There is no question in my mind and I am sure a bunch of others that GW2 will be the more polished game at release.
They have been saying for quite some time now, "when it's done" so I think we are in for a spectacular game. Just look at the footage from all of the conventions, the game looks ready for retail now.
Not to throw a wrench in your thought process but Bioware has been saying the same thing longer than ANET. The only difference is that when they said not until it's ready, or when it's done, everyone goes ballistic and swears that Bioware is hiding something or some other off the wall theory.
I can't speak to any of the other games, but every indication is that GW2 will be extremely polished when released.
In the speech in my sig file, he talks about alpha testing for GW1 taking place for over three YEARS with 10-20 builds put out each day. Testers were able to immediately access them and give feedback so that developers didn't waste any great amount of time on flawed concepts.
It seems like that kind of large scale alpha testing has been abandoned because they found that players were changing and viewing it more as just a chance to play the game, not test it. I still wanted to mention it because I think it shows their commitment to iteration and quality.
I did find this article very interesting, http://www.arena.net/blog/assuring-quality-qa-at-arenanet especially when it talks about QA people being on every team and how they view it as quality assurance, not functional assurance. They iterate everything they do and then when they finally think it's ready, they have every member of the company play it, get more feedback, and iterate it some more.
"Gamers will no longer buy the argument that every MMO requires a subscription fee to offset server and bandwidth costs. It's not true you know it, and they know it."-Jeff Strain, co-founder of ArenaNet, 2007
I wonder how many people furiously rubbing their crystal balls in early 2004 got anything right?
Self-pity imprisons us in the walls of our own self-absorption. The whole world shrinks down to the size of our problem, and the more we dwell on it, the smaller we are and the larger the problem seems to grow.
Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what
it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience
because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in
the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you
playing an MMORPG?"
I still have a hard time grasping the whole all or nothing thought process that seems to be rampant on the internet.
I mean seriously why can't all of the games succeed? As a life long gamer the more good games there are the better.
If all three titles turned out to be great I would try them. ( Although the TSW model of p2p & mt is a huge turnoff)
It is frustrating at best seeing people lie/twist the truth/bash a game for no good reason and this happens for every game.
I for one just hope the math equals all 3 are good games with a sustainable player base.
I really don't have any fears for SWTOR or GW2
SWTOR - I "know" I like this game
GW2 - Well why would you not pick a b2p mmo
TSW - looks good but the p2p & mt model is a turnoff
I think of the all or nothing thinking as a kind of nerd vision. It's black and white thinking from psychology. And when you have black and white thinking, one of the side effects is that you can't see other colors. It's extremely inflexible.
Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what
it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience
because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in
the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you
playing an MMORPG?"
You used a lot of words...I don't see a lot of math there...
Perhaps it's a word problem!
Maybe we were supposed to count the words? That's math, right?
Er, so anyway...
...in regard to what I believe the OP was trying to state, it does not work. Well, I mean it does. The OP is asking us to have an informed discussion based solely on quantity - not qualtiy. Thus, it is only "math" so to speak.
I can get a guy that writes books teaching ASP.NET to people to make me a website in 30 minutes.
I can get a guy that has never owned a computer to spend years developing me a website.
Does the amount of time spent by the latter mean it is going to be better than the former?
Can't have an informed discussion based solely on the "math"...sorry.
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
That being said, Funcom has a history of bad launches...but Anarchy Online is still going 10 years later. EA signed on to co-pub the game this year. I despise EA. We'll never forget EnB, you bastards!
GW never interested me in the least. GW2 actually interests me less than GW.
BioWare has made some nifty single-player games. This is supposed to be a MMO though, right? Well, it looks to be a combination SPRPG and game lobby. So, not interested in that in the least. SWTOR should be better than pre-NGE SWG. From what I have seen, it is not... so, nevermind.
All that being said, TSW is the only game of the three (of any game on the horizon) that I am looking forward to at this point.
Modern World. Skill Based.
Will just have to see how it goes...
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
You used a lot of words...I don't see a lot of math there...
Perhaps it's a word problem!
Maybe we were supposed to count the words? That's math, right?
Er, so anyway...
...in regard to what I believe the OP was trying to state, it does not work. Well, I mean it does. The OP is asking us to have an informed discussion based solely on quantity - not qualtiy. Thus, it is only "math" so to speak.
I can get a guy that writes books teaching ASP.NET to people to make me a website in 30 minutes.
I can get a guy that has never owned a computer to spend years developing me a website.
Does the amount of time spent by the latter mean it is going to be better than the former?
Can't have an informed discussion based solely on the "math"...sorry.
It also depends on vision and planning and all the other joyful stuff that goes into. I swear that some games in the past used alpha/beta testing of their combat systems because they didn't work it out on paper (IE do the math) before hand.
Then you have, like The Mythical Man Month suggests, the superstars who as one person outdo a whole team. I know people like that from back when I was with Symbolics. There was a company that had a team that bid two years to complete a project but a lone guy named Chuck Siska was able to do it by himself in 6 months. You can bet his system was better than their system would have been.
Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what
it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience
because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in
the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you
playing an MMORPG?"
I believe the GW2 is much larger than that. Can't remember source but those guys have gotten big. I think they have like 15-20 people alone on art!
Lol, GW2 had 55 people on art alone 2 months ago (was an article about it by the lead of the art department), as many as worked on SWG altogether.
ANET have 270 people working there right now (source: Wikipedia). Some of those are still working on the first GW or doing other stuff but OPs numbers are very suspicious and I would love to see a source on it. 150-200 is a lot more likelier number right now at least.
If memory serves me right, GW2 is using a modified / updated version of the engine used for Guild Wars. Pretty sure it's proprietary and developed in-house.
A lot of the "facts" in the original post seem somewhat off, and I'm not entirely sure why these numbers are relevant in the first place.
Yes and no. The engine is really changed by now and few things remain.
It is written by Jeff Strain but have some additional software included they bought from other companies in it to handle certain effects like lightning. I never seen a name on it, it have just been called a heavily modified version of the proprierity engine.
Even assuming these numbers are correct it still doesn't really work out.
GW2 is an evolution of various design concepts of GW1. Everything the devs tried and tested in GW1 was taken into account in the pre-production of GW2. Just because all that time is officially qualified as GW1 production time and not GW2 pre-production time doesn't mean it hasn't got any influence whatsoever.
Same thing goes for using the hero engine of SWToR. That thing has been in development since the late 1990s when it was still Hero's Journey. Just because those dozen years don't count towards SWToR's development time doesn't mean they weren't beneficial. And just because all the people working on that engine aren't counted towards SWToRs development staff doesn't mean they weren't doing a lot of development work for SWToR.
Apply exactly the same to Funcom's Dreamworld engine, that thing's also been used a lot longer then TSW has been in production. All of that time also indirectly benefitting TSW.
None of these games are developed in a vacuum. All of them have people working for them who've worked on other games and are taking all that experience, pre-production time and development time from that game to benefit the one they're developping now. If you want to talk about the quality and effort put into a game you've got to take all relevant factors into account, not just the ones that have conveniently accessable numbers.
We are the bunny. Resistance is futile. ''/\/\'''''/\/\''''''/\/\ ( o.o) ( o.o) ( o.o) (")("),,(")("),(")(")
I have looked at all the up coming mmo's and my thought runs like this - Continue playing LOTRO and invest in Elder Scrolls: Skyrim(single player). Maybe all 3 will be good but I will never play another Star wars game after a certain incident. P2P and cash shop, no thankyou - playing Lotro that way and 1 is enough. Guild Wars 2? Just not interested in it. All of the above is my opinion and not intended to disparage anyone elses, nor to influence any opinion contrary to mine.
Hmm well Secret World and Guild Wars 2 are the ones to watch... not watching Star Wars since I played beta and then told Gamestop to cancel my reserve and put the money towards Skyrim.
Secret World has it's own niche where it's set with a modern time theme with sorcery and fantasy. Funcom though is a company that's released games that did not do to well (conan for ex.) so they are the risk factor for this game. Weakness shown when they were counting down to the beta sign-up but when it hit 0 nothing happened as the clock was bugged itself or whatever they had intended to happen didn't happen.
Guild Wars looks good, the character skills/spells look decent but still wonder how they will draw me into the story or make me feel apart of the world.
TSW, I intended to play this when i first heard about it about 18mths ago if not more and signed up to the website and newsletter, but Subs plus cash shop, my wallet wont be opening for that. as nice as it looks.
SWtoG, cant make myself like this even though I have tried, all been done before just with light sabers, I can see a lot of people being dissapointed, but we will have to wait and see.
GW2, Everyone I know in RL that has gaming in their blood is gunning for this, I'm not really convinced of the nay sayers that try to diss this game, maybe some might be genuine, but not all. B2P is just win all the way in my book.
At the end of the day this forum only represents a tiny fraction of people who play MMO's. what views/opinions are shown here will never be a true reflection of the general populous.
Arenanet is at almost 300 staff now. been well over 150 for at least 4 years. they have 200 people playing the demo along with the public at game conventions. beta is starting next month and the game uses the engine from the first guild wars, with modifications.
Arenanet is at almost 300 staff now. been well over 150 for at least 4 years. they have 200 people playing the demo along with the public at game conventions. beta is starting next month and the game uses the engine from the first guild wars, with modifications.
Swtor - Out of the 3, it seems to be more standard imo. I will be trying it, as I am not playing anything atm. I am hoping they have reduced the rails and make exploring the worlds rewarding enough to allow for alternate game play (not just rail/story questing). Worried about the companions/voice over stuff taking away from the mmo feel.
GW2- WvWvW pvp has me very interested....Dynamic quests seem ok...Hoping for some DAoC memories in the WvWvW.
TSW - Like the ideas, guess it will be how well its done....I keep hearing people complain about the cash shop, but from what I could tell it is vanity only?
Arenanet is at almost 300 staff now. been well over 150 for at least 4 years. they have 200 people playing the demo along with the public at game conventions. beta is starting next month and the game uses the engine from the first guild wars, with modifications.
O'Brien, 40, is president and executive producer at ArenaNet, a Bellevue studio with 270 employees who build and run "Guild Wars," one of the world's most successful multiplayer online-game franchises.
Star Wars: People just seem to want KOTOR 3 mixed in with a mmorpg. Early reports are it performs nice, but is missing some convinience features that people will qq about endlessly. We all know those features so go debate them somewhere else.
I predict 2mil if they go after their base audience and after launch ....no idea
Guild Wars 2: Buy-to-play mmorpg finally trying to compete directly with WoW. Up until this point it has been a corpg and not direct competition. The game looks solid. We still have yet to see if the no trinity and no instanced raiding thing will actuall be accepted.
This is more hyped then ToR in view, so maybe 2-3mil on launch and after launch... no idea
Secret World: P2P + Cash shop = not even on my radar
2 mil? No, my math shows 1.4-1.6 at best with the current economy. It isn't a console game. If it does hit 2 mil it will be the biggest USA title for an MMO to date last i checked. Last I checked Warhammer broke the record with 1.2 mil opening weekend but with the market saturation of MMOs.... you think Star Wars fandom will carry it? Star Trek by numbers has more fans by dollar count and that didn't carry Star Trek Online. 2 mil.... I just see that as iffy in the current economy. If I were an investor I would be more confortable with ToR releasing an expectation of 1.2 mil units the opening weekend. I would be dubious of a 2 million unit launch target for this year. Sales in general are down in the USA market. EU zone isn't fair much better in entertainment spending. We have enough shit keeping us awake at night with a potential bust for the Christmas season.
IF ToR draws in the KOTR single player crowd then you would be looking at closer to 3 mil (Star Wars has done well in the console market) in sales but I've never seen a crossover like that. ToR is being sold as an MMO and I just don't see that kind of crossover sales happening. If it does then AoC had it right, they just had a hard-to-sell IP.
So I would state this: "If ToR clears 3 million units opening weekend, drawing a large crossover of the single player experience crowd, it will vindicate Age of Conan in some of the criticism that was levvied at AoC early on about their single player experience." That would mean MMO developers would likely look at building an MMO starting with a solid single player experience and then expanding it out into an MMO mechanic. It would also mark the death of the MMO as we once knew it (EQ, Meridian, UO, DAOC) in the sense that an MMO was intrinsicly a multi-player game. This would mark the shift of an MMO from multiplayer to singleplayer at it's core. WoW has slowly made that transition towards a single player core, but this would mark the first success at an MMO who, from the start, was built around the single player experience first.
Good news and Bad news I suppose.
Just as food for thought...pre-orders for TOR are already at 700K (and that's B&M retailers in the US alone) 1.2 million units would be lowballing the estimate - by alot. Sales (while they matter - and of course, 2 million units would pay for the development handily) aren't TOR's issue though. Retention rates suck for games in the past decade. The numbers that Bioware wants at a minimum would require a 25% retention rate of 2 million sales. That's exceedingly high these days.
Who knows though...all I can say is that I'll be there (on Dec 13th or so when I get EA) and I'll be there for a while. GW2 - waiting and seeing, for me, the only thing interesting is the WvWvW combat. TSW - not interested at all.
I'd argue that in a fashion, SWTOR does have a cash shop. It is in the way CE versions are done these days. You are no longer just buying fluff with your CE, you're buying in game advantages.
Look at RIFT - CE version came with a mount and a larger bag. The mount was originally going to be at level 20, but it became level 1. Purchasing the CE version provides in game advantages. Then they added the AoH edition...which allows you buy bank access anywhere in Telara. Yet another game advantage - think of the person gathering mats without it and the person with it.
So we look at the TOR-CE:
Flare Gun: Fire flares into the air
Training Droid: Hovers at your side for combat assistance
HoloDancer: Project your own holographic dancer
HoloCam: Keep visual records of in-game adventures
STAP: Sleek and unique in-game vehicle
Exclusive Mouse Droid: Spunky Droid to join your adventures
Exclusive Collector's Edition Store: Unique in-game vendor with an assortment of items
Do any of those look like they will provide you an in game advantage over just buying the regular version?
These items though:
Exclusive Gentle Giant Darth Malgus statue
Game disks collectible metal case
The Journal of Master Gnost-Dural as annotated by Satele Shan
The Old Republic galaxy map
Music of Star Wars: The Old Republic CD
High-quality Collector's Edition box
Custom Security Authentication Key
Now those are what one might think of with a normal CE version of a game... that extra nifty stuff for the, oh yeah - Collector!
So I'd argue that right off the back, that with the CE version - there is a cash shop - since you're buying an advantage through a RMT.
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
Nothing to discuss here. We all know that compare the the two, ArenaNet is the only one that polishes their game as they go. The other two polishes at the end, which will undoubtly result on many things being overlooked.
ArenaNet's re-iteration process is the key to insure that the game is polished in a certain phase of the game before moving on to the next phase. And they don't announce features unless they are complete and polished. Even though they changed features that they already polished, the new feature is polished before they announce it.
As you can see, it's not about the numbers or the math. ArenaNet's development process is superb compare to the other two which I believe will set GW2 way way apart from the rest.
Just watch the game play videos (not cinematics), you can tell a big difference already on how polished GW2 is compare to the other two.
Nothing to discuss here. We all know that compare the the two, ArenaNet is the only one that polishes their game as they go. The other two polishes at the end, which will undoubtly result on many things being overlooked.
Well, um... what I know is that I've played several games by Funcom and many games by BioWare. I did a trial of GW and uninstalled it shortly after entering the game.
So uh, what "most of us" know... is not to speak for everybody.
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
Comments
Not to throw a wrench in your thought process but Bioware has been saying the same thing longer than ANET. The only difference is that when they said not until it's ready, or when it's done, everyone goes ballistic and swears that Bioware is hiding something or some other off the wall theory.
I can't speak to any of the other games, but every indication is that GW2 will be extremely polished when released.
In the speech in my sig file, he talks about alpha testing for GW1 taking place for over three YEARS with 10-20 builds put out each day. Testers were able to immediately access them and give feedback so that developers didn't waste any great amount of time on flawed concepts.
It seems like that kind of large scale alpha testing has been abandoned because they found that players were changing and viewing it more as just a chance to play the game, not test it. I still wanted to mention it because I think it shows their commitment to iteration and quality.
I did find this article very interesting, http://www.arena.net/blog/assuring-quality-qa-at-arenanet especially when it talks about QA people being on every team and how they view it as quality assurance, not functional assurance. They iterate everything they do and then when they finally think it's ready, they have every member of the company play it, get more feedback, and iterate it some more.
"Gamers will no longer buy the argument that every MMO requires a subscription fee to offset server and bandwidth costs. It's not true you know it, and they know it." -Jeff Strain, co-founder of ArenaNet, 2007
I wonder how many people furiously rubbing their crystal balls in early 2004 got anything right?
Self-pity imprisons us in the walls of our own self-absorption. The whole world shrinks down to the size of our problem, and the more we dwell on it, the smaller we are and the larger the problem seems to grow.
I still have a hard time grasping the whole all or nothing thought process that seems to be rampant on the internet.
I mean seriously why can't all of the games succeed? As a life long gamer the more good games there are the better.
If all three titles turned out to be great I would try them. ( Although the TSW model of p2p & mt is a huge turnoff)
It is frustrating at best seeing people lie/twist the truth/bash a game for no good reason and this happens for every game.
I for one just hope the math equals all 3 are good games with a sustainable player base.
I really don't have any fears for SWTOR or GW2
SWTOR - I "know" I like this game
GW2 - Well why would you not pick a b2p mmo
TSW - looks good but the p2p & mt model is a turnoff
Perhaps it's a word problem!
Epic Music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAigCvelkhQ&list=PLo9FRw1AkDuQLEz7Gvvaz3ideB2NpFtT1
https://archive.org/details/softwarelibrary_msdos?&sort=-downloads&page=1
Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you playing an MMORPG?"
I think of the all or nothing thinking as a kind of nerd vision. It's black and white thinking from psychology. And when you have black and white thinking, one of the side effects is that you can't see other colors. It's extremely inflexible.
Epic Music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAigCvelkhQ&list=PLo9FRw1AkDuQLEz7Gvvaz3ideB2NpFtT1
https://archive.org/details/softwarelibrary_msdos?&sort=-downloads&page=1
Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you playing an MMORPG?"
Maybe we were supposed to count the words? That's math, right?
Er, so anyway...
...in regard to what I believe the OP was trying to state, it does not work. Well, I mean it does. The OP is asking us to have an informed discussion based solely on quantity - not qualtiy. Thus, it is only "math" so to speak.
I can get a guy that writes books teaching ASP.NET to people to make me a website in 30 minutes.
I can get a guy that has never owned a computer to spend years developing me a website.
Does the amount of time spent by the latter mean it is going to be better than the former?
Can't have an informed discussion based solely on the "math"...sorry.
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
Explorer: 87%, Killer: 67%, Achiever: 27%, Socializer: 20%
That being said, Funcom has a history of bad launches...but Anarchy Online is still going 10 years later. EA signed on to co-pub the game this year. I despise EA. We'll never forget EnB, you bastards!
GW never interested me in the least. GW2 actually interests me less than GW.
BioWare has made some nifty single-player games. This is supposed to be a MMO though, right? Well, it looks to be a combination SPRPG and game lobby. So, not interested in that in the least. SWTOR should be better than pre-NGE SWG. From what I have seen, it is not... so, nevermind.
All that being said, TSW is the only game of the three (of any game on the horizon) that I am looking forward to at this point.
Modern World. Skill Based.
Will just have to see how it goes...
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
Explorer: 87%, Killer: 67%, Achiever: 27%, Socializer: 20%
It also depends on vision and planning and all the other joyful stuff that goes into. I swear that some games in the past used alpha/beta testing of their combat systems because they didn't work it out on paper (IE do the math) before hand.
Then you have, like The Mythical Man Month suggests, the superstars who as one person outdo a whole team. I know people like that from back when I was with Symbolics. There was a company that had a team that bid two years to complete a project but a lone guy named Chuck Siska was able to do it by himself in 6 months. You can bet his system was better than their system would have been.
Epic Music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAigCvelkhQ&list=PLo9FRw1AkDuQLEz7Gvvaz3ideB2NpFtT1
https://archive.org/details/softwarelibrary_msdos?&sort=-downloads&page=1
Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you playing an MMORPG?"
Well I know in 2004 I was doing a lot of furious rubbing of... oh, you said crystal balls. My mistake.
Lol, GW2 had 55 people on art alone 2 months ago (was an article about it by the lead of the art department), as many as worked on SWG altogether.
ANET have 270 people working there right now (source: Wikipedia). Some of those are still working on the first GW or doing other stuff but OPs numbers are very suspicious and I would love to see a source on it. 150-200 is a lot more likelier number right now at least.
Yes and no. The engine is really changed by now and few things remain.
It is written by Jeff Strain but have some additional software included they bought from other companies in it to handle certain effects like lightning. I never seen a name on it, it have just been called a heavily modified version of the proprierity engine.
Even assuming these numbers are correct it still doesn't really work out.
GW2 is an evolution of various design concepts of GW1. Everything the devs tried and tested in GW1 was taken into account in the pre-production of GW2. Just because all that time is officially qualified as GW1 production time and not GW2 pre-production time doesn't mean it hasn't got any influence whatsoever.
Same thing goes for using the hero engine of SWToR. That thing has been in development since the late 1990s when it was still Hero's Journey. Just because those dozen years don't count towards SWToR's development time doesn't mean they weren't beneficial. And just because all the people working on that engine aren't counted towards SWToRs development staff doesn't mean they weren't doing a lot of development work for SWToR.
Apply exactly the same to Funcom's Dreamworld engine, that thing's also been used a lot longer then TSW has been in production. All of that time also indirectly benefitting TSW.
None of these games are developed in a vacuum. All of them have people working for them who've worked on other games and are taking all that experience, pre-production time and development time from that game to benefit the one they're developping now. If you want to talk about the quality and effort put into a game you've got to take all relevant factors into account, not just the ones that have conveniently accessable numbers.
We are the bunny.
Resistance is futile.
''/\/\'''''/\/\''''''/\/\
( o.o) ( o.o) ( o.o)
(")("),,(")("),(")(")
I have looked at all the up coming mmo's and my thought runs like this - Continue playing LOTRO and invest in Elder Scrolls: Skyrim(single player). Maybe all 3 will be good but I will never play another Star wars game after a certain incident. P2P and cash shop, no thankyou - playing Lotro that way and 1 is enough. Guild Wars 2? Just not interested in it. All of the above is my opinion and not intended to disparage anyone elses, nor to influence any opinion contrary to mine.
Currently bored with MMO's.
Hmm well Secret World and Guild Wars 2 are the ones to watch... not watching Star Wars since I played beta and then told Gamestop to cancel my reserve and put the money towards Skyrim.
Secret World has it's own niche where it's set with a modern time theme with sorcery and fantasy. Funcom though is a company that's released games that did not do to well (conan for ex.) so they are the risk factor for this game. Weakness shown when they were counting down to the beta sign-up but when it hit 0 nothing happened as the clock was bugged itself or whatever they had intended to happen didn't happen.
Guild Wars looks good, the character skills/spells look decent but still wonder how they will draw me into the story or make me feel apart of the world.
TSW, I intended to play this when i first heard about it about 18mths ago if not more and signed up to the website and newsletter, but Subs plus cash shop, my wallet wont be opening for that. as nice as it looks.
SWtoG, cant make myself like this even though I have tried, all been done before just with light sabers, I can see a lot of people being dissapointed, but we will have to wait and see.
GW2, Everyone I know in RL that has gaming in their blood is gunning for this, I'm not really convinced of the nay sayers that try to diss this game, maybe some might be genuine, but not all. B2P is just win all the way in my book.
At the end of the day this forum only represents a tiny fraction of people who play MMO's. what views/opinions are shown here will never be a true reflection of the general populous.
Arenanet is at almost 300 staff now. been well over 150 for at least 4 years. they have 200 people playing the demo along with the public at game conventions. beta is starting next month and the game uses the engine from the first guild wars, with modifications.
revise the OP.
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Category:ArenaNet_employees
your employee count might be a bit off.
Swtor - Out of the 3, it seems to be more standard imo. I will be trying it, as I am not playing anything atm. I am hoping they have reduced the rails and make exploring the worlds rewarding enough to allow for alternate game play (not just rail/story questing). Worried about the companions/voice over stuff taking away from the mmo feel.
GW2- WvWvW pvp has me very interested....Dynamic quests seem ok...Hoping for some DAoC memories in the WvWvW.
TSW - Like the ideas, guess it will be how well its done....I keep hearing people complain about the cash shop, but from what I could tell it is vanity only?
270 is not almost 300? if you say so. they had nearly 200 Anet characters in game in the Gamescom and PAX demos as well playing with people.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2015645196_brier18.html
O'Brien, 40, is president and executive producer at ArenaNet, a Bellevue studio with 270 employees who build and run "Guild Wars," one of the world's most successful multiplayer online-game franchises.
Just as food for thought...pre-orders for TOR are already at 700K (and that's B&M retailers in the US alone) 1.2 million units would be lowballing the estimate - by alot. Sales (while they matter - and of course, 2 million units would pay for the development handily) aren't TOR's issue though. Retention rates suck for games in the past decade. The numbers that Bioware wants at a minimum would require a 25% retention rate of 2 million sales. That's exceedingly high these days.
Who knows though...all I can say is that I'll be there (on Dec 13th or so when I get EA) and I'll be there for a while. GW2 - waiting and seeing, for me, the only thing interesting is the WvWvW combat. TSW - not interested at all.
I'd argue that in a fashion, SWTOR does have a cash shop. It is in the way CE versions are done these days. You are no longer just buying fluff with your CE, you're buying in game advantages.
Look at RIFT - CE version came with a mount and a larger bag. The mount was originally going to be at level 20, but it became level 1. Purchasing the CE version provides in game advantages. Then they added the AoH edition...which allows you buy bank access anywhere in Telara. Yet another game advantage - think of the person gathering mats without it and the person with it.
So we look at the TOR-CE:
Flare Gun: Fire flares into the air
Training Droid: Hovers at your side for combat assistance
HoloDancer: Project your own holographic dancer
HoloCam: Keep visual records of in-game adventures
STAP: Sleek and unique in-game vehicle
Exclusive Mouse Droid: Spunky Droid to join your adventures
Exclusive Collector's Edition Store: Unique in-game vendor with an assortment of items
Do any of those look like they will provide you an in game advantage over just buying the regular version?
These items though:
Exclusive Gentle Giant Darth Malgus statue
Game disks collectible metal case
The Journal of Master Gnost-Dural as annotated by Satele Shan
The Old Republic galaxy map
Music of Star Wars: The Old Republic CD
High-quality Collector's Edition box
Custom Security Authentication Key
Now those are what one might think of with a normal CE version of a game... that extra nifty stuff for the, oh yeah - Collector!
So I'd argue that right off the back, that with the CE version - there is a cash shop - since you're buying an advantage through a RMT.
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
Explorer: 87%, Killer: 67%, Achiever: 27%, Socializer: 20%
Nothing to discuss here. We all know that compare the the two, ArenaNet is the only one that polishes their game as they go. The other two polishes at the end, which will undoubtly result on many things being overlooked.
ArenaNet's re-iteration process is the key to insure that the game is polished in a certain phase of the game before moving on to the next phase. And they don't announce features unless they are complete and polished. Even though they changed features that they already polished, the new feature is polished before they announce it.
As you can see, it's not about the numbers or the math. ArenaNet's development process is superb compare to the other two which I believe will set GW2 way way apart from the rest.
Just watch the game play videos (not cinematics), you can tell a big difference already on how polished GW2 is compare to the other two.
Ready for GW2!!!
What about TERA?
Well, um... what I know is that I've played several games by Funcom and many games by BioWare. I did a trial of GW and uninstalled it shortly after entering the game.
So uh, what "most of us" know... is not to speak for everybody.
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
Explorer: 87%, Killer: 67%, Achiever: 27%, Socializer: 20%