My last article got me thinking. What is lacking from all the new MMOs constantly coming to market? Innovation. The Wii debunked many developers beliefs that their beautiful next-gen graphics would trump game play. They couldn’t have been more wrong. What the Wii did better than both Sony’s or Microsoft’s game system was innovation; a new way to play games that haven’t changed much over the years. The graphics on the Wii are notably last gen, but the game play is short of revolutionary.
Another thing the Wii brought to the market was a platform that the casual gamer could enjoy. Their games are not the same old game mechanics of where you need to buy the strategy guide just to figure out how to beat someone up. You pick up the controller and it’s intuitive with most of the games on what you need to do. You don’t need to put hours into a game, you can play as little as you like or as much as your body can take. My parents even bought a Wii after I brought mine up this last Christmas and they saw how fun it was.
So, what can MMO developers learn from the Wii example? Innovative game play and appeal to the casual gamer can go a long way in selling games. It’s still difficult at times to find a Wii on the shelf at your local game store. Better graphics and copying mechanics from other games doesn’t cut it anymore. The masses don’t want to have to always upgrade their computer whenever the new flavor comes out.
First we have the grind. Every MMO has it. Why? Even a game I see with some fun innovations, Warhammer Online, still has a major grind mechanic. Kill this mob and/or player to level up and get the uber gear. It’s always the same. There are other ways to level. Earth and Beyond gave you experience for many different things such as mining, so it can be done. It may not have been the best, but I liked the change. I’m tired of always needing to kill/disable/arrest something or someone in order to gain levels.
Then we have something that relates to the first point, the gear needed in order to play the game. This alone has caused numerous violations of game’s rules by having players buy with real money gold and armor or whatnot from Ebay or the inevitable advent of the Gold Farm website spam from the economy this creates. I play these games to immerse myself and get away from real life, I don’t think someone should have to be an economist to play an MMO. This has been the downfall of many games of yesteryear.
Then we have character customization. I don’t want to look like everybody else, I want to be unique. Fine, if I want to be pimpin’ I realize that I may need to grind a bit to get that flowing cloak of the earthwatcher or whatever, but I should be able to make my general appearance unique and not look like everybody else. City of Heroes/Villains did this right, in spades. However, their game has flourished by a disease I call altitis. Alts are what has let this game survive over the years as there is little end game content. There is a lot of content, but as the grind ensues so you create another alt and start over. So although CoX may have the best character creation I’ve seen, it may have been overkill.
My last point is more an observation. We used to call these games MMORPGs, that is Massive Multi-Player Online Role Playing Games. Now we just call them MMOs. Why? The RPG element is still there, mostly, but I think the game element has fallen by the wayside. It feels like work when I’m playing these games and I get enough of that outside the game world. I want games inside of the game, something I can do besides kill A to get B. In short, I want innovation.
While browsing the Internet for this story I find I’m not alone in my thoughts. At massively.com they have an article similar to mine. So come on developers, listen to the players. Wii want something different!
I would definitely try this game out. 
