[MUD-Dev] When will new MMORPGs that are coming out get originalwiththe gameplay?

[Derek Licciardi]

From: David Kennerly

> When enough players vote for originality with their wallets.

I think that is a little short sighted.  There are plenty of
customers clamoring for something better than the crop of
kill-loot-farm diku MMOs that have been released over the past
year. (exception TSO - too bad it wasn't a good game design)

What's really holding things up is that publishers haven't figured
out the risk management parameters of MMOs so their investment
strategies stick to what has worked while they get their feet wet in
the genre.  Remember its a genre where a publisher could make 5 - 10
single player games for the same money so risk mangement is of huge
importance.  Their reluctance prevents anything original from being
released.  Traditional investment doesn't even know about the game
industry as a whole, so the learning curve for traditional invesment
is even higher.  First it must be convinced that the 12 billion
dollar industry it has never invested in is actually a good place to
begin investing in.  Then you have to convince them of why an MMO is
better to invest in over a significatly cheaper (read less risky)
single player game.

The industry and investment communities simply are not ready to
digest 20 million dollar budgets when it has always been used to 2 -
4 million dollar ones or in the case of the latter no investment at
all.  Forget the idea that we're also in a recession that decreases
risk tollerance.

Consumers can't buy things that are not developed for them and
speaking with their wallets on some of the recent failures is only
acting to make the genre look less enticing to investors.  Thinking
it acts the other way, causing innovation, assumes the
investor/publisher actually understand/desires to play in the genre
in the first place and there are many factors working against this
assumption.  (recession, 5 - 10x development costs, quarterly
earnings...)

Kressilac
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