Ok seriously folks. Enough with the vaporware discussion. On the official forums they've said they will likely resume marketing later this year. In another thread on here, there was a statement by Colony on their HeroEngine based MMO.  Unless Colony is LIEING, HeroEngine is completed in its entirety, and the GMs at Simu are working on the game itself now.

Now ask yourself this. Do you know anything about the Bioware or Colony mmos? No, you don't. You don't even have their titles. But you do know they've been planning these since they licensed the HeroEngine. Companies like that don't just sit around twiddling their thumbs until their engine is done, they do plan beforehand what they'll do with the game.  So they're just as late as Simu is. Nobody has a HeroEngine based game yet. Simu isn't late until they've been beaten to the punch. So you can just shut up.

Of course I don't know why I bothered writing this since most of you vaporware touters simply have an irrational hatred for the company, but this board looks really bad right now, when it shouldn't.

I don't think anyone has in "irrational" hatred of anyone. Maybe disappointment with these jokers is more like it. The game was suppose to release in 2005 and delayed and delayed. In an interview in PCGamer Jan 2007 they said they would be launching in late 07. The Simu guys said that, not anyone else.

So.....doesn't take a rocket scientist to see why there might be some backlash.

I have no vested interest in this game, I own no stocks in the company so I could care less when it launches, what bothers me is the outright dishonesty of the company. If they just say "guys we are launching in 2011", everything is fine in that case. But every year its the same thing, at the beginning they put out a brief article about how they will be launching that year, then fall off the radar for another year.

Really by the time they get around to launching, how interested is the market going to be in yet another fantasy based, level grinder anyway? They are missing or have missed their window of opportunity IMHO anyway. Thats why they shifted focus to marketing the engine instead. Anyone can plainly see the MMO market is over saturated and has one product dominating it.  As long as WoW sits on top of the MMO market like a gorilla sitting on a fly, its a bad time to launch an MMO.

They're concentrating more of the engine rather than the game, no news in over a year, nothing new.

Originally posted by Torak

I don't think anyone has in "irrational" hatred of anyone. Maybe disappointment with these jokers is more like it. The game was suppose to release in 2005 and delayed and delayed. In an interview in PCGamer Jan 2007 they said they would be launching in late 07. The Simu guys said that, not anyone else.

So.....doesn't take a rocket scientist to see why there might be some backlash.

I have no vested interest in this game, I own no stocks in the company so I could care less when it launches, what bothers me is the outright dishonesty of the company. If they just say "guys we are launching in 2011", everything is fine in that case. But every year its the same thing, at the beginning they put out a brief article about how they will be launching that year, then fall off the radar for another year.

Really by the time they get around to launching, how interested is the market going to be in yet another fantasy based, level grinder anyway? They are missing or have missed their window of opportunity IMHO anyway. Thats why they shifted focus to marketing the engine instead. Anyone can plainly see the MMO market is over saturated and has one product dominating it.  As long as WoW sits on top of the MMO market like a gorilla sitting on a fly, its a bad time to launch an MMO.

 

 

If you know Simmutronics then their approach will not be a surprise to yourself, the game will be released and is not vaporware. And yes they have delayed the programme around HJ as sometimes when in a business priorities change... But we can all understand that can't we !!

WoW is a good game pleasant and all that but it is basic in concept does not have that great a depth... lots of content no depth. The HJ franchise will still be fresh and based on the depth Simmu have implemented into their other products there will always be a market for their games.

Their is a need for challenging well designed games within the market and some of the excessive features within current MMOs make the genre un rewarding to play. A step back to move forward will show some of the upcoming sandbox releases garner enough of a user base to make them profitable.

A lot of the generic MMOs being released will eat away at WOWs user base as well as the fact that people are now running up their own WOW servers and playing for free in their thousands , I can see its slow demise.

All in all HJ will always have a market.

Yes it is. And how many more years of nothing will it take to convince you?

Dishonesty? If you payed attention to the official forums you'd see they've been pleanty honest. They said right out that their schedule was pushed back a good 6 months by the HeroEngine licensing (which, again, if you pay attention to the official forums, is DONE. They're working on the game itself now)

Delays aren't lies. Delays are just that, delays. Was Working Designs lieing when they delayed Lunar for a year and a half? No, they were kicking ass and reducing the save time/memory usage by 90%. Was Nintendo lieing when they delayed Twilight Princess? No. They announced their delays. Simu announced their delays too, but only to the people who actually pay attention to what they have to say. They aren't going to hold a press conference over it since we already know about it. Be reasonable.

They've missed their window? How so? Name one good MMO that's come out in the past 2 years.  Seriously, the best I can find is Dream of Mirror Online and that's an asian import so I'm bound to get bored of that real soon.

Edit: I've looked at every MMO in development on this site. HJ has no competition at all. Warhammer Online is WoW 2.0. Age of Conan looks like a MUD, complete with MUD classes and MUD races. Chronicles of Spellborn has some of the worst ideas I've ever seen. The rest are either complete crap, Korean, or both. The "Window of opportunity" is wide open. Hell, it's not even a window. It's a massive gaping HOLE that only they can fill and they know it.

They jumped the gun on marketing. That's all.

And Amathe, do you really think anyone takes you seriously? Come on. (By the way, Age of Conan was originally scheduled for 2006. Go troll over there.)

Where's my animated gif of the dead horse being beaten..... This'll have to do!

this is the crysis of mmorpgs

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Originally posted by HJ-DEZORIN
Where's my animated gif of the dead horse being beaten..... This'll have to do!

 
 
 
 

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See - even the HJ staff admit the game is a dead horse :)

Okay all kidding aside - will HJ release before any of the other companies using the engine?

Amathe - so they missed their targetted release date - it happens. If the game never gets released - whats the worst consequence - my hopes get dashed. Big deal - I think your crusade to save us from ourselves is completely pointless and a waste of time you could be using to make an actual contribution to something meaningful.

Simu could have prevented the whole vaporware debate by refusing to give a release date and just saying it will be done when its ready.

I too followed this game for a very long time. I always thought that the trust here is waived more times I see no updates on the official site. It is like they don't care. Why not release some news with some encouraging updates if they still intend to release this game, if not shut down all the hype now and save face. At least they got a good rep with the hero engine.

Oh i just love seeing this go on and on and on...

Missed windows, dishonesty, trust  

Its an  f***ing game, there not holding back the cure to cancer for god sake.

Bleh, Patriots are vaporware.

the big problem with HJ is that they had a concept much like DDO.

and D&D online flopped hard.

if they still work on it, they are probably changing the whole concept much like Garriot did with Tabula Rasa. it wasn't a sci fi game at first....

they might make it more like WoW or EQ2 or guildwars.... I bet they try to copy some sucessful concept...

the biggest problem they face is that this year, the biggest blockbusters since WoW will go online...

Age of Conan and WAR...

so they wont do any PvP heavy or adult themed MMORPG either...

if they have enough time, they might wait it out and release the game in 2 years with totally next gen graphics to get customers...

but for the near future, I cannot see any market niche for HJ. that's why they are silent. if the DDO principle would have been a hit, we would have have HJ now already

Originally posted by HJ-DEZORIN

 

 

I'm kind of curious what'll happen when it ships.  Will he just never show his face again?  Go postal?  Say it was all just luck?

Dang, almost like sports fans at this point ;)

How bout them Patriots?

Reference my remarks about GMs hired off message boards in a previous post.

A couple of years ago I stopped playing WoW.  I looked around at potential games and I remember seeing this one back then.    It looked interesting, but while other games steadily developed (and in some cases crashed and burned) this one has done nothing. 

After the fiascos of 2007 from Vanguard, Dark and Light and Gods and Heroes you'd think people would learn not to trust developers unless they're providing proof to back it up.    Nice to see some lessons are never learned. 

LOL, this is just like reading the Darkfall forums.  Same arguments by both sides. Its a game.  Who cares if it ever, or never comes out.  If it does, great we'll play it.  If not, play something else.

Originally posted by Askatan

the big problem with HJ is that they had a concept much like DDO.

and D&D online flopped hard.

if they still work on it, they are probably changing the whole concept much like Garriot did with Tabula Rasa. it wasn't a sci fi game at first....

they might make it more like WoW or EQ2 or guildwars.... I bet they try to copy some sucessful concept...

 

the biggest problem they face is that this year, the biggest blockbusters since WoW will go online...

Age of Conan and WAR...

so they wont do any PvP heavy or adult themed MMORPG either...

 

if they have enough time, they might wait it out and release the game in 2 years with totally next gen graphics to get customers...

but for the near future, I cannot see any market niche for HJ. that's why they are silent. if the DDO principle would have been a hit, we would have have HJ now already

Thats a very interesting concept, but i just don't see it.  Hero's Journey will be the third evolution of the world of Elanthia.  Starting with Gemstone, and progressing into Dragon Realms we've seen vast differences in society, lore, culture, race, professions, and daily living.  This game will never be like WoW, AoC, or any other popular game out there. 

In May of 2006 i found myself in Elanthia for the first time(Gemstone), and two months later found the virtual age of Elanthia(Dragon Realms) that i know as well as the world we call Earth. Simutronics almost  a decade  ago, envisioned and sought to bring Elanthia out of our minds and onto our monitor.  After 2 years of no news, little update and some early rendering at  the SimuCons they trashed the everything and started over.  Not long into there this new attempt, will a new vision, it was desided they needed to develope the engine that would be capable of creating and bring Elanthia to us in a way that current technology and programming could not do.  The result Hero's Engine. 

So now here we are, I for one along with others have been awaiting this far longer than most of you.  Simutronics has been developing games, that are still evolving along there own timelines since 1987.  I wonder how many of people here where even born?   Regardless Hero's Journey and the age of Elanthia that will evolve and grow isn't focused at the  demographic WoW and all the others out there are trying to compete for. Simutronics exists because of Elanthia, Gemstone being its founding game.  Hero's Journey once its released dosn't want gamers, WoW is a game for gamers. We'll be looking for  residents to explore and build a new society upon Elanthia, people who will make history, solve mystery's, and those who just want to sit back and relax with a friend for awhile.

Hero's Journey once its released dosn't want gamers, WoW is a game for gamers. We'll be looking for  residents to explore and build a new society upon Elanthia, people who will make history, solve mystery's, and those who just want to sit back and relax with a friend for awhile.

...what? I just want a game that isn't WoW with a new hat.

Originally posted by Draq

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Hero's Journey once its released dosn't want gamers, WoW is a game for gamers. We'll be looking for  residents to explore and build a new society upon Elanthia, people who will make history, solve mystery's, and those who just want to sit back and relax with a friend for awhile.

---

...what? I just want a game that isn't WoW with a new hat.

Ditto.

Originally posted by Askatan

the big problem with HJ is that they had a concept much like DDO.

and D&D online flopped hard.

if they still work on it, they are probably changing the whole concept much like Garriot did with Tabula Rasa. it wasn't a sci fi game at first....

they might make it more like WoW or EQ2 or guildwars.... I bet they try to copy some sucessful concept...

 

the biggest problem they face is that this year, the biggest blockbusters since WoW will go online...

Age of Conan and WAR...

so they wont do any PvP heavy or adult themed MMORPG either...

 

if they have enough time, they might wait it out and release the game in 2 years with totally next gen graphics to get customers...

but for the near future, I cannot see any market niche for HJ. that's why they are silent. if the DDO principle would have been a hit, we would have have HJ now already

1.  Hero's Journey is NOT a concept like D&D Online.  There is no evidence to support this claim and I'm not sure where you got the comparison.  Also, why would they make another WoW/EQ2/Guildwars when there is already a WoW/EQ2/Guildwars?  That's terrible business sense and has gotten many other games put down for attempting.  Why would someone move from one product where they have time invested in to another product that is just like it and they have to start from scratch at?  It is true the concept got entirely changed, and concepts do tend to morph during the game making process as well, but this is not a morph into an already existing game.

2.  Age of Conan and Warhammer Online being big daddies in the mmorpg industry is personal opinion.  That is fine, as long as you make it known that is an opinion, not a fact.  For people like me, those games hold no charm.  Warhammer won't be for role players so much and Age of Conan....eh, I'm a feminist so enough said there.  They have indeed said this won't be a pvping game, and it won't be an "adults only" game either.  It will probably be something along the lines of other games out there in rating because, let's face it, you're shooting yourself in the foot if you make it so department stores can't sell something.

3.  Since when did graphics become the "killer of all things gaming"?  WoW doesn't make it because of it's graphics.  It makes it because of style.  Hero's Journey has a style all it's own.  These graphics are also constantly changing with developement, just like concepts.  This is how all games work.  You won't know what's going on there until the game is released.  If a game relies as much on graphics as you say, they'll be outdated in less than two years after having the best of graphics anyhow.  Style beats the test of time.

4.  DDO, once again, was a different game.  It wasn't a game for roleplayers, for one thing.  It might have succeeded with more catering to that group since who roleplays more than the table toppers?  RPers still lack their own game while the pvers and pvpers have them all over.  I'm sure you didn't much consider this group in your thinking.  Most think it's too small of a group, but it's actually just a beaten down one.  Simutronics, whether they mean to or not, is probably going to come out with a game that would attract role players.  Their past games have done it, and if they use even half the principles from them, this game will too.  And there you have it, a niche.