So here's the interesting thing... (Destiny)

by Cody Miller , Music of the Spheres - Never Forgot, Friday, February 12, 2016, 18:22 (3003 days ago) @ CruelLEGACEY

I'm a bit torn on this... Lately I've been wondering if I wish Bungie had just gone full MMO with Destiny in terms of monetization, content generation, and release schedules (don't freak out, Cody... I do NOT want typical MMO farming/fetch-quest activities).

I don't think that will help at all. You simply can't create meaningful content fast enough. There is a reason every single MMO on the planet sucks donkey balls: they have to stretch the content out to keep people busy till they make more.

I think I would be perfectly happy to pay $10 or $15 per month to play Destiny if we got the same kinds of regular content updates that WOW gets; significant, world-changing updates with boatloads of new activities. I'd be happy to pay another $40-$60 once every year or two, in addition to the monthly fee, for major expansions that add whole new locations, factions, enemy types, and large chunks of story content. I'd be happy to have Destiny exist as a game that keeps growing and growing without ever needing to reset or start us back at level 1.

If Bungie could deliver this, we'd have DLC every two months. They can't. Nobody can. Because Destiny has such heavy FPS elements, they have to make FPS environments, which are difficult and time consuming. Making RPG environments is much simpler since the interaction in MMORPGs is not very interesting or sophisticated.

Maybe this is because I've never actually played an MMO, so I don't have the same love/hate relationship with the idea that many WOW players have developed over the years. Or maybe it's because I don't find Destiny's combat to be very enjoyable until the upper levels, when my character's ability tree is fully unlocked and I have access to a wide array of gear. The idea of starting over from scratch is not exciting or appealing to me.

This is an interesting point, and also why DLC and incremental / episodic releases are worse than full games. Simply put, if you release a full game with lots of content you can effectively pace things out. You can't do that with a DLC model.