Naoki Yoshida recent interview

[justinjarjar]

snip .

It's cute and you might find some of these ideas added, but at that point why don't I just go outside and interact with people? And AI is just not there yet, but I could see some ideas being worth while to pursue. In the end all I want a game not a replacement for life.

[Miiu]

I think Yoshida is pretty spot on with his prediction of MMOS. WoW played no small role in that. If we are completely honest the mmos havn't changed much in terms on gameplay experiences. Mechanics change etc but on a fundamental level almost all mmos are the same. Now seeing the development time and features people expect from new mmos are ridiculous. How often when a new MMO came out has this come up: "I am max level and already ran out of content. WoW has much more content". Besides the point of being unreasonable to expect the same amount of content and polish WoW has in a game that just came out.
But that isn't the fault of Blizzard its just distorted player expectations.
WoW comes more into play in terms of success the game had and how much it did hurt the mmo industry. After WoW the mmos that went into production were at an all time high because companies wanted a piece of the pie but the glaring mistake they did and what FFXIV does to an extent is copying the WoW formular. Which isn't a bad idea in general, but they fail to see Bizzard did the exact same thing. They copied features left and right from mmos that came before. But they streamlined the design. They made features more accessible. The WoW clones we got didn't expand on WoWs design. They copied the state WoW was in at the time and were left behind when another expansion hit in WoW.

If you are a WoW clone you can only succeed on 1 thing: Brand recognition. If you have a brand that is popular and beloved you can hold the players. Something FFXIV does well. But if you go in blind creating a new IP copy WoW almost 1 to 1 but offer less content people won't play your game for long. Because they think "Well I did that already in WoW and that game has more to do".
Given how many games crashed and burned doing this approach it is easy to see how companies are now more cautious of creating an MMO. Especially if you try to pitch an MMO that is unlike everything people have seen by now. Good luck in finding people to fund the project that like Yoshida says has a development time of 5+ years and a humongous development cost if you even want to come to a fraction of content that WoW has.

At some point even the most avid mmo fan will feel the fatigue coming up and this is why I think we'll have less MMOs in the future, if there won't be any big changes in the experience they can provide.
Even something as simple as combat hasn't changed that much over the years. We are still mostly playing with hotbars and tabtargeting. Just check how much true action combat mmos we have. Even after we have the server technology and internet infrastructure to support such a system.

[Nektulos-Tuor]

I think Yoshida is pretty spot on with his prediction of MMOS. WoW played no small role in that. If we are completely honest the mmos havn't changed much in terms on gameplay experiences. Mechanics change etc but on a fundamental level almost all mmos are the same. Now seeing the development time and features people expect from new mmos are ridiculous. How often when a new MMO came out has this come up. "I am max level and already ran out of content. WoW has much more content than this game". Besides the point of being unreasonable to expect the same amount of content and polish a game that has been out of as long as WoW from a game that was released a month or so ago.
But that isn't the fault of Blizzard its just distorted player expectations.
Now WoW comes into play in terms of success the game had and how much it hurt the mmo industry. After WoW the mmos that went into production were at an all time high because those companies wanted a piece of the pie but the glaring mistake they did and what FFXIV does to an extent is copying the WoW formular. Which doesn't help anyone.

If you are a WoW clone you can only succeed on 1 thing: Brand recognition. If you have a brand that is popular and beloved you can hold the players. Something FFXIV does well. But if you go in blind creating a new IP copy WoW almost 1 to 1 but offer less content people won't play your game for long. Because they think "Well I did that already in WoW and that game has more to do".
Given how many games crashed and burned doing this approach it is easy to see how companies are now more cautious of creating an MMO. Especially if you try to pitch an MMO that is unlike everything people have seen by now. Good luck in finding people to fund the project that like Yoshida says has a development time of 5+ years.
At some point even the most avid mmo fan will feel the fatigue coming up and this is why I think we'll have less MMOs in the future if there won't be a big change in the experience they can provide.
Even something as simple as combat hasn't changed that much over the years. We are still mostly playing with hotbards and tabtarget enemies/party members. Just check how much true action combat mmos we have. Even after we already have the server technology and internet infrastructure to support such a system.

Sandbox MMO. Hasen't been done for years.. Q.Q R.I.P. SWG.

[Miiu]

Sandbox MMO. Hasen't been done for years.. Q.Q R.I.P. SWG.

I think ArcheAge is one of the recent bigger Sandbox MMOs that was ported over into our market. But apparently the company behind it screwed up massively.

[AsakuraVN]

I think ArcheAge is one of the recent bigger Sandbox MMOs that was ported over into our market. But apparently the company behind it screwed up massively.

Archage is a "Sandpark" MMO, meaning it stands somewhere between sandbox & themepark, because it has tons of limitations & rules enforced by the system to keep a balance (but ended up being exploited everywhere). It only gives you an illusion of freedom.

[Niyuka]

Sandbox MMO. Hasen't been done for years.. Q.Q R.I.P. SWG.

SWG was a total failure. Yes, there is a number of butthurt SWG fans out there, but apparently they are not enough to keep an MMO afloat. Sandbox has never worked out aside from EVE Online, which draws a massive PvP crowd for its unique design concepts around building and dominating an empire and other players.

[Magis]

Sandbox MMO. Hasen't been done for years.. Q.Q R.I.P. SWG.

Don't forget EVE online, the ultimate sandbox MMO. Other than that.... ehhh.

SWG was a total failure. Yes, there is a number of butthurt SWG fans out there, but apparently they are not enough to keep an MMO afloat. Sandbox has never worked out aside from EVE Online, which draws a massive PvP crowd for its unique design concepts around building and dominating an empire and other players.

I never played SWG but wasn't the "failure" due to Sony trying to make Jedi more accessible to casuals, and make "The New Experience" patch? Any old SWG players want to explain what happened there? Most people I heard who played it said the game died cause of that patch.

[Asmodaeus]

I never played SWG but wasn't the "failure" due to Sony trying to make Jedi more accessible to casuals, and make "The New Experience" patch? Any old SWG players want to explain what happened there? Most people I heard who played it said the game died cause of that patch.

Not only the Jedi, everything. Sony saw what WoW looked like and how it sold like hotcakes so they also wanted a piece of it and turned a Sandbox game into a bad theme - park WoW clone (without all the Blizzard polish and that was what made WoW huge). Of course that didn´t work out and most of the loyal fans who played the game for what it was (a sandbox game) were driven away. They also didn´t attract much new customers. The game engine was very janky and didn´t look to hot a few years after release. WoW was just the better product overall (if we compare theme - park vs theme - park).

[TheUltimate3]

I never played SWG but wasn't the "failure" due to Sony trying to make Jedi more accessible to casuals, and make "The New Experience" patch? Any old SWG players want to explain what happened there? Most people I heard who played it said the game died cause of that patch.

The New Game Enhancement or NGE was essentially the final attempt to rebalance the game in a way that most MMO players would recognize and enjoy, which in turn was basically WoW with a Star Wars Face. All the skill trees, which were already a pale shadow of their former selves thanks to the Combat Upgrade, were removed in favor of the standard "Pick your class" screen. While before levels weren't really a thing (they kinda did with the CU by simply adding levels but the game barely acknowledged it in any competent way. For example, I could level an entertainer to "max level" and have no combat skills, but the game would tell me I can fight a rancor with no problem until I actually tried and it murdered me.) the game became centered around it. Leveling took on a more themepark approach and there was no real way to change your class once picked.

The biggest problem with the NGE was that it was released on November 15th. The most recent expansion, Trials of Obi-Wan was released November 1st with litterally no word that the NGE was even being worked on. As the game was completely changed with the NGE, players left in droves and as far as I can gather, SWG never recovered.

[AzraelX]

Sandbox MMO. Hasen't been done for years.. Q.Q R.I.P. SWG.

Sandbox mmo is too costly and how do you gate certain things to keep people subbed longer