There's been a fair amount of controversy over the past several years about players spending too much time in MMOs; some governments have even levied restrictions against games in the genre.
On the other hand, there is, perhaps, an even bigger crisis. Most MMO games are full of hand-crafted content. If players blow through your content too quickly, they'll become bored and leave the game. Creating game content up to contemporary standards is a painstaking and expensive process, so this is a crucial issue.
Developers are attempting to discourage unhealthy player behaviors while maintaining a compelling gameplay experience. Recently, Square Enix announced its system for upcoming Final Fantasy XIV which is supposed to serve this purpose -- to fan outrage. Here's a relevant link.
World of Warcraft had a similar, if simpler system in its Beta, which docked experience from players after a certain point -- and these players hated it, until it was swapped out for an essentially identical system, but one which characterized points earned early on as an up-front experience bonus.
Game Career Guide challenged its readers to design a system for an MMO which encourages players to limit their playtime in a game (or, perhaps, limit their progression but not their total playtime) -- but without making the player feel like they are being penalized. What follows are the best and most original entries we received. Here are our top picks.
Best Entries
Mark Venturelli, Designer Residing in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Task-Based Progression (see page 2)
Christian Syvertsen, Student at The Norwegian School of Information Technology, Tri-Play System (see page 3)
Kris Kamfield, Sr. Ringtone Recorder, Window of Opportunity (see page 4)
Honorable Mentions
Brian Kononchik, The Fatigue System (see page 5)
Jonathan Lawn, Communications Software Engineer, Wandering Samurai (see page 6)
Dean Ray Johnson, Reduce Addictive Qualities (see page 7)
Ricardo Rambarran, Aspiring Game Design Student, Phantom Hourglass (see page 8)
Ronildson Scarani Sillas Palermo, Student at FATEC São Caetano do Sul, PACE System (see page 9)
Ryan George, Game Design Student, Columbia College Chicago, The Recovery System (see page 10)
Jesse Cathell, Amateur Level Designer, Northern Virginia, Prospatho (see page 11)
