"Q. 3 "Commitment" is just another word in the dictionary to too many people."
Yes, but some just don't realize the commitment they will have to make. I've had games Last upwards of 4-6 months. If you take a 24hr turnover game that has 1 turn a day and only one turn is played you could technecly have a game that Lasts years (nevermind the games that have one turn every 3 days, they tend to have people {like me
} who wait till the Last second to do the turn for upload. Its human nature to procrastinate).
Then you have to factor in real life things like families, jobs, sickness, vacation (which is hard enough to arrange in real life never mind taking into account 20 Online peoples schedueles), boredom (attention span) and the best one of all: Hardware/Software/Internet failure. (I've been through all three!
).
Then there is the frusturation factor. Imagine after 50-60 odd turns you miss one. AI has a field day (which annoys all your human allies) and the daunting task of spending a few hours doing a turn to set your empire right.
It would be nice if there was a 'quit game' option where the player who left has his empire disappear from the game entirely (ie planets empty, no ships etc).
It's kinda like MTGO (Magic the Gathering Online). Their multiplayer games/tournaments can Last 6+ hours Online and sometimes RL tends to inturrupt.