You probably read the news over the holidays that Zynga finally shut the original FarmVille down, owing to the deprecation of Flash and development of other titles in the franchise. I haven’t looked at the game in over a decade, but as it turns out, my dad was still playing and was pretty peeved about the closure. He didn’t actually farm; he used the game as a platform to build (now I know where I get it from!). And the shutdown provided him with what I think might have been his first experience with a sunsetting game.
My mom told me how during the last week of operation, they took screenshots of everything dad had built, and then he sold off everything he had in there, one chunk at a time, as a last farewell. And even though I feel nothing for FarmVille, I most definitely have empathy for him, having seen so many MMOs sunset over the years myself. I bet a lot of us have gone through those motions, taking pics and video and maybe even deleting everything rather than see it go down with the ship. I sure have!
How do you handle MMO sunsets? Do you record everything for posterity? Attend sunset events? Delete it all as a last show of agency? Or just walk away rather than put yourself through the funeral?
Every morning, the Massively Overpowered writers team up with mascot Mo to ask MMORPG players pointed questions about the massively multiplayer online roleplaying genre. Grab a mug of your preferred beverage and take a stab at answering the question posed in today’s Daily Grind!
