All Posts by EEL85

MMORPGs are never truly finished. That is the beauty with the games. However, everyone always gripes that they are never complete and therefore a piece of junk.... /slap

Originally posted by ghoul31

I have to agree with the OP. The graphics are good, and the quests are pretty interesting.

But the load times are terrible, the instancing is lame, and requires a really high end comptor to play.

 

I'm still underdecided about buying it

 

 

I am running a 3400+ AMD Sempron  w/  only 1.5 GB of memory. The only thing "special" and it is very outdated is my 7900 XXX video card. Running on low settings was giving me 28 FPS and the visual quality between low settings and high is not too much. The load times when entering an instance were next to nothing. I disagree that it takes a really high end computer because it doesn't.

Was getting about 80-100 kbs and switched servers. Jumped to 150-200 kbs. Called my service provider and upgraded services for $8.00 more a month. Instantly jumped to 650 kbp. It is nice to get instant gratification every once and a while.

Good discussion.

There hasn't been a loss of innovation but instead a narrowed focus on proven game designs. If I am forking over 20 million as the owner of a game company, I will research the industry and try to base my game off only the most successful. This being WoW, etc...$$$ Why would I ever want to create something innovative (as a businessman) and have the potential for huge loss when I could clone WoW?? I want to stay with what works and has proven to make huge $$$.

But yes, game companies are run by businessmen and not gamers. This explains the lack of innovation IMHO.

Originally posted by Thatim

Who says WAR will be such a great game?

I am really sorry, and I know I sound like a troll but..

 

I looked at this game closely, and it is alot like WoW with some improvements.

 

TCoS wont be aimed directly at WoW players. It will be casual and such, but it isnt aiming at WoW players like WAR is doing.

 

WAR can keep its players

 

No really this game doesnt need 10mil players to be succes full. No game does. Look at EVE with their 600k subscribers.

Warhammer will be good, great.  However, TCoS looks interesting.

Warhammer is going to be huge. Whether you like it or not, there is a good chance you will be playing it one of these days. Correct me if I am wrong but it is refreshing to see beta testers actaully placing pre-orders instead of bashing. 

I believe what you have tried to explain in your creative analogies is The Law of Diminishing Returns. I enjoy the irony.

Originally posted by FreddyNoNose

OP, I would highly suggest you read the book The Mythical Man-Month.  If you read it and fully understand it, come back here and try again.

I don't see how my suggestion would feed the flames to burn up an entire organization. However, I did enjoy reading what information I found online about the man-month. To reiterate, fix what is broken... Once the basics are fixed, take it to " a whole nuther level." The Appreciative Inquiry Theory comes to mind. The fact is, there has been great progress made in MMORPGs. However, I do feel there is still a disconnect between the game designers and consumers.

MMORPG's are companies and gamers are their stakeholders (Wiki defines stakeholder as an individual with a legitimate interest in a given situation). A lot of player time and money is invested into these games, giving the player a legitimate interest in the games they play. This includes having the right to be concerned for the well being of their game. It seems like companies take a push approach to game development in that they do not listen to their stakeholders. Instead, they push updates onto players and expect them to learn to like the new content. A pull approach seems like the ideal situation where the new content reflects the majority of players suggestions.  But yet they seem to defy logic.

No. Honestly?I look at VG as an ambituous project that was "almost" a huge success.  They just rushed it and released it before it was completed. One thing I realy like about VG is the diverse and large amount of races and classes that mesh together pretty nicely. There was a lot of thought behind the game but it was just too much for the devs to handle, and it could be said that it was one of the worst games at release.

Originally posted by batolemaeus

I will be happy if someday an mmo will be released where i can just go out in the great wilderness, hunt some animals, go fishing and sit near my own (crafted) hut near a waterfall, then decide to visit the next (player built) town to sell the things i harvested (to players of course) and buy things like a new longbow (or a new gun, crafted by players please).
i want a sandbox. I do not want to follow a storyline, i do not need quests, i simply want Eve-Online on Earth (or any other planet).

Those are my feelings exactly.

We did have a game similar to this on the ground... it was called SWG (b4 the NGE).

So why aren't there many if any new sandbox games being released?  From a business (financial) standpoint, sandbox games take much longer to evolve, which potentially results in far fewer subs at the beginning of the game. Unfortunately, with extremely high investment costs of these games, many of these companies are looking for a quick return on their investments (which is also why a lot of these new games are unfinished at release). So they shy away from sandbox games.

So a person new to MMORPGs logs in to this sandbox game and says "Wait a sec, there is nothing here.../cancel. Lets go play WoW because there is a lot of neat stuff to do." While a smaller group of experienced players logs in and says "This is great. The potential is here, and we know can shape this empty world into whatever we want. We are only limited by our imagination."

So for the next year or so, these pioneers grow and shape the game. Then, new players start seeing just how amazing the game, that seemed so lifeless at first, can be. This is when the game begins to grow. Look at EVE. The game is one of only a handful of games (if not the only one) that is actually growing in numbers. If you look though, the game also started out relatively low in subs compared to other games.

One great thing about sandbox games is that the pioneers create the game and have a sense of ownership towards the game. This is why SWG didn't shut down 2 years ago because these people will stick by their creations for a long time.

Anyways, a sandbox game is great game model for those companies looking for a long-term game. No other type of game creates such strong game loyalty. All of these companies are trying to figure out what player wants, when instead they could simply develop a world and give us the tools to create what we want.

As far as this thread goes, IMO people who are satisfied or neutral about games are out playing those games. People who are dissatisfied or very dissatisfied are in here posting (there are exceptions). This will greatly skew the results of a poll like this or any other question for that matter. But I am optimistic someone will get it right, eventually...

AoC could be great but the same problems seem to plague these "next generation" games. Promising way to much and biting off more than they can chew. Vanguard is a wonderful example of the "next generation" game that has fallen flat on its' face due to trying to implement way too much into the game. So many grandiose ideas overwhelmed the developers and they ended up promising up front  way more than they could have ever delivered at release.  I hope AoC does not  fall victim to this and doesn't live up to all that it promises. I am skeptical of games that promise so many great new features just because I have seen almost all of them not succeed.

I feel for a MMORPG to be successful, it is critical that the games foundation be very strong. This doesn't mean innovative or anything else, simply complete for release.  The only promise these company's owe us is the promise of a solid game at release.

These companies need to go back to the basics and focus on game performance, solid combat systems, a useful economy and crafting system, and fun / challenging game content. These companies do not need to reinvent the wheel but simply make it great. I am in no way saying this is an easy task but i feel companies are overlooking all of the simple but extremely important items and moving on towards the "whats going to make us great" items. I feel like these new games are way over thought and built from the top, down.

Anyways, I hope AoC focuses on the core content up until release and can make good on what it promises. It seems to me that  Warhammer is focusing on making a solid game for release.

It will be $14.99 a month within +/- $1.00. However, I wish they would do like xbox and only charge $5.99 a month!!

Like mostly everyone has mentioned though, $20 or even higher would still be ok if the game was extremely good.

It is very clear that the OP has very little experience with Vanguard. I have been following the game for a long time and not once have I ever seen anyone use VS for Vanguard? It is VG and always has been. Any person who has spent even the smallest amount of time would know this.

Interesting article in Business Week Online about EA's soon purchase of Bioware and Pandemic. EA says they will let these company's operate independently. Lets hope so...

http://www.businessweek.com/innovate/content/oct2007/id20071029_312839.htm

Simply put, people fell in love with the original MMORPG's like EQ, UO, SWG or even WoW. This entire industry is so young and there were very few experts on mmorpgs when they first made an appearance. People were more amazed in the fact that they could simply play online with other people. Anyways, every new online game is benchmarked against these older games, which people are so attached to. The original games couldn't be compared to anything else, and if you wanted to play online, you played them. I believe that the new games don't suck at all but instead are much more scrutinized. This phenomenon is extremely interesting to me and I am really wondering what game will replace WoW or other popular online games. In theory, this new game will have to be extremely well polished and offer something totally new. However, I feel that this new super game will also have to implement many common game elements that are already in use. Many people like their game features but simply get tired of the same content. The ultimate online game will be one where the newness factor never goes away. A mmorpg with no end, which is why I really want to see more sandbox type of games being released. A lot of people only focus on the negatives of new games and overlook all the positives the game has to offer.

Nudity and Gore will be a negative from a business stand point. This will greatly reduce the games potential market base. So what right? It is an adult game, we don't need kids, etc... Kids make up a huge segment of the gaming market and always will (limited responsibilities, no job, free time, etc..)  The whole idea behind on-line games is to have a massively populated on-line game and AoC is really putting themselves at a disadvantage. I don't see the game reaching over 250-400k subs in the states (if the game is released in a very well polished form) and those numbers might be high. I do hope AoC proves me wrong and turns out to be a great game.

 The aurgument is that kids will be attracted to this stuff and they will. However, many reasonable parents I would assume, will not buy nor let their children play the game.

The game is not dead. These games can survive with low populations for years (look at SWG) but it will take a lot of work and time to make something of it. 

Also, I agree with the OP that the game is not bad but how can you know if your only level 14? There is much of the game you have not seen as far as combat goes. 

However, with SOE in charge, odds are they will never save the game but I hope they prove me wrong.