The Massive Multiplayer Online Fad.

[_______________Lozer]

first off i did not spell/grammer check this and i am dislexice. but that aside you will not be dissipointed reading on.

the massive multi player fad. i been watching the game market for new and exciting mmorpg's that are in development. so far i have viewed 27 NEW ones that are going to be launched before the end of 2003. wheather that many actually make it is yet to be seen.

i personaly have played the 5 major ones that are curently on the market. and played em alot. but is this game market stable enough.... will it endure till 2004? that is what i am here to ask!

curently i have seen the flood of people leaving one game and going to another as soon as another game seems/is better than the one they are playing. witch leads me to beleave the market is already saturated with people that are willing to spend the time and effort of playing these games. meaning when the new games launch through out the nest year and a half the market will not increas mutch... for it has already reached it's peek.

now if you have kept reading this far you may be asking your self. why the hell do i care and what is the point of this article! whell that awnser is simple.
for each new game that has launched a certin amount of people from the curent ones was lost to it. naturally some return but not all. after the release of anarchy online and DAOC there has been a knoticable population decline on the ultima online servers. now that is only 2 new games being release into the market. emagin what 27 new games will do.

emagin for a sec that at the year mark of 2004 we have all 31 games still on the market. (not likly but worse case senaro) sence we have a limited number of players that play these games lets say for argument sakes 1 million players (probably no where near that but o well) thta 1 million is curently devided among 5 games giving each game 200 thousand people. if we have even HALF the games that will be lauhcned hit the market we will be lucky to maintain 60 thousand people per game.

once again those who are still reading are still asking: "so?" whell here is what it boils down to.
for the Anarchy online comunity that means 2 servers with a totall active acount populatoin (not including second acounts) of 60k people. leaving 30k people per server. of that 30k people we woould be lucky to have 1/3 of that as fully active people. leaving a mear 10k, with only MABY 3k online at any given time. (therecical numbers mind you, probably a hella lot less)

now although i am not aginst other new games coming out... i forsee a sevear problem. becase the market area that these games apeal to is so small all these games are going to be doomed to failer bringing down the clasics and the curent ones will fall before they ever get off the ground.

whell that is all i have to say about this.

[___________Obergeist]

Yep.... sad but true.

[___________Xenoberon]

Well, the current Market is growing as more and more get introduced into the genre (I am quite sure there are a ton more who get newly introduced to MMORPGs than those who "give up" the whole thing).

Which leaves more playerbase to be spread among those games.

However, I do believe that future games will no longer reach the massive amounts of accounts (400k etc like EQ) for long periods of time...unless they are truly a market leader and have a barrier breaking product (great support, content, stability and fun all in one).

If it comes to that point, all I think you'll see is less multi servers for games like DAoC, EQ and UO and perhaps only 1 (instead of 2 hehe) massive servers for games like AO.

I'm not sure of the cost of upkeep on these games, but I'm sure small companies like Mythic can still make profit even if they had to shutdown a couple of their servers.

Games will probably also move to more of a defined target market (like Shadowbane to PvPers) rather than try to appeal to everyone (like DAoC) as the market becomes tighter, and it would seem this is easier to 'balance' as you no longer have conflicting issues and player views to the same extent you have in the constant PvPer vs Non-PvPer balance issue war currently in games.

[_______________Lozer]

Originally posted by Xenoberon
Well, the current Market is growing as more and more get introduced into the genre (I am quite sure there are a ton more who get newly introduced to MMORPGs than those who "give up" the whole thing).

Which leaves more playerbase to be spread among those games.

However, I do believe that future games will no longer reach the massive amounts of accounts (400k etc like EQ) for long periods of time...unless they are truly a market leader and have a barrier breaking product (great support, content, stability and fun all in one).

If it comes to that point, all I think you'll see is less multi servers for games like DAoC, EQ and UO and perhaps only 1 (instead of 2 hehe) massive servers for games like AO.

I'm not sure of the cost of upkeep on these games, but I'm sure small companies like Mythic can still make profit even if they had to shutdown a couple of their servers.

Games will probably also move to more of a defined target market (like Shadowbane to PvPers) rather than try to appeal to everyone (like DAoC) as the market becomes tighter, and it would seem this is easier to 'balance' as you no longer have conflicting issues and player views to the same extent you have in the constant PvPer vs Non-PvPer balance issue war currently in games.

ahh true ture. anarchy online will endure the long run so will eq and uo. daoc i feel may fail. and asherons call evne though i hope the entire microsof corp dies a horrable death. the only reasion why ao, uo, eq, and ac will enture is becase the componeys are not soley depended on there one game to survive. funcom dose have other income sorces. so dose sony, microsfor and electronic arts (duh).....

although i do feel the market focus of the mmorpg is growing it is growing slowly.... and it is near its peek. we do get new players that have never played before. but not many of them stay playing. and we also loose players at the same time due to that thing called real life.

the game speciality will be a good thing in the long run. and helpt ot seprate the conflicting intrists that people have when making and maintaining these game..... and in the long run make the survivers really good... becase they had to serously improve just to stay in the compitition.

[Thyrra]

pretty straight forward analisys. seems intuitively correct.

FC seems to have planned the expansion about the time people will have looked at some newer games and relized they are messed up too. at the point when new players are starting to see the buggy underbelly of these newer games the expansion will seem like a shiny new toy; and since this game will have been in the market for 1 1/2 years already, it -should- have pretty good stability and depth ( marketing will at least try to paint this picture ).

if FC does not realize after all this time that once the newer games start to ship they will lose a lot of players, then they will flounder out of AO ability to maintain profitably or into better customer support and a new player centric focus.

the player seems to be the winner in the near future. more games that appeal more tightly to our likes, and a higher likelyhood that we'll meet people that share the same general interests and/or way of thinking. smaller crowds == less lag and makes it easier to provide good customer support.

in the long run things will probably go to the same system that other games work by. there will be strong powers in the mmog world where most of the people will be playing; with smaller niche games for those with snooty or very specific tastes.

[_______________Lozer]

one major benifite of this would be that all the mmog game compineys would be forced to ad more content and more intristing things to try and be the best.... the one that fails to do so will shurly start to fail *couch ao cough*

[______________Coymac]

As a previous poster stated, the analysis presented seems to be intuitively correct. However, before any real study can be done, a great deal of data would have to be acquired. First, it would be nice to know what the average "peak time" population is on each of the major MMORPGs. How has this number changed with the release of newer games.

We all know that EQ dropped the display of server population around the time that DAoC came out. One might think that this was an indication that Verant was losing customers to a new game. It could have also been a way to get players to stop complaining about over crowded servers. The only way to find out would be to see what the numbers actually were. Again, we're faced with a lack of data.

I do not necessarily agree that the market for online RPGs is saturated. Yes, a large number of people migrate between games. Still, more and more people are gaining high-speed access to the internet and ever more capable computers. This translates into a large potential customer base. The people buying these computers are also the ones that tend to play compuyter games. This would seem to indicate that the player base is growing at whatever rate increase in households with high-end computers and high-speed connections is growing. The market should not become truly saturated until this growth rate becomes flat of negative.

[_______________Lozer]

Originally posted by Artaxt Ravenson
As a previous poster stated, the analysis presented seems to be intuitively correct. However, before any real study can be done, a great deal of data would have to be acquired. First, it would be nice to know what the average "peak time" population is on each of the major MMORPGs. How has this number changed with the release of newer games.

that info unfortunaly is hard to come buy becase most of the mmog have become failry silent as of late with there totall active acoutns. i also play ultima online on the side (also posted this article there, slightly addapted for uo rules EG: 25 servers) i do know from a reliable sorce from within the staff of ultima online that there active acount base has declined from 225,000 acounts to around 100,000 active acounts over the last year and a half. largly due to the launch of other games.

We all know that EQ dropped the display of server population around the time that DAoC came out. One might think that this was an indication that Verant was losing customers to a new game. It could have also been a way to get players to stop complaining about over crowded servers. The only way to find out would be to see what the numbers actually were. Again, we're faced with a lack of data.

again that data is hard to come buy becase it seems many of the compineys have someting to hide.

I do not necessarily agree that the market for online RPGs is saturated. Yes, a large number of people migrate between games. Still, more and more people are gaining high-speed access to the internet and ever more capable computers. This translates into a large potential customer base. The people buying these computers are also the ones that tend to play compuyter games. This would seem to indicate that the player base is growing at whatever rate increase in households with high-end computers and high-speed connections is growing. The market should not become truly saturated until this growth rate becomes flat of negative.

this is ture.... but there are fewier and fewer new players joining these games and of those few that join only a small portion stay long term. i am speeking more directly of the comunity aspect of these games. it takes a large number of players to build a good comunity to keep everyting going. while i agree the market is not totalyl saturated it is darn close.

the reasion why i beleave the market is reaching its peek is for sevral major reasions. of those that are getting new computers and high speed connecction only a small marjin will find these games and stay.. also the RPG game only apeals to sertin people. those people are not a large population. the intrenet it's self is at its saturation point. despite the attempts to keep the internet a free information baise it is slowyl but shurly turning into a free market of trade of information. witch many will find displeasing. with in the next 2 years i for see massive exidus from the internet. everyting will be pay in some form or way, right donw to the search engins.

whell enough of my gloom forshadwing..... you all will see eventually waht i am talking about.

[Cambist]

You're funny.. UO didn't lose 125,000 accounts in the last few months. What does your reliable source smoke? The copyright is 2002 and I doubt EA would want to lie and get sued over something dumb.

From Origin's Home page http://www.origin.ea.com/
Four years after its launch, Ultima Online still is growing and has more than 225,000 active players who spend an average of between 10 - 20 hours a week immersed in the land of Britannia and the virtual world of Ultima Online.

Blatant speculation is fun and all, but they just released an expansion and are bragging about growth. Your facts are goofy.

Granted, I doubt the market can sustain 20+ games... I do think that DAOC coming out and pulling in 200k subs without putting any other game company out of business is proof that the market is still growing, though. http://www.darkageofcamelot.com/pres...ameofyear.html

There wouldn't be 20 someodd games coming out if publishers didn't see big $ signs in online games.

[____________Isembard]

The US market may or may not be reaching saturation point (I suspect not - better and cheaper technology will draw more people in to the hobby). The European market and the rest of the world market most certainly isn't!

The biggest hurdle to the take up of MMPORGS in Europe has been the strangle hold of a few companies over the availability of domestic broadband. Repeated kicking by the EC has gradually forced these companies to open up the market (i.e. threats of prosecution) and in the UK and Germany take-up is rapidly increasing.

The number one reason people in the EU give for getting broadband at home is to play online games (not just MMPRPGS).

The latest games consoles have been designed with online gaming in mind - Sony now produce a Linux conversion kit for the PS2 (keyboard and software) - Everquest on the PS2 is likely not far behind.

I can't believe those rabid technophiles in Japan would not go for MMPORGS in a big way. Actually, they probably already do - but the biggest barrier to a true worldwide MMPRPG is language and there isn't much of a market for Japanese language games in the West .

Funcom obviously aren't blind to this - we have a Japanese OOC channel and now a German language server.........

The immersive world market is very much in it's infancy - the technology still isn't quite there yet, the software isn't quite there either. The internet still has a fair way to go before it's full potential can be realised (most of the comms gear is using 1980's technology - most of the copper wires still have yet to be replaced by fibre optics).

/me Puts prophet's hat on

Things you can expect to see over the next 10 years :

Realistic Physics engines for games - big bucks for University's ATM - a physics engine controls the effect of actions on the world scenery in a realistic way - windows smash when you shoot them, paint can be sprayed on walls, kicking a can will send it moving, etc. These things will allow you to interact with the game world without the creator building all these things in by hand.

Voice recognition and synthesis - talk to people, don't type - and talk in a voice which suits your character.

A 'universal' translater would be darned useful with the above too (but is probably much further off).

Massive peer-to-peer networks reducing lag to almost zero - Microsoft are big players in this area.

An unreal number of control and display systems are under development - futurologists have been drooling over these for the last 20 years, but thin film technology looks likely to make some of these feasible.

Improved AI - the holy grail which with Moore's law, optical and quantum computing brings closer every day........

/me takes hat off

Some of these things may not happen - and a darn sight more similar things will. The above technologies are ALL being intensively researched by people who aren't into throwing away millions for nothing.

IMHO the MMPRPG market has a long, long way to go before it reaches saturation, or even maturity.

[Thyrra]

Originally posted by Sellyoursoul
There wouldn't be 20 someodd games coming out if publishers didn't see big $ signs in online games.

dot com craziness ring bells?

[engelstein]

Um, peer to peer networking? You'd need some pretty good crypto to keep something like that safe, and Microsoft's security record is not quite spotless.

[_________KrazyKanuck]

My first comment is that i don't think the market is nearly as large as it will be. This is a very rapidly growing area of gaming and computer use overall. For massively multiplayer games i believe we are just seeing the tip of the iceberg in terms of players right now.

Secondly, sorta sad note the MMO looses one of its smaller games as of tonight. A very interesting game but underfunded and underpromoted by Sega called 10six is being shut down probably for the final time today. The community and dedication of the players to that game rivals if not exceeds any game created before. Too bad that following only consisted of a few thousand players.

I think that the online gaming market is going to tend to be more successful in smaller independant companies who are not too worried about how far into the black they are in developing and running the games. I believe few games if any will ever be able to challenge the player base of games like EQ much past the end of the next 2 years. thus making these online games does not fit the buisness plans of larger diversified companies such as Sony, Sega etc. We're instead going to see a large number of games with smaller numbers of players playing.

[_______________Lozer]

Originally posted by Sellyoursoul
You're funny.. UO didn't lose 125,000 accounts in the last few months. What does your reliable source smoke? The copyright is 2002 and I doubt EA would want to lie and get sued over something dumb.

225k acounts is what they have but most players of ultima online have atleat 2 acounts. if not more. i know people that play that game that have over 29 active acounts. ultima online population decline is painfully evident when you play. you have to be blind to not see it. the up and coming build 16 patch that will be reelase by the end of the next month (also acroding to my sorces) will show that about 40% of the houses on each server are going to fall (new housing changes) becase incative acounts will no longer have there houses auto refrehed. i play on the alantic server of ultima online and there are only 2 out of 8 cities that even have people in them. the rest of the cities are totally abandoned. also the upcoming build 16 patch will see yet another mass exdius of people becase of the balancing changes that also will occure.

sorry to say ea is going by acounts not by actuall individual players.

[__________starknaked]

I don't believe that the market is at all saturated. Keep in mind that less than 10% of the american public have broadband connections as of now. The number of people who have broadband will increase exponentially over the next few years.

Also, I am expecting (or at least hoping) that the quality of multiplayer online games will go way up. Yeah, if all these games are about is levelling up so you can acquire better armor and weapons, then the market is almost saturated. But if and when these games branch out and become true virtual worlds, they can easily bring in 10's of millions of more players.

[_______bunderscratch]

<offence flaming mode on>
removed after cooling off and venting some irritation.
<offence flaming mode off>

There are relly two absoulutely different markets in MMOG:
for hardcore player and for casual player.
Market for hardcore player is pretty much saturated and I doubt it would sustain another 20 games (with all of them but 1 or 2 really suitable for hardcore gamers).
For casual players - ... well there is only one persistent character game now, wich is close to be to MMORPG for casual player - that is Diablo 2. AO/AC/UO/DAoK all hardcore games. You will not progress there without playing minimum 10 hours/week.(Don't know anything about Lineage though). There are two upcoming games which clamed to be for casual player - Sim online and EnB, and we will see if they succeed. Market for casual player not only not satuated - it's barely touched. All big money will be made in the games for casual player, but would casual player MMORPG should be look like no one still found...

P.S After some thought I have some idea though:

1. No leveling. Casual player can't keep up with hardcore, and if he too far behind he quits.
2. No loot. The same reason.
3. A lot of chatting. Casual player like to chat.
4. A lot of social events.
5. No (or very little) role playing. To heavy burden for casual player .
6. In game status defined mostly not by player actions, but subscription time. (Ye, game companies would like that)

Heh you don't like it ? but that is the future of online gaming.

[____________Isembard]

Re: Bunderscratch's post:

I don't think I agree - dividing players in 2 camps of 'casual' and 'hardcore' is much too limited - especially with a 10 hour a week cutoff! By this definition every PC game player I know (including myself) is 'hardcore'. There are as many patterns of play as there are players - and they all pay the same monthly fee .

I don't disagree that there is plenty of room for different game niches - and the market is already showing signs of some diversification (not much, but some).

One thing you have missed though - the 'casual' player who buys a boxed game, plays it for a few weeks and then buys another game is NOT a good customer for MMORPG's - companies would rather have someone who plays (and pays) for months after buying the box. Therefore content will NOT be created to cater for these people except on a limited box-shifting model.

So long as there are enough 'hardcore' players there will be a market for 'decent' MMORPGs - and there seems to be no shortage of those (I've recruited 6 new 'hardcore' MMORPG players in the last few months!).

Come on folks, lighten up, it's not all doom and gloom. In fact I can see bog all doom and gloom except in the eyes of all those people posting here who seem to think every silver lining has a cloud.

With 20+ games under development, the player base expanding exponentially, the potential market expanding locally and globally with the take up of broadband and some of the brightest people on the planet putting many man years into improving the games, what the hell is there to be miserable about?!!!!!

People deserting AO to play the online SiMs? - come on, it's a totally different market!

AO style games starved of development capital since companies would rather invest in games for 'casual' gamers? - I doesn't work like that. If you have a product, a potential market and a workable business plan you WILL get investors - it is not a finite 'bucket' on that sort of scale.

Some games WILL go to the wall. Some markets will NOT recieve as much investment as some would like (sorry, online MMP Bass Fishing does not appeal - to me at least!).

This how the market economy works.

[_____________Swahili]

>People deserting AO to play the online SiMs? - come on, it's a totally different market!

There's no question that it is a totally different market. That said, it is a market that is largely untapped as of now and one that is going to appeal to a much larger demographic with (most importantly!) far more discretionary income. The Sims Online is going to be MUCH bigger than AO, EQ, AC, DOAC could ever dream of being for a couple simple reasons... It isn't premised on killing stuff and at the root of it's non-online success is player creativity. If they allow for that same level of creativity in the online version, well, hell, even I will probably sign up just so I can occasionally log in and see what freaky stuff people are doing.

[_________________Zuh]

About different kind of player, I would say by experience there are 3.

Hardcore player of course, they are not so many compare to the mondial population but they are heavily addicted : ). Then you have the casual player, and the casual player almost always go in the 3rd category, we could describe as regular player.


The fact is, more and more people are attract by online games. But you can't denie also playing online games have serious issues when you think about your real life ^^. Hard to put the 2 together.

Myself I usually play like an hardcore gamer during a month, then have to stop because my RL doesn't follow. Then 2 months later I'm back to hardcore gaming. Don't know how I will handle that in the future. I need to find a balance : ).

[__________Mr.Nothing]

Its kinda like a food chain

i am only going to use example numbers

UO- 200 people
EQ Comes out with 350 people,
UO- Drops to 150 people
AC- Starts With 300 people
UO-Drops to 100
EQ- Maintains at 350
AO- Comes out with 200 people
UO- Drops to 75
EQ- Drops t 325
AC- Drop to 250
DAOC- Starts with 500 people
UO- Drops to 30
EQ- Drops to 225
AC- Drops to 200
AO- Stays The Same



Eventualy the oldest games with lose all its player base, or enough so that it has to shut down. This means all games with have a decent life span. No game is going to the last forever, but it they can last as long as UO who really cares right?

Also with each new game the market increases.