Originally posted by eddieg50 A failure at half a million players LOL, Vanguard would die to have a quarter that many players
If SWTOR did not go F2P, Vanguard will probably have more pop than SWTOR soon!
SWTOR has gone from 1.7m to 0.5m in 6 months and is still declining, and the 6 month subbers expire this month too, plus some will probably quit and wait for F2P now.
Vanguard goes F2P soon too. It will be interesting to see which one will do the best.
One of Vanguards probelms is similar to SWTOR, in that it does not run too well on older machines (at the time of their release), if at all. Now more people should be able to play Vanguard, yet with SWTOR it will take a few more years for more people to have PCs capable.
Even with newer machines TOR hasn't been smooth for some people. For me I upgraded my video card and ran gamebooster and the game ran like a champ. Then again my rig was bought in 2010 on discount for 600 bucks. MMO makers really need to take this kind of stuff into account if they expect their games to reach a mass audience.
The worst part is that the game is not that graphically stunning. It's just optimized horribly. Witcher 2 looks expotentially better, yet TOR taxes my system more, despite everything on Witcher cranked to the max. There are a few more variables in play with an MMO, but doesn't change the fact they've optimized it terribly.
Originally posted by sammandar In regards to SWTOR being a failure by all means, I would cite SWTOR going F2P, their playerbase loss, the layoffs at Austin, and the firing of Richard Vogel as sufficient evidence of SWTOR's failure.
You could not come up with anything easier and more generic...and less convincing.
1) F2P is a payment model and not a performance qualifier. 2) All games released in recent years followed same trend, even indie ones that has no marketing. It is how market is. 3) Layoffs are part of expense management. EA laid off almost 3k people in 2008-2009 after they acquired Pandemic studios, Take-Two, etc.
Layoffs pretty much always follow an acquisition or merge as you will get staff oversize. You either have alternative work for all those people or you lay them off, simple math.
4) You have no insight into internal affairs leading to Vogel's leave.
Originally posted by pharazonic SWTOR has had its chance the market has spoken.
With 500K subs as of July 31. How many of the 583 games listed on this site alone today have that many? I don't know. I am curious. Of course, many are F2P, so it would be hard to compare
Let me guess... You made a post back before SW:TOR launched saying it would fail and now you are trying validate that post.
I think your definition of "failure" and most other people's definition differ quite a bit. At the very basic element, "Is it making money?" That, to me, defines failure.
Maybe the game failed *you*. Maybe it failed many others. It failed *me* in what I had hoped it would be. That's mainly my own fault Trying to grasp wildly, speaking for others, EA/BioWare included, does not make it so. Did SW:TOR fail in it's goals? Possibly. I don't *know* what their goals were. Neither do you.
They launched with near 200 servers. I think that speaks to what its goals were.....
The worst part is that the game is not that graphically stunning. It's just optimized horribly. Witcher 2 looks expotentially better, yet TOR taxes my system more, despite everything on Witcher cranked to the max. There are a few more variables in play with an MMO, but doesn't change the fact they've optimized it terribly.
Agreed.
When I first played SWTOR I was greatly dissapointed (I guess I fell for the hype); not just graphically speaking. I remember very well one of my friends telling me not to worry, they should be coming out with patches and improving the game, he kept me playing SWTOR (he's a big time star wars fan and actually just recently canceled his sub - big deal for him).
In regards to SWTOR being a failure by all means, I would cite SWTOR going F2P, their playerbase loss, the layoffs at Austin, and the firing of Richard Vogel as sufficient evidence of SWTOR's failure.
You could not come up with anything easier and more generic...and less convincing.
1) F2P is a payment model and not a performance qualifier. 2) All games released in recent years followed same trend, even indie ones that has no marketing. It is how market is. 3) Layoffs are part of expense management. EA laid off almost 3k people in 2008-2009 after they acquired Pandemic studios, Take-Two, etc.
Layoffs pretty much always follow an acquisition or merge as you will get staff oversize. You either have alternative work for all those people or you lay them off, simple math.
4) You have no insight into internal affairs leading to Vogel's leave.
1) True, F2P is a payment model. Point is however, SWTOR was forced to change their payment model due to the fact that they were bleeding subs. Everyone knows this, if SWTOR intended, from the begining, to have the F2P model, why didn't they start with it? The main reason why the went F2P is not because they just decided, on a whim, to change their payment model (or because it was fun and inexpensive), but becaue their current payment model of P2P was unsustainable. In this case, it does become a performance indicator.
2) It is true that it does follow the trend of most games (not WOW so far; though they are F2P to lvl 20). But if you look at the nature of the trend, that also is very revealing. The main reason why most P2P games end up going F2P is because of the loss of subs and the unsuccessful sustainability of the P2P model. The trend is not due to a positive aspect of game development but due to a negative aspect; however natural it may appear.
3) It is true that layoffs are a natural part of business (as in not due to failures), but I would argue not so the case with SWTOR. There were no acquisitions and no major corporate restructuring in connectiong to SWTOR that could have justified the layoffs as anything but as an attempt to save the game. Why else would you fire the devs of a game that is tanking if not to either bring in new devs, attempt to offset epxenses and as means to increase profit in order to save the game.
4) I think it's pretty self evident as the main reason why Richard Vogel left; why else would the executive producer of SWTOR suddnely "leave" right as his game is tanking? I think it's pretty obvious. Off course, corporations will re-word how and why high level execs come and go, not only to save face but in order to not draw panic in regards to their stock value. I'm not criticizing the details of Vogel's "firing", but it didn't come as a surprise; especially due to SWTOR's dismal performance.
Originally posted by pharazonic SWTOR has had its chance the market has spoken.
With 500K subs as of July 31. How many of the 583 games listed on this site alone today have that many? I don't know. I am curious. Of course, many are F2P, so it would be hard to compare
Let me guess... You made a post back before SW:TOR launched saying it would fail and now you are trying validate that post.
I think your definition of "failure" and most other people's definition differ quite a bit. At the very basic element, "Is it making money?" That, to me, defines failure.
Maybe the game failed *you*. Maybe it failed many others. It failed *me* in what I had hoped it would be. That's mainly my own fault Trying to grasp wildly, speaking for others, EA/BioWare included, does not make it so. Did SW:TOR fail in it's goals? Possibly. I don't *know* what their goals were. Neither do you.
They launched with near 200 servers. I think that speaks to what its goals were.....
How you define failure is (in most cases) very much a subjective matter. However, when you are forced to change your payment model, fire devs from the gaming studio, offer free time in order to keep people from leaving your game and having the executive producer of the game suddenly "leave" (prob got fired)? I'm just not sure I can consider that a success.
Originally posted by sammandar 1) Point is however2) unsuccessful sustainability of the P2P model.
See what I did there?
Payment model is a not a performance qualifier, it is a factor.
Change the pricing, change the revenue.
Why would you go F2P from the beginning if you could make more money when released as P2P?
2.4M sales through first month at 60 USD per unit makes 144M USD revenue. You would be stupid to miss that, it is only about profit afterall.
P2P is good for the game releasing(especially the big titles) but becomes a burden later on as it will hinder product competitiveness on the market.
Originally posted by sammandar3) There were no acquisitions and no major corporate restructuring in connectiong to SWTOR that could have justified the layoffs
Except:
Release of SWTOR, ME3, no other projects apart from DA3 or projects not requiring full staff any more.
Layoffs after release are common place, there is no need to keep full development staff.
Originally posted by sammandar4) I think it's pretty self evident
Yes, it is evident to anyone who does not care about evidence...
All in all, all the support for your claims are arguments based on some arbitrary qualifiers or you just don't have any at all...
Originally posted by iceman00 So going from that number to essentially 16..... nothing to see here?
You see same pattern any game released recently follows.
Even tiny indie game such as Perpetuum released the game with about 6k subs just to drop to somewhere around 700-1k in less than 6 months. Same pattern.
This is how market is these days, nothing unusual with SWTOR.
Asheron's Call 2 was Fail. Everquest 2 I'd say is Epic Fail only because, to date, its the closest competition that WoW ever had and due to design choices and management changes its now a mess of fail with a small handful of population that just cant let go.. As for more present (more like prediction) I'm going to say The Secret World (for me) had alot of hype and did nothing but dissappoint me, and so far every mmo that made me regret buying has closed its doors, so I'm watching for that to bomb like the Matrix and Shadowbane and Auto Assault... (Before you jump on me, think about what all the Matrix fanbois said to the people who bitched about how terrible and clunky it was)
Vanguard? Tabula Rasa? Star Wars Galaxies... God I remember these games were preached to be the be all end all of MMOs.
There is alot of competition for "biggest fail" and its also a vague title.
So going from that number to essentially 16..... nothing to see here?
You see same pattern any game released recently follows.
Even tiny indie game such as Perpetuum released the game with about 6k subs just to drop to somewhere around 700-1k in less than 6 months. Same pattern.
This is how market is these days, nothing unusual with SWTOR.
Yet why?
WoW didn't have this.
RIFT had that, but then started getting serious about their game, now they don't have to worry.
It seems that when you offer actual value, you buck what you describe as a trend.
For me, the "Trend" is, make a crap game, people leave it. Make a good game, and focus on actually making your product quality, and people come.
So they opened with around 200 servers. They are now down to 16 or so. We can't estaimte that TOR fell WAY short of expectations based on this?
Payment model is a not a performance qualifier, it is a factor.
Change the pricing, change the revenue.
Why would you go F2P from the beginning if you could make more money when released as P2P?
2.4M sales through first month at 60 USD per unit makes 144M USD revenue. You would be stupid to miss that, it is only about profit afterall.
P2P is good for the game releasing(especially the big titles) but becomes a burden later on as it will hinder product competitiveness on the market.
Originally posted by sammandar
3) There were no acquisitions and no major corporate restructuring in connectiong to SWTOR that could have justified the layoffs
Except:
Release of SWTOR, ME3, no other projects apart from DA3 or projects not requiring full staff any more.
Layoffs after release are common place, there is no need to keep full development staff.
Originally posted by sammandar
4) I think it's pretty self evident
Yes, it is evident to anyone who does not care about evidence...
All in all, all the support for your claims are arguments based on some arbitrary qualifiers or you just don't have any at all...
1. Payment models in a vacuum are not performance qualifiers, they are indeed just factors. However, no game is ever in a vacuum, there is something very important called context. In the context of SWTOR, switching from P2P to F2P, in the environment surrounding SWTOR, the payment model does indeed because a performance qualifier. Bio/EA had to change the pricing in order to change the revenue due to the precipitous loss of revenue via monthly subs. If Bio/EA were expecting this to happen, solely based on the way they attempted to ward off the F2P transition, it is obvious and self evident that Bio/EA were not expecting to transition to F2P this early (roughly 6-7 months after release). And mind you, it wasn't 6-7 months of epic success; when you're sub revenue is approx $144 million compared to the development costs of at least $200-300 million (and that's being very conservative), I don't see how this follows a healthy natural trend (I don't think anyone but you and a couple others in denial do).
2. Why switch from P2P to F2P if there was nothing wrong with the game; if everything was going just normal. You claim the situation to be "normal", yet you fail to acknowledge that the reason for the change in pricing, in order to change the revenue, was due to a lack of sufficient (expected) revenue. As to the product competitiveness, post release, I wonder why the product suffers? In the case of SWTOR, it was quite obvious why they were suffering; players were jumping ship in vast numbers. So huge were the throngs of players leaving that Bio/EA had to give away free time and make the first 15 levels F2P; and still that wasn't (and isn't) enough. Normal? no way!
3. Layoffs are commonplace in business, but not at the level, degree and timing with regards to SWTOR; at least not in a healthy situation. Just because anyone ever gets fired it does not mean it is part of a healthy normal trend; people always get fired for multiple reasons, the key, as always is the context. With regards to SWTOR, the layoffs were in direct correlation to SWTOR's failures; including Vogel's.
4. What you're doing is picking and choosing examples in the mmo genre which by themselves (in a vacuum) are in essence just simple factors which do not portray the situation of any game. What you fail to acknowledge, and I'm starting to believe you are doing this on purpose, is to completely ignore that all these factors are to be taken within the context of the game; no trend is "normal" because no game is the same. You're completely ignoring the context, in this case, specifically SWTOR's context.
5. As to evidence, we have given plenty of context to the situation, the vast majority of journalists, gaming experts and reviewers all agree in unison that SWTOR was/is a failure. The number of people in agreement does not necessarily constitute validity, but it does lend to the reliability of our argument. All you have done is pontificated about factors in a vacuum whilst ignoring the context of the situation SWTOR is currently undergoing.
6. In summary, you fail to recognize SWTOR's unique situation and context. You spout out random "factors" in the evolution of a games without taking anything into account except for the flawed belief that somehow all games are the same and all somehow were made and exist in a vacuum; no context. Your failure to acknowledge what is most basic to the vast majority of everyone who understands anything about SWTOR's current situation baffles me. As to whether or not SWTOR is a failure is not necessarily the question, it is how much of a failure it is.
So going from that number to essentially 16..... nothing to see here?
You see same pattern any game released recently follows. Even tiny indie game such as Perpetuum released the game with about 6k subs just to drop to somewhere around 700-1k in less than 6 months. Same pattern. This is how market is these days, nothing unusual with SWTOR.
Yet why?
WoW didn't have this.
RIFT had that, but then started getting serious about their game, now they don't have to worry.
It seems that when you offer actual value, you buck what you describe as a trend.
For me, the "Trend" is, make a crap game, people leave it. Make a good game, and focus on actually making your product quality, and people come.
So they opened with around 200 servers. They are now down to 16 or so. We can't estaimte that TOR fell WAY short of expectations based on this?
According to him no, because there is no other context other than normal healthy trends which are all equal accross the board; no such thing as a poorly made game.
Blue: That is about the only true trend. Though people will define differently what is good and bad, I think there are general agreements amongst players as to what is good and what is bad; best example, WOW vs SWTOR. How can two big budget, big name games be completely different? WOW is a good game whereas SWTOR is not.
I just don't see why its so hard to admit that SWTOR has failed.
In August, just six weeks after the release of All Points Bulletin, the company filed for bankruptcy, laid off much of its work force, and closed its office in Boulder, Colo.
Actually, that's a very good point. I guess if we defined failure by the amount of money lost, then yes, maybe so. However, we would need to know how much money Bio/EA have lost from SWTOR. I'm not referring to them not making money, I'm referring to the lost income due to how bad the game has performed. Bio/EA invested heavily in SWTOR and I wonder how much of it have they recuperated. People are saying Bio/EA made approx $144 million from the monthly subs, yet how much did the game cost to produce/develop? ($200-$300-$500 million?).
The game was not designed well to last as a P2P model, and was too dependent on the IP, and alt playing to keep player's interest.
It was a bad game plan by swtor developers from the beginning, which greatly hurts the future of the game since there is a lot of side questing which is a huge developmental cost which is only better than the 'other MMOs' grind quests the first time or 2nd time on opposing faction as many have stated... but the problem/difference is in other MMOs the questing is simple and easy to develop wether it is the main quest line or filler quests, and normally have a sense of being well developed at the time of thier release as well. In swtor the story may be good, but it takes a lot more effort than text quests and this huge cost to development is done with side quests as well... and to many players the end game did not feel as developed to them for release - there is more now, but slightly more.
So swtor devs were not practical with thier money and overdeveloped the questing phase of thier game, which made their end game under deverloped or other non existant features not developed at launch and still at this point several months into the game's release.
Simply put, BW does not listen. I have seen the forums talk about the importance of pvp, world pvp, objectives, player housing, pvp mini games etc, and BW markets themselves as listenting developers and blames thier customers for 'listening' and making an MMO they wanted... when they did not make a Kotor with mini games or a WoW with the open world pvp that WoW has or even large BGs are still not included or possibly planned for the near future - that is a huge fail by BW to not make huge scale pvp soon. They only focus on what they excel at but at a very costly rate of other opportunities, and do use a lot of resources for side quests which makes the journey feel long winded 2nd time through, and a player will have to escape this monotony with WZs, FPs, heroics, space combat... which do exist as alternatives but some of these alternatives are also part of the end game. So after one class story, side quests barely matter as an interest to the player as it has been voiced many times by players in the forums and thier dislike of side quests.
So BW should transition to F2P, since the hype has died down and since the story alone is not worth a monthly sub (or limited end game), but also should change how they develop thier game. They should make thier side quests text based, but also make them more significant with alternating paths, or more of a concequence to the environment. This would increase the value of the mechanics of side quests, and make it more affordable to develop as well... freeing up resources so BW can make the feautres that would make swtor a great game such as mini games, 3d space combat, and all the expected end game content for thier P2P/F2P hybrid model to succeed.
The story in swtor now is free, so that means they need to focus on making other parts better - I hope they realize that. Since I only ever cared for the main story, and the only side story/quest worthy of a VO would be detailing important figures, or histories of swtor. Any small task was insignificant just like in any other game, and VO does not change that. However, VO in the main sotry, or in quests of interest do greatly increase the expereince but they over did that expereince by making it feel long winded with non important side quests which, imo, affected the story or other quests of interests as well.
So the only quests that should be VO, are quests with important figures, class story, FPs, and world arcs and that should exclude heroics as they already are excluding VO for that, but are still fun to play, and a lot of side quests should exclude VO but have fun mechanics in them.
Write bad things that are done to you in sand, but write the good things that happen to you on a piece of marble
There will never be a WoW killer at this point it will eventually bow out with gracce for the years its been successful, When ever that is. Im not a WoW fan but put it this way calling something a wow killer when its been around for eight years or so is like having a 60 year old boxing champion and bring in a 21 year old undefeated boxer and saying yea we got this champ killer here.
Originally posted by BLeeDzACiD There will never be a WoW killer at this point it will eventually bow out with gracce for the years its been successful, When ever that is. Im not a WoW fan but put it this way calling something a wow killer when its been around for eight years or so is like having a 60 year old boxing champion and bring in a 21 year old undefeated boxer and saying yea we got this champ killer here.
My money would be on the 21 year old who is healthy enough to take a beating and recover. If the 21 year old takes a beating the first time, but gives a beating in return he should heal quicker for the next fight to win that one.
So my response is not against your example, but how it translates to MMOs is that with hype being a new MMO and something different, an MMO has a stronger fighting chance to make changes and introduce new moves (game features) that the old dog cant learn.
WoW will never (or more accuractely I should say for all examples- does not include 'atm') have player housing, which would make it a greater game. WoW will never have/does not include sand box mechanics with sieging, and player/guild housing. WoW will never be a Sci-fi fantasy. WoW will never have/does not include gambling. WoW will never have bounties set by players. WoW will never have/does not include water combat. WoW will never have/does not include fun mini games like racing. WoW will never have lore that is conflicted with mature content of sister kissing, SGRA, and other mature content allowing for mature themes in the game such as gambling, or gore and thus the game should be more for adults rather than kids.
Write bad things that are done to you in sand, but write the good things that happen to you on a piece of marble
Auto Assault and Tabula Rasa with their short runs were the biggest failure IMO. But for the being big budget massively supported by a HUGE company the has got to be a top 10 of all time for MMO's. I would rate it an EPIC FAIL. Some one here at MMORPG needs to rate this SW:TOR among the other failed MMO'.
Comments
The worst part is that the game is not that graphically stunning. It's just optimized horribly. Witcher 2 looks expotentially better, yet TOR taxes my system more, despite everything on Witcher cranked to the max. There are a few more variables in play with an MMO, but doesn't change the fact they've optimized it terribly.
You could not come up with anything easier and more generic...and less convincing.
1) F2P is a payment model and not a performance qualifier.
2) All games released in recent years followed same trend, even indie ones that has no marketing. It is how market is.
3) Layoffs are part of expense management. EA laid off almost 3k people in 2008-2009 after they acquired Pandemic studios, Take-Two, etc.
Layoffs pretty much always follow an acquisition or merge as you will get staff oversize. You either have alternative work for all those people or you lay them off, simple math.
4) You have no insight into internal affairs leading to Vogel's leave.
They launched with near 200 servers. I think that speaks to what its goals were.....
Agreed.
When I first played SWTOR I was greatly dissapointed (I guess I fell for the hype); not just graphically speaking. I remember very well one of my friends telling me not to worry, they should be coming out with patches and improving the game, he kept me playing SWTOR (he's a big time star wars fan and actually just recently canceled his sub - big deal for him).
Yes, because their goal was to set server capacity deeply below release sales expectations so they can have 1 week waiting queues.
I think Blizzard did exactly the same with Diablo 3 - intentionally underperforming server capacity to achieve the highest queue times possible.
and there were still queues
This argument is seeing spilled milk and immediately suspecting a cow.
Ah, right. Their expectations being exceeded makes them not having any...yeah, you got it all in place as I can see.
1) True, F2P is a payment model. Point is however, SWTOR was forced to change their payment model due to the fact that they were bleeding subs. Everyone knows this, if SWTOR intended, from the begining, to have the F2P model, why didn't they start with it? The main reason why the went F2P is not because they just decided, on a whim, to change their payment model (or because it was fun and inexpensive), but becaue their current payment model of P2P was unsustainable. In this case, it does become a performance indicator.
2) It is true that it does follow the trend of most games (not WOW so far; though they are F2P to lvl 20). But if you look at the nature of the trend, that also is very revealing. The main reason why most P2P games end up going F2P is because of the loss of subs and the unsuccessful sustainability of the P2P model. The trend is not due to a positive aspect of game development but due to a negative aspect; however natural it may appear.
3) It is true that layoffs are a natural part of business (as in not due to failures), but I would argue not so the case with SWTOR. There were no acquisitions and no major corporate restructuring in connectiong to SWTOR that could have justified the layoffs as anything but as an attempt to save the game. Why else would you fire the devs of a game that is tanking if not to either bring in new devs, attempt to offset epxenses and as means to increase profit in order to save the game.
4) I think it's pretty self evident as the main reason why Richard Vogel left; why else would the executive producer of SWTOR suddnely "leave" right as his game is tanking? I think it's pretty obvious. Off course, corporations will re-word how and why high level execs come and go, not only to save face but in order to not draw panic in regards to their stock value. I'm not criticizing the details of Vogel's "firing", but it didn't come as a surprise; especially due to SWTOR's dismal performance.
How you define failure is (in most cases) very much a subjective matter. However, when you are forced to change your payment model, fire devs from the gaming studio, offer free time in order to keep people from leaving your game and having the executive producer of the game suddenly "leave" (prob got fired)? I'm just not sure I can consider that a success.
So going from that number to essentially 16..... nothing to see here?
See what I did there?
Payment model is a not a performance qualifier, it is a factor.
Change the pricing, change the revenue.
Why would you go F2P from the beginning if you could make more money when released as P2P?
2.4M sales through first month at 60 USD per unit makes 144M USD revenue. You would be stupid to miss that, it is only about profit afterall.
P2P is good for the game releasing(especially the big titles) but becomes a burden later on as it will hinder product competitiveness on the market.
Except:Release of SWTOR, ME3, no other projects apart from DA3 or projects not requiring full staff any more.
Layoffs after release are common place, there is no need to keep full development staff.
Yes, it is evident to anyone who does not care about evidence...
All in all, all the support for your claims are arguments based on some arbitrary qualifiers or you just don't have any at all...
You see same pattern any game released recently follows.
Even tiny indie game such as Perpetuum released the game with about 6k subs just to drop to somewhere around 700-1k in less than 6 months. Same pattern.
This is how market is these days, nothing unusual with SWTOR.
Asheron's Call 2 was Fail. Everquest 2 I'd say is Epic Fail only because, to date, its the closest competition that WoW ever had and due to design choices and management changes its now a mess of fail with a small handful of population that just cant let go.. As for more present (more like prediction) I'm going to say The Secret World (for me) had alot of hype and did nothing but dissappoint me, and so far every mmo that made me regret buying has closed its doors, so I'm watching for that to bomb like the Matrix and Shadowbane and Auto Assault... (Before you jump on me, think about what all the Matrix fanbois said to the people who bitched about how terrible and clunky it was)
Vanguard? Tabula Rasa? Star Wars Galaxies... God I remember these games were preached to be the be all end all of MMOs.
There is alot of competition for "biggest fail" and its also a vague title.
Yet why?
WoW didn't have this.
RIFT had that, but then started getting serious about their game, now they don't have to worry.
It seems that when you offer actual value, you buck what you describe as a trend.
For me, the "Trend" is, make a crap game, people leave it. Make a good game, and focus on actually making your product quality, and people come.
So they opened with around 200 servers. They are now down to 16 or so. We can't estaimte that TOR fell WAY short of expectations based on this?
Funny thing is, if there was a game that was released with this terms;
CEO of the company said: This will destroy everything, WoW included!
It had a budget of 100 billion!
It had a fanbase with half the population on earth!
It made the internet shut down on launch!
And if this very game was shut down one week later due to only 1 subcsriber (the CEO himself)....then.....
The fanboys would still claim the game as a success!! The gravestone is the most pretty around!
Get it! Fanboys are Fanboys!
SWTOR not a failure? LOL
1. Payment models in a vacuum are not performance qualifiers, they are indeed just factors. However, no game is ever in a vacuum, there is something very important called context. In the context of SWTOR, switching from P2P to F2P, in the environment surrounding SWTOR, the payment model does indeed because a performance qualifier. Bio/EA had to change the pricing in order to change the revenue due to the precipitous loss of revenue via monthly subs. If Bio/EA were expecting this to happen, solely based on the way they attempted to ward off the F2P transition, it is obvious and self evident that Bio/EA were not expecting to transition to F2P this early (roughly 6-7 months after release). And mind you, it wasn't 6-7 months of epic success; when you're sub revenue is approx $144 million compared to the development costs of at least $200-300 million (and that's being very conservative), I don't see how this follows a healthy natural trend (I don't think anyone but you and a couple others in denial do).
2. Why switch from P2P to F2P if there was nothing wrong with the game; if everything was going just normal. You claim the situation to be "normal", yet you fail to acknowledge that the reason for the change in pricing, in order to change the revenue, was due to a lack of sufficient (expected) revenue. As to the product competitiveness, post release, I wonder why the product suffers? In the case of SWTOR, it was quite obvious why they were suffering; players were jumping ship in vast numbers. So huge were the throngs of players leaving that Bio/EA had to give away free time and make the first 15 levels F2P; and still that wasn't (and isn't) enough. Normal? no way!
3. Layoffs are commonplace in business, but not at the level, degree and timing with regards to SWTOR; at least not in a healthy situation. Just because anyone ever gets fired it does not mean it is part of a healthy normal trend; people always get fired for multiple reasons, the key, as always is the context. With regards to SWTOR, the layoffs were in direct correlation to SWTOR's failures; including Vogel's.
4. What you're doing is picking and choosing examples in the mmo genre which by themselves (in a vacuum) are in essence just simple factors which do not portray the situation of any game. What you fail to acknowledge, and I'm starting to believe you are doing this on purpose, is to completely ignore that all these factors are to be taken within the context of the game; no trend is "normal" because no game is the same. You're completely ignoring the context, in this case, specifically SWTOR's context.
5. As to evidence, we have given plenty of context to the situation, the vast majority of journalists, gaming experts and reviewers all agree in unison that SWTOR was/is a failure. The number of people in agreement does not necessarily constitute validity, but it does lend to the reliability of our argument. All you have done is pontificated about factors in a vacuum whilst ignoring the context of the situation SWTOR is currently undergoing.
6. In summary, you fail to recognize SWTOR's unique situation and context. You spout out random "factors" in the evolution of a games without taking anything into account except for the flawed belief that somehow all games are the same and all somehow were made and exist in a vacuum; no context. Your failure to acknowledge what is most basic to the vast majority of everyone who understands anything about SWTOR's current situation baffles me. As to whether or not SWTOR is a failure is not necessarily the question, it is how much of a failure it is.
According to him no, because there is no other context other than normal healthy trends which are all equal accross the board; no such thing as a poorly made game.
Blue: That is about the only true trend. Though people will define differently what is good and bad, I think there are general agreements amongst players as to what is good and what is bad; best example, WOW vs SWTOR. How can two big budget, big name games be completely different? WOW is a good game whereas SWTOR is not.
I just don't see why its so hard to admit that SWTOR has failed.
APB had a budget of $100 million and the company filed for bankruptcy
thats a bigger failure
http://venturebeat.com/2010/09/16/realtime-worlds-to-shut-all-points-bulletin-in-one-of-gamings-greatest-flops/
In August, just six weeks after the release of All Points Bulletin, the company filed for bankruptcy, laid off much of its work force, and closed its office in Boulder, Colo.
EQ2 fan sites
Actually, that's a very good point. I guess if we defined failure by the amount of money lost, then yes, maybe so. However, we would need to know how much money Bio/EA have lost from SWTOR. I'm not referring to them not making money, I'm referring to the lost income due to how bad the game has performed. Bio/EA invested heavily in SWTOR and I wonder how much of it have they recuperated. People are saying Bio/EA made approx $144 million from the monthly subs, yet how much did the game cost to produce/develop? ($200-$300-$500 million?).
The game was not designed well to last as a P2P model, and was too dependent on the IP, and alt playing to keep player's interest.
It was a bad game plan by swtor developers from the beginning, which greatly hurts the future of the game since there is a lot of side questing which is a huge developmental cost which is only better than the 'other MMOs' grind quests the first time or 2nd time on opposing faction as many have stated... but the problem/difference is in other MMOs the questing is simple and easy to develop wether it is the main quest line or filler quests, and normally have a sense of being well developed at the time of thier release as well. In swtor the story may be good, but it takes a lot more effort than text quests and this huge cost to development is done with side quests as well... and to many players the end game did not feel as developed to them for release - there is more now, but slightly more.
So swtor devs were not practical with thier money and overdeveloped the questing phase of thier game, which made their end game under deverloped or other non existant features not developed at launch and still at this point several months into the game's release.
Simply put, BW does not listen. I have seen the forums talk about the importance of pvp, world pvp, objectives, player housing, pvp mini games etc, and BW markets themselves as listenting developers and blames thier customers for 'listening' and making an MMO they wanted... when they did not make a Kotor with mini games or a WoW with the open world pvp that WoW has or even large BGs are still not included or possibly planned for the near future - that is a huge fail by BW to not make huge scale pvp soon. They only focus on what they excel at but at a very costly rate of other opportunities, and do use a lot of resources for side quests which makes the journey feel long winded 2nd time through, and a player will have to escape this monotony with WZs, FPs, heroics, space combat... which do exist as alternatives but some of these alternatives are also part of the end game. So after one class story, side quests barely matter as an interest to the player as it has been voiced many times by players in the forums and thier dislike of side quests.
So BW should transition to F2P, since the hype has died down and since the story alone is not worth a monthly sub (or limited end game), but also should change how they develop thier game. They should make thier side quests text based, but also make them more significant with alternating paths, or more of a concequence to the environment. This would increase the value of the mechanics of side quests, and make it more affordable to develop as well... freeing up resources so BW can make the feautres that would make swtor a great game such as mini games, 3d space combat, and all the expected end game content for thier P2P/F2P hybrid model to succeed.
The story in swtor now is free, so that means they need to focus on making other parts better - I hope they realize that. Since I only ever cared for the main story, and the only side story/quest worthy of a VO would be detailing important figures, or histories of swtor. Any small task was insignificant just like in any other game, and VO does not change that. However, VO in the main sotry, or in quests of interest do greatly increase the expereince but they over did that expereince by making it feel long winded with non important side quests which, imo, affected the story or other quests of interests as well.
So the only quests that should be VO, are quests with important figures, class story, FPs, and world arcs and that should exclude heroics as they already are excluding VO for that, but are still fun to play, and a lot of side quests should exclude VO but have fun mechanics in them.
Write bad things that are done to you in sand, but write the good things that happen to you on a piece of marble
My money would be on the 21 year old who is healthy enough to take a beating and recover. If the 21 year old takes a beating the first time, but gives a beating in return he should heal quicker for the next fight to win that one.
So my response is not against your example, but how it translates to MMOs is that with hype being a new MMO and something different, an MMO has a stronger fighting chance to make changes and introduce new moves (game features) that the old dog cant learn.
WoW will never (or more accuractely I should say for all examples- does not include 'atm') have player housing, which would make it a greater game. WoW will never have/does not include sand box mechanics with sieging, and player/guild housing. WoW will never be a Sci-fi fantasy. WoW will never have/does not include gambling. WoW will never have bounties set by players. WoW will never have/does not include water combat. WoW will never have/does not include fun mini games like racing. WoW will never have lore that is conflicted with mature content of sister kissing, SGRA, and other mature content allowing for mature themes in the game such as gambling, or gore and thus the game should be more for adults rather than kids.
Write bad things that are done to you in sand, but write the good things that happen to you on a piece of marble