Today's new games struggle because "evergreen" hits like Fortnite "pull players towards them at all times", says former BioWare GM
Former BioWare boss on competing with Fortnite - "very few studios can match that"
Scrubquote from a scrub manager from a washed up has-been studio. People avoid your games because they suck, not because of opportunity cost.
Evergreen games cause casual gamers to stay in the market longer and makes them more likely to branch out after self identifying as a "gamer".
To that end, gaming enthusiasts already move around and engage in other games. Live service games don't stop them from playing other things.
I dunno, maybe what you're saying applies to some people, but I can say about myself that the live service games I've been following for years definitely suck up my gaming time that I might otherwise be using to try new games.
Tbh, I kinda agree. I have a tendency to go back to evergreen games because of their time limited content I don't want to miss out. Even if I find the actual game I'm playing objectively better. (eg bg3, totk, jedi survivor 2. Dropped them all after 10-20h and went back to farming shitty cod cameos and wow gear...)
I felt that way for the first season of Fallout76. I worked my ass off grinding away after work, and it felt like a 2nd full time job. I was so relieved when the season ended.
Then the second season dropped shortly after.. I started grinding for a few days, and then I just was so burned out and bitter that I stopped playing entirely.
I didn't want to just casually play when there were some later tier items I really wanted, especially for my camp. But I didn't want to grind for it either. So I bitterly said fuck you Bethesda and stopped playing FO76 entirely.
Fuck season bullshit that makes you grind like a full-time job. It's different when you unlock the content just by playing the game normally. A great example of that is DRG.
To be rare, bioware would probably get more attention if it.... Still made games
Joking. Kind of. He left a couple years ago, but still about 10 years after their last big release.