Originally posted by mikuniman Speak for yourself, I'm still enjoying more mmos than I did 10 yrs ago. Bouncing between Vindictus, GW2, SWTOR, Tera and WoW.
This isn't about whether or not it's pleasing you.
It's about how many different groups of people it's pleasing. And currently, its all themeparks aimed at people like you, and just about non of them are doing well. Hence why publishers are all pulling out of the market.
Originally posted by Mikeha People left all the real mmos for World Of Warcraft. You should have never left and supported the games you were playing. Now you are getting exactly what you deserve.
Actually, most of WOW's players came from outside of MMOs. From Starcraft and the like. Most MMO gamers returned to their games, by and large. The "real MMOs" didn't start dying until companies saw how big MMOs could be, and started changing their gameplay to be more like WOW, alienating their core audience.
I know most of WoW players came from outside of mmos. I am talking about people that was playing older games.
Originally posted by Mikeha People left all the real mmos for World Of Warcraft. You should have never left and supported the games you were playing. Now you are getting exactly what you deserve.
Actually, most of WOW's players came from outside of MMOs. From Starcraft and the like. Most MMO gamers returned to their games, by and large. The "real MMOs" didn't start dying until companies saw how big MMOs could be, and started changing their gameplay to be more like WOW, alienating their core audience.
I know most of WoW players came from outside of mmos. I am talking about people that was playing older games.
Sorry, no. I never jumped ship to WoW. While I have tried other MMO's, I still subscribe to EQ/EQ2.
Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain and most fools do. Benjamin Franklin
Originally posted by Mikeha People left all the real mmos for World Of Warcraft. You should have never left and supported the games you were playing. Now you are getting exactly what you deserve.
Actually, most of WOW's players came from outside of MMOs. From Starcraft and the like. Most MMO gamers returned to their games, by and large. The "real MMOs" didn't start dying until companies saw how big MMOs could be, and started changing their gameplay to be more like WOW, alienating their core audience.
I know most of WoW players came from outside of mmos. I am talking about people that was playing older games.
Sorry, no. I never jumped ship to WoW. While I have tried other MMO's, I still subscribe to EQ/EQ2.
Then you are the person that others should have been like. Everquest 2 was an amazing game that I feel was better then WoW. I still remember how it use to start you off on that boat and the goblin breaks out of the crate and you have to kill it. Everquest 2 was one of the games I would go to when I took a break from Lineage 2.
Originally posted by mikuniman Speak for yourself, I'm still enjoying more mmos than I did 10 yrs ago. Bouncing between Vindictus, GW2, SWTOR, Tera and WoW.
This isn't about whether or not it's pleasing you.
It's about how many different groups of people it's pleasing. And currently, its all themeparks aimed at people like you, and just about non of them are doing well. Hence why publishers are all pulling out of the market.
Bad for publishers AND consumers.
And apparently it is pleasing many different groups as the said mmos are alive and doing well and this to name just a few. And it's it is all about them doing well because if they weren't there would be no market then mmos would be in a state.
It's probably more about you not being able to be pleased. I don't know, I think with every flavor mmo available today people like you are just burned out with mmos or maybe don't really like mmos. I don't see publishers pulling out there are more than ever compared to 5 years ago.
The worst period to be a mmo gamer would be the stone age. No electricity or heat. Back then they played MMORPGs ... they were minimally multiplayer offline role playing games. O.P. stop complaining lmao
Originally posted by Mikeha People left all the real mmos for World Of Warcraft. You should have never left and supported the games you were playing. Now you are getting exactly what you deserve.
Actually, most of WOW's players came from outside of MMOs. From Starcraft and the like. Most MMO gamers returned to their games, by and large. The "real MMOs" didn't start dying until companies saw how big MMOs could be, and started changing their gameplay to be more like WOW, alienating their core audience.
I know most of WoW players came from outside of mmos. I am talking about people that was playing older games.
Sooo... you just ignored my explanation then, did you?
Originally posted by mikuniman Speak for yourself, I'm still enjoying more mmos than I did 10 yrs ago. Bouncing between Vindictus, GW2, SWTOR, Tera and WoW.
This isn't about whether or not it's pleasing you.
It's about how many different groups of people it's pleasing. And currently, its all themeparks aimed at people like you, and just about non of them are doing well. Hence why publishers are all pulling out of the market.
Bad for publishers AND consumers.
And apparently it is pleasing many different groups as the said mmos are alive and doing well and this to name just a few. And it's it is all about them doing well because if they weren't there would be no market then mmos would be in a state.
Except.. most of them AREN'T doing well, which is why almost no AAA companies are developing MMOs. It's why EQ3 scrapped itself halfway through development. It's why Titan got cancelled.
SWTOR was a failure on an unimaginable scale. Wildstar and ESO didn't do too much better. AoC, LotRO, Rift, and all the other WoW clones steadily dropped in population post launch and continued to fall. Funcom has sworn off MMOs after how badly The Secret World did. Turbine has shut down almost all MMO development and is working on MOBAs now.
Everyone tried their hand at making a WoW clone and the market rejected them. Pre WoW, most AA and AAA MMOs grew steadily over time, appealing to their niche, just like Eve is continuing to do.
Most MMOs are in, and have been in, decline, because the ONLY games on the market right now are underfunded inexperienced indie MMOs with teams of like, 8 people, or AAA WoW clones that appeal to no one that isn't already playing WoW.
Except.. most of them AREN'T doing well, which is why almost no AAA companies are developing MMOs. It's why EQ3 scrapped itself halfway through development. It's why Titan got cancelled.
SWTOR was a failure on an unimaginable scale.
Stop making up virtual failures which only exist in your brain, and your posts will sound 200% more convincing. Just saying.
EQ3 = EQ Next, not cancelled.
Titan got cancelled, but not because of the reasons you make up so conveniently.
And SW:TOR is a success despite what the local bridge inhabitants here think.
If it was a success they wouldn't have shut down 2 partner companies and fired 80% staff to keep it profitable, sorry bub the ship sailed on that one.
And EQ3 was the name of the project that was in development for 2 years before SOE scrapped it. They said it was just another themepark like EQ2 and all the others, and would be too expensive and the market wasn't there for it.
They went back to the drawing board and came back with EQNext, a sandbox game. Because themeparks, which is what 100% of the last 10 years of AAA releases have been... have not done well.
Or are you going to tell me that the options of AA and AAA games are more diverse than ever, and they're all thriving? Which is why Funcom and Turbine have sworn off making more MMOs? Which is why Rift continues to sink?
Except.. most of them AREN'T doing well, which is why almost no AAA companies are developing MMOs. It's why EQ3 scrapped itself halfway through development. It's why Titan got cancelled.
SWTOR was a failure on an unimaginable scale.
Stop making up virtual failures which only exist in your brain, and your posts will sound 200% more convincing. Just saying.
EQ3 = EQ Next, not cancelled.
Titan got cancelled, but not because of the reasons you make up so conveniently.
And SW:TOR is a success despite what the local bridge inhabitants here think.
If it was a success they wouldn't have shut down 2 partner companies and fired 80% staff to keep it profitable, sorry bub the ship sailed on that one.
And EQ3 was the name of the project that was in development for 2 years before SOE scrapped it. They said it was just another themepark like EQ2 and all the others, and would be too expensive and the market wasn't there for it.
They went back to the drawing board and came back with EQNext, a sandbox game. Because themeparks, which is what 100% of the last 10 years of AAA releases have been... have not done well.
Or are you going to tell me that the options of AA and AAA games are more diverse than ever, and they're all thriving? Which is why Funcom and Turbine have sworn off making more MMOs? Which is why Rift continues to sink?
Once a game is made, you don't need most of the development team to stick around anymore. You don't need nearly as many coders, you definitely don't need that many writers. Even more so for the artists.
Except.. most of them AREN'T doing well, which is why almost no AAA companies are developing MMOs. It's why EQ3 scrapped itself halfway through development. It's why Titan got cancelled.
SWTOR was a failure on an unimaginable scale.
Stop making up virtual failures which only exist in your brain, and your posts will sound 200% more convincing. Just saying.
EQ3 = EQ Next, not cancelled.
Titan got cancelled, but not because of the reasons you make up so conveniently.
And SW:TOR is a success despite what the local bridge inhabitants here think.
If it was a success they wouldn't have shut down 2 partner companies and fired 80% staff to keep it profitable, sorry bub the ship sailed on that one.
And EQ3 was the name of the project that was in development for 2 years before SOE scrapped it. They said it was just another themepark like EQ2 and all the others, and would be too expensive and the market wasn't there for it.
They went back to the drawing board and came back with EQNext, a sandbox game. Because themeparks, which is what 100% of the last 10 years of AAA releases have been... have not done well.
Or are you going to tell me that the options of AA and AAA games are more diverse than ever, and they're all thriving? Which is why Funcom and Turbine have sworn off making more MMOs? Which is why Rift continues to sink?
Once a game is made, you don't need most of the development team to stick around anymore. You don't need nearly as many coders, you definitely don't need that many writers. Even more so for the artists.
People always try this excuse. In MMOs, that's the opposite of true.
If your MMO is doing well, and your population is growing, your company grows with it. It's what happened to Mythic, Turbine, CCP, Aventurine, Funcom, Blizzard, all of them.
When an MMO crashes in the first month, you have to fire people. Turbine's office is 10 minutes from my house, I've been in there several times over the years. That company has been in decline for a long time. But back when AC and DDO were new, they were growing.
Except.. most of them AREN'T doing well, which is why almost no AAA companies are developing MMOs. It's why EQ3 scrapped itself halfway through development. It's why Titan got cancelled.
SWTOR was a failure on an unimaginable scale.
Stop making up virtual failures which only exist in your brain, and your posts will sound 200% more convincing. Just saying.
EQ3 = EQ Next, not cancelled.
Titan got cancelled, but not because of the reasons you make up so conveniently.
And SW:TOR is a success despite what the local bridge inhabitants here think.
If it was a success they wouldn't have shut down 2 partner companies and fired 80% staff to keep it profitable, sorry bub the ship sailed on that one.
And EQ3 was the name of the project that was in development for 2 years before SOE scrapped it. They said it was just another themepark like EQ2 and all the others, and would be too expensive and the market wasn't there for it.
They went back to the drawing board and came back with EQNext, a sandbox game. Because themeparks, which is what 100% of the last 10 years of AAA releases have been... have not done well.
Or are you going to tell me that the options of AA and AAA games are more diverse than ever, and they're all thriving? Which is why Funcom and Turbine have sworn off making more MMOs? Which is why Rift continues to sink?
Once a game is made, you don't need most of the development team to stick around anymore. You don't need nearly as many coders, you definitely don't need that many writers. Even more so for the artists.
People always try this excuse. In MMOs, that's the opposite of true.
If your MMO is doing well, and your population is growing, your company grows with it. It's what happened to Mythic, Turbine, CCP, Aventurine, Funcom, Blizzard, all of them.
When an MMO crashes in the first month, you have to fire people. Turbine's office is 10 minutes from my house, I've been in there several times over the years. That company has been in decline for a long time. But back when AC and DDO were new, they were growing.
You literally know jack shit about mmo game development. It is not "the opposite of true" for MMOs. You continue to keep a portion but you don't need everyone once the game has been launched. There's absolutely no need for it. The BULK of the work is done, so the BULK of the development team is no longer needed and are let go.
You keep a portion for maintenance and work on additional content but you're fucking kidding yourself if you think its economical(it doesn't matter how WELL your game is doing) to keep the entire team on salary from start to ???.
Originally posted by Mikeha People left all the real mmos for World Of Warcraft. You should have never left and supported the games you were playing. Now you are getting exactly what you deserve.
Actually, most of WOW's players came from outside of MMOs. From Starcraft and the like. Most MMO gamers returned to their games, by and large. The "real MMOs" didn't start dying until companies saw how big MMOs could be, and started changing their gameplay to be more like WOW, alienating their core audience.
I know most of WoW players came from outside of mmos. I am talking about people that was playing older games.
Sorry, no. I never jumped ship to WoW. While I have tried other MMO's, I still subscribe to EQ/EQ2.
Then you are the person that others should have been like. Everquest 2 was an amazing game that I feel was better then WoW. I still remember how it use to start you off on that boat and the goblin breaks out of the crate and you have to kill it. Everquest 2 was one of the games I would go to when I took a break from Lineage 2.
Sorry, but EQ2 was terrible compared to WoW. I say this as someone who's first MMO was EQ2. lol.
The newbie island was a barrier to alts, as was the advanced class system. It wasn't fun leveling alts to 10 (or was it 20?), just so i could try out a class to determine if i liked it. Instancing and frequent zoning between all the cities was a chore, for mundane quests. The long load times didn't help either.
Animations and models looked ridiculous too.
Packs of static gnoll mobs placed randomly throughout Antonica. Every zone was pretty much the same like this.
Dungeons were just awful, both instanced and openworld. The attunement quests to access them weren't fun either.
The things i did like was housing and crafting, but crafting became burdensome when i needed a component that was overpriced. I ended up making alts exclusively because of this. Heritage quests were another thing i liked though.
Then i tried WoW, and it was just more fun and friendly, and a more enjoyable experience.
The problem is the free to play model has stolen a lot of players who can spend money to be better then skill based players. The subscription based model tends to make all players equal on paper but the less skilled players fail to stay. So we see sporadic dwindling player populations in the sub models; thus it forces the gaming companies to convert to free to play. The ideal situation is the sub model, but for casual gamers who have money this is too hard.
What has happened is an all out greed fest, and yes we can blame the gaming community and the gaming companies equally. This greed concept has produced very bad games lately. The talent also producing these games seems to be sub par, because these game developers are more in it for the quick buck. The real artists who have souls don't seem to be involved with gaming as much as we would wish for.
This is how I feel more then what might be true...
I think the sub model is better for other reasons, but this idea that sub games make players equal is incorrect(aaa MMO). The major sub games use equipment as their advancement model, and that means existing players gave a gross advantage over new players.
FTP games haven't stolen players, players have simply chosen to play a new game.
rpg/mmorg history: Dun Darach>Bloodwych>Bards Tale 1-3>Eye of the beholder > Might and Magic 2,3,5 > FFVII> Baldur's Gate 1, 2 > Planescape Torment >Morrowind > WOW > oblivion > LOTR > Guild Wars (1900hrs elementalist) Vanguard. > GW2(1000 elementalist), Wildstar
Originally posted by Mikeha People left all the real mmos for World Of Warcraft. You should have never left and supported the games you were playing. Now you are getting exactly what you deserve.
Actually, most of WOW's players came from outside of MMOs. From Starcraft and the like. Most MMO gamers returned to their games, by and large. The "real MMOs" didn't start dying until companies saw how big MMOs could be, and started changing their gameplay to be more like WOW, alienating their core audience.
Wut?
Of course most of WoW players came outside of MMOs, pre WoW whole western MMO market was <1m
And like 90% of that 1m jumped to WoW and never looked back.
THATS why companies wanted their games to be like WoW (they wanted their former players back and hoping to snatch some of "new" players), but when you have such core design flaws like "old school" MMOs in your game, it just doesnt work.
Except.. most of them AREN'T doing well, which is why almost no AAA companies are developing MMOs. It's why EQ3 scrapped itself halfway through development. It's why Titan got cancelled.
SWTOR was a failure on an unimaginable scale.
Stop making up virtual failures which only exist in your brain, and your posts will sound 200% more convincing. Just saying.
EQ3 = EQ Next, not cancelled.
Titan got cancelled, but not because of the reasons you make up so conveniently.
And SW:TOR is a success despite what the local bridge inhabitants here think.
If it was a success they wouldn't have shut down 2 partner companies and fired 80% staff to keep it profitable, sorry bub the ship sailed on that one.
And EQ3 was the name of the project that was in development for 2 years before SOE scrapped it. They said it was just another themepark like EQ2 and all the others, and would be too expensive and the market wasn't there for it.
They went back to the drawing board and came back with EQNext, a sandbox game. Because themeparks, which is what 100% of the last 10 years of AAA releases have been... have not done well.
Or are you going to tell me that the options of AA and AAA games are more diverse than ever, and they're all thriving? Which is why Funcom and Turbine have sworn off making more MMOs? Which is why Rift continues to sink?
Once a game is made, you don't need most of the development team to stick around anymore. You don't need nearly as many coders, you definitely don't need that many writers. Even more so for the artists.
Yes, but layoffs that happen 6 months after launch have nothing to do with pre-launch.
Just for illustration, they said SWOTR had 800-1000 people working on it at times pre-launch (mostly contractors), and that 400 people will be their core team to carry post launch development.
At lauch contractors were gone and 2 rounds of layoffs that happened afterwards were form that CORE 400 people. Same goes for pretty much every MMO company since WoW, they had layoffs to their CORE teams because they failed, except GW2 which actually expanded their launch numbers (they had 250-270 team pre launch and they grew to some 350 after launch)
Originally posted by mikuniman Speak for yourself, I'm still enjoying more mmos than I did 10 yrs ago. Bouncing between Vindictus, GW2, SWTOR, Tera and WoW.
This isn't about whether or not it's pleasing you.
It's about how many different groups of people it's pleasing. And currently, its all themeparks aimed at people like you, and just about non of them are doing well. Hence why publishers are all pulling out of the market.
Bad for publishers AND consumers.
Obviously current gen mmos are pleasing/entertaining more people than pre-2004 mmos given all the games mentioned by mikuniman above have more people playing them than the entire Western mmo player base before 2004. Indeed a single game can appeal to a broad range of players through good design, which is probably one reason WoW is so popular.
Now I am not saying that popularity or the number of people a game pleases is an absolute measure of whether a game is good or bad. But that is the argument you are using, and even by your own logic the conclusion can only be that mmos are currently much better than pre-2004.
Here is another thing, we had several major releases last year, and several games are in the pipeline or being released this year or next year. This idea that publishers are pulling out or that consumers are suffering is so full of holes and non-logic it is bordering on the ridiculous. We are getting spoilt as gamers, being treated to ever more lavish and polished games without even having to pay a sub any more in many cases.
Naaaaahhh no complaining! ;D few years ago when I was preparing to pass my mature exam I wasnt complaining about " ohh no I dont have time for playing". Instead of getting knowledge I was playing till 10 h before exam I did exam well and I got lvl also so.... you get the point ;D
I've pretty much given up on MMOs at this point and have come to accept that the new generation of gamers want pretty graphics, quick rewards and shallow community/linear gameplay. That's what they -want- and enjoy. Maybe it's because they grew up in a very "have it now at your fingertips" world, or maybe it's my fault for growing up in the 80s. But whatever it is, I feel there are tons of MMOs out there right now...
And they're all different flavors of crap. Do I want the GW2 flavored pile with turd sprinkles or do I want the ESO flavored heap? What about the steaming SWTOR or the extra-turdly WoW in-its-modern-state? How about the mostly dead poo poo that is now EQ2? Or the invisible-wall linear turdgrind of FFXIV?
Now, that's how -I- feel. YMMV. The last time I really, really had fun in an MMO was back in Vanilla WoW, FFXI on NA release and EQ2 at release. Since then? Meh meh meh. And they keep getting worse for me. So, while I wait (probably in vain) for something interesting to be announced, life goes on and I'm busy with other things. In all honesty, there will probably never be a time I'll enjoy MMOs as much as I did when the communities were small, RP was frequent and not ERP saturated and when the games were, at least, TRYING to be innovative and not just cashing in on a name to make a quick buck.
Oh well. That's life.
PREACH!
Any mmo worth its salt should be like a good prostitute when it comes to its game world- One hell of a faker, and a damn good shaker!
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair…
"I'll never grow up, never grow up, never grow up! Not me!"
Originally posted by mikuniman Speak for yourself, I'm still enjoying more mmos than I did 10 yrs ago. Bouncing between Vindictus, GW2, SWTOR, Tera and WoW.
This isn't about whether or not it's pleasing you.
It's about how many different groups of people it's pleasing. And currently, its all themeparks aimed at people like you, and just about non of them are doing well. Hence why publishers are all pulling out of the market.
Bad for publishers AND consumers.
Obviously current gen mmos are pleasing/entertaining more people than pre-2004 mmos given all the games mentioned by mikuniman above have more people playing them than the entire Western mmo player base before 2004. Indeed a single game can appeal to a broad range of players through good design
Except that's not the case. SWG was a game that appealed to a broad range of people. Age of Conan is a game that attempts to appeal to the casual crowd but has no direction and half asses everything and ends up with no audience because most of its features are tired and pulled from WoW. That's basically the story of every AAA MMO except maybe GW2.
And no, most modern day AAA MMOs have about the same, or fewer people than pre 2004 MMOs. But, they cost about 20X more to make, and are declining way faster. Hence why publishers are all pulling out of the market. Themeparks, by and large, do not work.
If Rift had 350k subs, or 500k subs, like some pre 2004 MMOs, it wouldn't have fired so much staff, closed so many servers, and gone FTP.
Pre-2004 MMOs slowly grew because they all appealed to a niche and sized their budgets and dev studios accordingly.
The modern MMO market has games for only one type of player. You've got 10 different companies all basically releasing the SAME GAME, trying to pull people away from WoW. Those that like that kind of game, are playing WoW. Those that don't, aren't going to play a WoW clone.
For the people that love WoW, it's a good time. Except for all the failing WoW clones.
For publishers, developers, and players that don't like WoW, it's the worst time.
Comments
This isn't about whether or not it's pleasing you.
It's about how many different groups of people it's pleasing. And currently, its all themeparks aimed at people like you, and just about non of them are doing well. Hence why publishers are all pulling out of the market.
Bad for publishers AND consumers.
I know most of WoW players came from outside of mmos. I am talking about people that was playing older games.
Sorry, no. I never jumped ship to WoW. While I have tried other MMO's, I still subscribe to EQ/EQ2.
Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain and most fools do.
Benjamin Franklin
Then you are the person that others should have been like. Everquest 2 was an amazing game that I feel was better then WoW. I still remember how it use to start you off on that boat and the goblin breaks out of the crate and you have to kill it. Everquest 2 was one of the games I would go to when I took a break from Lineage 2.
And apparently it is pleasing many different groups as the said mmos are alive and doing well and this to name just a few. And it's it is all about them doing well because if they weren't there would be no market then mmos would be in a state.
It's probably more about you not being able to be pleased. I don't know, I think with every flavor mmo available today people like you are just burned out with mmos or maybe don't really like mmos. I don't see publishers pulling out there are more than ever compared to 5 years ago.
The worst period to be a mmo gamer would be the stone age. No electricity or heat. Back then they played MMORPGs ... they were minimally multiplayer offline role playing games. O.P. stop complaining lmao
Sooo... you just ignored my explanation then, did you?
Except.. most of them AREN'T doing well, which is why almost no AAA companies are developing MMOs. It's why EQ3 scrapped itself halfway through development. It's why Titan got cancelled.
SWTOR was a failure on an unimaginable scale. Wildstar and ESO didn't do too much better. AoC, LotRO, Rift, and all the other WoW clones steadily dropped in population post launch and continued to fall. Funcom has sworn off MMOs after how badly The Secret World did. Turbine has shut down almost all MMO development and is working on MOBAs now.
Everyone tried their hand at making a WoW clone and the market rejected them. Pre WoW, most AA and AAA MMOs grew steadily over time, appealing to their niche, just like Eve is continuing to do.
Most MMOs are in, and have been in, decline, because the ONLY games on the market right now are underfunded inexperienced indie MMOs with teams of like, 8 people, or AAA WoW clones that appeal to no one that isn't already playing WoW.
Depend
But yes market in actual crash and adapt
But you still can find fun in mmo
I know problem find right mmo
But i guess you dont know whatts mmo you want play
If you know think grind grind grind maybe start move on to things more "fast"
and leave mmo in side util you stop with this crapy b.s in you mind and start enjoy mmo again
If it was a success they wouldn't have shut down 2 partner companies and fired 80% staff to keep it profitable, sorry bub the ship sailed on that one.
And EQ3 was the name of the project that was in development for 2 years before SOE scrapped it. They said it was just another themepark like EQ2 and all the others, and would be too expensive and the market wasn't there for it.
They went back to the drawing board and came back with EQNext, a sandbox game. Because themeparks, which is what 100% of the last 10 years of AAA releases have been... have not done well.
Or are you going to tell me that the options of AA and AAA games are more diverse than ever, and they're all thriving? Which is why Funcom and Turbine have sworn off making more MMOs? Which is why Rift continues to sink?
Development team
Coders, Writers, Artists, Managers, PR, Marketing, Others
Once a game is made, you don't need most of the development team to stick around anymore. You don't need nearly as many coders, you definitely don't need that many writers. Even more so for the artists.
Be the Ultimate Ninja! Play Billy Vs. SNAKEMAN today!
People always try this excuse. In MMOs, that's the opposite of true.
If your MMO is doing well, and your population is growing, your company grows with it. It's what happened to Mythic, Turbine, CCP, Aventurine, Funcom, Blizzard, all of them.
When an MMO crashes in the first month, you have to fire people. Turbine's office is 10 minutes from my house, I've been in there several times over the years. That company has been in decline for a long time. But back when AC and DDO were new, they were growing.
You literally know jack shit about mmo game development. It is not "the opposite of true" for MMOs. You continue to keep a portion but you don't need everyone once the game has been launched. There's absolutely no need for it. The BULK of the work is done, so the BULK of the development team is no longer needed and are let go.
You keep a portion for maintenance and work on additional content but you're fucking kidding yourself if you think its economical(it doesn't matter how WELL your game is doing) to keep the entire team on salary from start to ???.
Be the Ultimate Ninja! Play Billy Vs. SNAKEMAN today!
Sorry, but EQ2 was terrible compared to WoW. I say this as someone who's first MMO was EQ2. lol.
The newbie island was a barrier to alts, as was the advanced class system. It wasn't fun leveling alts to 10 (or was it 20?), just so i could try out a class to determine if i liked it. Instancing and frequent zoning between all the cities was a chore, for mundane quests. The long load times didn't help either.
Animations and models looked ridiculous too.
Packs of static gnoll mobs placed randomly throughout Antonica. Every zone was pretty much the same like this.
Dungeons were just awful, both instanced and openworld. The attunement quests to access them weren't fun either.
The things i did like was housing and crafting, but crafting became burdensome when i needed a component that was overpriced. I ended up making alts exclusively because of this. Heritage quests were another thing i liked though.
Then i tried WoW, and it was just more fun and friendly, and a more enjoyable experience.
The problem is the free to play model has stolen a lot of players who can spend money to be better then skill based players. The subscription based model tends to make all players equal on paper but the less skilled players fail to stay. So we see sporadic dwindling player populations in the sub models; thus it forces the gaming companies to convert to free to play. The ideal situation is the sub model, but for casual gamers who have money this is too hard.
What has happened is an all out greed fest, and yes we can blame the gaming community and the gaming companies equally. This greed concept has produced very bad games lately. The talent also producing these games seems to be sub par, because these game developers are more in it for the quick buck. The real artists who have souls don't seem to be involved with gaming as much as we would wish for.
This is how I feel more then what might be true...
FTP games haven't stolen players, players have simply chosen to play a new game.
rpg/mmorg history: Dun Darach>Bloodwych>Bards Tale 1-3>Eye of the beholder > Might and Magic 2,3,5 > FFVII> Baldur's Gate 1, 2 > Planescape Torment >Morrowind > WOW > oblivion > LOTR > Guild Wars (1900hrs elementalist) Vanguard. > GW2(1000 elementalist), Wildstar
Now playing GW2, AOW 3, ESO, LOTR, Elite D
Wut?
Of course most of WoW players came outside of MMOs, pre WoW whole western MMO market was <1m
And like 90% of that 1m jumped to WoW and never looked back.
THATS why companies wanted their games to be like WoW (they wanted their former players back and hoping to snatch some of "new" players), but when you have such core design flaws like "old school" MMOs in your game, it just doesnt work.
Yes, but layoffs that happen 6 months after launch have nothing to do with pre-launch.
Just for illustration, they said SWOTR had 800-1000 people working on it at times pre-launch (mostly contractors), and that 400 people will be their core team to carry post launch development.
At lauch contractors were gone and 2 rounds of layoffs that happened afterwards were form that CORE 400 people. Same goes for pretty much every MMO company since WoW, they had layoffs to their CORE teams because they failed, except GW2 which actually expanded their launch numbers (they had 250-270 team pre launch and they grew to some 350 after launch)
Obviously current gen mmos are pleasing/entertaining more people than pre-2004 mmos given all the games mentioned by mikuniman above have more people playing them than the entire Western mmo player base before 2004. Indeed a single game can appeal to a broad range of players through good design, which is probably one reason WoW is so popular.
Now I am not saying that popularity or the number of people a game pleases is an absolute measure of whether a game is good or bad. But that is the argument you are using, and even by your own logic the conclusion can only be that mmos are currently much better than pre-2004.
Here is another thing, we had several major releases last year, and several games are in the pipeline or being released this year or next year. This idea that publishers are pulling out or that consumers are suffering is so full of holes and non-logic it is bordering on the ridiculous. We are getting spoilt as gamers, being treated to ever more lavish and polished games without even having to pay a sub any more in many cases.
So the moral of this story is real mmo gamers don't actually play MMOs, they just complain about them on forums.
The more you know...
PREACH!
Any mmo worth its salt should be like a good prostitute when it comes to its game world- One hell of a faker, and a damn good shaker!
"I'll never grow up, never grow up, never grow up! Not me!"
Except that's not the case. SWG was a game that appealed to a broad range of people. Age of Conan is a game that attempts to appeal to the casual crowd but has no direction and half asses everything and ends up with no audience because most of its features are tired and pulled from WoW. That's basically the story of every AAA MMO except maybe GW2.
And no, most modern day AAA MMOs have about the same, or fewer people than pre 2004 MMOs. But, they cost about 20X more to make, and are declining way faster. Hence why publishers are all pulling out of the market. Themeparks, by and large, do not work.
If Rift had 350k subs, or 500k subs, like some pre 2004 MMOs, it wouldn't have fired so much staff, closed so many servers, and gone FTP.
Pre-2004 MMOs slowly grew because they all appealed to a niche and sized their budgets and dev studios accordingly.
The modern MMO market has games for only one type of player. You've got 10 different companies all basically releasing the SAME GAME, trying to pull people away from WoW. Those that like that kind of game, are playing WoW. Those that don't, aren't going to play a WoW clone.
For the people that love WoW, it's a good time. Except for all the failing WoW clones.
For publishers, developers, and players that don't like WoW, it's the worst time.