Why Heroes of Newerth Failed

     The debatably labeled MOBA genre has seen some growth in recent years with the release of League of Legends (LoL), Heroes of Newerth (HoN), and soon-ish Defence of the Ancients 2 (DotA 2).  Prior to the release of these games the genre's flagship was a user generated and maintained modification created for Warcraft III.

     Even with all of this growth the population of players that enjoy this type of competitive game is relatively small. If you compare this genre to First Person Shooters, or Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games... this population would be microscopic.  The fact that there is such a small population of players is signification because each of these companies competing for player traffic (resulting in revenue) has to appeal to a very specific and very small audience.  The wedge driving most players into an either/or dilemma is the steepness of the learning curve for these games. The balance between obtaining the approval of the players that have played the original DotA for years, and broadening the horizon of the genre to make it more palatable for new players is proving to yield some nice drama.

     The Free to Play (F2P) model seems almost inevitable at this point given how hard LoL is crushing HoN in popularity.  The cause for such a lopsided bashing can be reduced to how the two games were released.  LoL was designed and release from the very beginning as a free to play game.  HoN hit the market with a 30$ price tag.  Based on that alone as a new player who is merely curious about a genre on the rise its no contest which game will be chosen.  Similarly, as a DotA veteran who hasn't had to pay for Warcraft III save for once a long time ago why should he/she drop 30$ now when there are two free options on the table.  ...and so LoL crushes HoN.

     In July of 2011, S2 Games figured it out and adopted the Free to Play model.  Unfortunately as the numbers have shown over the past few months that it's too late for HoN.  Population in-game at prime time usually peaks at around 50,000 and its not rising (number of unique accounts means nothing).  This number is equivalent to the traffic HoN saw during open beta.  There is a stronger inertia that exists with the MOBA player base because they know that they enjoy the game 100% more once they've overcome the learning curve.  The steeper the learning curve, the stronger the inertia.  All of the players that have been playing League of Legends prior to Heroes of Newerth going F2P have become very comfortable with the game and see no reason to make the change because they gain nothing (except another hero pool to grind, and more micro-transactions to make).  When new players are recruited into the genre, even though HoN is now free to play, all of their friends are now playing LoL so naturally they're going to play with their friends.

     Whats more, there is very little chance of Dota 2 not adopting the free to play model.  Free to Play is going to be the future of PC gaming whether you like it or not (and I don't personally) because micro-transactions are much more profitable over time than selling a 30$ box.  What the HoN community was hoping is that the competitive scene in DotA would migrate eventually to HoN because its game engine is superior.  A lot of the players that played HoN from closed beta (including me!) wanted HoN to be the new DotA, and if HoN had started out as a F2P game that may have been possible.  If you're a DotA vet still playing DotA over LoL and you're looking to move en masse to another MOBA you're going to choose DotA 2 over HoN or LoL.

     If HoN had the exposure that LoL is getting right now (which it would have if it had been F2P all along) and some seriously dedicated developers working on balancing for a competitive scene (as opposed to releasing imbalanced do-it-all new heroes so frequently that they have no time to rebalance before more new heroes are injected into the pool) then it might stand a chance against DotA 2.  The saddest truth about all of this is that HoN is objectively the better game in terms of game engine, stats, replays, etc...  There are a lot of absolutely top notch features in HoN that are going essentially unnoticed by the majority of MOBA players (albeit not by MOBA developers at Valve). HoN is being reduced to a small niche group of players that once saw its potential, but who refuse to see the bigger picture.  That niche group will only strink when DotA 2 comes out.

     When DotA 2 does finally come out (likely sometime in 2012) the chips will fall where they may.  My prediction is that DotA players will make up their mind.  They will likely choose DotA 2 over any of the alternatives, and the bulk of the player base will follow them.  Some people believe that multiple games can succeed in this genre now, but the reality is that only one of them can be a blockbuster.