As gaming has changed over the last decade, online gaming has become the most popular side of gaming. Over the last few years online gaming has been the biggest sector of gaming. Previously the most popular games were single-player story-based games, however, the inception of series, like Call Of Duty, put an end to the dominance of single-player games. Then recently, as server technology for games have improved, online games have started to dominate the scene even more, for bad or for good, that is subjective.
Fortnite
Around 7 years ago a small indie game by the name of Fortnite took the world by storm, yes that pun was intended, and became the biggest game in the world. With the backing of many steamers putting the world onto this game and word of mouth spreading the word, the game became the biggest thing in the world. I remember hearing about Fortnite and truth be told, I wasn’t convinced that the game would do well until I tried it, I remember loading up my dusty PS4 and downloading the game and being pleasantly surprised by how free it was, it was like when you find new UK operators and can see the difference between fresh eyes in the gaming world compared to the older and burnt out eyes of the Call Of Duty developers for example.
Since the game took over the world, it has become arguably the best and biggest game of all time and continues to grow and get bigger somehow.
Call Of Duty: Warzone
With Fortnite taking over gaming and other battle royale games like PUBG doing well, Infinity Ward knew they had to dip their toes into the lucrative world of battle royale games and they did and to no one’s surprise, they succeeded. During the godforsaken lockdown, the whole was scrabbling and finding anything to keep their minds busy and gaming was one of the biggest things people did. With a series that people were already attached to, Call Of Duty had the best possible foundations that they could have and this helped them a lot, with the game being downloaded around 80 million times in around 6 months which is astounding even for Call of Duty’s standards.
Why They Did So Well
The reason for the success of both Fortnite and Warzone is the fact both of the games were free. Even though both of these games were great and very well received they would not have been as popular without the added bonus of them being free to download and play. Would Fortnite have been as popular as it was if it wasn’t for them being free to play? The answer is most likely no. People are more likely to take risks on free games compared to games that cost money and luckily for Epic Games people, like me, became so invested that paying for skins and battle passes became second nature and probably made them more money in the long run.
GTA Online
Grand Theft Auto is one of the most influential and important gaming series of all time and is the balance of single-player and multiplayer and the success they can both have. GTA is known for being a single-player game but in 2013 they released the online version of the game and over a decade later it is still one of the most played games in the world. I strongly believe GTA 5 is the best game of all time, the story is timeless, the voice acting is incredible and then they added one of the most interesting and enjoyable online modes ever released as a cherry on top of the cake. Not only that, but they add updates and make new changes to keep it fresh for the people who enjoy playing it even 11 years after its release. It is an outstanding piece of art that future game developers should study and take ideas from.
