How many designers have been asked to make a “GTA killer”, or a “Guitar Hero killer”, or a “WoW killer”? I personally have heard numerous designers and producers working on unreleased MMO projects describe their game in these terms: “It’s like WoW, but…” I just shake my head when I hear this, because the team that is best poised to deliver a successful game that is an evolution of WoW is… well, the WoW team. They’ve got their thing, and they’re good at it. Let’s all carve out our own thing, and be the best at it. Truly great games are made by passionate teams who are on fire with the notion of changing the industry. If you are aiming at a competitor rather than aiming to make something fresh and innovative, you’ve lost.
—
How to Create a Successful MMO by Jeff Strain.
How to Create a Successful MMO by Jeff Strain.
Tom G
on 13 Oct 10Sometimes aiming at a competitor in a fresh and innovative way leads to the biggest advances in technology.
CP/M -> DOS -> Xerox Lisa -> Macintosh
There is room for true innovation as well as incremental advancement.
Jason Klug
on 13 Oct 10I’ve always liked this quote from Mike Lazardis of Research in Motion (creators of the BlackBerry):
Found that gem in Roger Martin’s book: “The Design of Business: Why Design Thinking is the Next Competitive Advantage”, which I’d also suggest if the topic of business innovation interests you.
Wil Brawley
on 13 Oct 10A great book on this topic is called “Different: Escaping the Competitive Herd.” The author covers brands that bucked conventional wisdom in highly saturated markets (JetBlue in airlines; MINI in auto; In-N-Out Burger in restaurants; etc.) and rather than one-upping the competition, they did something completely different. Very good point David and I highly recommend this book.
Richard
on 13 Oct 10Xerox made the Lisa? Dang I didn’t know that. I wonder what that apple logo on the front was about then.
Isak
on 13 Oct 10That quote is wrong. In the gaming community, Blizzard isn’t known as a very innovative company, it is known as a company that takes the best ideas from other companies and polishes them really well.
There wasn’t anything very new about World of Warcraft, but everything about it was just done incredibly well. So I wouldn’t be too surprised if the WoW team originally started thinking in terms of “like Everquest…except….”
Jonas Elfström
on 14 Oct 10Are we sure that WoW wasn’t an “Everquest killer”?
Matthew Bellows
on 14 Oct 10I worked in the videogame industry for years before starting Yesware, and Jeff is only half right. There are dozens of designers who can only describe their products in terms of what it’s “like, except…” And there are only a few designers who can be truly innovative. The trick with game design, as with most product design probably, is knowing when to innovate and when to stand on the shoulders of giants. Even the freshest experiences in games rely on precedents. And most sequels of successful franchises, even the latest patch in WoW, have real innovation.
Timothée Boucher
on 14 Oct 10It depends what the end goal is of course.
In this same gaming world, Zynga is known for remaking successful games, but they still beat the original games.
Alexander
on 14 Oct 10What about how the creators of Alien pitched their movie: “Its like Jaws, on a spaceship”.
See Chip Conley’s book on how to make stories stick, for great examples of how effective it is to reference something known, but add a distinctive twist.
Jeremy Ricketts
on 14 Oct 10One of those rare moments I kinda disagree with you guys:
WoW was not something new. It was just like Everquest (or any classic fantasy MMORPG), but… it was bigger, had more imaginative art, deeper lore, fixed critical game design flaws, had a more robust economy system, and executed on critical components (like crafting) far better than Everquest and the others.
Youtube wasn’t doing something new… they just delivered. Their videos (mostly) played every time. They had embed codes right next to the video. They had a “related videos” feature that worked much better then their competitors. They published uploaded videos much faster providing their users near-instant gratification (they still do great at this).
It’s true that something fresh and innovative can be successful even when it’s not perfect at launch (look at the first iPhone- no apps, no app store, no 3g, no GPS). But it’s also true that you don’t have to out-innovate the competition- sometimes you just have to execute and deliver it better.
Scott Drake
on 15 Oct 10Jeff is arguing that, in the nearly winner-take-all field of MMOs, it’s time to compete by doing what your competitor is not.
The next line in his speech is also telling (and echoed by previous comments):
Abiola Hondo
on 18 Oct 10I think that if your goal is to add something to a successfull product, it needs to be something really important, not a mere detail.
Robert Sullivan
on 18 Oct 10I just shake my head when I hear this, because the team that is best poised to deliver a successful game that is an evolution of WoW is… well, the WoW team.
Robert Sullivan
on 18 Oct 10(Apologies for double-post, forgot this wordpress or whatever it is has trouble with quotes, my bad, should have previewed)
C’mon, this is a typical, almost biological process. The King of the Hill rests on their accomplishments, and assumes everybody is thing that, and someone comes out with a better Microsoft Project than Microsoft. And the other piece Jeff is missing also, is that this is usually part of some disruptive technology, such as the Cloud, or peer-to-peer, as with Skype.
The caveat here is that without a level playing field (as a little history lesson for Jeff) the “DBase killer”, “Lotus Killer” or the “Wordperfect killer” will be a little easier if you own the OS underneath. But it’s still helpful to have your competitor that owns the nice, to take their eye of the ball a little, as was definitely the case with Ashton-tate and the wordperfect folks, who somehow didn’t grasp the importance of Windows.
Dan
on 19 Oct 10Yep focus on your product not your competitors. It’s all about focus.
This discussion is closed.