Could SE of had their cake an ate it?

[zoobernut]

dude, this is an MMO. no successful game has gotten away from this model yet.

that was my point... SE is one of the biggest game companies in the world they are considering making their own game consol they have the money and the resources to hire GAME DESIGNERS!

people whose job it is to figure out ways to make their game unique and not like the others. i dont like WoW its not fun for me but from talking to friends and looking at the 6million subscribers they have maybe they figured something out to help create fun gameplay that isnt completely item or money driven. (like i said not 100% sure because i tried playing WoW and didnt like it)

but like i said games need to evolve with each new one that is released. besides just better graphics they need to think of new ways of approaching the same old problems. for MMO like you said they all follow a model of being centered around loot. and someone needs to figure out a way to make an MMO that is more character driven or adventure driven.

[layoneil]

but from talking to friends and looking at the 6million subscribers they have maybe they figured something out to help create fun gameplay that isnt completely item or money driven. (like i said not 100% sure because i tried playing WoW and didnt like it)

WoW endgame is completely item driven, you raid and farm instances till you clear and have enough good gear to raid the next one.

[zoobernut]

i stand corrected but my point remains the same. WoW just is a bad example.

[layoneil]

i stand corrected but my point remains the same. WoW just is a bad example.

i get the concept but it's basically a time contraint.

- develop new stuff
- players do new stuff
- develop new stuff
- players do new stuff
- repeat

but the time it takes to develop new stuff is a lot longer than it takes for players to finish it. you have to put in elements that make the players want to do it more than once, that extends the life of the content and the game as a whole.

you can get around by having multiple dev teams on different dev cycles but the cost of that is astronomical.

[zoobernut]

this is why most companies fail at MMO's they are incredibly expensive to upkeep and take large ammounts of employees and resources to keep going. people talk about RMT and how much money they are making from their accounts but that is not all profit alot of that money just gets pumped back into the upkeep costs of the servers and paying for support staff and development team.

at the same time in the game industry if you want to keep your game alive and selling well thats what it takes you need to keep your game designers on their toes. shit deadlines for new content come up really fast and they need game designers that can keep up with the demand. if i were running the development team for new content i would stagger the content like a TV show start developing the next patch before the first one is even released. if they are letting ffxi fall into the same old MMO patterns because of time constraints then that is just bad time management. the game industry is not easy it is tough and you work really hard and really long hours. and face incredibly tough deadlines but that is how it is if you want to be successful.