The Slow Downfall of Live Service Games

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The video game industry is a complex beast, the need to continue on paths of unsustainable growth has lead to companies innovating and pushing the boundaries of what’s possible. The general idea is you make a breathtaking game that does things gamers have never seen before, and you’ll be rewarded for it with sales of said game. However, there is very little continued spending in this scenario. Just years of hard work, a spike in revenue, and the hope that what you made will last you until the next game or get you purchased by someone with deeper pockets.

But there have been games that subsist long after their release; World of Warcraft had seen many expansions and tweaks since originally coming out in 2004. Blizzard accomplished this by charging the users a month subscription on top of the initial purchase to continue enjoying the game. I recall during the days of the 360 wondering if the experience of a true MMO would ever come to console.

In 2014 my question was answered when Bungie, creators of the much loved Halo series, released Destiny, one of the most expensive games ever made. Claims now revised as misunderstood quotes made note of a ten year plan for the game itself, something completely foreign to console gamers at the time and after seeing how it turned out, still just a pipe dream. Destiny did well financially making over $500 million on day one. However, it left much to be desired from a player’s perspective, taking years to become the game everyone hoped it would be upon launch.

That mattered little to rival companies, as all they saw were the dollar signs attached to Destiny’s name. Soon we would have games like The Division, occupying the same space as a looter shooter, and encountering similar problems with it not reaching its true potential until years after release. Once again, The Division won big in the sales department, with Ubisoft announcing it had 20 million players by its second anniversary. However, many of those players never saw what the game became and knew only the disappoint that came with its launch.

Fallout 76 was the next high profile live service game to disappoint fans. As a big fan of the post apocalypse franchise, I had often hoped that one day I’d be able to roam the wasteland with friends. With many issues at launch, which have been meticulously and some might say, obsessively documented by critics on YouTube, I now hope that when it is finally in a state deemed acceptable, people will still be interested in joining me.

Unfortunately, or fortunately if you’re looking to try to get some of that sweet sweet outrage money, BioWare was another beloved developer to earn the internet’s fire. Known for hits such as Knights of the Old Republic, Dragon Age, and Mass Effect, it stood to reason that this would be the company to buck the trend and release something truly special. Anthem is not that game, it suffers from many of the same things as the other games mentioned in this blog; bugs, technical problems, and lack of endgame content to name a few. I have faith they will figure this game out, but as I mentioned in a previous blog, first impressions can be everything.

Along the way Bungie released Destiny 2, forgoing the rumored 10 year plan for the first game, and didn’t address some of the key problems players had with the first. With poor sales from Anthem and excitement being lukewarm for The Division 2, around many parts of the Internet one has to wonder, have consumers been burned one too many times? Will they stop reaching for the hot stove top? Will this prompt developers to re-evaluate their plans? At the time of writing that remains unclear, but we’ll have the answers sooner than later.

Lost in this is the continued support Sony and Nintendo have given to story driven experiences, resulting in big hits like Horizon Zero Dawn and Breath of the Wild. Proving there is still a demand for these types of games, and hopefully giving big companies pause. I leave you and the video game industry at large with a question; is the short term boost of cash brought about by the release of a live service game worth potential damage done to a studio’s reputation and brand?

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