What are the impediments to designing the ultimate game?

[Eraden]

The main impediment is that there is no such thing. By creating the 'ultimate' game you imply your game will please everyone, or at least the majority of people and this is just in the MMO crowd. You bring up some points, however, you never looked at the main component, the combat. What game would you base it on? Everyone has different opinions on what they want the combat to be, how it should play etc. With such a broad range of expectations, you cannot please everyone and so you cannot make the ultimate game just by its very definition.

Surely you could poll the player community and find out if there is some kind of consensus on these various features. Even if there were no clear choices in terms of popularity, the raw data from such a survey should probably provide some insight into what most of the players would want. I guess in this context, for me, the ultimate game would be the one that could satisfy the largest amount of players.

[GeminiReed]

Surely you could poll the player community and find out if there is some kind of consensus on these various features. Even if there were no clear choices in terms of popularity, the raw data from such a survey should probably provide some insight into what most of the players would want. I guess in this context, for me, the ultimate game would be the one that could satisfy the largest amount of players.

Blizzard actually researched this. Their conclusion was that there was no dominant niche. What they did find was that most players played a variety of content types. Ironic considering they let Hazzikostas gut everything casual. Even before the revelations about their toxic work environment their player population was trending downwards because of this.

[Irenia]

It depends.
It's possible to make a game that most people like. Your approach can get something like this.
It's impossible to make a game that most people love. I imagine any ultimate game needs to reach this goal, but because of differing tastes, it is out of reach. To use XIV, lots of people love this game, but more people only like it. Using myself as an example, I love it, but the abuse of veteran healers threatens that, which came about due to attempts to cast a wider net.

It is much more possible to have a many "ultimate games" each serving a small community, but MMO logistics make that impossible; scale is the name of the game.

[Avatre]

Surely you could poll the player community and find out if there is some kind of consensus on these various features. Even if there were no clear choices in terms of popularity, the raw data from such a survey should probably provide some insight into what most of the players would want. I guess in this context, for me, the ultimate game would be the one that could satisfy the largest amount of players.

The problem with polling the community is that you will only get the people who respond. There will always be many more who don't bother, or completely forget to answer in time. Think about a reporter out asking people for their opinions, how many say something about "don't have time" or "don't care"? The reporter could ask 300+ people, but only get half that responding. Polls, while they do give some insight, wouldn't provide a complete picture, so some people will always be left dissatisfied with the results of what happens due to a poll.

So honestly, the players themselves are the impediment to a "perfect" game because some will not like what the devs themselves created, or will dislike what the community has asked the devs to adjust/add/remove - especially if one of those things greatly impacts what they do enjoy in the game.