Tim Cain and Mitch Ferguson at Able Gamers!

Carbine Design Director Tim Cain and Lead Systems Designer Mitch Ferguson sat down with our friends at Able Gamers to discuss the future of MMOs! Here's an example of the conversation, with more to be found at the link below:

AbleGamers: MMO games have an extensive fan base. What would you say contributes to its success with millions of gamers?

Tim Cain: I think the popularity of MMOs boils down to the fun of playing games with people. You do not even have to be directly competing with them. There is just the joy of knowing many people are doing what you are doing. Sure, someone might "win" by reaching the level cap before you do, but in time, you will get there too. Mostly it is about the fun you have along the way. MMOs are kind of like bingo in that way.

Mitch Ferguson: It is tribal. Your actions do not count for much if no one else sees you, or your accomplishments. I do not even believe speaking, or fighting with other players is as important as their existence in a shared space is.

AG: MMO games are hugely popular among the disabled gaming community. What sorts of features might we see to make these games more accessible to gamers with disabilities?

Tim Cain: There are many things that MMO designers (and all game designers for that matter) can do to make their games more accessible to everyone. In addition to supporting alternative input devices like trackballs and joysticks, one feature that every game should support is user-modifiable interfaces. Letting the player change the location, opacity, font size, shape and information display on the game interface is a really powerful tool. Besides, there will always be a subset of your player base, disabled or not, that does not like how the game UI is laid out and wants to do it better. I say give them the tools and let them do it!

Personally, I was happy to see Blizzard add color-blindness options to World of Warcraft. I am slowly losing my color vision and that game was becoming hard to play for me. It uses color to deliver a lot of information to the player and I had to ignore that information, or get a friend to help me. The new option makes the game, especially the trade skills, something I can play solo again.

You can read more about their prognostications for the future of MMOs by visiting this link!

Enjoy!