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Originally posted by Crazy_Stick

Both articles clearly relate to the retension of more new players through improving the newbie experience even if they may not give you the specific numbers you want to graph and both indicate it’s an issue.

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Sadly it is only the numbers and graphs that are relevant indicators since "well known facts" and "thinking on your own" can prove just anything...

I think it will survive as a niche game, much like SWG did and Warhammer. It will be put on maintenance mode like DAOC and Warhammer were. Bioware ignored beta testers and betted on their name to hold people until much needed features were added, and they lost. People weren't willing to wait 6 months for features that should have been ingame day 1, beta testers brought this up and were ignored by Bioware and ridiculed by Bioware fans.

Bioware betted people would love the story so much they wouldn't care that endgame was just a poorly designed raid and battleground grind, not to mention the same old daily quest grind. They betted on everyone wanting to reroll and have every class as part of the fun in the game. Even the Voiceover got so old people spacebarred through everything but the class story, Voiceover was overdone, should have been class only.

People were not willing to sit minutes at a time through load screen and load screen and load screen, time and again just to travel to a destination, something that was ignored when beta testers brought up in beta at least 9 months before release.

The games ran horribly on even the best of rigs, Not sure how it is now.

The worlds and cities felt lifeless and dull, something brought up at least a year before release by beta testers and we were ignored by Bioware and bashed by Bioware fans.

Your choices were suppose to have an effect on you and the world and did not.

Illum was promised to be the massive pvp planet.

It's such a shame there's nothing more to do in the game but grind dailys, boring battlegrounds, and easy boring raids, the same old same old.

The cantinas are such a disappointment, so much potential. There's casinos already set up in Nar Shadaa, just sitting there, nothing to interact with..Other places ingame the same way but just sitting there lifeless.

People were promised many things and Bioware didn't deliver.

Originally posted by Gdemami

 

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Originally posted by Crazy_Stick

Both articles clearly relate to the retension of more new players through improving the newbie experience even if they may not give you the specific numbers you want to graph and both indicate it’s an issue.

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Sadly it is only the numbers and graphs that are relevant indicators since "well known facts" and "thinking on your own" can prove just anything...

Uhm. Well, if you don't want to  believe that EVE Online has a learning curve or an issue with new people sticking with it no matter what CCP itself says then that's your right. I am not arguing with you. Nope. Not at all...  *Looks at Gdemami*

U trollin me bro? :) LOL.

I really wanted to like Eve.. I installed the trial this weekend, and tried to follow the tutorial the best I could.  There were so many steps in that tutorial mode that made me go, "Wait.. what?"  It was a tutorial in itself to see which windows I really needed to have up at all times. 

The one thing I hate the most in an MMO is clutter.  Having 6 windows on my screen while I was learning how to play was a huge turn off.  SW:TOR, though implemented after launch, has UI where you can have only 10% of your screen as UI.  I'm still looking for an MMO.. I recently quit TOR for various reasons (most mention in this thread).  Perhaps there will be a sandbox soon with a learning curve that won't freak me out and turn me off.  No offense to you Eve fans, but that game is not "new user" friendly.

Originally posted by Gdemami

 

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Originally posted by ignore_me

Actually you are the one who asked for an evidence based proof.

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You made a claim, I asked for back up of your claims. What particularly am I supposed to prove?

You seem to get lost quite a bit...

That's awesome, you get lost and then blame me.

My premise that there are three things that I think the game would need to have changed was stipulated to be the opinion of one person, and you keep asking for proof after I told you there is none to be had. Saying the same thing multiple times is making me think you are having difficulty here. I will break it down for you.

I said I think the game needs some major changes that wont happen, you said prove it, I said no way to prove it and asked you to prove the opposite to illustrate that. You keep asking for proof.

Was that your golden BB? Ask for charts to show the game is sucking and when there are no official charts you win? ROFL

Game sucks man, sorry.

Originally posted by Grimlock426

Can it continue?  Sure.  Can it even be profitable?  Sure.  Is it or was it a success?  NO!  Will it ever achieve the status that was projected for it?  NO!

In the literal sense of the word, TOR can be considered a success if it brings in more money then it cost to make, market and keep running.  However, in life when most people use the term "success" they use it in the context of a myriad of factors, such as expectations, resource investment, etc. 

I'll use a Football analogy.  Last year the Philadelphia Eagles spent the most money in Free Agency, assembled a roster of all-pro talent and even gave themselves the moniker "Dream Team."  The team was primed and predicted to be a Super Bowl contender.  They finished 8-8 and missed the play-offs.  In a literal sense they did not finish with a losing record so some could argue they were successful, however most understand the team was a failure because of the talent, money and expectations placed upon the team.  For context, had the St. Louis Rams finished 8-8 last year it would have been considered a huge success and a building block for the future.  Success and failure is all relative.

TOR was given by some accounts the highest budget for any MMO in history.  It had the Star Wars IP at it's back and a well respected developer like Bioware leading it.  Make no mistake, TOR was meant to challenge WoW.  The bar was set very high.  The expectations were that TOR would have at least a million sustained subscribers.  As someone stated they said their break even point was 500K, but make no mistake, the devs, EA and Bioware were never going to be happy or be satisfied with that level.

The game is in decline and will continue to decline.  It may limp along, but for all intents and purposes, it's done!  There is an old saying, "don't throw good money after bad" and EA knows this and are not going to pour any significant amount of money into TOR to drasitically change it.  The game is what it is and that was a game that "failed".  I'm sorry if you personally liked the game, but it's the truth.  Yes it will live on in some fashion, but will never be what it could have or should have been.

 Makes perfect sense to me.

Yes it is possible for SWTOR to survive.

WAR survived.

And I want to put the emphasys on survive .............

Originally posted by Torgrim

When Guild Wars 2 and WoW  Panda launching?

I doubt it.

What do you guys think?

My 8-ball says, yes. If you're asking how BioWare plans to ensure it survives, well... for now I guess you'll have to subscribe to TOR and play it to see.

I certainly hope so because I enjoy the game.  I am actually incredibly suprised that they aren't fighting like hell to make some significant improvements given the amount of money they spent on the game.  Logic would suggest that they would want to protect such a large investment.  I am not suprised that their are some lay-offs taking place now that the game has been released and the pre-release development is over.  I don't know how true it is, but I have heard talk that some of the lay-offs are a means of making way to make room for some new talent.  That is excactly what they need at this point, in my opinion.  Bring on board some people that can breathe some creativity into the game and loose those that have been pounding away at it for years, and are likely not as enthusiastic as they once were.  The population on the server I play on is stagnant at the moment.  It isn't growing, but it isn't shrinking.  As the next few months pass by, I think the population flucuation will be a good indicator as to how well TOR is doing in the face of competition.  The Secret World seems to have had no impact on it.  I wish the game well.  I am tired of swords and arrows and would like to continue using lightsabers and lasers.  Honestly, the next few major updates had better be stellar, or the game might be in serious trouble.

Originally posted by waits1972

Honestly, the next few major updates had better be stellar, or the game might be in serious trouble.

Or? Dude, it *is* in serious trouble. And that's only if you count 'serious trouble' as the Titanic having broken its back, with the bow section already halfway to the seabed.

MMORPGs aren't in the business of recovering from launches this bad. These games foster an insular, pan-title community, and once word gets out about a product being 'tainted,' virtually nobody comes calling. Folks hear a game is bad, and they not only don't want to try it, but even if they do, it's a thousand times harder to get friends to go along. It's an industry-wide problem, and explains fully why WoW -- despite being hopelessly out of date in a number of arenas -- continues to putter along merrily, mighty and unchallenged.

I maintain that the age of huge, sub-based MMORPG is far from over. I maintain that people will continue to shell out $15 a month for quality products. And, above all else, I maintain that when the next 'thing' comes along, everyone will know it (just as we all did before WoW launched), and everyone will be playing it. WoW, like EQ1, will collapse overnight when it happens.

We're waiting for a white knight to sweep up off our collective feet. People keep riding up wearing garbage cans, mounted astride donkeys and smelling of cheap scotch. That's not going to get the job done. But, when somebody finally figures it out? They'll be rich -- richer than astronauts.

Originally posted by LordOfPit

Originally posted by Torgrim

When Guild Wars 2 and WoW  Panda launching?

I doubt it.

What do you guys think?

My 8-ball says, yes. If you're asking how BioWare plans to ensure it survives, well... for now I guess you'll have to subscribe to TOR and play it to see.

You could say the same about SWG 13 months ago. Loads of people were playing and SOE were doing more for the game than Biioware is or have done this year for SWTOR

The servers have gone from 200 odd to about 20, and are if you are on a destination server they are populated for now due to the merge but they are still bleeding.

Originally posted by ste2000

Yes it is possible for SWTOR to survive.

WAR survived.

And I want to put the emphasys on survive .............

It is possible it will survive, but it is also possible it will not survive.

It will definnately survive 100% for the next 30 days!

It will not survive forever, and I predict it will last about 5-6 years assuming that EA/LA do not want to cut their losses and throw more money at it, or have other projects to fiocus on that will get them more profit, when the number of subs and interest is lacking. Also I do not see hardly anyone playing this time next year, with or without GW2 or WOW, the game just does not hold you .... unless they add stuff which holds you.

Regardless of what the devs do, SWTOR will see a resurgance in late October when people quit Pandaria.

WOW has 10 million subs... most of them are asain gold farming accounts though.  If you compare the player base of SWTOR and WOW in America, they are very competitive for a new game.

Investors are like SWG fans though... in that nothing SWTOR ever does will please them, simply because it is SWTOR.

To the OP's question. No, SWTOR won't survive.

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Originally posted by Souldrainer
Regardless of what the devs do, SWTOR will see a resurgance in late October when people quit Pandaria.

WOW has 10 million subs... most of them are asain gold farming accounts though.  If you compare the player base of SWTOR and WOW in America, they are very competitive for a new game.

Investors are like SWG fans though... in that nothing SWTOR ever does will please them, simply because it is SWTOR.

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Originally posted by CazNeerg

A service is a success any time it brings in more money than it costs to provide.  With an MMO, even if it never makes back development dollars made in prior years, as long as it is profitable on a month to month basis, it is technically successful.  It isn't like a single player game where the only revenue is the box sales, and if box sales < development costs, the game has failed.

For survival, TOR only needs month to month profitability.  Whether or not it made back it's development costs only matters in terms of how much they will be willing to spend on expansions, or in terms of how many development dollars EA is willing to devote to future MMO projects.  And remember, we don't have solid numbers on how much they have made and spent, just speculation based on incomplete evidence.  It's entirely possible that while not making an obscene profit overall, they have still made one.  In which case TOR would still be a better use of resources on EA's part than many single player games end up being.  Games which fail to be profitable are quite common in the single player space.

Not quite. If EA spend $1M a month and make $1 profit that is not good enough. Not a good return on investment. It needs to be at least reasonably profitable month to month and ideally "substantially profitable". And for that EA said 500k subscribers - they also said they would keep the full development team etc. so I suspect they now need fewer than 500k subs. 

As mentioned by Icewhite mmo attract hardcore folk and it will stick around and then close at some point. And I think that point could well be when the IP comes up for renewal. And that could be as early as 18 months time if EA negotiated a 2 year deal with options to extend, doubt they will have gone for more than 3. Not taking up the options might cost them a little bit of money but maybe not if they tell LA early enough - not much different to booking a hotel room really, later you cancel the more you will pay.

And - unlike other "classic" mmos - SWTOR in much more of a "single player" game. 

Of course it can.

Look at DDO. That mmo was a dead man walking until they did some restructuring and changed their payment model. Now? That fucking game has gotten more updates since it went f2p than it did just about the whole damn time it was p2p. SWTOR is nowhere even close to the condition DDO was in. So if it can be done with a game like DDO then it can certainly be done here.

They will simply have to restructure, restrategize, and possibly entertain diferent payment model archetypes.

Although honestly considering how they've let Warhammer essentially circle the drain I'm not entirely sure EA cares to do those types of things. Which will be unfortunate.

It isn't a bad game. Can actually be rather fun. Simply some bad design decisions and really doesn't seem to be being managed well at all.

Originally posted by Wickedjelly

Of course it can.

Look at DDO. That mmo was a dead man walking until they did some restructuring and changed their payment model. Now? That fucking game has gotten more updates since it went f2p than it did just about the whole damn time it was p2p. SWTOR is nowhere even close to the condition DDO was in. So if it can be done with a game like DDO then it can certainly be done here.

They will simply have to restructure, restrategize, and possibly entertain diferent payment model archetypes.

Although honestly considering how they've let Warhammer essentially circle the drain I'm not entirely sure EA cares to do those types of things. Which will be unfortunate.

It isn't a bad game. Can actually be rather fun. Simply some bad design decisions and really doesn't seem to be being managed well at all.

DDO and Warhammer do not have IP licences to worry about, and especially one from LA, so you can not look at them for predictions, look at SWG.

Vanguard is going F2P and only has 2 servers which are both dead, but is not being shut down, so why did SWG with 13 servers and 4 of them full? Answer is LA. SOE will hold on to a MMO as long as possible, but EA do not, if it does not have the players and falls below a certain percentage it shuts down. Warhammmer obviously has enough players still, but if had a IP to pay it probably would have shut down by now., as it would need a bigger percentage of players.

Originally posted by superniceguy

Originally posted by Wickedjelly

Of course it can.

Look at DDO. That mmo was a dead man walking until they did some restructuring and changed their payment model. Now? That fucking game has gotten more updates since it went f2p than it did just about the whole damn time it was p2p. SWTOR is nowhere even close to the condition DDO was in. So if it can be done with a game like DDO then it can certainly be done here.

They will simply have to restructure, restrategize, and possibly entertain diferent payment model archetypes.

Although honestly considering how they've let Warhammer essentially circle the drain I'm not entirely sure EA cares to do those types of things. Which will be unfortunate.

It isn't a bad game. Can actually be rather fun. Simply some bad design decisions and really doesn't seem to be being managed well at all.

DDO and Warhammer do not have IP licences to worry about, and especially one from LA, so you can not look at them for predictions, look at SWG.

Vanguard is going F2P and only has 2 servers which are both dead, but is not being shut down, so why did SWG with 13 servers and 4 of them full? Answer is LA. SOE will hold on to a MMO as long as possible, but EA do not, if it does not have the players and falls below a certain percentage it shuts down. Warhammmer obviously has enough players still, but if had a IP to pay it probably would have shut down by now., as it would need a bigger percentage of players.

 I thought they both do actually. Could have sworn I have seen before that Turbine essentially leases it from Wizards of whatever fucking coast and EA has a deal with Games Workshop. Obviously not to any dollar amount I'm sure LA expects. Wasn't there even a lawsuit involving Turbine over ip related matters in relation to DDO?

Originally posted by Wickedjelly

Originally posted by superniceguy

Originally posted by Wickedjelly

Of course it can.

Look at DDO. That mmo was a dead man walking until they did some restructuring and changed their payment model. Now? That fucking game has gotten more updates since it went f2p than it did just about the whole damn time it was p2p. SWTOR is nowhere even close to the condition DDO was in. So if it can be done with a game like DDO then it can certainly be done here.

They will simply have to restructure, restrategize, and possibly entertain diferent payment model archetypes.

Although honestly considering how they've let Warhammer essentially circle the drain I'm not entirely sure EA cares to do those types of things. Which will be unfortunate.

It isn't a bad game. Can actually be rather fun. Simply some bad design decisions and really doesn't seem to be being managed well at all.

DDO and Warhammer do not have IP licences to worry about, and especially one from LA, so you can not look at them for predictions, look at SWG.

Vanguard is going F2P and only has 2 servers which are both dead, but is not being shut down, so why did SWG with 13 servers and 4 of them full? Answer is LA. SOE will hold on to a MMO as long as possible, but EA do not, if it does not have the players and falls below a certain percentage it shuts down. Warhammmer obviously has enough players still, but if had a IP to pay it probably would have shut down by now., as it would need a bigger percentage of players.

 I thought they both do actually. Could have sworn I have seen before that Turbine essentially leases it from Wizards of whatever fucking coast and EA has a deal with Games Workshop. Obviously not to any dollar amount I'm sure LA expects. Wasn't there even a lawsuit involving Turbine over ip related matters in relation to DDO?

WotC and Games Workshop shouldn't be compared to Lucasarts. Whole different leagues there. The D&D and Warhammer IPs don't have anything close to the money behind them that the various star wars brands do.