The Endgame Dilemma

To say that I am truly looking forward to the next year-and-a-half of events in the MMO world would be something of an understatement.  Now don’t get me wrong, as both TOR and GW2 look very intriguing, but my anticipation is mostly because I think one of my oldest theories is finally going to be put to the test.  But before I get into that, I am forced to bring up an old topic again whether I like it or not.  You see, many gamers just won’t quit their love affair with the idea that new MMOs are going to decimate current ones, even when reality still tells us that this just isn’t true.

Many players sub to more than one MMO to begin with anyway, and the ebb and flow of players from one game to another is a very continual thing.   Sure, the launch of a big new MMO can have some impact on current titles, but that impact has proven to be mostly reversible.  As I’ve said before, new MMOs only retain around 30-40 percent of the people who actually try them anyway.  How’s that for sobering news to potential shareholders?  The multi-million dollar MMO you are about to launch has a good chance to lose around 60-70 percent of its playerbase after the first month or two.

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But onto a little discussion regarding my theory, which revolves around the concept of the MMO endgame.  I am mostly speaking of two different titles that launched in November of 2004.  They are World of Warcraft and Everquest 2, and both are very near and dear to my heart for various reasons.  But through all the changes and tweaks they have received over the passage of time, the basic structure of their endgames has remained the same throughout.  Raiding is the chief activity, with quests/dailies and some form of instanced PvP thrown in for good measure.

That’s been the story for quite a while now.

So WoW and EQ2 are going to turn 7 this November, and it’s this writer’s opinion that if their endgames do not receive a healthy dose of innovation in expansions to come, then both will begin to suffer more subscription losses as we near the end of next year.  Yes, the launches of both TOR and Guild Wars 2 also loom ominously on the horizon, but these will only feed into an already growing problem of endgame stagnation.  This is where my theory comes into play, as it basically says that most players can only raid 3-4 nights a week for so many years before they suddenly crash faster than a freshman at a sorority party.

So I have always found that stagnation in developing new forms of content and time are the greatest threats to an aging MMO.  Many people will blame a bad expansion or specific gameplay alterations when they see an MMO begin its downhill turn.  But I’ve always felt that time is the true culprit more often than not.  The technology inherent to older games starts to lag behind the sparkle of newer titles, and the style of development and varieties of gameplay begin to feel aged and worn when compared to current offerings as well.

If an MMO has lived long enough to have an expansion-filled life, then time will being to kill it just as quickly as any changes you might be protesting.  You can even see Blizzard fighting to combat this phenomenon with their recent revamp of most content from levels of 1-60 (Blood Elf and Draenei starting areas excluded).  But players need something else to sink their teeth into as the years pass by, especially when it comes to endgame activities.  Breathing life back into your leveling content is a good idea, but this all leads players to the same destination anyway.

Gamers need the endgames of their MMOs to evolve with the ever-expanding ambitions of upcoming titles.

This is where content stagnation comes into play, and sadly neither Wow or EQ2 are coming up with many new ideas these days.  At best, the 4.2 Patch for WoW will be bringing some much needed storyline quests and dailies to the endgame, along with the phasing technology that many of us have come to know and love even with its drawbacks.  This kind of content will be a welcome change for many players I think, and it will also reward some very nice gear as well.

But the occasional patch with storyline content is just not going to cut it at the end of the day.  I guarantee you that if Blizzard’s next expansion gives us an endgame filled with more 10/25 man raids, normal/heroic dungeons, Wintergrasp version 3.0, along with some rated BGs and Arena play, then WoW will continue to take subscription losses in both North America and Europe.  These may be gradual sub losses or they may end up being more severe in number, as it’s very hard to predict that sort of thing.

But what I do know for certain is that Everquest 2 also falls into the same category as WoW.  If SOE just gives us another expansion with its arms wrapped tightly around the raid/loot grind, then I fear EQ2′s best days are long behind it.  The addition of Public Quests are a nice feature to be sure, but they will also fail to stem the tide of age.  Tacking on pre-used additions to your endgame (flying mounts, public quests) is not going to stop the creeping crud of dullness that seeps into the pores of an old MMO.  Props to the folks who get the creeping crud reference btw! 

But even more to the point, Wow and EQ2 have consistently delivered expansions of varying quality depending on who you talk to, but consistency is no longer enough to keep them growing.  These are two aging but still very entertaining games that need a little injection of adrenaline as they move into their twilight years.  I think a good measure of life is left in both of them, though Everquest 2 will certainly be hurt by the eventual release of a third MMO in the Everquest universe.  So we may end up having three Everquest games all out at the same time.

I seriously don’t know what to say about that and feel it’s a topic best left to another day, so let’s just move on.  In closing then, let us hope that Blizzard and SOE understand the predicaments that their respective MMOs find themselves in, and are already in the process of preparing the appropriate medicine.  Now is not the time for developer caution…now is the time ramp up the imagination and deliver some endgame content that is out of the box.  The fans of the two greatest franchises in MMO history are waiting the results with bated breath.

The “Second M”

My recent excursion back into the realm of Vanguard has got me thinking an awful lot about the current state of MMORPGs.  Specifically, I find myself ruminating on the loss of the “Second M”.  Oh multiplayer, wherefore art thou multiplayer?  As most of you know I’m sure, MMOs were riddled with the trials of forced grouping in their fledglings years.  EQ is a perfect example of this phenomenon.

Only several classes could solo with any sort of real efficiency in EQ, and the leveling rate slowed down dramatically if you dared to try.  So for most players it was all about the grouping and social aspects of the leveling experience.  Besides, ever try to solo in EQ as a Warrior?  You practically had to go off and watch 60 minutes when it was time to sit and regen health.

Things got even more tiresome once you leveled up enough and began to set maximum level in your sights.  Grouping was no longer a preferable option at this point, it was an outright requirement.  Blue con mobs now had health far beyond anything you could take out on your own.  So there players sat, sometimes for hours on end as they spammed “LFG” in chat.  Depending on your class this could end with nothing at all, a whole night wasted looking for a group without any spots opening up for you.  This is terrible MMO design and you’d be a fool to argue it any other way.

So many years later, along came World of Warcraft and its promise that you could solo all the way to max level if you so desired.  There was also plenty of group content while leveling in those days, with lots of group quests and elite named mobs roaming around for you to kill.  Players flocked to the polish of WoW in droves and understandably so, it was and still is a great game in many ways.  But even though I have praised WoW for its questing content and simply love much of the work they did for Cataclysm, there is still one thing that prevents them from claiming the…

It is the loss of the “Second M” in the leveling experience.  In WoW it’s far quicker and infinitely more efficient to level on your own than with a friend or group.  Oh sure, you could just run dungeons over and over for the much improved amount of xp they reward.  But if you just want to explore the huge world of Azeroth and its questing content, best to tell your buddy to take a hike because more people will only slow you down.

When you add the fact that many of the group quests in WoW have been nerfed to solo, and many of the named mobs have been nerfed from elite to normal status, you can almost hear the rushing vacuum sound of the “Second M” being sucked right out of the game.  This also, is terrible MMO design and you’d be a fool to argue it any other way.

But playing Vanguard again has reminded that it’s OK to have a mixture of solo and group content in your leveling process.  Vanguard is a game that still requires you to rely on people to do certain things other than just raids or dungeons.  It is very throwback in that respect, but you can still level to max on your own without the headaches of yesteryear.  So why do developers keep making the leveling process easier and easier on us, despite wonderful examples like the one that Vanguard provides?

I became even more curious about this when I recently played Everquest 2 and found the leveling there to be even simpler than it is in WoW these days.  Rift did not fare any better in this regard either.  So what in the world is going on?  Have we now swung the leveling pendulum too far to the solo side of the spectrum in harsh reaction to forced grouping of the past?  Or perhaps we should listen to the developers who tell us that this is all in the name of accessibility.  MMOs are businesses after all, and the more people who play your game means the more money you have coming in each month.

If that’s the case, I still think developers are missing the bigger picture here.  The health of an MMO community depends not only on the quality and amount of leveling content in a game, but also on what that content asks its players to accomplish.  By following the routes of Blizzard, SOE, and others, devs have hurt their own communities by practically making questing a solo endeavor.  The “Second M” is nowhere to be found.  By not requiring your players to occasionally work together while they level up, you create the kind of nightmare we now see in WoW’s Heroics.

Players in WoW have rarely been asked to play their class in a collaborative environment until max level, so how in the world will they know how to do that when the endgame suddenly tells them that teamwork is required?  Not everyone is going to run dungeons while leveling up, so is Blizzard really surprised that so many people have been complaining that Cataclysm Heroics and raids are too hard?

So if you create a MMO that has a leveling experience designed for little else other than solo gameplay, you will end up with far too many self-entitled jerks at max level who only care about their own progress and have no idea how to work with others…kind of like what you see when you use WoW’s Dungeon Finder to pug a Cata Heroic.  But what really distresses me is that far more games are following suit when it comes to making leveling a solo-only club.

The challenge is only saved for the endgame anymore, and sometimes even that is a laugh.  The continuity in themepark MMOs is slowly evaporating, and I don’t think there is any question that this is partially due to the loss of grouping and teamwork within the leveling process.  In the name of profits and good business, MMOs are ensuring that even kids can be taught to level up and reach the endgame.  But how is that kid going to fare when he is suddenly asked to coordinate split-second strategy in a raid environment, and manage all the pressures and requirements contained within?

Not very well I imagine, and the same seems to go for many of the adults too.  But difficulty is a tricky slope to manage.  I understand that as well as anyone.  So a good place to start might be to take a second look at games like Vanguard, which aren’t afraid to create massive worlds with a mixture of challenges to be found throughout.  The “Second M” is alive and well in the world of Telon, and if you listen closely you will hear its voice.