Somewhere along the way people confused "MMORPG" with "Tedious grindfest that has raiding" MMORPGs are supposed to be a giant online D&D session, not a grinding simulator. When game companies realize this the genre will return.
Most mmos are just solo games played with people around. I want to play WITH people not just with people. I'd like to see a game that has a mode that starts over every month and has a limited number of lives everyone shares . All players start from scratch and eventually when all extra lives are used up you can't die or you'll be unable to respawn. Everyone works together to beat it. No restrictions on trading or you must be this lvl to use this. Sword. If you have the money or the items for trade you can use it. Sure there will be player killers. Put bounties on player killers heads. Everyone has one month to beat the world before it restarts. That's just one mode. Have another mode where you keep a character and can battle it out in pvp or attack the bosses with other players and their main character.
A monthly restart also makes it a more beginner friendly environment. I've played mmos where players have grinded for years and owned the world and you couldnt get resources to grow without being hunted murdered and raided. A monthly reset would fix that. A new guild could actually have a chance to overthrow the previous guild ECT.
Bro you are the most underrated video for the fact that you make such high quality content while going through school at the same time. Keep up the fantastic work!
I literally cried when dust 514 servers got shut down on PS3 . It was in the eve online universe. Was even given cross play interactions with eve . Greatest MMO FPS ever
I would argue that the genre died earlier than that. On the 23 of November 2004. That was the day World of Warcraft was released. WoW did a lot of things right, it was far more friendly to players, more approachable and this allowed it to reach a far wider audience, an audience that would otherwise never have played MMOs. But WoWs success would ultimately prove detrimental to the genre as a whole. After WoWs release almost every game that followed was very similar to WoW. They might have had some minor mechanical differences and might have looked different, but mechanically they were still borrowing heavily from WoW. Things have improved a bit since, but WoW's shadow still looms over every new MMO. And while the gaming industry as a whole has been moving on and changing, the MMO market has moved far more slowly, other games have been taking its place, games from genres not as shackled to a single game released more than one and a half decade ago. Though the current "live service" games seem to be going down the same route as the MMOs, they're stagnating and they're made by companies that are just copying the early successful games, with minor mechanical tweaks and a new skin.
Having to convince your parents to pay for a montly fee only so you can sit in front of the pc all day was probably the biggest hinderance of MMOs growth.
Jesus christ this was sad, as someone who's been playing MMORPGs since I was 8 (asda story, order and chaos online on mobile etc) this makes me sad, I've been away from the genre like 5+ years but returned and looked for good MMOs sadly none of them have caught my interest:/
You're preaching to the choir kid. I remember when MMOs first started, and I would go to the library to play RuneScape, and Diablo 2 (Which truly was the precursor to WoW. It's even made by the same company) It just blows my mind some people don't have memories before mobile games. Not that it's bad it's just crazy to think about
This channel is made up of such good content! I try to share your channel with anyone I know when it’s least awkward lol, but I really hope it blows up
Sad reality, I started playing Classic WoW after abandoning the game in 2015 and fell into the same mood, it was a chore to play I got my Whirlwind Axe for my Warrior and then quit.
MMOs aren't a genre, a genre refers to a type of game play format, first person shooter, role playing game, real time strategy, and others are examples of genres of games, MMO simply refers to how the game is delivered, the genre type would be tagged on to the end of that (ex: MMORPG, and MMOFPS). MMO stands for Massively Multiplayer Online game. "Online game" simply refers to it being a service based game only played online. "Massively Multiplayer" is just an extension of single player, and multiplayer, single player means it's a game you can't actively play with others, multiplayer means it can be actively played with others, while massively player means it can be actively played with a large number of people, which few new online games cater to. That last part is the thing, many want their instant gratification, and with so many different gaming interests, having to deal with a large number of other people to be able to do things makes getting that content going rather difficult, especially when companies are busy churning out online games like crazy (these days there's more online games released in about any week, or likely even some days, than used to exist in total). With things as they are, in the long run, it's hard for any game to retain enough players to keep massively multiplayer content active, so many online games are just focusing on multiplayer content for some 2-10 players, not the big 20-100 player content actual MMOs from the past had (many these days call just about any online game a MMO), and some are even single player online games, with only minor community aspects not actually related to active game play. Just about everything has to be an online game these days, and while before those were just on PC, now they're also on consoles, and mobile devices, oh man are they on mobile devices, with some companies having stopped making PC games, and now just making mobile games. That's the direction of the gaming industry, smaller games, that require less people, but still being an online service based game, that's why MMOs aren't as much of a thing. One other point is that Meraki sounds like one of those people that's all nutty for PvP, isn't interested in a game with actual story content, and thinks everyone else is the same. Some of us detest PvP, and seeing a game with for instance open world "PvP," means the game is an instant no for them, as let's be honest, it's actually open world PKing, as it seems most of those into that aren't looking for a real fight, just to pick on those weaker than them, and all you have to do is watch one of their "let's pick on other people while I laugh at them" videos/streams to see that.
Damn, other people know about, play, and like LOTRO? I didn't know that was possible. I've been playing and/or watching my dad play since I was 4, and it was a big part of why I got into MMORPGs.
True but the underlying issue is that corporate greed eventually gets the best of them. WoW did not pioneer the MMO genre, Ultima Online did, then Everquest pioneered the first 3D mmo with a a moveable camera. Then Dark Age of Camelot came along and took it a step further but I believe that Ultima sparked blizzards interest but Everquest really sparked their imagination with what they could do with their Isometric game. There was just nothing like it at the time. I'll never forget going into my favorite game store (either electronics boutique or Babbages) and I was always looking at the newest games on the shelf and the owner of the store was like the guy from The Neverending Story movie. He handed me Everquest and told me this was no ordinary game. He was right, and my D&D friends dove head first into it and had some incredible adventures because the game was so hard but rewarding. For instance I had made a troll shadowknight character because I liked the chunky look (original models) with the chunky plate armor. My friend made a female human mage. Each race has its own language but you could teach each other languages from the other races by speaking them (typing them out). The speed at which you learn the language is determined by your intelligence stat. So since I was a a troll with low intelligence I learned the human language (common) very slowly and could only see a few words here and there. The language would be a bunch of random letters and gibberish if you could not speak it. As you learned the language and got more skill points by hearing it (we would spam /tell macros to each other to level up the skill) the words would become less and less scrambled. Since my friend was a human mage with high intelligence he learned the troll language REALLY fast, like in 20 minutes. One day, my friend was playing on his mage by himself and came across a party of troll players in a group. We were on a pvp server where you could actually lose money and some items when you were killed. They were in the process of getting ready to run a dungeon and my friend stopped and waved to see if they were friendly or not. They started talking in troll about how they planned to kill him and eat him lol. He spoke back in troll that that was not going to happen and their demise would soon follow if they tried. They absolutely loved it and started laughing and asked him to join the party and proceeded to do a hard dungeon pretty successfully. You just don't get that kind of content anymore. Corporate greed has absolutely SHATTERED what made MMO games great. Tedious grindfest with raiding makes the most money, especially when TONS of microtransactions are tacked on. The focus shifts from creating content for the community to exploiting the community with false claims of creating content for the community. The MMO community can only take so much before they are forced to move on. Just look at allllll the cookie cutter crap shoots that came after WoW trying to steal market share without anyone understanding why WoW did so well in the first place. It was quite by accident too. Blizzard had to scramble all night long looking for extra computers to make additional servers on launch day. Going on midnight runs to comp usa lol. I remember them talking about the game during development and saying I hope it does well and lasts at least 2 years. They NEVER expected this kind of success. I truly believe a company will one day find the formula to make good MMO but the genre will never return to its former glory. I know Ashes of Creation are trying but its still too weeb. You have to balance catering to the casual as well as the hardcore player. It's a tough dance but old school Blizzard proved its possible.
You are off by about ten years it seems. WoW is not the game that pioneered the MMOG "genre", but the game that marked the beginning of the end. Think about it: Instanced dungeons, instanced battlegrounds, heavy focus on solo content - these aren't exactly "massively multiplayer", are they? What used to set MMOGs apart from other multiplayer games is emergent gameplay - players *being* the main content. The griefing, area denial and general mob tactics in early Ultima Online, the big, open battles the backstabbing and the competition for farming spots in Lineage II, the piracy, formation of mercenary bands, spying and sabotage and the endless feuds of Eve Online that last years on end - that's what you can only get in truly "massively" multiplayer games. Sure - the original World of Warcraft still had some of that: Area denial in Blackrock Mountain, random open world battles in the Hillsbrad Foothills, competition for farming spots in Un'Goro Crater or the Eastern Plague Lands. But it also introduced things that went completely against what makes MMOGs special: You get the best loot from dungeons that are cut off from the open world and limited to a fixed number of players. PvP only has any meaning at all, really, when done in a structured, balanced and fair environment (aka Battlegrounds, later on Arena), which takes away a lot of the value of the persistent open world. Scheming, Plotting, Backstabbing, Ambushing? Not in WoW! Other players can barely mess with what you are doing and what you have, which takes away a lot of the value of having other players around in the first place. You don't really lose anything when you die, meaning that you can only ever gain, which even takes away the value of gaining... ...and that made it hugely successful. And that's why Blizzard are taking away even more freedom, are putting more and more effort into keeping the players on track, limiting emergent gameplay and catering to solos, and everyone else in the industry just follows suit. And as profit-oriented companies, that's just what they have to do, really. Let's face it: MMOGs really aren't for everyone. It is hugely frustrating to work towards something only to have it taken away or destroyed or made worthless by other players. Sure - this ever looming threat is what gives the things that you achieve in such a game much bigger value and gets you as a player more invested, but many people probably would rather like to just play in peace. And that's understandable and perfectly fine. There's a problem, though: An open world full of other players that can freely interact with each other really is the antithesis to playing in peace. So that means that an actual MMOG will never attract the number of players big publishers want to see. And really - an MMOG in our time is not something a small independent company has any chance of pulling off anymore. Emergent gameplay is far too dangerous after all, seeing how modern sensibilities might get hurt when players are left to their own devices. In our connected world, it is far too easy to cause a shitstorm powerful enough to just blow away a small independent developer. A bunch of griefers crashing an ingame funeral roleplay for a deceased friend in real life? A bunch of edge lords arranging their star base modules in the shape of a swastika just to pick a fight? A group of players thinking up and applying a gambling scheme ingame? All of those things would not exactly help a games survival in our nowadays all too easily offended world. The only aspects of MMOGs that are left today are the constant updates to keep players busy, the subscription fees and the need to connect to a server as the only effective form of DRM. It's sad, but it probably had to go that way. MMOGs never had a chance.
I hadn't seen this before today. I got into WoW in late 2008 - just after Wrath was released - and stuck it out until my subscription ran out in Match 2019. After a few months of not playing anything other than Witcher 3, I gave FFXIV a shot. The only thing I knew was that the next expansion was about to be released - I had no experience with Anime or FF and had never owned a Nintendo or PlayStation. I've really enjoyed it - it isn't perfect but the community is fantastic and the lack of endless World Quests and no Titan Forging has given me what I was looking for.
Just wanted to say my thoughts on how sad it is that the last time I had actual joy playing an mmorpg was ether saga- if you know the game the community was amazing. Great video btw, loved it! Lemme know ur thoughts.
The entire game industry changed from wanting to make good games, to just wanting to make quick money. What they don't seem to understand is a good game can make money, but it has to be GOOD. Unfortunately, churning out mediocre games is more profitable in the short term. The worst thing to ever happen to games is Free-to-Play.
Powerful video, very sad, but appropriately so. I've been subscribed to Warcraft for the past year, but I haven't even really bothered with the content. At this point, I'm subscribed out of habit, perhaps even chasing the dragon in the hopes that someday it'll recapture what ensnared me to begin with. Its hard for me to peel away from MMOS; so many of my longest lasting friendships were generated through them. I'm hopeful for the future, though... maybe not the immediate future... but it can still make a comeback if there's a developer willing to take some risks and try to break the mold up a bit.
Right there with you on the shitfest launch and ultimately the ongoing letdown of eso. Shoddycast had me so fucking hyped for eso... also when everquest next was canceled broke me...😢
I think something about WoW that always brings me back is the way that the heroes journey doesn't feel rushed. With the current Pre-Shadowlands leveling system 1-60 you get to play through these zones where your character has little to no renown. You get to just be an adventurer. This also continues where as you gain a reputation you get to experience things that have higher and higher stakes (BC - MoP). Where the player isn't the "Chosen One" they're just an adventurer that has aligned themselves with one particular faction. And I think that the introduction of the "Chosen One" mentality that was came with WoD and continues through the game to this day has actively isolated the player. You aren't a member of the Alliance or Horde working with your allies to defeat these evils you're essentially an all powerful being who does everything for everyone. So when end game content comes along, there isn't the unity among the players in the canon of the story or the gameplay. They just spend the last 3 expansions leveling through these areas where, yes you may work with other people, but the story has made it where it's all about the individual and not about the story, other players, and even other NPCs. That is what I see as the fatal flaw slowly killing WoW, they're emphasis on making it as singleplayer accessible while doing nothing to encourage actual real people interaction. Dungeons, Raids, and even PvP are hardly even group activities anymore, people just join up with randoms, never say a word, get their loot, pad their stats, and then do that on repeat.
I rember when i was a kid my father used to play Last Chaos and then i got my first PC and i also started a character, then we played together, he did show me around and all. Good old times, the game itself wast that intereting, too grindy, but exploring the world together with my dad was definetly worth it!
Hey man I love your content! Its always super chill. I never got into mmorpgs. I am interested, i played a little bit of Oldschool runescape. But thanks for the vid!
They need to make an MMO where you have an effect on the world. It needs to be unique to the player instead of just doing a quest to kill a monster and 2000000 others are getting the same quest and after you kill the monster it is still there fighting someone else..
You cant really do that. how long have they tried? FF14 tries and it fails. MMOs are about the friendships and bonds with other players they arent about being the hero or the chosen one and saving the world. Single player games do it infinitely better
Destiny 2’s moving more into the MMO genre I’m hoping it can highlight the genre more and hopefully allow it to grow again. Also who the frick disliked this?
Nice video! Some very good thoughts on the genre. I would pick SWToR as the most hyped/biggest disappointment in the genre. I 100% agree that 2014 was the year that the death spiral for the genre went critical. I hated ESO at launch - it's a much better game now. I mainly tried it while I waited for Wildstar. The WS devs said something to the effect of 'if this game fails, western AAA MMORPGs go with it'. It's eerie how something so pretentious proved so prophetic!
that's funny, i think youtube died in 2014, too. Also, yeah, i completely miss the good ol' days when social interactions were spontaneous and organic. Now everybody's in their own little worlds on these games. It's singleplayer with human ambiance.
yeah i agree. all the creativity has been sucked out of everything like a plague. youtube, gaming, etc. everything seems so cookie cutter now and not organic. and we're just fed bs and lies and told to accept low budget stuff and indie games. "kickstarters".
I think the biggest problem with this genre is grind. I just cant kill the mobs all day for... for what? My favorite MMO was Dragon nest. It had no open world and i think that's the thing that make this game better for me. It's not intresting for me just to punch mobs even with handreds of abilitis, but if it's a dungeon, where you have to punch mobs... I'll take the whole stock! Probably. I donno, I played it last time years ago, but that's definitely would make things better. Well, my point is just make some short time goals, i want to level up because of doing something, not to do something to level up. Destiny is good at this point, couse it has quests and a storyline. However I'm being tierd of just shooting, I want more abilitis with just cool down, not the ultimate ones. Cool video, recently found your chenel couse of the video about minecraft music. You'r doing a great job! Keep it up!
It's funny, LotRO was good. very very underrated, I tell people it was suprisingly one of my favorite MMO's too, And ive played everyone there is since EQ. Had the best PvE ive ever played. You got it all wrong about classic WoW though, you're to young to understand that. Resetting WoW to classic is that IP's last hope. WoW died with the release of WotLK. And the worst idea they ever had was resetting everyone every 2 years. They should have never increased the level cap.
I think the main reason mmorpg died was because they moved away from being about playing with other people, and to be more of a singleplayer experience, see gw2, blackdesert, ESO, WOW, Rift etc. etc. Sure there are some "dungeons" but that's not the majority of the content, what's more is that everyone should be able to do everything, which makes it so people don't need other people's help. I think if we wanted to see some form of resurrection into MMORPGs then we would need to go back to pen and paper, and see what is it that makes it so popular and so beloved (It's not that everyone can do everything). I think there were several factors which lead to the downfall of mmorpgs: - mmorpgs that is, Massive Multiplayer Online RolePlay games, have lost the massive as in the servers can often only hold less than 100 players, online as in its often instanced and with channels, so you can't see the same people and interact with them through your playtime, and roleplay, there's almost no roleplay elements anymore, those things have been turned into "cosmetics" and "classes" and there isn't really anything else that makes you want to roleplay. (which is funny because I think the reason some of the DND series like critical role etc. are so popular is purely because of the roleplay and far less to do with the combat.) - MMOs only focus on combat, and everything ties into combat. They "perfect" only combat in the sense that they're not really innovating on anything else. It's either tab targeting or "action combat" but can anyone point me to a magic system that isn't just hotbar skills etc. And to compliment the combat they change up the graphics, reskin them so to speak, and every other system that is implemented ties into combat being it crafting, place to store your achievements from combat, etc. - Refuse to innovate, make something new, ties into the one above, but there isn't really tried anything new, if they do it's only 1 or 2 mechanics that are changed and that's it, we don't see any innovation in the mmorpg market. I know some kickstarters tried to innovate, but even they don't really do that much. I think those are some of the big sinners for the stagnation and decline of mmorpg markets, build up systems that can immerse players, not just combat. But more importantly, build up mechanics for those systems as well, and 2nd MOST IMPORTANTLY: - Build systems for people to use to interact in different meaningful ways, to either create new story, help out each other, interact with each other. In MMORPGs use the fact that you have a lot of players, and don't just let them all live and interact in their small bubble. If the developers gave the tools for players to create story and impact the world the mmorpg would live much much longer. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- And I'm going to end with the most important, if you haven't read the above, read this at least: Wow died not at pandaria, but it died at Wrath of the Lich King, why? in 2008 of July Activism Blizzard was founded, and 4 months later Wrath of the Lich king was published. Now why was this a bad thing? one quick example I will give you is look up the armour sets that came with WoTLK, just choose one and look them through, there are only 3 kinds, which are all extremely similar. It began going downhill because they forced out a lot of dlc for money, and stopped caring to innovate. If there's anything that is killing MMORPGs it's greed and that the people in charge of mmorpgs only care about making money, and less about creating a good game. The developers are treated like cheap livestock to be exploited, and forced to reach tight deadlines, which doesn't give a lot of wiggleroom to really create something great. (And here just look at any big game publishers in america) Thank you for reading my wail of words, *screech* rant over :>
LOTRO was amazing up until that horrendous horse combat expansion(Rohan?). Plus they started adding more and more cash-shop bullshit around that time, so then I just pretty much left the game completely. And if I had the come up with one thing that killed the genre, tho, it's oversaturation. Old games refusing to die combined with way too many new, low quality, MMOs being released(especially from Asia) around 2005-2015. That's why GW2 didn't really take off, the average joe couldn't really differentiate it from all the other dozens of MMO being released around the same time. ESO kinda fits here, too. It's just too damn mediocre, and completely different from what made ES popular, i.e. the sandbox elements. So, I almost think we need a complete reset with all these older games being shut down before we can really see some new, cool stuff. Kinda harsh, but that's the only way, IMO. The market right now is just filled to the brim with garbage that somehow people still plays.
Personally I really enjoyed Mists of Pandaria - it was Cataclysm that started things down the wrong path and Warlords that made a series of horrendous decisions. I am sorry you don't like FFXIV but it isn't for everyone.
i fell like the genre will do the same thing as minecraft did it will strugle to survive and when its at its lowest nostalgia kicks in an amazing mmo will come (like the update 1.13 and 1.14 in minecraft) hopefuly full dive will be the new console technology
Recently I began playing FFXIV and as you say, the leveling is tediuos. I love the story, dungeons and raids but the pre patch from Vanilla to Heavensward is just hell. 100 quests to get into the expansion, it nearly made me quit. So far I like a lot the story
Because we have Zelda open world games like TOTK and BOTW with 0 micro transactions. Complete game for a fair price and nothing more. No pay to win bull crap.
Haha, thanks! I’m surprised people who watched me then still watch! I loved CSGO, but I’ve kinda lost interest. Either way, I was always too bad at the game to warrant making videos 😩
Actually, mmorpg are just an excuse to talk to another people with context, like an esport casual, talk about your job, talk about your college or school, and cooperate in something in the game, actually compare you progression with anothers is pretty cool too!
Playing MMO games are hard.. We try everything, but everything falls short of expectation. If only a game like YGGDRASIL(Overlord) comes out i'd spend my life on it🤣
For me, MMOs died for me when playing together became irrelevant. When a Guild was almost a family, now you don't need anyone group finder raid finder...
I love this genre, and I agree that it's dying. However, I have not lost hope and neither should you. Why? Because in 10-15 years, I'll make the MMORPG that everyone's been waiting for.
I think the biggest mistakes new MMOs make are the following. 1 - Overambition Many new ones try to make this HUGE world loaded with lots promises and such. They invest tons of time and money in it and when it fails to capture, it crashes hard. If they made a moderate project and it captured enough people, you could have the start of something interesting, if not, the crash is nowhere near as horrific. 2 - Appealing to the wrong audience Appealing to the current generation of gamers is a dumb idea. They are all about speed running and metas, something which is toxic to an MMO (look how the meta slave mindset effected classic WoW). The game should look _unappealing_ to them. The audience they seek are the kind of people who played D&D, basically Gen X'ers and Nerdy Millennials. Modern MMOs are not built with this in mind, at least as far as I am aware of (I have not played as many). This creates somewhat of a problem as any company with the resources to host a MMO simultaneously wants to "appeal to a wider audience". WoW's decline started before 2014 and it coincided with "appealing to a wider audience". 3 - Too far removed from the original idea of them. The _world_ must come first in an MMO, even above gameplay which sounds counterintuitive, but the _world_ has always been the part of MMOs that sucks people in, very rarely the gameplay. You can have the greatest gameplay features, but if the world is bad, nobody will want to stick around. That said, I do not expect to see another WoW. WoW was somewhat like the original Star Wars trilogy in that it released at the perfect time in to a culture that was suited for it. The LotR trilogy had just ended, and Harry Potter was getting really popular, a fantasy world with warriors and magic was an amazing setting. "Normal" people were starting to use the internet, so the idea of an online world was really exciting to them. Social media was not really a thing yet and WoW provided a good way to stay in touch with friends. Cheap poor quality games had not saturated the online space yet. And the game industry as a whole was not completely corporatized. There will not be another WoW unless there is a massive cultural shift. I think the best MMO fans can hope for is a small to medium scale game with an amazing world and solid enough gameplay. Maybe something like that can blossom, who knows, but it must be known that waiting for the second coming of WoW is not going to end well.
Game companies making games for profit instead of the passion of making a game they would want to play. We just need to wait for the next major crash to reset the playing field.
retail wow just feels pointless to me i started classic and i felt purpose in the game but not in retail which just rushes u to max lvl to do pvp and raids
Damn, in just 2 years FFXIV has WoW on its death bed and ESO is striving. Not that the MMO genre doesn't need radical change though, it definitely does if it wants to survive the next decade, but it just goes to show that the "WoW killers" were here all along.
Interesting enough, 2014 is also about the time that Minecraft multiplayer survival got huge
When someone makes william gibson's metaverse, it will have staying power.
Somewhere along the way people confused "MMORPG" with "Tedious grindfest that has raiding"
MMORPGs are supposed to be a giant online D&D session, not a grinding simulator. When game companies realize this the genre will return.
When d&d session makes money
Most mmos are just solo games played with people around. I want to play WITH people not just with people.
I'd like to see a game that has a mode that starts over every month and has a limited number of lives everyone shares . All players start from scratch and eventually when all extra lives are used up you can't die or you'll be unable to respawn. Everyone works together to beat it. No restrictions on trading or you must be this lvl to use this. Sword. If you have the money or the items for trade you can use it. Sure there will be player killers. Put bounties on player killers heads. Everyone has one month to beat the world before it restarts.
That's just one mode. Have another mode where you keep a character and can battle it out in pvp or attack the bosses with other players and their main character.
A monthly restart also makes it a more beginner friendly environment. I've played mmos where players have grinded for years and owned the world and you couldnt get resources to grow without being hunted murdered and raided. A monthly reset would fix that. A new guild could actually have a chance to overthrow the previous guild ECT.
Another great video man! This videos kinda sad tho not gonna lie
Thanks! And I agree... hopefully the next one will be more upbeat 😊
Bro you are the most underrated video for the fact that you make such high quality content while going through school at the same time. Keep up the fantastic work!
thanks so much! hopefully I'll get better at it... i wanna make as many videos as possible!
I literally cried when dust 514 servers got shut down on PS3 . It was in the eve online universe. Was even given cross play interactions with eve . Greatest MMO FPS ever
I would argue that the genre died earlier than that. On the 23 of November 2004. That was the day World of Warcraft was released. WoW did a lot of things right, it was far more friendly to players, more approachable and this allowed it to reach a far wider audience, an audience that would otherwise never have played MMOs. But WoWs success would ultimately prove detrimental to the genre as a whole. After WoWs release almost every game that followed was very similar to WoW. They might have had some minor mechanical differences and might have looked different, but mechanically they were still borrowing heavily from WoW. Things have improved a bit since, but WoW's shadow still looms over every new MMO. And while the gaming industry as a whole has been moving on and changing, the MMO market has moved far more slowly, other games have been taking its place, games from genres not as shackled to a single game released more than one and a half decade ago. Though the current "live service" games seem to be going down the same route as the MMOs, they're stagnating and they're made by companies that are just copying the early successful games, with minor mechanical tweaks and a new skin.
I personally never got into MMOs but i appreciate the history and popularity they once had. Great video!
Having to convince your parents to pay for a montly fee only so you can sit in front of the pc all day was probably the biggest hinderance of MMOs growth.
Jesus christ this was sad, as someone who's been playing MMORPGs since I was 8 (asda story, order and chaos online on mobile etc) this makes me sad, I've been away from the genre like 5+ years but returned and looked for good MMOs sadly none of them have caught my interest:/
You're preaching to the choir kid. I remember when MMOs first started, and I would go to the library to play RuneScape, and Diablo 2 (Which truly was the precursor to WoW. It's even made by the same company)
It just blows my mind some people don't have memories before mobile games. Not that it's bad it's just crazy to think about
@@the-engneer we're coming back to the MMORPG era PLUS also a golden era
Companies need to make MMOS that are not like World of Warcraft or Elder Scrolls Online like more casual MMOS without the RPG elements.
Not being on consoles didn't help.
This is really true man... Last decade was the best for games and most of my favourite games have either shut down or died
This channel is made up of such good content! I try to share your channel with anyone I know when it’s least awkward lol, but I really hope it blows up
Thanks so much, sharing it is super helpful! I appreciate it!
Sad reality, I started playing Classic WoW after abandoning the game in 2015 and fell into the same mood, it was a chore to play I got my Whirlwind Axe for my Warrior and then quit.
ToonTown, Club Penguin, Webkinz, & Funkeys are the BEST MMOS ever made.
MMOs aren't a genre, a genre refers to a type of game play format, first person shooter, role playing game, real time strategy, and others are examples of genres of games, MMO simply refers to how the game is delivered, the genre type would be tagged on to the end of that (ex: MMORPG, and MMOFPS). MMO stands for Massively Multiplayer Online game. "Online game" simply refers to it being a service based game only played online. "Massively Multiplayer" is just an extension of single player, and multiplayer, single player means it's a game you can't actively play with others, multiplayer means it can be actively played with others, while massively player means it can be actively played with a large number of people, which few new online games cater to.
That last part is the thing, many want their instant gratification, and with so many different gaming interests, having to deal with a large number of other people to be able to do things makes getting that content going rather difficult, especially when companies are busy churning out online games like crazy (these days there's more online games released in about any week, or likely even some days, than used to exist in total). With things as they are, in the long run, it's hard for any game to retain enough players to keep massively multiplayer content active, so many online games are just focusing on multiplayer content for some 2-10 players, not the big 20-100 player content actual MMOs from the past had (many these days call just about any online game a MMO), and some are even single player online games, with only minor community aspects not actually related to active game play. Just about everything has to be an online game these days, and while before those were just on PC, now they're also on consoles, and mobile devices, oh man are they on mobile devices, with some companies having stopped making PC games, and now just making mobile games. That's the direction of the gaming industry, smaller games, that require less people, but still being an online service based game, that's why MMOs aren't as much of a thing.
One other point is that Meraki sounds like one of those people that's all nutty for PvP, isn't interested in a game with actual story content, and thinks everyone else is the same. Some of us detest PvP, and seeing a game with for instance open world "PvP," means the game is an instant no for them, as let's be honest, it's actually open world PKing, as it seems most of those into that aren't looking for a real fight, just to pick on those weaker than them, and all you have to do is watch one of their "let's pick on other people while I laugh at them" videos/streams to see that.
Damn, other people know about, play, and like LOTRO? I didn't know that was possible. I've been playing and/or watching my dad play since I was 4, and it was a big part of why I got into MMORPGs.
True but the underlying issue is that corporate greed eventually gets the best of them. WoW did not pioneer the MMO genre, Ultima Online did, then Everquest pioneered the first 3D mmo with a a moveable camera. Then Dark Age of Camelot came along and took it a step further but I believe that Ultima sparked blizzards interest but Everquest really sparked their imagination with what they could do with their Isometric game. There was just nothing like it at the time. I'll never forget going into my favorite game store (either electronics boutique or Babbages) and I was always looking at the newest games on the shelf and the owner of the store was like the guy from The Neverending Story movie. He handed me Everquest and told me this was no ordinary game. He was right, and my D&D friends dove head first into it and had some incredible adventures because the game was so hard but rewarding.
For instance I had made a troll shadowknight character because I liked the chunky look (original models) with the chunky plate armor. My friend made a female human mage. Each race has its own language but you could teach each other languages from the other races by speaking them (typing them out). The speed at which you learn the language is determined by your intelligence stat. So since I was a a troll with low intelligence I learned the human language (common) very slowly and could only see a few words here and there. The language would be a bunch of random letters and gibberish if you could not speak it.
As you learned the language and got more skill points by hearing it (we would spam /tell macros to each other to level up the skill) the words would become less and less scrambled. Since my friend was a human mage with high intelligence he learned the troll language REALLY fast, like in 20 minutes. One day, my friend was playing on his mage by himself and came across a party of troll players in a group. We were on a pvp server where you could actually lose money and some items when you were killed. They were in the process of getting ready to run a dungeon and my friend stopped and waved to see if they were friendly or not. They started talking in troll about how they planned to kill him and eat him lol. He spoke back in troll that that was not going to happen and their demise would soon follow if they tried. They absolutely loved it and started laughing and asked him to join the party and proceeded to do a hard dungeon pretty successfully. You just don't get that kind of content anymore.
Corporate greed has absolutely SHATTERED what made MMO games great. Tedious grindfest with raiding makes the most money, especially when TONS of microtransactions are tacked on. The focus shifts from creating content for the community to exploiting the community with false claims of creating content for the community. The MMO community can only take so much before they are forced to move on. Just look at allllll the cookie cutter crap shoots that came after WoW trying to steal market share without anyone understanding why WoW did so well in the first place. It was quite by accident too. Blizzard had to scramble all night long looking for extra computers to make additional servers on launch day. Going on midnight runs to comp usa lol. I remember them talking about the game during development and saying I hope it does well and lasts at least 2 years. They NEVER expected this kind of success.
I truly believe a company will one day find the formula to make good MMO but the genre will never return to its former glory. I know Ashes of Creation are trying but its still too weeb. You have to balance catering to the casual as well as the hardcore player. It's a tough dance but old school Blizzard proved its possible.
No king rules forever
excellent content . Well presented ideas with in depth arguments , nice music and smooth editing . Keep up the great work !
Thank you for the kind words man!
4k views only? I found out about your channel with the Minecraft music video and now I'm binge watching all your videos.. And subbed of course!
You are off by about ten years it seems. WoW is not the game that pioneered the MMOG "genre", but the game that marked the beginning of the end.
Think about it: Instanced dungeons, instanced battlegrounds, heavy focus on solo content - these aren't exactly "massively multiplayer", are they? What used to set MMOGs apart from other multiplayer games is emergent gameplay - players *being* the main content. The griefing, area denial and general mob tactics in early Ultima Online, the big, open battles the backstabbing and the competition for farming spots in Lineage II, the piracy, formation of mercenary bands, spying and sabotage and the endless feuds of Eve Online that last years on end - that's what you can only get in truly "massively" multiplayer games.
Sure - the original World of Warcraft still had some of that: Area denial in Blackrock Mountain, random open world battles in the Hillsbrad Foothills, competition for farming spots in Un'Goro Crater or the Eastern Plague Lands. But it also introduced things that went completely against what makes MMOGs special: You get the best loot from dungeons that are cut off from the open world and limited to a fixed number of players. PvP only has any meaning at all, really, when done in a structured, balanced and fair environment (aka Battlegrounds, later on Arena), which takes away a lot of the value of the persistent open world. Scheming, Plotting, Backstabbing, Ambushing? Not in WoW! Other players can barely mess with what you are doing and what you have, which takes away a lot of the value of having other players around in the first place. You don't really lose anything when you die, meaning that you can only ever gain, which even takes away the value of gaining...
...and that made it hugely successful. And that's why Blizzard are taking away even more freedom, are putting more and more effort into keeping the players on track, limiting emergent gameplay and catering to solos, and everyone else in the industry just follows suit. And as profit-oriented companies, that's just what they have to do, really. Let's face it: MMOGs really aren't for everyone. It is hugely frustrating to work towards something only to have it taken away or destroyed or made worthless by other players. Sure - this ever looming threat is what gives the things that you achieve in such a game much bigger value and gets you as a player more invested, but many people probably would rather like to just play in peace. And that's understandable and perfectly fine. There's a problem, though: An open world full of other players that can freely interact with each other really is the antithesis to playing in peace. So that means that an actual MMOG will never attract the number of players big publishers want to see.
And really - an MMOG in our time is not something a small independent company has any chance of pulling off anymore. Emergent gameplay is far too dangerous after all, seeing how modern sensibilities might get hurt when players are left to their own devices. In our connected world, it is far too easy to cause a shitstorm powerful enough to just blow away a small independent developer. A bunch of griefers crashing an ingame funeral roleplay for a deceased friend in real life? A bunch of edge lords arranging their star base modules in the shape of a swastika just to pick a fight? A group of players thinking up and applying a gambling scheme ingame? All of those things would not exactly help a games survival in our nowadays all too easily offended world.
The only aspects of MMOGs that are left today are the constant updates to keep players busy, the subscription fees and the need to connect to a server as the only effective form of DRM. It's sad, but it probably had to go that way. MMOGs never had a chance.
Underrated comment
I hadn't seen this before today. I got into WoW in late 2008 - just after Wrath was released - and stuck it out until my subscription ran out in Match 2019. After a few months of not playing anything other than Witcher 3, I gave FFXIV a shot. The only thing I knew was that the next expansion was about to be released - I had no experience with Anime or FF and had never owned a Nintendo or PlayStation. I've really enjoyed it - it isn't perfect but the community is fantastic and the lack of endless World Quests and no Titan Forging has given me what I was looking for.
Just wanted to say my thoughts on how sad it is that the last time I had actual joy playing an mmorpg was ether saga- if you know the game the community was amazing. Great video btw, loved it! Lemme know ur thoughts.
The golden age ended with Wildstar.
He is playing the skyrim music in the background and I am still playing skyrim and I will never stop
The entire game industry changed from wanting to make good games, to just wanting to make quick money. What they don't seem to understand is a good game can make money, but it has to be GOOD. Unfortunately, churning out mediocre games is more profitable in the short term. The worst thing to ever happen to games is Free-to-Play.
I agree, they adding in loot boxes, micro trasnactions, sysbm.
Loved how you put the dragonborn comes in the background while you were talking about ESO
Great video. Thanks again for featuring my music :)
Powerful video, very sad, but appropriately so. I've been subscribed to Warcraft for the past year, but I haven't even really bothered with the content. At this point, I'm subscribed out of habit, perhaps even chasing the dragon in the hopes that someday it'll recapture what ensnared me to begin with. Its hard for me to peel away from MMOS; so many of my longest lasting friendships were generated through them. I'm hopeful for the future, though... maybe not the immediate future... but it can still make a comeback if there's a developer willing to take some risks and try to break the mold up a bit.
Right there with you on the shitfest launch and ultimately the ongoing letdown of eso. Shoddycast had me so fucking hyped for eso... also when everquest next was canceled broke me...😢
I think something about WoW that always brings me back is the way that the heroes journey doesn't feel rushed. With the current Pre-Shadowlands leveling system 1-60 you get to play through these zones where your character has little to no renown. You get to just be an adventurer. This also continues where as you gain a reputation you get to experience things that have higher and higher stakes (BC - MoP). Where the player isn't the "Chosen One" they're just an adventurer that has aligned themselves with one particular faction. And I think that the introduction of the "Chosen One" mentality that was came with WoD and continues through the game to this day has actively isolated the player. You aren't a member of the Alliance or Horde working with your allies to defeat these evils you're essentially an all powerful being who does everything for everyone. So when end game content comes along, there isn't the unity among the players in the canon of the story or the gameplay. They just spend the last 3 expansions leveling through these areas where, yes you may work with other people, but the story has made it where it's all about the individual and not about the story, other players, and even other NPCs. That is what I see as the fatal flaw slowly killing WoW, they're emphasis on making it as singleplayer accessible while doing nothing to encourage actual real people interaction. Dungeons, Raids, and even PvP are hardly even group activities anymore, people just join up with randoms, never say a word, get their loot, pad their stats, and then do that on repeat.
Entertaining and informative, as always. Great video man!
Btw what’s you wallpaper😂
Firewatch my man!
I rember when i was a kid my father used to play Last Chaos and then i got my first PC and i also started a character, then we played together, he did show me around and all. Good old times, the game itself wast that intereting, too grindy, but exploring the world together with my dad was definetly worth it!
Hey man I love your content! Its always super chill. I never got into mmorpgs. I am interested, i played a little bit of Oldschool runescape. But thanks for the vid!
I got a rpg commercial right before the video. Played
Took a break from my assignment to watch this and don't regret it, love your content man
Thanks so much! I appreciate it!
Now back to work 😤😤
R.I.P Club Penguin 😭😭
The OG :(
Meraki yep.. thanks for replying
MMOS > MOBAS > Battle Royales.
Also before MMOs you had your proto chat boxes with avatars and FPS game like CS 1.6 / Quake / IRC-Chats
They need to make an MMO where you have an effect on the world. It needs to be unique to the player instead of just doing a quest to kill a monster and 2000000 others are getting the same quest and after you kill the monster it is still there fighting someone else..
You cant really do that. how long have they tried? FF14 tries and it fails. MMOs are about the friendships and bonds with other players they arent about being the hero or the chosen one and saving the world.
Single player games do it infinitely better
Destiny 2’s moving more into the MMO genre I’m hoping it can highlight the genre more and hopefully allow it to grow again. Also who the frick disliked this?
my first mmorpg was: mmorpg school of chaos (a mobile game) and it established a lot of memories in me
Nice video! Some very good thoughts on the genre. I would pick SWToR as the most hyped/biggest disappointment in the genre. I 100% agree that 2014 was the year that the death spiral for the genre went critical. I hated ESO at launch - it's a much better game now. I mainly tried it while I waited for Wildstar. The WS devs said something to the effect of 'if this game fails, western AAA MMORPGs go with it'. It's eerie how something so pretentious proved so prophetic!
that's funny, i think youtube died in 2014, too.
Also, yeah, i completely miss the good ol' days when social interactions were spontaneous and organic. Now everybody's in their own little worlds on these games. It's singleplayer with human ambiance.
yeah i agree. all the creativity has been sucked out of everything like a plague. youtube, gaming, etc. everything seems so cookie cutter now and not organic. and we're just fed bs and lies and told to accept low budget stuff and indie games. "kickstarters".
I got an MMORPG advert when I clicked on this...
I look forward to every video! Keep up the great work bro! Also where do u get ur music?
Just search around for lofi remixes of games I like/am talking about!
Meraki that’s cool, I really like the songs you use in your videos
We don't need online multiplayer, we need good stories and gameplay. 👌
False
@@Sporkonafork1 ok?
I think the biggest problem with this genre is grind. I just cant kill the mobs all day for... for what? My favorite MMO was Dragon nest. It had no open world and i think that's the thing that make this game better for me. It's not intresting for me just to punch mobs even with handreds of abilitis, but if it's a dungeon, where you have to punch mobs... I'll take the whole stock! Probably. I donno, I played it last time years ago, but that's definitely would make things better. Well, my point is just make some short time goals, i want to level up because of doing something, not to do something to level up. Destiny is good at this point, couse it has quests and a storyline. However I'm being tierd of just shooting, I want more abilitis with just cool down, not the ultimate ones.
Cool video, recently found your chenel couse of the video about minecraft music. You'r doing a great job! Keep it up!
Even the people watching sao didn't know about mmorpg
I’m glad you mentioned Wizard101
This is why I still play second life, hoping one day something brings it back to its former glory(started in 2006).
Awesome video. Yeah it is sad that RPG mmo are kinda dead and I agree with you.
I still okay the RPG golden sun lost age on my GBA Nintendo SP
Im sad i was to poor to experience wow in my childhood
Got a mmorpg ad on this video
It's funny, LotRO was good. very very underrated, I tell people it was suprisingly one of my favorite MMO's too, And ive played everyone there is since EQ. Had the best PvE ive ever played.
You got it all wrong about classic WoW though, you're to young to understand that. Resetting WoW to classic is that IP's last hope. WoW died with the release of WotLK. And the worst idea they ever had was resetting everyone every 2 years. They should have never increased the level cap.
i have only played one mmorpg game not really into this genre but man i like old school runescape music
And that is why toontown will remain superior jk
I think the main reason mmorpg died was because they moved away from being about playing with other people, and to be more of a singleplayer experience, see gw2, blackdesert, ESO, WOW, Rift etc. etc. Sure there are some "dungeons" but that's not the majority of the content, what's more is that everyone should be able to do everything, which makes it so people don't need other people's help. I think if we wanted to see some form of resurrection into MMORPGs then we would need to go back to pen and paper, and see what is it that makes it so popular and so beloved (It's not that everyone can do everything).
I think there were several factors which lead to the downfall of mmorpgs:
- mmorpgs that is, Massive Multiplayer Online RolePlay games, have lost the massive as in the servers can often only hold less than 100 players, online as in its often instanced and with channels, so you can't see the same people and interact with them through your playtime, and roleplay, there's almost no roleplay elements anymore, those things have been turned into "cosmetics" and "classes" and there isn't really anything else that makes you want to roleplay. (which is funny because I think the reason some of the DND series like critical role etc. are so popular is purely because of the roleplay and far less to do with the combat.)
- MMOs only focus on combat, and everything ties into combat. They "perfect" only combat in the sense that they're not really innovating on anything else. It's either tab targeting or "action combat" but can anyone point me to a magic system that isn't just hotbar skills etc. And to compliment the combat they change up the graphics, reskin them so to speak, and every other system that is implemented ties into combat being it crafting, place to store your achievements from combat, etc.
- Refuse to innovate, make something new, ties into the one above, but there isn't really tried anything new, if they do it's only 1 or 2 mechanics that are changed and that's it, we don't see any innovation in the mmorpg market. I know some kickstarters tried to innovate, but even they don't really do that much.
I think those are some of the big sinners for the stagnation and decline of mmorpg markets, build up systems that can immerse players, not just combat. But more importantly, build up mechanics for those systems as well, and 2nd MOST IMPORTANTLY:
- Build systems for people to use to interact in different meaningful ways, to either create new story, help out each other, interact with each other. In MMORPGs use the fact that you have a lot of players, and don't just let them all live and interact in their small bubble. If the developers gave the tools for players to create story and impact the world the mmorpg would live much much longer.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
And I'm going to end with the most important, if you haven't read the above, read this at least:
Wow died not at pandaria, but it died at Wrath of the Lich King, why? in 2008 of July Activism Blizzard was founded, and 4 months later Wrath of the Lich king was published. Now why was this a bad thing? one quick example I will give you is look up the armour sets that came with WoTLK, just choose one and look them through, there are only 3 kinds, which are all extremely similar. It began going downhill because they forced out a lot of dlc for money, and stopped caring to innovate.
If there's anything that is killing MMORPGs it's greed and that the people in charge of mmorpgs only care about making money, and less about creating a good game. The developers are treated like cheap livestock to be exploited, and forced to reach tight deadlines, which doesn't give a lot of wiggleroom to really create something great. (And here just look at any big game publishers in america)
Thank you for reading my wail of words, *screech* rant over :>
Final Fantasy XIV is officially 10 years old
LOTRO was amazing up until that horrendous horse combat expansion(Rohan?). Plus they started adding more and more cash-shop bullshit around that time, so then I just pretty much left the game completely.
And if I had the come up with one thing that killed the genre, tho, it's oversaturation. Old games refusing to die combined with way too many new, low quality, MMOs being released(especially from Asia) around 2005-2015. That's why GW2 didn't really take off, the average joe couldn't really differentiate it from all the other dozens of MMO being released around the same time. ESO kinda fits here, too. It's just too damn mediocre, and completely different from what made ES popular, i.e. the sandbox elements.
So, I almost think we need a complete reset with all these older games being shut down before we can really see some new, cool stuff. Kinda harsh, but that's the only way, IMO. The market right now is just filled to the brim with garbage that somehow people still plays.
This is illegal
Any Thoughts About VRMMORPG when they get better
You know what else died in 2014? Monkey Quest.
I miss Monkey Quest. :/ another mmo that was shut down in 2014...
Wow it's probably just a coincidence but elder scrolls online was the last time I was part of a new mmo launch. After that it was just not the same.
R.I.P MMORPG's
Personally I really enjoyed Mists of Pandaria - it was Cataclysm that started things down the wrong path and Warlords that made a series of horrendous decisions.
I am sorry you don't like FFXIV but it isn't for everyone.
Nah i just got golden abyss...
I finished the console ones and now I sant to finish the series for good lol.
Great video btw😀❤️
I love your videos the vibe are great and just love how Yu edit your vids
My all time favorite was the original GW. GW2 and perfect world int.
i fell like the genre will do the same thing as minecraft did it will strugle to survive and when its at its lowest nostalgia kicks in an amazing mmo will come (like the update 1.13 and 1.14 in minecraft) hopefuly full dive will be the new console technology
The chance of mmorpgs getting revived is small.
"Archeage which is getting a rework, but I dunno it's probs going to be p2w again"
This man here is a fucking prophet.
you know, I really hoped Starbase would work out, 30bucks and like two weeks later the game was already dead haha
Recently I began playing FFXIV and as you say, the leveling is tediuos. I love the story, dungeons and raids but the pre patch from Vanilla to Heavensward is just hell. 100 quests to get into the expansion, it nearly made me quit. So far I like a lot the story
Have you made it to Shadowbringers yet?
Because we have Zelda open world games like TOTK and BOTW with 0 micro transactions. Complete game for a fair price and nothing more. No pay to win bull crap.
I was not expecting asmongold to show up here, a very pleasant suprise
Great vid man! I kinda miss your CSGO gameplay
Haha, thanks! I’m surprised people who watched me then still watch!
I loved CSGO, but I’ve kinda lost interest. Either way, I was always too bad at the game to warrant making videos 😩
Actually, mmorpg are just an excuse to talk to another people with context, like an esport casual, talk about your job, talk about your college or school, and cooperate in something in the game, actually compare you progression with anothers is pretty cool too!
MMo's are to expensive and really hard to maintain, thats the biggest problem
EoS was broken on launch. It’s a great game now.
Mmo games like WoW were the social media before facebook and smartphones. They don't fill that need anymore, and will never be as big.
Playing MMO games are hard.. We try everything, but everything falls short of expectation. If only a game like YGGDRASIL(Overlord) comes out i'd spend my life on it🤣
You guys ever played spiral knights?
Yeah.
Yeah.
For me, MMOs died for me when playing together became irrelevant. When a Guild was almost a family, now you don't need anyone group finder raid finder...
imagine bfa without group finder and tight knit guilds again...
Eve Online’s pop goes up each year.
Eve don't count. Never has.
I love this genre, and I agree that it's dying. However, I have not lost hope and neither should you. Why? Because in 10-15 years, I'll make the MMORPG that everyone's been waiting for.
Looking forward bro
I think the biggest mistakes new MMOs make are the following.
1 - Overambition
Many new ones try to make this HUGE world loaded with lots promises and such. They invest tons of time and money in it and when it fails to capture, it crashes hard. If they made a moderate project and it captured enough people, you could have the start of something interesting, if not, the crash is nowhere near as horrific.
2 - Appealing to the wrong audience
Appealing to the current generation of gamers is a dumb idea. They are all about speed running and metas, something which is toxic to an MMO (look how the meta slave mindset effected classic WoW). The game should look _unappealing_ to them. The audience they seek are the kind of people who played D&D, basically Gen X'ers and Nerdy Millennials. Modern MMOs are not built with this in mind, at least as far as I am aware of (I have not played as many). This creates somewhat of a problem as any company with the resources to host a MMO simultaneously wants to "appeal to a wider audience". WoW's decline started before 2014 and it coincided with "appealing to a wider audience".
3 - Too far removed from the original idea of them.
The _world_ must come first in an MMO, even above gameplay which sounds counterintuitive, but the _world_ has always been the part of MMOs that sucks people in, very rarely the gameplay. You can have the greatest gameplay features, but if the world is bad, nobody will want to stick around.
That said, I do not expect to see another WoW. WoW was somewhat like the original Star Wars trilogy in that it released at the perfect time in to a culture that was suited for it. The LotR trilogy had just ended, and Harry Potter was getting really popular, a fantasy world with warriors and magic was an amazing setting. "Normal" people were starting to use the internet, so the idea of an online world was really exciting to them. Social media was not really a thing yet and WoW provided a good way to stay in touch with friends. Cheap poor quality games had not saturated the online space yet. And the game industry as a whole was not completely corporatized. There will not be another WoW unless there is a massive cultural shift.
I think the best MMO fans can hope for is a small to medium scale game with an amazing world and solid enough gameplay. Maybe something like that can blossom, who knows, but it must be known that waiting for the second coming of WoW is not going to end well.
Rip Aqworlds
Game companies making games for profit instead of the passion of making a game they would want to play. We just need to wait for the next major crash to reset the playing field.
Eso was a huge let down , destiny was also sold to be like a more open Warframe and in reality it was so much less
retail wow just feels pointless to me i started classic and i felt purpose in the game but not in retail which just rushes u to max lvl to do pvp and raids
Never say never. Forever is a very long time.
The genre is just obsolete at this point
i got into old school runescape last year and idk it's still great and i like the graphics
been playing rs since 2000 during beta, love this game.
I really enjoyed it...
RIP MMO
MMO's didn't die, they mutated into Mobile Games... with all of the selling out included and amplified.
Damn, in just 2 years FFXIV has WoW on its death bed and ESO is striving. Not that the MMO genre doesn't need radical change though, it definitely does if it wants to survive the next decade, but it just goes to show that the "WoW killers" were here all along.
What killed mmos? microtransactions greed, and greedy stockholders, and narcisstic selfish ceos who only think of money not passion of making a game.