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Wasn't this going to be the WoW-killer?
SUMB44
Member Posts: 182
What happend to all the hype? I check the Vanguard boards every once in a while and it seems like the whole mood is changing... what gives?
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Who made the claim that this game is going to kill WoW. No game coming out anytime soon is likely to "dethrone" the sales of WoW. Down the road WoW will die out of old age and still have a couple hundred thousand loyal players/chinese farmers.
And of course the mood of the forum changed as people relize the game isnt the next big thing there been waiting for , even Vanbois are realizing it.. but as I said it can only get better X fingers . the one thing that concerns me is Brad & his one eyed vision of creating an EQ clone with newer graphics
Vanguard fans used to say that yes, in beta, before the NDA was released.
People pointed in the other direction, trying to make them pay attention to a thing called "reality"
That is where they started calling people "haters"
Been a downhill slide since then.
"This is not a game to be tossed aside lightly.
It should be thrown with great force"
In regards to Vanguard in particular though, at most Brad said over a million subscribers for Vanguard would be 'highly optimistic'. Given they only released in Europe and North America; a big number for them to have hoped for. About a quarter of what WoW has in the two markets...but hardly 'WoW-killer' numbers.
"What happened to all the hype?"
When it comes to hype or should I say over-hype as in over-hyping a game, there's only one winner here, WoW. And I'm far from defending VG as I'm cancelling soon as I can get in touch with it's "support." Seems my security question of where I reside isn't being taken by the account page. Question is where was I born, no way I could get this wrong as it's in New York where I live. But it says it's the wrong answer, go figure. But I already know others are also having problems cancelling.
I don't think there was "hype" as far as this game is concerned, at least not as the op is trying to indicate simply because from jump beta players were telling how bad performance was which is probably it's biggest problem. If anything VG has features WOW players only wish WOW had but that's another story.
I think the mood change is typical. Just like everything works better in theory than in practice, the anticipated game that optimistically matched every wish was a better game in theory than the available game is in practice. Whether you like the game or not, whether you consider it good or bad, reality is a downer compared to fantasy.
I have to agree with the other posters regarding the "WoW-Killer" expectations. Sigil's published market-volume expectations were never on the order of WoW's subscription base. The market-volume expectations came from external sources who regarded success as equivalent to money. The Sigil target market did include people who played WoW but wanted something more challenging, clearly, and appealing to that kind of vanity was clearly part of Sigil's marketing hype. The target market elicits an alternate interpretation of the term "WoW-Killer": for each individual WoW player who leaves WoW earlier than expected to play Vanguard, Vanguard is a "WoW-Killer".
Moreover, the pre-release boards were dominated by people with optimistic anticipations. The post-release boards can no longer be dominated by such people, because there is no longer any anticipation. Those whose anticipations were sufficiently met don't post to the boards as much as they used to, while those whose anticipations were insufficiently met either post expressions of their disappointments or don't post at all.
Back when EQ was the 800 lb gorilla, the fanboys for whatever game was coming out claimed it would be an EQ killer. DAoC, SWG, Shadowbane, et all. We all know how well that turned out.
Hell, even the WoW fanboys claimed WoW would be an EQ killer. And here we are coming up on 3 years later, WoW's got 8 million odd subs, and EQ seems to still be alive and kicking enough for them to keep crapping out expansions.
The new crop of LotRO/AoC/WAR fanboys are already predicting that their game de jour will be a WoW killer. And they're all wrong.
Fact is, fanboys, of any game, very rarely keep in touch with reality. And the reality of the situation is that no game has ever "killed" any other game. The handfull of MMOs that have had their plug pulled did so because they failed to get enough subs to be profitable in the first place.
They were not saying it was a WoW killer.
What they had on the cover is something along those lines: "WoW Killer?"
Thats it. What happened is that people took for granted it was a wow killer because it was newer and more promising (still is).
If one thing can beats WoW is SoS (Systems of Starcraft).
eqnext.wikia.com
That brought over a whole host of SoE haters from the SWG forums to this forum...hence the need for the stickied post at the top of this forum (even though it's not really enforced anymore).
Then the whole ran out of money, releasing the game as is, etc. Well, that didn't really help the situation very much.
It has gotten a bit better though. There does seem to be less and less of the more contentious posters dropping by on a daily basis. Granted there are still some who love to get a rise out of our more volatile base, but it does seem to be improving.
Rather than hate/bash WOW, or hype games as WOW killers, we should look at the success of WOW as opportunity. When the NY Times carries a story on WOW/MMORPGs it is following the trail of the venture capital financial markets. The return on investment of WOW is really incredible, and attractive. Quite frankly, just one thing that each of these funds is out there doing is beating the bushes looking for that next great WOW for their investors. Not the only thing they are doing, mind you, just one thing, but they never did this before. A game like WOW, or Second Life (which is also receiving alot of publicity) is the investment that keeps on giving.
The next big MMORPG may not be a fantasy or science fiction shoot and slash at all. It just could be the think outside the box game that appeals to an entirely different market demographic, kind of like what TSO was supposed too.
Yeesh, don't let the random numbers get out of hand. A quick glance over at mmogchart.com shows that both games steadily grew in subscribers some time after DAoC's release. These games don't tend to cannibalize one another.
Again with the MMOGChart. Some day, you poor folk will learn the true story of where SirBruce gets his numbers from.
Yeesh, don't let the random numbers get out of hand. A quick glance over at mmogchart.com shows that both games steadily grew in subscribers some time after DAoC's release. These games don't tend to cannibalize one another.
Again with the MMOGChart. Some day, you poor folk will learn the true story of where SirBruce gets his numbers from.
Press releases? That would be the easiest source.This matter has jack to do with any criticism of any math the webmaster employs for the more obscure numbers. Dark Age of Camelot released in record breaking form, and Everquest didn't exactly keep quiet either as it steamrolled along towards where it peaked.
The graph is consistent with what's evident elsewhere for what I posted; go laud any vendetta you have against it elsewhere. It was useful and accurate for this point.
The MMO companies keep their subscription numbers as closely guarded as a national treasure it seems, so now I try to just remember what the population was like on the games I played as a reference. Not all that accurate, but it's probably just as good as his figures.
(And yes my quip with the percentages when DAoC came out was just to reference that there was indeed a bit of a drop when DAoC first came out, as I was playing EQ at the time. However, there was also a lot of those very same players coming back month after month; the exact amount that left and then came back? Haven't got a clue - just like anyone else.)
I played EQ for the first few years. It's subs was always pretty strong and seemed like it was always increasing during those years, and the number of added servers seemed to support that feeling. I didn't switch over to DAoC until after I was finished with SWG (right after the CU). So, I definitely missed DAoC during it's prime.
However, I don't see both games continuing for much longer. DAoC especially is starting to get really low on subs. EQ is doing a bit better, but I'd say it's definitely loosing them at a steady pace as well. We'll how much longer they hang on.
I'll start my own SWG... with Black Jack... and Hookers!!!
In fact, forget the SWG!!!!
Heh, just kidding MX13. Good to see that some of us can stay on-topic.
You mean like in this thread? http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/post/746876#746876
All of those Vanbois posting lies and misinformation. What a bunch of sad trolls.
I played EQ for the first few years. It's subs was always pretty strong and seemed like it was always increasing during those years, and the number of added servers seemed to support that feeling. I didn't switch over to DAoC until after I was finished with SWG (right after the CU). So, I definitely missed DAoC during it's prime.
However, I don't see both games continuing for much longer. DAoC especially is starting to get really low on subs. EQ is doing a bit better, but I'd say it's definitely loosing them at a steady pace as well. We'll how much longer they hang on. hehe, funny thing bout those EQ subs is most of them come from station pass where they usually play EQ when one of the other station pass games are down. Like EQII, Vanguard, Planetside, SWG ect. Remember for 24.99 or something like that you get access to all those games. heck even a couple a months ago I was trying out the progression servers for EQ. Was quite fun. I would sub if they kept only the expansions to Luclin and thats it :-D
DAOC on the otherhand is only one game. With no other choice of others except when WAR hits and then DAOC most likely will cease to exist :-D