MMORPG Sequels Equal Death

MMOCrunch brings us an analysis of why and how making sequels for MMORPGs is typically a bad idea.

A few months ago, last Dec 2007, Eve Online underwent a huge update with their Trinity expansion. This free expansion not only added new features, ships and items, but was also a complete graphical update to keep up with the next generation of MMOs. Eve Online as far as I know is the first MMO to completely revamp their current game instead of creating a sequel which not only keeps all your current members, but creates enough of a buzz much like a sequel to boost membership numbers.

Taking a look at some past sequels, Asheron’s Call 2, Everquest 2 and Lineage 2, none of these sequels were able to match their predecessor’s in terms of members. Not only that, but if you combined the numbers from both games after a year, they were less than the original game at its peak.