The new year is finally upon us and a variety of new MMOGs are set to go live later in 2009. With this influx of new challenges at our doorstep, I'm curious about how smooth or steep a learning curve these games will have for the masses. Back in the early days, when the majority of us were playing Everquest and/or Ultima Online, that curve was so steep it often felt as though you were the leader of your own pack of lemmings as you dove head first off a cliff.
It never looked this good when we played.
There's no arguing that the landing could be more painful than watching a 24-hour Lawrence Welk marathon (Google it, you whippersnappers!). No one should have to suffer through that kind of pain while learning the ins and outs of their favorite game, but back then, we had little choice, so we sucked up more deaths than you can count and carried on. And do you know what? We liked it that way! Ok... some of us liked it that way, but those were also the days when those of us that played had more time on our hands, so it wasn't a big deal.
Fast forward ten years, and the MMO landscape has gone through some drastic changes, sometimes to the point that it's barely recognizable. Where there used to be open fields as far as the eye could see in the MMOG market, there are now cities and roadways cluttering the view no matter what direction you look in. One of the things that has changed the most is the amount of hassle gamers are willing to put up with from a game. If it's too hard or confusing early on, chances are they'll walk away from it in short order, no matter how cool they've heard things get near the end of the game. Despite what the majority of numbers tell us, I don't think this concept is as written in stone as people like to believe it is.
The undisputed king in the MMOG ring is obviously World of Warcraft. Even if they didn't currently have over 11.5 million subscribers, it's the one game that everyone in the modern world knows about, even if they don't play it. From the upheaval over pixelated torture to the William Shatner commercials on TV, the game has become a household name. While I know the original team didn't know how explosive their population would become (Everquest held the title back then with 500,000 subscribers), the game's success was not purely an accident. The biggest change they made in the established MMOG formula was to make it easily accessible from the moment you logged in to create your character. There were a myriad of other tweaks to the standard gameplay of the day as well, but in my mind, this was the most important.
Here's a napkin for your chin. Try to quit drooling!
Since then, other games have begun adopting the Warcraft approach as they make their way into the market. None have been remotely as successful as WoW has been (and I still don't think anyone will be for years), but some have been profitable and that's really all that matters when it's all said and done. If a game can support the developers and their families while still making a profit for the company itself, that's all they really need in order to continue following their dreams.
Vanguard: Saga of Heroes, while near and dear to my heart, went in a different direction and though I applaud them for it, things just haven't worked out for them. Innumerable issues have been a factor in Vanguard's struggle, but the initial learning curve played no small part. Assuming your gaming rig was capable of running the game smoothly, any old school Everquest player immediately felt right at home. This was due in large part to the immense depth of the world and the systems within it.
For new players, especially those that picked up Vanguard as their first MMOG, the learning curve was far steeper than that of its competitors. Add in the fact that a lot of those early lessons were never readily explained until the community started creating guides on them (Weaknesses, The Riftways, and Renting Flying Mounts ring a bell anyone?), they were too in depth and mystical for many player's patience.
Great graphics can be a double-edged sword.
The current trend in MMOG's appears to be make the game so easy and interest-grabbing right out of the gate that even a person with the attention span of a monkey chewing on a flyswatter will be able to keep up and get into the swing of things. Depth of game mechanics is still possible with a system like this, but it needs to be introduced not only clearly, but later in the game, after a player has played enough to be hooked and is willing to put in some extra time to learn about the more intricate game mechanics available to them.
But every rule has its own exceptions. I think anyone would be hard pressed to find a successful MMOG in today's market that has a steeper learning curve than EVE Online. While they've made distinct and purposeful progress in their attempts to make it friendlier to the casual gamer, they still have systems and subsystems more in depth than any other game out there. According to "The Rules" as they've been laid out over the last few years, you'd think that would mean EVE should barely be scraping by, if not saying its last hoorah. I'm glad to report the exact opposite is true. WOW Po has continued to steadily increase its subscription numbers over the years. The question to ask is why? Could it be the idea of everyone playing in a single, open universe? Perhaps it's the fact that the game's graphics are so gorgeous they make Angelina Jolie look like a leper in comparison?
Whatever it is, there's one thing I know for sure. It gives me hope.
I don't want the games of tomorrow to be so hard no one plays them and they crash and burn faster than the Hindenburg, but at the same time, I also don't want them to be so easy that I can put my brain on autopilot and play either. Both sides of the coin have proven they can be successful, so the question becomes, which games do you think will have both the ease of gameplay and the depth of mechanics to keep us all hooked in the coming year? It should be an interesting ride and I can't wait to see how it all plays out.
from tentonhammer.com |
