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10/26/12 12:25:00 PM#81
Originally posted by Torvaldr This! LOTRO at that time still had quite a few subscribers. Over 300k at least. Especially when the EU servers were still managed by Codemasters. Sure it wasn't the 600k + subs they had in the first 2 years till after Mines of Moria, but 300k+ is still a very respectable number. The thing was: 1. DDO's conversion to Freemium F2P model was a huge success in the first year! 2. They were bought by Warner Bros and wanted to put all focus on expanding the Freemium F2P model towards LOTRO. So LOTRO going Freemium F2P wasn't because the game was doing bad. They just wanted to increase their revenue further after the initial success with DDO. In other words .... they saw the $$$ signs and got greedy! And now 2 years later it's starting to backfire, as they have chased away most of their loyal fans with their continuing greed, squeezing out the playerbase more and more, turning the Store into Pay 2 Win, VIP subscribing has become pointless as it's much cheaper to stay Premium! So they have just shot themselves in the foot with their blind greed! /Facepalm |
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10/26/12 12:29:13 PM#82
Originally posted by Badaboom Nope. That is only when you release the game itself, that some overhead (like temporary staff) are let go. With expansions, it's basically a dedicated live team focussing on creating expansions. So when you release one expansion, this same team starts immediately working on the next expansion, etc, etc.
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10/26/12 12:32:38 PM#83
It's interesting that when Turbine hires alot of big names no one cares. Then when they have some lay offs all the haters come out in full force being happy that people loose their jobs! So many bitter people that LotrO is one of the most sucesfull MMOs and still going strong with a new expansion with the best content the game have ever seen.
If WoW = The Beatles |
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10/26/12 12:37:56 PM#84
Originally posted by Papadam Those so called "big" names they hired had nothing to do with LOTRO nor DDO! They were hired to help Turbine shifting their focus towards the console platform. These lay offs directly affect LOTRO and DDO. And RoR the best expac? LOL! You serious? You should have a good look at the official forums. /shrug I guess you also missed the outrage on the forums back in the summer regarding this expac and it's pricing and how they tried to ripp you off by keeping the Instance Cluster out of the expac and charge you extra for it? If LOTRO was going so strong as you say... they wouldn't try to rip off their playerbase with these kind of sleezy stunts! /Facepalm |
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10/26/12 12:49:46 PM#85
Originally posted by Papadam
1. A game going F2P is not strong. 2. Slow and old game mechanic 3. A game that rips off players is not strong 3. Content of expansions decreased dramatically, and people getting level 85 in a day is not strong 4. No new pvp map for 5 years You can say this game was strong at SoA and the launch of moria, but not after. SoM, RoI, RoR are all fail and the games numbers showed it. Bitter? not really, for i know this game is going downhill and more of a chance someone else will make a LOTR mmo, im pretty happy actually. |
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10/26/12 12:57:36 PM#86
Originally posted by JeroKane
If WoW = The Beatles |
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10/26/12 1:05:07 PM#87
Originally posted by xalvi
If WoW = The Beatles |
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10/26/12 1:14:28 PM#88
Originally posted by Ozmodan I said it's not F2P if they don't IMMEDIATELY give you free access to the cap. In LOTRO you have to start paying long before the cap or if you are one of the rare few you can GRIND, GRIND, GRIND TPs to unlock them. |
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10/26/12 1:26:04 PM#89
Originally posted by Papadam The instance cluster showed on the page that it was included the first 3 days when pre-orders went live! Then they made a stealth update to the page and removed it! When people got angry and felt mislead, they came out and posted that it was a Copy/Pasta mistake from previous Rise of Isengard expasion! LOL It took then a whole outrage on the forums that went on for several weeks! before Turbine decided to include the Instance Cluster within the expansion again. And only if you buy it with money! With TP you have to buy everything seperately and in end cost you a lot more! And what you blattering about server merges man?? No one in this entire topic has ever mentioned that? lol. /shrug |
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10/26/12 1:37:05 PM#90
Originally posted by JeroKane FYI, you're currently offering false information, which undermines the accurate information in your post. If you buy the expansion as an expansion in their Turbine point store, you will get the instance cluster included. This is an UPGRADE from the previous expansion where they could only offer it piecemeal until the cluster came out due to the lack of tech to be able to sell things that were not yet released. It is true that people weren't pleased with the pricing with the lack of instance clusters. However, Turbine responded and fixed it, which is a lot more than most developers would do. Players as a whole are VERY happy with the expansion on all counts. |
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10/26/12 1:39:01 PM#91
Originally posted by JeroKane
You goy any sources to back up those numbers? 'The trouble with quotes on the internet is that you never know if they are genuine' - Abraham Lincoln |
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10/26/12 1:40:15 PM#92
Originally posted by JeroKane Not adding much to discussion, but I find it funny, that you're defending TSW/Funcom so fiercely, when people have also been mislead and got angry from the WOW-like end game in TSW. Yet when those guys who got tired of the never-ending treadmill, it's their fault and TSW is awesome. Oh, the hypocrisy. Let's not fail to add that TSW sold less than 300k copies and Funcom already cut 50% of their staff. I'd say Lotro is doing much better than your TSW. I bought LotRO @ release, spent like 6 months in it and really enjoyed it. I enjoyed it enough to justify that sub price too. Just went back recently as F2P and I don't really like it that much anymore now. The shop is way too intrusive to gameplay. |
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10/26/12 1:47:11 PM#93
They pretty much killed the game with 3 horrible management decisions (IMO)...
1) Trying to push the game further and further away from the unique Middle Earth feel (It's main draw for many) and more toward a generic "High Fantasy MMO" . This was a conscious decision in order to "broaden" it's appeal to more generic MMO players (aka WoW's audience). Absolutely bone-headed decision (IMO). They should have tried to broaden the appeal by pushing those features that were unique and interesting about LOTRO and set it apart from other MMO's. In other words they should have grown thier own audience organicaly by reaching out to people not playing MMO's (or not well served by the current crop) rather then engaging in a futile effort to fight WoW for it's audience. You saw this toward the end of SOA with more over the top high fantasy magic in content and it went into full tilt in Moria with the introduction of a full blown magic user class, gear grinds, dailys and gear gated content. Got worse with the "solofication" of the game afterwards and making virtualy everything instanced...took away alot of the unique and interesting features of the game for more bland generic MMO'ness. Opportunity blown. 2) Allowing the player base to dwindle with long periods of content stagnation and nothing to do. They started out great with good, high quality regular content updates for the first year and a half or so. However then they went into a desert with content updates few and far between and really very minimal in nature...mostly a few instanced based things. I believe that was tied to the shifting resources to make F2P happen. It's the abnsolute DEATHKNELL of Themepark games not to keep up with at least thier casual playerbase in terms of content updates. You can never keep up with the truely hardcore, but that's not such a big deal....they can be satisfied by repeatable grinds/raids and they aren't that huge a portion of the player base anyway. However if you can't keep up with your own casuals your in big trouble. Either you need to keep the content flowing or you need to start switching to more "sandboxy" features (or PvP) where the players are providing thier own content. Failing to do either is just a killer. Opportunity Blown. 3) F2P conversion. I'm not going to debate the merits of one business model over another. However it's a VERY big deal switching business models for a well established product in mid-stream. It's one thing if your game is an absolute cellar dweller (DDO) and you've got nowhere to go....but for a game that has a reasonably healthy, stable population...switching models in mid-stream is a killer in the long term (IMO). You risk alienating alot of your long term, loyal customer base...trading long term brand loyalty for a short term bump in proffits. You have to realize that LOTRO and DDO are different products and what works for one won't neccesarly work the same way for the other. You also have to realize that if you are pulling resources away from further developing your product in order to support the business model switch that IS going to hurt the appeal of the product itself. Finally you have to make sure that you are scrupulous in keeping the assurances you made to your existing player base to mollify them about the negtive aspects of a cash shop. Instead Turbine let the cash shop become more and more intrusive into the game and gameplay. Things they promised they would never sell they started selling. More and more nickle and diming of full paying subscribers, etc. In other words they sacrificed the very teneous trust relationship built up between the brand and it's customers...something that once lost can NEVER be rebuilt...and they did it all for just a few extra dollars in short term sales. The F2P conversion strained trust...but it didn't break it.... the things that started creeping into the cash shop did...even if only giving the perception of greed and Pay-2-Win to those who were very nervous about those elements due to the bussiness model conversion. Oppoortunity Blown. Turbine, REALLY, REALLY has no one to blame for thier floundering revenue but themselves. They had a HUGE opportunity and they squandered it with short-sited decisions. I feel no sympathy for them. YMMV. |
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10/26/12 1:59:35 PM#94
Originally posted by keirion They didn't fix it! They were FORCED to fix it, as people refused to pay 40 bucks for a questpack and started demanding refunds based on false advertisment! Plus the outrage on both official and public forums didn't do them any good either! The worst was that initially when the Pre-order page went live, it actually showed the Instance Cluster was included! Then they waited three days to cash in on the initial pre-order rush, to suddenly remove the instance cluster from the pre-order with no notification whatsoever! When people suddenly discovered this little stealth update and became very angry and rightfully so, they were forced to respond. The response was that it was a "Copy / Paste" error from the previous Rise of Isengard expansion an that it was never intended to include an instance cluster to the Rohan expansion! Then they waited for several weeks to see if people would buy this farce of an explanation and if they could get away with, before they finally decided to include the instance cluster within the expansion again! /facepalm
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10/26/12 2:16:24 PM#95
atm i am really enjoying rohan..its way better than SOM and ROI.thing is they(turbine)charge large amounts of money for stuff that should be just general content addon.not good buisness when you do things like that.the community feels like its been ripped off.there have been some great changes in RoR.but no end game to me the problem is they are charging people again for lvl scaled dungeons going back god knows how many lvls.again not good buisness practice.then they make promises to put an instance cluster in RoR and charge people only to backtrack on that.it was only when the gamers set the forums on flames they backtracked again. the way i look at it is when you treat people like shit what do you expect.i have been extremely lucky..i have a lifetime sub that cost me £75 three years ago and i got the expansion for nothing.so they are not receiving income at all from me and have'nt for 3 yrs.although i,m happy i got a lifetime..these lifetimes and the ability to buy xpacs from the store is hurting the game imo.not sure how many peeps have a lifetime but it will be a few and thats income. when all said and done my opinion is that WB are mostly responsible for the chaos because they ask way too much off the dev team forcing them to take short cuts with content etc,and we all know when you dont do your job properly or are rushed into it,you get shoddy work..just look at EA for that example..my only wish is that someone else would take over the ip and do it justice because thats what it deserves. i,m no expert when it comes to mmo's i just enjoy playing them.the way i see turbine and WB atm is that they have been extremely greedy in overcharging people and they know it.but they have to make the money somehow.same has every other company..end result is if you dont want to pay the money then dont play it. i guess its down to bad buisness practice that they are now hurting..and they are not the only ones.funcom and most of the other companies are now suffering as well. |
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10/26/12 2:19:37 PM#96
Originally posted by Rawiz Ehh... they never ever mislead anyone with The Secret World. Everyone knew what the game would be. They have been very open and honest during development of this game. All the info was out there. I completely agree with you when it comes to Age of Conan. But that horse has been beaten to death now. Nothing left but pulp lol. Oh and I was very angry at that time.
PS. I bought LOTRO at release too and bought all the expansions. But stopped being VIP right after Rise of Isengard last year, as it was just total waste of money as I had full access to everything already anyway. |
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10/26/12 2:21:29 PM#97
Originally posted by Papadam You are trying really hard to prove what you are saying is true, when indeed it is not.
1. What doesn't make sense whenever a game is losing subscribers to the point where they lose profits and the like, then goes F2P? WoW for instance, are you saying they will go F2P with 9million subscribers? F2P saves mmo or lingers it, turbine couldn't save it but lingered it. That is a fail
2. Mounted combat,really. Ya that will save the slow pace combat....it not as if im fighting while monted all the time. Oh i know, use mounted combat while you are raiding! the day is saved. You just proved my point, it is a 5 year old game, which is why i said it has slow and old combat mechanics thanks for confirming what i said.
3. RoI was a complete rip of, and they tried to do the same even with RoR but failed. They increased the grind to the max, causing people to buy scrolls from the store and such.
4. I never played WoW, but GW2 is not meant to be a grind. It is set for casual players and ANET clearly said they don't want to mke this a pve grind. This is a pvp game.
The end, cha cha now. |
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10/26/12 3:09:14 PM#98
Originally posted by xalvi
If WoW = The Beatles |
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10/26/12 3:21:12 PM#99
Originally posted by Elsabolts I just really don't know what to say about this... |
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10/26/12 4:03:47 PM#100
Originally posted by bigsmiff Im glad to see the layoffs. People who screw off and dont do thier jobs regardless of thier job deserve to be fired.Ill agree that not all of the people bieng fired deserve it. That bieng said sapience,frelorn and lot of those cs people deserve it heres why CS/gm telling people to redo an entire raid b/c of a bugged loot chest is unnaceptable then threatening to ban the person filing the ticket for discussing the issue on glff channel and hearing other people agree that its not right to tell a paying customer that. CS/gm banning my friend for over a year accusing him of buying 3000$ worth of gold. This is beyond crazy and unacceptable.Then to give him the account back a year later and not even apoligize and say dont discuss this issue. This is highly unethical. Gm dating a customer that i know of. These are unethecil things going on constantly with lotro. If i was doing these unethical things at my job i would expect to be fired not allowed to screw off for 5 years and then be caught. Sapience,frelorn and lot of those gm's are hghly unethical people. So as much as theirs people who dont deserve to be fired these people do and i hope they are.
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