Vanguard has some innovative gameplay mechanics but can you imagine the game even seeing the light of day much less being still around a year later after that meltdown. Pirates of the Burning Sea has some interesting ideas but based on the technical issues I saw at launch I don’t think they would have been able to keep their server farms running without help from a more experienced developer. Even if they had their miscalculations about populations that forced them to consolidate servers so early on and the exodus that created would have killed an independent but SoE was able to keep them afloat until they smoothed things out. Heck, they’re even keeping Matrix Online up and running and continuing to evolve it – though to be honest I wonder if they’re using that and Planetside to work the bugs out of mechanics for The Agency.

I’m willing to concede that SoE is probably not doing this out of the goodness of their hearts, they are a business after all, but as a gamer I think it’s good for the genre. I honestly think the “WoW killer” won’t be one big game but a lot of smaller, more innovative, games – the death by 1000 cuts philosophy. I also don’t believe WoW will ever really go away and it will continue to dominate the numbers game for years to come but I think it’s already starting to serve as the “gateway” game. I see more and more people in EQ2 and even EQ who are looking for something more from their game than WoW will ever be able to deliver.

I wrote an article over at Massively for today about Runes of Magic, a WoW-like from China being imported to Europe and perhaps here by Frogster. This is the perfect example of a WoW-like that is aiming for where WoW was four years ago. Although the game is free to play and has fairly high production values, I can’t understand why anyone would play it in a world where WoW exists.

If you’re interested in more info about Runes of Magic, you can try reading these articles for screen shots, music and stuff.

How can you polish that which hath been polished to a fine sparkle.
We may rip on WoW, but the fact remains. It has taken mechanics from the other games and made it better already. How do you polish…uh…polish.

WoW could do with just a couple more things
Add housing and better guild rules and tools (like Guild levels, halls and bonuses) then everyone could play WoW forever.
All Blizzard would need to do then is take that original game, enhance the graphics in one to two years, and no one would ever have to leave again!

When I think about it, we say “POLISH POLISH POLISH” all the time, but what we really mean is “STEAL STEAL STEAL”. Take everyone else’s good ideas and using the benefit of hindsight, avoid the pitfalls and make it better. See, this is ANOTHER reason WoW-likes can’t duplicate WoW’s success — it already ripped the ideas from EverQuest, DAoC and others. But they are doing some pretty cool things for WotLK, so I would be looking out for an MMO which just basically took the WotLK things and built a new MMO around them. Like dragonback dungeon crawling, in-flight battles, the ability to temporarily change class (done first in EQ, but whatever), single group raids and so on.

You can’t expect to aim your WoW-like where WoW was four years ago and succeed. You have to aim it where WoW will be in four years.

So basically you’re saying that someone needs to take the fall, innovate and create a niche product that someone else can polish up and get rich from. As a gamer I support this notion. However I think the financial downside is obvious. Of the “innovators” you listed only Sierra had what i would consider a real hit (for it’s time).

It also seems to indicate that if you want to become fabulously wealthy, bum around Myplace min-MMOs (once that gets off the ground) until you find that spark of innovation that you can steal and take to the mass market. Twirls mustache in anticipation . . . .