This year marked both another fan festival for Final Fantasy XIV and another BlizzCon for World of Warcraft (among other games). BlizzCon, however, looks as if it’s going to be happening sans any major announcements; by contrast, the fan festival was held specifically because there was a major announcement.
On the one hand, I really do prefer conventions and convention appearances to coincide with big news. It means that all eyes are on the game, and from a selfishly professional standpoint, it means that there’s more interesting stuff to talk about. Even just from a fan standpoint, I like hearing about news rather than things that I can already experience right now by logging in.
But there are arguments against it. First of all, having a convention only when you’re going to announce something leads to situations like the Final Fantasy XIV fan festival, where everyone knows it’s going to have a big announcement and we’re just waiting to see if it’s what we know it is. Second, there are a lot of people for whom these conventions are about more than information, they’re about gathering as a community. So what do you think? Are conventions worth it for MMOs without big announcements? Does that extend only to game-specific conventions, or should it also cover showing up at more general conventions like E3?
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!
