Originally posted by rexzshadow

Originally posted by AmbrosiaAmor

Part III. Population issues


Server Merge:

BHS Korea: 37 -> 35 -> 15 -> 13 -> 6 (6 being theoretical)

There are currently 13 servers in South Korea. From the folks I have asked mainly from BG (others outside of BG)who have played K-TERA up to level 58 (some with multiple 58's) I have been told that for the most part the majority (at least 2/3) of the servers are always or almost always green (translates to light population) while only roughly 1/3 of the population being labeled in yellow (translates to normal population). I think they also have the red icon signifying heavy or full population, but from the few charts I was able to gather from Inven, it would seem that is has been a long time since they have hit that high. A couple of folks have told me that some servers are so light that they can easily do another merge and cut it down to half (hence why I placed 6 as theoretical).
Well we know the reason for the first 2 server merge was because the game had a horrible launch which is why server merged so much. Also the game isn't grindy enough for Koreans, honestly if BHS want ot keep Korean player just make the game more grindy for them shouldn't be that hard to scale exp required to lvl. Also like Koreans don't even OWPVP and their Arena is down for revamp so they kinda don't have pvp at the moment lol.

NHN Japan: 10 -> 3 -> 2 (2 being actual)

Japan only has had one server merge compared to BHS, but this one was rather major. The servers are able to handle I think upwards to close to 3000 players per server. They decided to reduce it to 3 to keep the player base at optimum levels for this reason. Unfortunately this has not helped. Even though the population stabilized at around 7500 after the merge, there has still been a considerable amount of decline from the last couple of months. Considering that the Japanese players do keep a statistical website that takes in Hourly... yes Hourly roll calls, I can safely say that they can drop the servers down to 2. 2 servers are clocking in at around 1550 players, while the 3rd is hovering around 950. For the first time in NHN TERA history, the Japanese population dipped below 4500 this week, during evening prime time playing hours.
Problem with JTera is that its  FCKING expansive, from what i heard it cost like 35 dollar a week? Thats just retardly high price many peopla aren't going to pay.

That leaves the remaining 2: Frogster and EME

Frogster: /Facepalm

Horrible company all around going from customer service to censorship/banning in the forums to all the way to the top. This will probably have a negative impact on the game in the long run if they don't change their business practices. When Scapes wrote in the old forums that Frogster was going to handle the EU side of things, 65 pages of rage ensued. So much was the backlash that Daniel Ulrich (Director of Product Management) extended an olive branch to quell the masses. We will see how it goes but I have no faith in them to be honest. Nothing more needs to be said here.
To me most EU company are horrible, idk why maybe just my luck but all game host by EU has the most dead forum i never seen and the company is bad, i feel bad for EU mmorpgs players XD

EME: Good so far

Half of EME is made up of former NCWest, while the other half come from numerous backgrounds. I may give them the benefit of the doubt since NCWest pretty much had their hands tied behind their backs, but NCWest didn't do anything to really improve their image as well. So far they have been doing a good job. We will have to see how the relationship between BHS and EME unfolds and also see how EME handles the game as well as complaints and constructive criticism from the player base.

As you can see things are looking very grim for NHN. For BHS I would say they are borderline: from doing just O.K. and below average. If the new update does not considerably regain some of those lost subscriptions, chances are they will continue to add more options/items to the premium cash shop and be aggressive overall with the premium service.


Part IV-A: P2P versus F2P versus Cash Shop (Vanity and Play to Win)


I will try my best to simplify this, since my posts are very long and going into detail here would make it ginormous. The P2P model comes in 2 formats (generalizing here) and both have been in decline since 2005. A. $4.99-$10.99 P2P model: for all intent and purposes, this model is practically dead. Of the 40 or so that used this model, I only know of 4 that have released a game in the past 3 years. B. $12.99-$15.00 P2P model. This model has also been in serious decline. There have been around 60 or more MMORPG games that "used" to be in this range (Note: not all at the same time period).

The majority however have fallen into the following categories A. Some have closed down. B. Some use a hybrid model that have premium monthly subscriptions but also a F2P model for those that don't want to pay a monthly fee. C. Have completely transferred over to the F2P model because the company cannot sustain their initial P2P venture. Roughly 75% of those that have followed the "strictly P2P" model have become extinct (or drastically changed their model). There are less than 30 MMORPG games that follow this model and more and more are transitioning to the F2P model.

This model is becoming so unpopular that the only games operating under the strictly P2P model that have been released from 2010 until now are the following: Rift, SWTOR, Xyson, FFXIV (although everything is riding on Version 2.0 and Yioshida has said he is open to the F2P model in a recent interview) and I am sure I am missing one other game. So there are 5 in total. Besides combat (which I thoroughly enjoy) I really don't see a reason [besides money] why you would add a cash shop on top of a P2P model (which is rapidly becoming unpopular).
In all honestly player can handel  cash shop pretty well as long as its not P2W and shop price aren't retarded. And i mean you have to litteraly go out of your way retard to make price where people get pissed of buying. I mean general cash shop user goes we willing to pay pretty high for the most useless thing and as long as they keep it semi reasonable people will buy. There is a great video on it google microtransaction extra credit. great video on who cash shop thing.

Part IV-B: Theme park versus sandbox versus East and West versus the Code Word: TREND


Long title. As we all know TERA is strictly a theme park MMORPG. The thing is that at the moment, there are over 550 MMORPG games and the vast majority fall under the fantasy role playing sub genre. For this game to stay P2P for a long time, it will need a good player base that sticks with the game. We all know that you don't need 12 million or 6 million or 3 million players to keep a business afloat. However, with that said, you do need a stable population that will not have a mass exodus after the first 3 months (something that plagues fantasy theme park MMORPG in recent years). The last time a P2P Korean game was "embraced" by the NA/EU market was "probably" Lineage II, and that game came out in 2004.

I am not sure if there will be enough NA/EU players to stay for the long haul. We already know the die-hard fans will... but what about everyone else? There is nothing wrong with a niche game, but if it becomes too niche, it can and will become a problem from a business standpoint. MMORPG trends have shown that games nowadays become F2P at a much rapid rate. Compare games that came out in 1996-2004 versus 2004-2009 versus 2009-present. It used to take games a decade (or more to go F2P) then it went down to 5 years, then 4, then 3 and now some taking under 3 years to go F2P such as Aion (again talking strictly about the NA/EU market).

On top of that recent upcoming fantasy based theme park games (some being very popular in Asia and/or NA/EU) have gone the F2P route or might. Phantasy Star Online 2 just announced this week from a media conference that it will be using the F2P model with a cash shop. In a recent interview Massively had with NCSoft they asked what payment model they were going to use [regarding Blade & Soul] (since Lineage II and Aion are F2P in North America). So far they have not finalized what business model they will follow which leaves it up in the air. Recent trends have shown that many companies cannot sustain a P2P model in the long term and are forced to become F2P or a hybrid model with a cash shop (usually starts with vanity items but has a high risk of eventually evolving into a P2W later down the road).
Its kinda sad to see game go down P2W road, the thing is they don't need to. I know game can fully substance themself off pure cometic and possbiliy some kind of gamble system. ( aka maplestory gacha) I mean maplestory thrived off almost pure cosmetic and gacha which isn't really P2W, they are doing fine but now they getting super greedy with cash shop item that help with scrolling and such. Sad thing is company can surive w/o it and do well but short term greed always get them over any long term goals.

Part V: My "member" is emotionally invested in this game and the flavor of the month issue.


Tits. Yes we know. They make the World go round and round. The graphics are nice, but let's not kid ourselves here, a good portion of the guys here are in it for the tail. There is nothing wrong with a 1 track mind (I guess). Will there be a mass exodus of people after the 3 or 6 month mark, will combat be enough, or will the feeling of been-there-done-that surface? I really wanted to enjoy the storyline (the way it was told as well as how the lore was unfolded) and the voice acting. Unfortunately they have been subpar. They are not horrible, but they could of been done much better in greater detail. I was not expecting it to be at the level ala Shawshank Redemption, but I was expecting a little bit more than mediocre.

The die-hard fans may come with the knee-jerk reaction of: who cares about the story anyway, EME never really advertised the game based on the story but (for the most part) based on the combat. Sure that is fine and dandy, but it would of been nice if the voiceovers and lore and quests were done better: it would of definitely of not hurt. Part of the problem I see in the official forum (White Knights) is that some folks are emotionally invested in the game: mainly because they want to catch the tail or because they have waited over 2 or 3 years for TERA and they absolutely abhor anyone that tries to rain in on their parade.


*By the way, don't you guys just love how fast news/information travels exponentially faster in 2012 compared to let's say, 2002? Companies need to be extra careful (and quadruple check) what they say because if you don't... well then you get bloopers like the quote I have in my sig.*

That last part didn't make much sense to me lol, idk who care about story of an mmorpg after 3-6month, i mean sure at the begaining you might be interesting but to be honest mmorpg story has always been iffy at best. If i want a well plan out story I watch a movie or read a book or play a single player game. I play mmorpgs to play with people, I will never understand people who play mmorpgs for the story, its nice and all but honestly story is short no matter what game its not going to keep people playing its the hook. Also you have to consider budject, lot of voice acting isn't exactly cheap, and as i stated many time before they do what they can with limited budget. The combat probably took most of their budget away. I mean even GW2 couldn't do full hitbox all the time due to programing issue. Considering their budget and what they had to do its pretty incredble if you ask me. I mean people always say this and that about quest but you know funding is limiting, they can only make what they can afford. I hope they do improve on it once the game start making them some money.

So... does this mean that now GW2 fans now get to invade all the Tera forums and post 87,987 "pay to win" threads?

;)

Originally posted by BadSpock

So... does this mean that now GW2 fans now get to invade all the Tera forums and post 87,987 "pay to win" threads?

;)

Bring it on!

Actually, if Tera goes P2W many people will have expected it due to typical stereotyping, but I think ANET really threw its fans a curve with their bold embracement of the cash shop model.

Originally posted by BadSpock

So... does this mean that now GW2 fans now get to invade all the Tera forums and post 87,987 "pay to win" threads?

;)

Okay...

PAY TO WIN!

But seriously now, that horse is a little pricey for something that is going to get replaced down the road when the release the flying star horse... you know its going to happen.

Originally posted by moosecatlol

Originally posted by BadSpock

So... does this mean that now GW2 fans now get to invade all the Tera forums and post 87,987 "pay to win" threads?

;)

Okay...

 

PAY TO WIN!

 

But seriously now, that horse is a little pricey for something that is going to get replaced down the road when the release the flying star horse... you know its going to happen.

Nooooooooooooooooo...

You're right of course but as long as it's vanity I don't care.  That and the company does something towards the game with the money... the game being played that is... not a future title being funded by the previous one...

C'mon next week get here already!

---

Originally posted by Ankur
Hmm i guess we 'should just get used to it'. Sub and item shop on top of it.

---

I don't know if i belong to a very small group but if i play a game with sub and they introduce a itemshop i quit.

Originally posted by Deron_Barak

Nooooooooooooooooo...

You're right of course but as long as it's vanity I don't care.  That and the company does something towards the game with the money... the game being played that is... not a future title being funded by the previous one...

C'mon next week get here already!

I got my 3rd and last bio midterm before my final next friday =\ also some stupid project due weds so its bitter sweet =\ o wait that sucks i hate bitter stuff and i don't like sweets -.-

and i want to SLEEP!!! Q_Q stayed up all night studying for chem test today total passed it but i can't sleep coz i got to pick class for next year akhfoiaehjfdakhfoiahdfjakdfoasjdfoiasd......

Here's the thing. Tera will be affected a lot stronger than GW2 from a bad implementation of a cash shop (assuming it gets implemented at all, so far all we know is that K-Tera implements some stuff, nothing about W-Tera).

Assuming that any P2win items find their way into the cash shop, it'll affect Tera stronger because it has PvP servers with open world PvP. GW2 in comparison has no open world PvP, the game is essentially a PvE server game. Tera PvE servers will not be affected at all by an implementation of a cash shop either of course.

So, it's more important to Tera to be extra careful with the cash shop, if they indeed decide to implement such thing. GW2 can get away with it, because for the most part the PvP is more controlled.

Btw, I still believe that Tera will go F2P with some sort of cash shop eventually. Pretty much all mmorpg developers are headed that way, with a handful of exceptions. It's just a bit too early to go that way. Not if they want early adopters to give them the game purchase money. Six months down the line or more, maybe, but not near launch. Not if they are smart.

Well they have not mentioned anything about WTERA getting a cash shop on launch, but have not dismissed it either, probably because they know if the game tanks they will do like every P2P MMO does and go f2p with a cash shop, be it cosmetic or P2W.

There are 2 major issues with this:

Releasing this information so close to the NA launch shows an extreme cluelessness.  this will, without question, cost them a number of subs.  Significant?  probably not, but it certainly will push some fence sitters off.  But why not wait a month, til after the launch?  That way those fence sitters may try the game.  If they like the game then they will likely stay anyway.

The cash shop itself is disgraceful.  Cosmetic items:  OK.  RENTALS of cosmetic items?  Seriously?

Well, it's not really an issue unless they confirm that the cash shop implementation will be mirrored in the west. So far pretty much no Korean game has done such a thing. Aion for example, has been a subscription game for years, when at the same time it followed the more traditional by time usage model in Korea.

So the logical thing to expect is the opposite of what is assumed by some people in this thread, ie, that K-Tera and W-Tera will have their unique monetisation systems.

Originally posted by Xasapis

Well, it's not really an issue unless they confirm that the cash shop implementation will be mirrored in the west. So far pretty much no Korean game has done such a thing. Aion for example, has been a subscription game for years, when at the same time it followed the more traditional by time usage model in Korea.

So the logical thing to expect is the opposite of what is assumed by some people in this thread, ie, that K-Tera and W-Tera will have their unique monetisation systems.

Thats not the point though, people *will* assume that the cash shop is on its way and wont even bother.  A developer would have to be foolish not to realize that.

Originally posted by Xasapis

Well, it's not really an issue unless they confirm that the cash shop implementation will be mirrored in the west. So far pretty much no Korean game has done such a thing. Aion for example, has been a subscription game for years, when at the same time it followed the more traditional by time usage model in Korea.

So the logical thing to expect is the opposite of what is assumed by some people in this thread, ie, that K-Tera and W-Tera will have their unique monetisation systems.

The comparison doesn't hold well.  Aion was still subscription in Korea, but they offered a different way to bill that time out whereas in the West it was billed monthly.  Aion has had a cash shop both in the West and East for a long time now and that has nothing to do with how they cut up time slices.

I can't think of a game that has a cash shop implemented only regionally can you?  When there is a cash shop a game is designed with that in mind, including drops and such.

Originally posted by rexzshadow

Originally posted by Deron_Barak

/snip 

I got my 3rd and last bio midterm before my final next friday =\ also some stupid project due weds so its bitter sweet =\ o wait that sucks i hate bitter stuff and i don't like sweets -.-

and i want to SLEEP!!! Q_Q stayed up all night studying for chem test today total passed it but i can't sleep coz i got to pick class for next year akhfoiaehjfdakhfoiahdfjakdfoasjdfoiasd......

Ouch but you know it will be worth it, good for you and hang in there.  You'll get sleep... it just might not come for a while.

On topic,

TERA here in the west is a tricky thing.  We're being ported a game that has been out a year in Korea but is going through an extensive overhaul right before we release here.  On top of that we have a publisher that can actually change the game as they see fit, within reason.  While we see news reports from Korea about K-TERA we might not actually see the same thing... though maybe a variation of it.

If you want to know what's happning with W-TERA you should go to the EME website.  Don't assume that because you see it in K-TERA doesn't mean it will be here.  EME is trying to get the latest version of K-TERA, content wise, so I imgine they are frantic right now so things go smooth on May 1st.

Here is an official stickied thread on the EME website about the K-TERA cash shop started by Knoxxer:

http://tera-forums.enmasse.com/forums/general-discussion/topics/EMEs-Response-to-Koreas-Item-Shop-Announcement 

He reponds a handful of times so best to check his post tracker.  They have all of the items the shop in Korea will have but EME gets to decide the delivery method.

I had written a little rant, as I'm getting frustrated with all the unwarranted bad press that Tera is getting.  I remember a time were people judged games based on the quality of the content itself, and not all these superficial factors that have nothing to do with gamplay.

Let's hate W-Tera because it was based off a korean MMO that had a terrible launch over a year ago.

Let's  hate W-Tera because one class has a huge weapon and talking pandas and that kills immersion for me.  But at the same time let's hate W-Tera because Archers have to pause and actually finish their arrow animation in PvP, that's too realistic.

Let's hate W-Tera because NCSoft which happens to be behind GW2 decided they should sue it's #1 competition during launch.

Let's hate W-Tera based off the first 11 of 60 levels because it's obviously going to be the whole game.  But I'm entitled to my completely uninformed opinion "dude", so I'm going to tell everybody this game is pants.

Let's hate W-Tera because it's a visual impressive action based MMO and does those things extremely well, but doesn't have enough arbitrary story related character choices that non-action based MMOs have.

Let's hate W-Tera because it's P2P, and not F2P with cash shop. Even though everybody hates cash shops anyway. And what's this ?!? K-Tera has the nerve add a cash shop to their sub model forcing everybody to buy these temperary green purely cosmetic glassses.  This is so much worse then GW2's cash shop that sells items that clearly effects gameplay.  K-Tera is P2Win now so I'm going to stop playing W-Tera?

Let's cut the bologna.  I'm not saying that W-Tera is perfect, it's not. It's a flawed but fun game just like every other triple A MMO out there.  So instead of bashing the game based on stuff that's completely unrelated to actual gameplay, how about we give it a fair review for once, and let the W-Tera succeed or fail based off the actual quality of the product.

What's sad is that we don't even care anymore.  I'm tired of listening to proffessional blogger's review of how much they love SW:TOR, but somehow never managed to reach endgame in 3 months and actively avoided the PvP.  I'm tired of hearing people talk about how much GW2 has more polish and content over Tera even though they've never even played Tera, let alone GW2!  And who cares if GW2 turns out to be completely buggy trash with no endgame content at launch, it's completely Free (minus the cost of the box), even though you can play the first month of Tera completely free too (minus the box).

Originally posted by Deron_Barak

Originally posted by rexzshadow

Originally posted by Deron_Barak

/snip 

I got my 3rd and last bio midterm before my final next friday =\ also some stupid project due weds so its bitter sweet =\ o wait that sucks i hate bitter stuff and i don't like sweets -.-

and i want to SLEEP!!! Q_Q stayed up all night studying for chem test today total passed it but i can't sleep coz i got to pick class for next year akhfoiaehjfdakhfoiahdfjakdfoasjdfoiasd......

Ouch but you know it will be worth it, good for you and hang in there.  You'll get sleep... it just might not come for a while.

 

On topic,

TERA here in the west is a tricky thing.  We're being ported a game that has been out a year in Korea but is going through an extensive overhaul right before we release here.  On top of that we have a publisher that can actually change the game as they see fit, within reason.  While we see news reports from Korea about K-TERA we might not actually see the same thing... though maybe a variation of it.

If you want to know what's happning with W-TERA you should go to the EME website.  Don't assume that because you see it in K-TERA doesn't mean it will be here.  EME is trying to get the latest version of K-TERA, content wise, so I imgine they are frantic right now so things go smooth on May 1st.

passed out after picked my classes for 5hrs, tired still but now more hungry lol

I'm putting my faith in EME and hope they don't screw us over like other game compnay do. Its big and proabaly will determine their future as a publisher as well.

Originally posted by rexzshadow

passed out after picked my classes for 5hrs, tired still but now more hungry lol

I'm putting my faith in EME and hope they don't screw us over like other game compnay do. Its big and proabaly will determine their future as a publisher as well.

 Lol, wow, well hopefully you find a good groove of play time and school time, it's important to have some of both... without forgetting sleep, ha! I'm gettting back to school myself after 12 years.  One class last term and two this term to get prereqs for nursing.  You'd think being married with three kids would make it harder but it makes me segment my time better.  Good luck man

Originally posted by BigBadWolfe

...

I remember a time were people judged games based on the quality of the content itself, and not all these superficial factors that have nothing to do with gamplay.

...

 The rest I agree with but this sums it up.  People still judge MMOs this way though the number seems small indeed.  As the years go on and the titles go by, especially the F2P rampage, you'd hope that MMO fans would be able to see quality development.