What caused the decline of EQ as the #1 MMO?

[Zereh]

Originally Posted by stormlord [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

... I think a quote that fits well here is one Bill Walton said in a recent chat during halftime of the lakers vs celtics game. He said, "It's what you know after you know it all that matters most."

That is actually John Wooden (RIP, the former UCLA Bruins men's BB coach) quote. He was really quite a remarkable person.


I wish I could pinpoint what exactly it was for me that soured EQ. I think it was that each expansion release made the world became so big that it was difficult to find other players. You practically had to bring your own group with you wherever you went. Unless, of course, you were a happy lemming who followed the crowd into whatever zone happened to be popular that expansion.

Or maybe when those expansions made having a "perfect" group a necessity. There was no way on earth you'd survive fights without a slower and CC was a must. I hate having content dictate exactly who I needed in my group. I know lots of places where CC / slow / etc is vital, but it was so bad whole groups of people would sit idle if they couldn't find the exact class they thought they needed to fill a spot. It meant that everyone pretty much needed a ready-made group. I loved my guildies, but damn. The chances of playing with new people became few and far between. (And yes, there are people who would rather sit idle than try something in a new and different way. I even see it here ... sitting on my butt in UGuk because we need DPS and a necro doesn't count as DPS until they're level 24 with a real nuke. So the level 22 necro just won't do. Really???? I'd rather die ten times trying than sit and do nothing, waiting. Thank the gods there are other like-minded folks out there!)

I tried pretty much every other MMO that came out. But none of them ever ever captured the feeling that EQ gave me. In order to accommodate, no cater to, the "casual" player, one could solo their way to the top of the food chain. When grouping was no longer a necessary component of the game dynamics it ruined the whole spirit that was at the heart of EQ.

Z

[marsh9799]

I think that it was a multitude of factors- some have been hit on others have been talked around.

Other Games

Many people talk about this factor- and still talk about it with other MMOs like what game is going to be the WoW killer? New games don't typically kill off older MMOs. The older MMOs are more typically dead husks where people continue to reside until the next new game comes out. The signs were on the wall for EQ for quite sometime. DAoC saw a large player decrease in EQ, but it wasn't the game people (most people) were looking for and the player base returned- Shadowbane was much the same way. The same was true for Shadowbane. This isn't always the case, but it typically funcitons this way for all games types across the spectrum.

Community

This is a big one. I feel that many people miss why and how this happened. In my opinion, the biggest reason for the community decline was due to the lack of a viable soloing option for many classes. This may seem counterintuitive but hear me out. When I first started playing EQ, grouping was easy. I loved the game. All the zones were populated. I could get groups in the Commonlands, Lavastorm, Crushbone, etc. However, as time went on, you didn't see people here grouping. You really didn't see anyone outside major hubs with much frequently. Those you did see were primarily twinks and people being powerleveled by friends. If you were new to the game and tried to start a Warrior after the release of PoP, you were going to have a very difficult time leveling up. It was going to be massively frustrating and not fun for most people. Historically, in somewhat an ironic spin, expansions do not expand the game but shrink it. People concentrate in the newer areas and the older ones become desolate wastelands. This further complicates the problem with having primarily a community that has finished with the leveling phase of the game.

WoW has been able to deal with this problem by continuing to make leveling faster and easier. Now, some people may say- that's not good for the game. The exact opposite is true. WoW isn't about the old world, it isn't about Outworld, it is about the Wrath of the Lich King expansion. If you want to play with other people, that is where you play. When the player base is primarily at the level cap, leveling is an obstacle to the primary function of the game- playing with other PCs. Just to continue to harp on this a bit more, I have a friend who I talked into coming back to WoW. He was 64 after one week- without my help. He'll probably be 80 in less than 3 weeks. Within 3 weeks, we're able to play together. In EQ... well, I think we know the time is substantially longer especially considering the number of AA's required to function.

In summation, there is a barrier to entry for the community.

Poor Game Management

This is something that Blizzard has done exceptionally well. How many games has Blizzard released since it released WoW? Zero. Sure, they may have been planning other things, working on other games, but I think it is safe to assume that they have been tunnel vision focused on the development of WoW. Say what you want about Verant (I know some people hated them), but they were focused on Everquest. I think when Sony took over- that focus was lost. Is involved in how many games now? EQ, EQ2, SWG, Vanguard, and probably more that I either don't know about or have forgotten. Oh, they did some RTS too didn't they?

Consolidated Player Base
This relates to the community but is really a game management issue I believe. As previously mentioned, there is the issue of the to the barrier to entry to the game community from leveling. There is also the of new servers. I don't believe that most game companies realize how detrimental releasing new servers can be. Sullon Zek was not a server that needed to be released. The Legends server did not need to be released. The progression based servers were bad ideas. Fracturing an already damaged community is terrible policy. The fact that other games were being planning and released was even worse. EQ2 was an absolutely terrible, terrible idea. The resources used for that game should have gone into addressing the problems with EQ1.

Failure to Adapt (IE Steal)
Again, something that Blizzard has done exceptionally well. I'm 100% convince that there is absolutely nothing original in WoW... like as in 0%... nadda... zip. The entire game concept was stolen originally from Warhammer Fantasy (right down to the map). The implementation of melee abilities from DAoC (EQ really needed to have adopted this). Battlegrounds and arenas from Guild Wars. Group instances from LDoN. I think most of the Molten Core bosses were ripped right off PoP encounters. And the continue to do this, several abilities that have been added or will be added in Cataclysm are near straight clones of Warhammer Online abilities. EQ has been very slow to modifiy their game based on new ideas and concepts found in other games.

Population and Momentum

Momentum is a powerful thing. I think that many people now play WoW for no other reason that everyone else plays WoW. WoW has the momentum- it hasn't always been the case. They did have a substantial player base drop for the releases of Age of Conan and Warhammer Online. Both games failed to meet player expectations and people returned. Similar to how things went with EQ and games that did not knock it off back in the day. It's harder to knock off WoW because of it's population. Companies have a tendency to have an all or none approach. EQ had the population at the time the time of the release of WoW to fight it off had it done things correctly. However, they did the exact opposite of what needed to be done with the release of EQ2 and created a strong momentum away from their EQ. There was never a competition between EQ and WoW- the real fight was between EQ2 and WoW.

[garyogburn]

Wow definitley killed the game due to population decreasing and sony blatantly ripping off wow's ideas.

I played wow for a bit, and at the beginning it was a neat game. But it quickly went downhill after they got rid of world pvp.

Also, AAs were great. I dont see how anyone disliked them (at least through pop when I quit playing) The arguement that they made people too powerful is BS, as gear does the same thing. AAs were a clever way to personalize your toon in a way gear couldnt.