Loading... Not So Wasted Youth

Tags: in

Posted Wed, Mar 11, 2009 by Ethec

Welcome to the 1,033rd Edition of Loading...

Loading... is the premier MMORPG news and commentary daily newsletter from Ten Ton Hammer. Play World of Warcraft? Jay "Medeor" Johnson's weekly WoW newsletter "The Overpull" keeps you entertained and informed on all the latest developments in WoW. Sign up!

The Pulse

You vote with what you view at Ten Ton Hammer, and the result is the Ten Ton Pulse (What is Pulse?).

Here's today's top 5 Pulse results for today:

Biggest Movers in the Top 20 today :

Star Wars: The Old Republic (UP 4 to #13)
NeoSteam (down 3 to #15)
Jumpgate Evolution (UP 1 to #12)

Loading... Daily

Loading... currently on NyQuil / DayQuil therapy, so pardon the dangling participles.

Apologies if you didn't receive yesterday's Loading... which can be found online here. Our newsletter mailer seems to have come down with the start of spring plague that's going around.

I was all set to give my first impressions of EVE Online: Apocrypha today, but owing to a nasty cold and a general lack of patience for a patch download that wouldn't pass verification (clearing the cache may help, we'll see), I've yet to get back into the game. So, in my hoarse John Cleese voice: now for something completely different...

Last month KingsIsle Entertainment announced that Wizard101 had over 1 million players registered, and Cartoon Network quietly claims over 6 million unique viewers per month for their deceptively browser-based MMO FusionFall (I say "deceptively" because it looks and plays ten times better than any other game-in-a-frame that I've ever tried, and will play on any OS to boot). I'll give you the equivalent of a nerdfight combo move: the next time someone says that no subscription MMO can succeed in a post-WoW world, just bring up these two kid-friendly games, both aimed at the post-Club Penguin but pre-WoW audience, but fun for players of any age. And I'd willing to bet that with a little broader marketing scheme, both games (but Wizard 101 especially) could triple their player populations.

While traditional MMOs are scrounging to get 300k players, KingsIsle and CN have found themselves a niche that will fork out a scanty sum each month for night limitless PC-based babysitting (just kidding - if you let your kids play unattended on the Internet you deserve the Dateline expose but your kids don't). Both games have their price point advantages - FusionFall is the loss leader at $5.95 / month ($9.95 /month for a four account "family plan") but Wizard101 (at $9.95 / month or $6.95 / month per family member account) allows players to buy their way into subscriber areas of the game using in-game currency. Both games have an unlimited access free-to-play areas as well.

Here is a prime example of two games that have found a competitive footing against WoW by effectively not competing with WoW. Their core game mechanics are more Pokemon (Wizard101) or platformer (FusionFall) than D&D, the subscription price is roughly half of what the rest of the industry is charging, FusionFall can be played on any OS that has a Flash-capable browser and, best of all, these are surprisingly sophisticated games despite being targeted at young attention spans.

Those are the upsides, but both games come with cautions. From various parent reviews, it seems that FusionFall may suffer from Watchmen-itis in that the game might feel kind of flat to players that aren't familiar with the IP. If you can't appreciate finally getting a Dexter or Ben 10 nano, there might not be a juicy enough carrot on the stick to keep you playing. Some parents also might not appreciate the witchy overtones to Wizard 101, and 13 years old with parental consent might still be a little young for the full text chat that your subscription can enable (despite the profanity and personal info filters which tweens are usually pros at beating). The answer is simple, play alongside your kid and don't depend on the Internet to play nanny.

There are a number of lessons to be learned here for more traditional MMOs. First, if your game can be compared unfavorably with WoW, it will be. FF and W101 dodge this bullet by not only targeting a younger audience but by innovating on core gameplay, as described above. Second, these games not only catering to their niche (meaning kids and parents), but give them all they've ever wanted plus a half-hour backrub - something we talk about often in Loading. Finally, $5 to $10 less dollars per subscription per month isn't meaningless in this economy, and I'm surprised that more subscription-based MMOs haven't tried to undercut on price, especially after the game's peak has long passed. If I could subscribe to 3 elderly MMORPGs for the price of one, I'd likely keep up my subscriptions just for the ease of checking out the latest content.

What other lessons can we learn from kids MMOs? Are children really the future? Discuss this or anything else that comes to mind in the Loading... forum or feel free to email me.

Shayalyn's Epic Thread of the Day

From our WoW: General Discussion Forum

What's the hurry?

Stormbringer hit our World of Warcraft forum and created a thoughtful and well-written post about a topic I'm pretty passionate about: the rush to end game. I'll admit, I used to have little patience for anything but progress--I wanted it all, and I wanted it now. I wanted the end game at the expense of lore and exploration. I wanted to be one of the leaders in my laid-back guild--the one who could raid and enjoy content that others who lagged behind exploring weren't getting to see. Once upon a time, that was definitely me. But I outgrew that phase when I realized that as a working adult I didn't have the kind of time that end game pursuits require. I became a casual gamer through necessity, if not by design.

But once I slowed down and actually started reading quest dialog and enjoying quest lines and exploring areas in games, I learned what I'd been missing. Stormbrjnger's post explains it all quite eloquently:

"New or newer players are looking for guidance and are being told a thousand times how to level just a bit faster. But while they're doing it, few will ever understand that the dragons they kill play such an integral part of the background to the entire story. [They consider them] just another trash mob to kill and skin."

Stormbrjnger also goes on to talk about the imbalance that results when everyone specs for end game potential instead of for their own enjoyment. His comments pertain directly to World of Warcraft, but could stand for most any MMOG:

"With so many obsessed with their DPS and fast leveling we have a major shortage of tanks and healers, or, if you want to put it another way, a major glut of DPSers. Nothing against DPS--I have a toon or two speced for it myself--but if you ever want to torture people, just type "LFM DPS for heroic" just before logging off and watch the flood of desperate whispers."

Are you all about the end game? Or do you take time to explore and learn the lore as you go? Does rushing to the end game result in burning out faster? Or does slow leveling lead to frustration? Share your comments in our WoW forum.

=================================
Awesome Quote from the Epic Thread:

"I felt so disillusioned by the race to 80 that everyone seemed to be engaged in that I did a complete 180 and pretty much gave up leveling entirely in favor of doing other things. I always wanted to explore everything even before Achievements came out, and while that's a nice bonus, it's all too easy to get the Explorer achievement while still missing lots of great sights in the game.

I agree that more interesting hidden spots would be nice, but I'm easily amused and get a kick just from seeing things from a different perspective. Plus there's something really neat about going to places that you know very few people have ever been before, even if it's just a grove along the base of Teldrassil or the hills along the northern coast of Azshara."

- Rokhana
=================================

Do you have a favorite Epic Thread? Let us know!

5 new MMOG hand-crafted articles today! 169 in February! 305 in 2009!

New MMOG Articles At Ten Ton Hammer Today [Thanks Phil Comeau for links and Real World News]

Interviews/Reviews

Community