kyoodle said:
Therumancer said:
The thing to understand is that what supports a game IS the endgame and what people do at level cap, the rest of the stuff is just filler to get to that point.
That is exactly the wrong way of looking at it, the whole game should be fun, not a slog to get to the endgame where things are suddenly interesting. Also the PvE isn't there just to usher you to the highest level as everyone goes into it at level 80.
Well, the progression to the top level shouldn't be boring of course, but at the end of the day for an MMO to survive it's all about the endgame. Like it or not, the bottom line is people re-upping subscriptions. If the game is all about the journey and the progression rather than what you do when you finally cap out your advancement, it simply means people are going to run out of things to do and move on. Some might undertake the journey a few times, but in the end if there isn't anything to keep them developing their favorite characters (raids, PVP, etc...) they are inevitably going to leave. We've seen it time, and time again, where pretty much every game that has launched using your basic attitude has pretty much failed, excepting of course WoW, which pretty much represents the standard for what you need to have for an endgame. Granted WoW itself is starting to fail after all these years, but nothing is forever, it's showing it's age, and honestly when Blizzard is turning Pandareans into the topic of an entire expansion as opposed to some cool little thing to toss into the game (which is what the people asking for them generally wanted) it's pretty obvious they are out of ideas... but that's another subject entirely.
A good example of the problem can be found with "The Secret World". People hit the very limited endgame, got burned out fairly quickly, and people are leaving (above and beyond the other problems with the game). There is very little to do in it. The big point is that most are saying (the game is well received by it's players while playing actually) that they will be back when Funcom finally releases Tokyo and there is more to do. Something that happens with a few games. The whole "locust" mentality where the players only drop by and pay when there is new content to devour, when it's gone, if nothing is there to hold their attention, they leave. The problem is that a game needs a constant, paying, subscriber base to justify financing new content. These quick locust bursts don't make enough money to be cost effective, hence the focus of a game has to be on providing enough endgame content via raids and entertaining long term objectives (a grind can be made enjoyable if it's done right) so people will keep paying a subscription.
I'll also go so far as to say that games DO need to face lift themselves once in a while as well, though we rarely see that happen. Way back in the day Everquest 1 re-did and updated it's graphics and models, something I haven't seen any other game do on the same scale. For a while EQ1 gave you the option of using old models or new models or even selecting which races would use which models in your display for purposes of performance for those with (then) older rigs. Funcom has been talking bunk about doing this with Anarchy Online for years, and honestly I think (as sort of mentioned above) part of WoW's recent problems is that it's showing it's age. Blizzard probably would have done better to re-do their entire graphics/art engine then add the Panda continent (though the Pandas and Monk Class themselves are fine, as are the inclusion of new raids and dungeons).
