change that much over the next few years. The revolution came when World of Warcraft was released, took the best out of Ultima Online and Everquest and made it easier for beginners with a good learning curve.
As long as the next MMOs are hotkey based, there won't be a revolution to change the genre. That's why DC Universe Online is doing a decent job so far. It's far more action oriented, storytelling is exciting and the graphics are better. But again, it didn't change the genre much either
I think that what's needed to change the genre is Guild Wars 2 and Star Wars: The Old Republic to become great games and provide competition to Blizzard. For starters to make WoW better and then to give them ideas for their next gen MMO.
I honestly don't think the MMO genre will change that much over the next few years. The revolution came when World of Warcraft was released, took the best out of Ultima Online and Everquest and made it easier for beginners with a good learning curve.
As long as the next MMOs are hotkey based, there won't be a revolution to change the genre. That's why DC Universe Online is doing a decent job so far. It's far more action oriented, storytelling is exciting and the graphics are better. But again, it didn't change the genre much either
I think that what's needed to change the genre is Guild Wars 2 and Star Wars: The Old Republic to become great games and provide competition to Blizzard. For starters to make WoW better and then to give them ideas for their next gen MMO.
Honestly? I'm expecting a massive decline in BioWare, Mass Effect series didn't impress me, Dragon Age: Origins was decent but it's sequel isn't looking like it, and Star Wars: The Old Republic I think is taking the wrong path shown in the quote in the OP.
I think Blizzard's new-gen MMO and Guild Wars 2 will revolutionize the genre again. Guild Wars 2 is straying away from the 'WoW template' and Blizzard's new-gen MMO is doing the same. Innovation brings change.
So yes I'll be getting Guild Wars 2 (great game and excellent for college) and hope with the addition of Blizzard's new-gen MMO it brings competition and revolutionary results to the genre.
I understand Bioware's reasoning, that's why i'm not ruling out SW:TOR. Dragon Age: Origins was amazing. Mass Effect never was my style so i didn't pay much attention but Dragon Age 2 looks extremely promising. They're masters in story telling and creating interesting stories. The fact that they know WoW and they know that it already does certain things very very well is good for them. Blizzard learnt from the other MMOs while creating WoW, they didn't reinvent the genre.
What the Guild Wars 2 team is doing is... too risky. I hope they succeed, but i seriously doubt it. The way they talked on the interview was pretty much PR talk. "Check our game, it's awesome and different than anything else" so i'm not really falling for that yet.
Well granted original Guild Wars wasn't a flop, it succeeded in generating 6 million subscribers, a lot for a new MMO, and even more for a F2P game to boot.
Yes, ArenaNet is pulling huge risks with Guild Wars 2 and I hope they succeed, and if they don't I'll still play it for the community and there's no downside to it being F2P.
As for BioWare's Dragon Age 2, I'm not really looking forward to the game. I'll probably buy it and do a playthrough, but after that I will probably leave it on the shelf to collect dust. I'd rather BioWare concentrate on perfecting their tactical gameplay rather than balance it with action gameplay which we all know is going to be dominated by Diablo 3.
And the storytelling BioWare is putting out with ME didn't really impress me, in fact it felt rushed. Granted DA:O was decent, but that's it, decent. I suspect BioWare will be going downhill if DA2 or SW:TOR doesn't pick it up.
I think that the fact Guild Wars was F2P was what gave the subscriber number. That weren't really subscribers since they don't pay more than once.
Now as of BioWare's statement? I think they're playing it smart. Lowering the expectations (everyone expected a WoW killer - they say they won't be) and taking certain game systems that they know WoW does well.
As for the combat system on Dragon Age 2, it's more action oriented on consoles. The PC version has the Dragon Age: Origins engine along with the more action oriented one. Which is a pretty good solution for me.
True, but not many suspected it will use WoW as a model to build upon (except for the pessimists) but this sort of confirms the pessimistic prediction.
Will SW:TOR flop? Not likely, but it probably won't bring in many casuals either, which is what MMO's solely live upon.
Back on Dragon Age 2, I guess it's preferences really. I prefer old DA:O to new DA2 and every feature so far announced of DA2 brought disappointment after another (dialogue wheel, new art direction [spiked armor, darkspawn revamp], paraphrasing dialogue choices, predetermined set character, dividing between action and tactical, etc.).
the fact that you get to play the character's rise to "Champion of Kirkwall" is pretty much a very long Origin story. Only minus is that the character can only be human. I really enjoyed the origin stories of all races (and sexes).
I'm not too fond of the dialogue wheel myself, but i'll have to see how it works for DA2 before judging it.
I agree Bioware is playing it smart by taking lessons from WoW, being that this is going to be their foray into MMO's. The thing that concerns me is that they might be overdoing themselves even despite the downplaying as a WoW-killer. Take for example the amount of work that's being invested in the production aspects. The game is going to be very polished (we can't expect less from collaboration with LucusArts), which is great but it's ultimately not a scalable model. They've taken pride in the fact that every playable and non-playable character is going to be fully voiced. Expansions and new content are the life-lines of MMO's, how are they going to be able to sustain that same level of production quality? Voice acting for everything for the next 5 years? Seems like they are doomed in that but they're setting the bar high so if they can pull it off it will definitely turn heads.
Guild Wars 2 also playing it smart by taking what's been done and improving on it or making it more appealing to the players. This is fine - they will attract players and make money, but it's still a "safe" move compared to what we will expect from Titan but of course Titan is still much further away than soon™.
"We're really trying to leverage all the lessons we learned through the years. Some of which we were able to address in World of Warcraft and others that maybe because of the design decisions we've made, you just can't address. So we're kind of taking a step back with all that knowledge to make something that's completely new and fresh."
I can't remember where I read this, but basically what this is saying is Warcraft is beaten to death and there will never be a World of Starcraft. So it only makes sense they need to start fresh. And just to mention this again, they've already told us it's going to be a completely new IP (universe/story) which agrees with that quote. Regarding Titan, I'm reluctant to think too much about this one, because I don't want to ruin the surprise for myself :). But I want to believe it's going to really challenge our current accepted convention of gaming - kind of like what Dust 514 is going to be for EVE. Some crazy cross-genre, cross-platform unification would definitely break the mold. Or maybe it's going to take gaming beyond just sitting in front of your monitor/tv?
Strictly speaking of changing the MMO genre, in the near future, its got be SW:ToR. The story based, voice recorded cutscene and dialog could go a long way to adding flavor to the genre if you ask me.
I play FFXIV, if they were able to add voice to all the cut scenes it would add so much to the game.
The real elephant in the room has got to be Titan though. I hate to even talk about it this early, but, no one can deny that when it does come out its going to be something millions of people are going to play, at the VERY minimum at release to see what Blizz has created. I can only imagine what they're going to cook up, what they have learned from their mistakes and how they're going to challenge themselves this go around.
SW:TOR is not bringing anything to the table. Hard coded story telling doesn't really work in the MMO environment, SW:TOR is an obstacle to MMO advancement more than anything. Story should be player driven with lore and global events to fuel it, SW:TOR is just sticking an SP game into an MMO. Not necessarily a bad thing but it's not a MMO element.
GW2 may or may not propel the genre forward. There is still too little info on the game to judge, but GW1 seems to have been OK, so I don't see why GW2 should screw up. So far, though, I feel GW2 sort of has the right idea.
I think once WoW dies we'll see something new in the genre. WoW is the main reason there wasn't any innovation for such a long time. We need to move from themeparks to sandboxes already.
SW:TOR is not bringing anything to the table. Hard coded story telling doesn't really work in the MMO environment, SW:TOR is an obstacle to MMO advancement more than anything. Story should be player driven with lore and global events to fuel it, SW:TOR is just sticking an SP game into an MMO. Not necessarily a bad thing but it's not a MMO element.
GW2 may or may not propel the genre forward. There is still too little info on the game to judge, but GW1 seems to have been OK, so I don't see why GW2 should screw up. So far, though, I feel GW2 sort of has the right idea.
I think once WoW dies we'll see something new in the genre. WoW is the main reason there wasn't any innovation for such a long time. We need to move from themeparks to sandboxes already.
Totally agree.
I don't think Gw2 have what it takes to make a "mmo revolution", but surprises may happen. But imo the game is lacking a really nice content, something to caught people's attention. Imo it's not even going to beat the original GW...
But i think GW2 have much more chances the SW:TOW. To change the enviorment you really need to risk and give people something new. I believe to move forward MMOs will have to invest in the gameplay part. Make it more organic and action based. I think the next "wow" will be a FPS/RPGMMO.
MMO's are problematic due to their payment model. I know all games are made for profit, but when you charge monthly, the focus becomes on keeping players playing. And how do companies do this? They make the mechanics in MMO's absorb massive amounts of time. WoW is no longer fun simply because to do anything, you need to grind endlessly. Most MMO's are like this. I don't like the model, which is why I don't think I'll ever play another MMO again. I no longer trust them. If the goal is to keep us playing indefinitely, its easier to make the game a grind than to make everything so fun that it's not repetitive or boring (not to mention cheaper for development purposes). That said, 11 million people enjoy the game so obviously they got something right. Many people play casually. For me, casual is boring in Wow, because you are necessarily weaker than everyone else. I know D3 will have a time commitment but it won't be to the level of WoW. I hope there is more of a skill distinction.
I'm intrigued by Titan though. I hope it's something drastically different.
Actually there's 4 things that keep people hooked to WoW:
1. Dungeons and Raids. Never gets boring (okay, maybe it does after a while). The pay per month model helps with steady updates in the raid content, though, which is always a good thing. Every expansion offers like 5-6 different raid dungeons (if not more). It gives enough variety for years.
2. PvP. Unpredictable, thus real fun for those really into that stuff.
3. Using the economy to make gold. Sounds boring, but some people find it real fun! Looking for bargains, collecting stuff.
4. Leveling alts. Every class has it's fun moments. Different mechanics, different role. It's awesome to experience the content the game has to offer from a different angle.
there's some minor stuff too like pet/mount collecting, profession leveling etc.
Those are major factors for any MMO. The problem is that WoW has them all with pretty good quality, while the others may be better at some things but way worse in others. Which results into a reaction like "Bah, this isn't good enough, i'd rather go back to WoW".
Dungeon quality is really important, but it's not enough to have just that.
What i hear from people that are really experienced with MMOs is that Dungeons & Dragons Online has THE best dungeons with a good amount of difficulties (solo up to large group for the same content) and a nice story. But it doesn't have all of the stuff i mentioned, so it fell behind.
Warhammer Online was awesome for PvP but the PvE was lacking.
Lord of the Rings Online was also awesome for team play and even for RPers. The professions weren't that easy to progress, though, leveling curve was problematic (at least at launch) and PvP was... weird.
Age of Conan had interesting combat system (and that's about all it had :P).
None of the above managed to establish itself as well as WoW and eventually most died off, or became Free to Play (LotRO, D&DO, Everquest 2 for sure).
Subscriptions always decline for WoW... till an expansion is released, then they go up again. The "about" 2 years till a new expansion is scheduled around that i think.
Dungeons do not belong into MMO's. At_all. The sooner devs realize that, the better. We can't move on until people stop associating MMO's with instances (seriously? this is not fucking Diablo).
Sandbox games are boring (IMO), and I remain skeptical whether they can be as popular as WoW until one reaches that level of popularity.
Farmville blows WoW out of the water.
Sandboxes are extremely popular and generally beat limited games by a huge margin with often very low input costs, i.e., Minecraft.
Problem is, when people think "sandbox" they think of games like EVE and Darkfall, not realizing that those games are, besides being sandbox, also "hardcore".
Farmville and other such social-networking games are extremely popular, but it's more than just their "sandbox"-like qualities. They have a platform (Facebook) that allows them to advertise to over half a billion people every day, deliver instant installation and gameplay, and accessibility that any robust MMO can't touch - mobile-device gaming. In addition, they've designed a game that has successfully tapped into a super-casual user base and found ways to make money off of it from a F2P model + microtransactions. A pretty brilliant business model, and if it weren't for most seasoned gamers' hardcore attitudes, Zynga would have it all.
If you look closely at GW2, it's still themepark based. Dynamic events are basically scripted quests, and the way they chain into other quests and cycle around is highly predetermined. The main difference is that players can join in on these "quests" at any point, and in any numbers, and all play together on the same goal at the same time, instead of dividing into seperate groups doing quests start to finish at an individual pace. It is the natural way to evolve a themepark so it actually works as a massively multiplayer experience, and I expect this aspect of the game to be heavily copied in the future if nothing else is. Rift was already sortof attempting this (funny how it's not even on anyone's radar as the latest "wow clone", doesn't bode well for the game.)
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However since WoW's release, many other MMOs have risen to the table, and failed (Warhammer: Age of Reckoning, Age of Conan, Lord of the Rings Online, etc.).
Now below I'm going to put 3 quotes from developers of ArenaNet, BioWare, and Blizzard, the 3 contenders as I see having the highest chance of succeeding and/or changing the MMO genre. The games they are developing? Guild Wars 2, Star Wars: The Old Republic, and Blizzards' new-gen MMO code-named 'Titan' (confirmed to be a entirely new franchise).
==============
Blizzard's new-gen MMO 'Titan', Blizzard CEO Mike Horhaime [PRINT SOURCE]
"To break the mold, sometimes you have to start over."
"We're really trying to leverage all the lessons we learned through the years. Some of which we were able to address in World of Warcraft and others that maybe because of the design decisions we've made, you just can't address. So we're kind of taking a step back with all that knowledge to make something that's completely new and fresh."
BioWare's Star Wars: The Old Republic, BioWare developer Greg Zeschuk [PRINT SOURCE]
"It [World of Warcraft] is a touchstone. It has established standards, it's established how you play an MMO. Every MMO that comes out, I play and look at it. And if they break any of the WoW rules, in my book that's pretty dumb."
ArenaNet's Guild Wars 2, Guild Wars 2 Manifesto Trailer [VIDEO SOURCE]
"We founded ArenaNet to innovate, so Guild Wars 2 is our opportunity to question everything, to make a game that defies existing conventions. If you love MMOs, you'll want to check out Guild Wars 2, and if you hate MMOs, you'll really want to check out Guild Wars 2. Guild Wars 2 takes everything you love about Guild Wars 1 and puts it into a persistent world that's got more active combat, a fully-branching, personalized storyline, a new event system to get people playing together, and still no monthly fees."
"We do not want to build the same MMO everyone else is building, and in Guild Wars 2, it's your world. It's your story. You affect things around you in a very permanent way."
==============
So, going from the 3 quotes above (and any other sources people desire to put in as long as it's accurate) which company/game do you think will change the MMO genre? Which company (companies) do you support? What do you think is the path the MMO genre will go?
-Anathemic One
As long as the next MMOs are hotkey based, there won't be a revolution to change the genre. That's why DC Universe Online is doing a decent job so far. It's far more action oriented, storytelling is exciting and the graphics are better. But again, it didn't change the genre much either
I think that what's needed to change the genre is Guild Wars 2 and Star Wars: The Old Republic to become great games and provide competition to Blizzard. For starters to make WoW better and then to give them ideas for their next gen MMO.
Honestly? I'm expecting a massive decline in BioWare, Mass Effect series didn't impress me, Dragon Age: Origins was decent but it's sequel isn't looking like it, and Star Wars: The Old Republic I think is taking the wrong path shown in the quote in the OP.
I think Blizzard's new-gen MMO and Guild Wars 2 will revolutionize the genre again. Guild Wars 2 is straying away from the 'WoW template' and Blizzard's new-gen MMO is doing the same. Innovation brings change.
So yes I'll be getting Guild Wars 2 (great game and excellent for college) and hope with the addition of Blizzard's new-gen MMO it brings competition and revolutionary results to the genre.
What the Guild Wars 2 team is doing is... too risky. I hope they succeed, but i seriously doubt it. The way they talked on the interview was pretty much PR talk. "Check our game, it's awesome and different than anything else" so i'm not really falling for that yet.
Yes, ArenaNet is pulling huge risks with Guild Wars 2 and I hope they succeed, and if they don't I'll still play it for the community and there's no downside to it being F2P.
As for BioWare's Dragon Age 2, I'm not really looking forward to the game. I'll probably buy it and do a playthrough, but after that I will probably leave it on the shelf to collect dust. I'd rather BioWare concentrate on perfecting their tactical gameplay rather than balance it with action gameplay which we all know is going to be dominated by Diablo 3.
And the storytelling BioWare is putting out with ME didn't really impress me, in fact it felt rushed. Granted DA:O was decent, but that's it, decent. I suspect BioWare will be going downhill if DA2 or SW:TOR doesn't pick it up.
Now as of BioWare's statement? I think they're playing it smart. Lowering the expectations (everyone expected a WoW killer - they say they won't be) and taking certain game systems that they know WoW does well.
As for the combat system on Dragon Age 2, it's more action oriented on consoles. The PC version has the Dragon Age: Origins engine along with the more action oriented one. Which is a pretty good solution for me.
Will SW:TOR flop? Not likely, but it probably won't bring in many casuals either, which is what MMO's solely live upon.
Back on Dragon Age 2, I guess it's preferences really. I prefer old DA:O to new DA2 and every feature so far announced of DA2 brought disappointment after another (dialogue wheel, new art direction [spiked armor, darkspawn revamp], paraphrasing dialogue choices, predetermined set character, dividing between action and tactical, etc.).
I'm not too fond of the dialogue wheel myself, but i'll have to see how it works for DA2 before judging it.
Guild Wars 2 also playing it smart by taking what's been done and improving on it or making it more appealing to the players. This is fine - they will attract players and make money, but it's still a "safe" move compared to what we will expect from Titan but of course Titan is still much further away than soon™.
I can't remember where I read this, but basically what this is saying is Warcraft is beaten to death and there will never be a World of Starcraft. So it only makes sense they need to start fresh. And just to mention this again, they've already told us it's going to be a completely new IP (universe/story) which agrees with that quote. Regarding Titan, I'm reluctant to think too much about this one, because I don't want to ruin the surprise for myself :). But I want to believe it's going to really challenge our current accepted convention of gaming - kind of like what Dust 514 is going to be for EVE. Some crazy cross-genre, cross-platform unification would definitely break the mold. Or maybe it's going to take gaming beyond just sitting in front of your monitor/tv?
I play FFXIV, if they were able to add voice to all the cut scenes it would add so much to the game.
The real elephant in the room has got to be Titan though. I hate to even talk about it this early, but, no one can deny that when it does come out its going to be something millions of people are going to play, at the VERY minimum at release to see what Blizz has created. I can only imagine what they're going to cook up, what they have learned from their mistakes and how they're going to challenge themselves this go around.
GW2 may or may not propel the genre forward. There is still too little info on the game to judge, but GW1 seems to have been OK, so I don't see why GW2 should screw up. So far, though, I feel GW2 sort of has the right idea.
I think once WoW dies we'll see something new in the genre. WoW is the main reason there wasn't any innovation for such a long time. We need to move from themeparks to sandboxes already.
Totally agree.
I don't think Gw2 have what it takes to make a "mmo revolution", but surprises may happen. But imo the game is lacking a really nice content, something to caught people's attention. Imo it's not even going to beat the original GW...
But i think GW2 have much more chances the SW:TOW. To change the enviorment you really need to risk and give people something new. I believe to move forward MMOs will have to invest in the gameplay part. Make it more organic and action based. I think the next "wow" will be a FPS/RPGMMO.
I'm intrigued by Titan though. I hope it's something drastically different.
1. Dungeons and Raids. Never gets boring (okay, maybe it does after a while). The pay per month model helps with steady updates in the raid content, though, which is always a good thing. Every expansion offers like 5-6 different raid dungeons (if not more). It gives enough variety for years.
2. PvP. Unpredictable, thus real fun for those really into that stuff.
3. Using the economy to make gold. Sounds boring, but some people find it real fun! Looking for bargains, collecting stuff.
4. Leveling alts. Every class has it's fun moments. Different mechanics, different role. It's awesome to experience the content the game has to offer from a different angle.
there's some minor stuff too like pet/mount collecting, profession leveling etc.
Those are major factors for any MMO. The problem is that WoW has them all with pretty good quality, while the others may be better at some things but way worse in others. Which results into a reaction like "Bah, this isn't good enough, i'd rather go back to WoW".
Another quality of WoW is Blizz good services. Blizz have good servers and WoW is the most secure mmorpg i've ever played.
What i hear from people that are really experienced with MMOs is that Dungeons & Dragons Online has THE best dungeons with a good amount of difficulties (solo up to large group for the same content) and a nice story. But it doesn't have all of the stuff i mentioned, so it fell behind.
Warhammer Online was awesome for PvP but the PvE was lacking.
Lord of the Rings Online was also awesome for team play and even for RPers. The professions weren't that easy to progress, though, leveling curve was problematic (at least at launch) and PvP was... weird.
Age of Conan had interesting combat system (and that's about all it had :P).
None of the above managed to establish itself as well as WoW and eventually most died off, or became Free to Play (LotRO, D&DO, Everquest 2 for sure).
Sandboxes are extremely popular and generally beat limited games by a huge margin with often very low input costs, i.e., Minecraft.
Problem is, when people think "sandbox" they think of games like EVE and Darkfall, not realizing that those games are, besides being sandbox, also "hardcore".
Sadly yes, 62M > 12M active subscriptions.