Green Monster Games - Curt Schilling

Grave said:

Ideas like restricting magic and such sound good on paper, and you"re right it would add an interesting little facet to the world. However, at the end of the day you have to ask yourself "is this fun?" and I think most people would agree that having their magic (one of the defining points of fantasy) limited is not in the best interest of fun gameplay.

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Exactly. And thats what relegates future fantasy games to "not much more than more of the same". Because there really isn"t much room left in the "new and innovative" department for fantasy mmos. Its why everything seems so similar across them. I suppose you could make the same claim about sci-fi to some extent, but I don"t think it would be as profound as it is in fantasy, because sci-fi isn"t nearly as prominent in the mmo genre. We"re already seeing things like "thats almost straight out of EQ" or "thats exactly how WoW does it".

It"d be nice to see what the new games bring to the table, but i"m not counting on anything substantial. From a new fantasy IP or otherwise.

Twobit Whore said:

High fantasy will rule the roost until World of Starcraft shows what a well polished Sci-Fi MMO "done right" can really do.

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Unfortunately, you probably will never see a WOS.

The problem is there isn"t a good model to start from. Blizzard doesn"t really create. They morph, refine, and polish what others have started with potential.

WOW is an EQ clone, taking the base formula and vastly improving it. Think of it like the Japanese and auto manufacturing in the 1980s.

There is no good baseline Sci Fi MMO to take the formula from. EVE won"t translate properly. SWG pre NGU doesn"t work for Blizzard, and has morphed from a sandbox MMO to a WOW clone itself.

The closest one could find would be Planetside, and it doesn"t lend itself to an MMO a la WOW.

My guess is Blizzard/Vivendi have already spent a good deal of coin in research and have come to the conclusion the Sci Fi MMO genre hasn"t matured enough to warrant the expenditures, and will wait for the next evolution that some smaller and more free thinking company will stumble across, and Blizzard will take, a la their previous products.

Dude its not rocket science. All there going to do is take WOW and put it in space. Done Deal with 6 million subs... Trust me as big as Starcraft is there will defiantly be a MMO.

Gecko said:

Unfortunately, you probably will never see a WOS.

The problem is there isn"t a good model to start from. Blizzard doesn"t really create. They morph, refine, and polish what others have started with potential.

WOW is an EQ clone, taking the base formula and vastly improving it. Think of it like the Japanese and auto manufacturing in the 1980s.

There is no good baseline Sci Fi MMO to take the formula from. EVE won"t translate properly. SWG pre NGU doesn"t work for Blizzard, and has morphed from a sandbox MMO to a WOW clone itself.

The closest one could find would be Planetside, and it doesn"t lend itself to an MMO a la WOW.

My guess is Blizzard/Vivendi have already spent a good deal of coin in research and have come to the conclusion the Sci Fi MMO genre hasn"t matured enough to warrant the expenditures, and will wait for the next evolution that some smaller and more free thinking company will stumble across, and Blizzard will take, a la their previous products.

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Agreed. To some extent anyway. Which is why I think that any new high profile IP needs to be based on anything BUT fantasy. Especially when they "intend" to compete with Blizzard for market share right from the start. Because you simply can"t keep regurgitating systems that have been built, improved upon, and altered into numerous variations countless times over already, with the realistic expectation of competing with those that have done it best.

Sci-fi holds immeasurable potential, because its far less constricting than fantasy. Star Wars, Star Trek, SG, BSG, Aliens, Sphere, Species, and countless others, have culminated into quite a large following in the sci-fi genre. I"d say likely close to equal in scope to the fantasy genre. With plenty of material for a new IP to draw upon for creative inspiration. Post-apocolyptic might do ok, although it tends to veer into sci-fi in one manner or another. Historical, although not as constricted as fantasy, is still too dependant upon fantasy aspects to provide any real market challenge.

I just doubt we"re going to see anything fantasy-esque in the mmo market compete with Blizzard on that level. Blizzard brought millions of mmo gamers into the market with WoW. And I highly doubt anyone other than Blizzard could accomplish such a feat, unless they"re beaten to the punch with something completely different.More of the sameis NOT going to accomplish that.

column said:

Dude its not rocket science. All there going to do is take WOW and put it in space. Done Deal with 6 million subs... Trust me as big as Starcraft is there will defiantly be a MMO.

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Possibly, but my guess is Blizzard has already done some homework on this and their opinion differs from yours.

Also, since most of their subs would probably come from their current WOW populace, why would they spend 100 million dollars to create an MMO where their biggest competitor is.. them?

Are you insane? SC is HUGE in Korea. MMOs are HUGE in Korea. It"s a freaking license to print money. You would have to be terribly naive to think their "homework" said a SC MMO wouldn"t be a hit.

They won"t compete against each other trust me,most people will sub to both. Blizzard will just copy what SOE has done and make a Station pass.Not to mention another card game. Its a win win for them.

column said:

They won"t compete against each other trust me,most people will sub to both. Blizzard will just copy what SOE has done and make a Station pass.Not to mention another card game. Its a win win for them.

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Most likely scenario IMHO. But its going to take quite a bit of time for them to transition the StarCraft IP into a sensible mmo. Which even further supports a new IP"s chance to do something great with the sci-fi sector, as well as introducing even more fresh blood into the genre. They don"t have to contend with adaptation restrictions brought on by predefined lore. Because its much easier to build sensible lore around a work in progress, than it is to adapt the work in progress to lore many fans will undoubtedly hold in the highest regard.

Blizzard is already working on another MMO. This is well known. My belief is that is must be Starcraft.

Blizzard won"t bet the farm on a new IP in an MMO format.

They"ve acknowledged that WoW has too much left to think about WoW 2 at this point.

Diablo is too close to WoW. Those would be competing.

Starcraft is all that is left.

We"ll see how the scifi thing works with Stargate this year.

Edit:
Stargate MMO is like free money.

FREE MONEY with money hats and money boats.

Twobit Whore said:

Are you insane? SC is HUGE in Korea. MMOs are HUGE in Korea. It"s a freaking license to print money. You would have to be terribly naive to think their "homework" said a SC MMO wouldn"t be a hit.

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I never said it wouldn"t be a hit. I merely pointed out they would be spending a lot of money on a product that would probably solely take market share from themselves. Plus, unless it was something new, and not Warcraft in space, there is the probability for it to be mediocre, which Blizzard wisely fights against.

Korea isn"t exactly a massive market, and there is propagation of a number of MMOs. Plus, the Korean MMO subscribers who would likely move to a SC MMO would leave WOW, validating my point.

Blizzard knows their product and what will sell. It"s why they are making another Starcraft game, and not a Starcraft MMO currently.

I"d say their track record makes them not in the least naive, but that"s just me.

A SC MMO wouldn"t be out for another 3 years at least.. that"s a good 2+ years of SC2 to get people ready for it. By then WoW is going to be 7 years old. People will be leaving anyway. What better than to get people leaving one of your games than to get them to go to another of your games?

It makes perfect sense.

I have no doubts that a StarCraft mmo will be developed. I also have no doubts that it will bring numbers consistant with WoW into the genre as more and more sci-fi gamer buffs begin learning about it. Sure, some will bleed in from the fantasy sector, but I think the significant population will be completely fresh mmo gamers.

I DO however doubt that any new fantasy IP will ever be able to compete with Blizzard for market share, and it"ll only be that much less significant once a StarCraft mmo is released.

The whole trap people fall into these days over and over is saying something will never meet WoW"s numbers. The way to achieve WoW"s success is to start with a successful game initially and build upon word of mouth. Stop worrying about achieving 5 million subscribers and focus on making a great game with enough quality hooks inside it to attract your average consumer.

The IP it"s built upon probably means a lot less than some people around here are suggesting when it comes to attracting the non-typical gamer like WoW did.

Twobit Whore said:

A SC MMO wouldn"t be out for another 3 years at least.. that"s a good 2+ years of SC2 to get people ready for it. By then WoW is going to be 7 years old. People will be leaving anyway. What better than to get people leaving one of your games than to get them to go to another of your games?

It makes perfect sense.

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Thats a bit black and white.

3 years from now WOW will still be a strong MMO. Given there are no strong contenders on the market, and they are planning the next expansion post Lich King, I doubt they are even considering a successor for WOW. Why would they? I also believe they will not release "WOW in Space", based on their corporate philosophy. You can disagree but their history says this probably won"t occur.

This may change if Bioware releases a KOTOR MMO that has 5 million people, with enough new things to create a paradigm shift, but thats solely speculation based on hypotheticals.

Given Blizzard"s notoriously slow development cycle and long testing and polishing phase, I think from the base leak of their decision, it"d be at least 4 years for an MMO project to see the light of day, unless it"s a port of WOW.

It wouldn"t surprise me if Blizzards current MMO project entails a port of WOW to the 360 or PS3, since this would be a low cost, high profit potential and leverage their product to many, many more users.

ShroudedMist said:

The IP it"s built upon probably means a lot less than some people around here are suggesting when it comes to attracting the non-typical gamer like WoW did.

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Three years ago, i"d have had no problem agreeing with you. But with the turn the mmo market has taken, if your IP is little more than a variation of previously implemented systems and stories, your chances of meaningful competition against those who have done it best are somewhere between slim, and none.

Thats a helluva risk to take with such an expenditure. Unless you go into it with the intent of just carving out your little piece, and being happy with what you end up with, you may find yourself way out of your league, and in over your head.

You realize before WoW came along, EQ had done it best? Before EQ, UO had done it best? WTF are you talking about?

WoW is not the be all end all of MMORPG design. They made a very good game, and currently dominate. That does not mean by any stretch that someone can"t come along, unique IP or generic_fantasy_01, and completely outmatch them.

I would actually venture to say that going too far from the established mold is MORE of a risk than simply doing a variation of the established system. As long as the gameplay rivals WoW, and it is polished and well maintained, the game will succeed.

Grave said:

You realize before WoW came along, EQ had done it best? Before EQ, UO had done it best? WTF are you talking about?

WoW is not the be all end all of MMORPG design. They made a very good game, and currently dominate. That does not mean by any stretch that someone can"t come along, unique IP or generic_fantasy_01, and completely outmatch them.

I would actually venture to say that going too far from the established mold is MORE of a risk than simply doing a variation of the established system. As long as the gameplay rivals WoW, and it is polished and well maintained, the game will succeed.

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There is very distinct reasons for those 3 games success.

UO was the first real mainstream mmo
EQ was the first true 3d dikumud..when muds were extremely popular
WoW brought its huge playerbase with them from warcraft not to mention they hired some of the top players of EQ to work for them.WoW would not enjoy the kind of success it has without warcraft.

When Eq was number 1 here in the states it was not the number 1 mmo in the world. More asians were playing games like Lineage then EQ.

It would take a true juggernaut of a game to dethrone WoW or even get close to it.I don"t see it happening anytime soon,especially not this game company which has no games at all to its name. Even Verant had Tanarus before EQ.

Grave said:

You realize before WoW came along, EQ had done it best? Before EQ, UO had done it best? WTF are you talking about?

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Way to miss the point there skippy. NO PREVIOUS game has taken the market by storm the likes of WoW. You seem all to eager to forget those that came AFTER WoW. ALL of which did things both similar to, and completely different to EVERYTHING before them. INCLUDING WoW.

WoW is not the be all end all of MMORPG design. They made a very good game, and currently dominate. That does not mean by any stretch that someone can"t come along, unique IP or generic_fantasy_01, and completely outmatch them.

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When did I say it was? I merely stated that I doubt any new "fantasy" based IP would be able to compete with it anytime soon. Perhaps try to avoid adding in your own personal thoughts to the comments you read?

I would actually venture to say that going too far from the established mold is MORE of a risk than simply doing a variation of the established system. As long as the gameplay rivals WoW, and it is polished and well maintained, the game will succeed.

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Venture there if you like. But it doesn"t change the fact that even sticking with fantasy is EQUALLY risky, especially when you"intend"to compete with Blizzard for market share. I never made any claims that a new fantasy IP couldn"t "succeed". What I DID say, was I find it highly unlikely that such an IP would be able to compete DIRECTLY with WoW. LotRO was pretty well polished, and i"d say its pretty well maintained as well. Does that change the fact that it doesn"t compete for market share on an even remotely similar field as WoW? That LotR IP is about as bag as they come. And it still didn"t matter.

Rayne said:

But it doesn"t change the fact that even sticking with fantasy is EQUALLY risky

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I don"t see how. Fantasy is proven. People are familiar with it. It"s a lot easier to get people to come to a game that"s "like WoW kinda but a whole lot better" than it is to get them to go to a game that isn"t like anything they can understand. Obviously vets and hardcore players won"t be affected by this but I think we all can agree that the vast majority of the mainstream market doesn"t fall into this category.