Why the NDA was lifted so early...

Vhaln

I'm willing to bet that it's because the stress test caused a bit of a problem - lots of players wanting into beta, and a few disappointed players who didn't care about the beta anymore. The disappointed players were vocal, because they didn't care about the consequences of breeching the NDA. Banned from beta? Why would they care if they thought it sucked, anyhow?



Meanwhile, the lots of players who liked the game stayed silent, respecting the NDA. It created a very skewed poll of beta player impressions.



This game makes a very positive first impression, particularly on people who aren't looking for the perfect MMO, or the perfect rendition of Middle Earth. It's just a fun little game, with some really nice ambience and art direction. Probably ideal for the masses of casual players looking for an alternative to WoW. Plus, I think it's the first MMO that's so polished, it seems ready for release early.



But, the game does aim low in a lot of ways. A small gameworld, lots of simple little quests, few simple classes with no customization, and it's all so very casual and newbie friendly. There will be quite a few players who are unhappy with all that, but because they're in the minority, lifting the NDA will probably help drown them out.

Kyleran

Excellent post, appreciate your candor on how you feel the game has developed and who its really targeted for.

While I haven't played the beta, I do think they took solid aim at WOW's playerbase..... too bad they couldn't get it done last fall before BC came out. Now its going to be hard to get WOW players attentions since they are all busy with the new content.

I know lots of current WOW players, and almost none of them are looking for a new game right now....

Eol-

I think they lifted the NDA because overall, they know that the beta testers like the game a lot, and the game is in pretty good shape as far as bugs and being playable. They have a lot more to gain than they have to lose, because its usually the haters who break the NDA while the people who like the game continue to stay quiet and abide by the NDA. You're right about that part.

I do disagree with your comment about 'lots of simple little quests', because IMO this game has BY FAR the most , and most detailed and interesting, quests and quest-chains that I have ever played. Many of those 'little' quests are simply one step of a long quest-chain.

Salvatoris

I think it's a case of "nothing to hide".  The game may not be for everyone, but it is exactly what they have hyped it as.  They aren't trying to reinvent the wheel, but they have made a game that looks and runs great, while being pretty darn fun to play at the same time.  Something the latest several lackluster releases have not managed to do.  This game is such a departure from DDO that maybe they feel word of mouth is the best advertising they can get right now.  I am the eternal pessimist and admittedly, overly- picky... but I still can't find much to complain about with this game.

Maybe it really is better to release with a shorter feature list, but have everything in working order with the promise of content down the road than to try and cram a bunch of half-coded features in for launch and promise stability down the road.  I wonder is Sigil is paying attention.

DeaconX

The game, while quite good and fun is not perfect by any means. Lifting the NDA however allows players to talk about the game and spread the word and thankfully, most of the word is justfully good. Turbine is doing what Blizzard did to make WoW. They’re polishing solid gameplay first and foremost and they’re doing a good job of it. There are still many features I’d love to see but as is, the game is amazingly stable and the bugs since the earlier betas are getting eradicated. I haven’t encountered a bug since this last beta began.

 

There’s still plenty of tweaking to add, but from speaking with players who also played Vanguard [this is not a Vanguard bash, simply what players shared with me] LotRO in beta is much more polished than Vanguard is now. Not to say that Vanguard won’t eventually be the outstanding game it aims to be – best wishes.

 

No NDA = Positive word of mouth marketing for Turbine and LotRO.

Unknown

As the thread starter said, lifting the NDA after a series of "open" stress tests have been conducted should be good in numerous ways. On an other note I don't think they'll lift the NDA because Turbine think that the forums will be full of complaints. All game have betas under NDA and all those games got it's grievers and also its followers.
Personally I haven't played the beta, so I can't say anything based on how the game plays but from what I've read I think the LOTRO game will capture the look and feel of something based on the books of JRR Tolkien. The game relying on PvE rather than PvP should be great too in a sense that if LOTRO is successful I'm sure Turbine will expand the game with more races and maybe even "true" PvP for those who like that kind of game.

Vhaln

Originally posted by Eol-

I do disagree with your comment about 'lots of simple little quests', because IMO this game has BY FAR the most , and most detailed and interesting, quests and quest-chains that I have ever played. Many of those 'little' quests are simply one step of a long quest-chain.

Could you elaborate a little? I'm open to the possibility that I may have missed a lot, but the quests seemed like your basic fetch, deliver, and kill tasks, for the most part. I refer to them as little, because not only did they strike me as lacking innovation or interesting gameplay mechanics, it seemed like they were unusually short and easy. As if they were aiming to keep players spending more time running back and forth than anything that might resemble spawn camping.



Admittedly, I haven't gotten high enough to do many of the group quests, though. I did one where we had to kill a Goblin leader, by fighting our way through his mountain fort, and that was kind of fun.



Also, there were exceptions, like one where I had to escort an NPC through a bunch of giant spiders. Not just babysitting though, he helped fight, which made it more fun. It wasn't instanced, and a nearby player saw that I was having a tough time of it, and joined in to help, which made it more fun, too. I enjoyed quests that involved teaming up with NPCs and the lack of instancing, which made things feel a little more unpredictable and dynamic, but they were very few and far between.



Also, even that one was very short. Only took a few minutes. Almost all the quests struck me as ridiculously short. Which they compensate for by making them very numerous. Which to me, has the end result of making them feel very simple and repetitive.

Theodgrim

It is very simple.  The NDA was lifted because the game is polished and in excellent shape, right now.  By most MMO standards these days, this game would have been released weeks, or even months, ago.

Now, some folks wont like it.  But it wont be because the game crashes frequently, has poor performance, looks crappy, or lacks content.  It just wont be the type of game they are looking for, and that is to be expected.  Different strokes for different folks.

Vhaln

Originally posted by Theodgrim

It is very simple.  The NDA was lifted because the game is polished and in excellent shape, right now.

That in itself is not a reason to lift an NDA. Unless you think NDAs are only used to hide flaws.

Samuraisword

Originally posted by Vhaln

Originally posted by Theodgrim


It is very simple.  The NDA was lifted because the game is polished and in excellent shape, right now.

That in itself is not a reason to lift an NDA. Unless you think NDAs are only used to hide flaws.

That's exactly what NDAs are for.

Don't you think its disingenuous for developers to hand pick positive beta tester posts from their beta forums and beta journals for release during the NDA, while never airing negative complaints or allowing others to do so?

Sevenwind

I think this game is fantastic. I found myself playing LOTR beta more than Vanguard which I paid for as well. LOTR ran 100x better, looked better, played better and the quests were a lot better than Vanguard.

I don't consider it a WoW clone at all, to me it felt more like AC2 in a lot of ways and I loved AC2 towards the end. The GUI most of all reminded me of AC2.

I pre-ordered and plan to get the lifetime sub. I agree with some others this is the best beta I've been in with a game that already feels released. Only bug I have had so far is it does not like Windows Vista to much, but once I'm in the game runs smooth.

Cheers Turbine!

Edit: Bah posted this in the wrong post I was aiming for.

Theodgrim

Originally posted by Vhaln

Originally posted by Theodgrim


It is very simple.  The NDA was lifted because the game is polished and in excellent shape, right now.

That in itself is not a reason to lift an NDA. Unless you think NDAs are only used to hide flaws.

At this stage of development,  you bet the NDAs are used primarily to hide flaws.  Sure, in early dev stages, they are concerned with competition stealing ideas or being forced to make significant changes to gameplay due to unexpected issues.  Not a concern this close to release.  So, the only reason to enforce the NDA now, would be if they had something to hide from potential customers. 

Vhaln

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Originally posted by Samuraisword

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Originally posted by Vhaln
That in itself is not a reason to lift an NDA. Unless you think NDAs are only used to hide flaws.

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That's exactly what NDAs are for.

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Heh, no. It's not. That's just a common misconception, because it does work as a side benefit for a lot of MMOs.

Pjotr

Originally posted by Vhaln

Originally posted by Eol-


I do disagree with your comment about 'lots of simple little quests', because IMO this game has BY FAR the most , and most detailed and interesting, quests and quest-chains that I have ever played. Many of those 'little' quests are simply one step of a long quest-chain.

Could you elaborate a little? I'm open to the possibility that I may have missed a lot, but the quests seemed like your basic fetch, deliver, and kill tasks, for the most part. I refer to them as little, because not only did they strike me as lacking innovation or interesting gameplay mechanics, it seemed like they were unusually short and easy. As if they were aiming to keep players spending more time running back and forth than anything that might resemble spawn camping.



Admittedly, I haven't gotten high enough to do many of the group quests, though. I did one where we had to kill a Goblin leader, by fighting our way through his mountain fort, and that was kind of fun.



Also, there were exceptions, like one where I had to escort an NPC through a bunch of giant spiders. Not just babysitting though, he helped fight, which made it more fun. It wasn't instanced, and a nearby player saw that I was having a tough time of it, and joined in to help, which made it more fun, too. I enjoyed quests that involved teaming up with NPCs and the lack of instancing, which made things feel a little more unpredictable and dynamic, but they were very few and far between.



Also, even that one was very short. Only took a few minutes. Almost all the quests struck me as ridiculously short. Which they compensate for by making them very numerous. Which to me, has the end result of making them feel very simple and repetitive. Most of the quests are your basic fetch, deliver and kill quests. But usually it's with a twist. A lot of quests are chained and a chain of quests usually has the mix of those quests which makes the grind go away pretty much. There are also epic quests that are chains of sometimes more than 10 quests. Another quest chain I had as a dwarf was one I started at level 5 but it was a long quest chain of multiple quests and when I was level 14 I finally completed it and the most cool thing about that quest was that the last part was a puzzle you needed to solve using hint you got in the earlier quests of that chain.



But the best part of the quests is the way they are written. Every quest has a nice backstory that really makes the world feel alive. In most MMO's I ended up just reading the direction of the quests because I didn't care really about story or there was just no one which make the MMO really feel like a grind. In LOTRO I really felt the story behind each quest was cleverly written so I ended up reading most of the quests. When I do a quest I now have a better reason than just to level up. Especially the epic quests, those are big chained quests that can take up to 5 hour to complete, those quests not only take you trough almost every corner of the map but also lets you fight next to or meet important characters from the books.



I think LOTRO, while it looks like a WoW rip off at first will actually appeal very well to people who like to ropeplay and be drawn into the world.

matraque

Originally posted by Vhaln

This game makes a very positive first impression, particularly on people who aren't looking for the perfect MMO, or the perfect rendition of Middle Earth. It's just a fun little game, with some really nice ambience and art direction. Probably ideal for the masses of casual players looking for an alternative to WoW. Plus, I think it's the first MMO that's so polished, it seems ready for release early.



This will not please the LOTR addicts.  I'm pretty sure a "perfect" tolkien world was expected



But, the game does aim low in a lot of ways. A small gameworld, lots of simple little quests, few simple classes with no customization, and it's all so very casual and newbie friendly. There will be quite a few players who are unhappy with all that, but because they're in the minority, lifting the NDA will probably help drown them out.



Thats exactly why i selected the other game... You know, the one that start with a V

Good post man!