The 7 million players is the mistake, it's too unrealistic.
Looking at the GW box sales, last time checked it was something like 6.5 million: but that is if I'm correct all the expansion sales included.
So someone who bought GW + all expansions accounts I think for 4 units sold. Granted, not everyone who bought GW Prophecies will have bought all the expansions, but to be on the safe side, it means that at the least 1.6 million people have bought and played GW, with a high likelihood of this number being 2 million or such.
7 million is not that unrealistic but that would be the total number of players during 5 years.GW did not sell that many accounts, 4,5 million is the number I heard but let's say 3,5 to be sure. I think GW2 will sell double that because the company is more renowned today and the game is pretty well known among people while the first game was very unknown at it's launch.
Also will GW cater to more types of players and the first sequel usually sell better than the first game (Like Diablo 2, Starcraft 2 and many others).
But 7 million players at the same time is doubtful, at least unless they release the game in China and Korea too. Wow never had 7 million western players either, just over 5 million players and almost twice that in Asia. Thinking that it will outsell Wow is a bit optimistic.
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums: Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
Will it appeal to the hardcore? Depends, which crowd are you referring to - PvE raiders or PvP? With GW2 using high-end raiding content to give players better looking armor/weapon skins whole thing pretty much becomes a matter of vanity without any tangible gameplay advantages (better gear, etc) so it may be an interesting thing to see who'll stick around for it. PvP entirely depends on how well they pull it off.
Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing.
I wouldnt have thought the hardcore section will be interested in gw2 due to the ease of levelling. From what i understand there is not much of a grind and levelling from 5 to 10 will be around the same speed as levelling from 50 to 55....this makes me feel like the game will be a more "end game" type mmo with everyone pretty much the same!
I might be misunderstanding though. but this is the reason my interest died.
I am glad i made you smile. As for comparing mmorpg's, it's not a new thing it's been happening for years. I guess some of us noticed this early on in our mmorpg gaming history. You seem to use the word troll alot, do you have a problem walking under that bridge? you can get help you know. There are three goats that live up the top of your road, one of them can help you with your problem.
It must be hard for you, to grasp that players can actually like to play more than 1 MMO.
Do you feel you need to protect 'your' precious GW2? Aaaw, cute. Don't worry, GW2 will manage to do well even without your 'help'.
You like GW2? Good for you, pat on your back, now try to stay on topic of the OP even if you find it difficult.
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums: Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
I wouldnt have thought the hardcore section will be interested in gw2 due to the ease of levelling. From what i understand there is not much of a grind and levelling from 5 to 10 will be around the same speed as levelling from 50 to 55....this makes me feel like the game will be a more "end game" type mmo with everyone pretty much the same!
I might be misunderstanding though. but this is the reason my interest died.
You are both right and wrong. Guild Wars' model is based on not having to wait to get to the fun stuff, but the endgame is conceived as being the majority of the game. Let me say that even more clearly: rather than levelling to 80 and spending the rest of the time at "endgame" where "endgame" is defined as high-end dungeons and PvP, Guild Wars is story-based and tries to get you to max level while you have still only experienced a small fraction of the land mass, story, and content.
For example, in LOTRO, this would be like reaching max level when you're in the North Downs. In EQ2, it would be reaching max level at the Butcherblock Mountains.
I expect that the nearly flat leveling curve in GW2 aims to replicate that experience. The whole game is "endgame", so that the term "endgame" in itself becomes meaningless.
Edited to add: as for "everyone being the same", progression in GW has generally been about acquiring skills to build elaborate skill sets. In GW2 this would take the form of traits and trait challenges, as well as skills that may drop off of mobs (I seem to recall this being mentioned in a blog post; I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong on that point). That and appearance armor chasing .
so i simply used 7 million players as the baseline for illustration sake. Im not saying that GW2 will sell that much just at launch, but given past success which there building on, i wouldnt be surprised given the hype that they could realize this number within the first year or 2, assuming of course the game doesnt deliver like most havent. But i have some faith in arenanet.
The 7 million players is the mistake, it's too unrealistic.
Looking at the GW box sales, last time checked it was something like 6.5 million: but that is if I'm correct all the expansion sales included.
So someone who bought GW + all expansions accounts I think for 4 units sold. Granted, not everyone who bought GW Prophecies will have bought all the expansions, but to be on the safe side, it means that at the least 1.6 million people have bought and played GW, with a high likelihood of this number being 2 million or such.
Remember, WAR and AoC were on the top of hype and player excitement too, but still 'only' sold 1 million units. I expect that GW2 will probably do better with their established interested player base of GW players, an even higher hype and better word-of-mouth after launch, but still, 7 million players seems just way too high, even if you take into account a full year of sales. Unless they break into Korea and China
They could generate more money of course when their expansion(s) hit the market, I expect those to follow quickly, the first within the first year just as it happened with GW.
Your forgetting that people that bought all the expansions did not always = 4 box sales. A couple years ago they began selling GW in both trilogy (first 3 games), and Platinum (original with eotn) box copies. Every time i see GW in a store now, it is in one of these forms, so that also throws the numbers by another unknown variable. So i find loki's estimate to be believeable. But again, my estimate was using the only number we do actually know of as a baseline.
Despite all the hype here about WAR and AoC, most people werent quite rdy to ditch WoW. I believe that alot more WoW players are getting tired of it them they were back then. And War was clearly going after WoW players. GW wasnt. GW got the people who were either new to mmo's, were more into diablo like games, or just wanted something different from most mmo's. So only bored WoW players for the most part took an interest in WAR. One of the biggest limiting factors with AoC was that most people who may have loved to get into it couldnt because they didnt have there computers sufficiently upgraded. When AoC was released you needed a semi- high end pc to play it. I think this contributes a great deal to why despite the hype WAR and AoC only sold up to 1 million copies each, even before people found out how lacking they were.
GW2 isnt trying to steal any games players. They have a solid base of GW players already from there first game, and rather than trying to take other players aways from other games, there using there b2p model to be an alternative alongside the mmo people may already play. They also are making there game run on low-mid range PC's instead of trying to push the technological limits which would limit there customer pool. Given the differences, i dont find 7 million within a year unrealistic at all. I do think that people will be cautious at first of GW2 being another hype trap like WAR and AoC so the launch numbers may not be in the millions. But once word gets out that the game delivers (assuming it does), Id expect the game sales will only continue to climb into the millions within the first few months.
I expect that the old GW1 PVP crowd is looking forward to GW2. The level of PVP in GW1 was unparallelled before the release of Nightfall. Ppl who only look at the limitation of the 8 skills on a skillbar, dont understand GW1's metagame. PVP is built for 8vs8, so its a build of 64vs64 skills. A coherent set of skills played by a team that acts like one unit. I havent played any other CORPG/MMORPG where the team skill was so important and so good. In other MMO's its just the basic stuff.
All the gankbased or gearbased open world PVP is certainly fun, but cant really be compared to Guild vs Guild in GW1. PVP in GW had the potential to be the basis for a e-sports competition (which it has been for a while).
Some people in this thread who call PVE raiding hardcore, dont understand that all they did was learning to jump through hoops. Not to mention that the driving force is nothing but a stupid piece of gear. It doesnt even come close to a strong competition between human players.
Only a team of human opponents provide a real challenge.
From my very limited expereince in GW, (about 2 weeks), GW2 will have its fair share of hardcore players, just like every other MMO out there. IMO it will attract those that like to do a LOT of small scale PvP/PvE over and over and over sorta like the FPS crowd.
Although the combat mechanics differ greatly, PvP in games like WoW and GW2 remind me of all that time I spent playing CS, die, respawn, die, respawn continuously with nothing to gain or lose other than smack talking rights. I have no doubt that a hardcore group that enjoys that style of game play will be playing and enjoying the game from day one.
The hardcore crowd I wouldn't expect to see in GW2 are those who enjoy games like EVE or Darkfall, where you can lose something and players actually have an impact on the game world.
Yes, this is a very strong point you raise.
One of the features of hardcore (or some sandbox games) has often been that actions have repercussions that have cascade effects, not just a binary win-lose then repeat. That can be very severe but also very rewarding way of extending the experience on the game world.
That's clearly not going to be in the game in any form, by all accounts. One of the few things I will miss in GW2.
they have actually already talked about this and it will be in the game in two levels
one, They will give you choices to make in your personal stoy line that you cannot go back and change (they will also not reset) such as the hard choice in the human story in which you must choose to save either a hospital or an orphanage that are being attacked at the same time; if you choose the hospital, the orphanage will remain destroyed and the sad orphans will roam the streets around it begging.
Again, the orphanage will not reset, and neiher does most events either, which ties into the second level they talked about
two, events do not reset, they cycle based on player actions. very simple Example: A centaur base is sending out patrols to attack villagers in a near town, players defeat the centaurs and then take over the base. The base will not reset, in fact it can stay perminantly controlled by the players as long as they protect it, but if no players are protecting it for too long the centaur attacks on that base will become too much for the npc's in it to handle, and eventually it will fall back into their hands.
Basically you cant ask the devs to make online content permanent as in, "once we take the base centaurs cant take it back ever, even if it's empty" because that wouldnt be dynamic, and it wouldnt be realistic; as centaurs would definately try and reclaim their base of operations once they mustered a force to attack it.
The events cycle based on player interaction, which makes surtain things permanent untill players cease their involvment. I mean we're the heroes in this story people, they cant make content in which the npc's save the day can they? By that I mean content is made to have the players feel heroic, or at least a bit of a good person (watering plants isnt heroic, but its a nice thing to do).
The game responds to player interaction, which is AMAZING! how many mmo's have player interaction on the level we're seeing from guild wars 2? watering crops that actualy grow (as apposed to glowing and notifying you that you watered them...)? taking bases that stay taken untill the players become negligent? Defeating an giant elemental boss at lvl 1?!
The changes in the game are as permanent as most in the real world are; they stay changed untill someone changes them.
lol wouldnt it be hilarious if they sold out of boxes on release? XD
I don't know if they will but i would take an outside bet on it. Of all the mmorpg coming next year, this is the one game that can do it.
Indeed, boxes may get sold out! Thankfully steam will have plenty of cd-keys to go around. Although i'll be after the collector's edition if i can get one.
Comments
7 million is not that unrealistic but that would be the total number of players during 5 years.GW did not sell that many accounts, 4,5 million is the number I heard but let's say 3,5 to be sure. I think GW2 will sell double that because the company is more renowned today and the game is pretty well known among people while the first game was very unknown at it's launch.
Also will GW cater to more types of players and the first sequel usually sell better than the first game (Like Diablo 2, Starcraft 2 and many others).
But 7 million players at the same time is doubtful, at least unless they release the game in China and Korea too. Wow never had 7 million western players either, just over 5 million players and almost twice that in Asia. Thinking that it will outsell Wow is a bit optimistic.
(Edit. Post to which mine was a reply upon has been removed.)
The ACTUAL size of MMORPG worlds: a comparison list between MMO's
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums:
Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
Will it appeal to the hardcore? Depends, which crowd are you referring to - PvE raiders or PvP? With GW2 using high-end raiding content to give players better looking armor/weapon skins whole thing pretty much becomes a matter of vanity without any tangible gameplay advantages (better gear, etc) so it may be an interesting thing to see who'll stick around for it. PvP entirely depends on how well they pull it off.
I wouldnt have thought the hardcore section will be interested in gw2 due to the ease of levelling. From what i understand there is not much of a grind and levelling from 5 to 10 will be around the same speed as levelling from 50 to 55....this makes me feel like the game will be a more "end game" type mmo with everyone pretty much the same!
I might be misunderstanding though. but this is the reason my interest died.
It must be hard for you, to grasp that players can actually like to play more than 1 MMO.
Do you feel you need to protect 'your' precious GW2? Aaaw, cute. Don't worry, GW2 will manage to do well even without your 'help'.
You like GW2? Good for you, pat on your back, now try to stay on topic of the OP even if you find it difficult.
The ACTUAL size of MMORPG worlds: a comparison list between MMO's
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums:
Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
You are both right and wrong. Guild Wars' model is based on not having to wait to get to the fun stuff, but the endgame is conceived as being the majority of the game. Let me say that even more clearly: rather than levelling to 80 and spending the rest of the time at "endgame" where "endgame" is defined as high-end dungeons and PvP, Guild Wars is story-based and tries to get you to max level while you have still only experienced a small fraction of the land mass, story, and content.
For example, in LOTRO, this would be like reaching max level when you're in the North Downs. In EQ2, it would be reaching max level at the Butcherblock Mountains.
I expect that the nearly flat leveling curve in GW2 aims to replicate that experience. The whole game is "endgame", so that the term "endgame" in itself becomes meaningless.
Edited to add: as for "everyone being the same", progression in GW has generally been about acquiring skills to build elaborate skill sets. In GW2 this would take the form of traits and trait challenges, as well as skills that may drop off of mobs (I seem to recall this being mentioned in a blog post; I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong on that point). That and appearance armor chasing
.
Your forgetting that people that bought all the expansions did not always = 4 box sales. A couple years ago they began selling GW in both trilogy (first 3 games), and Platinum (original with eotn) box copies. Every time i see GW in a store now, it is in one of these forms, so that also throws the numbers by another unknown variable. So i find loki's estimate to be believeable. But again, my estimate was using the only number we do actually know of as a baseline.
Despite all the hype here about WAR and AoC, most people werent quite rdy to ditch WoW. I believe that alot more WoW players are getting tired of it them they were back then. And War was clearly going after WoW players. GW wasnt. GW got the people who were either new to mmo's, were more into diablo like games, or just wanted something different from most mmo's. So only bored WoW players for the most part took an interest in WAR. One of the biggest limiting factors with AoC was that most people who may have loved to get into it couldnt because they didnt have there computers sufficiently upgraded. When AoC was released you needed a semi- high end pc to play it. I think this contributes a great deal to why despite the hype WAR and AoC only sold up to 1 million copies each, even before people found out how lacking they were.
GW2 isnt trying to steal any games players. They have a solid base of GW players already from there first game, and rather than trying to take other players aways from other games, there using there b2p model to be an alternative alongside the mmo people may already play. They also are making there game run on low-mid range PC's instead of trying to push the technological limits which would limit there customer pool. Given the differences, i dont find 7 million within a year unrealistic at all. I do think that people will be cautious at first of GW2 being another hype trap like WAR and AoC so the launch numbers may not be in the millions. But once word gets out that the game delivers (assuming it does), Id expect the game sales will only continue to climb into the millions within the first few months.
I expect that the old GW1 PVP crowd is looking forward to GW2. The level of PVP in GW1 was unparallelled before the release of Nightfall. Ppl who only look at the limitation of the 8 skills on a skillbar, dont understand GW1's metagame. PVP is built for 8vs8, so its a build of 64vs64 skills. A coherent set of skills played by a team that acts like one unit. I havent played any other CORPG/MMORPG where the team skill was so important and so good. In other MMO's its just the basic stuff.
All the gankbased or gearbased open world PVP is certainly fun, but cant really be compared to Guild vs Guild in GW1. PVP in GW had the potential to be the basis for a e-sports competition (which it has been for a while).
Some people in this thread who call PVE raiding hardcore, dont understand that all they did was learning to jump through hoops. Not to mention that the driving force is nothing but a stupid piece of gear. It doesnt even come close to a strong competition between human players.
Only a team of human opponents provide a real challenge.
lol wouldnt it be hilarious if they sold out of boxes on release? XD
they have actually already talked about this and it will be in the game in two levels
one, They will give you choices to make in your personal stoy line that you cannot go back and change (they will also not reset) such as the hard choice in the human story in which you must choose to save either a hospital or an orphanage that are being attacked at the same time; if you choose the hospital, the orphanage will remain destroyed and the sad orphans will roam the streets around it begging.
Again, the orphanage will not reset, and neiher does most events either, which ties into the second level they talked about
two, events do not reset, they cycle based on player actions. very simple Example: A centaur base is sending out patrols to attack villagers in a near town, players defeat the centaurs and then take over the base. The base will not reset, in fact it can stay perminantly controlled by the players as long as they protect it, but if no players are protecting it for too long the centaur attacks on that base will become too much for the npc's in it to handle, and eventually it will fall back into their hands.
Basically you cant ask the devs to make online content permanent as in, "once we take the base centaurs cant take it back ever, even if it's empty" because that wouldnt be dynamic, and it wouldnt be realistic; as centaurs would definately try and reclaim their base of operations once they mustered a force to attack it.
The events cycle based on player interaction, which makes surtain things permanent untill players cease their involvment. I mean we're the heroes in this story people, they cant make content in which the npc's save the day can they? By that I mean content is made to have the players feel heroic, or at least a bit of a good person (watering plants isnt heroic, but its a nice thing to do).
The game responds to player interaction, which is AMAZING! how many mmo's have player interaction on the level we're seeing from guild wars 2? watering crops that actualy grow (as apposed to glowing and notifying you that you watered them...)? taking bases that stay taken untill the players become negligent? Defeating an giant elemental boss at lvl 1?!
The changes in the game are as permanent as most in the real world are; they stay changed untill someone changes them.
I don't know if they will but i would take an outside bet on it. Of all the mmorpg coming next year, this is the one game that can do it.
Indeed, boxes may get sold out! Thankfully steam will have plenty of cd-keys to go around. Although i'll be after the collector's edition if i can get one.