2008 - A Look Ahead
Note: This is a follow up to my last blog post entitled "Was '07 really a bad year for MMOGs?" located here.

   
    I've seen a lot of talk lately on game forums and other gaming blogs about what we have to look forward to in the upcoming year. After my last article giving the rundown of the previous year in the MMOG world, I figured it would be nice to do a follow up and answer some questions about the upcoming year and what it looks like as of now. Ever since World of Warcraft raised the bar in the industry, there has been a lack of creativity from game developers, who have tried to use the World of Warcraft success to their advantage instead of making a truly unique game of their own. The best example to date was this previous year, where instead of creating a new game developers just imported generic MMOGs from overseas, a lot of which were duplicates of other games such as Maplestory or even World of Warcraft. Will 2008 be any better? What do we have to look forward to?
Florensia.
    Florensia is aimed to be released into the CB phase within the first quarter of 2008. The game is a unique game that follows along the lines of Pirates of the Caribbea

Was 2007 really a bad year for MMOGs?

   Over the past month or so there has been a lot of people writing about how last year was such a terrible year in the MMOG industry. But are these people really looking at the whole picture, reviewing the entire year and all of its ups and downs, or are they just making random assumptions because they were disappointed with the lack of originality in MMOGs this year? I plan to look into last year, and give you my reasoning behind my judgment on the overview of the year.

    A lot has happened this year in the MMOG world. From new game expansions such as The Burning Crusade and Eye of the North, to entirely new imported games, straight out of the generic MMOG factory, such as Holic, Fiesta, and all of the abominations that Ijji released. We also had terrible news such as the delays of WAR and Age of Conan, two highly anticipated MMOGs. We've had more clones come out, and all of them seem to be centered around the oldest milestone for MMOGs, Diablo 2. I mean, take a look at Mythos, Dungeon Runners, and so many other MMOGs that came out in '07 alone, and a large percentage of them were clones of another MMO. But behind it all, Diablo 2 clones ru

Lately, I have seen a lot of controversy over what is considered to be an MMOG. Now, I figured I would just throw in my two cents because I have experience with all types of games in the extremely large genre of MMOG. First off, I would like to point out what the acronym MMOG actually stands for, for the few people that don't know;

Massive(ly)
Multiplayer
Online
Game

You can also make the category more specific and turn it into MMORPG, MMOFPS, and a lot more. But they are all part of the MMOG group, as the common factor is the massively multiplayer online part, and of course the game part is implied. The part where people start to get confused is how is the acronym grouped? What I mean by this is that some people will say that a MMOG must be massive, multiplayer, online, and a game (Duh!).

Then there are people that think more specifically. That a MMOG must be massively multiplayer, multiplayer online, etc.

This is what it all comes down to. The acronym of massively multiplayer online games is a definite, but then there's the controversy over how to determine the reasoning behind the definitions.

Why does it even matter? Well, the whole point is really in the massively multiplayer part.