Originally posted by Yaos

Take Fable and The Elder Scrols and smash them together by people who think Fable is a good series and have no clue why anything in The Elder Scrolls exists. That's Kingdoms of Amalur. It's a very, very, bad game.

Peter Molyneux should be shot and put out of our misery.

Originally posted by greyed-out

Originally posted by eyeswideopen

This is what happens when you announce big names like McFarlan and Salvatore and then release a singleplayer WoW copy with nothing that seems to point at either of them being involved, outside of Salvatore writing out of game lore. The artwork had the appearance of literally being ripped from WoW and the ingame dialog could have been matched by a fourth rate freelance writer at scale. The game itself ws just a boring hack-and-slash "Kill 10 rats" borefest.

The final sales figures of KoA: Reckoning, developed by their other studio, has some but little to do in the financial problems of the R.I. studio.  The R.I. loan was setup to be self sufficient for the MMO only and to bring it to market.  There are problems with the MMO / R.I. studio, as Reckoning was successful on its own.

Nowadays, 300k sales isn't really a success for any game, especially a high profile marketed-to-the-ends-of-the-Earth game. Especially one touted as "competition for Skyrim" ( which it in no way, shape, or form was comparable to ANY TES game in mechanics or anything else ) in advertisements and PR pieces. When you take into consideration development costs, salaries for those bignames, over the top advertisement blitz,etc., I'd be surprised if they even came close to breaking even.

Originally posted by L0C0Man

One question here (didn't get to do that particulat quest). When you use the in-game browser, are you using the regular google or a limited version for the game?. If you so use regular google I can see it being spoiled a bit, though, since after the game is released and people starts looking for it more often you'll start to see straight up answers for the quests popping in the first places just by searching.

It's the full "real" google. You can even sit ingame and surf porn.

This is what happens when you announce big names like McFarlan and Salvatore and then release a singleplayer WoW copy with nothing that seems to point at either of them being involved, outside of Salvatore writing out of game lore. The artwork had the appearance of literally being ripped from WoW and the ingame dialog could have been matched by a fourth rate freelance writer at scale. The game itself ws just a boring hack-and-slash "Kill 10 rats" borefest.

Originally posted by Sorrow

Originally posted by AbdullaDoo

To me they've been arrogant and classless for a long time.  I followed Dragon Age's progress for many years, and toward the end when people questioned why certain design choices were made (lack of scabbards, dynamic weather, and day/night cycle, etc.) devs popped up with lazy, rude, "We know better than you what makes a good game" type of responses, while community managers disciplined posters and shut down threads that were critical of certain choices.  EA had bought Bioware in there at some point during DA:O's development.  Perhaps they were influenced by EA's "corporate culture" or because going big time got into their head a little bit.  Who knows.

 

I haven't played either DA game, so perhaps they did get it right, but the attitude is not a thing unique to TOR.  I'm not sure how many of those people worked on TOR, but it seems to me that has become Bioware's identity and that's they type of people they want working for them.  

 

Now they've stepped out of their element with a 100x as many people paying attention.

 

 

 

 

 

 

When they literally verbally attacked the SWTOR CB testers because we were offering feedback, called us idiots said they knew more than we ever would and we should bow down and worship them for allowing us to buy games from them well that was the point I was done with Bioware...

 

FOREVER!

Yep, I remember that. Specifically, it was George Zoeller who told us they didn't need our feedback. As long as we played, they got all the "metrics" they wanted and the rest was no concern. That was when I stopped even trying to suggest anything helpful and became a regular pain in EAware's ass on the forums.

And if that isn't enough to tell even the staunchest fanboi that SW:ToR is indeed a failure, I don't know what else to say.

Originally posted by eycel

Originally posted by Bjelar

Originally posted by eycel

?? 

Cant share my impressions?  I didnt say anything that isnt known already from the weekend beta.

 

You are not even allowed to tell anyone you're in closed beta ...I've heard...

 

Careful, Illuminati is watching...

thats not what i read at least from my perspective.

cmon guys this is mmorpg.com, not yahoo.com

anyway sorry if the post was not correct any who.

Open beta = no NDA.

Closed beta = NDA.

You fucked up, homie.

Although you probably have little to worry about.

Originally posted by TSWSilverfox

REserve your final list's judgement until the later betas. As you said, there are animation place holders and limited character creater at this time.

One month left to release. It's fair to start judging now. After both AO and AoC, it's a fact of record Funcom cannot produce "miracle patches" in multiple months, much less under one.

Originally posted by AdamTM

Originally posted by Vannor

I feel the real reason for people being interested in RPG's went out of the window years ago. It used to be about the setting, theme, lore, charcters, story, those IP's we geekily love etc. TESO will offer loads of that sorta stuff no matter the gameplay style. Gameplay was always important but it wasn't the major factor. Times have changed.

When was that and why did i miss it?

Back during the days of Planescape: Torment, Baldur's Gate, Fallout, etc.

Originally posted by Loktofeit

Originally posted by Kost

Originally posted by Loktofeit

the developers offer no other way for a person to see if they like the game before investing $40, $50, $60 or even more to discover it isn't for them. 

Which was never a problem during the late 80s, 90s and early 2000s. People purchased the game, played, and if they didn't like it they never played it again and chalked it up as "shit happens".

Actually, many games in the late 80's and early 90's had freeware or demo versions. You also had a good number of software rental stores all over the place (the industry made short work of those evildoers!). PC Gamer used to have a diskette (later a CD) of game demos included with it. I think it was only about 6 or 7 months ago that they finally stopped that.

The computer expos used to have booth after booth with trials, freeware, shareware, demoware etc diskettes for sale.

Judging by your age in your profile, most of the game demos, freeware and shareware were probably before your time, but they most certainly did exist and they gave gamers a chance to try out the game before they bought it. This was especially important because of two 'features' of systems at the time - how memory was handled (Standard/EMS/XMS) and the diverse range of video cards and their individual drivers.  In the late 90s and early 2000s, game demos generally moved to the internet, with FilePlanet being one of the biggest demo repositories, for commercial games at least.

I bet some of the older gamers here still have their FullThrottle/Rebel Forces demo CD lying around somewhere. The real dinosaurs probably have a 3.5 or two of  their favorite shooter squirrelled away, as well.

 

Part of what killed demos is the preorder. I mean, seriously... why waste time making a demo version that allows people to actually decide if they want to buy or not, when you can change the color of an existing skin, offer it as a preorder bonus and get them to buy it months before the game is released?

 

I remember buying Duke Nukem 3D from 3D Realms by following the link at the end of the 2 level shareware disk.

The real TES fans are real happy...happy to let the casual fans play the mmo to fill Zenimax's coffers to keep giving us the REAL singleplayer TES games us REAL TES fans enjoy.

Originally posted by BayonetRecon

The custom outfits would be an area I'm sure they could make some money in a F2P route.  I was thinking that was the reason why the clothing options were so limited (until I saw Pangea) at the start.  Maybe they were going to make people pay extra for really cool looking clothing options.

Oh, they are going to be charging for the best looking clothes in the cash shop. The thing is, they think they're going to have subs and a cash shop both. They did that to AoC. Then went F2P.

Simple fact is, Funcom knows there's a good chance they're going to have yet another flop on their hands and will have to resort to F2P in order to keep it going when the subs drop, just like AO and AoC. Only this time, they're building the game around F2P in the beginning so they won't have to work so hard when the inevitable shift happens. The game as it stands now is set up perfectly for F2P. Missions would easily be chopped into buyable packs, cash shop will already be fully loaded, etc.

Originally posted by lordwedgely

Originally posted by jtcgs

Originally posted by JeroKane

Ragnar always said they are aiming for a different crowd with this game.

They are actually one of the few developers who got the message that WoW players will play WoW!

So The Secret World is trying to aim for a more "mature" crowd in the gaming community, with a tad more patience.

Oh stop it...

Age of Conan...nipples, decapitations...made for mature players.

Anarchy Online, rated M for mature...again, nipples, swearing and what not and out before WoW was a glint in someones eyes.

WoW has nothing to do with it, Funcom is Funcom. The game will be for mature players, the game will also not live up to its expecations, have a launch with more than average amount of bugs, be missing a great deal of gameplay, have higher than average times between updates, have updates that dont meet expectations, take forever to fix major issues and the list goes on and on.

Funcom is Funcom....just like fanboys will say the most outrageous things to make a game the second coming.

swearing and nipples in anarchy online? i love nipples! show me, show me!

The female models are actually fully textured, Funcom just doesn't allow you to remove the "default" clothing to see them.

Back when tattoos were first put in, some of the male tattoos were actually useable on female characters, and since the male tattoos were for the back, they left the chest exposed. http://t2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQ_0joelrjm6Ydeway0Sw6NSSNKINMq7Tj3LLLdb_h3w8wC-7NWVQ

Also, some female mobs such as Medusa's show nipples. And of course Brontosaurs have giant puckered buttholes and Hammerheads ( big dinosaur things ) have big floppy udders hanging from them.

Originally posted by Kost

Originally posted by Loktofeit

the developers offer no other way for a person to see if they like the game before investing $40, $50, $60 or even more to discover it isn't for them. 

Which was never a problem during the late 80s, 90s and early 2000s. People purchased the game, played, and if they didn't like it they never played it again and chalked it up as "shit happens".

So why is it an issue now?

The issue now is we got tired of getting fucked by hype, spin, and flat out lies from developers/publishers.

Devs don't want people using "beta" as a trial run, then those devs need to spend their own money and hire professional testers.

And sorry, the "pre-order/pre-purchase can't be cancelled" thing doesn't work. Funcom actually is using this policy if you pre-order the game directly from them. Fortunately, credit card companies do not consider anything to be "purchased" until the finished product, i.e. released product and not "beta, is provided. Until there is an actual product, the credit card company will simply provide a charge back for those denied refunds on their pre-order. As it should be.

Just wait until EA buys out Funcom. Then you'll really hear the screams of the damned.

Originally posted by Angrah

After trying the beta and being disapointed. I attempted to cancel my preorder with Funcom to be told basically nahnahnnah we have your money and you can't have it back.

 

No refunds because playing in the beta is the same as receiving the game. So no refunds.

 

Wrong. Until they release an actual product, you have not recieved the product you pre-ordered and are entitled to a refund. If Funcom doesn't want to give it to you, a simple phone call to your credit card company will get you the money back easily as they will do a charge back against Funcom.

Originally posted by charmtrap

Originally posted by eyeswideopen

Edit: Another "genius" move is forcing players to use google to find solutions to puzzles instead of having them solveable ingame. Every time you take someone out of the game, it makes it that more likely they'll stay out.

There is a browser in-game.

Makes no difference. Whether the browser is ingame or not, simply opening that browser throws you back into the "real" world and takes you away from the game.

Now had they done something along the lines of GTA IV where it had computers that could access fake ingame websites and such, not only would it have maintained "immersion" but it also would have allowed a bit of creativity, such as "hacking" into an Illuminati web server for info, etc.

Originally posted by severius

At least they aren't going to get the chance to do this sort of injustice to the Fallout mmo. 

And why is that? Zenimax owns the Fallout IP just like they own TES. Lawsuit settled, Interplay lost ( thank God ). Fallout MMO (if it happens ) will be a Zenimax mmo same as TESO.

Originally posted by robthemaniac

Aside from the fact that their alpha testers are probably testing a build that we won't see until launch,

Yes, they used the "you're playing an old build" excuse during AoC beta. So did EAware with SW:ToR. It's spin, nothing more.

and aside from that fact that NO games put their full polish on during beta,

RIFT would like to disagree, for just one example.

how are so many people swearing off their pre-order with a game that isn't even finished?

It's one month to release. You want to pay for "promises" and "potential", go right ahead. Those of us who've been playing mmos for decades know the signs to watch for that say "Don't buy this until at least six months after launch."

 

Quests bugged? Well that's beta, that's why we're in it, not playing a free preview--Or am I wrong?

 

Sure, you're their to test. It doesn't mean you have to close your eyes and shut down your brain in the process.

[mod edit]

Originally posted by Suzie_Ford

Originally posted by Beyorn

I thought I read something (now I cant find) that all the animations were place holders for other better animations.  That may very well be Funcom double speak but I know the articel I read stated that.  Wish I could find it now ;P.

 

Dare I say this but....WHY would you keep placeholders in the game for its first showing with massive numbers of people? That just does NOT make sense to me.

And, yes, animations and sound are my biggest issues but, IMO, those are HUGE issues. Most of us are sensory beings and to -see- crap combat/movement and -hear- sounds that are just off is...disconcerting.

 

Because it's Funcom. What more do you really expect?

This is their third-strike-and-out.

It's going to make the cries of disappointment and outrage at AO and AoC's releases pale in comparison.

Can't wait.

Edit: Another "genius" move is forcing players to use google to find solutions to puzzles instead of having them solveable ingame. Every time you take someone out of the game, it makes it that more likely they'll stay out.