I dunno Bill. On one hand SoE appears to be trying to do things right. On the other, after my horrible beta experience with Dragon's Prophet, I still see the same old SoE casual disregard for their customers when it comes to squeezing a few extra dollars out of their wallets. For example look at the recent $50 1 day pony fiasco that the EQ2 team put out or the fact that right before the Dragon's Prophet open beta they dropped the pre-order pack prices by 25% to get more sales thereby basically pooing all over their early supporters.
I'm watching EQ:N but through a very skeptical lens. SoE has done some monumentally stupid things and I don't think they've entirely learned their lesson. Proceed with caution.
I bought a TV at Wal-Mart the first day they carried it. Then two months later those bastards had a sale and sold it 25% cheaper!
How dare they crap all over us "early adopters" by offering sales!
That isn't what happened though is it? This isn't a TV and shallow thoughtless analogies don't really do it justice.
What happened is they offered a pre-order for a game for early adopters and either didn't sell enough or just wanted more money (which is more like SoE behavior) so before the game launched they dropped the pre-order price to entice more sales.
In your TV analogy it would be like going to WalMart and pre-ordering a new flat screen TV for $500 two weeks early and coming in the following week to see that the pre-orders are now $375, but WalMart won't honor the price reduction. In your analogy world if I purchased this from WalMart or Amazon I would be able to either be refunded the difference or return my original pre-order and buy it at the new price. SoE offered neither of these.
The scenario you describe is more like Rift's approach with their box fees. If you buy early you pay full price. If you buy 3 months down the road you get to purchase it at a cheaper price. That is completely different from this situation.
They did totally shit on their early adopters and in more than one way because they weren't forthcoming about how their item packs with regard to housing worked either.
It was worth the risk to me because I get 9k SC out of it so it's not a total loss, but it totally reinforced why I typically don't do preorders and why I especially don't trust SoE to screw me over for a buck. They are totally within their right to do what they did. I'm not disputing that, but now I could give two shits about their game and I have no loyalty to them or their game.
This is why I'm an opportunist. Even though I get burnt on taking the risk sometimes (like this one) I always use game publishers and developers to my advantage with no remorse.
I'm with Torvald on this one. To a degree.
I totally get the TV sale analogy and think it is a good arguement other than the fact these packs were a preorder deal. SOE should have honored the new lower price.
I wouldn't go so far as to label them the devil though.
I disagree, the game was worth the investment when you purchased it, nothings changed for you ( hypothetical you). Most of us played in-between then and the price drop as well. The only room in the discussion is for those who didn't play before the price drop and/or purchased the package days/hours/moments before the drop. The TV analogy works, we all were using the product prior to the price drop. ( BTW I purchased a package a weekish ( + or - ) before the price drop, only played the beta for an hour)
I was there well before EQ2 and Wow and to be honest i was not a big EQ1 fan and absolutely nothing Blizzard had out impressed me either.
I was actually first talked into Eq1 by a lady friend i met playing UT99,so i tried it,never liked it.
So when Eq2 was coming out i was only slightly interested and Blizzard was still no where on my radar.
Eq2 was released i bought it and played it.I thought it was pretty good,but back then i was buying almost every new game ,so a few weeks later i also bought Wow.
Back then as now i couldn't care less about marketing or hype or numbers.What i saw when i stepped into Wow was what looked to me a MUCH inferior product when compared to EQ2.Liek i said i had no care for numbers ,but i would have bet anything that no way Wow would be much of a hit,it looked too cheap and amateurish.
Prime example was when i started in EQ2 i quickly was enthralled in this giant city of Freeport,it showed me a lot of effort.When i was in Wow i saw nothing,just a cheap looking hub with a few Npc's to give me quests.The comparison was like night and day,one game enticed me early the other was a total turn off.
Fast forward many years alter and now both developers turn me off.They both have spent every year copying each other and trying their best to completely dumb down the RPG experience and turn gaming in to something superficial like cash shop or instances.
Blizzard has shown me nothing that they are a AAA developer,they still house an amateur game engine,they still can't port to consoles,they still deliver low end graphics.Soe has completely dumb down EQ2 to where now it is nothing but a constant everyday maintenance schedule to update the cash shop.
I have absolutely no confidence in Blizzard and in SOE i expect shallow gaming directed at cash shop sales.So both of these games need to be overly impressive or i couldn't care less.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
I dunno Bill. On one hand SoE appears to be trying to do things right. On the other, after my horrible beta experience with Dragon's Prophet, I still see the same old SoE casual disregard for their customers when it comes to squeezing a few extra dollars out of their wallets. For example look at the recent $50 1 day pony fiasco that the EQ2 team put out or the fact that right before the Dragon's Prophet open beta they dropped the pre-order pack prices by 25% to get more sales thereby basically pooing all over their early supporters.
I'm watching EQ:N but through a very skeptical lens. SoE has done some monumentally stupid things and I don't think they've entirely learned their lesson. Proceed with caution.
Well, if you played EQ2 (and you don't) you'd know what I was talking about. There is a whole history to Dave and his features that you just weren't there for. I'm not here to educate you on a long history.
Thing is, on paper it sounds awesome, hence your comment "the idea of it is pretty neat". Idea is the keyword. The implementation of his "features" are another matter altogether. Universally, they were either half-baked, altogether broken, rejected due to their sheer stupidity by the community, or abandoned altogether and scrapped.
Well stupid or not, gotta give him credit for trying things no other company is doing. even if he has a big mouth and ideas that are far fetched. Hopefully they've learned their lessons and will make EQNext something great. I know I am in the minority, but I will be hoping for something a lot more like EQ1 personally
Yeah watching EQnext unfold is going to be really interesting, they have a great opportunity to make some thing amazing and unique, but they need to step back from any terrible money making systems, 50 station cash for a resurrect on your dead character in dragons prophet, really ? ! lol..
Originally posted by heffy4life Eqnext i hope is subscriptions... keep all the kiddies out of the game raging everywhere.
I have no doubt it will be hybrid.
No way SOE is just doing pure subs these days.
they have gone on record as saying it will be a F2P model like they use for the current games, EQ, EQ2, VG, PS2 etc.
i take what they say with a huge pinch of salt, having played SWG from launch to the NGE/CU and EQ2 just after launch until about a year ago.
i really want this game to be good, but i cannot help but have doubts, this is SOE we're talking about! i dont believe they learn from any of their mistakes, they just seem to sweep it under the carpet and pretend it never happened.
i will also add that anyone who is expecting a huge "pure" sandbox style game i think will be massively disappointed, at best it will be some type of theme park/sandbox hybrid, probably leaning more towards themeparks.
Originally posted by heffy4life Eqnext i hope is subscriptions... keep all the kiddies out of the game raging everywhere.
I have no doubt it will be hybrid.
No way SOE is just doing pure subs these days.
they have gone on record as saying it will be a F2P model like they use for the current games, EQ, EQ2, VG, PS2 etc.
What many call 'F2P' are actually hybrid models though, featuring subs that are essential to the overall revenue. They just like putting the 'F2P' brand on things because the word 'free' is appealing to many.
I would consider a pure 'F2P' title to be one that relies exclusively on a cash shop for ongoing income, no subs offered.
i take what they say with a huge pinch of salt, having played SWG from launch to the NGE/CU and EQ2 just after launch until about a year ago.
i really want this game to be good, but i cannot help but have doubts, this is SOE we're talking about! i dont believe they learn from any of their mistakes, they just seem to sweep it under the carpet and pretend it never happened.
i will also add that anyone who is expecting a huge "pure" sandbox style game i think will be massively disappointed, at best it will be some type of theme park/sandbox hybrid, probably leaning more towards themeparks.
I tend to agree with your post here. I have seen first hand the way SOE say whatever they think the people want to hear at any given time and simply disregard it when it suits them. First rule is SOE lies. They are expert frog boilers.
I don't get why people are thinking this might be like EQ1 at all really... haven't SOE stated that it has been built to offer a very different experience than their existing titles and has been designed to sit alongside them rather than replace them?
I imagine alot of us EQ vets are going to be disappointed with EQ next......I'd be willing to bet its going to be yet another quest driven game with voice acting and cutscenes and crap gameplay....Theres no way this game can live up to the hype.
I dunno Bill. On one hand SoE appears to be trying to do things right. On the other, after my horrible beta experience with Dragon's Prophet, I still see the same old SoE casual disregard for their customers when it comes to squeezing a few extra dollars out of their wallets. For example look at the recent $50 1 day pony fiasco that the EQ2 team put out or the fact that right before the Dragon's Prophet open beta they dropped the pre-order pack prices by 25% to get more sales thereby basically pooing all over their early supporters.
I'm watching EQ:N but through a very skeptical lens. SoE has done some monumentally stupid things and I don't think they've entirely learned their lesson. Proceed with caution.
QFT
*cough* SWG NGE *cough*
I'd say the #1 issue with SOE is that they are completely out of touch with their customers. By that, I mean there have been several fundamental issues over the years that produced many feedback threads with (not exaggerating) thousands of posts and hundreds of pages from their customers that got ignored for months. Months! The most recent one involved their selling off the European community to a half-rate TV company in Germany for "publishing". They made this catastrophic announcement, the community went into an uproar, and they blatantly ignored the community for months which resulted in the loss of hundreds (thousands?) of accounts. They don't communicate, and they treat their customers with contempt.
Out of curiosity, I took a peek into the Dragon Prophet forums to see how that was going. Abysmal is a word I would use. The same SOE schtick of terrible communication and poor treatment of their customers.
So, you're right, they haven't learned. Its the same people running the show as before, doing the same song and dance. You can't teach Smed new tricks, and his devious little imp (Dave Georgeson) perches on his shoulder and whispers sweet honey in his ear.
Nope Bill, you're not going to put your hooks in me this time. You know what they say "fool me once shame on you, fool me 20 times.... I ain't bitin' " I've been burned way too many times by the hype from this site. It's not going to happen again. I am thoroughly convinced that Sony, Activision, EA, NCSoft, Cryptic et al (excluding CCP) can't make an MMORPG worth playing. The line of pathetic, bug laden, cash grabbing MMORPG corpses, for me, stops now.
We're tired Bill. Stop hyping games years before you're ready to give us video of actual game play (not some animated trailer). Work harder at getting information about games that are coming out in a month, not years down the road. Dig deeper into them... flesh out the story a bit... do some actual reporting and less PR.
Originally posted by Torvaldr I dunno Bill. On one hand SoE appears to be trying to do things right. On the other, after my horrible beta experience with Dragon's Prophet, I still see the same old SoE casual disregard for their customers when it comes to squeezing a few extra dollars out of their wallets. For example look at the recent $50 1 day pony fiasco that the EQ2 team put out or the fact that right before the Dragon's Prophet open beta they dropped the pre-order pack prices by 25% to get more sales thereby basically pooing all over their early supporters.I'm watching EQ:N but through a very skeptical lens. SoE has done some monumentally stupid things and I don't think they've entirely learned their lesson. Proceed with caution.
QFT
*cough* SWG NGE *cough*
How is it that anyone expects anything different from SOE, when it is all the same people still driving the bus? Smed was in charge when customers were tossed over before, at all the various times (and when did SOE alienate YOU as a customer?) and he and his cronies are still in charge. SOE just gaffed a bunch of people on pre-order prices? Not a surprise. I seem to recall Einstein saying the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.
And as an added bit, it should be noted that Bill has a long standing and personal relationship with one or more SOE employees, that he does not generally disclaim when reviewing/discussing their products. It is things like this that have called MMORPG.com's credibility into question.
Originally posted by Burntvet And as an added bit, it should be noted that Bill has a long standing and personal relationship with one or more SOE employees, that he does not generally disclaim when reviewing/discussing their products. It is things like this that have called MMORPG.com's credibility into question.
Well, in the interviews he's done with them, I'd have to say that I've seen what you allude to. Very carefully prepared Q & A's that only shine the best light on SOE. One interview sticks in my mind, the one where Bill is chatting to Dave about the F2P transition, and it was nauseatingly clear what was going on.
Titan has been a façade since year one of WOW. There is no such game and never will be a game come from this. Anyone that has been around gaming for any length of time knows that Titan has been thrown around for years and nothing has ever surfaced from it.
Originally posted by Burntvet And as an added bit, it should be noted that Bill has a long standing and personal relationship with one or more SOE employees, that he does not generally disclaim when reviewing/discussing their products. It is things like this that have called MMORPG.com's credibility into question.
Well, in the interviews he's done with them, I'd have to say that I've seen what you allude to. Very carefully prepared Q & A's that only shine the best light on SOE. One interview sticks in my mind, the one where Bill is chatting to Dave about the F2P transition, and it was nauseatingly clear what was going on.
Bill has acknowledged his friendships with SOE people in the past, but if you didn't know that, you might take his opinions at face value. In other industries, disclosure is the key. Notice how on the financial shows, they always have a box when journalists/analysts are talking about some stock or company with stuff like: Owns the stock, Family owns the stock, Company/Fund owns the stock, etc., that is called "disclosure". Real journalists / sites insist on that. Sadly, it does not much happen in the gaming press.
I would expect a new press announcement just about any moment now.
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.
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 have great hopes for EQ Next. The Forgelight engine seems to work pretty well in Planetside 2.
My greatest fear is also my greatest hope - The Smedley. He single-handedly crushed the life out of Star Wars Galaxies, one of the last sandboxes. He says he has learned his lesson, but who knows? It could be a trick or just P.R.
Can we really trust the man? I think most SWG veterans want to see proof first of what is intended for EQ Next.
I have set a lot of my hopes for the MMORPG genre on this game. We are in dire need of change and I believe SOE will be able to turn the tide for mmo's once and for all, they seem to understand that we want something different. That we, the gamers, are not waiting for another themepark / quest hub game.
If a big company like SOE understands this, and are working on building the ultimate sandbox, then all we can do is put our hopes in this game, they might finally give us back the RPG in the MMO's.
I think it's funny that there's so much hatred for Smed...yet so much love for original EQ (which was Smed's baby).
He got a bad rap for SWG despite the fact that it was a Lucas Arts decision to do the GU..and a Lucas Arts decision to keep the changes even after the initial horrendous reaction, just look up quotes from the now fired head of the project.
(forgot her name a long time ago, but she got axed shortly after saying something like "give the game 3 months, it'll bounce back" )
Loved EQ. Played the hell of of that game back in '99 through '04, when EQ2 and WoW released. Really enjoyed that sense of danger... running from Qeynos to Freeport sans SoW, the trains through Blackburrow, etc. No game has captured that sense of awe I had when I first stepped into Norrath.
You know, back when it was designed by Brad McQuaid for Verant and Sony, Smed, et al had little actual influence over game design decisions.
Comments
I disagree, the game was worth the investment when you purchased it, nothings changed for you ( hypothetical you). Most of us played in-between then and the price drop as well. The only room in the discussion is for those who didn't play before the price drop and/or purchased the package days/hours/moments before the drop. The TV analogy works, we all were using the product prior to the price drop. ( BTW I purchased a package a weekish ( + or - ) before the price drop, only played the beta for an hour)
I was there well before EQ2 and Wow and to be honest i was not a big EQ1 fan and absolutely nothing Blizzard had out impressed me either.
I was actually first talked into Eq1 by a lady friend i met playing UT99,so i tried it,never liked it.
So when Eq2 was coming out i was only slightly interested and Blizzard was still no where on my radar.
Eq2 was released i bought it and played it.I thought it was pretty good,but back then i was buying almost every new game ,so a few weeks later i also bought Wow.
Back then as now i couldn't care less about marketing or hype or numbers.What i saw when i stepped into Wow was what looked to me a MUCH inferior product when compared to EQ2.Liek i said i had no care for numbers ,but i would have bet anything that no way Wow would be much of a hit,it looked too cheap and amateurish.
Prime example was when i started in EQ2 i quickly was enthralled in this giant city of Freeport,it showed me a lot of effort.When i was in Wow i saw nothing,just a cheap looking hub with a few Npc's to give me quests.The comparison was like night and day,one game enticed me early the other was a total turn off.
Fast forward many years alter and now both developers turn me off.They both have spent every year copying each other and trying their best to completely dumb down the RPG experience and turn gaming in to something superficial like cash shop or instances.
Blizzard has shown me nothing that they are a AAA developer,they still house an amateur game engine,they still can't port to consoles,they still deliver low end graphics.Soe has completely dumb down EQ2 to where now it is nothing but a constant everyday maintenance schedule to update the cash shop.
I have absolutely no confidence in Blizzard and in SOE i expect shallow gaming directed at cash shop sales.So both of these games need to be overly impressive or i couldn't care less.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
QFT
*cough* SWG NGE *cough*
Well stupid or not, gotta give him credit for trying things no other company is doing. even if he has a big mouth and ideas that are far fetched. Hopefully they've learned their lessons and will make EQNext something great. I know I am in the minority, but I will be hoping for something a lot more like EQ1 personally
Eh. All we have is Smedley hyping his project up. Until we actually see what they're creating, I see no reason to be too hopeful. It's Smedley.
Although, *if* the hype-train info is actually true, then this will be something to look forward to.
Haha but they will make it better and improve upon the mistakes SOE makes . And of course it will be World of Warcraft type setting .
they have gone on record as saying it will be a F2P model like they use for the current games, EQ, EQ2, VG, PS2 etc.
i take what they say with a huge pinch of salt, having played SWG from launch to the NGE/CU and EQ2 just after launch until about a year ago.
i really want this game to be good, but i cannot help but have doubts, this is SOE we're talking about! i dont believe they learn from any of their mistakes, they just seem to sweep it under the carpet and pretend it never happened.
i will also add that anyone who is expecting a huge "pure" sandbox style game i think will be massively disappointed, at best it will be some type of theme park/sandbox hybrid, probably leaning more towards themeparks.
I tend to agree with your post here. I have seen first hand the way SOE say whatever they think the people want to hear at any given time and simply disregard it when it suits them. First rule is SOE lies. They are expert frog boilers.
I don't get why people are thinking this might be like EQ1 at all really... haven't SOE stated that it has been built to offer a very different experience than their existing titles and has been designed to sit alongside them rather than replace them?
I'd say the #1 issue with SOE is that they are completely out of touch with their customers. By that, I mean there have been several fundamental issues over the years that produced many feedback threads with (not exaggerating) thousands of posts and hundreds of pages from their customers that got ignored for months. Months! The most recent one involved their selling off the European community to a half-rate TV company in Germany for "publishing". They made this catastrophic announcement, the community went into an uproar, and they blatantly ignored the community for months which resulted in the loss of hundreds (thousands?) of accounts. They don't communicate, and they treat their customers with contempt.
Out of curiosity, I took a peek into the Dragon Prophet forums to see how that was going. Abysmal is a word I would use. The same SOE schtick of terrible communication and poor treatment of their customers.
So, you're right, they haven't learned. Its the same people running the show as before, doing the same song and dance. You can't teach Smed new tricks, and his devious little imp (Dave Georgeson) perches on his shoulder and whispers sweet honey in his ear.
Nope Bill, you're not going to put your hooks in me this time. You know what they say "fool me once shame on you, fool me 20 times.... I ain't bitin' " I've been burned way too many times by the hype from this site. It's not going to happen again. I am thoroughly convinced that Sony, Activision, EA, NCSoft, Cryptic et al (excluding CCP) can't make an MMORPG worth playing. The line of pathetic, bug laden, cash grabbing MMORPG corpses, for me, stops now.
We're tired Bill. Stop hyping games years before you're ready to give us video of actual game play (not some animated trailer). Work harder at getting information about games that are coming out in a month, not years down the road. Dig deeper into them... flesh out the story a bit... do some actual reporting and less PR.
QFT
*cough* SWG NGE *cough*
How is it that anyone expects anything different from SOE, when it is all the same people still driving the bus? Smed was in charge when customers were tossed over before, at all the various times (and when did SOE alienate YOU as a customer?) and he and his cronies are still in charge. SOE just gaffed a bunch of people on pre-order prices? Not a surprise. I seem to recall Einstein saying the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.Well, in the interviews he's done with them, I'd have to say that I've seen what you allude to. Very carefully prepared Q & A's that only shine the best light on SOE. One interview sticks in my mind, the one where Bill is chatting to Dave about the F2P transition, and it was nauseatingly clear what was going on.
Well, in the interviews he's done with them, I'd have to say that I've seen what you allude to. Very carefully prepared Q & A's that only shine the best light on SOE. One interview sticks in my mind, the one where Bill is chatting to Dave about the F2P transition, and it was nauseatingly clear what was going on.
Bill has acknowledged his friendships with SOE people in the past, but if you didn't know that, you might take his opinions at face value. In other industries, disclosure is the key. Notice how on the financial shows, they always have a box when journalists/analysts are talking about some stock or company with stuff like: Owns the stock, Family owns the stock, Company/Fund owns the stock, etc., that is called "disclosure". Real journalists / sites insist on that. Sadly, it does not much happen in the gaming press.I would expect a new press announcement just about any moment now.
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.
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 have great hopes for EQ Next. The Forgelight engine seems to work pretty well in Planetside 2.
My greatest fear is also my greatest hope - The Smedley. He single-handedly crushed the life out of Star Wars Galaxies, one of the last sandboxes. He says he has learned his lesson, but who knows? It could be a trick or just P.R.
Can we really trust the man? I think most SWG veterans want to see proof first of what is intended for EQ Next.
I have set a lot of my hopes for the MMORPG genre on this game. We are in dire need of change and I believe SOE will be able to turn the tide for mmo's once and for all, they seem to understand that we want something different. That we, the gamers, are not waiting for another themepark / quest hub game.
If a big company like SOE understands this, and are working on building the ultimate sandbox, then all we can do is put our hopes in this game, they might finally give us back the RPG in the MMO's.
I think it's funny that there's so much hatred for Smed...yet so much love for original EQ (which was Smed's baby).
He got a bad rap for SWG despite the fact that it was a Lucas Arts decision to do the GU..and a Lucas Arts decision to keep the changes even after the initial horrendous reaction, just look up quotes from the now fired head of the project.
(forgot her name a long time ago, but she got axed shortly after saying something like "give the game 3 months, it'll bounce back" )
Loved EQ. Played the hell of of that game back in '99 through '04, when EQ2 and WoW released. Really enjoyed that sense of danger... running from Qeynos to Freeport sans SoW, the trains through Blackburrow, etc. No game has captured that sense of awe I had when I first stepped into Norrath.
You know, back when it was designed by Brad McQuaid for Verant and Sony, Smed, et al had little actual influence over game design decisions.
EQ2 launched with a very old-school approach to MMO design.
WoW launched about a month later, and proceeded to swiftly sweep the floor with EQ2.
Smed and co immediately began changing EQ2 to be more like WoW, and has been playing a "me-too" game of "catch up" with Blizzard ever since.