MMO Diversity

The makers of Warhammer Online are trying to entice their old players to return, according to an article just posted by Game Informer.

Mythic Entertainment, the creators of last fall's critically-acclaimed MMORPG, are giving plenty of incentives to return. They are offering tons of experience awards, a unique quest line, and even free play time to players who re-activate their accounts. This is in addition to the many upgrades that Mythic made to the game as a whole, including new careers, new game modes and tiers, new rewards, and a number of performance patches.

The game is one of the highest rated MMO's ever, just behind the WoW giant and my personal favorite, Guild Wars. But the game was judged at release against the well-established World of Warcraft, which had already had years to fix bugs and tweak gameplay design. So now that Warhammer Online (WAR) has had time to catch up, with tweaks and patches of its own, its time for players to take another look.

This seems to be just the latest struggle by the game industry to break the monopoly World of Warcraft has on the MMO market.

Not that WoW is a bad game, its just getting to the point that it may be bad for the MMO industry. So many millions of players are invested in WoW that they have little time to even try out other MMO's. Many fans are too used to the way WoW works to enjoy anything else, including some friends of mine and a number of professional reviewers. There is a single-minded attitude that is spreading, that WoW does things right and everything else has to copy it, but do better.

Which is frustrating, because the notion is both wrong and harmful to the games industry. No one game has all the answers, no matter how great it is. There are different kinds of games that have different themes and objectives, and there is no reason MMO's should be any different. Guild Wars, for example, offers a more casual approach to MMO's, with a much lower level-cap and shorter quests and missions that can be completed by active or busy gamers. It doesn't require players to surrender their social lives, which is a good thing. But in contrast, it offers tighter more tactical gameplay.

But when these diverse MMO's are criticized for not being like WoW, everyone suffers. Players want different kinds of experiences; there is a reason Guild Wars still has thousands of active users. And honestly, even those who are comfortable should branch out. Diversity is a good thing, it allows for innovation and creativity to flourish.

So quit playing the same character you've been playing for years, and try something new. For your sake, for my sake, and for the game industry's sake.

- Scott