[Column] Elder Scrolls Online: Is ESO Dying or Just Carving a Niche?

SBFord

At the time of writing this, The Elder Scrolls Online is just shy of being three months old. Three months isn’t very old for an MMO, especially since they are supposed to be played for years, but it’s long enough for players to know if they like the game or not. Which means do they continue to pay the subscription fee or cancel their account and look for the next greatest thing. In this week’s column I’m going to look at the question that has been plaguing the community for the last few weeks. Is ESO dying?

Read more of Ryan Getchell's Elder Scrolls Online: Is ESO Dying or Just Carving a Niche?

Yaevindusk

 

I don't want to speculate with regards to actual numbers, though I had about seven friends in real life that bought the game -- as well as a medium size RP guild that I keep in touch with from WoW -- that went to ESO when it came out.

 

None of my friends play, and the guild disbanded some time ago (the leadership and core members are the only ones I really talk to, and they quit; won't speak for others they picked up when the guild was formed).

 

Though to be fair the same thing occurred with Wildstar -- Had about five friends buy it, and they all decided not to resub when their time is up (though one had purchases a few months of C.R.E.D.D from players -- which will no doubt artificially inflate subscriber numbers).

david361107

first I played ESO in beta and loved the look, combat was good enough. Those of us that have yet to purchase are hearing this, no end game, makes us feel like what's the point of putting in the time?

 

Peace

Lascer

Katbird

I played it in the open beta but didn't buy the game.  I loved the graphics and the storyline seemed good but the fact I couldn't lock the camera behind me just made me crazy (don't do FPS)  -- small reason but enough that I just looked elsewhere for a game I could enjoy running through.

Vonatar

"The Wheel of Time turns..."

 

It's always the same with a new headline MMO. Hype and expectation, people dive in in their hundreds of thousands, they hit max level in a week or two, get bored and move on. The massive population drop after a month or two should be expected in any MMO these days and it doesn't mean the game is dying, just levelling out as you say.

 

People said SWTOR was dying, or died. We had all the jokes about the TORtanic. And yet it seems to be highly profitable these days with its f2p model.

 

People just don't play MMOs long term anymore. Some do, but there seems to be a large mass of MMO players that move from game to game. The so-called "content locusts".

alkarionlog

still think in a MMO if the first thing you mention is graphics or story, something is wrong, you need to like the gameplay, and make so guilds be more important, what hold me on MMOs are not the game alone, but the friendships you made during it.

 

also a side note, saying the story is what will hold elder scrolls fans on this game shows pretty much the writer never played one, they do have they quest and the story tell but, from the number of mods you can find on what matters most is the sandbox do whatever you want who draw most people

Rattenmann

ESO is not going away, but it is not going to grow either in my humble opinion.

 

The game concepts are just a TINY little too extreme and limiting to attract a big crowd and keep those subs. I mean... really. Pure questing for story and nothing else is something a vocal minority might enjoy. But the majority of players want to PLAY their games and INTERACT with other players in a meaningful way. ESO is lacking both aspects.

flclimax

it's dying faster than TSW did. lol @ niche, guess every game with at least 10 players has carved a niche. no, ESO is a flopped thempark MMO.

Nickhead420

What killed it for me was the lack of class balance.  I played a healing templar, the ONLY class with a full set of healing skills.  What do people roll with for healers?  Sorcerers and DKs with healing staves.  In most cases, they can heal just as well as a full healing specced templar, but at the same time can top templar DPS if that templar was doing pure damage.  Taking a sorc or DK for a healer is basically like taking a healer and an extra DPS in one character.

When thinking of a "Dragon Knight" most people would picture a warrior in the heaviest, coolest looking armor with massive melee weapons and shields.  What do DKs look like in ESO?  Cloth armor and staves...Yep, they look just like everyone else.

Don't get me wrong.  I don't plan on being done with the game.  I'm f***ing cheap.  And I invested $95 so far.  I'll get back to it at some point, but not before seeing some drastic changes to VR content.

On a side note though.  1-50 was possibly the most fun I've ever had leveling in an MMO.

Mothanos

People only leave the mmo they bought if they dont like it....

Remember a time where people played their mmo for years ? months without breaks ?

That is because those mmo's were decent and good.

The current mmo's that come out are garbage and thus people who hope to have found an mmo that is on level of their old time mmo's and fun to play for a decent amount of time just find themselves bored 2 weeks ro 1 month past their purchase......

 

Todays mmo's are a complete joke and are not even a shadow of what those old timers were.

Dedication and team spirit were needed, today you need casuals to fill your pockets and the mmo genre suffers from it.

Love for the genre made place for men in suits who want to cash in and want to have that money yesterday.

Deadlines are shorter then chinese dic..

And above all else studio's think the same way as the suits.

 

Just look at Zenimax........they dont give a shit about gamers, they just pretend they did.

This whole ESO mmo stinks from bottom to the top.

This whole studio managed to damage the IP of the Elders Scroll to cash in on the mmo players who hop from mmo to mmo and quickly make a few millions.

No serious Elders scroll player wanted an mmo, they wanted a morrowind or skyrim rpg, well bethesda can look to CD Project Red who are making The Witcher 3 and dream how a polish studio with 1/50 of their budget is making a game of the year :P

 

Nah these current mmo studio's are a bunch of wolves in it for the money but say they love gaming when it was the other way around not to long ago.

Dont get me wrong tough !

Nothing wrong with making tons of cash !!! but at least deliver a god damn mmo or game that is worth every penny and makes you feel good you are part of that game.

Zenimax is a shit studio that produced a turd.

My 2 cents

 

PAL-18

I dont know if its niche or not,but they should take couple lessong from GW2 in this weird single player MMO genre.

 

 

orbitxo

the whole leveling experience of ESO was pretty dam good- the lore and quests as well top noch!. Came veteran mode = i lost interest really quick.- didnt want much todo with pvp (just didnt have the time to invest in it as i would like to)the new zone having to 5 -12 man it just didnt appeal to me tbh.

ESO isnt dead, they still have their console fans waiting for the game- and i see much potential how Zinemax will treat the game future content. the game isnt for everyone, thats not to say its dead.

Paske

This was posted ( and 5 min later locked ) on ZOS thread.

 

I do expect to be back in few months.

 

___________________________________________________________________________________________

I have decided to say farewell to ESO for a while. But before I do would like to share information with ZOS as to why. So they might remedy these issues.

So far ZOS has been listening to community and I see no reason why they would not continue to do so in the future.

If you are leaving please share your top 5 reasons why ( please keep it kind and constructive as you can ).

My issues:

1. Veteran leveling.
This has been discussed at length many times. For me this is the main reason for leaving.
I simply do not have the mental capacity to grind and be bored for months ( took me over a month to get to V1, yes Im casual ). Veteran leveling is simply not fun. On top of that I do like my faction and really dislike questing and helping "enemy".

2. Veteran dungeon difficulty
As a casual player it is hard for me to find hard core guild that will run V1-V5 dungeons.
PUG-ing a dungeon is next to impossible. If you are really lucky there might be a good group that can clear content in dungeon, but that usually takes 90 minutes or more. Too much for a linear dungeon.
But most of the time, as a healer, I wait for an hour ( give or take 15 min ), find a group and then wipe for 30-40 minutes after which group disbands.

3. Bugged bosses in veteran dungeons
So far most bosses glitched in vet dungeons. They either dissapear or reset. if your lucky the group might kill them, but thats just chance based.
Bugged bosses in dungeons that were in beta and still bugged after 3 months of launch period. I am sorry, but that's too much for me.

4. Gear progression
Like many people I do like to get cool gear. Not just cool looking, but gear that upgrades my stats as well. It gives player false feeling of accomplishment.
There are two sides to this debate, there are many who simply don't care. That is fine, it just so happens I like to get an epic weapon that is powerful, not 20% ( or less ) better then green items.
This would also help with veteran content / dungeon difficulty. Since gear would help players clear content.

5. Lack of end game
This is something that will be fixed as time goes by. Its issue with every new MMO and ESO is no different.
Right now end game is horrible veteran levels grind in order to postpone most people reaching V12, because there is next to nothing there.
Craglorn was fun for a short while, but one can farm items for only so long as a zerg before it becomes pointless.
Havent tried Crypt of Hearts ( low lvl ), but I hear its really damn hard. Again, gear progression is lacking in order to validate hard PVE content.


So thats it. These are my top 5 issues. There are many more, but I can live with them.

Please share your issues so we may come back to ESO one day when part of it all is fixed.

alakram

I played month and a half. I left on second month becouse Healing was either imposible or irrelevant, that means I dodnt felt like I was able of maintaining my group alive and second I couldn't own a house. I will be back once they add it, probably.

Doogiehowser

Now days.. flop MMO = niche.

shadylurker

I bought it for the PVP, as soon as VR players started taking on multiple any levels  and slaughtering them I left that shit ASAP.

 

There is no way I'm going to play a character from 1-50 and then play MORE quest content and pay you more money for it!  Now if an actual end game exsisted  with some sort of actual group play (you know the MM in the MMO) rather than questing...I probably would of stuck it out.

But it's really my own fault it was known that VR was just playing other factions quest lines.  That's just lazy. On my part for not researching, and Zeni for rehashing content and calling it end game.

rodingo

"ESO is a game that hasn’t truly been done before..."

There is a reason for that and we are seeing why.

Incarnatus2009

I so love how the main reason for so many leaving ESO is never mentioned.

 

I and my wife pre-ordered ESO, were part of the beta and absolutely loved the game. Then it launched and everything changed. Enter the Gold Farmers. I have never seen a game so infested with Bots, Hackers and Gold Spammers as ESO. And ZeniMax apparently have (had?) no way of dealing with this apart from removing, from the game, anything that could be considered nice loot.

 

To start with the bots (10 at a time) camped about every dungeon boss and world boss in the game. So ZeniMax removed the loot from them and put them on timers. The bots moved into the open world. You could see them running (10 at a time) in circuits following their clearly defined paths. What did ZeniMax do? Next to nothing. Who suffered? The players.

 

We left the game. Now don't get me wrong. It has some truly great features but it is a terrible mmorpg. Try to group with someone. Nearly everything is instanced and designed to be completed solo. So your team members vanish and you each have to complete separate quest updates. How are ZeniMax dealing with this? The latest update warns you that you can't do the particular content as a group????? That is no fix!

 

So is the game dying? Define dying. Is it going to fail? Well that all depends on ZeniMax. Do I as a person who would love the game to be fixed have any confidence in ZeniMax? NO!

 

 

Tyggs

Originally posted by Doogiehowser
Now days.. flop MMO = niche.

More like "Didn't reach WoW level success, flop."

If the game is turning a profit, it is not a flop. I am not sure if ESO is profitble yet, but it is far to early to call it a flop.

People call SWTOR a flop for some reason, when it is one of the most profitable MMOs on the market.

bcbully

The most popular mmorpg on the most popular mmorpg site, dying... 

 

Nadia

Originally posted by SBFord

Read more of Ryan Getchell's Elder Scrolls Online: Is ESO Dying or Just Carving a Niche?

ESO is a fantastic game, it has the best graphics that have ever been in a MMORPG, and the story lines far exceed any expectations that I had for it.

i havent tried ESO yet but likely will in the near future

i'm more interested in ESO than seeing the latest expansion of WOW

Sovrath

They wanted the competition of End Game, they wanted a race to the finish line.

 

Let me guess, they wanted WoW?

Matticus75

If a company wants to keep a good game going, then they will need to innovate, they do not do that, MMOs are scamish nowadays

Soandsoso

Stopped reading at "they wanted a competition".

 

Kind of sad when the writers are buying into "the mmo is dieing" mumble jumble.

Asm0deus

I am just waiting for them to go f2p and if they don't well no biggie.

Joeyjojoshabadu

'Just' carving a niche? That's the real shame with ESO. It had the ES name behind it (GOTY quality and popularity) and the best even it's fans are now hoping for is that it becomes 'just' a niche game. It could have been so much more.