I wrote the following after reading Yomega's post. I've edited a couple posts between to remove anything that looked a little too much like personal attacks. Let's keep our cool here fellas.
Creativity or Quality or Productivity or Demographics?
We can prove productivity...
<table width="300" align="center"><tr align="center" bgcolor="navy"><td>YEAR</td><td>RUMBLE</td><td>RACE</td><td>DRAG</td></tr><tr align="center"><td>2008</td><td>22</td><td>30</td><td>107</td></tr><tr align="center"><td>2007</td><td>31</td><td>58</td><td>121</td></tr><tr align="center"><td>2006</td><td>2</td><td>39</td><td>92</td></tr><tr align="center"><td>2005</td><td>9</td><td>50</td><td>72</td></tr><tr align="center"><td>2004</td><td>45</td><td>149</td><td>105</td></tr><tr align="center"><td>2003</td><td>51</td><td>164</td><td>106</td></tr><tr align="center"><td>2002</td><td>133</td><td>200</td><td>157</td></tr><tr align="center"><td>2001</td><td>64</td><td>250</td><td>110</td></tr><tr align="center"><td>2000</td><td>59</td><td>357</td><td>56</td></tr><tr align="center"><td>1999</td><td>258</td><td>496</td><td>26</td></tr><tr align="center"><td>1998</td><td>164</td><td>293</td><td>0</td></tr></table>
'99 was the best year for rumbles and races in terms of productivity; '02 was best for drags. Why? The answer is:
Demographics! For those of you who don't know, demographics describes groups of people. In computer gaming that means who plays what, when they play it, and from that hopefully you can figure out why... so as to sell them more. For us, we only need to think of a pie chart. Back when mtm began, it was one of the first hardware accelerated games and in fact one of the first games period. As a result, mtm dominated the pie because if people wanted to play an online racing game, mtm was just about the only option. Today is different. There are dozens, maybe even hundreds, of games to choose from. But in terms of the totality of players, there is only ever one pie... which has become sliced into dozens of pieces, of which mtm is only one small piece. If the numbers are down in mtm, it's only because there is more to choose from. Whereas in the early days mtm had a stranglehold on the online racing market, today it's just one option among many aging game titles. The same thing goes for races and drags. Today, racers find appeal, rightly or wrongly, in the characteristics of other games; but if draggers want online action, mtm is still the best option... with the result that the racing population is not as strong as it once was, and the dragging population reflects the popularity of monster jam. You may or may not like the trends, but those are the statistical and demographic facts, and no amount of arguing can change that. Yes, trends can be changed, but that's something else.
Creativity is something altogether different. This is where we get the customs vs replicas argument. But nobody asks the right questions. So. If something is custom, does that automatically mean it's creative? I say no. And. If something is a replica, does that automatically mean it's creative? I say no. Which leads us to the subject of "quality."
Are all customs trucks good trucks? I think not. Are all replicas good trucks? Again, I say no. The thing with a replica is that while it may not show creativity, it does indeed show the skill of the maker. A good replica, whether you consider it creative or not, is a work of art. The problem with this point of view, however, is that people come to believe that a replica, because of the skill required to make a good one, is somehow superior to custom trucks. Nothing could be further from the truth... because those same skills used to make a good replica are also needed to make a good custom truck. And! while a poor replica may not look as nice as a good one, it is still a replica nonetheless, and the maker has every right to classify it as a replica.
I could go on, but that should be enough for anybody who is seriously interested in the topic to understand there is more at work than just personal preference.
Are there too many drag tracks? too many replicas? Of course not, that's just silly. But if a person wants to stimulate activity in any area of the game, then they would do well to address the issues properly. For example, there has been an increase in rumble productivity over the past two years. Why? Because there are rumble tournaments now where there were none before. It's the same principle of monster jam and drag tracks. Increase interest in that area, and increased productivity and activity will follow.