tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3249541406364691686.post3181716979201813749..comments2023-09-15T05:54:48.691-07:00Comments on SERIAL GANKER: Will we see another Triple-A Fantasy MMO?sid67http://www.blogger.com/profile/16656756657483499337noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3249541406364691686.post-20473677722240629972010-02-27T11:34:29.086-08:002010-02-27T11:34:29.086-08:00Thanks for your thoughtful reply (that Google blog...Thanks for your thoughtful reply (that Google blog search only just, this morning, called my attention to).<br /><br />This is the part of the discussion where we find out that we agree on many points. I think you and Green are right that maintaining a complex system gets harder over time. That's why the operating system we're playing our MMOs on isn't still called Windows 3. But it is still called Windows, and it still comes from Microsoft, even though Microsoft has gone through some rocky years immediately after they got to the points where it became unmaintainable and had to be rewritten from scratch. People stuck with them through the Vista years, for example, because Microsoft Windows was what everybody else was using: network effects.<br /><br />Cataclysm is almost certainly not the last time that Blizzard will rip the guts out of a big part of WoW and replace them. Sad to say, if you want to play a generic-D&D type MMO in 2020 and you want to be playing with lots of other people, that MMO will still be called World of Warcraft. It may not have a single map, model, mob, or line of code in common with today's WoW, but it will still be called WoW. Unless, as I already said, Blizzard decides to get out of the business, decides to stop investing in it; then, all bets are off.<br /><br />One last point: I wonder if you really hate science fiction in MMOs, or if what it really is that you hate is the really rotten job of creating a science fiction GAME in MMO space that everybody, and I mean everybody, has done so far?<br /><br />The thing that propelled generic D&D universes like Azeroth to the forefront of MMO space is that way the heck back in the 1970s, Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson took all the complexity of fairy tales and high fantasy and boiled it down to very, very simple gameplay:<br /><br />1) Check your current location for tricks, traps, and secret doors.<br />2) Open a door.<br />3) Kill everything on the other side by beating on it until it falls down.<br />4) Take their stuff.<br />5) Repeat ad infinitum.<br /><br />And after every xth thing you kill, you go up in level and earn the right to kill different looking bags of hit points. And every yth thing you kill, on average, had in its loot a "magic item" that amounts to a different special effect for knocking hit points off off a bag of hit points.<br /><br />This simplification really, really doesn't work for science fiction, or spy thrillers, or westerns, or cyberpunk, or film noir, or hardboiled detectives, or super heroes, or romantic comedy, or any other genre. We're still waiting for the Gygax and Arneson of those genres to design actual game play that tells those kinds of stories.<br /><br />Until then we're stuck with reskinned Everquest clones -- as Phil Foglio pointed out back in 1982: http://www.airshipentertainment.com/growfcomic.php?date=20070617J. Brad Hickshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12818419805983138860noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3249541406364691686.post-44878023507791621072010-02-15T17:12:26.793-08:002010-02-15T17:12:26.793-08:00I think "fantasy MMO fans" is probably a...I think "fantasy MMO fans" is probably a false assumption.<br /><br />If Blizzard's as yet unrevealed MMO is sci fi or contemporary and SWTOR is reasonably good we may see less than 10% of MMO players playing fantasy MMOs in 2012.<br /><br />They're Blizzard fans not fantasy fans, most of them.Stabshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08716211705647213383noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3249541406364691686.post-90316376018928151842010-02-13T09:47:49.677-08:002010-02-13T09:47:49.677-08:00Point is, it raises an interesting question for Fa...Point is, it raises an interesting question for Fantasy MMO fans -- what's next?<br /><br />Cataclysm? Then whatever Blizzard's next big title is? And that's assuming it's not Sci-Fi as Tobold suggests (and I agree with him).<br /><br />If you don't like the small indie games and you are tired of WoW, you might not have much in the way of an alternate choice.<br /><br />About the nit: Not my quote, so feel free to nit-pick:) There is also Aion, if you want to include ports. That said, I think when you are talking about Triple A alternatives to WoW, AoC is going to be the only one left standing in a year or two. WAR is suffering a nasty demise and might not even last out much longer.sid67https://www.blogger.com/profile/16656756657483499337noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3249541406364691686.post-1548061302856809012010-02-13T03:32:56.314-08:002010-02-13T03:32:56.314-08:00WoW won't be dominant in 2020 but probably Bli...WoW won't be dominant in 2020 but probably Blizzard will.<br /><br />Much of WoW's success is down to people who were Blizzard fans but not mmo players starting mmos because it was made by Blizzard. The company's reputation is so strong that it's single player games from the 90s still sell well.<br /><br />Also small nit: AoC isn't the last generic fantasy game to aim for WoW's crown, Mark Jacobs specifically said that Warhammer Online would be trying to take it.Stabshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08716211705647213383noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3249541406364691686.post-58075743275559933812010-02-12T13:55:16.319-08:002010-02-12T13:55:16.319-08:00Yeah I was thinking just the other day that it fin...Yeah I was thinking just the other day that it finally seems to have struck home with investors that it might be a good idea NOT to try to play in the same space as WoW.<br /><br />Most of the hyped releases seem to be sci-fi, space opera, cyberpunk, superhero, etc. I guess Final Fantasy XIV is on the horizon if you want a fantasy MMO, though.<br /><br />Failing that, there will always be an endless stream of free to play games pushing the "just like WoW, but not as good.. but free!" line.Carson 63000https://www.blogger.com/profile/10900682924502279486noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3249541406364691686.post-7401759850660950532010-02-12T13:23:26.509-08:002010-02-12T13:23:26.509-08:00Well, Blizzard's next generation MMORPG could ...Well, Blizzard's next generation MMORPG could be Sci-Fi, and then the competition would have fall back on fantasy. :)Toboldhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04354082945218389596noreply@blogger.com