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Originally posted by PreCU
Heh, I remember patch notes saying things were fixed, when they weren't in SWG, over and over again. This CoH deal was quite a bit better for me. I actually discovered the changes myself in beta testing, before seeing any patch notes about them. A lot of the problems presented by the system change had been thoroughly addressed. I was pretty surprised and had people test stuff with me over and over just to make sure I wasn't hallucinating lol. Then I had an exchange with the lead dev on the changes, in which he confirmed listening to current player feedback, and making significant changes to try to accomodate it. It's an attempt to address issues raised by non-pvers AND by current pvpers alike. It would be kind of like saying to SOE around CU time, "hey we really liked crafted stims for doctor buffs," and they would have said, "oh ok, we'll put those back before this goes live." Deleted powers have been restored, and mechanics have been changed to make my multi-million dollar pvp builds viable again. At the start of beta, they were junk. All the progress in character building and crafting that I was about to lose, has been salvaged. This is really huge for me. |
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11/22/08 12:59:04 AM#42
The COX franchise is going nowhere put a down anyway as it's run its course. COX will not compete well with the two new next generation super hero MMO's heading our way anyway. Nobody in their right mind who enjoys the whole comic super hero thing pick COX over a DC comic MMO. |
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Originally posted by IAmMMO
Well, I can safely say that SOE didn't listen to current players about unwanted revamps, but now, before the revamp has gone live, NCsoft has listened and made important changes. If left to choose between the DC MMO by SOE, and CoX, I'd now choose CoX. The reason would be that before things went live, the devs actually listened, and responded well. I really, really wasn't expecting this, and I'm very pleasantly surprised. They may have competition with Champions Online, but SOE still puts a damper on the DC game for me. |
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11/22/08 4:31:22 AM#44
Originally posted by ArcAngel3
Well, I can safely say that SOE didn't listen to current players about unwanted revamps, but now, before the revamp has gone live, NCsoft has listened and made important changes. If left to choose between the DC MMO by SOE, and CoX, I'd now choose CoX. The reason would be that before things went live, the devs actually listened, and responded well. I really, really wasn't expecting this, and I'm very pleasantly surprised. They may have competition with Champions Online, but SOE still puts a damper on the DC game for me.
Congrats Arc. Imagine that, devs that listen to their playerbase even on upcoming, already coded, CHANGES. What a concept. |
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11/22/08 9:58:36 AM#45
Yeah this is a good thing, and as for DCU Online, I don't even consider it since they have alot of NGE-bound devs in there. SWTOR: sub ended, no thanks to Georg Zoeller! |
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11/22/08 10:04:30 AM#46
Originally posted by sookster54
They do also have Jim lee, and the question is how much of the NGE crap that was Lucasarts fault. Don't count out a game because some of it's devs made stupid things before, it all depands on who is the boss and who the brainchild of the NGE was. And anyways, there is still Champions online coming also so I am not so sure that CoX wont lose subs to them at least. |
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Originally posted by Esquire1980
Congrats Arc. Imagine that, devs that listen to their playerbase even on upcoming, already coded, CHANGES. What a concept.
Blew my mind lol ^_^, in a good way for a change. Gives me more hope for the game, and the genre. If people do leave for Champions or DC, it won't be as much because they felt shafted. Some still feel this way, mind you, but the effort to listen and incorporate current player feedback is defintely there, along with important results. Combat in pvp is slowed some for people that really had a hard time keeping up, I don't mind it slowed down a bit tbh, I'm old :P. It's not ridiculously slow though, as it was to begin with. Also, some overly dominant archetypes have been balanced, and weaker ones now have more of a chance. Now, when I play the beta pvp and the live pvp, I actually prefer the beta slightly. At the beginning, beta was an absolute nightmare, devs and players seemed to have dug in their heals, and my pvp builds were junk. Now that people are done reacting, and people are actually talking and listening, new players are getting some welcome changes, and old players are finding their pvp builds more viable again. There's still a ways to go mind you, but this is a very nice direction. |
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11/22/08 1:15:09 PM#48
Originally posted by ArcAngel3
Congrats Arc. Imagine that, devs that listen to their playerbase even on upcoming, already coded, CHANGES. What a concept.
Blew my mind lol ^_^, in a good way for a change. Gives me more hope for the game, and the genre. If people do leave for Champions or DC, it won't be as much because they felt shafted. Some still feel this way, mind you, but the effort to listen and incorporate current player feedback is defintely there, along with important results. Combat in pvp is slowed some for people that really had a hard time keeping up, I don't mind it slowed down a bit tbh, I'm old :P. It's not ridiculously slow though, as it was to begin with. Also, some overly dominant archetypes have been balanced, and weaker ones now have more of a chance. Now, when I play the beta pvp and the live pvp, I actually prefer the beta slightly. At the beginning, beta was an absolute nightmare, devs and players seemed to have dug in their heals, and my pvp builds were junk. Now that people are done reacting, and people are actually talking and listening, new players are getting some welcome changes, and old players are finding their pvp builds more viable again. There's still a ways to go mind you, but this is a very nice direction.
Admittedly, I talk more here about $OE's Chapter 6 Combat Downgrade more than anything due to being most familiar with it. If Blixtev and Deadmeat would of done this in C6, they might actually of had most of the 100K subs they talked about, then, still in the game, today. But, Blixtev, and Co., had their godhead egos going full bore, trained via CU and NGE, and they did what they did and have what they have. But it is nice to see that some1 learned something from CU, NGE, and C6CD, even if it wasn't $OE Austin. I still have high hopes for ST:O. |
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11/23/08 2:40:02 AM#49
Originally posted by Loke666
They do also have Jim lee, and the question is how much of the NGE crap that was Lucasarts fault. Don't count out a game because some of it's devs made stupid things before, it all depands on who is the boss and who the brainchild of the NGE was. And anyways, there is still Champions online coming also so I am not so sure that CoX wont lose subs to them at least.
Jim Lee's background is in comic artwork and production, not in game development. His name on a comic book MMO means squat to me. As far as the degree of who was most responsible for the NGE, it doesn't matter if the SOE devs from SWG/NGE are in DCU. Just look at that mess the NGE was when it came out. "I have only two out of my company and 20 out of some other company. We need support, but it is almost suicide to try to get it here as we are swept by machine gun fire and a constant barrage is on us. I have no one on my left and only a few on my right. I will hold." (First Lieutenant Clifton B. Cates, US Marine Corps, Soissons, 19 July 1918) |
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Originally posted by Esquire1980
Blew my mind lol ^_^, in a good way for a change. Gives me more hope for the game, and the genre. If people do leave for Champions or DC, it won't be as much because they felt shafted. Some still feel this way, mind you, but the effort to listen and incorporate current player feedback is defintely there, along with important results. Combat in pvp is slowed some for people that really had a hard time keeping up, I don't mind it slowed down a bit tbh, I'm old :P. It's not ridiculously slow though, as it was to begin with. Also, some overly dominant archetypes have been balanced, and weaker ones now have more of a chance. Now, when I play the beta pvp and the live pvp, I actually prefer the beta slightly. At the beginning, beta was an absolute nightmare, devs and players seemed to have dug in their heals, and my pvp builds were junk. Now that people are done reacting, and people are actually talking and listening, new players are getting some welcome changes, and old players are finding their pvp builds more viable again. There's still a ways to go mind you, but this is a very nice direction.
Admittedly, I talk more here about $OE's Chapter 6 Combat Downgrade more than anything due to being most familiar with it. If Blixtev and Deadmeat would of done this in C6, they might actually of had most of the 100K subs they talked about, then, still in the game, today. But, Blixtev, and Co., had their godhead egos going full bore, trained via CU and NGE, and they did what they did and have what they have. But it is nice to see that some1 learned something from CU, NGE, and C6CD, even if it wasn't $OE Austin. I still have high hopes for ST:O. I hear you on this. You know, I think when a game company asks the question, "Should we target current players or potential players?" you have a big problem. The fact of the matter is, you always have to target both groups with your development plans. As soon as you attempt to cater to one at the expense of the other, your game and online community are doomed. If you target current players only, you limit your growth potential. If you target potential players only, you alienate your foundation. In either case you divide the player community and set them at each others' throats by creating a subgroup of "haves" and a subgroup of "have-nots." As I look over the history of SWG, I see this mistake being repeated over and over. It's what we in the social policy anyalysis biz call a systematic error. People tend to commit these errors outside of their awareness, and they tend to have far reaching effects. It appears that the folks running CoX have caught this error, and that they're trying to undo some of the damage related, in part, to their initial approach to the revamp. Players aren't faultless here either. Initial reactions included strings of compound words that you don't hear in Sunday School. I understand the frustration though, and people feeling a need to vent. At the same time, venting directly to the developers doesn't necessarily lead to effective communication and problem solving. We are having that now though, thankfully. |
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11/23/08 1:51:16 PM#51
Advertising is the easiest way to gain new customers while focusing on keeping the current customers satisfied, that all is really needed, of course there'll be new players that won't like the game but still there'll be plenty that do. Right now the gain on new players is super slow in CoX and even worse in SWG (due to word of mouth usually), even new games like Warhammer & AoC are struggling on getting new players a few months after launch. SWTOR: sub ended, no thanks to Georg Zoeller! |
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11/23/08 2:44:57 PM#52
Originally posted by ArcAngel3
Blew my mind lol ^_^, in a good way for a change. Gives me more hope for the game, and the genre. If people do leave for Champions or DC, it won't be as much because they felt shafted. Some still feel this way, mind you, but the effort to listen and incorporate current player feedback is defintely there, along with important results. Combat in pvp is slowed some for people that really had a hard time keeping up, I don't mind it slowed down a bit tbh, I'm old :P. It's not ridiculously slow though, as it was to begin with. Also, some overly dominant archetypes have been balanced, and weaker ones now have more of a chance. Now, when I play the beta pvp and the live pvp, I actually prefer the beta slightly. At the beginning, beta was an absolute nightmare, devs and players seemed to have dug in their heals, and my pvp builds were junk. Now that people are done reacting, and people are actually talking and listening, new players are getting some welcome changes, and old players are finding their pvp builds more viable again. There's still a ways to go mind you, but this is a very nice direction.
Admittedly, I talk more here about $OE's Chapter 6 Combat Downgrade more than anything due to being most familiar with it. If Blixtev and Deadmeat would of done this in C6, they might actually of had most of the 100K subs they talked about, then, still in the game, today. But, Blixtev, and Co., had their godhead egos going full bore, trained via CU and NGE, and they did what they did and have what they have. But it is nice to see that some1 learned something from CU, NGE, and C6CD, even if it wasn't $OE Austin. I still have high hopes for ST:O. I hear you on this. You know, I think when a game company asks the question, "Should we target current players or potential players?" you have a big problem. The fact of the matter is, you always have to target both groups with your development plans. As soon as you attempt to cater to one at the expense of the other, your game and online community are doomed. If you target current players only, you limit your growth potential. If you target potential players only, you alienate your foundation. In either case you divide the player community and set them at each others' throats by creating a subgroup of "haves" and a subgroup of "have-nots." As I look over the history of SWG, I see this mistake being repeated over and over. It's what we in the social policy anyalysis biz call a systematic error. People tend to commit these errors outside of their awareness, and they tend to have far reaching effects. It appears that the folks running CoX have caught this error, and that they're trying to undo some of the damage related, in part, to their initial approach to the revamp. Players aren't faultless here either. Initial reactions included strings of compound words that you don't hear in Sunday School. I understand the frustration though, and people feeling a need to vent. At the same time, venting directly to the developers doesn't necessarily lead to effective communication and problem solving. We are having that now though, thankfully.
/agree. $OE has appearently never learned the above lesson, even yet, and I seriously doubt at this point in time, they ever will. As we all know, you can get a "focus group" to say pretty much whatever you want. Depends on how you load it. Any company. in any industry, can make a mistake and missread their product. We all know the "Coke" debackle. Where the mistake becomes fatal is when you do not try to mitigate your own damages (a tried and true legal concept). Coke quickly reacted and restored the product and their customer base. $OE, well, they let their egos get in the way of good business practices surrounding their product(s) and paid the price for their arrogance. If I owned a gaming company in todays world, I think threads, such as this, would be required reading for all employees, from CEOs to the janitorial staff. |
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11/24/08 10:25:58 AM#53
I just found out about Tabula Rasa being planned to shut down on Feb 28 2009, if NCSoft is willing to shut down servers from Auto Assault and TR, they'll probably shut down City of Heroes if population continues to drop, that I won't like. SWTOR: sub ended, no thanks to Georg Zoeller! |
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Originally posted by sookster54
Tabula Rasa had a rough launch after a massive shift in development direction not very long before release. You can Youtube the trailers for the original TR, and see that the game that was released isn't the game that was planned. I'm not sure why that happened, but Garriot himself said that the release was "rough." It seemed that the game never really recovered from that tbh. It went from rough launch to relatively empty in a fairly short time it seems. Interestingly, the original game seemed much more pre-cu in design, but someone apparently decided that this genre really needs a fast-paced FPS game in a sci-fi setting...so they switched part way through. At least, unlike the NGE, they did the switch before the game went live. It still flopped, but people didn't feel intentionally scammed on top of that. The Auto-assault team also said that their game was just poor at launch. If anything, this reinforces the idea that a successful launch is critical. It also calls into question massive visioning shifts part way through development. It seems that the fps version of TR, for example, didn't have much development time. CoX has a good foundation, and I'm glad they decided not to chuck us out the door in favour of some potential audience. I wonder what has to happen behind the scenes for this kind of change to happen during a beta test. Anyways, they're launching for the Mac in the near future, and have a highly anticipated issue coming out in the new year. My hope is that they will continue to grow the game, honour current players, launch well to Mac, and do a great job on the mission architect. A little marketting around all of this, and the game should see some growth. Here's hoping :)
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11/24/08 11:48:00 PM#55
I know all about TR's history, development started in 2001 as a fantasy genre and changed to sci-fi in 2005, it was a very long project. The point is that TR had a decent amount of players (more than SWG currently has), 3 servers were medium-heavy pretty often (not sure how it is now though). One problem I had with TR is that the devs kept fucking with the classes when they didn't even need to be touched. SWTOR: sub ended, no thanks to Georg Zoeller! |
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Originally posted by sookster54
If it changed to sci-fi fps in 2005, that really does seem like a short development period for an MMO. It's no surprise then that the launch was problematic. I'd hate to be a dev working on a game that wasn't ready for release. Trying to upgrade a live game has to be a real pain. Now you've got people making progress, paying money, and feeling attached to what they've already got, even if it isn't working well. One thing about the TR closure I noticed is that they're offering free time for the last while, and that they're planning some events for current players. In a way it seems like they're trying to "end well" so to speak. When I think of SWG sunsetting, I often wonder if they will choose the high road like this: free time, maybe some events; or will they make one final cash grab and then close the doors unexpectedly? Hopefully they'll take the high road too. |
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11/25/08 11:48:16 AM#57
Originally posted by ArcAngel3
If it changed to sci-fi fps in 2005, that really does seem like a short development period for an MMO. It's no surprise then that the launch was problematic. I'd hate to be a dev working on a game that wasn't ready for release. Trying to upgrade a live game has to be a real pain. Now you've got people making progress, paying money, and feeling attached to what they've already got, even if it isn't working well. One thing about the TR closure I noticed is that they're offering free time for the last while, and that they're planning some events for current players. In a way it seems like they're trying to "end well" so to speak. When I think of SWG sunsetting, I often wonder if they will choose the high road like this: free time, maybe some events; or will they make one final cash grab and then close the doors unexpectedly? Hopefully they'll take the high road too.
I remember when they announced the NGE I was shocked they didn't offer people a one month free trial to kinda smooth things over. With the lack of time between the annoucment and going live I thought this was the least they could do but instead I guess they figured that we were that expendable. I'd like to think they would give a reasonable time frame with any announcement of closure, but I wouldn't be a bit surprised if they don't. It just doesn't seem to be the SoE way. |
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