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| Archaeologists up, orcs down. I remember when MMOs were a pretty new idea, and I'd never played one, but I'd heard about them. I was really excited about the idea, but mostly because the games I was imagining were games like Uru: Community focused, roleplaying intensive, "shared world" experiences with an emphasis on exploration and world building. This is where it always seemed to me that the real potential of massively multiplayer gaming lay. Instead, we have over 12 million people playing WoW while Uru hangs by a thread and the much-lamented SEED died before it even left beta. Do these concepts really not appeal to people? I fully understand the addictive quality of the "get loot, get levels" style that's so dominant in the format, yet I don't see why that precludes the possibility of there being more mature, focused entries that actually use their collaborative nature for something more interesting than comparing your stats and ganking n00bs. |
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| SEED was both in space and not about laser guns. Apparently this caused the world to implode. |
Addendum: In it's latest incarnation, Uru is entirely donation supported. This means that if you're interested in playing, you should immediately go download it and try it, since it's completely free. It offers an MMO experience remarkably close to my initial vision of what these sorts of games would (and should) be, with no levels, no stats, no swords, and a remarkably fleshed out and detailed dead civilization to explore and understand. It involves a lot of research and lateral thinking, and creates one of the most immersive game worlds I can name.
thanks for talking about this. Your description of Uru sounds fascinating. I'm with you on the loot/level trap MMOs seem caught in. It does occur to me that a lot of people like creating things and cooperating, too, and you can find them in VR environments like Second Life, but that setting is not a game as such. (Is there a way to wed the best features of that kind of open environment with an MMO? Hm.) As to the fortunes of Uru, I think an awful lot of the problem has to do simply with the marketing. There are probably sufficient players to keep it thriving if they *knew* of it. If the game as a different dynamic than the same-old same-old, it probably needs to be marketed differently as well. And widely. But your mention right here is the first time this has come to my attention, so this suggests to me they're not getting their product in front of a varied enough audience.
ReplyDeleteSounds like something I'd enjoy tho. Will be checking it out.
I really have to take exception to your use of the word "mature." If you mean, "the trappings are for grown-ups," then ..well, I don't know what to say to that without at-hand statistics about the age of MMO players. If you mean, "has a well-developed technology," then you're just entirely off-base, because the loot-and-leveling style of game is an incredibly sophisticated Skinner box technology.
ReplyDeleteThe problem that character-driven, intellectual focus-driven MMOGs face is that focus is effort, and for effortful gameplay to sustain interest, it has to have a really strong reward system in place as well, and that reward system has to create engagement and investment in a large variety of players - enough to defray the substantial costs of development, maintenance, and continuous new-content creation.