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MMOGs Reaching For Casual Gamers
The Guardian Gamesblog has a nice bit of commentary up today discussing the push for MMOGs to connect with casual gamers. Announcements of Massive games on the next generation of consoles have been fast and furious, but skeptics seem to feel casual gamers may not make the leap. Indeed, even veteran MMOG players have difficulty with the genre, as a recent AFKGamer column on how to deal with Grind illustrates. From the Guardian article: "Still, in order to be a viable entity on a home console unit - competing directly with the likes of GTA, Super Mario and FIFA - things will have to change. Some may call it dumbing down, but the product must be created with the consumer in mind. Personally, while I consume my fair share, I'm still only primarily interested in them from an academic perspective, as resources of human sociability in online space" Update: 07/02 05:09 GMT by Z : Gamasutra's weekly question dealt with this exact issue. The opinions of industry participants are always welcome.
These 3 factors will exist in any game, leading to people who are just better than you, period, defeating the fun the casual player would normally get.
Derive Politics
Well put. I think that "casual gamer" is the polar opposite of someone who plays an MMORPG. The great thing about Madden and Super Smash Bros. is that they game only lasts a few minutes. After that you are free to enjoy the same mindless fun again, or move on. There is very little investment. But MMORPGs, you have to invest hours and hours and hours to get a decent character, and if you do not, the game will not be as fun. So I do not expect to see a great increase in MMORPG playing among casual gamers.
It was possible to play at least one MMOG casually. In Planetside, player skills were effectively capped after roughly 1 month (level 20 or something) at which point it came down to skill and teamwork.
It was fun and I had a blast playing the first year. Then they introduced so-called "command" skills which required lengthy accumulation of "points" eventually resulting in special "command" powers like evoking god beams from space to annihilate a few acres of players. Within a few months every non-casual player had this and satellites were going off every few seconds. Then came "mechs"; another lengthy point accumulation resulting in practically unkillable casual player eating monsters. At that point I quit.
Had Planetside not changed into a game of point accumulation I would still be playing. They could have introduced new environments (sea combat, air combat with more depth, hacking that wasn't merely watching a progress bar, buildable structures, customizable vehicles, elaborate sensor and trap systems, etc.) Instead they introduced things that stratified players into those who had 10 hours a day to play and those that didn't.
Making a causal player friendly MMOG is easy. There is basically one rule; if a player must play more than 1-2 hour every other day to stay on par with the hardcore players (in terms of "stuff") it's not going to work for casual players. The game must rely on skill and knowledge rather than accumulation of wealth and rank. End of casual player requirements.
Lurking at the bottom of the gravity well, getting old
I'm beginning to think it isn't. I'm sure everyone here has heard of World of Warcraft. It was supposed to be casual friendly and managed to succeed fairly well at it - for the first 35 levels or so. Some time around level 40 it reverts to the "grind XP" model and once you hit end-game, it's back to EverQuest-style raids.
The problem is that World of Warcraft is ultimately starting to alienate both hardcore gamers, who rushed through the content and are now bored, and casual gamers, who are just now starting to finish the content and are now discovering that they're getting bored too. A proper setup needs to somehow balance both casual gamers and hardcore gamers.
Final Fantasy XI had an interesting system set up originally that could have made it casual friendly and allowing hardcore to have fun too, by allowing casual players to play one job and hardcore players to play several jobs (on the same toon) thereby allowing hardcore players to get more rewards than casual - but not sufficiently more to be completely overpowering. Except FFXI made soloing impossible (no, Beastmaster doesn't count, because you have to have grouped to get it in the first place), and that concept was totally defeated when they raised the level cap from 50 and started adding end-game pseudo-raid content.
Ultimately, you have to find some way to allow both casual and hardcore players to succeed, or else both are going to get bored and leave. WoW is an interesting case-study in that - it'll be interesting to see how the next several months go as more and more casual players reach level 60.
you have to invest hours and hours and hours to get a decent character
Maybe that's why some of the underling assumptions need to be re-thought. Is there a way to present a MMORPG in such a way that you can get in, and get some cool stuff done without worry about some 40 hr/week player coming along and kicking the stuffing out of you with is 'super special nuclear sword'.
Obviously a game that allows for that sort of social structure isn't going to be popular among hard core gamers that like to newbie bash or fight master wizard battles.
Why would a casual movie watcher pay $8.50 to see one movie a month in the theater?
$8.50 for just two hours of entertainment makes no sense at all.
It doesn't hurt to be nice.
Yeah it's really easy to get to 60. But then it's like running into a wall once you get there because the only thing to do is instances which can take hours. And that's if you can find a group. Many classes just aren't considered special enough(like priests) or you're one of 50 other hunters looking for a group.
Not necessarily.
Most MMORPGs use levelling and equipment as their primary rewards. It's the sort of system where time -> better character. If the goal is to provide the best experience for the casual gamer, then it seems like it would be a good idea to break that link, or at least minimize it.
If you want to attract casual gamers, it seems like some cash bonuses are in order. For example, if you charged $1/hour up to the first twenty hours in a month, then said anything above that was free. Chances are, even a "casual gamer" is going to play for fifteen hours a month, so the financial difference isn't huge. The point is to make them feel like they're not getting too gypped by not spending their every waking hour in Azeroth.
Now, if someone is playing an hour a night, every other day, they won't last long unless you give them something interesting to do in that hour. If just about every dungeon requires a five hour grind-a-thon to complete, that's no good. Whatever the goal of a dungeon is, there should be another path to that goal which--though harder in aggregate--can be completed in 50-90 minute chunks.
Casual gamers are good for a company because they provide steady revenue, and they outnumber the fanatics by a huge number. But the fanatics are the ones who run the clans, maintain the websites, buy the tee shirts, and tell all their friends about teh aw3som3st g4m3 EVAAAR!!!1 So it seems to me that going the route I suggest could suck away the most enthusiastic portion of the fanbase.
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
As a casual gamer, I didn't mind that people have better stuff; what bothered me was that I could play no role in determining what "better stuff" was. Everything interesting about the game - which combination of equipment, race, spells was best for a character - which combination of classes was best for a group - were already worked out. If I wanted to play a class I was expected to play it exactly the way someone else had figured out long ago.
I would like to see some effort put into making every character an individual. The best solution I've thought of is to provide some sort of "gift" once every few levels(in EQ the trainers would give them out). Your elf-ranger wouldn't get the same gift as every other elf-ranger, and those elf-rangers wouldn't have anyway to get that gift on their own. Some people might complain if they got a bad gift, but the sting would be reduced by the knowledge that a few levels later they might get a great gift.
When grouping with new people, you wouldn't just assume their role. You would need to talk to them, find out what abilities they have, and then decide who does what.
Early role playing games tried to introduce variety by rolling dice to get player attributes, but people would just start over with a new character if they didn't like their dice roll, so in games like EQ you get to assign the stats yourself (again, their are expectations of how you will assign them). With gifts being randomly given out every few levels, it would take long enough to get the gifts that it wouldn't make sense to keep going back and starting over.
I often don't like the choices people make, but I like the fact that people make choices. That's why I'm a conservative.
That's the thing about MMOGs: there's always going to be someone who is obsessed with the game and have better stuff than you, and because of that, they're going to do better.
There's no "grind" in Uunreal Tournament or Counter Strike. Your only indicator that you're doing better is, well, doing better. You know it's fun because you're having a good time, not because you reached 60th level.
I kind of look at it like exercise.
If you gave a group of people $10 every time they went to the gym, then after a year you'd have some people with more money than others. Note that these might be the strongest, fastest or thinnest of the group. But they might not. They might be having fun, or they might not. I see these as the MMOGers
But what if instead you just said, "go to the gym as long as it's fun to you." At the end of that time some people are going to be more fit than others and some are going to be more happy than others. These people are winners because they're fit or happy, not because they have more money (levels).
But what do casual gamers want? They just want to have a good time, either by themselves or with their friends. If MMOGs want to attract these gamers, they're going to have to find a way to focus on haveing a good time instead of getting stuff.
TW
The same reason millions of people pay $30 a month to watch satellite (or cable) television. I find it extremely interesting when people say this: I just bought a $50 game and now you're telling me I have to pay $10 a month to even use any of it??? Why is it that people don't say: I just bought a dish system and now you're telling me I have to pay $30 a month to see anything??? I've never been able to find the distinction. Both are entertainment. You're paying for a service in both. The mmog even costs less than watching your TV...Why do so many more people make this complaint over the other one? Now, you may be like me and just not *want* to shelve out money (I don't have satellite either) but that's a whole different issue. That's what marketing is for: to convince them they need it (Joe Bloe across the street believed the marketting in satellite TV...)