Age of Conan

Originally posted by Maverick123w

 

Originally posted by gestalt11

Haha your question just shows how much BS the term "Open Beta" has become.

 

The fact that people are considering not buying a game because they don't get a chance to TEST it shows that these things are not tests.

 

What you want is a FREE TRIAL.  Not an open beta.  They may have become the same thing but they are not the same thing.

 

No MMORPG should ever have an Open Beta prior to release, because no one comes to actually test.  The most they should do is preview events like Guild Wars has done in the past.

 

It's a TEST drive for people.  Obviously the game is done by the time open beta rolls around.  I don't know about you, but I wouldn't buy a car without a TEST drive.

The price differance is fairly large between a car and a game....i'm not even going into what Beta is cause people should know by now, but the fact is over 100,000 people signed up for beta, So come on you really think it's gonna be an Open Beta

Originally posted by gestalt11

Haha your question just shows how much BS the term "Open Beta" has become.

 

The fact that people are considering not buying a game because they don't get a chance to TEST it shows that these things are not tests.

 

What you want is a FREE TRIAL.  Not an open beta.  They may have become the same thing but they are not the same thing.

 

No MMORPG should ever have an Open Beta prior to release, because no one comes to actually test.  The most they should do is preview events like Guild Wars has done in the past.

Open Beta is usually used for promotion of a product. Nothing more. What worries people now is that developers do not believe that their product can advertise itself if people would try it.

There should have been a poll option for "They are hiding something".

Originally posted by Litchfield

Originally posted by Maverick123w

 

Originally posted by gestalt11

Haha your question just shows how much BS the term "Open Beta" has become.

 

The fact that people are considering not buying a game because they don't get a chance to TEST it shows that these things are not tests.

 

What you want is a FREE TRIAL.  Not an open beta.  They may have become the same thing but they are not the same thing.

 

No MMORPG should ever have an Open Beta prior to release, because no one comes to actually test.  The most they should do is preview events like Guild Wars has done in the past.

 

It's a TEST drive for people.  Obviously the game is done by the time open beta rolls around.  I don't know about you, but I wouldn't buy a car without a TEST drive.

The price differance is fairly large between a car and a game....i'm not even going into what Beta is cause people should know by now, but the fact is over 100,000 people signed up for beta, So come on you really think it's gonna be an Open Beta

It doesn't really matter.  It's my money, and I won't throw it away on a crap product.

Ok im going to tell youguys the flip side of things, I have a group of friends who plays FPS's like counterstrike and COD4 constantly. This same group of people saw a preview for Pirates of the Burning Sea. Mind you none of them had ever played an mmo, they all tried it cause it looked "Interesting" in open beta for fileplanet.

You know how much they liked it?

THEY DIDNT! Later a couple of em went onto one of the forums on a gaming site and said how bad it was. SO all im saying is, with a thing like open beta, you can get people that arent even in your target audience and even people who hate the game trying it out.

I play Tabula Rasa in open beta, and i hated it, I ended up trying it after launch and i love it, have been playing it for 2 months, so as you can see open beta means nothing.

-Jive

Originally posted by andyjd

 

Originally posted by Xris375

Try before buy I say. That said, could the OP link us to where this news comes from ? It is av very bad sign if indeed this news is correct.

 

This very site:

http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/gameId/191/setView/features/loadFeature/1682

Thanks

C&P of the relevant part

"Launch is scheduled for March 25, 2008 and for those hoping for open beta, there won't be one. As Jason said, when they opened beta applications, they got 100,000 applications in a very short time. Right now, they have 15,000 invitations extended and they will simply invite many more players in the next few rounds. So if you want to take a look at this game prior to launch, and haven't put in your beta application, you can still put one in now. This is one beautiful looking game."

Open beta = free advertising. If Funcom miss such an opportunity, they are either really arrogant, stupid or smart.

I paid for Vanguard beta, I will not risk paying for another. if people continue to pay top cash for crappy games, they will continue to develop crappy games.

Jump in with both feet.

If they had 170k beta applications, they have plenty of people to draw from to test, if that's the intention, and it seems to be their path, as opposed to marketing.

I think Richard Garriott had some good points when he talked about the Tabula Rasa beta. Linkage

I tend to believe that many people apply for the beta for a free trial anyhow, so that's exactly what they get.

A good decision for Funcom? No idea, but on paper, you can easily argue that it is pretty smart, and some points to make that it isnt a good idea either.

Originally posted by spikenog
I'm going to get it regardless but I'm sure there will be an open beta. It's a great way for FC to stress the game and servers and drum up some hype for the game...and hype = sales. Sales = Money and money is why they are making the game in the first place,

I hope if there's one thing that FC learned from AO's launch...

"Stress the servers BEFORE release".

LOL...

My mind is still rubberbanding from all the rubberbanding I did in Rubi-ka!

Reminds me of the movie "Three Amigos", with Steve Martin's character chained in that cell with the weights attached to his hands and feet. Running across the cities in AO was "Gonna make it.... gonna make it.... GONNA MAKE IT.... notgonnamakeitnotgonnamakeitnotgonnamakeit... <sob>".

open beta was only good pre-wow release because mmos weren't a fad then and they really needed as many testers as they could get their hands on

now that wow stirred everything and theres so many millions more willing to play (and hundreds of thousands willing to beta) having open beta is no longer necessary

a bold and intelligent move by Funcom