The next big MMORPG needs to revolutionize the genre

The largest and most successful MMORPGs are theme park games. They rely on story content, exploration of areas, dungeons, raids, and instanced PvP. But they all share a problem: the content runs out faster than developers can deliver it. To trigger another big hype, new MMORPGs need the help of players, says MeinMMO editor Alexander Leitsch.

WoW generated a hype around MMORPGs after its release in 2004/2005. This was also due to the fact that WoW broke with some traditions of the genre and thus revolutionized MMORPGs:

The entry into the game was as easy as in no other MMORPG before.
Death was not harshly punished, for example, by losing equipment or experience, as was common in old games.
Although WoW was not the first MMORPG with instances, no game focused as much on it as WoW did.
There was competition between Alliance and Horde, but PvP in the open world was not a must, because there were extra PvE servers.

Of course, the background story of Warcraft, Blizzard’s budget, and the comparatively good graphics at the time played a role. But WoW stamped the genre with such an impressive mark that many more games followed, later called “WoW clones“.

The article was originally published in July 2022 and was updated in April 2023.

However, since then there have been no major changes in MMORPGs. Even today, new games either orient themselves towards WoW’s successful formula or try to bring the “old school” feeling of old titles like Ultima Online or Dark Age of Camelot into a modern MMORPG.

But to truly be a huge success, there needs to be (a small) revolution again. And I see that in the collaboration between players and developers.

By the way, copying WoW was not enough to be successful, as these examples show:

5 MMORPGs that Should Have Been WoW Killers But Failed

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Player-generated content for endless fun in PvE

The big problem that new theme park MMORPGs keep having is the lack of endgame content. No matter how good the entry and leveling phase are, the game content becomes too thin in the end. This was a major criticism at the launch of ESO and is still held against New World.

I see the solution in editors and programs that are easy to use and in which players can create their own content:

They can create dungeons and raids and make these experiences so challenging that other players struggle with them for weeks or months.
They could build their own areas – with quest lines, world bosses, and other challenges.
Even their own PvP arenas or complete PvP modes would be possible.

Of course, some balance must be struck here. Areas and quest lines should, for fairness, be taken over and officially implemented by the developers. Otherwise, exploits or game-breaking bugs could be possible.

But especially with own dungeons, raids, and PvP modes, I see huge potential. Since these take place in instances, they do not have a direct impact on the game world.

Theoretically, it would even be possible to completely forgo loot and rewards, as I believe players often are satisfied just experiencing this content, achieving world firsts, or hosting events that they experience as a guild or stream on Twitch.

The fact that the development of content by players is a great enrichment is evident in many games:

Skyrim is still a popular game, partly because the modding community continually provides new content worthy of an addon.
Pure sandbox games like Minecraft thrive on crazy servers or communities.
In Super Mario Maker, people create the toughest levels ever, and players enjoy mastering such challenges.

Some modders are so good that they even get hired by the developers afterward, as was the case with a modder for Fallout 4 and Bethesda.

Who is actually speaking here? Alexander Leitsch is the MMORPG expert at MeinMMO and grew up with Guild Wars 1. He has spent over 10,000 hours playing it. Since 2009, however, he has been around in almost every new MMORPG. He currently spends most of his time in New World, but also enjoys testing indie titles like Broken Ranks.

No revolution on the horizon, also because EverQuest Next failed

When I look at the MMORPGs that will be released in the coming years, I am actually not very pessimistic. Ashes of Creation will surely generate a hype and relies to a certain extent on sandbox elements, such as conquering, leveling, and expanding cities. Players thus create new content themselves.

But at its core, Ashes of Creation is a PvP MMORPG, and even though I will have a lot of fun with it, I know that the large majority favors theme park and even single-player elements. This audience probably will not be retained long by Ashes of Creation, as it focuses too much on social communities.

The upcoming Throne and Liberty by NCSoft also has a strong PvP focus, while Justice Online looks so much like an Asian MMORPG that it probably won’t have a fair chance in the West.

Also, aside from these big titles, I see no MMORPG that relies so heavily on player-generated content as would be necessary for a great revolution in the genre. Only in the past was there once a game that sounded exactly like what I would wish for EverQuest Next. But unfortunately, the game failed, just like two other titles that also wanted to revolutionize the genre: