Many online games rely on a certain rhythm and weekly rituals. In WoW there is the raid lockout, in Destiny 2 comes Xur, in Hearthstone new daily quests appear, and in Fortnite every Thursday is chaotic. We want to know from you: Do you follow the rhythm of your game?
What are these rituals? Online games set a certain rhythm.
- The major rhythms are about: A new update should come every 3 months, a major expansion or even a new game every year or every two years.
- But the smaller rhythms are more present in everyday life: Every Tuesday is a reset, after that, the bosses in the raids and their loot are back. New quests come every day, and new challenges appear once a week.
- Guilds, clans, or gamer friends set their own rhythm: Every Tuesday we do a special strike together, every Thursday is raid night, and every two weeks we have clan meetings.
Rhythms are immensely important for the success of games
What do these rhythms aim to achieve? For the games, it’s about stronger customer retention. Every online game wants high “Player Retention.” Players who were there at launch should still log in at least once a week three months later. That’s the stated goal.
High player retention leads to customers buying the next expansion later, spending money in the cash shop, or even maintaining a subscription monthly.
Sometimes even cult-like: Certain rituals can be crucial for a game’s success. Beyond the borders of Destiny, the vendor “Xur” became known. He appeared on Friday morning and left on Sunday morning.
No one really knew at first what he would have. But everyone knew: I need the stuff. The ritual was so new that many became interested in this phenomenon in 2014, even if they didn’t play Destiny.
Success guarantee: It is striking that today every online game that takes off establishes such rhythms. For example, in Fortnite …
- every Tuesday there is a patch that changes the balance or brings new items
- every Thursday new challenges (like the clay shooting this week) and usually new “limited time modes”
- and every 10 weeks a new “season” starts with map changes and a new battle pass – there is a lot of hype about that weeks in advance. This ritual compensates for the fact that Fortnite, as a free-to-play title, does not release DLC or expansions.
This rhythm is one of the secrets to the success that makes Fortnite earn so much money. They are said to have made a billion US dollars by now.
Rituals need new content
But there is also a diminishing returns effect: However, such effects fade if the rituals are not regularly fed with new content. So a raid reset in WoW is only exciting as long as the raid still poses a challenge and you want to get the new loot.
Even Xur in Destiny 2 has long lost his appeal. The mystery has faded, and his offerings are no longer as exciting as they once were.
Players often groan under the rituals over the months and years. They wish for something new when they do the same thing for the forty-eighth time.
Today we want to know from you:
- Do you follow such rituals?
- Do you play differently on certain days?
- Do you have fixed dates with your friends that you adhere to?
- Are you looking forward to certain days in your game because something exciting happens?
