MMO Weekly: Grandiose Innovation and Incremental Change

31 Aug 2010 at 05:44:04 by Jeff Hollis

Hello there, fellow online addicts, and welcome to this week's MMO Weekly.  In today's episode, we'll be talking about innovation in MMOs, whether “innovation” is actually an effective tool for improving the genre, and how these innovations impact players. 

First up, a bit of background:  “innovation” is one of those words that gets tossed around a lot whenever I've interviewed MMO developers.  It's a catch phrase.  It's a hot, trendy term.  It's something that every developer, and every MMO company, loves talking about. 

But what does innovation actually mean?  Well, most often, it refers to some sort of new, ground-breaking kind of gameplay.  Innovation, in this broad sense, is about game-changing new ideas.  This is the kind of innovation that developers are all after.

In reality, however, when I've seen innovation demonstrated, it's not exactly the game changing feature that the promos all talked about. In fact, it's generally a lot less than advertised. 

Example?  Warhammer Online introduced a system of area-wide, collective quests.  If you happened to be in a particular zone, these quests unfold every 20 minutes or so.  You can join up freely, grouping with everyone else in the zone that wants to play out this scenario.  Generally speaking, the NPCs begin to do their thing, shouting out to the zone that they need help accomplishing X, overcoming monster Y, or winning the battle against the evil forces of Z.  You proceed to the appropriate location, help defeat the monster in question, and then collect a reward.  Afterward, you continue about your business as usual.

I'm not saying that this is a bad idea.  Quite the contrary; these quests are fun. However, they aren't exactly game changing.  It's not like a lot of developers saw this idea and thought, “Damn, that's frakkin' awesome! We have got to get that into OUR game.”  These quests didn't, in any significant way, really change MMOs for the better.

Another example is the movement system in Guild Wars.  I once had a dev chat this system up, discussing how player characters had a system of advanced pathfinding that would ease movement throughout the game.  To be honest, it is a good system, but again, it's by no means game changing.  Players didn't demand it in future MMOs, and other developers didn't mimic this concept.

I could go on and on.  I've had devs tell me about their innovative crafting system, or the importance of their NPCs dialogue options, their epic quest lines, etc.  I can't think of a single time these pre-conceived, “game changing” innovations actually turned out to be anything significant.  What developers often tout as a game changing mechanic, a truly innovative concept, or a next-gen feature, very often turns out to elicit a very bland “meh” from the gamers themselves. 

I can think of but one exception.  In Gods and Heroes, the developers attempted to introduce a system by which players could acquire NPC companions.  These companions would prove to be important, in that players could form groups, or even fill out empty spots in raids, using these NPCs.  Is that a game changer?  If it had been implemented properly, I honestly think that it would have been.  Sadly, the company behind Gods and Heroes wasn't exactly financially solid, so G&H never made it to market.

In contrast, let's consider some actual innovative ideas, and how they've impacted the genre.  First up, the auction house.  In first generation MMOs, players could trade with one another freely, and this was considered the cutting edge of the genre.  Players would run about, shouting out what they had for sale, and other players would contact them to make purchases.  It was chaos, but it was fun (at least I thought so). 

Now consider the auction house system found in modern MMOs.  The auction house actually changed the game.  No longer are you an hybrid class, the adventurer/marketing guy. You are primarily an adventurer, and the auction house allows you to conduct business on the side, rapidly and easily. 

Let's also take a look at the transportation system in most contemporary MMOs.  In first gen games, if you wanted to get anywhere, you walked.  Dark Age of Camelot introduced a system in which players could pay an NPC for a horse ride between cities.  Since players liked the idea, virtually every subsequent MMO has copied this concept.  Further innovation in this field has come from outside the genre.  In various shooters, sci-fi games, etc players can instantly transport from one location to another.  Since this has proved popular, MMOs are now incorporating aspects of this idea.

Probably the most recent change of any significance is the dungeon finder implemented by WoW.  Instead of attempting to ask your guild, any friends you have online, or simply using /shout to find a group, you now simply use an in-game tool.  Push a couple of buttons, and you're instantly teleported to the dungeon you were looking for.

You'll probably notice that these innovations weren't much-touted, highly lauded, well-promoted features.  Many of them were introduced into a game well after launch, simply as an improvement.  These innovations turned out to have an actual impact on the genre, in that they made MMOs more playable and more fun.  In fact, these ideas became so popular that players of other games demanded, them, devs loved them, and they were widely copied by the originating game's competition.

And that, my friends, is my point:  evolution is the future of the genre.  While the occasional “big concept” may change MMO gaming for the better, that's generally not the case.  It's the little improvements, the gradual changes, and the incremental features that improve the genre.  A good development house, it turns out, rarely wows players with a feature no one's ever thought of before.  Generally, it's a game that's been around a while, that introduces something new and worthwhile. 

Thoughts?  Opinions?  Rants?  Let's hear them in the comments below.  :)

As always, if you enjoyed this little bit of nerdery, please visit me over at Coolorama, where we delve into nerdy concepts all day long.  For now, ciao!

Comment