Originally posted by MMOExposed

Originally posted by -Zeno-

It seems that every game that is a clone of EQ has become a failure (with one exception, WoW).  AoC ended up 20 million in debt within its first year.  Rift is already doing server merges and has a dwindling population.  Warhammer Online fizzled out.  All of these so called EQ clones have lost population within their first year instead of increasing population.

Now lets look at the flip side with two games that are not EQ clones.  EVE Online started out with less than a 50k players and was considered a mining SIM in its first year.  Since then they have actual grown and have more than 300k players.  Darkfall Online is another good example.  They started with small team that took forever to release the product and had a rocky launch.  Judging by the only numbers we have, clanned players, there was only 1400 players in clans in the first year.  Over time (way slower than EVE) the clanned players number went up to over 3500 players (this is only NA server stats too).  Not bad for a very niche game with a low player base to start with.

So one question I have to ask.  Why do developers keep trying to make EQ clones?  Why don't they just break away from the EQ standard and become successful like EVE Online and Darkfall are?

lol you left out DAoC as a EQ Clone. that was successful.

 

and SWG was a Hybrid of EQ and UO. so its also a clone of sucess in some ways as well.

Having around 10k subs is successful for DAoC?  They did go up at the start (this was a long time ago, they had an advantage like Blizzard had) but the decline went quick.  SWG is now being closed down so thats shows its a strong failure.

There are a few that I have noticed that seem to not be failures.  However they are games that use time based gameplay in Asia and count thoes accounts in their overall numbers.  3 million players with most paying for "5 hours" of game play is not really a success.  Thats like counting ROM and their X million active accounts (that are free)!

Originally posted by jpnz

EQ clones fail?

Aion = 3M subs

EVE = 400k subs

Even if we take out the Sub-king WoW, themeparks (EQ Clones) are way more successful in the market.

You can twist perception all you want but the raw numbers are just not in 'sandboxes' favor.

That Aion number is wrong.  That is accounts.  Including my own in-active account.  They do that because of time share accounts in Asia.  Thankfully they don't count trial accounts or they would have Warcraft numbers.

I have made predictions of several games in the past few years that were true (their declines).  However as of right now I have mixed feelings with SWTOR.   I do feel that it has a possible winning combination like Blizzard had with WoW.

Here are some things in common with WoW:

Blizzard had ~10 years worth of fans at WoW's launch (Battle.net members to back itself up).

Bioware has ~16 years worth of fans and a solid IP to work with.

Blizzard had plenty of money to toss at their game (and not much competition at the time of their launch).

Bioware has ton$ of money to use on their game (thanks to EA) but tons of competition as well.

Blizzard has respect in the gaming world.

Bioware has respect in the gaming world (except for the EA acquisition).

The only set-backs I see right now is that Bioware may have spent most of its money on putting voice overs into the game (as actors and voice editing is expensive).  That could mean other areas of the game may be lacking, including the fact they are using the Hero engine which other game companies have found very lacking and buggy.  However with the amount of money they put into it this could be a moot point.  There is also the possibility they used the EQ standard in their game which will cause players to feel as if they have played the game before which will reduce the "cool" factor of voice overs, playing a Star Wars game (and make them think "why am I even playing this" and end up elsewhere).

So my official prediction is: I don't know yet.  Its hard to tell before a big title like this is released what it will do 6 months down the road.  In the short term I think it will sell like hot cakes, since they were smart enough to not release the NDA when offering pre-orders.  Until they give pre-order numbers we wont be able to even make a solid pre-release judgement.  Remember, if its awesome then beta testers will beg their friends to pre-order.  If not, they will tell their friends not to pre-order, NDA or not.  So, only time will tell.  However I do not see them releasing pre-order numbers unless it hits a million pre-orders.

Originally posted by naraku209

Originally posted by Markn1

 WOW cloned alot of what was good about EQ but the WOW we see now isnt anywhere near what it was ment to be its a bastard child of what it was ment to be thats been twisted and turned by the whining playerbase which is the case for EQ to now.  

There is no EQ clone EQ was and always will be the first 3d MMO no matter how many games try they cant clone what that generation started 15 years ago when they started development i can tell you i played the original EQ beta and still play EQ 8 hrs a day to this day nothing has given me the feel and fun EQ does.

 

Theres a reason for this that most people dont see.  WOW, EQ2, Rift, AOC what are these that EQ is not ?  Action fast combat MMORPGs.  EQ is more a role playing slow combat for the most part not alot happening its just a different feel than the new games and wow give.

but would ultimately make a lot of things EQ clones to be honest. everything we see in mmos today came for UO and EQ

Bingo.  You win the prize.  UO started it all, but EQ screwed it up by adding levels and restrictions.  So now you have either EQ style games (theme parks) or UO style games (sandboxes).  You have a dime a dozen theme park games out there and only a few sandboxes.  We need more innovation, more sandbox games.

Theme park games are dieing left and right while silently the very few sandbox games are growing.  Sure, you have some Theme parks that make their dev costs back and make their owners rich, but after 6 months they become ghost towns (server mergers, player loss, etc) which is not good for the player (in many, many ways).  The old standard was 40% retention rate, but now thats pushing as low as 20% on Theme parks.  All the while sandboxes are keeping quite, slowly growing, and laughing in this insain market (Darkfall Online and EVE Online).

I guess the player is at fault anyway.  Your the one (and yes, me too) that buys into these "next big things" only to find out what crap they really are in the end.  You have to move on from these EQ clones in order to get developers to stop producing crap, however I don't see you doing that.

It seems that every game that is a clone of EQ has become a failure (with one exception, WoW).  AoC ended up 20 million in debt within its first year.  Rift is already doing server merges and has a dwindling population.  Warhammer Online fizzled out.  All of these so called EQ clones have lost population within their first year instead of increasing population.

Now lets look at the flip side with two games that are not EQ clones.  EVE Online started out with less than a 50k players and was considered a mining SIM in its first year.  Since then they have actual grown and have more than 300k players.  Darkfall Online is another good example.  They started with small team that took forever to release the product and had a rocky launch.  Judging by the only numbers we have, clanned players, there was only 1400 players in clans in the first year.  Over time (way slower than EVE) the clanned players number went up to over 3500 players (this is only NA server stats too).  Not bad for a very niche game with a low player base to start with.

So one question I have to ask.  Why do developers keep trying to make EQ clones?  Why don't they just break away from the EQ standard and become successful like EVE Online and Darkfall are?

I told you so.  Server mergers.  Dwindling population.  Its all right on schedule.  Next.

Can anyone speak out about the game yet to say if its good, it sucks, its a clone, etc?

Originally posted by MadnessRealm

You should pick up where xzyax left off in these forums : http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/259666/DarkFall-Character-Counts-for-both-Servers.html

Or just make a single thread and update it like this every week or so so we can observe the growth of DarkFall.

I don't understand his numbers.  They are way off to what I had back then.

There is no way to make DF free to play without screwing it up.  Item shop in a full loot game? Heh...

With the news of Darkfall 2.0 we see a slight decline in the number of players in clans.  However I have seen an uptick in the nuber of unguilded, possibly new, players around newbie cities.  Race alliance chat is usually more active than Chaos as well, unlike last time where Chaos chat was where it was all at.  These numbers are still higher than a year ago.  This informaiton is being pulled directly from here.

Clans

Active (gain or loss) / Total (gain or loss)

Clans: 242 (-14) / 329 (+12)
Players in Clans: 3154 (-242) / 3383 (-35)

Top 5 clans by population

The Shadow Legionnaires    109 (+20)
Ruff Knights    105 (+18)
Battle Saints    97 (+13)
The Empire    90 (-4)
Sick Bastards    83 (new to top 5)

Originally posted by Jimmac

Reset everyone's character in Eve online and CCP might as well just file bankruptcy...they would be done, and so would Eve. 

Do it like Fippy Darkpaw on EQ1 and it will be fine (meaning don't erase the old server, just make a new one for those who choose to utilize it). 

However on one hand a new player would not be able to catch up to another player that has billions of ISK to throw away.   How many people would try EVE if a wipe happened and they changed things around?

Originally posted by meleemadness

That is very similiar to what SOE did with SWG.  One day I logged in and my character was destroyed....a melee stacker.  I had to pick between other gimp classes that were lower level than what I was.  I just uninstalled the game and moved on.

Was there people on the opposite end of this?  Left the game becasue of what it was but came back when it was changed to check it out?  I know SWG's situation, it effected vet's.  What about new players or returning players?

Originally posted by Murashu

No Sir.

So it would cause a trust issue with the developer?  Thats the aim of this poll, how many people would feel the developer is not trust worthy (ie: game wiped every 2 years instead of lasting forever).

Any MMO could be considered (World of Warcraft) for this poll but its more focused on the ones with big "new to endgame" gaps. 

Lets say you played a game that had veteran players own your face or said game made you fell like you could not compete unless you had played it years.  Lets say you liked the idea of said game but that veteren curve and possibly learning curve was harsh.

Would you return to said game if the developers did the below:

Have worked over the past year to made a "2.0" of the game.  They call it a "new game" as they wanted to build something better.  They say they have learned from their past mistakes and said people who have bought the game do not have to buy it again for this "re-boot".

Two current game examples I can think of is EVE Online and Darkfall Online.  I am sure there are many other games that are like this (Aion?).

Keep in mind that a wipe would enrage the current players who spent multiple years maxing out their current characters.  Not only that any sane developer would be making it easier for new players to "catch up" which would have already enraged them.  As the saying goes the people with the loudest voice are the pissed off minority.  We trust developers of these persistant worlds wont lose our charactors, so wiping could be a trust issue.  What do you think?

Edit: above circumstances

Darkfall forum link

The point I want to make with this is an answer to his question "how much time must pass before it's no longer appealing to anybody new to join the re-launched game again?".  One month.  Then you will have the veteran paradox all over again.

Wipe or no wipe, it does not matter.  However honor matters above all.  Would it be a wise company decision to give a middle finger to the people who have stayed with them and helped pay for this "new game" expansion?  What do you think?

Originally posted by Omali

If Aventurine were to wipe the game, people would simply macro back up to their previous skill levels like they did the first time. Those who put the most work into leveling would probably not even bother coming back to do it all again, so you would wind up in the same position.

Except it would take them a week while a normal player playing the game casually would take a month.  Actually, with a wipe, both would take a month as both players would need money and creatures yield better gains for skills.  So no, your wrong.

This is a 10 inch Tablet with a DX11 video card and Windows 7 Home on it for about $500.  I have yet to find a Vantage or 3Dmark score anywhere for this tablet.  If its anything close to the Netbook version of this processor I could see use as a MMO playing machine.  No way this thing could do raids or sieges but solo play in just about any game may be possible.  Has anyone tried this?

Link to this Tablet on Amazon.  It has good reviews for normal use.

This type of AI is already in Darkfall (dumbed down version).  The NPC's have to aim at the player and can sometimes, but not all the time, predict which way you are going when you are moving.  Just like a player.  They also hide behind stuff and go by sight and sound instead of aggro range.

There is no grind in Darkfall anymore.  They made skills raise about 10x faster when used on NPC's about 3 months ago, raised crafting gains in the last patch and added the meditation system so you can gain skills and stats while you are logged out.  Its on par and even faster than most other MMO's on the market (except you can kill a vet, like me, within your first week, yes I suck that bad at FPS, wtb Shadowbane 2).

Originally posted by Seinaru

Well, they said "relaunch." So that means that either it's going to be a new game or everyone's going to be wiped, right?

I've never played DF but I think I might try it out as long as there's going to be a clean slate.

It doesnt matter.  In a few days you can survive to vet players.  In a few weeks you can kill vet players.  No reason to have a clean slate.