News

MMO "in a rut," still "mainly WoW clones," says Diablo co-creator
Posted: 10.10.2011 13:15 by Simon Priest Comments: 4
Blizzard North co-founder David Brevik, now working on Marvel Universe Online at Gazillion Entertainment, believes the MMO genre in general is a bit stale.

He feels the genre is generally "in a rut," with little exploration beyond 'what's safe'. The MMO game "is a platform," and there's many ways to get people together.


“I think MMOs in general are in a rut,” said David Brevik. “It’s still mainly WoW clones.” Studios needn't stick to the same flavours in theme, mechanics and techniques.

“Look at Ultima Online,” he said. “It’s an MMO, but the experience of Ultima Online was very different from World of Warcraft, yet everybody’s gone in that one direction."

“In reality, a massively multiplayer online game is a platform. It’s the ability to get people together in the same game to play at the same time,” he added in an interview. ”It doesn’t have to be limited to this one kind of game.”

Do today's MMOs all copy and paste the same general foundation of gameplay? Blizzard has said before they hope someone comes along to inject more life into a genre they've dominated for years now, as it would help World of Warcraft to flourish too.

What do you think of Star Wars: The Old Republic, or Guild Wars 2?
Source: BeefJack

Comments

By SiyaenSokol (SI Elite) on Oct 10, 2011
SiyaenSokol
I am not a great fan of MMORPG's. The game tends to stay the same, and other companies are not really improving the genre.
By herodotus (SI Herodotus) on Oct 10, 2011
herodotus
BioWare no doubt believes it has the answer, but we'll see (or everyone but Australia and NZ will). Not sure what the answer to this will be.
By SiyaenSokol (SI Elite) on Oct 11, 2011
SiyaenSokol
BioWare has a neck to create great stories for games. The stories tend to consume you rather than the game.

That happened to me with Neverwinter Nights 2. I got bored with game long before I got to the end, but I wanted to see it through, as the story was very-very interesting.
By SirRoderick (SI Elite) on Oct 12, 2011
SirRoderick
I'm with ViGotH on that one. The story is always what kept me going, and that's the way I like it.