Many mmo's don't die, they just contract to a single server of active players that are profitable long after everyone else has forgotten about the game and development and bug fixes have stopped.
There seem to be a similar tiny minority of fans that could keep these Zynga games barely alive for much longer, so why isn't Zynga doing this? My guess is they view hardcore customers as suckers and would rather have them spending $20 a month on a new title with new content then $1 a month keeping a near dead title just over break even. Carrying the example math forward even if they lose 95% of these hardcores it's going to be worth it if they can move 5% of them to a new release.
MMOs are able to continue generating content without developer input via PvP, or by allowing players to create new characters and run the grind again, or by allowing players to talk to one another inside the game context.
That's not content that's activity and Zynga games have the same ability to run the grind ad nauseum, interact with other users, etc. If Joe Customer wants to log in and keep feeding 25 cent cookies to his Zynga dog every morning he could keep doing that forever.
> Zynga games have the same ability to run the grind ad nauseum, interact with other users, etc.
No, they don't. In an MMO, if you get to level 80 as a cleric, you can go back and redo all the zones as a warrior. In a Zynga game, this isn't available: it's what MUD designers called single ladder advancement. You get to level 80 and that's it: you can only keep buying more stuff, or only maintain what you have. That's very different. There's no reason to make a new Facebook account and start over.
In an MMO, there are a plethora of interactions, mostly related to group activities. In a Zynga game, interactions are pushed into status updates. To bring in another analogy, an MMO is like a bar. You can go there, sit down, and chat with people. You can buy a beer if you want, but you don't have to. A Zynga game, however, is a beer. You can talk with people over said beer, but that talking isn't an intrinsic part of the experience of the beer. And at the bottom of the cup, it says, "Tell your friends how great this beer was to get more beer!"
> If Joe Customer wants to log in and keep feeding 25 cent cookies to his Zynga dog every morning he could keep doing that forever.
Yes. But are there enough of him to justify keeping the servers running?
In MMOs, the answers tends towards yes, because the interesting activities tend to be group-friendly, which naturally pushes up the number of people playing and paying. You can't say the same about Zynga games.
There seem to be a similar tiny minority of fans that could keep these Zynga games barely alive for much longer, so why isn't Zynga doing this? My guess is they view hardcore customers as suckers and would rather have them spending $20 a month on a new title with new content then $1 a month keeping a near dead title just over break even. Carrying the example math forward even if they lose 95% of these hardcores it's going to be worth it if they can move 5% of them to a new release.