I loved so much of Darkfall, but the bad outweighs the good by so much. What it's going to do is hurt the PvP-MMO sandbox movement in the industry. Big companies will just see epic failure and not even try to develop this kind of game.

The game failed because of what's missing and the sloppiness. Given a good game that was fun and seemed complete the PvP players and the PvE/PvP players would have stayed and the ones that don't like PvP would have left. Instead everyone is going because Aventurine dropped the ball badly.

It's not the macro'ing, it's not the ganking and it's not the focus on PvP.People blame the macro crowd, but I played without macro'ing and I know many others did too. You can still win fights, even early on, and everything would have evened out later if the game was worth sticking around for.

People needed more Mobs in the wild, it's much too empty. They don't need to convert it to a PvE game, just give attractive locations to PvE, and the gankers would follow, giving a contested area. They needed a better controls system. I liked the control system pretty well, most people hated it. They could have adjusted it so that it didn't have soo many locks and clicks to get it right. They needed a better bag system, just breaking it into 6 squares or something would have been better, or auto-gold placing. They also needed character customization. They needed a world that seemed to be complete, with NPC's in cities walking around and seeming real. This is all stuff they could have done in relatively short time.

What Darkfall has shown me that this kind of game can be awesome, what they lack or have messed up has hurt the chances of a good game of this kind ever coming out.

You spent a lot of words to say nothing. Essentially you're saying the game sucks because it doesn't have enough PvE.  Go play vanguard if what you want is exploration based PvE.

Darkfall would be terrible if mobs littered the landscape in an even distribution like other games. It makes sense that they are concentrated in camps, making it less likely for them to get in the way of PvP when traveling, making it easier to concentrate battles as fights over good spawn locations, and it just makes conceptual snese that these enemy groups be placed in encampments of their own. It makes them a more sensible part of the world.

This is not a PvE/PvP game. It is a PvP game. This game changes nothing and was only made for 1 crowed.

Originally posted by asdar

I loved so much of Darkfall, but the bad outweighs the good by so much. What it's going to do is hurt the PvP-MMO sandbox movement in the industry. Big companies will just see epic failure and not even try to develop this kind of game.

Not really. SWG did much more harm than Darkfall ever could.

You have some positives as well, like EVE.

But in order for sandbox games to be taken seriously by major development studios, you would need a success story. You have Mortal Online and Earthrise coming up soon, so we have to see.

EVE is not a PvE/PvP game. Darkfall, like EVE, is a strategic PvP game where NPCs are merely a way of helping advance skill gain and loot collection for fueling PvP.

Darkfall is great for future games. Anything will look polished in comparison to Darkfall.

Originally posted by asdar

I loved so much of Darkfall, but the bad outweighs the good by so much. What it's going to do is hurt the PvP-MMO sandbox movement in the industry. Big companies will just see epic failure and not even try to develop this kind of game.

The game failed because of what's missing and the sloppiness. Given a good game that was fun and seemed complete the PvP players and the PvE/PvP players would have stayed and the ones that don't like PvP would have left. Instead everyone is going because Aventurine dropped the ball badly.

It's not the macro'ing, it's not the ganking and it's not the focus on PvP.People blame the macro crowd, but I played without macro'ing and I know many others did too. You can still win fights, even early on, and everything would have evened out later if the game was worth sticking around for.

People needed more Mobs in the wild, it's much too empty. They don't need to convert it to a PvE game, just give attractive locations to PvE, and the gankers would follow, giving a contested area. They needed a better controls system. I liked the control system pretty well, most people hated it. They could have adjusted it so that it didn't have soo many locks and clicks to get it right. They needed a better bag system, just breaking it into 6 squares or something would have been better, or auto-gold placing. They also needed character customization. They needed a world that seemed to be complete, with NPC's in cities walking around and seeming real. This is all stuff they could have done in relatively short time.

What Darkfall has shown me that this kind of game can be awesome, what they lack or have messed up has hurt the chances of a good game of this kind ever coming out.

All you need is a competent developer and a good game you will have.

Having not played the game, I'll have to form my opinion from the numerous post for and against  the game,  it seems to me the biggest problems with the game are the things that affect a lot of mmorpg's  bugs, missing content/features,  frustrating/punishing mechanisms and poor community .   Whether or not these can be overcome remains to be seen.

Originally posted by Trenchgun

EVE is not a PvE/PvP game. Darkfall, like EVE, is a strategic PvP game where NPCs are merely a way of helping advance skill gain and loot collection for fueling PvP.

 

 

EVE is a sandbox game. Darkfall is a Full-loot PvP game.

Originally posted by thexrated

Originally posted by asdar

I loved so much of Darkfall, but the bad outweighs the good by so much. What it's going to do is hurt the PvP-MMO sandbox movement in the industry. Big companies will just see epic failure and not even try to develop this kind of game.

 

Not really. SWG did much more harm than Darkfall ever could.

You have some positives as well, like EVE.

But in order for sandbox games to be taken seriously by major development studios, you would need a success story. You have Mortal Online and Earthrise coming up soon, so we have to see.

SWG didnt do anything, SOE did.... Same with Darkfall its not the core idea nor the perspective of the players its AV. And its not just the story imo its the whole package = story + content + pvp/pve in harmony etc to make a good sandbox
 

It's not the game that should scare yeah.  It's the players.  Guess theres a reason for cults afterall.  Follow your idol.  If you lieked cobain follow his example.  Shotgun mouthwash.

Originally posted by Comnitus

Originally posted by Trenchgun

EVE is not a PvE/PvP game. Darkfall, like EVE, is a strategic PvP game where NPCs are merely a way of helping advance skill gain and loot collection for fueling PvP.

 

 

EVE is a sandbox game. Darkfall is a Full-loot PvP game.

hey thanks for that Comnitus

i was attempting to come up with a response to the asinine post by trenchgun - - - perfect, short and sweet

and wasn't darkfall suppose to be a sandbox game too instead of the one dimensional pvp game that was released?  it didn't make the grade but maybe given time, they seem to be heading in that direction- - - though i still chuckle over the carebear treasure chests that litter the landscape, it is just so ftp style :)

Originally posted by asdar

I loved so much of Darkfall, but the bad outweighs the good by so much. What it's going to do is hurt the PvP-MMO sandbox movement in the industry. Big companies will just see epic failure and not even try to develop this kind of game.

The game failed because of what's missing and the sloppiness. Given a good game that was fun and seemed complete the PvP players and the PvE/PvP players would have stayed and the ones that don't like PvP would have left. Instead everyone is going because Aventurine dropped the ball badly.

It's not the macro'ing, it's not the ganking and it's not the focus on PvP.People blame the macro crowd, but I played without macro'ing and I know many others did too. You can still win fights, even early on, and everything would have evened out later if the game was worth sticking around for.

People needed more Mobs in the wild, it's much too empty. They don't need to convert it to a PvE game, just give attractive locations to PvE, and the gankers would follow, giving a contested area. They needed a better controls system. I liked the control system pretty well, most people hated it. They could have adjusted it so that it didn't have soo many locks and clicks to get it right. They needed a better bag system, just breaking it into 6 squares or something would have been better, or auto-gold placing. They also needed character customization. They needed a world that seemed to be complete, with NPC's in cities walking around and seeming real. This is all stuff they could have done in relatively short time.

What Darkfall has shown me that this kind of game can be awesome, what they lack or have messed up has hurt the chances of a good game of this kind ever coming out.

I agree totaly..this is pure truth...i wish the mmo devs would have brains to figure things out..and make finaly a good mmo...Darkfall is the potencial itself...

I doubt it'll have a tremendous effect on the industry since it was made by small development studio. A lot of games that fall in that category come and go; the big studios are looking at the big market games, and that's why they haven't tried to replicate sandbox/open PvP formulas in a long time. If Darkfall had been released by, say, Blizzard or SoE, then it definitely would have made an impact. But then again, that's why 90% of big budget MMO's that come out in the western market are WoW clones, since anything outside of that style always seems to get a poor reception in North America.

If anything, it'll have a positive impact. I bet the developers of Mortal Online are looking at all the reviews and comments of Darkfall and saying to themselves, "Let's learn from this." That is, -hopefully- they're doing that.

I honestly don't think it'll hurt the genre. That's because any in-depth analysis will show the reasons for the train wreck quite clearly:

1 - Overhype that went wrong: They promised the world. And could barely deliver a functional game. That in itself speaks volumes.

2 - Dishonest business practices: Honestly, how many people were turned away from the game by the way Aventurine does business? No way. It reeks of scam, and people are aware of that in a digital environment. It was shady from the get go. The whole NA server episode is a poster child case of deliberate misconduct.

3 - Lies and Spin Doctoring: Tasos' interviews are a classic case of what a Dev should not do when promoting a game. Seriously.

4 - Oversimplified game: The PVP in DFO is reduced to its bare bones. It's no wonder the fans tout "tactics, terrain, skill" as the best thing about DFO. Because these factors are present in any game where you face other enemies. A game of checkers is much more complex to the average fight in DFO. Like all PVP games, fights get better when you have less people. But when a larger battle happens, poof: the game turns into Counterstrike.

5 - To sandbox or not sandbox, that's the question: My guess (and it's a crapshot, like all opinions about the development of the game here) is that at a certain point, they realized that a true sandbox was impossible for them, due to lack of resources, time, funds or, more probably, a mix of all of those. So, they maintained just the façade of sandbox: e.g. seamless world, and hoped the hype would do the rest. Obviously, it didn't.

6 - Fundamental failure to understand basics of games: The focus is PVP, and that's fine. However, PVP round the clock gets old fast. The lack of options funnel people into finding something to do. Then, you mix large landmass X few players and voilá. Have you ever played a map of Battlefield (the large ones) with 3 other people? Boring huh? Not having any fluff, below mediocre PVE, and any other goals beyond the next frag and maybe some crafting is a deal breaker to many.

7 - Soloer Hell: Ignoring that many people like to solo is going to hurt your game. Before going into Guilds and such, lots of people like to solo a bit to get a feel for the game. In this game, you are actually punished for trying to do that. Great sandbox, where the game practically forces you to gang up.

8 - No advertisement: DFO had three distinct moments, advertisement-wise: the inception of the game and the excitement that followed; then, the vaporware moment, that lasted for some good many years; then, the bad rep it got by those who actually played (or tried) to play the game. How can a game be successful under this circumstance?

I won't list the technical aspects here because they are not important: People are forgiving (in general) towards technical glitches in a brand new MMO, because that's part of the game. Neither will I list graphics and sounds, because while they are important, they rarely lead to people leaving the game, if the core gameplay is fun.

I agree with another poster who said that this is not even a niche game, anymore. We have to face the hard fact that the DFO crowd is gone! All those hundreds of thousands of people simply got sick and moved on, and a great part of them will not touch DFO again even if it was covered in gold. By any standard, DFO should have at least high five-digits players. I'm really curious to see if the game outlives Hellgate in active server months.

But after listing all that, why don't I agree that this will hurt future games? Well, because the failure of Darkfall is very obvious and easy to understand. It happened in public, the reasons are open for everyone to see. It does not need an in-depth financial study or nothing of the like. Most of it is in plain daylight. So, I think it might even help, by clearly showing what kind of attitude won't work for games like this.

Originally posted by Comnitus

Originally posted by Trenchgun

EVE is not a PvE/PvP game. Darkfall, like EVE, is a strategic PvP game where NPCs are merely a way of helping advance skill gain and loot collection for fueling PvP.

 

 

EVE is a sandbox game. Darkfall is a Full-loot PvP game.

And being a sandbox, EVE has lots of tools or activities for PVE focused people to enjoy, while DF left those mostly out.

Originally posted by asdar

I loved so much of Darkfall, but the bad outweighs the good by so much. What it's going to do is hurt the PvP-MMO sandbox movement in the industry. Big companies will just see epic failure and not even try to develop this kind of game.

The game failed because of what's missing and the sloppiness. Given a good game that was fun and seemed complete the PvP players and the PvE/PvP players would have stayed and the ones that don't like PvP would have left. Instead everyone is going because Aventurine dropped the ball badly.

It's not the macro'ing, it's not the ganking and it's not the focus on PvP.People blame the macro crowd, but I played without macro'ing and I know many others did too. You can still win fights, even early on, and everything would have evened out later if the game was worth sticking around for.

People needed more Mobs in the wild, it's much too empty. They don't need to convert it to a PvE game, just give attractive locations to PvE, and the gankers would follow, giving a contested area. They needed a better controls system. I liked the control system pretty well, most people hated it. They could have adjusted it so that it didn't have soo many locks and clicks to get it right. They needed a better bag system, just breaking it into 6 squares or something would have been better, or auto-gold placing. They also needed character customization. They needed a world that seemed to be complete, with NPC's in cities walking around and seeming real. This is all stuff they could have done in relatively short time.

What Darkfall has shown me that this kind of game can be awesome, what they lack or have messed up has hurt the chances of a good game of this kind ever coming out.

Don't worry.

If the "big companies" cannot look at the game and dissect and analyze why it failed, they wouldn't be able to make a good sandbox anyway.

EVE has proven that it is possible, that impression Darkfall is not able to destroy.

Originally posted by asdar

I loved so much of Darkfall, but the bad outweighs the good by so much. What it's going to do is hurt the PvP-MMO sandbox movement in the industry. Big companies will just see epic failure and not even try to develop this kind of game.

A great developer sees someone elses failure as an opportunity for success.  AV proved that there is in fact a niche of the MMO community interested in this type of game.  But just because AV wasn't up to the task doesn't mean another more talented dev group isn't watching and waiting in the wings.   Despite this hackneyed attempt by AV, I have hope that another, as-yet-unknown, dev group will pull it off. . .someday.

MO will reverse Darkfall's effect and make the genre explode with popularity, you are wrong sir.

If MO doesnt cut it, I will go back to RTS ;)