Smedley speaks on the future of MMO's

I honestly feel that WoW is indeed a factor in the success of future MMOs, but not for reasons many may suggest.

In fact, the only reason WoW is a factor is because it gobbled up most of the people who enjoy an MMO's culture. It brought the complexity and difficulty of EQ1 down several notches and made it more accessible to the average player. This then sucked up a huge pile of players and became a phenomena to such a degree that most MMOs that attempt to imitate it, or at least do something similar to it, just don't do nearly as well as a result.

And even if they do something different, even if it's something truly amazing. it doesn't help that WoW still gobbled up a huge pile of players. This is a massive portion of potential buyers now gone. Even some truly amazing and creative MMOs just don't do nearly as well as a result.

I know many people who love to role play. I keep telling them that EQ2 is a far superior role playing experience compared to WoW. WoW still doesn't have player housing. This is a fundamental part of many new MMO releases and WoW tossed it to the wayside, yet many role players still stand around in huge body piles in a tiny tavern trying to make sense of each other's posts. WoW has appearance gear, if you don't mind going out of your way to pay in game currency to transmogrify it. WoW doesn't allow for cross race interaction even on a RP/PvE server. But people play it, because it is the game all their friends are playing, because it's the game all their friends are playing, so on and so forth.

If WoW were to spontaneously explode and die one day, there'd be such a massive influx of players available for other MMOs that many servers would inevitably crash and burn, simply because most MMOs aren't designed with a community as large as WoW in mind. That will be tragic.

But, back on topic.

A) I don't agree that people have shorter attention spans/Less time now. The end game they give us in AoM and how many people actually bother to do it is proof of that.

B) If he truly believes the average player has a short attention span, why does AoM exist in its current state? The player with an average attention span still won't bother to go through that treadmill, in my opinion.

Smedley, we built your franchise -- kept it going after the privacy theft debacle -- sustained it through "no RMT ever!...er, Some RMT sometimes!" -- and now as your enterprise is in a delicate spot, you throw down tone-deaf nonsense like this.

Hell of a way to say thanks, bud.


Instead of a Senior VP of Global Sales and Marketing, I suggest that Smed needs a communications director that pre-clears everything he intends to say publicly.

Would love to see the global sales and marketing folks show some love for our games which have a loyal following instead of only focusing on the yet to be released games. After all they will still need our revenue to insure that those titles get released. :/.

Wildstar tried to bring back nothing. It was a button mashing solo your way to lvl cap game just like WoW.

its a MULTIPLAYER game not solo-your-way-to-end-game-then-kinda-group-through-auto-group-finder-while-sitting-in-town-game

Well, one reason, i log on to eq2, is raiding. So yeah, not every night, simple cause there are not enough zones

Do any of you think EQ2 or EQ has much hope of surviving more than a year? It just seems, to me, that they are slowly shutting EQ2 down. I hope I'm wrong but it sure looks that way.

I expect EQ to either be sold to the highest bidder or be put into maintenance mode in the next year or two.

I am hoping Pantheon delivers on its promises within that time frame.

Why shut down something that is making you money?

It seems like what they are saying is EQ2 is longer viable. It doesn't represent the new "face" of MMOs. Which is a round about way of saying they are losing money with EQ2. Doesn't matter to me I'll be here til the bitter end.

Obi One Smedley performing the old Jedi mind trick on the customer base:

"These are not the games you are looking for."

Customer base response:

"Nothing to see here, move along."

If MMO's keep moving in the direction of H1Z1, I'll be moving back in the direction of CRPG's.

Pillars of Eternity and Sword Coast Legends both look to be excellent games. Both take everything that was good about the old AD&D CRPG's and update them with modern mechanics and graphics.

Many people have been asking for the same thing with EQ (EQ1 with updated graphics). Perhaps Pantheon will pull it off, perhaps not. I will be rooting for VR to succeed. Daybreak has made it clear they no longer have an interest in further investment in my demographic.

From my point of view, why whittle away at the staff until you are left with a skeletal crew if you are planning on great things for that games future? Unfortunately nothing surprises me any more. Its getting harder and harder to be even cautiously optimistic, especially in light of Smed's attitude.

Just because you don't like it, doesn't mean it didn't have significant impact or wasn't important. Business analysts would certainly disagree with you as MMOs saw an explosion in growth and popularity after WoW was released. I don't play the game, and don't like it either. But I do respect the 50 ton elephant in the room.

One of the biggest reasons players flocked to WoW back in the day was because any PC...even a crappy one was able to play the game...unlike EQ2.

He didn't say that at all.

Who are these "today's gamers" that he is referring to? I certainly don't feel it's me.

The way he described it NOBODY who enjoys EQ or EQ2 is one of 'today's gamers'.

Same here....I guess it's the 12-13 yr olds who want quick fast who most don't have an attention span long enough to get involved in lore/questing/epics/raiding/crafting etc....yep...bring on the smash 'em grab 'em give me 30 minutes of thrills and pvp...oh yes...they love pvp....that's the gamer type it sounds like he is hoping to market.....screw all us older (gasp) folks who love to immerse ourselves into all this game has to offer along with communities, friends, guilds, etc.

IMO...I believe there is a market for both types of gamers...too bad he can't see that!

SoE tried going for those type of gamers in there kid mmo, forget the name now, and found out 12-13 year olds do not have the disposable income needed to support that type of game. So not sure what he is looking for in a gamer now.

His coments about MMOs and 'the future of gaming' leaves me deeply worried about what EQNext will be...