I guess it depends on what perspective you are coming from when you say they are incomplete. Tabula Rasa is hardly the example I would have gone for. Complaining about endgame 2 and a half weeks after launch...well...that leads me to believe you are not playing MMO's for the right reasons anyway.
There is an entire list of really bad, broken, waste of coding games BUT MMO's have been turning around as of this year for the mostpart. Most of what people are bitching about in most of the newer games is mainly subjective opinion. Things like shallow or clone or graphics could have been pull off in "X" year, thats an opinion...whats the basis though? WHat does that have to do with being in beta like quality. Log into Vanguard for beta like quality. Try Dark and Light, Roma Victor, Horizons or many others...
When you look to the left you can see there are many games that have actually been poorly made but for the mostpart they are dead or dying. The players do speak and have, with their wallets. Quality games thrive while poors one die.
I don't think game designers actually set out to "rip you off". There are far easier ways to do that then sink 3 to 5 years of development time into a game in hopes of making a "quick" rip off cash. Thats just silly to think that. Most developers get caught in a tight spot and are cornered into launching or folding up.
The customers just need to be a little more savy and enter into newly launched games more cautiously.
This has been bugging the crap out of me. This is the only video game genre where companies are starting to get off on thinking they can charge a monthly fee for a game in beta still. It makes me absolutely sick. They know damn well it isn't near a finished product, yet they say to themselves, "Hey, we might as well get paid 15 a month while we make the game, eh?" Under no circumstance should a company think they can sell a half-assed product and get paid while they fix it. To be honest, monthly fees are a rip-off anyway. Multiplayer games like GW, Diablo 2, and tons of FPS games profit who provide dedicated servers for FREE. Yet, games like Tabula Rasa charge an initial fee, plus a monthly fee for a game that should still be in alpha? Its an utter insult to all gamers that some people actually pay for this garbage. At least garbage is what it says it is. Half the features on the boxes of MMOs arn't even in the game when you get home and start playing, they add them months later, maybe never. False advertising anyone? Oh, well as long as they add "Game Experience May Change During Online Play" they can do whatever they bloody want (different rant, maybe later =/). I'm using TR as my example because it demonstrates this well. The graphics and UI could have well been pulled off in 2003, and the end-game content is, well, non-existent completely, plus the current game has the depth of a spoon. All things are relative, so let's look at other games. It takes just as long and just as much effort to create an MMO as it does to make an in-depth FPS like, say, BioShock, or even a giant RPG like Oblivion or Mass Effect. A game like that is developed thoroughly until it is almost totally perfect. In this case, 60 bucks seems fair. Yet, a game with equally as much development effort/money, and 1/10th the quality thinks they can charge 15 a month when they game isn't even close to finished. It's unacceptable. I hate to say it, but WoW is an example of a great MMO. Want to know why? Well, they released a finished friggin game. I know that should be a given, but in this abomination of a genre, it really is not always expected. WoW released a finished game, and added on to it continuously for a long time simply on monthly fees. The amount of added content was beautiful. Even though they did add a dreaded expansion, they waited a good while.
Then, on TOP of that, they add some minor addtions and charge $50 and call it a bloody expansion pack. (Cough, EQ2). So, we pay an intitial fee for the development, 15 a month for new additions, then, wait, what? 50 more a year for some new quests and zones? I'm not sure what's more pathetic; people who actually pay for this monkey business, or the game companies who act like its okay to conduct business in this manor. MMO's have gone down the john, and my rant is over. I, and others, are refusing to pay money for incomplete products.
Your argument hits the wrong side. You should not be angry at the company that sells half-baked games, you shold be angry at stupid people that actually buy them and keep those companies running in business thinking their game was complete and encouraging them to make more half-baked games.
The answer to your question is perhaps that gamers have massive amount of patience and the willingness to go on faith. Faith, that the game will eventually be a complete game if they just stick with it. Look at the game Dukenukem forever. The game has been in development for how long? Yet if you go onto the DN4 forums and read the posts then you will see how long a game company can string a game base along on nothing but faith. A more modern example of this is EVE. When EVE was released it was missing 60% of all the promised features and was bugger than vanguard. (Yes it actually was) How ever we stuck with CCP on nothing more than the Faith that EVE would eventually become the game we had been sold. Well for some then yes four years later it did, for others the game that was sold to them and what EVE has become are 180deg apart but in any case EVE has almost became a complete game. Thus the answer to your question, MMO companies charge subs for their betas because they can. They can because there are enough of us gamers that have enough faith in a game(s) that as Oveur (CCP) said “we can be led along with a carrot until the items we were waiting on are implemented” Also that is one of the things that the WOW haters really do not get. WOW was a complete game when released, this meant that you did not have to be a fanatic gamer to get behind it and keep the faith; all you had to do was buy the game and start playing.
QFT This is America today with respect to the MMORPG field. This is why an indie game has a better chance to succeed that one where developers are responsible to investors for a "return on investment" or ROI. When a game is being backed by loans of venture capital, it is all about the ROI. You can't go to a bank or venture capitalist and say, watch this... I people will gladly pay $15 a month while the game is in beta and while I complete the game. Unless your game completely sucks, yes they can and will pay for beta. EVE proves that.
If you are lucky enough to be self funded and don't have to worry about answering to anyone else but the fans, you've got it made. As the above posted said, Eve released way early in a beta state. Yet, how did the fanbois reward CCP for release a beta? Well, they have had over 100,000 subscribers for all for years and today they have over 250,000 subscribers. Those 100,000 subscribers they've been able to maintain since launch have reward them with $72,000,000 dollars to complete/maintain their game. Add in the addtional 150,000 (250,000 total) they've been able to maintain over the last 18 months alone, that is an additional $40,500,000.
Die-hard fanbois don't care if the game is complete or not, they just want the game to launch so they can keep their characters forever and will gladly pay $15 a month for the pleasure. I've been a strong advocate for years that MMORPG companies need to stop giving away F2P beta positions. CCP is proof enough that enough people will gladly pay $15 a month for a game in beta. This helps pay for all the costs associated with producing and maintaining a game.
To me, the one game on the market today that is in position to pull the next EVE is Darkfall Online. If the game is near complete as the developers say that it is, there is no excuse for them not to launch a paid beta like CCP did with EVE. It is a sandbox game with loads of promising features without all the fuss of hand-held games. They have a community chomping at the bit for beta and a built in fanbase just like EVE of FFA PvPers. Even if everything doesn't work, the PvP community has already proven they will gladly sit by and pay $15 a month for years while you complete your game. They have no problem at all with paying for a game with potential.
Fear not fanbois, we are not trolls, let's take off your tin foil hat and learn what VAPORWARE is:
"Vaporware is a term used to describe a software or hardware product that is announced by a developer well in advance of release, but which then fails to emerge after having well exceeded the period of development time that was initially claimed or would normally be expected for the development cycle of a similar product."
Because people pay. The thing of it is though that these companies are doing this and their player base is dropping off to fast. People are getting sick of it and it puts a bad taste in their mouth so that they won't ever give the game another shot, and some times they won't give the company another shot either. A lot of games are failing now because they think they can still get away with it.
I just read the topic title, its simple they keep doing it because people keep bloody paying for games that should still be in development.
If people stop paying monthly for buggy pos games, then they will stop making buggy pos games because they wont sell.
It is the same for everquest clones, if you dont want an everquest clone stop buying games that use the mechanics, then they will see it does not sell and look to make unique games. It works, it happens in every genre people finnally get fed up of say contenues world war 2 games so they stop buying them, developers see this and stop making them.
UO, AC2, Shadowbane, Anarchy Online were all games that I personally played/tried that had major issues at launch. Vanguard, Dark and Light, EQ2, Horizons, and, as someone else mentioned, Eve are others that I have not tried. Not exactly a small list.
Whoever said that WoW was not finished at release obviously never played any of the aforementioned titles at release. Compared to those WoW was flawless at release. Of course Blizzard pulled it own purse strings and had the resources to do it right. Many of the other studios just bite off more than they can chew and then have to answer to the investors. IMO it comes down to piss-poor planning.
Take Dark and Light for example. They wanted to release the largest world ever. This obviously came with a price tag that they could not afford cause it went into the toilet. Instead they could have released with a small world, cap accounts some quantity, get the funds rolling in, and then expand. Most businesses start small and then grow. Only the largest corporations and conglomerates can roll out really big startups. So why do MMO developers think they can pull it off? Who knows...
EvE is a great example, despite its apparent buggy launch, that a studio can build a MMO over time.
I agree with popular opinion that studios continue to do it because they can and continue to get away with it. Ultimately it comes down to the consumers to vote with their dollars.
That kinda reminds me of eastern games. Some companies there make games that are within the borders for years before something actually goes international. I`m not sure why, probably because an international server would be hellish to maintain (and the fact that the last game I played only had 20-ish people total staff). Or maybe because it`s not worth enough to put on international servers, exactly what we`re complaining about here`n now.
I have absolutely no idea. who knows, it might just be because translations take way too much programming. when you compare eastern 'input methods' with western.
I had to tweak up my pc to check out some games from that side of the globe... heck, not even reading and writing, but even Direct X needed a special upgrade.
I wonder if they have some kind of deadline in their heads, saying "if we can stay on for x years in this region, the game`ll probably be on forever with international servers"
Although nobody outside the country would probably even have heard about the game until it launches international, it`s allready been running for a while, and should work way better than when you`re launching "out of the blue", in one blast on the international net. You`ll have a closed beta phase, while "the whole world" is drooling over it. So a company wants to finish up ASAP and charges money for their "2nd beta" to hire more programmers get more servers etc. It`s indeed more like bad planning than ripping people off. Too much of a hurry to turn the 'new hype' in a durable game. But that just kills the fun for the people, and the hype, and eventually the company because they`ll lose all their valuable players. But on the other hand, when you see... whatever, for instance "SuperHerOnline is coming soon" and 4 years later it`s still "coming soon" you`ll simply stop waiting...
I like the way some industries keep a game local for a time before going international...
That way, you don`t have to wait for anything, because you don`t know it exists untill it`s there. And the international beta`s look alot better too, like they actually went trough all the build stages too.
Actually, that usually only leaves one important thing to tweak, connectivity... placing either localised servers, or programming a better data transfer so anyone from anywhere can play on the same server.
Also, those industries usually work with game cash and premium items, or any other alternative ways than a standard monthly fee for a half baked system. they can refund those alot easier too (to game cash, not to real cash sadly enough). which doesn`t make it feel like a waste of money as much. wether or not it actually is a waste, as long as players feel it isn`t, they`ll stay. something some companies don`t seem to care about, because "the world`s full of people, there`s bound to be enough idiots sómewhere"
oh, and look at Microsoft, how did they get big? The presentation of Windows ended up in alot of blue screens. "oh, very promising error report system", but nobody seemed to care about the program`s faillures.
That`s how they got big, strong marketing, and "umm, well, we`ll mop up the rest in due time.". quite some MMO companies seem to try out that same sales strategy, but there`s too much competition to make it a working strategy... unless you`re allready big...
What was once a strategy for a "flawless victory" is now a failing strategy that only worked in the past.
Another part of this is that companies know by now that there are always that group of people who want to be "First" or at the top of the pack so there will always be an influx at start. The rush to the top is easily seen by the heavy grinders that rush to max out and then complain about no content being available at high levels.
There is also the fact that if you want to be a successful crafter in mmo's, it is generally a better idea to start at the beginning so as to build a name and get a jump on everyone else....just the way it works.
...cause there's a sucker born every minute. Face it, most people are idiots with too much money, throwing it around like it dont matter. Even the ones that dont have much do it, like a friend of mine who called me here the other day saying she won 500,000 nkr(norwegian crowns). She only had to pay them 250 to get it. And she did. Luckilly I managed to talk her out of it, and get her bank to cancel the payment. Moral is, people are suckers who will eat anything some self-serving dev feed em.
...cause there's a sucker born every minute. Face it, most people are idiots with too much money, throwing it around like it dont matter. Even the ones that dont have much do it, like a friend of mine who called me here the other day saying she won $500,000. She only had to pay them $250 to get it. And she did. Luckilly I managed to talk her out of it, and get her bank to cancel the payment. Moral is, people are suckers who will eat anything some self-serving dev feed em.
-.- that`s not the whole point is it?
It`s also because some of those suckers work in a company that tries to make cool online games.
Insufficient planning or inefficient strategies cost alot of cash.
And where do you want to get that cash from?
Exactly, the clients, every gamer that wants to be a part of the gaming experience.
it`s either going broke or annoying the gamers to fix up that problem.
But most probably, what Squaresoft did, and what blizzard did, worked out the best.
Warcraft, heck, I don`t need to name numbers, was an overly big succes. now they threw it online.
Same with Final Fantasy. They allready had thousands of fans of the title. and almost every character was allready in 3d before putting it online (although they`d probably needed some refinement).
That`s a pretty effective way to start out an MMO game, to turn a successfull offline game into an online game. They allready had a big name, hmz, and a big cash start for investments which would definately come back, and when you look at it now, it definately did.
This has been bugging the crap out of me. This is the only video game genre where companies are starting to get off on thinking they can charge a monthly fee for a game in beta still. It makes me absolutely sick. They know damn well it isn't near a finished product, yet they say to themselves, "Hey, we might as well get paid 15 a month while we make the game, eh?" Under no circumstance should a company think they can sell a half-assed product and get paid while they fix it. To be honest, monthly fees are a rip-off anyway. Multiplayer games like GW, Diablo 2, and tons of FPS games profit who provide dedicated servers for FREE. Yet, games like Tabula Rasa charge an initial fee, plus a monthly fee for a game that should still be in alpha? Its an utter insult to all gamers that some people actually pay for this garbage. At least garbage is what it says it is. Half the features on the boxes of MMOs arn't even in the game when you get home and start playing, they add them months later, maybe never. False advertising anyone? Oh, well as long as they add "Game Experience May Change During Online Play" they can do whatever they bloody want (different rant, maybe later =/). I'm using TR as my example because it demonstrates this well. The graphics and UI could have well been pulled off in 2003, and the end-game content is, well, non-existent completely, plus the current game has the depth of a spoon. All things are relative, so let's look at other games. It takes just as long and just as much effort to create an MMO as it does to make an in-depth FPS like, say, BioShock, or even a giant RPG like Oblivion or Mass Effect. A game like that is developed thoroughly until it is almost totally perfect. In this case, 60 bucks seems fair. Yet, a game with equally as much development effort/money, and 1/10th the quality thinks they can charge 15 a month when they game isn't even close to finished. It's unacceptable. I hate to say it, but WoW is an example of a great MMO. Want to know why? Well, they released a finished friggin game. I know that should be a given, but in this abomination of a genre, it really is not always expected. WoW released a finished game, and added on to it continuously for a long time simply on monthly fees. The amount of added content was beautiful. Even though they did add a dreaded expansion, they waited a good while.
Then, on TOP of that, they add some minor addtions and charge $50 and call it a bloody expansion pack. (Cough, EQ2). So, we pay an intitial fee for the development, 15 a month for new additions, then, wait, what? 50 more a year for some new quests and zones? I'm not sure what's more pathetic; people who actually pay for this monkey business, or the game companies who act like its okay to conduct business in this manor. MMO's have gone down the john, and my rant is over. I, and others, are refusing to pay money for incomplete products.
So much exaggeration……..>
50.00 for an EQ 2 expansion? The last expansion was 39.99 which included all the previous expansions and adventure modules, and this expansion contain the largest content update ever in any EQ brand game.... as far as TR goes bug free for me and a hell of a lot of fun, and if you think those graphics could have been pulled off in 2003, you might want to pull that Monster 3d card out of your Pentium II machine and consider upgrades. And you are already at end game in what just a couple weeks? You have managed to zip forward in time and play ever thing DG has designed for TR??? WoW you're awesome!!!
What your post boils down to is WoW rox0rz and everything else sux0rz. You dig WoW fine go play WoW, your voting with your wallet which is cool, but there really is no need to BS up the forums with Tall tales to back up your flawed reasoning.
...cause there's a sucker born every minute. Face it, most people are idiots with too much money, throwing it around like it dont matter. Even the ones that dont have much do it, like a friend of mine who called me here the other day saying she won $500,000. She only had to pay them $250 to get it. And she did. Luckilly I managed to talk her out of it, and get her bank to cancel the payment. Moral is, people are suckers who will eat anything some self-serving dev feed em.
-.- that`s not the whole point is it?
It`s also because some of those suckers work in a company that tries to make cool online games.
Insufficient planning or inefficient strategies cost alot of cash.
And where do you want to get that cash from?
Exactly, the clients, every gamer that wants to be a part of the gaming experience.
it`s either going broke or annoying the gamers to fix up that problem.
(wow, finally a short post )
Which brings us back to my original statement. If people dont plan stuff right they deserve to go down the drain. You want to play with the big boys and dollarsigns, you better make sure that every dollar you spend, is wellspent. But we, the players are the suckers(with too much money) feeding their stupidity and bad planning.
I did not play EVE during that time, but from what you just said that's horrible. Maybe it's just me, but that doesn't seem right. They could of held more interested gamers if they polished EVE more. I'm sure a lot of people payed for EVE at that time, then left and never came back because it felt like a ripoff, which killed it for lots of gamers. It's just not a good way to launch a game. The people who are NOT faithful unsubscribe. If they simple completed it, they would actually have a lot of subs.
I do have one question for you. Do you think the world would be better without Eve today ?
If only games that were 100% polished were released, there'd be tons of companies that would run out of money ( like CCP at its beginning ) and tons of games that couldn't evolve from this bugged status to the "good game" status.
So are you saying you prefer games to never see the light of the day if they can't be polished from the start ?
you know developers dont just sit down and say "hey guys lets make a half backed attempt at a mmo". More time than others its the people who pay the developers wages, or the board of directors.
Its all about money at the end of the day, if you've advertised when the game will be going out by, and the developers aint finished then they just publish it because re-advertising aint cheap. Also developers are expected to finish the game after publish, however doesnt happen very often as players love to complain about other things like "balance" (aka bullpoo).
Most of the time the developers are being screwed as much as us, they dont make the deadlines.
Also its acceptable to publish software with 75% of the bugs amended, leaving 25% in, you might say its more but you just narrow visioned as the games bigger than loosing a couple of items out your inventory or all your textures turining white etc...
MMo's are a developers nightmare, being the most deverse genre of game. FPS you have multiplayer servers where everyones got access to the same guns (even Cstrike can buy :P) therefore no deversity and fewer exploits.
MMo's you got different classes, different levels of skills, different skills. Therefore there a wider range of bugs that can creep in, because the worlds in mmo's are bigger than any other game.
So much exaggeration……..> 50.00 for an EQ 2 expansion? The last expansion was 39.99 which included all the previous expansions and adventure modules, and this expansion contain the largest content update ever in any EQ brand game.... as far as TR goes bug free for me and a hell of a lot of fun, and if you think those graphics could have been pulled off in 2003, you might want to pull that Monster 3d card out of your Pentium II machine and consider upgrades. And you are already at end game in what just a couple weeks? You have managed to zip forward in time and play ever thing DG has designed for TR??? WoW you're awesome!!! What your post boils down to is WoW rox0rz and everything else sux0rz. You dig WoW fine go play WoW, your voting with your wallet which is cool, but there really is no need to BS up the forums with Tall tales to back up your flawed reasoning.
Maybe the OP resides in a country with a disadvantaged exchange rate, maybe he had to pay for shipping, maybe he had to pay tax. Also the OP was not pushing WoW but merely stating how they got their release right. Perhaps you should work on your reading comprehension before flaming and BS'ing up the forums.
Well its quite simple. If this particular game has 50,000 diehard fanboys that been following the game for years, at least half that amount will stick around and feel it's their duty to HELP make the game perfect. If the idea of the MMO is everythign the fanboy wants, he and she will do whatever it takes to help make this game perfect in their eyes, even if it means paying a monthly subscriiption for a product they know is NOT finished.
I did this with Vanguard and EQ2. Both games were released waaay to early, of course Vanguard was 5x worse than EQ2, but I followed both games religiously, even participated in Betas for each, knew both games were definiely not ready for release, but what did I do when they went live?? I was first in line to get the game, took a few days off work and dived right in even though I knew 100% for a fact that they weren't ready. But as a gamer, especially one who loves the next best MMORPG, I have to much hope and faith in Game companies. I said to myself, and i know many other people said the same thing, "Well I know that EQ2 and VG aren't finished, but the game is at least playable now which means the devs will definitely have most of the kinks, bugs, and performance issues tuned out in a month or two max. Well, that obviously didn't happen with Vanguard, but EQ2's problem was a bit different than performance issues. That game had so many classes, "still does" but alot of them were to similar and there was no real diversity between them along with all the armor/weaps looking like tin cans and garbage, and the combat wheel was to complex and ridiculous, i just couldnt take it anymore.
Anyway, most of you should have learned by now that MOST if not ALL MMORPG's released are almost always released way to soon. The hit ones like EQ 1, DAOC, EQ2, and WoW were all released early but in time they all grew to be excellent MMO's because we the customer were willing to test their products to help make the game better for everyone to enjoy.
It wont change
Rallithon Oakthornn (Retired Heirophant of the 60th season)
Originally posted by Nyast I do have one question for you. Do you think the world would be better without Eve today ? If only games that were 100% polished were released, there'd be tons of companies that would run out of money ( like CCP at its beginning ) and tons of games that couldn't evolve from this bugged status to the "good game" status. So are you saying you prefer games to never see the light of the day if they can't be polished from the start ?
Obviously not the OP but I think you make a valid point. There sometimes are good games that evolve from crappy releases given time.
Like others said, MMO's are generally big projects compared to the regular video game but studios and publishers still try to launch them the same way - with a typical marketing big splash. So in the interest of encouraging studios to start MMO projects, encouraging the 'acceptability' of a 'paid beta' stage is arguable. However I think studios should go about it in a manner with a little more integrity. Let the consumer know that it is an early stage release and maybe compensate early participation with say, a discounted subscription rate.
I think all the ranting and raving comes from the fact that initial releases are expected to 'work as advertised.'
The plain and simple answer to the OP has already been answered. Because they can.
But the bigger problem is why can they? Because gamers are a bunch of unorganized "in it for myself" people. The game companies know this and rely on it. The gamers get organized and start working towards stopping this practice by game companies is the day you will see less bug filled games.
And it isnt just MMO game companies that screw over their players. I have seen several non-MMOs get the same treatment. Take CnC:Renegade for example. It was released with half its MP features missing and they out right lied about a SP SDK. Then there is BF:Vietnam that was released with such a huge imbalance it made most of us wonder if the developers ever even beta tested the game at all since there is no way that imbalance would have made it to live had their been.
This has been bugging the crap out of me. This is the only video game genre where companies are starting to get off on thinking they can charge a monthly fee for a game in beta still. It makes me absolutely sick. They know damn well it isn't near a finished product, yet they say to themselves, "Hey, we might as well get paid 15 a month while we make the game, eh?" Under no circumstance should a company think they can sell a half-assed product and get paid while they fix it. To be honest, monthly fees are a rip-off anyway. Multiplayer games like GW, Diablo 2, and tons of FPS games profit who provide dedicated servers for FREE. Yet, games like Tabula Rasa charge an initial fee, plus a monthly fee for a game that should still be in alpha? Its an utter insult to all gamers that some people actually pay for this garbage. At least garbage is what it says it is. Half the features on the boxes of MMOs arn't even in the game when you get home and start playing, they add them months later, maybe never. False advertising anyone? Oh, well as long as they add "Game Experience May Change During Online Play" they can do whatever they bloody want (different rant, maybe later =/).
Reminds me from my experince with Vanguard. That was the first time I was really disappointed in game devs. There has been numerous other games like that too (NwN2, TR...) , but after Vanguard I realised that for gaming companies "it's ok to give false hopes" for paying customers since most of the mmorpgs aren't what they were originally supposed to be - and because they have the freedom to alter the game however they like after it's been released. So if you pay from the game you think you like, eventually you might just end figuring out why did you even bother.
I participated in TR's beta too and paid the fee but didn't take the next step since the game felt too cripled for my taste after launch, so I quit after two week. That was well spent 5 euros.
Good thing nowadays is that when you get hooked with beta account, you can actually help the game devs with their works with hammering out bugs etc. - AND try the game before you buy it. If you manage to get into late beta, it's pretty easy to see if the game is actually ever going the be The Game it advertises to be.
Now I got few more betas to do and after that I'll be able to choose which game is the next mmorpg i'll throw my pennies in. My word to you gamers: If possible try getting accepted in beta phase or wait at least for a trial account and avoid being f*cked by the greedy gaming companies with their loose promises.
This genre is still too young to site examples as benchmarks. Many of the past crap got by because there was nothing else comprable on the market. Eve is a good example of that. I can remember when UO first came out facing lag so bad you were taking one step every minute or so. We put up with it because there was nothing else out there that was any better.
You could not successfully launch a game in that condition in the market today. EQ II was released prior to Wow in an attempt to steal some of Blizzard's thunder only it backfired on SOE. Took them almost a year to get EQ II up to the standard that Blizzard set with Wow. Vanguard is a good example of a game that flopped strictly because it was not up to today's standards. People just expect more today. Recently released games like Hellgate and Tabula Rasa have had less than welcome receptions mainly due to lack of content and originality.
Myself, I will not be an original buyer anymore. Seems to take these game 3 to 6 months minimum to get the game in a decent playable state.
You just cannot through a half completed game out there anymore, you risk alienating too much of your playerbase. SOE was nuts to buy Vanguard, they have alienated enough of the genre's playerbase already without adding to it.
If you find a game that seems to you to be still in beta, don't play it, there are plenty of other games to sample in this genre.
You cannot equate the complexity of a MMO to a game running on a stand alone computer. MMO's have the following additional costs compared to games that run on a stand alone computers:
programming the communications protocols and communication interfaces for the client
programming the communicatiion protocolos for the server
programming the game to actually run on the server; eg designing and scripting the databases
programming the security for servers and clients
programming and setting up user registration and online payments
initial setup cost for the servers
server running costs
fine tuning the gameplay. For example, getting the ingame economy working and balancing different character builds so that no class is under or over powered. These types of issues are difficult to model reliably and can often only be reliably tested when the game world has matured and you have a large community that has progressed significantly.
Cheating is more important in a multi-player world. The MMO itself runs on the server rather than having processes running in an decentralised fashion on player's computers. Hacking the client has less chance of giving a player an unfair advantage, and there are no saved games on your local hard drive to edit.
I might consider paying a discounted price to play a beta MMO if the game had reached a point where it was playable. MMO's, in addition to testing for bugs, really need to test the gameplay. Gameplay issues often only show up after the MMO has been running for some time. Some gameplay issues like ruined ingame economies, can take a long time to recover after patching. For example, EQ2 had a lot of gameplay issues (in addition to some bugs) when it went live. From what I have read in forums, the gameplay issues have now been fixed. The gameplay issues included the economy being flooded with second hand items, the way shards on death were implemented, the high failure rate of healing spells and shared experience debt that discouraged grouping. While the game was playable, an extended beta period would have picked up the gameplay issues. What beta players carried over from the paid beta period to the live game would also be a major issue . One wonders whether EQ2 would have been more successful if it had a longer period of beta testing prior to release.
This has been bugging the crap out of me. This is the only video game genre where companies are starting to get off on thinking they can charge a monthly fee for a game in beta still. It makes me absolutely sick. They know damn well it isn't near a finished product, yet they say to themselves, "Hey, we might as well get paid 15 a month while we make the game, eh?" Under no circumstance should a company think they can sell a half-assed product and get paid while they fix it. To be honest, monthly fees are a rip-off anyway. Multiplayer games like GW, Diablo 2, and tons of FPS games profit who provide dedicated servers for FREE. Yet, games like Tabula Rasa charge an initial fee, plus a monthly fee for a game that should still be in alpha? Its an utter insult to all gamers that some people actually pay for this garbage. At least garbage is what it says it is. Half the features on the boxes of MMOs arn't even in the game when you get home and start playing, they add them months later, maybe never. False advertising anyone? Oh, well as long as they add "Game Experience May Change During Online Play" they can do whatever they bloody want (different rant, maybe later =/). I'm using TR as my example because it demonstrates this well. The graphics and UI could have well been pulled off in 2003, and the end-game content is, well, non-existent completely, plus the current game has the depth of a spoon. All things are relative, so let's look at other games. It takes just as long and just as much effort to create an MMO as it does to make an in-depth FPS like, say, BioShock, or even a giant RPG like Oblivion or Mass Effect. A game like that is developed thoroughly until it is almost totally perfect. In this case, 60 bucks seems fair. Yet, a game with equally as much development effort/money, and 1/10th the quality thinks they can charge 15 a month when they game isn't even close to finished. It's unacceptable. I hate to say it, but WoW is an example of a great MMO. Want to know why? Well, they released a finished friggin game. I know that should be a given, but in this abomination of a genre, it really is not always expected. WoW released a finished game, and added on to it continuously for a long time simply on monthly fees. The amount of added content was beautiful. Even though they did add a dreaded expansion, they waited a good while.
Then, on TOP of that, they add some minor addtions and charge $50 and call it a bloody expansion pack. (Cough, EQ2). So, we pay an intitial fee for the development, 15 a month for new additions, then, wait, what? 50 more a year for some new quests and zones? I'm not sure what's more pathetic; people who actually pay for this monkey business, or the game companies who act like its okay to conduct business in this manor. MMO's have gone down the john, and my rant is over. I, and others, are refusing to pay money for incomplete products.
i agree with all that, mmo pricing is out of control, sadly though there isnt much people can do about it , with game subscriptions i could understand $5 a month if its a good game, but $15 bucks a month i hate having to pay, (thats why i play guild wars)
Games Played: Guild Wars, Runescape, World of Warcraft, RF online, Silkroad online, Knight online, Lord of the Rings online. what a rip, i got a warning for having a link on this signiture....>:( Games Waiting for: Gods and Heroes, Aion, Chronicles of Spellborn
The moment people stop buying these games and shelling out the subscription fees is the same moment publishers and developers will put more time into polishing their bug-laden games.
MMO games played or tested: EQ, DAoC, Archlord, Auto Assault, CoH, CoV, EQ2, EVE, Guild Wars, Hellgate: London, Linneage II, LOTRO, MxO, Planetside, SWG, Sword of the New World, Tabula Rasa, Vanguard, WWIIOL, WOW, Age of Conan
Comments
I guess it depends on what perspective you are coming from when you say they are incomplete. Tabula Rasa is hardly the example I would have gone for. Complaining about endgame 2 and a half weeks after launch...well...that leads me to believe you are not playing MMO's for the right reasons anyway.
There is an entire list of really bad, broken, waste of coding games BUT MMO's have been turning around as of this year for the mostpart. Most of what people are bitching about in most of the newer games is mainly subjective opinion. Things like shallow or clone or graphics could have been pull off in "X" year, thats an opinion...whats the basis though? WHat does that have to do with being in beta like quality. Log into Vanguard for beta like quality. Try Dark and Light, Roma Victor, Horizons or many others...
When you look to the left you can see there are many games that have actually been poorly made but for the mostpart they are dead or dying. The players do speak and have, with their wallets. Quality games thrive while poors one die.
I don't think game designers actually set out to "rip you off". There are far easier ways to do that then sink 3 to 5 years of development time into a game in hopes of making a "quick" rip off cash. Thats just silly to think that. Most developers get caught in a tight spot and are cornered into launching or folding up.
The customers just need to be a little more savy and enter into newly launched games more cautiously.
Why do couples, or single child families, buy SUV's, only to complain about the price of gas?
Why do workers complain on forums, during work hours, about their bosses yelling at them for shirking their job responsibilities?
Why do people who don't vote complain about the people in office?
Why do people carry on larger luggage than they are allowed onto a plane, then get frustrated when it doesn't fit in the overhead compartment?
The answer, my friend, comes in these two gems from Mr. Homer Simpson:
Because they're stupid, that's why. That's why everybody does everything!
And, of course....
Never understimate the power of stupid people in large numbers.
Fear stupidity of the people.
I am the type of player where I like to do everything and anything from time to time.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor - pre-WW2 genocide.
QFT This is America today with respect to the MMORPG field. This is why an indie game has a better chance to succeed that one where developers are responsible to investors for a "return on investment" or ROI. When a game is being backed by loans of venture capital, it is all about the ROI. You can't go to a bank or venture capitalist and say, watch this... I people will gladly pay $15 a month while the game is in beta and while I complete the game. Unless your game completely sucks, yes they can and will pay for beta. EVE proves that.
If you are lucky enough to be self funded and don't have to worry about answering to anyone else but the fans, you've got it made. As the above posted said, Eve released way early in a beta state. Yet, how did the fanbois reward CCP for release a beta? Well, they have had over 100,000 subscribers for all for years and today they have over 250,000 subscribers. Those 100,000 subscribers they've been able to maintain since launch have reward them with $72,000,000 dollars to complete/maintain their game. Add in the addtional 150,000 (250,000 total) they've been able to maintain over the last 18 months alone, that is an additional $40,500,000.
Die-hard fanbois don't care if the game is complete or not, they just want the game to launch so they can keep their characters forever and will gladly pay $15 a month for the pleasure. I've been a strong advocate for years that MMORPG companies need to stop giving away F2P beta positions. CCP is proof enough that enough people will gladly pay $15 a month for a game in beta. This helps pay for all the costs associated with producing and maintaining a game.
To me, the one game on the market today that is in position to pull the next EVE is Darkfall Online. If the game is near complete as the developers say that it is, there is no excuse for them not to launch a paid beta like CCP did with EVE. It is a sandbox game with loads of promising features without all the fuss of hand-held games. They have a community chomping at the bit for beta and a built in fanbase just like EVE of FFA PvPers. Even if everything doesn't work, the PvP community has already proven they will gladly sit by and pay $15 a month for years while you complete your game. They have no problem at all with paying for a game with potential.
Fear not fanbois, we are not trolls, let's take off your tin foil hat and learn what VAPORWARE is:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaporware
"Vaporware is a term used to describe a software or hardware product that is announced by a developer well in advance of release, but which then fails to emerge after having well exceeded the period of development time that was initially claimed or would normally be expected for the development cycle of a similar product."
Because people pay. The thing of it is though that these companies are doing this and their player base is dropping off to fast. People are getting sick of it and it puts a bad taste in their mouth so that they won't ever give the game another shot, and some times they won't give the company another shot either. A lot of games are failing now because they think they can still get away with it.
I just read the topic title, its simple they keep doing it because people keep bloody paying for games that should still be in development.
If people stop paying monthly for buggy pos games, then they will stop making buggy pos games because they wont sell.
It is the same for everquest clones, if you dont want an everquest clone stop buying games that use the mechanics, then they will see it does not sell and look to make unique games. It works, it happens in every genre people finnally get fed up of say contenues world war 2 games so they stop buying them, developers see this and stop making them.
UO, AC2, Shadowbane, Anarchy Online were all games that I personally played/tried that had major issues at launch. Vanguard, Dark and Light, EQ2, Horizons, and, as someone else mentioned, Eve are others that I have not tried. Not exactly a small list.
Whoever said that WoW was not finished at release obviously never played any of the aforementioned titles at release. Compared to those WoW was flawless at release. Of course Blizzard pulled it own purse strings and had the resources to do it right. Many of the other studios just bite off more than they can chew and then have to answer to the investors. IMO it comes down to piss-poor planning.
Take Dark and Light for example. They wanted to release the largest world ever. This obviously came with a price tag that they could not afford cause it went into the toilet. Instead they could have released with a small world, cap accounts some quantity, get the funds rolling in, and then expand. Most businesses start small and then grow. Only the largest corporations and conglomerates can roll out really big startups. So why do MMO developers think they can pull it off? Who knows...
EvE is a great example, despite its apparent buggy launch, that a studio can build a MMO over time.
I agree with popular opinion that studios continue to do it because they can and continue to get away with it. Ultimately it comes down to the consumers to vote with their dollars.
That kinda reminds me of eastern games. Some companies there make games that are within the borders for years before something actually goes international. I`m not sure why, probably because an international server would be hellish to maintain (and the fact that the last game I played only had 20-ish people total staff). Or maybe because it`s not worth enough to put on international servers, exactly what we`re complaining about here`n now.
I have absolutely no idea. who knows, it might just be because translations take way too much programming. when you compare eastern 'input methods' with western.
I had to tweak up my pc to check out some games from that side of the globe... heck, not even reading and writing, but even Direct X needed a special upgrade.
I wonder if they have some kind of deadline in their heads, saying "if we can stay on for x years in this region, the game`ll probably be on forever with international servers"
Although nobody outside the country would probably even have heard about the game until it launches international, it`s allready been running for a while, and should work way better than when you`re launching "out of the blue", in one blast on the international net. You`ll have a closed beta phase, while "the whole world" is drooling over it. So a company wants to finish up ASAP and charges money for their "2nd beta" to hire more programmers get more servers etc. It`s indeed more like bad planning than ripping people off. Too much of a hurry to turn the 'new hype' in a durable game. But that just kills the fun for the people, and the hype, and eventually the company because they`ll lose all their valuable players. But on the other hand, when you see... whatever, for instance "SuperHerOnline is coming soon" and 4 years later it`s still "coming soon" you`ll simply stop waiting...
I like the way some industries keep a game local for a time before going international...
That way, you don`t have to wait for anything, because you don`t know it exists untill it`s there. And the international beta`s look alot better too, like they actually went trough all the build stages too.
Actually, that usually only leaves one important thing to tweak, connectivity... placing either localised servers, or programming a better data transfer so anyone from anywhere can play on the same server.
Also, those industries usually work with game cash and premium items, or any other alternative ways than a standard monthly fee for a half baked system. they can refund those alot easier too (to game cash, not to real cash sadly enough). which doesn`t make it feel like a waste of money as much. wether or not it actually is a waste, as long as players feel it isn`t, they`ll stay. something some companies don`t seem to care about, because "the world`s full of people, there`s bound to be enough idiots sómewhere"
oh, and look at Microsoft, how did they get big? The presentation of Windows ended up in alot of blue screens. "oh, very promising error report system", but nobody seemed to care about the program`s faillures.
That`s how they got big, strong marketing, and "umm, well, we`ll mop up the rest in due time.". quite some MMO companies seem to try out that same sales strategy, but there`s too much competition to make it a working strategy... unless you`re allready big...
What was once a strategy for a "flawless victory" is now a failing strategy that only worked in the past.
Another part of this is that companies know by now that there are always that group of people who want to be "First" or at the top of the pack so there will always be an influx at start. The rush to the top is easily seen by the heavy grinders that rush to max out and then complain about no content being available at high levels.
There is also the fact that if you want to be a successful crafter in mmo's, it is generally a better idea to start at the beginning so as to build a name and get a jump on everyone else....just the way it works.
...cause there's a sucker born every minute. Face it, most people are idiots with too much money, throwing it around like it dont matter. Even the ones that dont have much do it, like a friend of mine who called me here the other day saying she won 500,000 nkr(norwegian crowns). She only had to pay them 250 to get it. And she did. Luckilly I managed to talk her out of it, and get her bank to cancel the payment. Moral is, people are suckers who will eat anything some self-serving dev feed em.
edit:...ment nkr not $..meh
---
Grammar nazi's. This one is for you.
-.- that`s not the whole point is it?
It`s also because some of those suckers work in a company that tries to make cool online games.
Insufficient planning or inefficient strategies cost alot of cash.
And where do you want to get that cash from?
Exactly, the clients, every gamer that wants to be a part of the gaming experience.
it`s either going broke or annoying the gamers to fix up that problem.
But most probably, what Squaresoft did, and what blizzard did, worked out the best.
Warcraft, heck, I don`t need to name numbers, was an overly big succes. now they threw it online.
Same with Final Fantasy. They allready had thousands of fans of the title. and almost every character was allready in 3d before putting it online (although they`d probably needed some refinement).
That`s a pretty effective way to start out an MMO game, to turn a successfull offline game into an online game. They allready had a big name, hmz, and a big cash start for investments which would definately come back, and when you look at it now, it definately did.
(wow, finally a short post
)
So much exaggeration……..>
50.00 for an EQ 2 expansion? The last expansion was 39.99 which included all the previous expansions and adventure modules, and this expansion contain the largest content update ever in any EQ brand game.... as far as TR goes bug free for me and a hell of a lot of fun, and if you think those graphics could have been pulled off in 2003, you might want to pull that Monster 3d card out of your Pentium II machine and consider upgrades. And you are already at end game in what just a couple weeks? You have managed to zip forward in time and play ever thing DG has designed for TR??? WoW you're awesome!!!
What your post boils down to is WoW rox0rz and everything else sux0rz. You dig WoW fine go play WoW, your voting with your wallet which is cool, but there really is no need to BS up the forums with Tall tales to back up your flawed reasoning.
It`s also because some of those suckers work in a company that tries to make cool online games.
Insufficient planning or inefficient strategies cost alot of cash.
And where do you want to get that cash from?
Exactly, the clients, every gamer that wants to be a part of the gaming experience.
it`s either going broke or annoying the gamers to fix up that problem.
(wow, finally a short post
)
Which brings us back to my original statement. If people dont plan stuff right they deserve to go down the drain. You want to play with the big boys and dollarsigns, you better make sure that every dollar you spend, is wellspent. But we, the players are the suckers(with too much money) feeding their stupidity and bad planning.
---
Grammar nazi's. This one is for you.
I do have one question for you. Do you think the world would be better without Eve today ?
If only games that were 100% polished were released, there'd be tons of companies that would run out of money ( like CCP at its beginning ) and tons of games that couldn't evolve from this bugged status to the "good game" status.
So are you saying you prefer games to never see the light of the day if they can't be polished from the start ?
Infinity: The Quest for Earth, space-sim MMO with a seamless procedural galaxy.
you know developers dont just sit down and say "hey guys lets make a half backed attempt at a mmo". More time than others its the people who pay the developers wages, or the board of directors.
Its all about money at the end of the day, if you've advertised when the game will be going out by, and the developers aint finished then they just publish it because re-advertising aint cheap. Also developers are expected to finish the game after publish, however doesnt happen very often as players love to complain about other things like "balance" (aka bullpoo).
Most of the time the developers are being screwed as much as us, they dont make the deadlines.
Also its acceptable to publish software with 75% of the bugs amended, leaving 25% in, you might say its more but you just narrow visioned as the games bigger than loosing a couple of items out your inventory or all your textures turining white etc...
MMo's are a developers nightmare, being the most deverse genre of game. FPS you have multiplayer servers where everyones got access to the same guns (even Cstrike can buy :P) therefore no deversity and fewer exploits.
MMo's you got different classes, different levels of skills, different skills. Therefore there a wider range of bugs that can creep in, because the worlds in mmo's are bigger than any other game.
Well its quite simple. If this particular game has 50,000 diehard fanboys that been following the game for years, at least half that amount will stick around and feel it's their duty to HELP make the game perfect. If the idea of the MMO is everythign the fanboy wants, he and she will do whatever it takes to help make this game perfect in their eyes, even if it means paying a monthly subscriiption for a product they know is NOT finished.
I did this with Vanguard and EQ2. Both games were released waaay to early, of course Vanguard was 5x worse than EQ2, but I followed both games religiously, even participated in Betas for each, knew both games were definiely not ready for release, but what did I do when they went live?? I was first in line to get the game, took a few days off work and dived right in even though I knew 100% for a fact that they weren't ready. But as a gamer, especially one who loves the next best MMORPG, I have to much hope and faith in Game companies. I said to myself, and i know many other people said the same thing, "Well I know that EQ2 and VG aren't finished, but the game is at least playable now which means the devs will definitely have most of the kinks, bugs, and performance issues tuned out in a month or two max. Well, that obviously didn't happen with Vanguard, but EQ2's problem was a bit different than performance issues. That game had so many classes, "still does" but alot of them were to similar and there was no real diversity between them along with all the armor/weaps looking like tin cans and garbage, and the combat wheel was to complex and ridiculous, i just couldnt take it anymore.
Anyway, most of you should have learned by now that MOST if not ALL MMORPG's released are almost always released way to soon. The hit ones like EQ 1, DAOC, EQ2, and WoW were all released early but in time they all grew to be excellent MMO's because we the customer were willing to test their products to help make the game better for everyone to enjoy.
It wont change
Rallithon Oakthornn
(Retired Heirophant of the 60th season)
Obviously not the OP but I think you make a valid point. There sometimes are good games that evolve from crappy releases given time.
Like others said, MMO's are generally big projects compared to the regular video game but studios and publishers still try to launch them the same way - with a typical marketing big splash. So in the interest of encouraging studios to start MMO projects, encouraging the 'acceptability' of a 'paid beta' stage is arguable. However I think studios should go about it in a manner with a little more integrity. Let the consumer know that it is an early stage release and maybe compensate early participation with say, a discounted subscription rate.
I think all the ranting and raving comes from the fact that initial releases are expected to 'work as advertised.'
The plain and simple answer to the OP has already been answered. Because they can.
But the bigger problem is why can they? Because gamers are a bunch of unorganized "in it for myself" people. The game companies know this and rely on it. The gamers get organized and start working towards stopping this practice by game companies is the day you will see less bug filled games.
And it isnt just MMO game companies that screw over their players. I have seen several non-MMOs get the same treatment. Take CnC:Renegade for example. It was released with half its MP features missing and they out right lied about a SP SDK. Then there is BF:Vietnam that was released with such a huge imbalance it made most of us wonder if the developers ever even beta tested the game at all since there is no way that imbalance would have made it to live had their been.
Kai
Reminds me from my experince with Vanguard. That was the first time I was really disappointed in game devs. There has been numerous other games like that too (NwN2, TR...) , but after Vanguard I realised that for gaming companies "it's ok to give false hopes" for paying customers since most of the mmorpgs aren't what they were originally supposed to be - and because they have the freedom to alter the game however they like after it's been released. So if you pay from the game you think you like, eventually you might just end figuring out why did you even bother.
I participated in TR's beta too and paid the fee but didn't take the next step since the game felt too cripled for my taste after launch, so I quit after two week. That was well spent 5 euros.
Good thing nowadays is that when you get hooked with beta account, you can actually help the game devs with their works with hammering out bugs etc. - AND try the game before you buy it. If you manage to get into late beta, it's pretty easy to see if the game is actually ever going the be The Game it advertises to be.
Now I got few more betas to do and after that I'll be able to choose which game is the next mmorpg i'll throw my pennies in. My word to you gamers: If possible try getting accepted in beta phase or wait at least for a trial account and avoid being f*cked by the greedy gaming companies with their loose promises.
Whev what a rant.
This genre is still too young to site examples as benchmarks. Many of the past crap got by because there was nothing else comprable on the market. Eve is a good example of that. I can remember when UO first came out facing lag so bad you were taking one step every minute or so. We put up with it because there was nothing else out there that was any better.
You could not successfully launch a game in that condition in the market today. EQ II was released prior to Wow in an attempt to steal some of Blizzard's thunder only it backfired on SOE. Took them almost a year to get EQ II up to the standard that Blizzard set with Wow. Vanguard is a good example of a game that flopped strictly because it was not up to today's standards. People just expect more today. Recently released games like Hellgate and Tabula Rasa have had less than welcome receptions mainly due to lack of content and originality.
Myself, I will not be an original buyer anymore. Seems to take these game 3 to 6 months minimum to get the game in a decent playable state.
You just cannot through a half completed game out there anymore, you risk alienating too much of your playerbase. SOE was nuts to buy Vanguard, they have alienated enough of the genre's playerbase already without adding to it.
If you find a game that seems to you to be still in beta, don't play it, there are plenty of other games to sample in this genre.
You cannot equate the complexity of a MMO to a game running on a stand alone computer. MMO's have the following additional costs compared to games that run on a stand alone computers:
Cheating is more important in a multi-player world. The MMO itself runs on the server rather than having processes running in an decentralised fashion on player's computers. Hacking the client has less chance of giving a player an unfair advantage, and there are no saved games on your local hard drive to edit.
I might consider paying a discounted price to play a beta MMO if the game had reached a point where it was playable. MMO's, in addition to testing for bugs, really need to test the gameplay. Gameplay issues often only show up after the MMO has been running for some time. Some gameplay issues like ruined ingame economies, can take a long time to recover after patching. For example, EQ2 had a lot of gameplay issues (in addition to some bugs) when it went live. From what I have read in forums, the gameplay issues have now been fixed. The gameplay issues included the economy being flooded with second hand items, the way shards on death were implemented, the high failure rate of healing spells and shared experience debt that discouraged grouping. While the game was playable, an extended beta period would have picked up the gameplay issues. What beta players carried over from the paid beta period to the live game would also be a major issue . One wonders whether EQ2 would have been more successful if it had a longer period of beta testing prior to release.
i agree with all that, mmo pricing is out of control, sadly though there isnt much people can do about it
Games Played: Guild Wars, Runescape, World of Warcraft, RF online, Silkroad online, Knight online, Lord of the Rings online.
what a rip, i got a warning for having a link on this signiture....>:(
Games Waiting for: Gods and Heroes, Aion, Chronicles of Spellborn
Because they can.
The moment people stop buying these games and shelling out the subscription fees is the same moment publishers and developers will put more time into polishing their bug-laden games.
MMO games played or tested: EQ, DAoC, Archlord, Auto Assault, CoH, CoV, EQ2, EVE, Guild Wars, Hellgate: London, Linneage II, LOTRO, MxO, Planetside, SWG, Sword of the New World, Tabula Rasa, Vanguard, WWIIOL, WOW, Age of Conan
They want profit from day one.
Even if you end up fixing games for them.
Website