All Posts by ClaudeFR

...which is a high chance for the game to fail like so many other games/studios in the youngest past.

Let me elaborate:
We are observing an interesting trend in the gaming industry which is developing something not different
to something already existsing, repeating mistakes over and over again instead learning from the failure
of others.

More and more, releases are simplified (not to say dull), talking about "Expansions" even before the initial game is released.

This is clearly a synonym for "we are running out of funds and time, we need to throw it out now even if its half done - we will add/fix later".

Gamestudios are astounding alienated with the reality here, totally ignoring the fact that such
strategy will lead in most cases (if not all) to a business disaster.

The most important thing for a new product/game is the reputation based on the very first impression.
Its the word from mouth to mouth and the gamemagazines (reviews) deciding over a games fate
at a very early stage!

Almost no one (only a very low percentage) is willing to revisit a game after its initial reviews.
So in other words: Get it done right from the start or simply forget it, there is almost no second chance.

Customers began to take the freedom to pass on games since they are just another number
on the list of "i dont play"-titles. There are enough games already offering the same boring gameplay.

Players dont want to spend another 50 bucks just to get confirmed that this was actually wasted money.
Compared to gamestudios, customers are learning quick - they are able to avoid doing mistakes again. They have learned
no to buy a game blindfolded before it has been tested and reviewed by trusted game magazines and personal friends.

A good number of gamer are not going to buy the box, reading about another dull shooter, grindmill, levelbased
game just in another dress (doesnt matter if Fantasy, SciFI or whatever).

A good number of gamer are not going to buy the box, reading about a 7.1/10 score for the game.

A good number of gamer are not going to buy the box, reading about a game with like 50% content, the rest following
later as an "Expansion" - which (btw) will most likeley consume some extra bucks.

If any gamestudio still dont get what is essential to the potential customer and what not, let me suggest they
look up the latest games (start with Vanguard over DnD, ending with SWG) again to start understanding the market
and how it works, what IS important to a player and what NOT.

Of course, there are many player not really interested in housing or RP or community and things like that.
But that is not important! Important IS, that there is always the same amount of player which ARE interested
i such things - and that is an easy math: You double your subscription numbers by satisfying this group as well,
you dont need to be a rocket scientist figuring that out.

But the "bonus" is: The player not interested in such mechanism will STILL subscribe if its build in - he can simply ignore
the fact that these gamemechanisms exist. But the player who will care for these things cannot "ignore" them not existing.

Do not make the mistake looking to World-of-Warcraft because this game is an exception to the rules, following
no rule in real - its success is based on some very different aspects, but thats a different story.

The gamestudios need to rethink and understand the CURRENT gaming-world and relearn how to make money. The current way
of the gamestudios is as wrong as it could be. This bold statement is backed up by the latest "incedents" we all aware of.

Gamestudios underestimate the huge changes which took place within the customers reigns the last year after all the
flops, after all the let-downs, after all the disappointments. The gaming world has made 180 degree change
the last few moth - but the gamingstudios are still living in 2004/2005.

No one is buying a car without brakes, relying on them being delivered 4 month later - but then for another good amount
of bucks. Honestly, where these guys come from? It must be a far far galaxy.
(I do hate car analogies as well, bear with me this time please)

Regarding Stargate i just read what will be NOT included in the game - which is EVERYTHING making a game different, making a game
worth to pay for, giving a game diversity and immersion.

When i read about SGW i have a Dejavu - it wasnt any different to what i read the last year - quickly half finished released
games relying on fixing/additions while operated but finally going down the hill very quickly due to their incompleteness.
We are facing nothing different here with SGW.

All left is a shiny combat simulator placed in the Stargate-World.
I do believe: It makes no difference if a char has long ears or is a gnome or a Jaffa or whatever:
The underlying mechanism is the very same. And its the very same boring quick, if there is nothing else to do, lacking machanisms
supporting a community and a social interacting for all the RP's out there.

Even the high anticapated LOTRO begun to suffer from that, thats why Book 11 was thrown out quickly to work against that
devastating trend.

No guildhalls, no playerhouses, no vehicles, no spacecombat, no spaceships, no decorating, no nothing - i mean, what the hell
am i going to buy ? The vey basic protocol-functions of the Unreal engine ?

Im sorry, i can download their product-demo for that without paying a monthly fee - and it will be the same "fun".

Im brave enough to say:
Bookmark this posting and reread it 6 month after release, the game has most likely failed (assuming it goes live as that)...

MAYBE other gamestudios are willing to take postings like this SERIOUS.

One thing for sure:
I survive EVERY flop - the studios wont. I have a long standing...gamestudios not.
I can wait for studios getting a clue coming up with the right product.

Its the studios decision, they need to choose a side: Top or flop ?
The way to both was just posted -IMO of course.

EDIT:
1)
Sorry for the bad formatting - the editor here is acting up.

2)
Wall of text hit for 2356 damage

Morning,

like DeaconX said already:

Its not the brush making a good painter...

The Hero Engine is one of the main reason why Heros Journey was/is delayed: The engine developement took its time.

The engine is NOT a 3D Engine, its a GAME engine. The difference is, that the engine has the most librarys onboard, like physics (havok), audio, graphic, network, terrain editors, level/world editors, chunking/zoning mechanism etc etc etc.

The gfx-part of the engine can look like a crappy PDA-game or a "next-gen®" game - it depends on the artist creating the models/world.

An important part is, what the engines structure looks like, cuz this will make up the resource consumption later for the finished game.

The Hero Engine is about 900.000 USD, so the target customers are the bigger studios.

Oblivion was made (like posted already) with an engine based on NetImmerse, which became later GameBryo. The problem of that engine is the so called "frame pre-rendering" which Oblivion makes use of, thats why the mouse is constantly lagging in oblivion even with high-end computers. Another Oblivion "problem" was the used software for the vegetation-models (SpeedTree) which is well known to be a ressource-hog.

Expect any game based on Hero Engine and Speedtree to be ressource hungry but not as problem loaded as Vanguard was, because these games will come in about 2-3 years from now on and the computers then will be able to handle such immerse games easy (quadcore, 4 GIG RAM, SLI cards and better).

Good morning,

numbers are not important as they are only a RESULT of the current reputation of a company and their game(s).
I for one dont need their numbers to know the current state of a game.
There are a dozen other "tools" to see the current state of a game, accessable for everyone.

I consider SWG's current state no good. At least its far from a "successive game".
Of course its no new title, but there are other games - old but still healthy - aka "stable on an economic base".

Hands down, a Star Wars MMO should not attract just 50 or 80 or 85 thousand people, this is simply not good enough for such IP - no matter when and where: Star Wars is successfull for 30 years and some generations now, it simply should attract many more player all over the world.

I also do believe that the not-up-to-date graphics is not really important, when they very game is healthy and fun. I prefer a game keeping me excited and willing to log in on a daily base - even lacking nice gfx effects, that is minor to me.

It is no secret, that SoE has "brown" on the hands since NGE. It's no secret that many people refuse to buy their products anymore. Poor reviews and quality are beginning to tarnish the SoE brand.

The result are much more serious problems then the current SWG numbers, when the
name "SoE" (and therefore all of their titles?) is suffering from the reputation damage.

Its absent-minded and clouding the issue, being "happy" in a monday meeting just because of
a not even 2-figure sub raising.
Its shortsighted and temporarly and not the cure for the real businessproblem they got.
Its also very shortsighted to consider the company sucessfull only because other companys are signing platform/hostingcontracts with SoE.

The important thing is that these hostingscontract are not worth the paper they're written on,when the crowd isnt willing to subscribe for these products (hint: Vanguard).

SoE is not focussing on the important things and SoE is not working on the root of all evil.

They will always have some temporarly success and light moments, but that is not enough to operate a successfull gaming-brand on the long run.

As long as this delusion is not being banned from their houses, they will not come back to anything remotly comparable to the "glory days" and remain living death.

It's not important that "grunted vets" are voicing up frustration whenever a company is announcing a deal with SoE. What IS important is the fact, that this "noise" is finally affecting such deals (negative).

Its an urgent task to work (repair) on this, unfortunatly i think their current CEO Smedley is not really qualyfied to archieve this goal and should step back to free the chair for competent young talents willing to breath fresh and healthy air into the company.

Gaming (online) has changed massivly the last 3 years but John Smedley is not keeping up. His old way of thinking and his Asia-orientation is poisoning the company constantly and preventing the very own and needed housecleaning. You dont reach out for the other side of the world when you own doormat isnt cleaned yet - this is were you need to start.

I think he was the right man for the mmo-business when it started. But the market changed since then and his methods today are not "matching" anymore. I call him a founder but no good choice for day-to-day management.

He should step back for the sake of the company and the social responsibillity he has.
I mean, he can lean back an play the adviser/consultant, but the final decisions should be taken out of his hands.

@Obraik:
I think repeatly acting like Mr. Smartypants is not THAT intelligent.
Posting "my toy-train is the best and you all lie" over and over again is not really impressive.

While i respect your contributing postings, Obraik, i think you should refrain from posting such pre-adolescence responses like you did here, it makes you look much more dull like (i think) you are in real.

Have a nice day.

The situation is easy to analyze and i even predicted, on another site tho.

What happend?
Sigil expected a number of subscriptions to cover the ONGOING costs for developement and maintenance of the product.

And here is the doom-loop:

No ongoing developement without financial backup.
No financial backup without needed subs due to the horrid product-state.

So it was just a VERY predictable matter of time, when the sell-out starts.
Its starting NOW.

Vanguard as a product will be dead..no, "is" dead already, cuz Sigil cant bear the financial burden anylonger, since the current subscription isnt allowing the needed pool of expensive manpower, dev-wise.

The very usual way is to get someone in the boat who is willing to inject fresh money into the product, hoping it will return double after the "investment-phase".

This is nothing new and very usual in the business-world.

But, and this is the "but": No1 will do this without a certain amount of control.

Someone jumping into the sinking ship is VERY aware, that the ship is sinking BECAUSE the current captain failed in all strategys.

So the new investor WILL ask for control to make sure, the ship isnt sinking anymore with his money on board.

So the whole question now is: How MUCH and WHAT control will be transfered to SoE ?

Since everyone knows SoE, it should be VERY safe to say : "Fullcontrol" overe the product.
They dont jump into the boat, they BUY the boat and contract a "payback" licencebased.

Similar to the SWG-Lucas-SoE-Deal, just the other way around this time.

That means clearly, it will be a SoE-product from now on, with full control over it.
Sure, the MIGHT hire the current Sigil-devs to carry on the development, but from now on under the SoE-flag to the SoE-terms.

Is this good ? Is this bad ?

Im too biased here to answer this.
I saw SoE doing things which were not only suicid business-wise (and the current state of some games are prooving me right), i also saw them doing things indicating clearly the loss of the "consumer-pulse", which is a basic condition to turn around a sinking ship.

But i am openminded and looking forward to a "SoE-wonder".

Im SURPRISED to see it happen maybe someday, i am PROOVED again to see it fail.

My 00.2 cents.

[quote]Originally posted by Reklaw
[b]The only thng i can say is to those that constant bring this BS about grind to forums should really reconsider if mmorpg is the type of game for them as GRIND is a mindset which only is there if people let it be there or if people are impatient.[/image][/b][/quote]

Generalizing MMORPG's down to levelbased grinding is not remotely meeting the requirements to see the problem to the whole extent, which is far more complicated and relying on other aspects.

There are examples/games out there showing how to NOT make a game repeative and dull.
It STARTS with the very basic grind mechanism of the game, but it is not ENDING there.

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Originally posted by KariTR

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Originally posted by Chessack

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Originally posted by Baikal

The cost for a small, single room house will vary based on your server, but I think the cost for my house was right around 11g. Plots do run from 2.5g to 30g.

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Right so as I had figured... ~11 g for the house and ~10 g for the plot = (roughly) 20 gp more or less for a house.

Just keep this in mind, anyone wanting to play VG because "it has player housing." It does but unless you go out and (against the game rules) buy gold with money or something, it's going to take most people a long time to get to this point - many months for most and at the rate I've been earning gold, I would predict it could take me till the end of this year to get a house.

Odds are I won't be still playing VG at the end of this year, so I've just crossed "get a house" off my to-do list at this point. Oh I'll keep saving up for one "someday" but realistically? Not a goal of mine anymore.

C

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Just as a point of interest, here is a post made 3 days ago on SV.
 
"I take back all of my complaining about adventure sphere only players being broke as a joke.

About a month ago during the high point in complaining about a disparity between crafters and adventurers, my wife and i decided to see how much money we could make adventuring only.

Not being scientific for this experiment because neither of us knew how we started by asking ourselves one questions. What type of mindset exists that allows crafters to be wealthy.

Our answer. They have to invest hours and hours and hours doing the same thing over and over and over again.

My wife and i stopped adventuring to gain levels and instead went back to dungeons that had been rendered trivial to us. We stayed in these various dungeons for 30 days.

Our net result to our commitment to make money in the adventuring sphere was a total 92 gold 34 silver and some copper.

We didnt advance much into our twenties in fact we are both still 22, alot of our friends are hitting their mid 30s now. We do however have, the fastest horses we can find with good horseshoes, great crafted armor for both of us, and a sloop, with 45 gold left over towards a caravel, if all goes right with the broker we will have our 50 gold for our caravel in no time.

So in closing i would like to appologize for taking the stance that money cannot be made in the adventuring sphere. It just takes the same dedication to making money that crafters and harvesters live by."

By this reckoning a solo player could get the gold needed to build a house in roughly 2 weeks - farming gold for yourself is completely legitimate. Or they could harvest resources and sell to the crafters - very good profit. Or they could take up crafting themselves.

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And exactly this is the problem with vanguard:
People want to have "homes" in this game. Homes are a huge social apsect in every game, drawing the thin line from an "cold feeling shooter" to a "personal feeling experience".

But people cant afford homes without becoming a crafter (which some dont like) or becoming a mindless and automated "goldgrinder".

And this brings in goldsellers. This is the BEST condition for goldfarmers, Vanguard is magnetizing them par excellence. You dont believe in the myth they could be stopped, no?
It is like spam: Sigil will find ways to stop them, goldfarmers will find a hole to continue, they are always one step ahead and Sigil can only REact.

Grinding for gold the way your posting shows would take 30 days.
30 Days goldgrinding is 15$ (subscription).
I see gold going for 5$ per 100g already, you do the math, you rub your crystal what will happen...

Sure, grinding for gold is the legal way, making you stay safe ingame.
Not using exploits is also legal and making your account staying safe, but does that mean no1 is using exploits anymore ? NO.
Do you think noone is buying gold anymore? NO.

As long there is a demand for gold, the goldfarmers will stay ingame, just a question of supply-and-demand.

And what do we learn at the end?
That Sigil is fighting their own ghosts they called.

Finally:
No, i never used an exploit except falling through mountains by intention to short traveltime.
No, i never bought gold and dont plan to do so.
But i also dont plan to play this game a long time cuz its repeative and definatly not the game i grow old with. Its just a gapfiller till the next, better title hits.

Why?
Because the advertising of having housing is a fraud to me:
There is a difference of "you can have" and "you WILL have".

I CAN have a pink boeing 747-400 as well - with the last 20 models-of-the-year, singing "ClaudeFR is da dude" in cheerleader dresses without undies, while the captain is serving caviar personally in my leather/glass/chrome suite on board, passing by Keith Urban behind the door, giving private jam-session to me...
...I "CAN"....but "WILL" i ? NO.

You see the "fraud" here? The conditions for housing are so extremely off, that the casual gamer-majority will never call a place "home".

I mean, Sigil confirmed this themselves by only having like 4000 plots ingame, when targetting 500K subs the same time. That SIMPLY means Sigil already expects just 1% of the playerbase having homes ever.

From a business- and legal point/view, something making just 1% is something which may not be advertised (here in Europe) cause its no "regular" of the product.

This leads to false advertising and the very understanding, why many player feel betrayed with the whole "housing promises".

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Originally posted by CnCUFPForces

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Originally posted by Manmadegod
So does this mean that STO is going to play like EVE? Do you get to ever get out of your ship? If not, it's a complete deal breaker for me.

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Players will spend at least 50% of their time outside of their ship, as an avatar. And of course, you may well spend time aboard your ship as an avatar. Player ship interiors are by no means confirmed to be excluded from launch.

barthburger, instead of a middle-finger smiley, Daron used a Klingon smiley. Point being? It was a joke, and should be taken in the spirit with which it was intended. I think the linked posts make it clear the developers are listening, as they have been for the last two years.

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While i do respect your approach to defend the executive producer, it is more then ultrawrong as an executive producer to clearly say (between the lines):
If you dont like it, fu...off.

This is the completely wrong sign to act in public, disrespecting the critical (but constructive) "soon-to-be-cutomers". Even the slightes "risk" to be misundertand by such statement should have him made think twice about posting such comment.

Like we say here:
The apple doesn't fall far from the tree - so what should we think about the rest of the crews attitude we are supposed to pay the their salarys in the future?

An official excuse for "misleading wording" is the least i expect to read soon®

And yes, i think you get the idea:
This is NOT the WoW crowd or blizzard forum, so please dont thread us (me) to that effect.

Good day,

surprising to see companys not really learning from others mistakes.
Surprising to see companys moving away from the target audience the longer they work for the target audience (similar effect in music- and movie biz).

Losing the feel for the cutomers pulse is the death of every business model.

STO is a product, supposed to sell well and gain regular income from subscriptions.
Its not only a need, it is a MUST to create a product the target audience will buy and pay for on a subscription base.

The get this right, the CORRECT definition of "target audience" is the very basic.
Im afraid companys fail a great deal here already. But all further and ongoing actions based on this are unfortunatly heading the wrong direction, because the "target audience analysis"
is wrong already.

I read "WoW" and "multimillion sellers" in STO discussions and statements.
Thats so wrong as it could be for a title like STO.

PE should face that an STO-game is absolutely NOT targeting the WoW audience, and you shouldnt even try...

STO is no fantasy title. WoW is more mostly for minors with a flat learning curve and easy
gameplay (jemp on me..cmon...): Fast, fun - but also boring quick, thats why WoW has such high subscription fluctuation (mostly at level 60).

Of course, a business based on this can work (as we see), but its relying on the fact, that there are enough customers willing to refill freed slots (subscription wise).

A Sci-FI IP already fails on these conditions. We know from business surveys, that the SciFI genre is a minor genre (17%) compared to fantasy games.

This alone puts a SciFi game into another spot in the MMO world, the business model here is completely different and any "WoW-strategy" will fail miserable (hint: Vanguard).

You cant rely on such fluctuation on a high level, you need to get the "few" interessted Sci-FI online gamers into your game and you need to KEEP them in the game.
And that busniess model is COMPLETELY different from WoW. WoW is a "quantity" model.
STO is a "quality model".

These days i often see the (imho) major fault that many companys looking at the WoW-model, but they forget that there is no need to copy WoW - its already THERE!

Second, the Star Trek IP is already requesting the productplacement to think in terms of elder, mature audience which KNOW the ST-series. You wont get any 8 yr. old yapping for an STO-box by only promising them "you can be a borg" (a WHAT?!).

These basics are requesting the developers to put the game in a sandbox-style with huge community aspects, with a very special, home- and personal feeling spirit.

The EVE-audience is a prime example here, its a complex game for people wanting to play no game, rather then live a VIRTUAL WORLD FOR YEARS!

STO SHOULD be placed exactly here too.

Without interior (giving the feel to actually operate something), whithout personal places to gather with friends, without a big social factor - the game remains a "simple shooter in space" and will be the same boring like so many other titles. At the end, the whole budget has been eaten and the title fails.

And do NOT forget, that EVERY new game has flaws, glitches, bugs and annoyance.
If you ADD this to the "design mistakes", a game will fast become what eg. Vanguard became:
A "suxor" so to speak.

No financial investor will inject fresh money into something not even fulfilling the initial prognose playernumber-wise, or even more worse: Having cancellations (or running out initial subs) after launch. That means at the end, money is running out !
Exactly the same Sigil is experiencing these days.
Either you have a huge financial reserve to survive this time/phase/period or you simply go down the hill with it.

That is a disastrous way to go with any MMORPG-title and should be avoided under each and all circumstances.

Taking away diversity and complexity from the mature player, leaving the no #167 "mouse mashing spaceshooter" for the potential customer will not get any money from me - how about you ?

My prioritys for gaming are:
Housing/Quarters (own ship) from the BEGINNING on
Decorating
Crafting
Complexity
Economy
Sandbox
Huge social interacting (but without forced to be grouped to advance)
Combat (yes, i rate combat at last, cause STO is many diff. things then combat)

Missing any of these points means missing thousands of subscriptions, which results in a loss of thousands and million dollars.

PE is either a hobby of an arabian oil-prince or simply not in the position to risk that.

It would baffle me if this illogical, business suicid would go on, esp. at a point where everything can still be corrected.

[quote]
Originally posted by Dundee
Give the guy a chance. List what's wrong in a helpful sort of way, and post it over there.
[/b]
[/quote]

ROFL ! Good one /cheers !

Uhm...that was a joke, no ? ....