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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lazybones" data-source="post: 923972" data-attributes="member: 143">I don't really play MMORPGs, so I can't really comment on how fun or not-fun they are.  Personally I'm opposed to pay-as-you pay when there are free alternatives out there.  I considered buying Planetside, for example, but finally decided to stick with Battlefield 1942 for my FPS fix, despite the problems that game has.  However, it does seem like a pattern is repeating itself here.  Each genre of PC game, it seems, has a break-out title or two that really popularizes the genre, leading to a massive explosion of "me-too" games that ultimately saturate the market.  We saw it with the Doom/Quake clones in the FPS genre.  We saw it with the umpteen RTS games that followed the success of the initial Command and Conquer series.  Sure, there is innovation--look at how games like Deus Ex and Jedi Knight took the FPS experience to new levels, and how Age of Empires and Starcraft re-explored the RTS landscape.  But for every innovative title there seems to be dozens more that just repeat the same basic game experience over and over again.  The latest issue of PC Gamer has an article about the bourgeoning MMORPG market.  Apparently there's some one hundred and seventeen MMORPGs either in the release pipeline or under development.  How these publishers expect all of these titles to find market share is beyond me.  I don't mind having a lot of choices to choose from, and I know there will always be cheap copies of the latest fashions to sort through.  I just wish that more developers would encourage innovation (I know, I know, that means more risk, and we're talking about businesses here).  Looking back over the last six months or so, of the scores of titles that have been released, I don't see all that many creative and new releases like Freedom Force, or Neverwinter Nights, Battlefield 1942... or even Vice City (which I haven't bought, but which is definitely pushing the envelope!).  Instead when I go to the store I see a hundred re-takes on what's already come before.  Ah well, capitalism.</blockquote>

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