Games Radar's article on what MMOs need to stop doing:
"We've lost at a lot of MMOs over the years. That's the one thing we're pretty good at when it comes to them. After the initial period of infatuation with any given MMO we find ourselves helplessly obsessed with, we always lose. We lose track of what loot drops we wanted from what boss, what quest we were trying to clear, or why we even started playing in the first place. Every time we sever ourselves from whatever MMO we're addicted to, there's a part of us that swears we'll never touch another one again.
It's the part that remembers hearing adults arguing over imaginary in-game items, the part that remembers a good night sleep, and a diet not entirely consisting of microwave meals and canned goods. Here's what MMOs need to stop doing if we're ever going to jump back in for the long haul."
Danish from eXputer: "Despite Blizzard's attempt to give a fresh new spin to World of Warcraft, some fans still seem to be stuck in the past."
HG writes: "Blizzard is usually pretty bad at keeping secrets, but the company somehow managed to keep this one under wraps until now. Plunderstorm is a special limited-time event that’s basically World of Warcraft’s take on the Battle Royale genre."
Hanzala from eXputer writes "History is witness to their downfall, yet they keep coming."
It's not so much Devs as it is Invested and shareholders, issue is barely anyone has the backbone to stand up to them anymore and say no for the sake of the project.
This is a fairly interesting article that does summarize a bit of the history of this revenue type. But to answer the main question is a much simpler affair: While people will say in the internet that they hate GaaS games. The top revenue generating games are GaaS, so companies will try to have their own. Take Genshin Impact for example, that game alone generated more than 1.5 Billion USD in revenue during 2022. That is almost as much as the 1.9 Billion USD that Ubisoft as a whole generated that year.
It's definitely a risky move because the majority of GaaS games don't reach the level of success Genshin Impact achieved. However, companies can't seem to take their eyes off that tempting prize at the end.
Do you ever think that over the past year or so every studio who makes this shit has started to think
"GaaS is dying out partially because there's so many of them in the market now, I think other developers are moving away from the model now BUT lets stick to our GaaS game and then when it releases we'll be one of the few on the market still which allows us to get more of the market share since every one else has left"
Yet because every developer has that same thought process they've now all got GaaS games on a still over saturated market.
Premiere gaming is dying. With Spider-Man's 300 million dollar budget and Ratchet & Clank's ridiculously low return on investment (8 million Dollar loss) AAA gaming is going to be only filled with even more High profile IPs trying to make the biggest bang for buck. Expect to see more of this stuff.
"AA" level games are now making a big comeback and are usually even more beloved by playerbase now. So hopefully that's the silver lining. Smaller, better games.
Grinding, plain and simple.
I had no idea that gold farming was THAT serious... Jesus.
I used to play alot of Phantasy Star Online in it's dreamcast incarnation. When the started the subscription based play that was it. I hate dropping 50-60 dollars on a game and then another 10-15 a month to play. I know that WoW has been huge to say the least. But no thanks. I'd play if there was a reasonable yearly subscription. Perfect example of how not to do things is PSO & FF XI on the 360. I pay my 50 a year and then Sega and Square expect me to pay more per month. Don't think so.
MMO is a waste of time and money.
Waist half day every day and it doesnt even cheer you up at the end. All you get is 2 hours of sleep before job.