If EA goes free to play, I want Earth & Beyond back.

Originally posted by Agricola1

Originally posted by VideoJockey

Here in America we have similar anti-trust laws, but I will posit this: why is it acceptable for a small business to operate in this way, but not a large one? How does making Intel chipsets cost less negatively impact consumers? Why would it be perfectly acceptable for Intel to spawn a faux competitor and continue to operate in the same way with both companies (and why should they have to go through the inefficient motions to achieve the same result)? I understand that using these tactics to remove AMD from the marketplace is unacceptable, but that has not happened; AMD has been around for quite a  time (relative to the age of the microchip) and doesn't seem to be going anywhere soon.

 

 

So you believe that what they did was unacceptable yet you forgive them of their crimes because their attempt was unsuccessful?

I hope that if I ever commit a criminal act but am thwarted by the law before my acts come to fruition, that you will be on the jury at my trial!

let me clarify: I believe using these tactics to specifically put AMD out of business would be unacceptable. That did not happen and will not happen. Exclusive manufacturer-retailer relationships have been going on for ages. I am not arguing that they did not commit a crime (they already have been convicted), I am arguing that such practices should not be considered a crime.

I also think calling Intel's actions "paying retailers to not sell AMD" is misleading; they gave retailers a discount to carry only their products. It's a fairly common practice, and they're doing it here in the USA without any legal difficulties. I really don't think there is an anti-trust issue here because not only is AMD a comparably priced alternative, it's also a pretty good one (I switched to an AMD core last year). The whole point of anti-trust legeslation is to protect the consumer; have any consumers suffered because Intel can offer cheaper products than AMD?

AMD is fully capable of making the same arrangements, and since they have a smaller market share the EU would probably encourage it in the name of competition. It is not Intel's fault if they are not willing to do so.

Here in America we have similar anti-trust laws, but I will posit this: why is it acceptable for a small business to operate in this way, but not a large one? How does making Intel chipsets cost less negatively impact consumers? Why would it be perfectly acceptable for Intel to spawn a faux competitor and continue to operate in the same way with both companies (and why should they have to go through the inefficient motions to achieve the same result)? I understand that using these tactics to remove AMD from the marketplace is unacceptable, but that has not happened; AMD has been around for quite a  time (relative to the age of the microchip) and doesn't seem to be going anywhere soon.

Originally posted by Agricola1

Originally posted by Cleffy

I don't think the European Union sees the chip market through all its avenues.  First you cannot take AMD chips out of the market and expect it to not have an impact somewhere else.  If Intel gets someone to stop selling AMD chips, the customer may have shopped around and went with another retailer selling AMD chips.  I really don't see these acts as decreasing sales of AMD chips in the European Union since there were always AMD retailers despite those techniques.  If anything those retailers decreased there possible sales for offering lower selection.  To me those decreased sales AMD had weren't caused by non-compete practices, but by a poor performing platform.

However, the European Union has been adament about fining large corporations for anti-compete acts in the last few months, such as their fining of Microsoft for not offering competing browsers on initial install of their operating system.

 

So are you sayiong it's OK for Intel to break EU law, because you can buy AMD elsewhere? Most people just go to a shop and buy a tower, wether it has AMD or Intel makes little to no difference with their choice. If Intel didn't think this illegal practice would increase their sales and/or lower AMD sales then why do you suppose they broke the law and did it?

Caveat emptor. The ignorance of the consumer is not the responsibility of the manufacturer; that's the (3rd party) retailer's role. If the retailer finds that not selling one chip or the other is in their best interest, how is that the manufacturer's fault? AMD should have been right there with the Intel guy, offering the same kind of deal-- If they weren't, that's a piss poor sales strategy. If they were and couldn't beat Intel's prices, that's hardly Intel's fault.

Retailers jump all over these kinds of discounts for a reason. If AMD can't  compete, then they need to restructure so that they can. That's the whole upside to competition; elimination of the weak and lower prices from the strong.

People who want to buy AMD can and will. I had no problem finding a retailer that sold both AMD and Intel chips, and I made an informed decision and bought AMD.

If the radar system is adequate, there won't be any disadvantage to using 1st person.

Believe it or not, some people still roleplay these days. Even rogues.

After what happened to my beloved SWG, I'd rather be initially underwhelmed and pleasantly surprised by the release. Hope is for suckers.

One thing that cannot be overlooked when talking about WoW is the community. WoW has the worst community that I have ever seen in my 10 years of playing MMOs, including the f2p games marketed towards kids. The community/playerbase, for me, detracts from any positive qualities the game has. I played for 6 months with some college friends... but I decided if I wanted to be verbally abused by a 14 year old I'd go work at a mall.

I can't login with my old account. Blueballed by Ryzom :(

Originally posted by Nerf09

 

Originally posted by eric_w66

If you could fly the best ships from day 1, there wouldn't be much to call it a MMO.... that'd be more of a FPS type of game with no progression.

Every MMORPG is a "level" based game, even Eve. Eve's is based on time spent  learning skills, but it still equates to "levels". New pilots in eve can't fly battlecruisers on day 1.

You all lack imagination.  ALL OF YOU!

 

A vigorous PvP unrestricted environment could happen, without ganking, without grinding, without all the other nonsense that plagues othergames, but you all lack imagination to do it.  You are all stuck on the old Everquest model and you will never get out of it.

What you describe has already been done. It was called Planetside. I don't want JGE to become that. I want it to be a game where you earn things and feel a sense of accomplishment, not a game where you log in, pick out whatever you want to fly, get blown up, and shrug and walk away. The driving force behind MMO's is the sense of accomplishment and fear of losing that accomplishment. Without an emotional investment, there's no excitement. No fun. And don't bother singing the merits of beating other players; only insecure people need that kind of stimulation.

I would think so. You'll also need the expansion and a $20 entry fee. From the official rules:

To participate, you must:

• Have an active subscription to World of Warcraft with an account in good standing, meaning the account is not flagged, suspended, or banned for violating any of the Terms of Service, EULA, or other rules of World of Warcraft.
• Have World of Warcraft and World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade installed.
• Have a World of Warcraft account that has been upgraded to The Burning Crusade.
• Be the authorized account holder of the Account. "Authorized account holder" is defined as the natural person who registered the Account.
• Have a valid credit card to pay the per-competitor registration fee for the tournament, which is €15/£12 in Europe; 20,000 won in South Korea; $20 in North America; and NT$450 in the regions of Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau for each six-week qualification round that the competitor participates in.
• Reside in a country or territory that allows participation (you will see the full list when registering).
• Complete the required information on the registration page to register for the tournament.
• Meet all eligibility requirements listed in the rules. Players meeting these requirements will be allowed to participate in the tournament and will have access to the dedicated tournament realms in their region.

I have not been able to load worldofwarcraft.com or log in all day. The client loader can't even bring up the news page. Anyone know anything? I had specifically penciled in play time this afternoon :(

It took me 5 months of casual play to make it to 70, and I did not encounter a single game-stopping or time-wasting bug. It is way more polished than any of the dozen other MMO's I've played... though I started playing WoW more than 2 years after release.

Edit: just remembered the vanish "bug" which Blizzard says is working as intended. So 1 in 5 months.

Originally posted by redriver

Originally posted by Antarious

I think the worst idea is to base an MMO.. on a well known IP.  You are going to piss off a lot of people no matter what you do... 

 

it worked for W0W.. I think it comes down to implementation.. the ppl in charge of SWG development who called the shots didn't have the vision and failed to hold course.

To be fair, Warcraft didn't have nearly the fanbase that Star Wars does. I hadn't even heard of the game until the third one was released, and I didn't find it much different than the other 4 dozen RTS games available at the time. WoW is probably a bastardization of Warcraft, but I don't think anyone cares because it is an enjoyable game that doesn't need the Warcraft feel to draw in players.

It had the right feel for me. Not everything matched up with the movies, but honestly, I didn't want to play the movies. Movies are not games. The game built on the original movies, adding depth that you don't get in 7 hours of following a single plot line.

Having read a few dozen EU novels, I felt like one of the lesser-known characters that still made important contributions to the Rebellion.

SWG wasn't about "playing the way you were meant to," it was about being in the SW universe and doing whatever you felt was appropriate. That's why it was so sandbox. If I wanted a SW game that told me what to do, I'd play any of the large number of SW console games.

Instead of walking through a scenario, seeing only what the devs show you (which is what most single-player games are), I was free to roam across planets and see things that I had heard of either in the original trilogy or in the books. I was not directed to see these things, and most often there was no reward for doing so, but I got to define my own role in the SW universe. That's why it felt right to me.

I'll give it a try, I haven't looked at MXO since the open beta.

Something that I have not seen mentioned is competent coders. I don't think the NGE would have been half as bad as it was in reality if they had the programming talent to make it work the way it was supposed to. I've never had so many bug/ui/connection problems in a subscription game. Hell, the english version of Voyage Century doesn't have any developers on staff (they all do the Korean version and someone translates to english) and the game still plays better than the NGE.

It's a lot harder these days to find people that don't inspire the rage in me. Once upon a time you had to be reasonably intelligent to play MMOs, but now they're almost all designed so kids can play.

With graphics like that, I'll probably need a new PC to play. Feh.

Something that seems to have been swept under the rug is the penalty for PvP death.

PvP in WoW is widely successful because the only penalty is the 3 minutes it takes to run back to your corpse. You either win honor or lose 3 minutes. It's a more than reasonable gamble to take.

PvP in games like EVE and JGC had a harsher death penalty; namely, the loss of all of your equipment. Now, both games have monetary insurance, and it functions similarly in both, but as one who had a pair of S3 artifact engines back in the day, the cost of death (pvp or otherwise), was incredibly high. Whenever I used them, I had this nagging feeling that if I crashed or got killed, I'd never have another pair again; I wasn't willing to hunt artifacts for weeks on end again, and I couldn't afford to buy them from someone else. Because of this, there was always far more PvP going on in the simulator than out in space.

Just as important as how to design your PvP system is what you decide will be the death penalty.