New World proves: People have Bock on proper MMOS (Column)

When World of Warcraft then went like a rocket through the blanket and Blizzard could look forward to several million subscribers, the once so nish genre of the online role-playing games experienced a boom. For when the market predicts a rule, then the following: If something is successful, then there is always someone who wants to copy this success with a comparable product.

The high-time of MMORPGs

From 2005, about a decade of a decade of many online role-playing games appeared in all colors and shapes. And often a well-known license in the back like Warhammer, Star Wars, Elder Scrolls, Star Trek, Conan, Final Fantasy or Matrix ranged to hunt the next hype train through the Internet. Jap, people had Bock on huge, persistent online worlds where they can lose so well. Too bad enough to fight as well as all MMO representatives at first with the genre-typical problems: Server overload, bugs, too little content, Maues Endgame.

At the same time, they often often copied the payment model of WOW with purchase price and 13-euro subscription, and in a time when people still resisted, for online services in the monthly cycle. Yes, that was before Netflix. The result from these (and other) factors: Most potential WoW killers disappointed, were set or had to adjust the payment model to lure more players on the servers. Only a few could clarify after a weak start and improve over the years so continuously that they count today to the success titles of the genre (The Elder Scrolls Online or Final Fantasy 14, for example). Final Fantasy 14 is one of the few online role-playing games in the market, which today is much better than the launch. Source: Square Enix

Too expensive, too much risk

When we look at what online role-plays have appeared in our west in recent years, we mainly see ports of Asian MMOS and smaller titles like Albion Online or Crow, which focus on PVP and / or Sandbox. On the other hand, Western publishers and developers hardly look at great theme park MMOS ran.

Why too? Finally, there are now more riskier opportunities to bind players online in the long term. Games like Fortnite, League of Legends, Overwatch or World of Tanks can be developed with comparatively little financial effort or to expand new content, and thanks to micro-transactions, Battle Pass or Lootboxes, a lot of money comes in. The hype about Star Wars: The Old Republic was enormous. Unfortunately, it took much too long until cool content enriched the endgame. Source: Bioware

New World is a blessing

Unlike in 2005 to 2015, it is therefore quite noteworthy that with New World (Buy Now 39.99 €) has now released a large MMO, behind which a western publisher / developer stands. And we have twice luck: New World was initially very strongly designed for PVP and Sandbox elements, the game has become a Genre representative with numerous quests and PVE challenges with numerous quests and PVE challenges.

And how much lust MMO fans have to be able to experience exactly this kind of game again from scratch, this proves the enormous play tower to the launch: partly there were servers with queues of more than 25,000 players . More than 707,000 buyers should have attempted at the launch day in Steam at the same time playing New World. For several days, Amazon always pushed new worlds until the situation slowly improved.

All this shows: 1) The launch phases of MMOs remain problematic, and there it is no matter whether you can use the server capacities of a MEGA Group like Amazon. And 2) The genre is by no means dead, just because the WOW gentled in the years loses more and more players and barely developed someone great MMOS.

The hope dies last

My hope is that New World will be successful over the next few months and years, thereby commissioning other publishers a jerk and, in turn, ambitious online role-playing games. With great license in the back, focus on PVE (epic quest straps, dungeons and raids, sacred triangles from tanks, healers and damage distributors) and with the understanding of why so many players have fun with a WoW Classic and TBC Classic. The nostalgia alone is not responsible for this.

Rather, modern MMOs must concentrate on what the genre actually makes as fascinating and how to promote this fascination by server structure, gameplay and content in the best possible way. And which payment model makes sense and which is not. Spoiler: An too big focus on Ingame-Shop, Battle Passents and Lootboxes torped all this what MMOS makes up. Then you can be the same.

More: Power on the Hype Train! So my wish MMO looks out of the future The Great Special for MMORPG genre Who missed our three-piece series to the MMORPG genre, can catch up below. We highlight the success of WOW, the failure of the competition and the current status of the genres: MMORPG genre on the test bench: Part 1 - The success of WOW MMORPG genre on the test bench: Part 2 - Failure of WOW Competition MMORPG genre on the test bench: Part 3 - Are MMORPGs dead? The links marked with are affiliate links. Affiliate links are no ads because we are independent in the search and selection of the presented products. For product sales, we receive a small commission, with which we partially finance the free content of the website.