If there weren’t, there wouldn’t be an ongoing franchise beyond the game. There are still plenty of stories to be told in the Marvel universe or the Star Wars universe.
Licensed IPs are like the storytelling equivalent to Twitter some people prefer it because of its limitations. Storytelling Limitations Aren’t Necessarily Bad The game may have to fill me in on the current political climate of The Old Republic era or the fallout of the destruction of Romulus, but the game world at large is already familiar to me long before launch day. The enjoyment in exploring Tyria is discovering new locations, whereas the enjoyment of exploring Middle-Earth is all of the moments that make you say “Oh! These are the trolls that Bilbo defeated!” or “Hey, this is the spot where Frodo got stabbed by a Nazgul!” or “Man, the Old Forest is a huge pain to find your way around in, just like Tolkien described it!” Both have their advantages and disadvantages, but I tend to prefer the latter a little, mainly because I don’t have to trawl dev posts and wikis to learn the lore. I still feel fairly lost as to the lore of Guild Wars 2 after playing it for a couple of years, but as soon as I stepped into Lord of the Rings Online, I already knew the world because I had read the books and seen the movies (yes, in that order). Unless this hypothetical person has a friend who plays, there’s not much of a chance a game like Guild Wars 2 will catch their eye at Walmart, but if they recognize a franchise they like they’re significantly more likely to give it a try. Those people, however, can probably identify several super heroes and have seen at least some of the Star Wars movies.
I know it’s hard to imagine, but there are people out there–gamers even–who have never played an MMORPG and know absolutely nothing about Guild Wars, EverQuest, or possibly even (gasp) World of Warcraft. Let be honest, MMOs are businesses, businesses need to market their products, and brand recognition is huge. While ultimately gameplay is what makes a game good or bad, I think a licensed IP can actually be a really good thing for a game. As someone who just got back into Lord of the Rings Online for the umpteenth time, I actually disagree with this rather strongly. It also opens the developers up to all sorts of criticism for “breaking lore” (don’t bring up the Rune-Keeper in LotRO global chat it’s still a huge sore spot in the community over seven years later).
Their reasoning was the usual since the creators do not “own” the story, they are limited in what they can do with the lore.
I saw a player proclaiming in Guild Wars 2 the other day that he or she would never play a game based on an unoriginal intellectual property.
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