The Victims of Online Multiplayer Graveyard

It happens from time to time in the video game industry that publishers become infatuated with chasing some new business model that promises to deliver easier profits and lower investment costs.  Just like with any jinn in a bottle the promise seldom works out the way they think it will and comes with a massive downside. They have to sell their soul to consummate the wish and their greed makes them oblivious to the swath of destruction left in the wake of the chase.  I may have strong opinions about this...

If you've been playing video games for any length of time, you have probably experienced at least one of the cycles I'm talking about - churning out endless mediocre clones of successful titles (Super Mario Bros., Castlevania, Final Fantasy, DOOM, Resident Evil, Demons' Souls etc...), forcing games to have multi-player modes where it made no sense in hopes of creating a commercially exploitable competitive space, holding back content to sell it to players later as DLC, preying on addiction with loot boxes etc... The consequences of all of these "movements" have lessened the institution of video gaming in some way, whether it was producing mountains of shovelware, making a lesser single player game by diverting resources to multi-player mechanics for a game where almost no one wanted or played the multi-player, or ensuring that the full version of a given title could never be enjoyed by posterity by locking bits of it behind an Internet gate.  

But perhaps the worst damage is done when the gambit spells the end of a gaming franchise with a large audience and otherwise healthy prospects.  Out of all of the gold-rushes that have historically plagued the games industry, there's one that has led to the death of more beloved gaming franchises than any other I can name - Online Multiplayer.

My diatribe makes the assumption that sequels are, in general, a good thing, and that the existence of gaming franchises enriches the industry as a whole when those games are made with passion and respect. The return of recognizable characters like Mario, Link, Master Chief, and Nathan Drake generally serve to deepen the immersion and affinity gamers have for these games.  While it's true other icons like Sonic the Hedgehog, Laura Croft or Crash Bandicoot aren't a guarantee of quality, their continued existence results in a net positive for both makers and players.

The massive financial success of Ultima Online and Everquest (and subsequently World of Warcraft), and the high profit-to-cost of recurring-fee games like Counter Strike and SOCOM (and subsequently PUBG and Fortnite) have sung a psiren song that some publishers seem powerless to resist - the dream of building one game and selling it forever.  Instead of constantly re-inventing new ways to play and developing them from the ground up, you just pay a skeleton crew of devs and writers to provide a trickle of new content and laugh all the way to the bank.  Nevermind that you have sacrifice innovation, homogenize play mechanics, and "nerf" players who find a single "best" approach to win.

 

In the early 2000's there was a massive explosion of MMORPGs which instantly over-saturated the market.  Many of the hopefuls died quick and unceremonious deaths for various reasons, but the allure of making a game once and selling it forever was just too much for some publishers to let go of.  Over the years I have watched as this model has spelled the end for a number of excellent single-player game series.  Even once their online incarnations faded into obscurity, no one has picked up the torch to revitalize them.

Here we will memorialize the game franchises that have been MIA since their publishers took out behind the woodshed that is "online".  It's fair to argue that sometimes game series die because they've been played out - there's nothing left to offer, and it's better to end on a high note than to be exploited into mediocrity.  But I don't think that was the case with any of the following.  Furthermore the best possible outcome from my perspective is to be wrong about one or more of these being lost forever.

Phantasy Star

Status: MIA

Last game in the main series: Phantasy Star IV

Last Seen: 1994

Went Online: 2000

Description:  Phantasy Star was a favorably reviewed series of turn-based JRPGs released on the Sega Master System and Sega Genesis consoles between 1987 and 1994. Unlike the other JRPGs of its era which were had predominately medieval settings and fantasy mechanics, Phatasy Star was futuristic science fiction.  It was Sega's answer to Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy, and arguably held its own against both of those powerhouse franchises.  

What Happened: When Phantasy Star went online in 2000 as "Phantasy Star Online", the deep, scripted, turn-based single player experience was replaced with a short 4-player ARPG.  The "story" could be completed within a couple of hours, but the players were meant to work through the same handful of levels over and over at higher difficulties.

Current Online State: Phantasy Star Online 2 was originally made available only in Japan in 2012.  But an official "free to play" English version is due to be released in 2021. It currently sits at about 200,000 players. 

Probability of Return: Very low.  Since abandoning the single-player turn-based RPG, Sega has released no fewer than 9 "Online" iterations of Phantasy Star Online. It is clear that they regard the series' relatively shallow and repetitive online incarnation as its permanent state.  Since the demise of the Dreamcast and Sega's pivot to a software-only company, they have also gradually ceased doing much development in-house, instead either hiring development out to third parties, or granting licenses to third parties that approach them with game ideas.  Phantasy Star's only real chance for a return to form is for a third party development house to approach Sega with a pitch and a plan.

Warcraft

Status: MIA

Last game in the main series: Warcraft III

Last Seen: 2002

Went Online: 2004

Description: Warcraft was a highly successful series of turn-based strategy games released for PCs between 1994 and 2002.  The game was originally inspired by tabletop RPG Warhammer but became an independent property before release.  It offered both a single-player campaign and two-player modes.

What Happened: Blizzard put all of their development resources into making an MMO that could capitalize on the market created by Ultima Online and harvested by Everquest by lowering the learning curve and making the MMO concept more approachable to a larger portion of the game playing population.  

Current Online State: "World of Warcraft" launched in 2004 with a player base of just over 1 million, and rose to its peak of 12+ million in 2010.  Since then it has steadily declined, eventually dipping below 2 million in 2018.  Its numbers were bolstered in the last couple of years by the re-introduction of "classic" servers that allow players to experience the original iteration of the game prior to its many expansions.  It currently sits at 4.7 million subscribers.

Probability of Return: Very Low.  Blizzard has never announced any intention of creating a sequel to Warcraft III, nor any main-series game.

Grand Theft Auto

Status: MIA

Last game in the main series: Grand Theft Auto V

Last Seen: 2013

Went Online: 2013

Description: Grand Theft Auto was a game series released between 1997 and 2013.  Originally a top-down adventure game with criminal protagonists.  Initially a title with an average sized fanbase the series experienced a massive surge in popularity when Grand Theft Auto III was released in 2001 bringing with it a new third-person perspective and practically defining the "sandbox" game genre.  The game was also popularized by the controversy it created with elements such as restoring health by having an encounter with a prostitute.  In all four more sequels were released after Grand Theft Auto III, each one pushing the envelope of both technical achievement and adult themed storytelling. The consensus among many reviewers of Grand Theft Auto V when initially released on the XBOX 360 was that the game seemed to have exceeded what was thought possible on the platform in terms of AI and graphical fidelity.

What Happened: When Grand Theft Auto V was released, Rockstar games semi-simultaneously released Grand Theft Auto Online - an up to 16-player online iteration of Grand Theft Auto V.  In the eight years since the release of Grand Theft Auto Online Rockstar's only single player contributions to the world of Grand Theft Auto have been multiple re-releases of Grand Theft Auto V, ported to 8th and 9th generation consoles.

Current Online State: It's difficult to compare this to other online releases as it is not "Massively Multiplayer", however statistics show that it averages between 150,000 and 200,000 players any given day.

Probability of Return: This one is tricky.  In 2021 Rockstar began talking about the possibility of Grand Theft Auto VI, but they are estimating the potential release date at around 2025, which is far out enough to not take seriously.  The real problem is that if GTA VI ever does see the light of day, there's a real possibility the single player experience may not exist at all.

Knights of the Old Republic

Status: MIA

Last game in the main series: Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords

Last Seen: 2004

Went Online: 2011

Description: Knights of the Old Republic was a highly acclaimed series of pseudo-turn based single-player RPGs developed by BioWare and Obsidian.  These games offered expertly written stories with groundbreaking morality-based outcomes where the morality of the player's choices had measurable consequences.

What Happened: BioWare spent four years developing an MMO believing that they could carve out a place in the MMO market with their distinct brand of deep storytelling, and of course that instead of making sequels they could make one game and sell it over and over again.

Current Online State: SWTOR quickly showed why most MMOs do not rely on deep storytelling.  After an initial surge to 2 million players, the game's player base quickly declined as players exhausted the four years worth of content BioWare had worked to build in about six months.  Within a year, BioWare did what all desperate MMO operators do when they are unable to sustain a player base - they made the game "free-to-play" thus obscuring the recurring fees.  Since then the player base has fluctuated significantly, hitting lows of less than 30,000 players, but has managed to claw back a decent player base of ~400,000 as of this year - with the rise of players seeming to correspond with the quarantine dates from the pandemic.

Probability of Return: Practically Zero.  Star Wars licensing is, needless to say, complicated.  Since the initial creation of KOTOR, BioWare has been acquired by Electronic Arts, and the Star Wars property has been acquired by Disney.  Electronic Arts does (or did, depending on when you read this) an exclusive licensing deal with Lucas Arts to make Star Wars games which pre-dated the acquisition of Star Wars by Disney and followed the property to Disney.  Since that time, EA has been embroiled in more than one controversy for injecting real-world-money gambling mechanics into several of its games, more than one of which were Star Wars games. This is exactly the sort of bad press that Disney tries to keep clear of and it's widely speculated that EA will not be able to renew its exclusivity deal, so there's not much chance of what's left of BioWare being allowed to develop a new Star Wars game.  Since the "Old Republic" series is probably partly owned by EA (by way of its acquisition of BioWare) it's probably not likely that anyone else will be allowed to create an "Old Republic" game either.  And that's not even taking into account the complex mess that is the Star Wars "canon" - many of the events and themes introduced in KOTOR I&II may have been tossed out to accommodate J.J. Abrams' conditions for finishing the "Skywalker Saga".

The Elder Scrolls

Status: Indefinite Limbo

Last game in the main series: The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

Last Seen: 2011

Went Online: 2014

Description: The Elder Scrolls was a series of single-player first-person Action RPGs developed by Bethesda.  They were characterized by enormous worlds, deep progression mechanics, expert storytelling, detailed backstories and histories and the potential for non-linear gameplay.  Skyrim was the culmination of decades of perfecting their formula and still holds up incredibly well even 10 years after release.

What Happened: In a nutshell, Bethesda became lazy.  Skyrim represented the high point of their development potential and met or exceeded nearly every expectation set for it.  In the 10 years since its release, Bethesda has only released one single-player Action RPG on a comparable scale - Fallout 4, and as I'll describe below, it was a lazy re-skin of Fallout 3 rather than an innovation or even respectable increment.  When it came to a follow-up to this amazing single player franchise, Bethesda opted to chase easy profits and release the Elder Scrolls Online.  Initial impressions were bad and the game had a very rocky launch, struggling to maintain a healthy player base.  

Current Online State: Shortly after ESO failed to become the instant cash cow they had hoped, Bethesda began porting Skyrim to every available platform, and ostensibly using the revenue generated to keep ESO afloat while they tried to find some way to draw and keep more players for ESO.  Player numbers have fluctuated wildly, but remained below 100,000 for several years.  The recent pandemic seems to have boosted the numbers somewhat as the numbers have peaked above 1 million players, though the average for the year is still closer to 600,000.

Probability of Return: 50%.  It has now been 10 years since the last mainline Elder Scrolls game. From III to IV was 4 years, from IV to V was 6.  Since 2011, Bethesda has maintained that they plan to release another main series Elder Scrolls title but never indicated one was actually in active development.  When Bethesda was trying to hype ESO, the fans repeatedly asked whether this meant that there would not be an Elder Scrolls VI.  Clearly ruffled that fans were more interested in a proper single-player game than their shiny new MMO, they offered assurances that there were still plans to make an Elder Scrolls VI, but it would not be during the current console generation (PS4, XBOX One).  Three years ago in 2018, Bethesda announced plans and showed a completely content-free teaser logo for the Elder Scrolls 6, and has since not shared a single detail of the development.  Since then Bethesda has been acquired by Microsoft, and since ESVI only exists as a shaky promise from a man who's no longer in charge (Todd Howard), there's an even chance that it will never actually see the light of day.

Fallout

Status: MIA

Last game in the main series: Fallout 4

Last Seen: 2015

Went Online: 2018

Description: Fallout began life as a series of isometric turn-based RPGs.  The license to the franchise was acquired by Bethesda who re-tooled the series into a first-person action/turn-based hybrid RPG utilizing the same game engine as their fantasy-based "Elder Scrolls" series.  The Bethesda-era fallout titles were all characterized by enormous worlds, deep customization and progression mechanics, and professional storytelling.

What Happened: Fallout 4 was commercially successful but largely panned by fans of the previous games in the series as it failed to innovate and in many ways was a step backwards in terms of quality storytelling and engine stability.  At the same time, Battle Royale games like PUBG and Fortnite were setting sales records and this clearly caught Bethesda's eye.  Rather than make the single-player RPG that it acknowledged its existing fans wanted, Bethesda attempted to look beyond it's existing fan base and capture the people pouring money into Fortnite.  When it was initially announced it would be generous to say that the reaction was mixed.  Fresh from defending ESO to their fans, Bethesda baked the assurance that they would eventually make another proper single-player Fallout game into their press conference.  

Current Online State: The launch of Fallout 76 was a failure by most objective standards, and to this day the game struggles to maintain an audience with player numbers fluctuating between ~5,000 and ~30,000, however Bethesda has committed to keep pouring money into it until it works.  

Probability of Return: Low.  Despite a weak promise during the announcement of Fallout 76 in 2018 that this would not be the end of the Fallout as a single-player offline experience, Bethesda has made no announcements and not answered any questions in the affirmative to indicate that they even have plans to make a new mainline Fallout game.

Grandia

Status: MIA

Last game in the main series: Grandia III

Last Seen: 2006

Went Online: 2009

Description: Grandia was a series of JRPGs developed by Game Arts. The first game in the series was noteworthy for being an incredible technical achievement which pushed the limits of the Sega Saturn hardware beyond what was thought possible, as well as for its charming characters, deep story and innovative, engaging battle system.  Later games in the series continued to refine the unique battle system and were similarly characterized by charming characters and deep story.  In what is either a gran homage or rote plagiarism, the battle system Square-Enix used for Final Fantasy X was essentially a copy of the Grandia battle system.

What Happened:  A Korean MMO called "Ragnarok Online" (Defunct as of 2015) rose to popularity in Asia in the early 2000's and publisher GungHo wanted to get in on the action.  And "meet the growing demand for MMORPGs in the Asian market".  They began partnering with Game Arts in 2004 to create "Project GO".  At the time Game Arts was still developing Grandia III.  In 2005 in what was a fairly obvious move to protect its investment in what it thought would be an MMO gold mine, GungHo bought Game Arts outright. Though they allowed Grandia III to be completed, they turned all future development for the series towards Grandia Online which they released exclusively in Asia in 2009 after nearly 5 years of development. Grandia Online lasted a scant three years, closing down its service in 2012.

Current Online State: Dead. 

Probability of Return: Zero.  In 2009 GungHo released the original Grandia as a PSOne classic title for PS3 as publicity to draw attention to Grandia Online.  This set the tone for GungHo's plans for the Grandia series.  Since the failure of Grandia Online, GungHo seems only interested in continuing to sell cheaply financed ports of the existing games rather than investing development money in any new material for the series.

Metal Gear

Status: MIA

Last game in the main series: Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain

Last Seen: 2015

Went Online: 2008/2015

Description: The Metal Gear series was most noted for inventing the stealth action genre, allowing player choice achieve objectives with or without violence, raising the level of cinematic storytelling in video games, and having some of the most convoluted socio-political science fiction plots ever conceived. The auteur responsible for creating Metal Gear, Hideo Kojima, used these stories as a vehicle for his musings on existentialism, politics, nationalism, mutually assured destruction, government conspiracies and the future of technologies.  The official "canon" follow a thread beginning with a group of cold war-era covert operatives throughout a future where nuclear war is both a reality and an ever-present threat.

What Happened:  I'll admit that Metal Gear might not belong on this list.  Although it did disappear after going online, its circumstances are somewhat unique.  Firstly, the franchise DID survive it's first brush with being transformed into an online game when Metal Gear Online was originally released alongside Metal Gear Solid 4.  Though that original incarnation of Metal Gear Solid Online was released in Japan only and did not enjoy worldwide success.  When Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain released, there was also an online multiplayer game that was originally touted as an online mode of MGSV, but was, in reality a successor to Metal Gear Solid Online and there has not been another single-player Metal Gear title released since then.  However the lack of a new stand-alone title can more easily be explained by factors other than going online.  Konami, the company which (unfortunately) owns Metal Gear chased more than just Online Multiplayer in its greed-fueled quest for easier profits. In 2014 when MGSV was still in development the company was undergoing a drastic re-structuring that would eventually transform it into a full-time gambling conglomerate. During this time the were publicly accused of gross mistreatment of employees and had a rather public falling out with Metal Gear creator Hideo Kojima. This resulted in Konami scrubbing Kojima's name from the game in what seems like an overtly spiteful move.  Since then most of the company's software development has been similarly re-purposed in the service of gambling, whether that's pachinko machines, or mobile games, however in another seeming act of spite Konami released one final online-only Metal Gear title called "Metal Gear Alive" which shared no similarities in design or game play with Metal Gear Solid other than re-using some of its digital assets and was voted by many reviewers and publications as the worst game of 2018.

Current Online State: Metal Gear Alive is still technically online but it's player count is generally in the lower double-digits.

Probability of Return: Zero. Konami would have to sell the rights to someone who gave a damn about video games, and they have no incentive whatsoever to do that.