Indie Developers can and do just fine.  As long as they are realistic about their profit projections and their budgets...they can be ok.... and eventualy some can even survive to join the big leagues. Where indie's run into trouble is when they get a boatload of iniitial investment cash and get too ambitious about spending it to make a big splash and predicate their business plan on unrealistic production schedules and unrealistic initial profit projections. You see that sort of story with companies like CME, Sigil and Perpetual.

Icarus on the other hand, seems to be alot more conservative/realistic about their projections and budgets. It's a slow track to success....and it may not lead to a block-buster...but it can lead to a decent, sustainable proffitable company. EVE is the model for this sort of track.

Without violating any NDA's....as some-one who works in the software sector... I can tell you that for the stage of development they are in...thier product is WELL ABOVE average....in terms of polish and QA.  Far better then most of the big companies products are at a similar development stage.  Yes, they still have some bug squashing to do...and yes they still have some optimization to do.... but they are still officialy in closed Beta... so that is totaly expected at this stage of the game.

It's also not uncommon for a company to do multiple stress tests at various stages of development.... helps provide some metrics for the network engineers to work with. Just because they are doing a stress test doesn't mean they will be releasing soon....... and even if they did release in it's current form....the game would still be better in terms of polish then a fair number of the big name games were at release.

As far as setting/genre/etc.... that's all just personal preference...... The genre and setting really aren't my cup of tea....but there are also flavors of ice cream I don't like either..... doesn't mean they aren't popular with alot of other folks.

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Originally posted by urbanmonkey

This game will either be canned or it will be released, made F2P and then canned.

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Wow. You weren't taking any chances at all with this "prediction", huh?

Way to really go out on a limb.

I agree with the OP too.

Either that or this will happen, or this and that will happen. Unless this happens first in which case that other thing may or may not happen.

Originally posted by popinjay

I agree with the OP too.

 

Either that or this will happen, or this and that will happen. Unless this happens first in which case that other thing may or may not happen.

 

 

Ok Mr. Smarty Pants. I see you are not running the strongest CPU around which may cause you to be a little confused so I simplify my prediction for you.

1. Game gets canned before release.

2. Game gets released, then made free to play then gets canned.

There are only two options and both reach the same final conclusion:

THE GAME WILL GET CANNED.

That is my prediction. Still confused? Need some sort of baseball sketches to get a better visual picture?

Originally posted by urbanmonkey

Originally posted by popinjay

I agree with the OP too.

 

Either that or this will happen, or this and that will happen. Unless this happens first in which case that other thing may or may not happen.

 

 

Ok Mr. Smarty Pants. I see you are not running the strongest CPU around which may cause you to be a little confused so I simplify my prediction for you.

1. Game gets canned before release.

2. Game gets released, then made free to play then gets canned.

There are only two options and both reach the same final conclusion:

 

THE GAME WILL GET CANNED.

 

That is my prediction. Still confused? Need some sort of baseball sketches to get a better visual picture?

OH FFS.... get at least a tiny sense of humor....

DB

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Originally posted by urbanmonkey

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Originally posted by popinjay

I agree with the OP too.
 
Either that or this will happen, or this and that will happen. Unless this happens first in which case that other thing may or may not happen.
 
 

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Ok Mr. Smarty Pants. I see you are not running the strongest CPU around which may cause you to be a little confused so I simplify my prediction for you.
1. Game gets canned before release.
2. Game gets released, then made free to play then gets canned.
There are only two options and both reach the same final conclusion:
 
THE GAME WILL GET CANNED.
 
That is my prediction. Still confused? Need some sort of baseball sketches to get a better visual picture?

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So you think the game will get canned.

Finally, a prediction! And no more..

And yes, please try and find a sense of humor, lol.

Where do all these prophets come from recently? Every new game has at least a few of them that predict this or that based on superficial facts and most of the time long before the final game has been released.

OP, your prediction is based on one single argument. "Indie developers have no chance in the current highly competitive MMO market".

You made a counter argument yourself. The big companies fail as much as the indies. You simply can not predict who will survive.

Can you present us with any data to back up your claim? Since this is your only argument it must be very obvious and should be easy to back up with solid facts and numbers.

And making a prediction before the game is even released is as good as asking the primate in your avatar to make a prediction.

KJ

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Originally posted by taus01

Where do all these prophets come from recently?

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Other failed MMOs that they predicted would be a "hit" and had already subscribed to mostly.

Warhammer just announced ANOTHER round of server closings, they will be down to nine down from over 100 in the first month, AoC is on a milk carton and Tabula Rasa and a few others have bitten the dust.

Originally posted by Mahlo

Originally posted by Daffid011

All a game has to really have to be successful is fun factor.  It isn't like the major studios are pumping out high quality fun games lately. 

 

If anything they look rather vunlerable to an indie developer.

 

Whatever you think about major studios their products are a hell of a lot more polished than FE. And I'm talking production here, not the type of game. FE can't get away with it because it's not like most other MMOs. It should still have a certain level of 'finish' if they want people to pay a subscription to it.

I agree with what you are saying 100%.   What I said above was in a more general sense of mmos and not specifically about fallen earth.  There has been a lot of suck released the last several years and most of that didn't even work properly just to make the presentation that much worse. 

If a game (be it fallen earth or another game) is fun to play, but lacks polish I think people will give it a chance.  It can't be fun, but busted to hell like Vanguard or have core concept flaws like warhammer that lack any believable roadmap to recovery.  As long as they are fun and not beyond the realm of an acceptable functionality/polish level at release I think people will give them time.  Right now I think the market is prime for a few types of games to make a strong showing and hold onto players and I don't think that is limited to the big game studios. 

In my eyes with this game as long as it is fun to play, I will be subscribing to it i have been waiting a long time for a decent sci-fi based game to emerge. I have been coming here and reading alot of the trash chatter that has been going on about it, and this one post has got me abit incensed about it.

What your not taking into account is fan base, I loved AO thought it was a damn fun game, the thing that let it down was customer service it was awful - if fallen earth is even remotely like it weapon wise i'll be happy. Yet independents tend to show the best CS as they really want to keep their player base. I have personally not applied for a beta pass for this game as I don't want my hopes for this game to be tainted by the whining on the beta servers by people not interested in playing this game. So as for your canned or F2P scenario i think you really need to readjust your view based on sci-fi based nutters eagerly awaiting this game, and generally laughing at the people putting it in a grave before it's released.
 

Game is being launched September and Gamestop already is taking pre-orders so not looking like being canned.

Without sayin too much due to nda, i was really surprised when the release date was announced.  I enjoy the game immensly (would have like the true sandbox game but at least their getting away from the status quo a bit) but feel that a few more months of polish would do the game a great deal of good

Originally posted by ProfRed

You are wrong OP.  Look at CCP with EVE Online.  The thing is the indie developers need to not aim so high and promise all these features.  They need to get a feature list that attracts gamers, but declare that they will do a phased release starting with a solid version of the core game, and then build upon it while gaining subs through word of mouth and not hype.  As long as they have a solid core game without a bunch of pre launch hype and the devs prove themselves confident with a solid feature list they are going after they will gain a cult following and eventually do very well like CCP has done.

The problem is the indie devs recently have promised the world, over hyped, and under delivered.  They tried to cram in too many features that weren't tested well so they spend the first 6 months of the games liftime simply fixing bugs instead of adding on features.  Every game has a chance no matter how slim.

CCP has also had years to polish their game and started in a time where the bar wasn't nearly as high as it currently is. Games cannot come out with any major flaw anymore or they won't have any sort of major success. WoW as well as the internet boom have brought a lot more gamers into the genre. The problem though is that they expect WoW level polish out of the box. Even I will admit that I expect a certain amount of polish on certain things(ui/controls being #1).

I can say, hopefully without violating NDA, that I played the game for ~1 hour then stopped and then came back 1-2 months later and played for 15 mins. I can also say that I beta tested Vanguard and tabula rasa for tens of  HOURS, played multiple asian MMO's, some half translated, to mid levels, etc. I am a very tolerant person when it comes to games and understand certain things being unfinished, different, etc but some are just game breaking and unforgivable. If those aren't polished what does that say for the rest of the game.

Originally posted by Distaste

 

CCP has also had years to polish their game and started in a time where the bar wasn't nearly as high as it currently is. Games cannot come out with any major flaw anymore or they won't have any sort of major success. WoW as well as the internet boom have brought a lot more gamers into the genre. The problem though is that they expect WoW level polish out of the box. Even I will admit that I expect a certain amount of polish on certain things(ui/controls being #1).

I can say, hopefully without violating NDA, that I played the game for ~1 hour then stopped and then came back 1-2 months later and played for 15 mins. I can also say that I beta tested Vanguard and tabula rasa for tens of  HOURS, played multiple asian MMO's, some half translated, to mid levels, etc. I am a very tolerant person when it comes to games and understand certain things being unfinished, different, etc but some are just game breaking and unforgivable. If those aren't polished what does that say for the rest of the game.

yeah....there's "Needs work", and then there's "are you fucking kidding me??". I'm usually pretty tolerant myself...in fact, a bit too forgiving, IMO. But even I have standards :P

Originally posted by Distaste

Originally posted by ProfRed

You are wrong OP.  Look at CCP with EVE Online.  The thing is the indie developers need to not aim so high and promise all these features.  They need to get a feature list that attracts gamers, but declare that they will do a phased release starting with a solid version of the core game, and then build upon it while gaining subs through word of mouth and not hype.  As long as they have a solid core game without a bunch of pre launch hype and the devs prove themselves confident with a solid feature list they are going after they will gain a cult following and eventually do very well like CCP has done.

The problem is the indie devs recently have promised the world, over hyped, and under delivered.  They tried to cram in too many features that weren't tested well so they spend the first 6 months of the games liftime simply fixing bugs instead of adding on features.  Every game has a chance no matter how slim.

 

CCP has also had years to polish their game and started in a time where the bar wasn't nearly as high as it currently is. Games cannot come out with any major flaw anymore or they won't have any sort of major success. WoW as well as the internet boom have brought a lot more gamers into the genre. The problem though is that they expect WoW level polish out of the box. Even I will admit that I expect a certain amount of polish on certain things(ui/controls being #1).

I can say, hopefully without violating NDA, that I played the game for ~1 hour then stopped and then came back 1-2 months later and played for 15 mins. I can also say that I beta tested Vanguard and tabula rasa for tens of  HOURS, played multiple asian MMO's, some half translated, to mid levels, etc. I am a very tolerant person when it comes to games and understand certain things being unfinished, different, etc but some are just game breaking and unforgivable. If those aren't polished what does that say for the rest of the game.

You should learn to read what the NDA states. By saying you're playing the beta, you're violating the NDA. But even besides the point, people should always be aware that the people who have problems are the ones who post on forums. That's the nature of them. Trying to dance around the issue of NDA then claiming you didn't like the game for unspecified reasons sounds like you're just trying to sound cool to me. Then of course is the issue of being able to claim the bad side of things and bash a game knowing that people aren't going to be able to respond to you, because unlike you, they actually respect the NDA.

The thing you guys have to realize is that being 'indie' they don't have to have tons of subscribers to pay the bills. They don't need to be as successful as WoW, Warhammer, or even EQ. Look at Pirates of the Burning Sea, which is another niche indie game that is still going. And as far as spit and polish goes, they still have a month before their curtain call goes up, so we'll see what they've done with the game. If they did good, then buy it, if not, then don't. Simple as that. Worrying about whether they will succeed or not is like a monkey worrying if the NASDAQ is gonna fail. It's so far above your heads that you don't even need to worry about it.

Originally posted by urbanmonkey

 

Fallen Earth? I really don't see anything innovative about it. The only thing unique about it is the setting but in Earthrise it also has a direct competitor. I had high hopes for TCoS (an innovative game from an indie developer) and got hugely dissapointed.

In truth, even if an indie game is innovative in several aspects, it is usually hugely lacking in others making it an average game at best. The only good coming out of this is that the power houses of online gaming can then copy these proven innovative features and incorporate them into their own games thus driving the industry forward.

Earthrise and Fallen Earth are drastically different.  Earthrise is majorly faction and guild based.  Fallen Earth leans more towards a smaller setting.

Everything I read about Earthrise has turned me away from it, other than that they are both sci-fi, I see no real comparison between the two.  Maybe I'll be able to tell when I get in the open beta.  But right now I'm leaning on fallen earth, not thinking about the never max Earthrise skill set.  Do I wish them both well, hell yeah.  Because Sci-fi is my love in the first place.

As for an Indie company not able to compete?  I think that is a major false.  Even based on your own statement.  Post-Wow era, there hasn't been a successful game other than maybe Lord of the Rings, which is probably just a heavy following of its fans(not to mention it is very similiar to WOW in most mechanics)  So we have all these big developers who can't release anything but crap and won't attempt anything different because they hope to cash in on WOW even though everyone agrees it is not going to happen, as many that have played/play WOW weren't MMO'ers or gamers before hand.

So the only way to change the way the system works is put something else out.  Don't copy WOW, you will fail(look at the million diablo clones, all are junk and utter garbage) Blizzard is to high of a quality studio to put out something that is easily replicated.  WOW hasn't even been.  An Indie developer is the only chance of releasing something outside the Normal MMO anymore.

Originally posted by DefaultThis

Fallen Earth may actually do ok since:

- None of the large mmo devs do sci-fi mmorpgs except CCP (oh wait they were indie not so long ago too!)

- Fallen Earth is not your average class based game, no other game offers this except EVE & Darkfall, however one of those is terrible and the other is a slow burner.

- Fallout 3 recently refreshed gamers memory that a post apocalyptic world is hella fun.

 

Since NDA is lifted now I can comment on this:

-Fallen Earth is the first  post apocalyptic MMO in years, with a game world that is at least original.  Graphics are nice, and it certainly beats Neocron in quality (to recall the closest equivalent I know)

-Fallen Earth offers more freedom in building your character than most MMOs, but still forces you into choosing some degree of specialization. It is also partly level based. Overall not bad, but the devs did not dare to be as different as EVE.

-The FPS-like user interface is a nice change, but behind it there are still old-fashioned MMORPG mechanics. You can be perfectly on target but still only score a glancing hit with less damage.

Overall, a nice game but I'll probably keep my  EVE account active (and I pay only for one MMO at at time). Overall, I like EVE just a tad better. Which is not meant to disparage FE, it certainly has its charm