you are talking about your perspective. not the game's perspective. You are also only talking about 1 demographic (yours), not all of them.
I played WoW from 2005 to 2014 (On and off towards the latter) I am definitely older, but so are my kids. They also play online games now where they didn't a decade ago. You grew up and moved to new priorities. But you speak nothing of the generation behind you who would have graduated into the genre. So, you growing up and moving on is not why these games changed. For the same reason Platform jumpers haven't changed in decades. You played them as a kid, your kids play them now. Their kids will play them too.
What happened was this: The older MMO was more or less a niche game that saw an anomaly move the game into a much broader demographic. But in order to try to keep that new demographic pleased, they have made changes to please the broader player base. Unfortunately, this came at the cost of the genre's original identity.
The avg age of a gamer is increasing. If you have evidence of the contrary , sources please.
The argument isn't about the increasing age of gamers. It's about not staying focused on a snapshot in time.
Saying someone in their 20s who started playing MMOs is now 35 and doesn't have the time to be as dedicated to the game as they were 15 years ago, as a reason for the games to go casual, excludes the gamers who are now in thier 20s who can play today but were only 5 when WoW released.
If the avg age is increasing what does that tell you about where the bulk of gamers are?
It shows what PvP games are really all about, and no, it's not about more realism and immersion. It's about cowards hiding behind a screen to they can bully other defenseless players without any risk of direct retaliation like there would be if they acted like asshats in "real life". -Jean-Luc_Picard
Life itself is a game. So why shouldn't your game be ruined? - justmemyselfandi
Saying someone in their 20s who started playing MMOs is now 35 and doesn't have the time to be as dedicated to the game as they were 15 years ago, as a reason for the games to go casual, excludes the gamers who are now in thier 20s who can play today but were only 5 when WoW released.
well, games are more casual today than before.
May be devs are targetting the 35 years olds. May be the 20 year olds today don't want to be dedicated to one game.
Do you have evidence that today's gamers are not more casual?
If the avg age is increasing what does that tell you about where the bulk of gamers are?
I am not talking about older gamers who still play. I was responding to your OP that was talking about gamers having less time for gaming as they get older.
The TLDR logic is this Avg game age is X What does age X look like according to the us/uk census? Therefore X has less time.
If you want to contradict that sources please.
It shows what PvP games are really all about, and no, it's not about more realism and immersion. It's about cowards hiding behind a screen to they can bully other defenseless players without any risk of direct retaliation like there would be if they acted like asshats in "real life". -Jean-Luc_Picard
Life itself is a game. So why shouldn't your game be ruined? - justmemyselfandi
I am not talking about older gamers who still play. I was responding to your OP that was talking about gamers having less time for gaming as they get older.
I don't think age is the sole issue. Players are becoming more casual not because they are older and less time, it is because there are more choices of entertainment.
When EQ was released, there was no netflix, a thousand different online games to choose from, endless website to surf and so on and so forth.
I am not talking about older gamers who still play. I was responding to your OP that was talking about gamers having less time for gaming as they get older.
I don't think age is the sole issue. Players are becoming more casual not because they are older and less time, it is because there are more choices of entertainment.
When EQ was released, there was no netflix, a thousand different online games to choose from, endless website to surf and so on and so forth.
The TLDR logic is this Avg game age is X What does age X look like according to the us/uk census? Therefore X has less time.
If you want to contradict that sources please.
You post a thread titled:
Why MMOs changed to what it is today
You made a connection from that to this. It's very convenient you left that part out when you asked me to verify sources. Especially when it was the foundation for my initial post.
Less time to play means less time to play. Which equals people not able to play games where it takes a long time to do things.
It shows what PvP games are really all about, and no, it's not about more realism and immersion. It's about cowards hiding behind a screen to they can bully other defenseless players without any risk of direct retaliation like there would be if they acted like asshats in "real life". -Jean-Luc_Picard
Life itself is a game. So why shouldn't your game be ruined? - justmemyselfandi
The people that made mmos the way it is today are those that don't like mmo in the first place; ala the casual players. A genre that wasn't made for them became the focus.
Even the old schoolers got `real lifed` and are now casuals. People grew up and made life choices.
It shows what PvP games are really all about, and no, it's not about more realism and immersion. It's about cowards hiding behind a screen to they can bully other defenseless players without any risk of direct retaliation like there would be if they acted like asshats in "real life". -Jean-Luc_Picard
Life itself is a game. So why shouldn't your game be ruined? - justmemyselfandi
Playing: Darkfall New Dawn (and planning to play Fallout 76) Favourite games have included: UO, Lineage2, Darkfall, Lotro, Baldur's Gate, SSX, FF7 and yes the original Wizardry on an Apple IIe
Its partially our fault, but mainly it was world of warcraft and blizzards fault for getting mmorpg's into casuals hands. Once something goes mainstream it tends to get ruined. I mean I've seen so many other mmorpgs change themselves into bascally wow clones, ff14 for a prime example, I still feel near the end of 1.0 was a far better game than 2.0 has been. Mostly since 2.0 is bascally wow in a ff skin. 1.0 was actually diffrent, it actually felt like a mmo should. Mind you at its initial release 1.0 of ff14 was terrible, thats why I said the last like 6 months of its life were good. Then they take it down (due to the stigma of the orignal 1.0 release it failed) and turn it into generic wow clone number 6251573. The only way I can see mmorpg's ever recovering and actually becoming good again is if casuals lose interest in wow-style mmorpgs, which will force devs to probally go back to the old way. But.. since they are like mainstream now, I don't think this is going to happen anytime soon, because of such I've pretty much given up on the genre, because I am sick of playing all these diffrent mmorpgs that are pretty much the same wow game with a new skin over it, because thats what they bascally are/have been since wow proved successful. Been like 8 months or more since i've touched a mmorpg. I tried guild wars 2 last around when the base game became free, but it bored me and put me to sleep so I dropped that pretty quick lol.
Being a pessimist is a win-win pattern of thinking. If you're a pessimist (I'll admit that I am!) you're either:
A. Proven right (if something bad happens)
or
B. Pleasantly surprised (if something good happens)
What does 30 -> 31 mean? That's right folks! DING DING DING! It means it is INCREASING! YAY!
Apologies as I can't make it any easier than the above.
It shows what PvP games are really all about, and no, it's not about more realism and immersion. It's about cowards hiding behind a screen to they can bully other defenseless players without any risk of direct retaliation like there would be if they acted like asshats in "real life". -Jean-Luc_Picard
Life itself is a game. So why shouldn't your game be ruined? - justmemyselfandi
Even the old schoolers got `real lifed` and are now casuals. People grew up and made life choices.
It doesn't mean we don't want to play a game where there is an environment where there is non-casual gameplay.
Speak only for yourself. Given so much other entertainment (and also other stuff like work & family), I only play games casually now.
In fact, it is hard to justify spend 13 hours in a game when the alternative is something like Netflix Dare Devil ... which is much more enjoyable than many games to me. And we are not even get to the part that having a 3 hour date with my wife .. outweighs 3 hours on ANY game.
I don't know if you could call old WoW truly casual. It was a little grindy. Not EQ levels but it took time to level. It was more the transitional game. It has/had many of the traits of old school gaming. But it's not their fault the genre lost its nuts and wanted to get a piece of the pie. I think it's pretty insane that the genre went near exclusively WoW centric.
I mean even though Call of Duty is huge it's biggest competitor Battlefield took another route focused more on large scale battle and environmental destruction. Most FPS have developed their own niche. MMORPG just went uniformed casual themeparks quest hub. The only genre I can say something similar happened was maybe RTS becoming Dune 2 clones.
I don't know if you could call old WoW truly casual. It was a little grindy. Not EQ levels but it took time to level. It was more the transitional game. It has/had many of the traits of old school gaming. But it's not their fault the genre lost its nuts and wanted to get a piece of the pie. I think it's pretty insane that the genre went near exclusively WoW centric.
I mean even though Call of Duty is huge it's biggest competitor Battlefield took another route focused more on large scale battle and environmental destruction. Most FPS have developed their own niche. MMORPG just went uniformed casual themeparks quest hub. The only genre I can say something similar happened was maybe RTS becoming Dune 2 clones.
Battlefield didn't take another route, they've been doing scale battles sense I can remember but added environmental destruction now.
Even the old schoolers got `real lifed` and are now casuals. People grew up and made life choices.
It doesn't mean we don't want to play a game where there is an environment where there is non-casual gameplay.
Speak only for yourself. Given so much other entertainment (and also other stuff like work & family), I only play games casually now.
In fact, it is hard to justify spend 13 hours in a game when the alternative is something like Netflix Dare Devil ... which is much more enjoyable than many games to me. And we are not even get to the part that having a 3 hour date with my wife .. outweighs 3 hours on ANY game.
I am casual gamer because most games dictate casual play. There are handful of games of any genre that have depth or even challenge to have me sit in front of a TV for hours.
But I can make time for it for sure. Even working 2 jobs. Just like I make time for commercial drawn out sporting events that take 3 hours. MMORPGs were a genre I would play for hours because the experience would be unique each session.
Modern MMORPG are hard to stomach with the genre repetitive single player game inside a multiplayer world. Completing the same easy low level quest I have for years is not fun. I can log on to any of the modern MMORPG and know exactly what to expect in an over refined genre. It's all a carefully crafted experience that I have experienced repeatedly over and over.
I don't know if you could call old WoW truly casual. It was a little grindy. Not EQ levels but it took time to level. It was more the transitional game. It has/had many of the traits of old school gaming. But it's not their fault the genre lost its nuts and wanted to get a piece of the pie. I think it's pretty insane that the genre went near exclusively WoW centric.
I mean even though Call of Duty is huge it's biggest competitor Battlefield took another route focused more on large scale battle and environmental destruction. Most FPS have developed their own niche. MMORPG just went uniformed casual themeparks quest hub. The only genre I can say something similar happened was maybe RTS becoming Dune 2 clones.
Games are not casual/hardcore, that is gamer's attribute.
I don't know if you could call old WoW truly casual. It was a little grindy. Not EQ levels but it took time to level. It was more the transitional game. It has/had many of the traits of old school gaming. But it's not their fault the genre lost its nuts and wanted to get a piece of the pie. I think it's pretty insane that the genre went near exclusively WoW centric.
I mean even though Call of Duty is huge it's biggest competitor Battlefield took another route focused more on large scale battle and environmental destruction. Most FPS have developed their own niche. MMORPG just went uniformed casual themeparks quest hub. The only genre I can say something similar happened was maybe RTS becoming Dune 2 clones.
Games are not casual/hardcore, that is gamer's attribute.
Most developers are gamers and yes games advertise being hardcore and having hardcore gaming modes. The term comes from games not gamers relating to games.
Vermillion_Raventhal said: Most developers are gamers and yes games advertise being hardcore and having hardcore gaming modes. The term comes from games not gamers relating to games.
That does not refute my point.
A "hardcore" game can be played casually and vice versa, thus only relevant factor is person playing the game.
I don't know if you could call old WoW truly casual. It was a little grindy. Not EQ levels but it took time to level. It was more the transitional game. It has/had many of the traits of old school gaming. But it's not their fault the genre lost its nuts and wanted to get a piece of the pie. I think it's pretty insane that the genre went near exclusively WoW centric.
I mean even though Call of Duty is huge it's biggest competitor Battlefield took another route focused more on large scale battle and environmental destruction. Most FPS have developed their own niche. MMORPG just went uniformed casual themeparks quest hub. The only genre I can say something similar happened was maybe RTS becoming Dune 2 clones.
The move from timeconsuming and hard to fast and easy wasn't something that happened in a day. Wow started it and became a huge success and when Blizzard and the rest saw it they continued moving things in that direction. And whenever a games subs becomes stable or start dropping they make everuthing faster and easier still.
The question though is if they didn't go way too far and how much of Wows success actually was due to the fact that it had 5 times the budget of any earlier MMO and a rather talented crew. I don't think it was Wows difficulty that made it a success.
Making the game easier and faster is easy and fast but after you reach a certain points the faster and easier you make the game the shorter time will the average player stay in the game. And throwing in a few hard raids wont solve that.
Comments
It's about not staying focused on a snapshot in time.
Saying someone in their 20s who started playing MMOs is now 35 and doesn't have the time to be as dedicated to the game as they were 15 years ago, as a reason for the games to go casual, excludes the gamers who are now in thier 20s who can play today but were only 5 when WoW released.
It shows what PvP games are really all about, and no, it's not about more realism and immersion. It's about cowards hiding behind a screen to they can bully other defenseless players without any risk of direct retaliation like there would be if they acted like asshats in "real life". -Jean-Luc_Picard
Life itself is a game. So why shouldn't your game be ruined? - justmemyselfandi
Avg game age is X
What does age X look like according to the us/uk census?
Therefore X has less time.
If you want to contradict that sources please.
It shows what PvP games are really all about, and no, it's not about more realism and immersion. It's about cowards hiding behind a screen to they can bully other defenseless players without any risk of direct retaliation like there would be if they acted like asshats in "real life". -Jean-Luc_Picard
Life itself is a game. So why shouldn't your game be ruined? - justmemyselfandi
When EQ was released, there was no netflix, a thousand different online games to choose from, endless website to surf and so on and so forth.
You post a thread titled:
Why MMOs changed to what it is today
You made a connection from that to this.
It's very convenient you left that part out when you asked me to verify sources. Especially when it was the foundation for my initial post.
Gaming since 1985; Online gaming since 1995; No End in Sight! My YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8POVoJ8fdOseuJ4U1ZX-oA
Less time to play means less time to play. Which equals people not able to play games where it takes a long time to do things.
It shows what PvP games are really all about, and no, it's not about more realism and immersion. It's about cowards hiding behind a screen to they can bully other defenseless players without any risk of direct retaliation like there would be if they acted like asshats in "real life". -Jean-Luc_Picard
Life itself is a game. So why shouldn't your game be ruined? - justmemyselfandi
MurderHerd
It shows what PvP games are really all about, and no, it's not about more realism and immersion. It's about cowards hiding behind a screen to they can bully other defenseless players without any risk of direct retaliation like there would be if they acted like asshats in "real life". -Jean-Luc_Picard
Life itself is a game. So why shouldn't your game be ruined? - justmemyselfandi
Playing: Darkfall New Dawn (and planning to play Fallout 76)
Favourite games have included: UO, Lineage2, Darkfall, Lotro, Baldur's Gate, SSX, FF7 and yes the original Wizardry on an Apple IIe
Being a pessimist is a win-win pattern of thinking. If you're a pessimist (I'll admit that I am!) you're either:
A. Proven right (if something bad happens)
or
B. Pleasantly surprised (if something good happens)
Either way, you can't lose! Try it out sometime!
Seriously...?
The Average Age Of A Gamer Is 30 Says ESA - G4tv.com - Jul 31, 2012
Gaming advocacy group: The average gamer is 31, and ... Apr 29, 2014
What does 30 -> 31 mean?That's right folks! DING DING DING! It means it is INCREASING!
YAY!
Apologies as I can't make it any easier than the above.
It shows what PvP games are really all about, and no, it's not about more realism and immersion. It's about cowards hiding behind a screen to they can bully other defenseless players without any risk of direct retaliation like there would be if they acted like asshats in "real life". -Jean-Luc_Picard
Life itself is a game. So why shouldn't your game be ruined? - justmemyselfandi
In fact, it is hard to justify spend 13 hours in a game when the alternative is something like Netflix Dare Devil ... which is much more enjoyable than many games to me. And we are not even get to the part that having a 3 hour date with my wife .. outweighs 3 hours on ANY game.
I mean even though Call of Duty is huge it's biggest competitor Battlefield took another route focused more on large scale battle and environmental destruction. Most FPS have developed their own niche. MMORPG just went uniformed casual themeparks quest hub. The only genre I can say something similar happened was maybe RTS becoming Dune 2 clones.
But I can make time for it for sure. Even working 2 jobs. Just like I make time for commercial drawn out sporting events that take 3 hours. MMORPGs were a genre I would play for hours because the experience would be unique each session.
Modern MMORPG are hard to stomach with the genre repetitive single player game inside a multiplayer world. Completing the same easy low level quest I have for years is not fun. I can log on to any of the modern MMORPG and know exactly what to expect in an over refined genre. It's all a carefully crafted experience that I have experienced repeatedly over and over.
A "hardcore" game can be played casually and vice versa, thus only relevant factor is person playing the game.
The question though is if they didn't go way too far and how much of Wows success actually was due to the fact that it had 5 times the budget of any earlier MMO and a rather talented crew. I don't think it was Wows difficulty that made it a success.
Making the game easier and faster is easy and fast but after you reach a certain points the faster and easier you make the game the shorter time will the average player stay in the game. And throwing in a few hard raids wont solve that.