Yeah, he seems to forget that it's just a game, and after a while people want to play new games. Games, by their very nature, appeal partly for the novelty (who wants to play a game if all the challenge is gone?) which means that when the novelty wears off, people will go elsewhere. Nothing wrong with that. It's like thinking a movie is leaving the theater because the popcorn is getting stale.
I'm not sure that is inherent to games. Many people devote a lifetime to mastering games like Chess or Go.
Its a little more true of video games, but even there the lifetimes can be quite long. The original StarCraft was relased in 98 and is still being actively played even with StarCraft II out.
Of course, the thing all these examples have in common is competition with other players, but that is true in all MMOs as well.
That's true, but I still feel like the nature of MMOs encourage the "novelty factor", even if it's longer than many video games. Chess, Go, Starcraft, Sim City and other timeless games share the characteristic of being different and continually challenging. Most MMOs have a tendency to get repetitive. Sure, you can go on raids, trade, etc, but there's not the continually evolving strategy and new challenge of a different style of play, new sequences, etc. The games engine simply isn't that rich, it's underlying structure is still limited.
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Yeah, he seems to forget that it's just a game, and after a while people want to play new games. Games, by their very nature, appeal partly for the novelty (who wants to play a game if all the challenge is gone?) which means that when the novelty wears off, people will go elsewhere. Nothing wrong with that. It's like thinking a movie is leaving the theater because the popcorn is getting stale.
I'm not sure that is inherent to games. Many people devote a lifetime to mastering games like Chess or Go.
Its a little more true of video games, but even there the lifetimes can be quite long. The original StarCraft was relased in 98 and is still being actively played even with StarCraft II out.
Of course, the thing all these examples have in common is competition with other players, but that is true in all MMOs as well.
That's true, but I still feel like the nature of MMOs encourage the "novelty factor", even if it's longer than many video games. Chess, Go, Starcraft, Sim City and other timeless games share the characteristic of being different and continually challenging. Most MMOs have a tendency to get repetitive. Sure, you can go on raids, trade, etc, but there's not the continually evolving strategy and new challenge of a different style of play, new sequences, etc. The games engine simply isn't that rich, it's underlying structure is still limited.