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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.
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
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.
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.
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