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1Q 09 update from Olev Sandnes, Funcom CFO. And yes, the results are not good.
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Time is hard to calculate in monetary terms, mine is very valuable for instance. Luckily the code (wasn't really a game) I bought was took back to the shop for a full refund after 2 weeks.
I doubt they could afford to refund 1 copy at this moment in time
Be paid for Beta Testing, don't pay to Beta Test.
I rather play that piece of shit than WOW and WAR - now those are games are brainless and pieces of turd
And if Funcom goes bust so be it, dont need to come on a forum and whine - idiots
I rather play that piece of shit than WOW and WAR - now those are games are brainless and pieces of turd
And if Funcom goes bust so be it, dont need to come on a forum and whine - idiots
Hahaha, your joking right? Open world WoW, against closed claustrophobic instanced world. 12mill subs WoW, against less than 50k subs AoC. It must hurt to live in the dream your living in. You got owned hard mate, by Funcom's propaganda.
I rather play that piece of shit than WOW and WAR - now those are games are brainless and pieces of turd
And if Funcom goes bust so be it, dont need to come on a forum and whine - idiots
Hahaha, your joking right? Open world WoW, against closed claustrophobic instanced world. 12mill subs WoW, against less than 50k subs AoC. It must hurt to live in the dream your living in. You got owned hard mate, by Funcom's propaganda.
What game is better boils down to one thing personal preferances. I have played WoW and WAR, while I truly enjoyed Vanilla WoW, TBC made WoW dull. over the months WoW got reduced toa game that was rinse and repeat for gear. WAR has an AI on world mobs that makes me think the bricks in Tetris have better AI. and the whole gameplay in WAR bored me to death. Aoc ain't perfect but out of the 3 games it is the one I found the most fun. Seeing we don't have Pre CU SWG around anymore, I guess I have to settle for AoC until the next game that catches my attention arrives.
I base my choices on what I like, bot what others tells me is good. Loads of people claim WoW to be best, good for them, personally I ain't touching WoW again. It's not a bad game, it's just extremely boring. and 12 million subscribers don't make the game better.
Playing: Battlefield - Bad company (Xbox360) Arma2, DFO (PC)
On my radar: TSW, MO
MMO's played: SWG (pre cu/cu), WoW, AoC, WAR, DFO, Planetside
MMO's that I have tested: Lotro, L2, Aion, Ryzom
I agree with 100% of what you said,
The thing is that Famine is most likely trained and schooled in Public Relations, I work in a similar field and his approach is very text book. I have to look at what he's really saying behind the words he chooses. When I do that, it draws a very different picture for me.That's just me though from years of RL occupational habits.
If there were fanbois who were being paid to be here and fight off the harsh criticisms ( as in a certain correspondent) I guarantee you his objectives, and his reporting all begin and end at Famine. So when it comes to my issues with FC, although I can appreciate Famine's use of techniques of " How to Win Friends and Influence People," those will never work on me personally.
Compared to some of the PR's Ive know--I give Famine 6/10 (he loses marks for not always asserting he knows whats going on, (when a PR claims "they don't know" it shows they are either out of touch, or lying) and a lack of follow up on the AoC boards ("I'll get back to you" starts to lose merit when he never does). There are other things, but Im sure he's probably a perfectly nice guy outside of his professional role.
But Im looking at this from a different angle--so Im not suggesting you are wrong. It's just there is a certain amount of know-how to come across like Famine.
fair enough. I am just a old techie, my PR skills are nil. it's just that his posts at least strike me as professional and mature.The fanboy attack dog style posts do nothing but harm now, makes the remaining community look like a bunch of immature nitwits who cannot discuss the game rationally.
The main point I was getting at is the time for hype and BS are long gone now. If the game is to be saved it will be by the improving games quality. Looking at last quarters report should shout out loud and clear that what they have done so far is not working and no amount of hype can overcome that. The game has been over hyped since launch and all it has caused is a lot of initial box sales followed by a lot of hard feelings. Box sales are over FC , now you are depending on subscription retention and that is where you have fell short. What may save the company and game is to continue improving the game quality and soliciting feedback from present and past customers and using that feedback wisely.
That worked for worked for Eve, it might just pull AoC out of the hole it has dug for itself. On the otehr hand if FC tries to use SOE's style of hype and crap customer service they will end up with a Vanguard population. While SOE is a big enough entity to keep games like the Matrix and Vanguard on life support for extended periods I do not think FC can last very long losing 20 million plus a quarter.
I miss DAoC
Although this thread is almost inactive, i would like to apologise to JackDog for refering to him as a Troll and flaming his post, around post #113 of this thread. I miss interpreted his comments and miss took him for a troll of which he is clearly not. Sorry for any offence caused to him and others i lashed out at.
I think if you read Jack's comment right above yours, it is exactly what he is talking about when he mentions the 'fanboys' on the site and how they are doing more harm then good.
If you have complete fanboys who make outragious claims or twist news, then you have someone in the 'middle' correct them or give a counter-argument.. all of a sudden it makes the 'middle' person appear to be a troll.. and from that point on, no real progress can be made in the discussion.
If the fanboy is honest, and starts the conversation somewhere near the truth, then the counter-argument is viewed as more of a debate and discussion rather than a flame. If you want to see what I"m talking about, look at the thread Avery started regarding the 4Q results. He only talks about the retention rate 'improving' and fails to mention that Funcom expects AOC to lose even more players this quarter. He fails to mention the 23M loss in the quarter. Of course his original post is going to be 'attacked' by people in the middle who point out the loss of subscribers expected and the quarterly loss the company posted. If Avery had started the thread in a more truthful way.. including the bad news... then the discussion that followed would have been meaningful, and the people correcting him wouldn't be seen as trolls.
Of course it works the other way.. people with negative views of the game should start the debate closer to the middle (the truth) rather than exagerate their beef.
I think if you read Jack's comment right above yours, it is exactly what he is talking about when he mentions the 'fanboys' on the site and how they are doing more harm then good.
If you have complete fanboys who make outragious claims or twist news, then you have someone in the 'middle' correct them or give a counter-argument.. all of a sudden it makes the 'middle' person appear to be a troll.. and from that point on, no real progress can be made in the discussion.
If the fanboy is honest, and starts the conversation somewhere near the truth, then the counter-argument is viewed as more of a debate and discussion rather than a flame. If you want to see what I"m talking about, look at the thread Avery started regarding the 4Q results. He only talks about the retention rate 'improving' and fails to mention that Funcom expects AOC to lose even more players this quarter. He fails to mention the 23M loss in the quarter. Of course his original post is going to be 'attacked' by people in the middle who point out the loss of subscribers expected and the quarterly loss the company posted. If Avery had started the thread in a more truthful way.. including the bad news... then the discussion that followed would have been meaningful, and the people correcting him wouldn't be seen as trolls.
Of course it works the other way.. people with negative views of the game should start the debate closer to the middle (the truth) rather than exagerate their beef.
Big agree. I am an advocate of knowing that no matter how much you may like the game, it still has issues.
I love playing AoC, but it is hard for me to turn a blind eye to Funcom's mess ups.
But, it is not fun to read any thread with real questions being bombarded with "Who cares about your question, AoC will fail anyways". People are still playing and want to play, so if we could reach some type of truce on WHICH threads to leave alone...it would help. I have no problem with negativity if the poster is educated about the current state of affairs. Old news helps no one. And that is another problem...
Anyways, hopefully the threads will even out evetually or the game will close...it does not matter. For me, I still play, and want to discuss mechanics and issues and other stuff the game does that is cool.
Thanks
That brings up a good point, if they lost 25 or 30 million this year with the massive box sales AoC had. Now that the games population is in the basement, how the hell are they going to survive the coming year? Trying to develop Secret World and while they are keeping AoC on life support and get it launched in 2 or 3 other countries while developing a version for the 360.
All I can say is they have a full plate and I would not want to be in their shoes.
Funcom is actually working very much so on The Secret World, up to 80 people on that project now. They recently hired an upcoming game designer, said to be a little of a genious in what he does (Rasmus Hahr) and there are certainly high hopes for this title. Rasmus Hahr had a foot in the door in another singleplayer project called Lost Empire that was nominated twice as ""Best game of the year". That game didnt do overly good, but I did see reviews going up to 9.3 of 10, so I do have hopes for this Secret Worlds of thiers.
They are also working with 20 men teams on coming casual MMO titles based on the Unity engine, expecting to launch their first already in 2009.
So yes, AoC with 100K subscribers is bad, but that doesnt stop them from creating new and hopefully better and more succesful games.
I ask this in all seriousness...who is going to buy TSW at release? Funcom learned NOTHING from AO's launch. If they had a good history with launches and customer relations, I might have given them a mulligan for AoC, but after 2 disastrous MMO launches, I wouldn't touch TSW without a free trial first.
I still play AOC.
I still have fun playing AOC.
In my opinion it is better then any other subscription game on the market which is why I continue to subscribe.
The game is not perfect but in comparisson to other games I have played it is overall a better game.
I would drop AOC in a heartbeat if I thought the game sucked or if another game is realesed that is better.
I laugh at the attitude some write with on this subject as people seem to have an unhealthy mental state being unable to deal with people liking and enjoying soemthing they do not.
In short: -
I could care less what profit loss FC make as long as I can play the game while it is still the best around.
I really feel sad for people that seem to NEED to force their anger onto others in the hopes they feel part of something by having others that are full of hate hear their moan.
I feel sad for those that would prefer to be angry on a forum rather then have fun in a game. Sad.
I rather play that piece of shit than WOW and WAR - now those are games are brainless and pieces of turd
And if Funcom goes bust so be it, dont need to come on a forum and whine - idiots
Hahaha, your joking right? Open world WoW, against closed claustrophobic instanced world. 12mill subs WoW, against less than 50k subs AoC. It must hurt to live in the dream your living in. You got owned hard mate, by Funcom's propaganda.
I prefer good graphics in an instanced world then crappy cartoons and open.
I hold true the opinion that the majority of people are stupid. Game subs might just be living proof of that.
Do our respective opinions make WOW for you and AOC for me poorer games? Or do we still like our respective games and act maturely knowing opinion isn't something you can change by being rude or angry?
If the game concept sounds interesting I will buy it. there is a chance I get dissipointed, but I can also geta good experience. it's a bit like a lottery :P
Playing: Battlefield - Bad company (Xbox360) Arma2, DFO (PC)
On my radar: TSW, MO
MMO's played: SWG (pre cu/cu), WoW, AoC, WAR, DFO, Planetside
MMO's that I have tested: Lotro, L2, Aion, Ryzom
BEST POST EVER!
This post should be read by every whiney MMO gimp out there who thinks that slagging off games they don't like is a productive way to spend their time.
Attempting to wreck the enjoyment of others and trash the things they care about does not make someone any more important, right or special. Such people are no different to ghetto degenerates who use violence to try and gain a degree of importance.
Whether or not people enjoy any of the games listed on this site is down to personal preference. If you don't my game, who the hell cares! Why even post? Feel good that you've sown the seed of doubt in my mind? Is that as close to satisfaction you get all day, you sadistic creep? I hope the bullies at school steal your lunch again tomorrow, because we all know they do. If you weren't some downtrodden sap, you wouldn't even waste you time posting such drivel.
This site is littered with these bastards. Stop wasting my f*cking bandwidth!
Playing: Ableton Live 8
~ ragequitcancelsubdeletegamesmashcomputerkillself ~