Talk to Sampson

The MMORPG Genre has been stagnant for a long time. Lets be honest with ourselves, the popular mm games we play today are hardly the gems they used to be. We play MMOs now in this sort of tired patience. Hoping something soon will happen or come out that would change the genre, refresh it. However the payer base is so used to that being just a dream that nobody is disappointed any more when those dreams don’t come to fruition.

If we look at the most played MMORPGs right now we can see how stale the genre has gotten. This is not to insult these games in anyway, they each have their own allure that keeps players coming back, but they all also lack any NEW competition. World of Warcraft is one of the finest and easiest examples. WoW came out in Nov, 2004 and hit an all time high player count in 2010 with roughly 12.5 million. That was 11 years ago and it is still the most played MMORPG today with a current Estimated player count of 2-4 Million. Blizzard (the Studio behind World of warcraft) Has even released “Classic” servers to try and attract back older players. Classic is a recreation of the game in the state it was in back when it released in 2004. Classic servers went live to much popularity. Even though that popularity has dwindled as the novelty fades, there are still a significant amount of payers purely playing WoW classic that it could even be considered its own MMO on the market and still be in the top 10 MMOs most played in 2021.

Final Fantasy 14 Released in 2010 and even though it didn’t have the best release it was successfully able to re-image itself and has had a steady, and large player count ever since. At around 2-3 Million estimated players currently it rivals World of warcraft and its classic counterpart in today’s MMORPG market. Currently Blizzards multiple failings in the workplace have led to staff protests, a lawsuit, and a severe content draught in game. With all of this very well known to the players there ha been a mass migration to Square Enix’s Final Fantasy 14. It is very likely that within the next few months FFXIV surpasses WoW in player count to become the most played MMO in 2022. FFXIV has many amazing qualities that have kept it alive today, but it is an 11 year old game. How long can we expect it to keep up with our demands from more modern games.

Some of the other top MMORPGS played today are: Runescape (2001), Black desert online (2014), and the Elder scrolls online(2014). The oldest of these being 8 years old currently. Most other Genres don’t have to worry about the games in their category becoming old and stagnant because they get many entries/additions into the genre per year. The MMO genre is like many other genres in the sense that it takes many games to release for a few real gems that capture the hearts of millions of players. However unlike other genres the MMO genre do not get those many new releases per year. There is a severe lack of competition that leads to lazy developers, bored players, and content draughts.

Things may be looking up however for those who love and/or miss the genre. We have 3 major contenders on the horizon, and a few smaller others to keep an eye on. Amazon’s New world, Ashes of creation by intrepid studios, and an unannounced title by Riot games. The first two Ive mentioned here (New world, and Ashes of creation) have shown us some firm evidence of a possible major league contender in the MMO world. Riot’s unannounced project is mentioned here purely because of all the set up riot has done through the years in their most major game: League of Legends.

Amazon’s New world is due to release on sept.28 2021. During its creation it gained a good amount of hype online. Alpha footage only helped to bolster the excitement for the game. Finally the beta opened up to massive success (for a beta). Around one million Unique players played in the New world beta, the real testament to those 200,000 players being the sheer amount of content that was put up online during that roughly 2 week period. YouTube alone has thousands of hours worth of gameplay and guides guilds and discord are established and ready for launch day. The amount of excitement and chatter for New Worlds release is huge, and it paints a very good picture for the early health of the game. The develops have listened to the community on several key issues during the development of the game, one of the major ones being items that would be featured in the cash shop. If this sort of healthy communication between developers and players can continue, I can see a very good future for the this title.

Intrepid studios has been hard at work creating ashes of creation. The creative director Steve Sharif is a long time fan and player of the MMORPG genre, he has been very transparent about his title and what will and wont be in the game opening day. The node systems is very original and will make each and every server unique, along with the player interactions such features will create. If Ashes of Creation holds up to what is being promised and so far shown by Intrepid studios we could very well be looking at the new industry standard for the genre. The game is still around 2 years off (this is an estimate) and the hype is absolutely huge. There are already guilds and streamers talking about making a full move when the time comes. It is a title to keep your eyes on.

Riot studios has been a big name in the PC gaming industry for awhile now purely because of one game: League of Legends. League of Legends released in 2009 and is still one of the most played online PC games today. During this time they have laid out a vast amount of story and background for all their many characters. They have expanded on all this quite a bit included a map filled with different regions and cultures. League of legends the MMO is pretty much already designed and planned in just the story and lore set out in league of legends alone, all that is left is to actually make it. Riot has begun to reach out however into other industries including first person shooters, and recently they have announced their goal to make and MMORPG. Which with what I’ve said earlier is big news. They already have a capable studio, an active player base, the story, lore, and conflicts written up. If this MMO is made to the standards League of legends was originally created to, then we could be looking at a huge hit 4 or 5 years (possibly longer) down the line. It in a long time off, but the clock is counting down now. The new age of MMORPGs is hopefully on the horizon.