On Wednesday, seven-years-in-the-making Darkfall Online proved that having the longest development cycle of any game in history is no substitute for competency. After perhaps the most inelegant launch in MMO history, the game’s shocking lack of polish, poor user interface, and frustrating combat system are already driving players away.

On Friday, Age of Conan game director Craig Morrison addressed concerns about the current status and future of the game. AoC has been reportedly hemorrhaging subscribers–so many that Funcom had to consolidate the game’s existing 49 servers into just 18. The company has been plagued with departures of top executives, including AoC’s original game director and Funcom’s chief financial officer. Worst of all, Funcom reported a $33.8 million net loss in 2008 despite having one of the top 10 best-selling PC titles. It is currently estimated that Age of Conan boasts under 100,000 active subscribers.

On Saturday, the universe of Tabula Rasa came to a spectacular conclusion as developers chose to mark the shut down of the failed MMO’s servers with a game-wide apocalyptic alien invasion. The end comes as no surprise; both players and industry professionals have been speculating on the game’s demise since the departure of its creator, Richard Garriot (AKA Lord British), in November.

Today, Mythic releases the Bitter Rivals patch 1.2 for Warhammer Online as the first installment of its Call to Arms “live expansion”. The update introduces two new melee classes classes (the Dwarf Slayer and the Orc Choppa), the Bitter Rivals live event, new items, career balancing, and over 500 bug fixes. Players participating in the live event will be the first to gain access to the new playable classes at its completion on March 10th; everyone else will have to wait until the 17th.

Warhammer Online hits hard times

The new content patch comes at a pivotal moment in the history of WAR. On February 3rd, to the surprise of many, EA noted in its quarterly earnings report that Warhammer Online maintains only about 300,000 subscribers–a far cry from the 750,000 who signed up at launch on September 18, 2008. One cannot help but ponder that the poor performance of the MMO has something to do with the recent layoffs at Mythic. On January 16th, Joystiq reported that “21 customer service employees, half of QA and all of the playtest group” got the axe.

In the spirit of full disclosure, I should admit that I maintain a subscription to Warhammer Online, however I haven’t been motivated to play in a couple of months. My inattentiveness to WAR is not for lack of quality or content–I firmly believe that Warhammer Online is a superb game that doesn’t get even half the credit which it deserves. The PvE content feels slightly generic from its lack of narrative, but the environments are beautiful, diverse, and inspired. Despite clamorings of PvP being unbalanced, I find open RvR and scenarios to be immensely fun.

The real reason why I never found myself staying up to slay the forces of Destruction at 3 am was because I never got a sense of cohesive community (outside of guilds) from the game. The lack of community is directly caused by Mythic’s decision to never develop a meaningful player economy in WAR. Since its release, gold has had virtually no purpose in the game as the best gear is earned through questing rather than being dropped (and unbound) or crafted. Without the need to trade goods or make use of the auction house, player interaction becomes almost unnecessary which results in few relationships and friendships being formed. Furthermore, players can queue for RvR scenarios anywhere in the game, decreasing the need to gather in population centers even more. As a result, cities do not have the characteristic hustle and bustle that one would expect.

Life after 40

While community aspect of WAR is a problem, it only represents one piece of the puzzle as to why players have abandoned the game. Not having a guild or in-game friends makes leveling a chore, even with the streamlined quest system that Mythic has created with the Tome of Knowledge, which represents a large hurdle to those gunning for the level cap.

Level 40, however, has its own problems. In World of Warcraft, raiding represents the most dominant path of endgame progression and most of the development cycle is devoted to generating content to retain players. The Bastion Stairs and other dungeons fill this niche in Warhammer Online to an extent, but the game was never intended to be a mindless PvE gear grind like WoW. Where Mythic has failed is in creating a meaningful way of advancing via PvP after hitting max rank. Grinding renown is an unsatisfactory solution to competitive-minded players much as it was maligned with WoW’s old PvP ranking system. What WAR needs is some sort of ladder advancement akin to Blizzard’s arena system in order to recognize either individual or team achievement. Such a system would force players to form bonds with others, which are integral to retaining players who don’t want to lose touch with people whom they feel connected to on a personal level. And, unlike PvE and RvR scenarios, ladder advancement takes much longer to feel stale since the intricacies of fierce competition are radically altered by even small balance changes amongst the classes (ie, the buff/nerf cycle).

Can orange mohawks save Warhammer Online?

While the “live expansion” is marketed to make players feel like they’re getting content that they’d normally have to pay extra for at retail, I don’t think Call to Arms is the solution that Warhammer Online needs right now. I believe that the developers at Mythic certainly deserve great praise not only for their constant stream of quality updates, but also for the excellent communication with the game’s community through forums, the herald, and their newsletter. Unfortunately, the content doesn’t address the aforementioned problems with the game that lie at the heart of WAR’s dwindling subscriber base. On the bright side, 300,000 is still a very solid number and, unlike Funcom, Mythic still has the opportunity to turn things around.

Similar Posts:

• Mythic Offers 10-Day Free Trial of Warhammer Online
• Warhammer Online Announces ‘Call to Arms’ Live Expansion, 2 New Player Careers
• S-O-S! Mythic Closes 63 Warhammer Online Servers
• More Playable Classes Coming to Warhammer Online
• Dawn of War 2 Patch 1.2.1 Coming to a Computer Near You on 4/13/09