One more quest: How mobile gaming reshaped online RPGs

Smartphone and tablets have changed the landscape for gaming. For one, it has made a gamer out of those who would have never even imagined playing a PC or console game, much less consider themselves a gamer. But even for those who have already been whiling away hours in front of the TV or the monitor, the culture of mobile has also changed a few things. Take for example the corner of the gaming world known as online RPGs and how the ubiquity of smartphones have somewhat redefined that genre, for better or for worse.

The Past

Ask a veteran and a new gamer what an online RPG is and they will undoubtedly give you different answers. Of course, there will be certain commonalities, like the requirement to be online (duh), the adoption of roles or job classes, and the need to hoard loot and experience. But ask them about the experience, both mechanical and social, and they will most likely give you different, if not diverging, opinions.

Before smartphones, online RPGs were, more often than not, called MMORPGs or massively multiplayer online RPGs. And that's because they were truly massive, both in the number of players they support at any given time, as well as the scale of the game world itself. Sprawling areas that spanned virtual continents, sometimes even planets, towns that make real world flea markets look deserted, and party or guild mates that felt just as real as your next door neighbors. This is the world of the likes of Guild Wars, World of Warcraft, and Ultima. This was the online RPG, before the idea of squeezing them into perpetually mobile device even became fashionable.

Mobile Constraints

Understandably, it was nigh impossible to compress all of that into a smartphone or a tablet, both the experience as well as the games themselves. Forget first the technical limitations of a smartphone. One has to consider the fact that not all game makers have the capacity to run massive servers like those mentioned above. A few hundred players they can support, maybe a thousand at most. Of course, there are companies like Gameloft or EA that can handle a lot more, but most of the time, they don't really scale.

Then there's the fact that one usually doesn't spend hours playing on a smartphone. At least not normally. At most, one can spend half an hour of uninterrupted gaming during the day, more during the night. The normal span, however, was measured in minutes. As such, the open ended, open world gameplay of online RPGs also do not scale down to size, where quests took longer to complete and raids required the full might of a ten-man party.

Of course, these days, the tides are shifting again. Mobile gamers are staying glued to their screens for hours, tapping like there's no tomorrow on Clash of Clans, forming friendships online that are just as strong offline. Online mobile gaming is indeed being reshaped, but this now and was definitely not back then.

Sweets and Avians

And then came along blockbuster casual games like Angry Birds and Candy Crush. People, even those who don't consider themselves gamers, would lose hours, not to mention dollars, playing those games and their kin. Clearly, they were doing something right that not only got people hooked, but also got people playing at any time that they wanted.

Of course, there are many factors that contributed to the success of these games, but one of the most unique things was the progression system. It presented levels as small, bit-sized chunks that you can play in just a few minutes, usually one or two. It visually showed a clear path of progress. The short bursts meant you didn't have to worry about spending too much time on the game. It gave you a sense of control, though, in fact, it was also somewhat of an illusion. While you could indeed stop when you wanted to, the gratification system, which bombarded you with victories every other minute, meant you were hopelessly hooked.

A new breed

Mobile games started to adopt this system and, in due time, it would also make its way to RPGs. Curiously, it was adopted more by RPGs that required you to be online. Offline games like the Zenonia series, for example, followed the traditional story-driven path. Online RPGs, however, needed a better hook than a deep storyline. And that's when the "casual online RPG" genre, for lack of a better name, was born.

It was like Final Fantasy meets Angry Birds. It has the strappings of an RPG game, with customizable characters, loots galore, and the semblance of a plot. But there was also staged progression, where parts of the story are dished out piecemeal and in almost disconnected fashion. Every minute or so you could choose stop and return to the real world and it would not make a dent in your gaming experience.

Majority of these RPGs become more like short skirmishes, with slaying one wave of enemy after another as the primary goal. And after a period of screen mashing and swiping, the player is thrown back to "town", more often than not just a screen littered with menus for equipment, skills, and cash shops.

Sure, some mobile online RPGs do inject a bit of social activity, which takes different forms. Sometimes, it can be as simple as a list of friends whose characters you can summon to your aid even when their owners are offline. It can also be as elaborate as guilds or some semblance of it, allowing players to, from time to time, band together for a common goal or raid. But these social features, more often than not, are tacked on. These online games remain primarily solitary games that you just happen to play online.

The Dilution

Such online RPG games have proliferated and flourished with such a basic pattern that has been repeated and copied to no end. While that is, to some extent, a good thing, pulling in more people into the world of mobile gaming and increasing the army of gamers worldwide, it also served to dilute the some of the key experiences of an RPG, particularly an online one.

"RPG" has become a blanket term to cover any game that involves growing characters and their equipment. It barely matters if there's any rhyme or reason to the game. In fact, in many of the games, the plot is practically a very thin excuse to kill enemies. Call it a single-player MOBA (if such an oxymoron did exist) and it would change nothing. These games have the "game" part down to a T, but the "role-playing" aspect has been lost somewhere in transition. Instant gratification has become the name of the game. Somewhat ironically, those bits of gratification do pile up, turning what should be just minutes of gameplay into hours.

The "online" part has also somewhat lost its meaning, though happily not completely. Some mobile games even advertise themselves as mobile MMORPGs and yet fall short of the MMO half. In particular, the social aspects become dwarfed. Friend Lists, leaderboards, and chats are good, but they too don't come close. Nothing replaces the feeling of logging into a town full of other players going about their business, or exploring vast maps with new found friends, or the thrill of taking down a boss monster with your long-term guildmates. Those were the experiences that have drawn and hooked thousands of players to MMORPGs. Now we wait for the same to happen with our smartphones.

Final Thoughts: A New Hope

Apart from a few outliers, this has been the state of mobile gaming for quite some time now. But it seems that there are stirrings happening rather quietly. Mobile devices and frameworks have evolved to the point that games need to worry less about hardware capabilities, giving game makers some leeway to break from the mold and experiment a bit. They no longer need to worry too much that devices can only load very small scenes and very few assets, which limit how much you can accomplish in a game. And we can see some faint trails of those.

Gameloft paved the way with its Order and Chaos Online, with O&C almost like its take on the Warcraft franchise. Recently, games like Iruna Online and Izanagi Online have also popped up. What these three have in common is an open world more like a traditional MMORPG and all that it entails. Perfect World Entertainment and Snail Games, both legends in the PC MMORPG scene, are also bringing their titles to mobile, though it remains to be seen if they will take the easy, cookie cutter path or blaze a new trail.

With advancements in mobile technology and hardware, game designers are more free to think less about hardware constraints and really answer the hard questions. With the changing behavior of mobile device users, they also need not worry anymore about whether there will be players willing to spend more than just a few minutes on a well done, addictive title. And hopefully, we will also get to see more mobile gamers daring to go beyond their comfort zones and venture into the dangerous world outside their cave, sword and shied in hand.

Women gamers make a statement at Electronic Entertainment Expo

Women showed their emerging presence in the video game world at the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) this week.

The three-day event at the Convention Center in Los Angeles, California, is home to the world’s premier trade show for computer, video and mobile gaming. The conference is attended by software developers, programmers, distributors, entertainment industry representatives, venture capitalists, and video game consumers. Big name companies in attendance include Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo.

And this year, whether it be programmers or fans, women were in high attendance at the traditionally male-dominated expo. 

Video game console, Xbox (owned by Microsoft) had a plethora of their gaming presentations operated by female leaders and executives, according to NBC News Los Angeles.

RELATED: Feminist critic forced to cancel lecture after gun threat

“Sometimes, girls feel as if video games aren’t meant for them,” said Erica Hampson, a game developer for Virgini to NBC News. “Games used to be very sexualized but it’s been getting a lot better.”

With a strong increase in female attendance at the conference, more female characters were displayed in new game releases.

Emily Kaldwin, the assassin in Bethesda Softworks’ “Dishonoured 2,” Rae, a blind female character in Microsoft’s “Beyond Eyes,” and a female hunter in Sony’s “Horizon: Zero Dawn,” were some of the new heroines presented, according to the Associated Press. These characters all joined established female lead characters like Lara Croft of “Tomb Raider” series.

Meanwhile, Bethesda’s “Fallout 4,” EA’s “Mass Effect: Andromeda” and Ubisoft’s “Assassin’s Creed: Syndicate,” gave players the option to play as female characters. In addition, “FIFA ’16” is introducing women teams, as the 2015 FIFA Women’s World Cup is currently underway.

A small all-female gaming development group from South Carolina called 3 Queens also made an appearance at E3, to introduce their new game “Creeping with the Crudashians,” a mobile game parody of “Keeping Up With the Kardashians,” according to MTV News.

Before “Creeping with the Crudashians,” Cara Florence, Nicole Young, and Maureen Coffey-Edri created an mobile platform application called WeConsent2, which established affirmative consent for women who are at risk of being sexually assaulted.

The positive vibes at the expo served as a counterpoint to the prevailing image of the gaming industry as sexist, and even potentially dangerous, for women. Just last year, Anita Sarkeesian, a feminist critic who has written extensively about misogyny rampant in video games had to cancel a planned lecture at Utah State University after mass murder threats were made.

“I think that women and young girls have a different perception of gaming or even anything in technology or software-related. I think the perception is off, and if they could see more and be exposed to these types of events or opportunities and even see other women, like us, who are actually being successful at these types of opportunities, that would really inspire them. I wish that they could see that more,” Cara Florence, a co-founder of 3 Queens, told MTV News.

“Just do it, and be open to collaboration with other women too,” her fellow co-founder Nicole Young added. “Don’t be intimidated by the male dominance of this industry.” 

Can the Microsoft shake-up get Windows 10 moving in mobile?

Likely realizing the challenges ahead, the world's largest software maker announced on Wednesday an overhaul of its executive ranks. The most notable change was the departure of Stephen Elop, whose devices business -- which includes smartphones -- will be integrated into the operating systems group run by Terry Myerson.

"We are aligning our engineering efforts and capabilities to deliver on our strategy and, in particular, our three core ambitions," Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said in an email to employees. "This change will enable us to deliver better products and services that our customers love at a more rapid pace."

The shake-up underscores what's at stake if Microsoft fails to bolster its mobile presence. With Microsoft pushing the idea of getting its Windows 10 operating system on as many devices as possible -- and having them work together -- it's critical that the company establish a bigger foothold in mobile. Without the smartphone, for many the single-most important device in their lives, the idea of a seamless Windows experience between devices breaks down.

"Microsoft's reorg shows that Microsoft is determined to be a part of the mobile mind shift, and that their mobile efforts will benefit from closer engineering alignment with Windows," said Forrester analyst Frank Gillett.

For most people, the idea of a Windows phone remains foreign. Smartphones running on Microsoft's Windows Phone operating system (which will be rebranded to Windows 10 Mobile) made up only 2.5 percent of the global market in the first quarter -- a fraction down from a year ago, according to Gartner. In comparison, Android controlled nearly 80 percent of the market, with iPhones making up 18 percent.

That task is now up to Myerson, who will lead the newly created Windows and Devices Group and will focus on "enabling more personal computing experiences powered by the Windows ecosystem."

Microsoft didn't make Myerson available for interviews.

For Elop, the departure marks the end of his four-year quest to get consumers to buy a Windows Phone, first as the CEO of Nokia, when, in 2011, he controversially shifted the Finnish phone giant's strategy toward Microsoft's mobile operating system. Elop, who originally left Microsoft to join Nokia, returned after the software giant acquired Nokia's devices business in 2014.

His unit, however, released only a handful of cheaper, lower profile devices under Microsoft, and Elop was absent from the company's Build developer conference keynote presentation in April.

Better  together

One of the challenges Elop faced -- and Microsoft still faces -- has been the lack of popular apps available when compared with Android and Apple's iOS operating system. Whether it's new games like Fallout Shelter or social networks like Snapchat, there remains a lot missing from the Windows App Store. Even if a popular app like Spotify shows up, it's often much later in the game.

Microsoft's pitch has been that the common foundation behind Windows 10, which will power PCs, tablets and smartphones, allows developers to write an app for one device and easily have it run on the others. The hope is that more apps pop up for all Windows users.

It's a story that's been told before by Microsoft, even back when Windows 8 was making its debut with the idea of the common tile-based user interface across PCs, phones and tablets. But back then, there were still fundamental differences between the guts of the mobile and PC platforms, something they've worked on for Windows 10.

Microsoft's move to create a new group under Myerson also underscores the importance of tying together parts of the business that have largely run separate from each other.

"When you talk about integration between software and devices, you need to integrate on the staff level," said Chris Hazelton, an analyst at 451 Research. "This will give you the full integration that Microsoft wants."

Progress with Surface

Microsoft has already made strides in one aspect of the mobile business: tablets. Its Surface Pro 3 has proved to be a hit with consumers, particularly business-minded ones.

In January, Microsoft declared that Surface represented a billion-dollar business, led by the high-end version of the tablet. Its rise comes as Apple's own iPad business has struggled with declining revenue.

"It's stealing share from competitors and slowed the growth of the iPad," Hazelton said.

The Surface Pro 3 is an important ingredient in Microsoft's software-anywhere recipe, but Myerson needs to parlay that success into broader interest in its Windows smartphones.

Surface Pro 3 was successful enough that Elop hinted that the next Microsoft flagship smartphone could find inspiration in the tablet.

"There are a few clues on a device like this," he said in an interview in March as he grabbed a Surface Pro 3.

So where is that flagship smartphone?

All the software improvements and integration in the world won't get consumers excited about Windows 10 Mobile without a sexy flagship product to rally behind. One of Myerson's biggest priorities in his new role is to ensure that Microsoft has an exciting product (or products) to push when the new Windows Phone platform, Windows Mobile 10, makes its debut.

"The lack of a halo device is a major gap in their portfolio," Hazelton said.

The older Windows Phone platform has clung to its market share by offering affordable smartphones in the emerging markets. In the US, it has similarly won a small following through attractively priced devices. On Wednesday, AT&T said it would sell its large Lumia 640 XL smartphone for $8.34 a month for 30 months, or roughly $250.

These devices, however, tend to get overshadowed by higher profile -- and more expensive -- products such as Apple's iPhone 6 or Samsung's Galaxy S6, which benefit from significant advertising and retail support.

Getting that high-profile device in the hands of consumers is vital to showing off the new Microsoft, one in which all of its software and experiences can flow from device to device.

Microsoft has already made progress with the Surface Pro 3. It's a virtual certainty that the PC and laptop makers will heavily push Windows 10-powered devices when they become available. The missing link is the smartphone.

"If I can move seamlessly between devices, I can see the value in having a Windows smartphone," Hazelton said.