I tell you why WoW and MMORPGs are struggling in this day and age...

[Schizoide]

-online communication is no longer a novelty
-you only see another player as a mean to your ends
-communication with another player is considered meaningless if not rewarded

We live in the age of "profit" where everything is meaningless unless you can profit from it. Even people.

I assure you that player behavior was the same with Everquest in 1999 and when WoW launched in 2004. Playing EQ was all about efficiency 22 years ago before many reading this were even born, same as WoW today. I once camped 3 mobs that spawned every 6 minutes for 2 weeks for XP, had them perfectly split 2 minutes apart, and I jealously guarded that location, scared someone else would take it. I sat camping the frenzied ghoul in Lower Guk for a prized haste cloak for weeks. People trained my camps all the time, griefing me, to steal them. People don't change. People are just people. Some are dicks, some are alright.

[Zodiark]

Uh...GW2 just had their most profitable year in like 3 years and has an expansion coming in 2 months.

Not sure about ESO but it has been a major money factory for Zenimax. I can't imagine it hasn't also benefitted from the decline of WoW.

Yes your absolutely correct. GW2 is an amazing game. Lots of fun. I honestly don't mind supporting them and paying for gear cosmetics because of how nice the sets look. They put a lot into that game fun-factor wise and it shows. Also ESO is a fun game in it's own right. It's also doing quite well due to console support and steady fanbase with cash-shop items players don't mind investing in.



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I assure you that player behavior was the same with Everquest in 1999 and when WoW launched in 2004. Playing EQ was all about efficiency 22 years ago before many reading this were even born, same as WoW today. I once camped 3 mobs that spawned every 6 minutes for 2 weeks for XP, had them perfectly split 2 minutes apart, and I jealously guarded that location, scared someone else would take it. I sat camping the frenzied ghoul in Lower Guk for a prized haste cloak for weeks. People trained my camps all the time, griefing me, to steal them. People don't change. People are just people. Some are dicks, some are alright.

That's not true. I played EQ1 in 99. We spoke contantly. Even in groups while doing pulls. True story but I actually met a girl I wound up dating for a bit in one of those groups. She lived several states away and came to visit on the basis of one of those conversations during a 36 hour camp in the window room of SoL B. Not to mention the countless chats while farming Ass/Sup for the SSoY You had to add friends whom you grouped with to make forming a party easier.

[Schizoide]

EQ had group chat because you'd be stuck in those groups for hours sitting in the same room pulling the same mobs every X minutes. If another game grew popular with enforced downtime, the same would happen. But I mean, hell to the no, not for me.

[Chadow]

Just to clarify

Conquering and winning is always fun.
We earn the girlfriend, we win at our job, we conquer arena rating, we win gear etc

But what i mean is that nowadays we may have lost touch with other players and the simple joy of communicating with them and just having "stupid fun".

[Swnem]

I do find it funny that many don't remember way back in Vanilla when WoW stopped selling new subs/game (before digital, it was) for a time, so they could catch up server-side, now that FFXIV is evidently doing the same thing, or is at least talking about it.

That was then, this is now. What does it matter? The criteria aren't the same.
Just being an online game was novel enough then. Now, it's not enough. People expect more. The way of playing these games has been standardized as well and that is something only the game design can solve.

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Lets get real.

Who cares about the story in games if the gameplay or content sucks?

These companys selling games because they have good story. Bullshit.

If people want a good story, they read a book or watch a movie.

Story alone shouldnt be the selling point of a video game. Should be a complementary quality.

Not quite. The whole package matters. Just gameplay being good, but lore/world/story/music/systems being bad still produces an underwhelming product.
It's about the package as a whole - the experience, not only one thing.

[rrayy]

You really didnot catch the real reason, however to easily to fix communication:
1- bring back guild perks and cataclysm system, connect it to rewards in pvp and pve. Solved

2- party auto connect to voice chat just like overwatch or shooting games. This will slowly encourage people to communicate in pvp and pve

Now to the real reason struggling is only one thing. We are in the year 2021 soon 2022. People bo longer want to have nonsense grinding all day. They want something that time efficient. Like look at pvp in wow now its like you have to play at least straught 5 hours to keep up and you have to do all shits just to play pvp. Thats bad. Also dungeons and raid requires so much things outside your skill and gear

That will not work the way you think it will. Nothing of what you say will cause communication.

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I mean, I'm sure there is some truth in what the OP is saying but I don't see those things as the issue. The big issue is that there's an incompetent dev team at the helm of a ship taking in serious amounts of water and they can't figure how to close the hole in the ship.

The ship is floating perfectly fine. the game is still immensely profitable.

[potis]

Another pointless post.

You guys dont even realize you have fallen into the trap of game hoping and you think you are smarter than everyone, other than realizing how you are ruining your own choice of game genre, its why most game companies dont even bother anymore.

Its amazing how you think you are punishing a company by going to play other games thats literally hoping on you to do just that, cause they know you are gonna hop back and forth multiple games and buy them all.

"YEAH FUCK YOU BLIZZARD, I ONLY GAVE YOU 39.90E + 66E FROM 6 MONTH SUB+ BOUGHT 2 PETS AND 2 STORE MOUNTS AT XMAS FOR ONLY 25E AND 4 TOKENS FOR 80E WHICH I PRETEND I DONT BUY TO GET BOOSTS WHILE SCREAMING HOW THE GAME IS RUINED"

Only to go do something similar to another game, and come back 2 patches after, or an expansion after to repeat the process, only to check the next game, and repeat.

New world is the latest flop because of this trend, Lost Ark is gonna be the next, then repeat with WoW/GW2/ESO/FFXIV expansions, rotating the millions of MMO players that think they are "punishing" other companies by playing a different game each 2 months.

[Tyris Flare]

2- party auto connect to voice chat just like overwatch or shooting games. This will slowly encourage people to communicate in pvp and pve

That is nightmarish, I would instantly disable that like in every other game.

[potis]

I agree to a point with your comment. The Developers don't listen because they hear so much from so many different angles. People first need to be vetted in a sense to prove they in fact have valid good points that resonate with the majority of the game.

They listen, the problem is they listen to the loudest whiners of the certain period, and focus on that, creating another 10 problems with switching the game design towards there, this has been happening for the last 10 years, they eventually gave up and its obvious to anyone with 5 IQ that the design shift is towards making the casual player base sub even slightly longer, while holding the initial "Raiding simulator" going.

Luckily or unluckily, this annoying at times game still has the most fluid movement/combat and produces 99% bug free content, you guys have not seen bugged games if you think a mob bugging once every 6 months in a dungeon is even remotely annoying.

[baseballfan]

I wouldn't say all MMOs are having this problem. WoW definitely has this problem though.

[Selah]

The ship is floating perfectly fine. the game is still immensely profitable.

Ah yes, profit, the one thing to point to while on copium to justify the claim "the ship is fine." It doesn't matter that the crew and passangers and jumping ship and there are multiple fires raging across the ship. Because, clearly, if the ship's engines are still working then that clearly means there's no issues, taking on water, fires raging, people jumping ship, it all means nothing.

I mean, who can argue with that reasoning?

[Accendor]

-online communication is no longer a novelty
-you only see another player as a mean to your ends
-communication with another player is considered meaningless if not rewarded

We live in the age of "profit" where everything is meaningless unless you can profit from it. Even people.

Edit: Just to clarify

Conquering and winning is always fun.
We earn the girlfriend, we win at our job, we conquer arena rating, we win gear etc

But what i mean is that nowadays we may have lost touch with other players and the simple joy of communicating with them and just having "stupid fun".

MMOROGs are not really struggling, it's honestly just WoW and then that makes incredible amounts of money

[neik]

Just to clarify

Conquering and winning is always fun.
We earn the girlfriend, we win at our job, we conquer arena rating, we win gear etc

But what i mean is that nowadays we may have lost touch with other players and the simple joy of communicating with them and just having "stupid fun".

I still don't understand what do you mean. If you are a raider (mythic or not), you have your raids, you have your mythic plus and pvp teams, nothing has changed, it's business as usual.

Maybe some players are in weird role-play fetishes, I don't know.. Sucking each other off in online game is gross. Surely there are a therapist somewhere willing to talk, or a functioning telephone sex line to attend ones lust. Otherwise let's play some games.

[Syegfryed]

with the game time being expensive as fuck of course people don't want waste time "hanging around" or "exploring for funsies" people want to do the crucial things first to not get behind when they have time left, so they don't feel they are wasting money

[Swnem]

Another pointless post.

You guys dont even realize you have fallen into the trap of game hoping and you think you are smarter than everyone, other than realizing how you are ruining your own choice of game genre, its why most game companies dont even bother anymore.

Its amazing how you think you are punishing a company by going to play other games thats literally hoping on you to do just that, cause they know you are gonna hop back and forth multiple games and buy them all.

"YEAH FUCK YOU BLIZZARD, I ONLY GAVE YOU 39.90E + 66E FROM 6 MONTH SUB+ BOUGHT 2 PETS AND 2 STORE MOUNTS AT XMAS FOR ONLY 25E AND 4 TOKENS FOR 80E WHICH I PRETEND I DONT BUY TO GET BOOSTS WHILE SCREAMING HOW THE GAME IS RUINED"

Only to go do something similar to another game, and come back 2 patches after, or an expansion after to repeat the process, only to check the next game, and repeat.

New world is the latest flop because of this trend, Lost Ark is gonna be the next, then repeat with WoW/GW2/ESO/FFXIV expansions, rotating the millions of MMO players that think they are "punishing" other companies by playing a different game each 2 months.

You might be generalizing a bit. I doubt most people do that.

[Shmazard]

-online communication is no longer a novelty
-you only see another player as a mean to your ends
-communication with another player is considered meaningless if not rewarded

We live in the age of "profit" where everything is meaningless unless you can profit from it. Even people.

Edit: Just to clarify

Conquering and winning is always fun.
We earn the girlfriend, we win at our job, we conquer arena rating, we win gear etc

But what i mean is that nowadays we may have lost touch with other players and the simple joy of communicating with them and just having "stupid fun".

gonna have to agree with OP, nothing is genuine anymore, if your not tiktok ceo daytrader youtube superstar, you are nothing.

[OrangeJuice]

Well streamers play every day so they're going to know whats wrong with the game. They might not have a solution or the right solution, but they understand where the issues are. If a million followers of a top streamer are making a suggestion towards something, then the devs need to listen to it and understand why they're saying it. The devs might have a better solution if they took a second to listen to what the complaint is truly about. Flat out ignoring everyone because they're too insecure to hear it or because they're being spiteful towards the streamer is just pettiness. Everyone just wants to play the game and have fun but theres so many roadblocks in every aspect of the game that the outcry can be overwhelming, but then again maybe blizzard needs to stop releasing games so fast until they've actually playtested every aspect themselves.

[Hobbidaggy]

I’m going to add

- Market flood. They are no longer a “new” thing and every company has a MMO of some sort now. Which stretches the player base as the time commitment is unable to be achieved across multiple at once.

- Time. People don’t have the time they used to have to play these types of games now. I have played WoW since about 6 months before TBC launched. And it’s getting harder and harder to stay active because my lifestyle has changed. My partner is supportive so that’s not an issue with playing it literally just comes down to I have other things to look after instead now

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[melodramocracy]

-online communication is no longer a novelty
-you only see another player as a mean to your ends
-communication with another player is considered meaningless if not rewarded

We live in the age of "profit" where everything is meaningless unless you can profit from it. Even people.

Edit: Just to clarify

Conquering and winning is always fun.
We earn the girlfriend, we win at our job, we conquer arena rating, we win gear etc

But what i mean is that nowadays we may have lost touch with other players and the simple joy of communicating with them and just having "stupid fun".

You're on the right track IMO.

First MMO I ever played was far more grindy, far more sandbox-ey, and had far more setbacks than WoW ever has. Dying had a penalty, dying numerous times without having a plan on corpse retrieval would really mess things up. Items could be irretrievably lost, destroyed, stolen. There were no banks, no private trades, no concept of BOE or BOP. You had to legitimately trust other players to get things done.

There were no name changes. No server transfers. While all of this would probably seem incredibly draconian to a current MMO player, it drove this idea that your character was an avatar of what who you truly wanted to be viewed as, rather than just a random character with x abilities. It established an idea that interactions between players themselves would form their own storylines that people got involved in.

The modern MMO never really delivers anything close to that. And while WoW does have an abundance of group focused activities, none of those feel like you as an individual persona matter. (and to be fair, you kind of don't, outside your performance metrics).

The other side of this coin is playerbase expectation. Warcraft is a pretty huge game when you consider the number of zones, quests, storylines, instances, and surprises that might await a player. But in trying to play with others, the subscriber is expected to minimalize or forego that element of surprise and exploration for the sake of group efficiency and speed. Unironically, single player adventures offer much more in this arena.

[MoanaLisa]

Ah yes, profit, the one thing to point to while on copium to justify the claim "the ship is fine." It doesn't matter that the crew and passangers and jumping ship and there are multiple fires raging across the ship. Because, clearly, if the ship's engines are still working then that clearly means there's no issues, taking on water, fires raging, people jumping ship, it all means nothing.

I mean, who can argue with that reasoning?

The business is about making money which it is clearly doing. People have been forecasting doom since the very start. The argument that it's dying is a non-starter. To be very clear: The number of 'passengers' that abandoned ship after a few months of Cataclysm was much, much worse than anything going on now.