Will We Ever See Another Good MMORPG? - MadSeasonShow Reacts 

Talking about the state of the current mmo industry, and also its future. Not sure if it'll be the next, but working on famous/infamous WoW player part 5 right now :D

ok now THIS is epic, did not expect this!!! Much love dude ❤

The guide culture / meta chasing is what ensures that no MMO will ever give the same sense of wonder as early WoW

He’s pumping them out y’all

"If a piece content has a title as a question, the answer is no." D:

Hearing Madseasonshow chuckle to himself whilst telling stories of the past really made me smile this evening.

That Steve Jobs quote really hit the nail on the head

The steve jobs quote ! Holy shit he summed up the entire games industry right now

The fact J1mmy is getting more and more popularity from even youtube big boys like asmon, and then legends like madseason is so nice to see

I thought original release The Old Republic was good. Hutt ball as a bounty hunter was incredibly satisfying.

Just so you know the "I told you so" has yet to feel old. Even the like 8m version used this time

My personal dream colab would be you and Josh Strife going at it together about the mmo industry, the takes you two would have together would be so great

At this point, given how much the gaming industry has changed for the worst in the last decade. Probably not. Everything now is live service games. MMOs are complicated and expensive to make. Easier to just make a mobile game with micro transactions and you can make more money much safer than trying to do an MMO in current year.

That Steve Jobs clip with the WoW shop in the background went hard. Make that a short

It's the whole "Money Ball" thing. Ever since analytics took over pro sports, it's the whole thing where a whole bunch of scientists, that have zero experience in the thing they're analyzing, end up making the most consequential decisions, and after sports, it slowly leaked into every other thing that was working just fine...

The number of videos you've put out recently is wild, I never minded the time between uploads but it's neat to have so much new stuff at once!

I really dont think there will be another MASSIVE MMORPG for the simple reason that the main thing that brought people to the old mmos was the fact that everything was undiscovered and a little scuffed, look at vanilla wow and why it was unironically so good for a new player even in 2020. Tons to discover things were kinda scuffed.

Old-school Runescape literally does everything right that all these other MMOs do wrong. When you play OSRS read all of the dialog in quests and when you finally infiltrate the penguin HQ, you will understand.

Neverwinter's system for creating your own instance is a space that studios should be playing in. It was so fun to explore different dungeons that people had created with their own stories and themes. Someone needs to really perfect that and let the community run wild with it.

Been working in the video game industry for almost 13 years now. It has its ups and downs just like any profession. Sometimes I wish i was mowing lawns instead of working in game dev, and sometimes I fall in love with working on games all over again. It depends on the project and the team. I've worked on MMO's before (including wow), but I've never got in at the start. I enjoy working in MMO's but I'd love to be there at the start for all the incredibly fun brainstorming and white boxing. I keep faith there will be another mmo that has the same fun as WoW when it first launched, but its going to take a really passionate indie team. Building it over a long period of time with lots of community feedback.

Main issue with MMOs (and MOBAs) is they compete not for 10 or 20 hours of time - they compete with years invested versus the years already invested in the other MMO/MOBA. That's why single player games, or co-op games such as Divinity or Baldur's Gate 3 are much more likely to be made and thrive.

Man, Runescape 1 back in 2001 was my introduction to MMO's. I still remember mining coal in the Barbarian Village and grinding steel shortswords to vendor off. ...or finally getting the ability to use the desert entrance shortcut once I finished the quest. ...or running naked through the wilderness to go explore and getting smoked lmao. ...or finally learning how to use colored text and selling lobsters in the marketplace. Good memories, man.

OSRS a game with 23 skills has one skill dedicated to simply killing mobs, while others call it "quests" lmao.

old school EQ leveling was great. it took people 12-24 months of regular play to get max level. And the majority of players never reached max level. I want that in the next big mmo.

J1mmy AND MadSeasonShow, my two favourite things together!

I find Madseason’s reaction videos really encouraging. It kind of reminds me of how academics respond to each other’s papers. With enough effort put into properly contextualizing the original video, and offering your own unique response, these videos can feel more like a dialogue between experts than just low effort rip offs. Good job dude. Really enjoying all the stuff you’ve been putting out.

I 1000% agree, the leveling experience is what hooked me to wow back in 2007, 95% of my time played on that game was leveling characters. I think if a modern MMO is to really succeed, it would be from an epic leveling experience.

Gah, man, the background music throughout this really took me back to the good days. Might have to fire up some old school Final Fantasy titles now. Thanks for the vid dude.

I think it's fair to recognize that "flash in the pan" for an MMO means under 5 year lifespan. Shadowbane for instance ran from 2003 to 2009. It was a great fun game, with guild made castles and conflicts, harsh intense PVP with loot dropping, and a HUGE number of classes and races, some of which even had big modification to your gameplay, like the flying races, centaur, and even minotaurs which got larger with their strength. But a lot of people never heard of it, and because it's not STILL running it is not considered a great classic mmo. Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning as well ran for 5 years, but people considered it a failure because it shut down. WildStar Also lasted 4 years, I personally loved it and played it a ton. TERA lasted 10 years and people claim it was a failure because it shut down Generally, a single player game with a linear story loses 90% of it's playerbase on the metrics in the first month, because people beat the game and move on. But no one judges them by that metric. For some reason an mmo has to basically be online forever to be considered a success. The genre is not dying imo, there are millions and millions of MMO players. Lost Ark STILL has 75,545 people online via steam right now. Sorry for going on a tangent 44 seconds into the video, but I just really hate that framing and think it's inaccurate.

5:25 These series' that people used to cherish just seemed to have become so disconnected." (long pause on Street Fighter V) This is a very confusing reference. SFV was received really poorly back in 2016 (8 years ago); however, Street Fighter 6 launched in 2023 and was perhaps the greatest fighting game launch ever. Not criticizing your point (I agree), just a very odd visual example for that point.

Love how you used the reaction as a jumping off point to just speak about things dude. It’s a great addition to what you offer on your channel as I know you’ve said these are easier and quicker to make unless I’m misunderstanding something. Good stuff dude

The most fun I had at max level in vanilla was 5 mans on my mage. During WotLK and Cata, I was a pally tank and had fun with the 5 mans. In other xpacs, once I got to max was level, I would level alts, help guildies level and run guild events.

You are correct, it takes the perfect amount of open time, and sadly for most the world we are all fighting for the next day under the current workings of the world. I hope it changes, but one can only hope.

So Happy you're posting and experimenting at the rate you're publishing. So far everything you've published I support all the way! Keep having fun and doing what feels right for you. You don't miss!

Holy crap you are dropping so many videos and at the same time keeping the quality!🎉🎉 Wow that’s something you don’t see anymore on RU-vid .

Main MMO issue is player mentality. If you always utilize shortcuts (fast travel, party finder, buy gear from market instead of grindin’ to craft, etc.) you’ll lose opportunities to connect and be invested. If you only look to other players to help you craft your play experience, and not try to find ways to incorporate your own ideas for enjoyment, you’ll lose opportunities to connect and be invested. If you don’t engage in social aspects (chat, mini games, events), then you lose opportunities to connect and be invested. It won’t feel immersive and expansive, if you never immerse yourself or try to expand your experience.

This will be my 4th time watching j1mmys video. Original, asmons react, j1mmys react to asmons react, now this XD

after experiencing so many failed MMO followups its hard to still have hope. i can completely see why Blizzard doesnt want to make a WoW2. flash in the pan is the perfect way to describe modern MMOs

Love your recent reacts, keep it up !

i think these companies need to somehow grab the massive numbers of players who used to play MMO's who left the genre. Of course, grabbing the new never before played crowds is big but there are many many many folks that are now feeling nostalgic for those classic wow days- people like myself that played wow from 2004-2008 then left for some reason or another and have never gone back to the genre since. Of course I think the success of Classic WoW seems to echo this thought, but this is just grabbing those who would literally replay the exact game again. A new game that can capture that feeling and experience again (if its even possible) has a chance to find a strong core audience, somehow this game will also need to be the same one that can capture the NEW audience..... finding this magic sweet spot is going to be the challenge. grab the folks that abandoned the genre but have nostalgia for it, build enough buzz to intrigue new interest by "never playeds" and have good enough gameplay to hook a decent percentage of those never playeds to stay along with the core nostalgia folks.

MORE MADSEASON?! HUZZAH!

Madseason, could you do a "lore to sleep to" series? :)

"I know I can input my credit card solo to level from 1 - 70. That's the best way to play video games in my opinion. I'm such a fan of MMOs that I'll not only pay $15 a month to play them, I'll pay hundreds more to NOT play them. Because you know, I love them SO much." Ooof that hit SO hard bro. 100% truth right there. You summed up in a few sentences EVERYTHING that is wrong with the genre today. Appreciate your content as always.

The way you drew your lil helm makes it look like an anvil kinda. Neat.

J1mmy once again showing out for the MMORPG community, mans is a OSRS Legend and now moving his name throughout the ranks of the MMO playing field.... the true G.O.A.T for MMO players

Why is my GF watching this channel all the time?

the problem with the current state of the mmo industry is that everyone is trying to be WoW but with modern AAA graphics which means enormous dev costs, and no one is trying to be runescape.

Plunderstorm was honestly pretty well received from the community. Some treated it as a grind cause they didn't like it for cosmetics, some just don't like battle royals, PvPers liked it for the new pvp mode, even if its not honor or conquest related, and for others it was a change of pace or something that was rather short and easy to jump into for something to do for a little bit while getting some rewards. So a mixed bag, but overall was liked since when it shut down, overall people wanted it to stay and not feel like a FOMO thing.

Before I watch the video just my thoughts I think WOW and the MMOS of that time, came out at a perfect time, but now for the younger generations MMOs are not what they seek and to the already existing fanbase, most people no longer have the time to really commit.

In regards to the toner heads clip, it's ultimately the shareholders that are the root cause of these corporatization problems in the AAA industry, their demands for forever increasing dividends necessitate ever shorter sighted decisions such as that toner head problem Jobs explains. Publicly traded companies is the cancer.

2000's was the golden age of gaming for sure... you had the build up to wow, warcraft, warcraft 2, warcraft 3, Lan parties at internet cafes, Laptops and Computers where just getting affordable and more available.

I comment very infrequently, but I wanted to say thanks for really coming back. I think we both miss WoW the way that it was, but your videos are amazing to listen to while I clean my space or get work done. Love you, mystery monotone man.

I watched this when J1mmy posted it. I watched when Asmon reacted. What's once more 'round the sun, eh lads?

After EverQuest, WoW was a good little sister MMO, but it was over.

30:31 was a huge blackpill for me about the state of the player base. I never agreed with the argument that these big corporate companies are dumb, "Why can't they get back to good game design? Don't they see how bad this is?" They know exactly what they are doing.

Man you are just pumping out the content, much appreciated :clap

No one wants to spend more than 2 years making a game anymore... publishers are now pushing too hard to get an instant return they don't allow any developers to take their time.

People seem to think that if a game isn't the #1 viewed game on twitch, with the most subscribers of any mmo of all time, and the number of subscribers isn't continuously increasing and NEVER decreasing, then it must be a complete failure.... It's completely irrational.

I honestly disagree that every quest should have major meaning or lore implications. I think killing 20 goblins and gathering 6 bear asses is part of knowing your place in the massive world. And that is why the rare moment you do actually get a major lore type quest, it feels that much more special. We shouldn't get the "Thank you for saving Azeroth once more, heroes!"-esque shoulder patting every other quest.

You are doing an awesome job and I am so happy you're back. Keep up the good work.

Love just hearing your thoughts, you've a wonderful voice!

Almost nobody has time for more than one. MMOs also have huge "sunk cost" progression-protection psychology. MMOs take longer and cost more to develop because of the extreme need for content and balancing. There just isn't room in the market for lots of AAA-scale MMOs, and by now most major publishers have figured that out.

Oh man, what a treat. J1mmy happens to be one of my favourite creators, he's like the MadSeasonShow of OSRS - his love for the game never seems to burn out.

Quick answer: No WoW was the genres peak only because it captured the zeitgeist of the time, being in the right place at the right time. MMO's for me at the time served not only as a game but a social media platform before places like discord or twitter or facebook took off. the idea was in WoW you were a social community, that social aspect of MMO's no longer exists due to outside sources of socialising, for an MMO to be popular again you really need to capture something new, or make something old new, not remake something that was already done. WoW did a really good job at ripping off other MMO and making it accessible and easy and navigable. I think MMO's have fallen into that RTS phase of history, and sure RTS can still be done and made but they'll never be as popular, and thats the same with MMO's. At least thats my 2 cents. I do think there are also so many other factors. such as getting old, societal changes, and just new fads in the gaming sphere.

I started playing WOW when BFA launched. My favorite part of WOW since is thr leveling process. It was amazing. Then when i finished, i just got bored. The journey was more fulfilling to me than the destination.

Love the content! Keep it up MadSeason!

All this madseason content makes me happy 😊

You are so right about the social media „comparison“. I have 2 friends from different EU-countries and they met in molten core. They are a pair for 15 years now. She moved here and they are still married.

Love this new video format!

13:51 "My friends call them chores" Your friends are right: that's what dailies are: chores that you have to do EVERYDAY. No surprises there 😂😂

In the 48:48 segment you're basically describing osrs. The whole game is about your leveling journey and it's why so many love it

You can't meaningfully figure out why MMOs took off as much as they did without looking at the interest rate and cost of borrowing. I really wish people would like... learn about how capital works, lol. So when a company wants to make a game, it's really rare that all the money is there up-front to do it. Sure, if you're public, you can try to sell shares or go public and list an IPO, but that really isn't a strategy that works if your product is something that could bomb. So you borrow from investors, which tends to mean investment firms. Even if you're already a big, established company with titles under the belt. Which is a lot easier to do when the interest rate is nearly 0% than when it's over 5%. People wonder why games take Epic store exclusivity when "they could make so much more money if they sold on steam" - as if needing capital infusion mid-development is just this thing that never happens. MTX, weird exclusivity deals, layoffs - they're all going to continue to grow in prominence, because the cost of servicing an already-ridiculous amount of debt shot up to a ridiculous rate. Which compounds. This cycle tends to be what we call a 'bubble,' but games present an interesting thing: effectively infinite scalability. You can make a sparklehorse for almost nothing, and it costs you the same to sell 10 as it does 10M. The bubble can bloat to an insane, unique degree because the consumer will spend money on something that effectively exists outside of most working models of the relationship between goods and labor.

Glad you're back to regular content, Mads (: I've been watching since pre classic wow and can't express how much I enjoy your work.

Part of the problem isn’t just the suits running AAA’s … it’s the culture of the Market itself … namely what the driving force of the player base wants - fast and furious. There is a counter group that wants what Mad wants … but the driving force side fuels the short-term profits of the suits. Change the culture of the player base and the game designs will change.

I think if we see another great MMO, it won't be obvious at first and it'll take time until we are all clued into the idea that "actually, that game was an MMO". If I could point towards something, I feel like what Siege Camp is working on right now for their next game could be it. They have a successful game behind them already, "Foxhole", which is a persistent war game where players, split into two factions, fight over a single large map until one side can overpower the other. It doesn't sound revolutionary, but between maintaining frontlines, planning and executing operations, players having to do everything from resource gathering to building production facilities and doing basic logistics that fuels the war effort, and forming groups, some formalized in clans, some less tangible and temporary, it is kind of like an MMO. An important aspect here is that 80% of players use their microphone to talk here, there is a lot of communication that forms the backbone of memorable moments and impromptu partnerships. There is a lot more communication in the average foxhole trenchline than the average Dungeon Finder 5 man group in WoW. Their next game, Anvil Empires, which is still pre alpha with some public tests done, seems to lean even more heavily into players shaping a much larger game world together and building empires together in an effort to fight for a common goal. Entirely a sandbox where players shape the game from top to bottom. That game or games that build on it in the future could be the future of the genre, leaving behind character based progression in favor of a kind of group progression. We'll see where it goes.

People need to understand that growth is the most important factor for a publicly traded company. Nobody "has to" rely on microtransactions and all that nonsense to keep an mmo profitable and to be able to pay their employees. However, if the profits from this year aren't significantly higher than the ones last year, executives will start meddling. And even if they are, they'll start meddling anyways because profits could always be higher ...

There is another component here which is corporate greed. Once a company becomes big enough, if it is publicly traded, it gets coopted by activist investors who will remove management that don't make them enough money. These investors are willing to sacrifice everything to make a few more dollars. This trend is part of every facet of our life. Any major company that has experienced "enshitification" is likely the result of corporate executives at the very top along with hedge funds working together to make "the line go up."

No studio is able to get the budget to make an MMO without being backed/owned by a company that will ruin said MMO.

Quick note, the first battle royale game was not H1Z1. The earliest i know of is the PlayerUnknown mod for Arma 3, which was later fully developed into what is now PUBG.

What’s wild is WoW Classic, at almost 20 years old, is more engaging than most new MMOs.

To your point about the next big MMO and OTK's success with player driven content: that event was a success for bringing in viewers more so than players. The amount of people who have the time and interest to actively participate in something like that by joining the platform it's hosted on and being an active participant seems much lower than number willing to view the event on twitch as a passive participant.

I think J1mmy raises a good notion that the next big MMO is not going to have quests where you slay X goblins. That has been done a million times, perfected, exhausted. The "next big thing", if it even happens, will be something completely different. Look at OSRS compared to WoW, they're both successful "MMOs" but they couldn't be any more different from each other. They occupy entirely different niches. The next MMO that exhibits that same kind of longevity is going to be as different from OSRS and WoW as they are from each other.

I agree that WoW got so popular because it was simply innovative in a time where internet was still such a new thing and no one really used it as "who needs the internet all the time????"...but this made WoW so mystic and such a challenge to play...we simply didn't know what awaited us when leveling or especially when reaching max level! Our curiosity was driving us, but currently we already know EVERYTHING before the new expansion is out and that inmho takes out the fun. A HUGE reason why I love FromSoft titles is that I am still getting that feeling, first even if you are reading about e.g. DarkSouls beforehand and learn about certain hidden items or quests, there are so many that you will never get them all and your curiosity in the game always pays off. Listening to dialogs and connecting the dots will almost always reward you with smth or sometimes just give you a mushroom :D tl;dr; I am so happy that you are bringing out so many videos now and I like your style of reaction videos!

If we do get a new big MMO, if we even call it that, it'll be very different from WoW or any of the ones we'd currently think of. The same happened to other genres too: no one makes Quake-styles arena shooters anymore, but instead we have big war games like Battlefield, or battle royales, or PvE or hero shooters. No one really makes Starcraft style RTS games either (hell, even Warcraft 3 was already a departure from that), but we do have MOBAs instead, or more rapid tactical games without base building. So whatever the next big MMO is, I'd expect that level of difference in gameplay there too.

Everquest is what laid the groundwork for WoW's success. It was the game that really proved there was a market for that type of game, and where the game developers of WoW got a lot of inspiration for their own game design. Having played both myself, classic WoW is basically a "casual" version of Everquest, but with much improved gameplay and graphics. The big difference being that Everquest forced most classes to at least group with one other person to navigate the game world and level up after they got of the noobie levels, where in WoW the leveling process can be solo`d by any class. Everquest also had harsher rules around dying and corpse retrieval. Essentially they took the Everquest formula, and tweaked it enough to appeal to a broader audience, while adding enough to keep the veteran MMO players happy. You hit on the point that these early MMO games were essentially like social media platforms. I'd also add that gaming online back then was also just hitting mainstream levels of popularity. It was a very special moment in time when WoW started to take off, and gaming culture has changed a lot. This means another game hitting the same success levels of WoW comparatively and surpassing it highly unlikely. It's very hard to recapture the novelty of playing multiplayer games for the first time. It's basically baked into the cake now, and you need something more than "its fun to play with friends". I think Jimmy is right, any future successful MMOs will need to break up the traditional leveling up on mobs and quests type of gameplay, and introduce other systems to advance in the game world. In my own opinion, which is not the normal one I imagine, I would like a MMO that leaned more into the needing of others to progress. I personally dislike questing with other people in WoW, because only a select few quests really need a second player, and you end up wasting a lot of time lining up and completing quest objectives. But a game world where the difficulty level encouraged at least one other player would hit differently. I think a game that perfected a 2 to 3 player mode of gameplay that wasn't a form of PVP, would be amazing. 2 to 3 players to tackle the static world, and instanced dungeons/raids that required more players.

@Madseasonshow, played Runescape for 9 years, I really couldn't afford World of the Warcraft during my youth, so Runescape was a cheaper alternative. Runescape was starting to become monetized around 2010's and eventually involved into a whole new game, Runescape 3. Most hardcore fans of the series stopped playing, and lead Jagex (game developers of Runescape) to reintroduce Runescape as Old School Runescape (an older version of the game with no montization). What is so interesting is that Old School Runescape is completely Community driven by its player base. Every couple of months, Jagex puts in game polls where players can vote on new content they would implement in the game. If the majority of player do not vote on it, I mean like 80 to 90%, then it's not added to the game. It's a really cool way for the developers to reach out to community and stay in touch with the player base. I think most of the innovation stuck with Old school Runescape, as Runescape 3 is a cash grab system. I personally go back to runescape here and there, but not as much as WoW has grabbed most of my attention. Just a little insight from a guy who used to love playing Runescape on a daily basis.

I actually think there's better potential for MMOs to go the other way - a return to more traditional MMOs. Three reasons why: 1. Classic WoW's success shows that there's a market for how MMOs used to work. Since classic is still going years later, it's more than just nostalgia at this point. 2. Advances in AI and game development tools have made it feasible for small teams to take on big projects, and there's no shortage of web hosting for whatever kinds of servers are needed. This means that, if not now then soon, it will be feasible for smaller game companies to produce MMOs. Those games likely come without the same polish as a AAA game but are functional nonetheless. 3. The risk of microtransactions have caused a growing number of players to swear off of that monetization scheme entirely. When a game like BG3 comes out where the developers say, specifically, this game is what it is and will never have microtransactions, that alone can create goodwill and publicity, and leads to an interested playerbase. With all of these things together, my suspicion is that the next big MMO won't be big in the sense that it captures a huge audience of players. Rather, it will be big in the sense that it sees overwhelming success despite coming from a small or lesser-known developer, and it will feature a return to MMO traditions such as an emphasis on the leveling phase and dependence on group play.

Instead of spamming kill 20 goblins while level 40 just make a quest, get into a mage tower and find a missing scroll, sit by a campfire with other player for 5 minutes. It would set much more interesting "goal" rather than doing the same thing over and over again, but quest for killing 8 wolves while u are low level are okay imo.

I think Riot figured out they can't make an MMORPG because they have to make a game for their audience and that audience doesn't want a real MMORPG.

Prewatch-thoughts: As a game developer, I think we are a couple of technological advancements away from a new era of MMOs The gaming industry was totally changed once the ability to be an indie dev was in reach for the every person. As a whole, the MMO genre is not that accessible for indie devs. However, Cloud computing has never been more accessible than now. And with promising tools for indie devs, like the Godot project, I think it's only a matter of time before the first truly successful Indie MMO breaks onto the scene. And once it's done for the first time, it will be replicated. Okay, time to watch the video and I'll give my post-watch thoughts below

I think the problem is the economy of the game, the developers always want to capitalize on the game economy but buying and trading is a lot of what makes an MMO fun. A new good MMO needs to have a completely player driven economy imo

WoW and its ancestors Everquest/Ultima were the OG social media. in 2004 there was no facebook, no discord, no youtube and the now-defunct myspace was barely a year old. 2004WoW was a persistent 24/7 online server and chat room with a side of fantasy rpg. It struck at the perfect time where the tech was finally good enough to create something new and magical. The next "Good" MMO that will pull off* the modern equivalent of what WoW did is just waiting in the wings of possibility, biding its time for a corresponding quantum leap in technology. The spirit is willing but the hardware is buggy and prone to latency issues

So long as quarterly profits take front and center over a good product that can sell and stand on its own. No. The answer is no. It will never get better.

Glad to see you enjoying making content again,

Can we take a moment to appreciate that THIS is how you make a REACTION video?! You actually elaborate on certain topics, take time to properly articulate and make additional points that ADD to the original video. Not like all thes reaction videos of ppl just watching laughing and saying nothing !

This is my favorite "react" video that I've ever watched. Always a pleasure 🙂

Loving the new videos 🙌

I remember there was a plan for a Magic the Gathering MMO and was so excited. Then nothing for years. Then when they said anything they were not going to do it because they couldn’t figure out how to do spells and combat in the game. I was so bummed because I would have loved to see the game play as its own world in the MTG multiverse or have us be planeswalkers and able to hop around from plane to plane as different zones/ expansions. So much possibilities. But excuses I still don’t understand. Really wanted to be a beast master and just summon all those beasts to fight with.

just wanna say LOVE all the new react content, mad! keep em coming

Love to see you branching out. Thanks for keeping us entertained.