Why AAA MMOs fail

Trolldefender99

This is true for any genre, but seems particularly true for MMOs. Since even games like CoD still sell a lot.

AAA Company: How do we make the most money from the lemmings that buy our product?

indie dev: How do we make a product that is fun and people will want to buy it?

 

Granted, that indie dev isn't going to have the funding of an AAA company. But his product will have "love" put in to it, so to speak.

 

Example:

Minecraft...Notch made a game that he wanted to play and wasn't going after everyones dollar

Same with DayZ

And while I was not there for EVE's development, a close friend that was, said that was similar

 

Examples of games that have failed or cheap ripoffs, because they only wanted to make money

SWTOR (so low retention rate, and they cheaped out on endgame)

Warhammer Online (SWTOR is going down the same exact path as this did)

 

And a good non-MMO example, even though people still buy it...CoD...every Call of Duty game is a slight modification to the previous. Only going after the dollar, no love put into it at all.

 

There...the secret to a successful MMO or any game. The difference is, one (indie) wants to make a fun game that everyone wants to play. The other (AAA) makes a game only to make money with no love put into it.

 

TLDR - Greed

 

The_Korrigan

To the thread title, I'm just gonna answer with a question:

"Do they?"

silvermember

They fail because throwing money at crap doesn't suddenly make it smell like cake. Also the kind of people that are attracted to COD is similar to the majority of player than play WoW other games have less of a chance, but it still goes back to my original  premise of crap doesn't smell better just because money is thrown at it.

Zekiah

TLDR = Greed 

maplestone

I suspect there are a lot of indy games that fail (commercially and artistically) without ever even getting on anyone's radar.

Xese

I am not too sure what you mean. Could you define "failing" for me?

Burntvet

Because MMO studios are no longer contolled/managed by "game guys" but by accountants.

Since MMOs have become "mainstream", most producers of AAA MMOs are part of larger entertainment companies. As such, they become controlled/directed by corporate businesses and "best practices". This has very large implications for a "highly creative" industry: it is fine to rely on "industry standards" and focus groups and the like when running a conventional business, but it is hard to make "good games" that way.

On the other hand, AAA MMOs have become very expensive to make, comparatively, since the UO/DAOC/SWG days and it is almost impossible for anyone BUT one of these large companies to fund one.

 

So, on one hand, you "need " the big companies/large investors to make MMOs that are not the ones that the small indies have been putting out, but it is the same management practices and corporate controls that these big companies use, that discourage the innovation, creativity, and risk taking needed to succeed in this industry.

And thus, you have the last 5+ years of bland MMO gaming.