The Perfect Recipe For A Great Mmo

By Author: Chris Coker
Total Articles: 18
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So many have come along, promised much, disappointed, and then disappeared into the ether, never to be seen or heard from again. In this article we analyze the key ingredients required in cooking up an Massively Multiplayer Online game that gamers will want to play for years to come.

The License:

Nothing gets gamers instant attention like a snazzy license. Be it the franchise rights to a beloved table top game, a multi-million dollar summer blockbuster, or the resurrection of a long dormant but much loved gaming classic, licenses are a great way for developers to catch the attention of gamers.

Getting a great license isn't easy though, and frankly, it's only a small ingredient, a license alone won't make for a great MMO, and gamers' curiosity and excitement is likely to turn into vitriol and discontent if they see a franchise they love being treated badly by a developer.

Beta Buzz:

MMO developers almost always get this one terrible wrong.

If you're making a game, then gamers want in on that, for free, and as early as possible. Letting too many gamers into a beta too early can have the ...
... disastrous effect of creating bad buzz. Fickle gamers might not understand that the game is still relatively early in development, and might not be understanding about its shortcomings in the form of missing content, placeholder art, and bugs and system crashes.

That said, once things on the development side are nearly complete, it's a great time to open the beta up to a wide variety of people, the more the better. Get folks playing for free, this way you get to test more rigorously, and be certain you catch game breaking bugs before the game launches. It's a sad thing, but so many games (Funcom's Age of Conan come to mind) launch before they're ready, and are worse off for it. You can bet Funcom would give any amount of AoC gold to turn back time and rectify their mistakes.

The other major advantage of a massive, lengthy open beta, apart from the benefits to quality assurance, is that you have a large community of gamers who've been playing your (hopefully) great game, and who don't want to suddenly not be able to play when the game goes live. By doing so the developer creates an instant built in and loyal subscriber base.

Free Game Weekends:

Show of hands if you like free stuff? That's what I thought. If you've got a pay to play subscription based MMO, then frequent free game weekends are a great way to get gamers hooked on Aion Kinah, XP, questing, and raiding all day long and well into the night.

The same goes for free-to-play MMO's though, what better way to have get gamers excited about the different items and weapons they can buy than to give them free samples?

Real Money Trading:

While it might appear like three dirty words, a lot of forward looking MMO developers are starting to see the benefit of letting gamers engage in Real Money Trading. Whether it's Aion Kinah, WoW gold or EQ2 plat, folks like the option of deciding how to spend their cashola.

The simple fact is that not everyone has fifteen hours a week to spend on building up their alts and mains, most gamers, especially older gamers, just don't have the time. These gamers would rather have the option to pay a small price and get their hands on higher level items. After all, what's the point in playing a game for years if you never get to see the best of what it has to offer?

It's likely that as the genre continues to evolve, more and more developers will start to figure out new and innovative ways of integrating Real Money Trading into their in-game economies.

Community, Community, Community:

Say it once, twice, three times, and even then it's not enough. Forget content, forget graphics, forget lore. Massively multiplayer online games, by definition, live and die on the strength of their communities.

Forums, Twitter, Facebook integration, fan sites, in-game events and celebrations, all these go a long way to helping foster a sense of community and keeping gamers playing together.

Highest on the community to do list though, would be listening to what the community wants. Too often in the past developers have made the mistake of thinking they knew what gamers want, spending months of development time on features that gamers just don't really care much about.

Expansions!:

Even the best MMO's grow long in the tooth after a little while (just look at World of Warcraft and the currently in-beta expansion, Cataclysm. Regular expansions are a great way to keep interest fresh, and keep gamers, or those who've long since left for other games, to come back and check out what's new.

The Most Important Ingredient:

Is simple, pure, unadulterated fun. MMO's are a tricky beast. Developers want to keep gamers playing, and so often make the mistake of substituting grind for fun. Sure developing systems that keep gamers grinding is easier, but more often than not, once gamers realize they're not having fun, they leave for pastures anew.

Chris Coker is a freelance writer and avid gamer. He has written on all aspects of the MMO industry, focusing on his latest favorite, Star Trek Online. Check out some of his posts where he dishes out everything from ship interiors to energy credits to good old-fashioned grinding.