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The Secret Life Of MMOG Characters
An article at Gamasutra pines for MMOG characters to have their own lives. Specifically, the author wishes that over a very long period of time xp would accrue for parked characters. From the article: "Here's what I'd like to see: instead of Vanille Ice and all the millions of unused characters sitting on their collective tookuses, why not imagine that each day they venture forth and do some low-level crime fighting (orc slaying, etc.) just to, you know, 'stay in shape'. Now this workout wouldn't actually happen in any way visible to players logged on, but these characters would earn nominal amounts of experience each day. And in three months time, presto, a new level."
No, it's closer to "Concerned writer offers suggestions to Game Companies on possible ways to maintain interest in their MMOG titles on the part of casual gamers as a device to improve income."
If the MMOG Companies can figure out how to make it attractive enough for players to maintain their monthly subscriptions even if said players don't have time to log in every week or even every month to play, they've hit a potential goldmine of long-term subscriptions.
For instance, I played Asheron's Call for nearly 6 years. I was part of a good monarchy, had characters in various states of advancement and even had in-game goals I was actively working towards. I started playing before I got married, and even after I got married, I simply got my wife hooked on the game and we played together. So why did I cancel? Well, one-month old newborn twins will severely negatively impact both your wallet and your spare time. AC fell far enough down the priority list that I could not justify paying the subscriptions on the three accounts we own when we didn't have time and energy to log in for more than 5 minutes in a given month. Paying $40/month to Turbine for essentially nothing wasn't a worthwhile proposition.
But if Turbine had set it up so that some sort of advancement was happening on my character even if I didn't log in for 6 months straight but merely kept my subscription active, well, I might still have one or more active accounts.
In the end, it's not about Lamers wanting something for nothing. It's about Game companies maximizing their revenue streams (Duh). If allowing some sort of limited, offline advancement for players who merely maintain an active subscription keeps players like me who would otherwise cancel their subscriptions for lack of time and desire to play then the Game companies have found, in essence, a source of free money.