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Kicking up a storm: The Escapist on Blizzard
This week's Escapist is fascinating as ever, dealing with the behemoth that is Blizzard Entertainment. While the pieces looking at the rise of Blizzard and its company culture are interesting enough, the real gem is the World of Warcraft article.Of course, no mention of Blizzard would be complete without WoW these days. However, the game's dominance of the MMO genre means that, as the folks at Terra Nova noticed, no discussion of MMOs is really complete without WoW:For better or worse, WoW is the face of the massive genre. In a very small part of the galaxy, it's a gravity well bending light that passes anywhere near it. When discussing PvP, questing, guilds or class balance, commentators now have a lingua franca: the common tongue of World of Warcraft.When on the hunt for a MMO to play that isn't "just another WoW clone", then, bear in mind that many people are looking at what clearly works for inspiration. We will certainly see games with strange and innovative MMO gameplay, but will they attract the numbers necessary to survive?
Prof debunks MindArk hype; causes CEO tantrum
Not sure how we missed this bit of juicy drama, so forgive us for the weeks-old nature of this post in advance, please. A chronological format works best: MindArk creates major media buzz with its announcement that they would allow players to draw money out of their Project Entropia accounts with a new debit card. We admit, it sounded novel, so we published our own uncritical account of the news. Wharton Professor and Terra Nova blogger Dan Hunter took a step back to ask whether the big news was really as fantastic as MindArk made it out to be. He analysed the deal then concluded, "Hey, guess what? This new frontier in virtual currency is...wait for it...a co-branded debit card." He went on to state that previous MindArk press releases, upon further analysis, appear to be "nothing but bullshit." MindArk's CEO throws a fit, sending a nasty email to one of Hunter's bosses at Wharton, accusing Hunter of "spreading slander." Hunter blogs it. Awesome. As Terra Nova commenter Peter wrote, "Someone should have told [MindArk CEO] Welter his god-mode is limited to [Project Entropia] alone...." See also: Aleks Krotoski's take, Daniel Terdiman's summary.
Hands on with Soul of the Ultimate Nation
Korean MMO company Webzen is launching an attack on the Western world with Huxley, but the company isn't confining itself to the MMOFPS genre. Soul of the Ultimate Nation is a fantasy-themed MMO with a distinctive Eastern style that will be launched in North America during 2007 (it's currently in open beta in Korea). Fantasy MMOs are ten a penny these days, so we asked Webzen representatives what makes SUN different. They are banking on its graphical style to win fans, and also its competitive nature -- players enter into 'competitive hunting' with others, rather than co-operating as in many other MMOs. The game also features voice chat amongst adventuring parties and guilds.
Splitsville for Microsoft and Sigil after "varying visions"
Sigil Games Online, developers of upcoming MMORPG Vanguard: Saga of Heroes, announced today that they'd be co-publishing the game with Sony Online Entertainment after "it became clear that [Microsoft Games Studios] and Sigil had varying visions and direction for the title's development," according to Brad McQuaid, CEO of Sigil Games Online, as quoted in a company press release on the break-up. It's rare that a game in beta switches publishers. We have no inside information, but a little digging makes it clear that something's not quite right fresh in Denmark. At least one high-profile game designer recently quit, and Sigil's CEO has been defending the game from legions of WoW Fanboys doubters that have been questioning whether it'll ever be commercially viable. The surest sign that the game may be in choppy waters is the fact that McQuaid's now doing business with SOE after his high-profile departure from the same company in the fall of 2001. According to MMOG-community gossip circulating at the time, this departure was also the result of diverging creative visions between McQuaid and Sony on the evolution of Everquest, the successful MMORPG that McQuaid co-founded and designed. Smart observers suggest that the culprit behind all of the churn und drama is the tremendous success of World of Warcraft. To wit: how will Vanguard fare against WoW and the other bajillion MMOGs slated for release? For reaction to this announcement from MMORPG insiders, check the FoH forums, where the unruly mob is being characteristically brutal. Even the President of Sony Online Entertainment is trolled into doing some damage control.
Penalty for being the worst raid leader ever? 50 DKP MINUS! [update 1]
In the NSFW video that follows, a raid leader flips out ninja-style as his team of 40 raiders fails to kill the dragon known to World of Warcraft players as Onyxia. For those who've never raided Onyxia, you need to know that this multi-phase fight is laden with traps and tricks, and usually takes hours upon hours of failed attempts before a group finally downs her for the first time. An experienced raid team can finish the encounter in 20 minutes. The video that you're about to see captures the frustration of the Onyxia experience, showing just how emotional things can get when total party wipe follows total party wipe. It also highlights the hilarity that results when people with very little management experience are given the opportunity to lead a large group of people. Some soar, some flop. Our protagonist in the following video flops like a pancake. Click here to watch. Turn the sound down (or put on some headphones), because the raid leader loves to drop the F-bomb. [Update 1: Fixed autoplay issue.]
MMOs: the near and distant future [Update 1]
Academic blog Terra Nova is asking a big and important question -- what does the future of massively multiplayer games hold? Arguing that current games like World of Warcraft are the best the current-gen has to offer, what's around the corner for next-gen MMOs?A few buzzwords that are floating around the comments thread: middleware; user-created content; no grinding; item-based revenue; user-hosted MMOs; dynamically-changing worlds; non-high-fantasy-themed games; customisation; co-operative control of vehicles; massive-scale MMOs; celebrities; console platforms.That's a lot of theorising, and a lot of potential for new MMOs. Whether new games get personal with localised, user-hosted mini-worlds, or create their own celebrities with ingame content creation that ties into a large-scale international world, there are some exciting possibilities around the corner.[Update: reinserted mysterious vanishing end-of-post.]
Interview with Space Cowboy Online producer Jason Park
Jason Park, producer for the "action-based MMO space shooter" Space Cowboy Online, agreed to a brief email interview. We asked him some tough questions about the game, and he shot from the hip, like a true cowboy. Jason also agreed to monitor this post and respond to any reader questions that might pop up over the next 48 hours (from the time-stamp on the post).
Gamer feels cheated by FFXI's sneaky hidden fees [update 1]
Davis Freeberg wrote to Joystiq to let us know that he feels ripped off by the lack of disclosure about the fees required to play Final Fantasy XI for the Xbox 360. Though experienced PC MMOG players and other hardcore gamers know that games of this type typically include monthly fees, Freeberg appears to be more typical of console gamers. He expected to be able to buy the game, pop it in, and start playing. Instead, he was required to spend hours installing the game and registering for a separate online service before he was told that the game would cost $12.95 per month plus an additional $1.00 per month per character (beyond the first) he created. Deceitful marketing or clumsy mistake? Click "continue" below to see what we found.
MMO subscriber charts show what's hot
Bruce Sterling Woodcock of MMOGChart has been tracking the subscriber numbers for a variety of different MMOs for years; version 19.0 of his data was released about a week ago, providing numbers up to January 2006 in a long-awaited update. The chart's coverage isn't perfect; geographic information would be especially useful, but is near impossible to find, and the site explains the accuracy behind the data (there are differences between active subscribers, cumulative subscribers and boxes sold). However, it's interesting to see what this snapshot of the current MMO world is like.The graph above shows the largest MMOs, those with over 120,000 subscribers. The green line leaping towards infinity is World of Warcraft -- the yellow and red curves, declining slowly, are Lineage and Lineage II respectively. Many of the others stop in 2005, so it's hard to get an accurate up-to-date picture, but the light blue line representing Runescape seems to be finally taking off, cresting the 500,000 barrier -- an impressive feat for a game started by a couple of students.
You'll kry when Krowbar kwits
We are getting close to hitting our quota of maudlin MMORPG music vids for the day. You did watch the Drakedog suicide vid, right? This very special flash video from the wayback machine will mean the most to those of you who played (and by "played" we mean "dedicated your life to raiding in") end-game Everquest, but it should also be familiar to anyone who's joined a guild in a MMOG and has experienced the requisite drama that comes with the guild structure. This video's so friggin' over the top with the melodrama that it's downright hilarious, if you understand the context. Yes, that's a 1.0 cleric epic you spied there. The truly leet can name the purple armor, too. Thanks for hosting, Flowers of Happiness!
DICE: Garriotts predict MMO industry's future
Brothers Robert and Richard Garriott outlined their visions of the MMO industry's future at DICE today. Richard, aka Lord British, sees a shake-up on the cards: he predicts that within three to five years, many of the startups will drop out of the market, leaving only five companies playing the MMO game.It's an interesting vision to have, and presumably the Garriotts are hoping that NCsoft will be one of the five. However, with the recent growth of some niche MMOs, it seems there is a place for smaller companies and startups; as players become bored of the more popular titles, they may seek out similar experiences elsewhere, boosting the popularity of titles that may not have the international resources of Sony Online Entertainment or NCsoft.
Virtual worlds' selective reflections of reality
The announcement of Valentine's Day events for both City of Heroes and World of Warcraft comes hot on the heels of a debate around virtual identity sparked off by a LGBT-friendly guild. The creation of in-game events that reflect popular world holidays is increasingly fashionable; it seems no week goes by without some new festival being celebrated in WoW's capital cities.However, by first stamping out discussions of sexuality, and then opening up the floodgates by theming an event around love, what are Blizzard thinking? Will players be able to flirt with same-sex NPCs or will they be instantly banned for even venturing a hug? We hope that there will be some procedures in place to help stop harassment, as it can be difficult to throw off determined admirers at the best of times. As for those gamers who prefer their MMOs with a dash of escapism, it seems to be a dying trend, especially amongst popular Western games.[Image from the Alter Ego project]
Massively multiplayer games branch out
There may be some exciting-looking original games coming to a platform near you this year, but what about that clichéd of genres, the massively multiplayer game? When you think of MMOs, three things spring to mind: elves, dwarves and monthly subscriptions, and the success of World of Warcraft hasn't helped defeat any of these stereotypes.Today's Wall Street Journal features a piece looking at MMOs that are venturing into non-traditional waters, focusing on two examples in particular. Firstly, NCsoft's upcoming title Auto Assault manages to shatter almost every MMO cliché--it's set in a post-apocalyptic world and most combat takes place in heavily armoured vehicles with big guns attached. No cloth-wearing spellcasters in sight.Secondly, Sony Online Entertainment will be testing out new revenue models later this year with a free-to-play title that uses micropayments to attract customers' cash. Not much information has been released by SOE on this strategy, but games like Anarchy Online have seen increased users since becoming free to play.
