Sure it'll be huge. And I will participate as a fellow mmo player as I have with the likes of eq2 (since beta)...ac2 before that...It will be what it will be, love or leave it ... plain and simple. Any wanna-be big e-peeners and vanilla bois will suck a big 1 for daddy, you can bet on it...have fun with that! ... but if the game captures my attention for future playtime, cool...and I'll find those bois and make their life miserable
If (and that's a pretty big if) - Pantheon has super smooth gameplay with no bugs, a stable client and stable server end - the game COULD have over 100K players at launch, but I don't think that it can have over 200K players with the current design.
Also lets say that somehow they manage 250K players - will they have the infrastructure to handle that many clients? I mean imagine servers getting crushed under load with terrible performance for all due to overloading - that would go over as well as a turd in a puncbowl.
It is EXTREMELY hard for a MMORPGs today to have even 250k+ players 6 months post launch, even some AAA titles struggle to maintain that level of playerbase, for an indie game it's virtually impossible.
MMORPGs have problem retaining 250k people because mostly they are a pile of steaming shit, let's be honest. You guys praise the beauty of modern MMORPGs while truth is people will play them for a couple of months before getting bored with it.....that's the kind of MMO you are promoting guys (not just you). Modern MMOs are made to last a month or two, not enough content and a super fast leveling it's a deadly combination for player retention. What do you expect players to do when they run out of content after a month, to stick around? It doesn't take a genius to understand that once players run out of content they move on to something else.
Pantheon is designed like older MMOs, slow leveling make sure that the content will last a year in time for the new expansion. Yes, slow leveling is a cheap trick to make content last longer, and yes, many people hate slow leveling, but there are also lots of people that like a slower pace in MMORPGs, and those people will stick around for years if the game is good enough.
Pantheon is the only game that could sustain a Subscription model as it is built to have players subscribed the whole year, as "beating" the game in a couple of months is not going to be an option. Other games that try the Subscription model failed because they didn't have a clue of what they were doing. Subscription works only for slow leveling games like EQ, or games with ton of content like WoW. Every other game should stick with the Free To Play formula as they don't have enough content to justify a year long subscription.
I don't think anyone (other than maybe the OP) believes a kind of game like Pantheon will draw millions of people, but the idea that it won't do well because there has been some sort of cultural shift away from them is supposition as best. People play other games, because that is what the industry believed to have highest earning potential ... until it no longer did.
interesting, because a while back you tried to imply there were millions of people interested in this sort of game. (i remember you linking an article and *you* claimed 2+ million people have purchased EQ, when it was pointed out that article included the original game and its first 7 expansions , you went silent) the game is super niche, will be lucky to have 3 low to med pop servers. it might be a great example of what it tries to be, but what its trying to be isnt really desired by many people anymore. why the change of opinion, Dullahan?why have you backed off the Panthaon super success party line?
we have to admit, this isnt the game people want anymore. why are 2D platformers all indie niche, low cost games? the gaming world changes. Pantheon may be great at what it does in the end, but it will probably be at Age of Conan levels of population - at best.
I never claimed, at any time, that Pantheon will have "millions" of concurrent players. I did say there are millions of people who played EQ, and that Pantheon would appeal to many of them.
That said, 6 months in, there will be more people playing Pantheon who never played EQ than did. There are plenty of people who the game will appeal to who had no idea they'd like it. How could they? Those games were phased out chasing WoW numbers over a decade ago.
That type of person didn't go away, and most people have no idea whether they'll truly enjoy something until they try it. In fact, many of those skeptical or outright opposed to the game in this very thread will be the biggest junkies.
Mark my words: People will move on from Pantheon after 2-6 weeks regardless of how good it is - if it's the best game in history of gaming - your average player will STILL move on after 2-6 weeks.
Why? Because people simply don't play games like they did 15 years ago.
This argument of yours always make me smile. I don't think you are actually thinking when you say that. It seems you elevated yourself as the benchmark for every other MMORPG player.
15 years ago you were a teenager with lots of time in your hand, now you are a family man with less time. Am I correct?
But guess what....teenagers are still around and have more spare time today than ever. In Asia they have to put an artificial cut off time in their games to avoid people playing for days on end, and you are telling me that today people have no time? You have no time, don't speak for everyone else.
The reality is that students, teenagers and young professionals have still plenty of time to dedicate to gaming, and this category account for 70% of the gaming population. Are you going to argue with that?
Subscription works only for slow leveling games like EQ, or games with ton of content like WoW. Every other game should stick with the Free To Play formula as they don't have enough content to justify a year long subscription.
The subscription model hasn't "worked" for WoW either - not in the way you imply. A couple of years ago they announced 100M+ accounts; pause and reflect, does this means:
Blizzard has had a loyal following of 5-10M subs for (now) 12 years; or
Blizzard has lost an average of c.8M unique accounts every year for 12 years - was close to 10M when announced.
Blizzard hasn't retained subscribers; their success has been to launch the game in new markets; advertise it to new audiences; re-imagine it and more.
Which is a good thing for people waiting for Pantheon - since aiming to create a years worth of content would take the devs years and years.
EQ1 is Daybreaks highest populated game they own. Comparing Pantheon to P99 is like comparing Apples to Oranges.
H1Z1 is far more populated than EQ1 - so you are mistaken.
Pantheon is heavily based on vanilla EQ1 - which is P99 - there is no other game on the market that is closer to Pantheon than P99 - and yes I am talking about gameplay style, pace of combat, group centric content etc...
I would have thought DCUO was their best title. Jack Emmert being made CEO would certainly support this.
Not even close - Look at steam stats for DCUO, less than 4k players peak, been under 1000 concurrently since march 2015.
Now I know that steam only shows a portion of playerbase, but the huge disparity between under 1k numbers and greater than 20k H1Z1 numbers ia pretty significant
H1Z1 is the most popular Daybreak title by far.
It is indeed: over 44k peak today. Makes Jack Emmert's CEO title even more ridiculous.
The subscription model hasn't "worked" for WoW either - not in the way you imply. A couple of years ago they announced 100M+ accounts; pause and reflect, does this means:
Blizzard has had a loyal following of 5-10M subs for (now) 12 years; or
Blizzard has lost an average of c.8M unique accounts every year for 12 years - was close to 10M when announced.
Blizzard hasn't retained subscribers; their success has been to launch the game in new markets; advertise it to new audiences; re-imagine it and more.
Which is a good thing for people waiting for Pantheon - since aiming to create a years worth of content would take the devs years and years.
So you also noticed that the subscription base shrank together with the leveling curve? That just proves my point.
Early days content in WoW used to last for more than a year, for the average player. As the game got easier and leveling got faster, players started running out of content after 6 months, now they can do it in 3 months, though with Legion they tried to revert that trend with discreet success.
It's really no rocket science; No content = No Subs Why would anyone subscribe to a game that runs out of content after 2 months? (it should be an easy question to answer)
Would you stay subscribed to Netflix if they stop adding Movies to their library? My guess is not. You stay subscribed because you get fresh content each month. Same apply to MMORPGs.
I really dont see how an old school MMO will fly well in 2017 (r whenever this will see the light of day)...Sure there is a niche market for it but will it be big enough to pay the bills?
I'd like to discuss this,
- It's been a long time since old school
- Old school mindset is usually thought as old looking game with old mechanics.
- People tend to think younger people don't have the time or the brain power to play this style.
How do you know this style wouldn't start a new rebirth !!!!!!!
Anecdotal evidence. My son and his friends (all around 24 yrs old) are all former MMO players cutting their teeth on DAOC, WOW and some others.
Their current stable of games include LOL, Overwatch and a variety of PS4 games, but no MMORPGs.
I even tried to entice my son by giving him ESO for Christmas for his new PS4, since he really enjoyed playing Skyrim.
He decided to start playing Witcher 3 first.
Young people today seem to have so much more vying for their time then they did years ago, my guess is they really aren't seeking a slower paced, more in depth gaming experience.
I'd say EVE like success is a more likely aspiration for this or most any other solid indie title.
But a run away smash hit, little chance of that occurring IMO, too many factors lined up against it at the moment.
There really is nothing even remotely offering slow paced or deep gaming experience among MMORPGs.
It's not like there were no sports, consoles games, pc titles, or other real life activities 20 years ago. Neither people nor the surrounding environment have changed. If anything, sitting around playing games is more acceptable today than it was back then. It's just that those MMOs that people pour time into no longer exist in modern form because studios went for mass appeal chasing WoW money.
I don't think anyone (other than maybe the OP) believes a kind of game like Pantheon will draw millions of people, but the idea that it won't do well because there has been some sort of cultural shift away from them is supposition as best. People play other games, because that is what the industry believed to have highest earning potential ... until it no longer did.
The cultural shift is more then supposition, there are far more entertainment options today then in 2000, all carving away the same 24 hour day.
I used to regularly read books, magazines, and newspapers back then, now I read ebooks, online news sites, Reddit and of course, my smart phone.
I also watch over 300 cable channels, Netflix, Prime, go to 3D movies (Real 3D and IMAX) and waste far too much time reading Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn.
Forget Twitter, Snapchat, Twitch and a half a dozen others my children always visit.
All of these are in addition to the activities available to me back in 2000 so of course some like my photography hobby have suffered.
While people today have the same amount of time each day now as then, there is so much more vying for our attention.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
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The cultural shift is more then supposition, there are far more entertainment options today then in 2000, all carving away the same 24 hour day.
I used to regularly read books, magazines, and newspapers back then, now I read ebooks, online news sites, Reddit and of course, my smart phone.
I also watch over 300 cable channels, Netflix, Prime, go to 3D movies (Real 3D and IMAX) and waste far too much time reading Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn.
Forget Twitter, Snapchat, Twitch and a half a dozen others my children always visit.
All of these are in addition to the activities available to me back in 2000 so of course some like my photography hobby have suffered.
While people today have the same amount of time each day now as then, there is so much more vying for our attention.
I disagree. While the medium may have changed with broadband and new technologies, we had more TV than anyone could possibly consume in the '90s. We had more games we could possibly play across multiple consoles since the 80s. There was hunting, fishing, camping, biking, clubbing, dancing, sports and even women... all before the 20-teens.
People have always had more things to do with their time than they could ever make time for. The choice has always been the same. Do a little of everything or a lot of a few things. The only difference in gaming is that there used to be things dedicated to specific segments rather than everyone. We couldn't play current mmos like we played those of the first generation if we wanted to. There's simply not enough to do, what little there is feels trivial; and as a result the playerbase is too transient to establish a real community.
The era of niche games is back, and it will be glorious.
The cultural shift is more then supposition, there are far more entertainment options today then in 2000, all carving away the same 24 hour day.
It's not a cultural shift....you just got older. Older people who still play games are the exception, not the norm. Younger people have plenty of time, they frikking live on internet 24/7.
Yeesh, too bad this is one of those topics where despite how easy it will be to see who's right by the time the truth comes out (along with the game, assuming it does come out), the joy one would get from saying "I told you so" will have gone stale and rotten for most people.
WoW is hemorrhaging subs because of changes to the games design. Not because the model no longer works.
P2P works if and only if players never run out of meaningful progression before new content is added. Something ALL MODERN THEMEPARKS fail to achieve unless you play really casual (A few hours a day or weekends only). And yes this is a problem with all the current generation themeparks.
Same issue is happening with FFXIV as well but at a higher level then wow atm. Why that game is hemmoraging subs atm. 5+million copies sold, no new servers ever added since 2.0 launch, and half the existing ones are barren worlds now. Population will boom at the next expansion then crash again 3-4 months later once 80% of people beat the game again.
IF you are an active player >20hrs a week, you will beat the game (get the best gear possible) in a modern casual focused themepark mmo in about 3-4 months of starting. If you are a hardcore gamer and have 40-50hrs a week that is not even 2 full months of valid content on a 6-9month patch cycle depending on the game.
Back when WoW launched and such it took you that long to even get started in endgame, pre-wow games you were not even at endgame yet in that time. Think about it you can probably level 5 toons to cap in Legion without using leveling potions in the time it took you to get 1 to endgame in vanilla.
Why are games losing subs... It is simple. Because the devs have shifted focus so much to the casual spectrum and making sure even those who play on weekends can experience everything the people who play mmos alot simply run out of stuff to do.
Who in thier right mind will pay a subscription for a game for 4-9 months when they have nothing else they can do to progress. It is throwing money a way.
The modern design cannot support p2p anymore. UNless the devs want to increase content per patch by 4-5 fold (so all they have to do is increase input cost to the game by 500% sure investors will like that). So any mmo company making a modern casual themepark should use a cash shop or GW2 B2P model because that fits the product, P2P absolutely does not. A game that is designed to take time and where its content last long term, well p2p worked in the past it will still work now.
The increased pace is definitely key, but there are other factors as well. The mmorpg was originally a very social experience. Hard to believe for a lot of people, I'm sure, but that was actually one of the primary goals. When you take a game that was meant to be an enduring shared experience and remove that aspect, all that's left is very much like any single player or offline game. Now you're competing with other genres, and you've lost one of the pieces that compelled people to log on every day. It's a recipe for disaster from a business standpoint.
The subscription model hasn't "worked" for WoW either - not in the way you imply. A couple of years ago they announced 100M+ accounts; pause and reflect, does this means:
Blizzard has had a loyal following of 5-10M subs for (now) 12 years; or
Blizzard has lost an average of c.8M unique accounts every year for 12 years - was close to 10M when announced.
Blizzard hasn't retained subscribers; their success has been to launch the game in new markets; advertise it to new audiences; re-imagine it and more.
Which is a good thing for people waiting for Pantheon - since aiming to create a years worth of content would take the devs years and years.
So you also noticed that the subscription base shrank together with the leveling curve? That just proves my point.
Early days content in WoW used to last for more than a year, for the average player. As the game got easier and leveling got faster, players started running out of content after 6 months, now they can do it in 3 months, though with Legion they tried to revert that trend with discreet success.
It's really no rocket science; No content = No Subs Why would anyone subscribe to a game that runs out of content after 2 months? (it should be an easy question to answer)
Would you stay subscribed to Netflix if they stop adding Movies to their library? My guess is not. You stay subscribed because you get fresh content each month. Same apply to MMORPGs.
What in my post leads you to believe that - quote "So you also noticed that the subscription base shrank together with the leveling curve?"
Your comment: a sub model works for a game with a lot of content like WoW; the reality however is that it doesn't.
Now I agree when you say "No content = No Subs" I will go further and say "No content = No game".
And I agree that - up to a point - adding new content on a regular basis will help. I have said previously I believe that that was a key factor in WoW's early success and a reason WoW's "core" subs declined when they took the best part of 3 years off.
The speed of levelling however doesn't equate to rate at of content consumption - if by "content" we means stuff with at least the semblance of a story. So not the whack-a-rat type. That is just about matching the content to a players level.
Yes a game can be slowed down: 20 minute runs, 15 minutes waiting for a boat ride followed by a 5 minute ride, sitting "eyes closed" in front of a spell book, sitting to regain health slowly. That was the EQ way. You will still need a lot of content however to last a year.
Other games have tried. Regular content was promised for Wildstar and ESO and SWTOR. Games have had a lot of content at launch e.g. ESO - and slow levelling. ESO did not manage 10M subs at the end of a year however; Wildstar did not eclipse WoW and so forth. Comments that were made pre-launch by "ardent fans" that were met with the same "realism" that claims about Pantheon's stratospheric success are being met with in this thread.
No hate involved - I don't think there has been one negative post. Just a healthy dose of realism.
And as long as the developers are rooted in said reality Pantheon has a chance. The problem is that even a "cheap" mmo will rack up significant expenditure.
I hope but it's anyone's guess at this point. It's all about hitting their target market. If they can do that, then yes I guess it can be called great. With MMOs it's more then the base game. What they do after launch will matter more so. I really hope they know how to keep us happy.
Coincidentally, the only MMORPG that held my interest for longer than a few weeks was the EQ progression server. I am very interested in The Pantheon but I hope it is run like a niche game... not with WoW expectations.
Phycology is the study of algae. Did you mean psychology? Is it really that important for you that the game be a "huge" success? Having followed the development of WoW since day one I can safely conclude that having a huge amount of players only increases the chance of your devs being swayed by the whiny vocal minority and turning the game into a steaming pile of poop which has very little to do with the original product. If I really enjoyed an MMO I definitely would not want it to be a smash hit. All you need for an MMO to flourish is a few servers filled with dedicated subscription paying players. Not 500 servers filled with whiny kids and credit card warriors.
Phycology is the study of algae. Did you mean psychology? Is it really that important for you that the game be a "huge" success? Having followed the development of WoW since day one I can safely conclude that having a huge amount of players only increases the chance of your devs being swayed by the whiny vocal minority and turning the game into a steaming pile of poop which has very little to do with the original product. If I really enjoyed an MMO I definitely would not want it to be a smash hit. All you need for an MMO to flourish is a few servers filled with dedicated subscription paying players. Not 500 servers filled with whiny kids and credit card warriors.
That's the irony of the OP's post. Apparently his desire to have his choice validated as "popular" overrides his common sense.
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Early days content in WoW used to last for more than a year, for the average player. As the game got easier and leveling got faster, players started running out of content after 6 months, now they can do it in 3 months, though with Legion they tried to revert that trend with discreet success.
So WoW is losing subs because players run out of content much faster than it used to. WoW had a much slower pace the first half of its life. Before they could count on a yearly subscription, then a 6 months subscription, now it's down to a 3 month subscription. That's my point. Players stay subscribed as long as there is content to play.
The increased pace is definitely key, but there are other factors as well. The mmorpg was originally a very social experience. Hard to believe for a lot of people, I'm sure, but that was actually one of the primary goals. When you take a game that was meant to be an enduring shared experience and remove that aspect, all that's left is very much like any single player or offline game. Now you're competing with other genres, and you've lost one of the pieces that compelled people to log on every day. It's a recipe for disaster from a business standpoint.
I agree, although I would also like to call it a social experiment, they created classes and content while allowing players to figure out everything else. In some ways the early mmorpg developers were naive in thinking players could guardian themselves, for instance with pvp but the amount of player creativity that the early games allowed people to have just can't be found in modern mmorpg.
In the early days you also didn't have guides for everything, raid guilds didn't share strategies, there were no videos on what to do, instead you had to figure out things on your own. While the strategies weren't as complex fights the trial and error made it feel more awarding taking down bosses.
All of those things changed during 2005-2010 and mmorpg became a lot worse because of it. Maybe more fitting for the other thread but your post really hit me. If I can point to the one thing that I truly miss from mmorpg its the shared experience between players.
Iselin: And the next person who says "but it's a business, they need to make money" can just go fuck yourself.
As one of the 'retired and disabled' I can assure you that there are a lot of us around the world. More than enough to deliver a solid base of subscribers to Pantheon. I expect thst the niche of a niche is large enough to deliver 50k solid subscribers for a good game. Who knows it might be ten times that (500k) for a quality product. But time will tell.
Sure, it may be enough to get by, I was speaking toward the OP though and possibilities of mass success, for that massive crowd they'd need to focus, at least somewhat, on the younger audience to some extent. I shy away from trying to guess actual numbers, yet as Tiamat said about backing up Kano... with their current focus, I see it on the lower side. That's what being a niche essentially means...Not that that's exactly a bad thing for the game, as long as it makes the ends meet, that's all that really matters.
That said, it likely won't bode well for those who play at odd times if it goes that way. I'd expect it to be quite like a matured game a couple years after launch, where primetime play is ideal to get the full experience.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
The increased pace is definitely key, but there are other factors as well. The mmorpg was originally a very social experience. Hard to believe for a lot of people, I'm sure, but that was actually one of the primary goals. When you take a game that was meant to be an enduring shared experience and remove that aspect, all that's left is very much like any single player or offline game. Now you're competing with other genres, and you've lost one of the pieces that compelled people to log on every day. It's a recipe for disaster from a business standpoint.
I agree, although I would also like to call it a social experiment, they created classes and content while allowing players to figure out everything else. In some ways the early mmorpg developers were naive in thinking players could guardian themselves, for instance with pvp but the amount of player creativity that the early games allowed people to have just can't be found in modern mmorpg.
In the early days you also didn't have guides for everything, raid guilds didn't share strategies, there were no videos on what to do, instead you had to figure out things on your own. While the strategies weren't as complex fights the trial and error made it feel more awarding taking down bosses.
All of those things changed during 2005-2010 and mmorpg became a lot worse because of it. Maybe more fitting for the other thread but your post really hit me. If I can point to the one thing that I truly miss from mmorpg its the shared experience between players.
Yeah. Ironic that in all the clamoring for "innovation" and procedural generation, that they've all but cast aside one of the greatest sources of dynamic content found in player interaction.
Comments
You guys praise the beauty of modern MMORPGs while truth is people will play them for a couple of months before getting bored with it.....that's the kind of MMO you are promoting guys (not just you).
Modern MMOs are made to last a month or two, not enough content and a super fast leveling it's a deadly combination for player retention.
What do you expect players to do when they run out of content after a month, to stick around?
It doesn't take a genius to understand that once players run out of content they move on to something else.
Pantheon is designed like older MMOs, slow leveling make sure that the content will last a year in time for the new expansion.
Yes, slow leveling is a cheap trick to make content last longer, and yes, many people hate slow leveling, but there are also lots of people that like a slower pace in MMORPGs, and those people will stick around for years if the game is good enough.
Pantheon is the only game that could sustain a Subscription model as it is built to have players subscribed the whole year, as "beating" the game in a couple of months is not going to be an option.
Other games that try the Subscription model failed because they didn't have a clue of what they were doing.
Subscription works only for slow leveling games like EQ, or games with ton of content like WoW.
Every other game should stick with the Free To Play formula as they don't have enough content to justify a year long subscription.
That said, 6 months in, there will be more people playing Pantheon who never played EQ than did. There are plenty of people who the game will appeal to who had no idea they'd like it. How could they? Those games were phased out chasing WoW numbers over a decade ago.
That type of person didn't go away, and most people have no idea whether they'll truly enjoy something until they try it. In fact, many of those skeptical or outright opposed to the game in this very thread will be the biggest junkies.
I don't think you are actually thinking when you say that.
It seems you elevated yourself as the benchmark for every other MMORPG player.
15 years ago you were a teenager with lots of time in your hand, now you are a family man with less time.
Am I correct?
But guess what....teenagers are still around and have more spare time today than ever.
In Asia they have to put an artificial cut off time in their games to avoid people playing for days on end, and you are telling me that today people have no time?
You have no time, don't speak for everyone else.
The reality is that students, teenagers and young professionals have still plenty of time to dedicate to gaming, and this category account for 70% of the gaming population.
Are you going to argue with that?
- Blizzard has had a loyal following of 5-10M subs for (now) 12 years; or
- Blizzard has lost an average of c.8M unique accounts every year for 12 years - was close to 10M when announced.
Blizzard hasn't retained subscribers; their success has been to launch the game in new markets; advertise it to new audiences; re-imagine it and more.Which is a good thing for people waiting for Pantheon - since aiming to create a years worth of content would take the devs years and years.
I think it will be Huge Mungus
I think it's very hard to see what numbers are going to show up both short term, as it grows
, and long term. There are just too many unknown factors.
That just proves my point.
Early days content in WoW used to last for more than a year, for the average player.
As the game got easier and leveling got faster, players started running out of content after 6 months, now they can do it in 3 months, though with Legion they tried to revert that trend with discreet success.
It's really no rocket science; No content = No Subs
Why would anyone subscribe to a game that runs out of content after 2 months? (it should be an easy question to answer)
Would you stay subscribed to Netflix if they stop adding Movies to their library?
My guess is not.
You stay subscribed because you get fresh content each month.
Same apply to MMORPGs.
I used to regularly read books, magazines, and newspapers back then, now I read ebooks, online news sites, Reddit and of course, my smart phone.
I also watch over 300 cable channels, Netflix, Prime, go to 3D movies (Real 3D and IMAX) and waste far too much time reading Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn.
Forget Twitter, Snapchat, Twitch and a half a dozen others my children always visit.
All of these are in addition to the activities available to me back in 2000 so of course some like my photography hobby have suffered.
While people today have the same amount of time each day now as then, there is so much more vying for our attention.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
People have always had more things to do with their time than they could ever make time for. The choice has always been the same. Do a little of everything or a lot of a few things. The only difference in gaming is that there used to be things dedicated to specific segments rather than everyone. We couldn't play current mmos like we played those of the first generation if we wanted to. There's simply not enough to do, what little there is feels trivial; and as a result the playerbase is too transient to establish a real community.
The era of niche games is back, and it will be glorious.
Older people who still play games are the exception, not the norm.
Younger people have plenty of time, they frikking live on internet 24/7.
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P2P works if and only if players never run out of meaningful progression before new content is added. Something ALL MODERN THEMEPARKS fail to achieve unless you play really casual (A few hours a day or weekends only). And yes this is a problem with all the current generation themeparks.
Same issue is happening with FFXIV as well but at a higher level then wow atm. Why that game is hemmoraging subs atm. 5+million copies sold, no new servers ever added since 2.0 launch, and half the existing ones are barren worlds now. Population will boom at the next expansion then crash again 3-4 months later once 80% of people beat the game again.
IF you are an active player >20hrs a week, you will beat the game (get the best gear possible) in a modern casual focused themepark mmo in about 3-4 months of starting. If you are a hardcore gamer and have 40-50hrs a week that is not even 2 full months of valid content on a 6-9month patch cycle depending on the game.
Back when WoW launched and such it took you that long to even get started in endgame, pre-wow games you were not even at endgame yet in that time. Think about it you can probably level 5 toons to cap in Legion without using leveling potions in the time it took you to get 1 to endgame in vanilla.
Why are games losing subs... It is simple. Because the devs have shifted focus so much to the casual spectrum and making sure even those who play on weekends can experience everything the people who play mmos alot simply run out of stuff to do.
Who in thier right mind will pay a subscription for a game for 4-9 months when they have nothing else they can do to progress. It is throwing money a way.
The modern design cannot support p2p anymore. UNless the devs want to increase content per patch by 4-5 fold (so all they have to do is increase input cost to the game by 500% sure investors will like that). So any mmo company making a modern casual themepark should use a cash shop or GW2 B2P model because that fits the product, P2P absolutely does not. A game that is designed to take time and where its content last long term, well p2p worked in the past it will still work now.
Your comment: a sub model works for a game with a lot of content like WoW; the reality however is that it doesn't.
Now I agree when you say "No content = No Subs" I will go further and say "No content = No game".
And I agree that - up to a point - adding new content on a regular basis will help. I have said previously I believe that that was a key factor in WoW's early success and a reason WoW's "core" subs declined when they took the best part of 3 years off.
The speed of levelling however doesn't equate to rate at of content consumption - if by "content" we means stuff with at least the semblance of a story. So not the whack-a-rat type. That is just about matching the content to a players level.
Yes a game can be slowed down: 20 minute runs, 15 minutes waiting for a boat ride followed by a 5 minute ride, sitting "eyes closed" in front of a spell book, sitting to regain health slowly. That was the EQ way. You will still need a lot of content however to last a year.
Other games have tried. Regular content was promised for Wildstar and ESO and SWTOR. Games have had a lot of content at launch e.g. ESO - and slow levelling. ESO did not manage 10M subs at the end of a year however; Wildstar did not eclipse WoW and so forth. Comments that were made pre-launch by "ardent fans" that were met with the same "realism" that claims about Pantheon's stratospheric success are being met with in this thread.
No hate involved - I don't think there has been one negative post. Just a healthy dose of realism.
And as long as the developers are rooted in said reality Pantheon has a chance. The problem is that even a "cheap" mmo will rack up significant expenditure.
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Is it really that important for you that the game be a "huge" success?
Having followed the development of WoW since day one I can safely conclude that having a huge amount of players only increases the chance of your devs being swayed by the whiny vocal minority and turning the game into a steaming pile of poop which has very little to do with the original product.
If I really enjoyed an MMO I definitely would not want it to be a smash hit.
All you need for an MMO to flourish is a few servers filled with dedicated subscription paying players. Not 500 servers filled with whiny kids and credit card warriors.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
So WoW is losing subs because players run out of content much faster than it used to.
WoW had a much slower pace the first half of its life.
Before they could count on a yearly subscription, then a 6 months subscription, now it's down to a 3 month subscription.
That's my point.
Players stay subscribed as long as there is content to play.
In the early days you also didn't have guides for everything, raid guilds didn't share strategies, there were no videos on what to do, instead you had to figure out things on your own. While the strategies weren't as complex fights the trial and error made it feel more awarding taking down bosses.
All of those things changed during 2005-2010 and mmorpg became a lot worse because of it. Maybe more fitting for the other thread but your post really hit me. If I can point to the one thing that I truly miss from mmorpg its the shared experience between players.
That said, it likely won't bode well for those who play at odd times if it goes that way. I'd expect it to be quite like a matured game a couple years after launch, where primetime play is ideal to get the full experience.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson