Originally posted by Thillian

I would be pretending everyone is happy and trying to artificially increase the subscription rates for the next BoD meeting, while feeding my superiors with phrases from Gobbledygook Generator  such as "This is no time to bite the bullet with our quality management matrix approaches." or "We need a more blue-sky approach to compatible third-generation concepts."

http://www.plainenglish.co.uk/examples/gobbledygook-generator.html

And enjoying my high salary while it lasts, naturally. It seems current lead dev actually thinks the same way.

Originally posted by Kalfer

I would argue with EA that the expansion would be needed to be free update for all players. It would be the largest patch ever made for a MMORPG (and marketing would ride that sthick, trying to create new hype around the game.. even brining it to e3). 

 

 

 

It would re-create SWTOR as a Sandbox game, through the introduction of open space flight. Guild Ships in the galaxy. players being able to affect the power balance in the world.

 

 Would scrap the way combat works for something that looks and feels nice, like Jedi Knight... a bit like TERA but in a way that feels good for star wars. 

All end-game would be scrapped and abandoned. Raids and Warzones would be left behind for something else and more meaningful.

day/night cycles would be introduced, levelling speed would be increased to make the path to lvl 50 less boring. many of the side quests would have their durations / requirements greatly reduced to make them not monotone but exciting. 

all NPCs would undergo massive overhaul. make them lifeful. Make them act like living NPCs who sleep at night, eat, go to work (in the context of were they are in the world). like Skyrim the aim will be to make them fill a meaningful role as the common people of the galaxy while the player is the hero. 

Races - non humans would undergo drastic animation changes to seperate them for humans. 

character customization and itemization - more variety and choice for all classes with gear. more body types (and some exclusive for certain races that make sense), - full customization control over player race companions. pick any face and hairstyle you want.

- open up the planets focusing on the war. increased planet size, make them alive. give reason to come back. 

Awesome post.  I would just like to add 2 things for my own tastes.  Increase the Epic Music we hear per zone/area and Knock Down all those invisible walls and give me Mountains to go climb and nooks and crannies to seek out filled with small but fun Lore or Items or rare mobs.  I want to come around a corner on the road and see vistas that I can go OOH at or maybe even go visit them if I travel far enough.  

Like that crashed Ship on the horizon on the starter planet for Troopers and Smugglers...Ord mantell I think it is, I want to visit that crashed ship.  Currently, it's just a matte painting that never moves but is supposed to make me think it's there...yet it's lost on me due to the art style and invisible walls.

Originally posted by cloud8521

Originally posted by Kreedz

If I worked for Bioware, I'd probably tell EA to stick it where the sun don't shine and go Indie (where all the innovation is happening).

not possible. EA owns Bioware.  bioware cant leave without their permision because  bioware is not the devteam anymore its a part of EA and EA owns their name and place of busness along with anything they make.

Management buyout?

I wonder how many of the peeps at Bioware said exactly this kind of thing would happen when BW were being bought by EA. BW were an amazing company but now they have just been subsumed into the giant clusterfuck that is EA.

I remember a quote I read a while back and think it was referring to EA/BW but cant find the link now.

"Bioware needed to make money so they could make great games. EA needed to make games so they could make great amounts of money"

If I was a smart employee, I'd listen carefully to what the executive was looking for. Then I would send my resume to ArenaNet.

Realistically, if it's really sinking, going F2P looks like the best option.

ill kick that exec in the nuts and continue playing TOR

First I would wonder why I am still working at EA.  If I had no faith in my abilities I would do what ever the Exec thinks would save TOR.  If I had faith in my abilities I would quit and go indie or look for a job at places that anit connected to the big boys.

Originally posted by Kalfer

I would argue with EA that the expansion would be needed to be free update for all players. It would be the largest patch ever made for a MMORPG (and marketing would ride that sthick, trying to create new hype around the game.. even brining it to e3). 

 

 

 

It would re-create SWTOR as a Sandbox game, through the introduction of open space flight. Guild Ships in the galaxy. players being able to affect the power balance in the world.

 

 Would scrap the way combat works for something that looks and feels nice, like Jedi Knight... a bit like TERA but in a way that feels good for star wars. 

All end-game would be scrapped and abandoned. Raids and Warzones would be left behind for something else and more meaningful.

day/night cycles would be introduced, levelling speed would be increased to make the path to lvl 50 less boring. many of the side quests would have their durations / requirements greatly reduced to make them not monotone but exciting. 

all NPCs would undergo massive overhaul. make them lifeful. Make them act like living NPCs who sleep at night, eat, go to work (in the context of were they are in the world). like Skyrim the aim will be to make them fill a meaningful role as the common people of the galaxy while the player is the hero. 

Races - non humans would undergo drastic animation changes to seperate them for humans. 

character customization and itemization - more variety and choice for all classes with gear. more body types (and some exclusive for certain races that make sense), - full customization control over player race companions. pick any face and hairstyle you want.

- open up the planets focusing on the war. increased planet size, make them alive. give reason to come back. 

So basically shut this one down and start from scratch then. Sounds like a plan to me

It may be a little bit to late, but - simply make the game like LOTRO.

Client free , until x lvl, after that pay for quests on planets.

Shame that they didnt do it at start , than they could do the same but sell the client aswell.

But with all bad hype the game got, it may be late, to late.

Funny that on end of all SWG was many times more profitable for Lucas Arts

Primary goal; Focus on keeping the 1.7 mil sub base TOR currently has. Listen and cater to what those players feel is needed in the game. Wouldn't want another CU, that'd be ironic. Once the Sub base stabilizes, more players will come. There's no need to frantically try to amass a huge player-base at this time.

First; server merges, leaving some servers low pop (Some players enjoy this). Give the players a choice to merge or stay.

Third, work on a better LFG system. Not cross-server (Making the community happy), but looking into a toggle option for what Heroics/Flashpoints you are interested in, and allowing Party leaders to view players who are interested. Leaving the comments box there to give players the feel that they aren't a statistic of a 'role' unless they feel they are.

Fourth, toss in a bi-monthly content team who's main goal is keeping TOR fresh, and letting the players know their $15 isn't going to the developer's alcoholic needs. Anything from new FP's to WZ's or with a few feature additions and gear.

• Check on games progress in July-Aug. (The time that the Founder's 6-month subs expire),  to see if the player-base has grown or shrunk. Chances are, they might take a dip, but if that wouble is less than 1/3's, It's acceptable. Set a team aside to work on an expansion along with a theme for it, no real date set yet. Still pre-planning phase.
• Check on server status, if another merge is needed, have a metrics team look into where peak time falls for players in them, Make a system that can match a players average play-time and decide what server has the best amount of players at that time daily. Match based on this. 

Fifth, around December 2012, if the player-base has successfully stabilized from 1.7-2.0 mil, Announce plans for an expansion, possibly even a trailer to stir hype for the new year, and investor meetings. If not, recycle expansions resources back to the main pool and continue work on bug fixes and content creation. 

Formulate a contingency plan for if subscribe numbers fall, prepare to transition to F2P with a 'DLC' price model.

Its game design is done so that drastic changes would be impossible.  The game was designed for the short term subscriber in mind.  Sell a ton of boxes, hope people sub for 3-6 months then rinse and repeat.  It really is a McDonalds style MMO where you go for a quick fix then move on.  I believe that is how BW envisioned it.  I just do not see how they thought someone would be willing or want to play it beyond that kind of time frame.

Ugh, not sure if I should bite. Ok, given I have NO idea how expensive what idea is, here comes:

I would appoint three teams, I - Animated World, II - Alternative Quests, III - Alternative Content. Let me explain.

Team I - Animated world:

This team focusses on every way to make the planets look more interesting, like living, breathing worlds. They calculate the chances and methods to implement these:

- swimming, and diving and possible underwater areas (lakes)

- day- and night cycles

- weather

- more small animals (deer, rabbits, birds or their star wars pendent), and making the fauna ANIMATED and not stand there

- MUCH more ambient sounds, can be added easy and cheap and does a great effect

- mobs are wandering a bit around and not stand there

- NPCs do some work and not just stand there. Take the Twilek Village on Tython. NONE of them does anything. Wrong! Add optional Chat Bubbles and also let NPCs have chat-bubble conversations so you get some lore info about whats going on around you in the world.

- Animated City life in new planned social hubs, Coruscant, Anchorhead as. The Fleet is done away, and these new social hubs and formed with all social hub needs + animated city life.

Team II - Alternative Quests

This team adds new quests with the emphasis NOT to make too make "kill X" or "use terminal" quests. A really horrible bane of SWTOR is how many quests involve going into a cave or tunnel area, mow down all mobs to find the quest objective at the end of the cave/tunnel and then fight through all mobs back. That has to GO. Period. Team II adds tons of "soft quests", care a day for the war orphans, find and tame a cute creature for some animal researcher, find the treasure of Pirate X and get a fancy hat, some stuff that is NOT super dramatic and serious. Stuff that does not involve war, killing and fedex trash. Creative quests, as alternative levelling content for better replay value with new alts. They would save money by ignoreing Voice Overs and just make a few VO sentences, not these long winded conversations.

Team III - Alternative Content

This team adds all sorts of non heroic and non combat content. Entertainer system, real crafting, player housing, player cities, hobbies like fishing, farming asf; minigames like Podracing, Pazaak asf.; adding Puzzles (like in Rift); creature taming and collecting, all sorts of things which are NOT killing, war and combat.

That's my suggestion.

There is no doubt in my mind that the game not only needs saving, but can be saved.. i don't think the solution is even all that radical, the first step, imo, would be to create a cross server 'dungeon tool' that would allow players to group together regardless of current location, and do flashpoint missions, the current system does not work. Without that first step, i don't think the game has much of a future. Blizzard didnt introduce those tools to their game without good reason, Bioware needs to understand why they did it, and implement something similar. They could even give more 'funcitonality' to guilds by giving guilds the ability to 'kick down' to another guild members level in order to do flashpoints etc, together with them, i know this is a game mechanic that guildwars is implementing in their game, but any game that doesnt learn from others successes, and their own mistakes, is doomed to repeat them. Maybe once the game becomes a real MMO, in terms of players able to group together to do content with a minimum of time wasted/difficulty then the more likely it will be that players will stay, despite other, perhaps less impacting, game issues,

Add Pandas!

Originally posted by RefMinor
I would tell him the game is fine and is the future of MMOs and the issue is with the customers.

Before or after selling all your EA stocks?

to OP.

very tough. so many bad decision were made during the whole process that to fix this game now it will probably take way more work then to start a new one. so much lazyness, so little vision, so little soul.

1) the first thing that absolutely has to change is the feel of combat. it is just too static, unresponsive, awkward, slow, un inspired....for heaven's sake even DC online has funner feeling combat then TOR. the absolutely best thing about WoW is just how smooth and responsive the combat is. this should be priority #1. now i dont actually know how to make the combat feel better but it has to be done.

2) stop focusing on voice overs. the majority of people dont want a friken voice over on every damn quest. main story line sure, but not every single damn quest.

3) you've got to come up with new worlds that dont feel like a bunch of rails in a box. i cannot stress how small and funneled all maps in this game feel. make one BIG world that it's open (no unscalable cliffs that funnel you, no invisible walls everywere), that is big so you can explore, and dont just make a huge usless city that takes up 1/4 of the map. WoW has a huge world, if you were to walk from the top of Kalimodor to the bottom it would take you hours. worlds that feels alive and not just "oh those mobs are there because i need something to kill". on pvp worlds make this world open pvp ffs, that's the whole point of rolling on a pvp server.

4) somehow change the space aspect of this game so it feels like you are actually piloting your ship from point A to point B. the current space part ofthe game is soo lazy, boring, and completely redundant. it's basically a house with screen that makes it look like you are in space, nobody is fooled. also the space mini games are horrendous.

I'd tell EA that working for you has been a mistake and we(bioware) are going to go back to making quality games without you rather than crap games with you.

I'd do exactly what was never done in the 1st place.

Homework!

Find out who wants a Star Wars MMO game. Find out who doesn't. Then determine the reasons why. Then see if there are those who don't want it who can be brought over to those who do without sacrificing thoes in the 1st group. Then you grill that 1st group to find out what makes them tick. What stimulates them, what turns them on and off. Keep them in the loop at all times during the planning of the game. Make no assumtions. Find out what the market wants. Find out what they don't want and give it to them. Do not think that because someone else did it, it's repeatable. If it means scrapping the current game for a redesign...Then DO IT!  Sony was able to do it. Yes, they failed, but that's because they took it the wrong way. And no, I am not suggesting converting it to SWG. I am just suggesting to find out what will make people want to stay in the game for month after month.

It is not possible to make an 12 mln game out of it.

To be honest apart of few F2P heavy-asian games on Chinese market no game will gain 12 mln again anytime soon.

Simple as that.

While playerbase overall is bigger and it expanding , there is far far more game now than few years ago and new ones keep pouring in.  

There is no chance in hell that any mmorpg will dominate whole market as hard as WoW have done it in next 5 or so years.

There will be few quite big popular titles with 1 mln + populations. Some might even jump to 4-5 mln , there will be no 12 mln anymore anytime soon (with exclude of those very specific Asian only chinese f2p grinders that have i insane populations , simialr like Runescape once had  - still for many reasons RS did not earn that amount of cash like WoW did and that was one of reasons it could have that big playerbase).

That kind of domination WoW had (and partially still do but it is melting fast) is almost only possible on 'fresh markets'. 

Let me explain - LoL is like WoW for MOBA games.  There is fierce fight in Moba genre and it will be even bigger with many upcoming titles.  

Dota 2 is big project financed propably ALOT more than LoL was in it's development time. Will it gain as high playerbase as LoL?  

No it won't. 

It WILL be popular and it will get some players from LoL and it will propably be second most popular MOBA and maybe in some years time it will be most popular or maybe it won't.

Still there is no easy "let's make next 10 mln users MOBA". It will just not happen as MOBA market is starting to mature (but still 'fresh' compared to mmorpg market).

That's why so many MMOFPS and MMORTS big titles are coming out in next 2 years. Cause companies hope for 'mmorts or mmofps boom' simialr to mmorpg and MOBA's boom and know that best of those titles in each of this 2 genres will propably gain ALOT of players and their moneys.

Players coming late to already developed market have very very low chance of dominating market as much as 'first big success' did. It is not impossible (see CoD and FPS games) but it is very hard and actually not very propable.

Better stick with lesser goals and make business project for more realistic goals imo. 

Some finance guys does not seem to realize that and want 10 millons users and BILLIONS of revenue game right out of box.

Guess they will never learn.  

Putting alot of money can make you popular game , but it won't guarantee HUGE BIG MAMOOTH TOTAL DOMINATION game like WoW and LoL were / are in their genres.