Perhaps my personal experience will shed some light.
Some time ago my gaming troop was playing tribes2 and waiting/watching/wishing for the new version of Tribes, the new Halflife (which we thought would be an online co-operative at the time) and some other games to come out.
We waited. And waited... and there were delays.. and we waited. We played some Unreal Tournament, etc.
Then while waiting since there was nothing going on, we tried FFXI (Final Fantasy IX - a Massively Multiplayer Online Roleplaying Game).
We have been playing that for 2+ years now. The new titles came out but we were already satisfied and only one or two of us purchased the new titles.
The game industry lost our troop as customers by taking too long to bring out the next titles.
Some of the group who were playing FFXI concurrently went to try WoW (World of Warcraft a MMORG) but they then came back to FFXI because WoW didn't have the holding power over post-teen gamers FFXI did.
Some of the group (including myself) went to try EVE but eventually dropped that and came back to FFXI. reasons: Servers kept crashing and you couldn't get to parts of the game unless you devoted your life to it and joined a big alliance. To be in a big alliance you had to use some sort of voice-chat and manage 'chat rooms', etc in order to tell your alliance buddies not to frag you because you were about to jump to a new section of the game they happned to be camping. (Camping: to wait for something to happen in-game)
quick note: To those who say you have to devote your life to an MMORG, well you can but I play FFXI for 4 hours a week or less.
The short of it: I won't be buying another title for my PC anytime soon.
The long of it:
A good MMORG has advantages over new game titles. Below is why our troop moved to FFXI.
1) no hardware upgrades needed since we are still playing the same title for 2+ years. The only hardware upgrades we made are those we chose to make. (one of us bought a Dell 24" screen monitor just for playing FFXI) 2) new content comes out so the game 'grows' and has new things to do/explore 3) new upgrades/content are also for co-operative online play (unlike HL2 (Half Life 2) which was dissapointingly only single player) 4) the server infrastructure for online play is maintained by monthly fee. (I used to be against monthly fees but ran into HORRIBLE performance from the 'free' servers,etc.) 5) Things done in-game builds add to your characters standing and thus to your playing experience. -a game like AOE (Age of Empires) is played against other players, but each time you start a new match, you start from scratch again. 6) We don't have to learn a new interface, a new strategy or run into new setups and connections and new passwords for new accounts... etc. etc. 7) If you want to be busy or relaxe you can choose. Playing styles such as micro-management or laid back playing can be chosen by character 'job' type. I.E. those who want to play and be 'very busy' (example: FFXI job 'Red Mage') can play side by side with those who want to relax. (example: FFXI job 'Monk') 8) I could go on but don't wan't to be a bore.
Slashdot Mirror
Perhaps my personal experience will shed some light.
Some time ago my gaming troop was playing tribes2 and waiting/watching/wishing for the new version of Tribes, the new Halflife (which we thought would be an online co-operative at the time) and some other games to come out.
We waited. And waited... and there were delays.. and we waited. We played some Unreal Tournament, etc.
Then while waiting since there was nothing going on, we tried FFXI (Final Fantasy IX - a Massively Multiplayer Online Roleplaying Game).
We have been playing that for 2+ years now. The new titles came out but we were already satisfied and only one or two of us purchased the new titles.
The game industry lost our troop as customers by taking too long to bring out the next titles.
Some of the group who were playing FFXI concurrently went to try WoW (World of Warcraft a MMORG) but they then came back to FFXI because WoW didn't have the holding power over post-teen gamers FFXI did.
Some of the group (including myself) went to try EVE but eventually dropped that and came back to FFXI. reasons: Servers kept crashing and you couldn't get to parts of the game unless you devoted your life to it and joined a big alliance. To be in a big alliance you had to use some sort of voice-chat and manage 'chat rooms', etc in order to tell your alliance buddies not to frag you because you were about to jump to a new section of the game they happned to be camping. (Camping: to wait for something to happen in-game)
quick note: To those who say you have to devote your life to an MMORG, well you can but I play FFXI for 4 hours a week or less.
The short of it:
I won't be buying another title for my PC anytime soon.
The long of it:
A good MMORG has advantages over new game titles. Below is why our troop moved to FFXI.
1) no hardware upgrades needed since we are still playing the same title for 2+ years. The only hardware upgrades we made are those we chose to make. (one of us bought a Dell 24" screen monitor just for playing FFXI)
2) new content comes out so the game 'grows' and has new things to do/explore
3) new upgrades/content are also for co-operative online play (unlike HL2 (Half Life 2) which was dissapointingly only single player)
4) the server infrastructure for online play is maintained by monthly fee. (I used to be against monthly fees but ran into HORRIBLE performance from the 'free' servers,etc.)
5) Things done in-game builds add to your characters standing and thus to your playing experience. -a game like AOE (Age of Empires) is played against other players, but each time you start a new match, you start from scratch again.
6) We don't have to learn a new interface, a new strategy or run into new setups and connections and new passwords for new accounts... etc. etc.
7) If you want to be busy or relaxe you can choose. Playing styles such as micro-management or laid back playing can be chosen by character 'job' type. I.E. those who want to play and be 'very busy' (example: FFXI job 'Red Mage') can play side by side with those who want to relax. (example: FFXI job 'Monk')
8) I could go on but don't wan't to be a bore.