Time for part two of the article - Vicious Circle or Circle of Friends: Breaking the Cycle, by Julie Whitefeather. What do you break the cycle that game developers use to players to keep coming back for more and still keep the subscriptions coming?  We will discuss that in this article.

Read on…

.Breaking the cycle…by Julie Whitefeather

You may ask yourself what cycle - especially if you didn’t read part one of this article entitled “Vicious Circle or Circle of Friends.”  The cycle I am talking about in this case is that which game developers use to keep players coming back for more.  When Richard Garriott described World of Warcraft as a “system of inventory management” his comments need not have been limited to just that game. No matter how many levels you throw at players, no matter how often you raise the level cap, it will never be enough. PVE content will always get played out before the next content update is ready no matter who a game developer works for.  Even Turbine, who’s response to how they will handle end game was once “what end game? We are going to keep developing content!” has already had their share of complaints about lack of content and the game has barely been out a year.

There are a limited number of ways that developers seem to use to string players along and keep the subscriptions coming. This is one area in which I have not seen a great deal of development - perhaps I should look harder.  What I do see however falls into several categories, the first representing the vicious cycle: whether it is in raiding or pvp ask any player why they keep doing it and they will tell you they will tell you they raid/pvp for better gear and they need better gear to get better at raiding/pvp.

A second way developers try to keep subscriptions coming is with crafting systems.  But no matter how good the crafting system is, no how much a player enjoys it, even that will only last so long. Case in point: the guild master of one of my EQ2 guilds has a character that is at the top level of crafting in each area.  Even so, there are some good points about crafting in EQ2 that some players may not appreciate. Crafting for player housing has become a game within a game in EQ2. I was going to go into some of the differences and point up just how good EQ2 players have it when it comes to crafting - as well as point out an innovation or two from other developers - but I will save that for next time.

That still begs the question how to break out of the vicious cycle that is end game and yet still keep the subscriptions coming? Some game developers through instances to be raided at the players, making them harder and harder each time. This may be new content but once you have seen it, if you are only there to see what’s new, there is no need to run the instance more than once.  Even if you do raid end game instances for fun it is limited by the same tired character classes that get used in MMOs time and time again.

What do I mean by that?

Log on to any games looking for group channel and you will see the same classes, over and over again - healer, tank, dps.  This way of running classes never seems to change. Even in instances where there are hybrid classes gaming communities invariable try to pound that character class into a particular role and heap abuse on  any player that doesn’t do things as expected.

But changing the way a game is played, right down to the basics - getting rid of the “looking for healer, looking for tank, looking for DPS” spams are not likely to change any time soon.  Not, at least, while there is still the 800 pound gorilla in the room encouraging the myth that ever game must compete with WoW to succeed. Not when the companies like EA and Activision/Blizzard spout corporate nonsense that small independent developers may as well give up the ghost.

So what is the solution?

As odd as it may seem, the solution is to make games that are simply about having fun again. Make games that are not designed to appeal to the greedy nature of human beings. The time was, and not that long ago, when PvP was done just for the fun of it, and not what players can get out of it.  God Bless his soul, Gary Gygax gave us a game that people used to get together and just have fun playing. Game developers need to bring those days back.  In a recent episode of Massively Online Gamer, Ryan Verniere (one of the shows hosts) talked about the idea of the days of the MMO being over soon.  This is not, I should point out, the same as the “pc gaming is dead” nonsense. What he was talking about are games where a few friends can get together on line in a multi-player game - not a MASSIVELY multiplayer game but just a few friends - and have fun.  He may not be far from wrong. What is the difference? A few friends having fun is the difference. Having fun - not competing to be the best, not trying to beat each other to the best gear - just having fun.

In the end that is what end game needs to be about. In fact, that is what all of gaming needs to be about - just a few friends having fun at a game that is fun to play.  Me? I belong to a group that spans a lot of games. That group is called “The Older Gamer” (TOG); older, in this case, meaning anyone above the age of 21. One estimate in Massive Magazine put the number of the group’s members being 14,000. I have no idea if that is true or not. Still, I can say that being part of TOG has made all the difference to me when it comes to games. I have started playing a lot of Lord of the Rings Online lately - not because it is a game that I consider to be head and shoulders above Sony products, but just because they are a great group of people to game with - and that is the solution to breaking out of the cycle.

Until next time,

See you online,

Julie Whitefeather