Shroud of the Avatar - Richard Garriott - Goals, Milestones, and Expectations - MMORPG.com

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Shroud of the Avatar - Richard Garriott - Goals, Milestones, and Expectations - MMORPG.com

Last week we got the chance to talk with Richard Garriott about the state of Shroud of the Avatar and all the upcoming milestones for the game. Many people continue to watch the progress of the game closely as backers and players get ready for the full release of the game. Early Alpha and Beta phases have been tested heavily by fans. Now Richard explained that they are making the final 20% push into release. What will the rest of the world think?

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ste2000

""""Continuing this thought, Richard talked about Portalarium on a much broader scale. Back in his Origin days, he wanted to build worlds. That was their mantra “We create worlds.”""""

No Richard, you didn't create any "World", that's why the game failed.
SotA is just a collection of features badly stiched together, no amount of polish can save this game at this point.

Instead of listening to the White Knights, you should have listened the real criticism instead of hiding inside your sound proof bubble surrounded by your loyal arse lickers.

I am a first minute backer by the way, and followed developement since the beginning.
I can safely say that 80% of your time has been spent designing Houses, Castles, Decorations, silly hats, silly masks, silly everything.
Sadly SotA is not a game, it's a Real Estate Simulator.
I am so disappointed with SotA, I can't even put it in words.

Aeander

*Grabs popcorn*

This thread is going to be good.

MaximusNova

I wouldn't even get this game for free.

Solar_Prophet

Graphics suck, lore (what little there is) sucks, combat sucks, art style sucks, and so on. This game does almost nothing right. Ultima 7 is one of the best RPGs ever made, and comparing that masterpiece to this pile of shit is disrespectful and highly offensive.

Do everyone a favor, Dick, and launch yourself back into space permanently.

postlarval

Solar_Prophet said:

Graphics suck, lore (what little there is) sucks, combat sucks, art style sucks, and so on. This game does almost nothing right. Ultima 7 is one of the best RPGs ever made, and comparing that masterpiece to this pile of shit is disrespectful and highly offensive.



Do everyone a favor, Dick, and launch yourself back into space permanently.

I would add:

1. Take Starr Long with you
2. Use Chris Spears as rocket fuel.

Aragon100

Garriott you should ask yourself why there are so few playing this game.

I was following this game from start and have seen the developer lies and how and why the game changed into what it is now. The whole process.

From start there was alot of of old UO PvP veterans following the game and had loads of ideas on how to make PvP and the game a successful one.

I made numerous threads over at SOTA forums on risk vs reward, full loot and needed player skill to perform well in PvP and tolls from the beginning supported such features. I was far from the only one making such threads.

There is a huge market for a game like Ultima Online 2, a far bigger market then the SOTA game we see today.

Developers had also claimed that it was the community that should decide what kind of game SOTA should become.

When high investors that had no interest at all in PvP started to complain they would leave the game developers began to agree with them and totally ignored any ideas coming from the old UO veterans that had listened to Garriotts kickstarter claim that SOTA was the spiritual successor of UO. They felt like they werent listened too.

Those UO veterans that enjoyed UO PvP have left the game.

If developers instead had listened to the PvP players and lets say made a felucca and trammel map with oldschool UO PvP settings they would have had a more successful game today.

Not listening to their community when it comes to combat system, a huge majority hated the card combat system, was another nail in this games coffin. Ultima Online had one of the best and balanced combat systems and not listening to the community was a unforgiving insult.

Becoming dependent on PvE whales fundings was the major setback to this game. Players with good ideas were ignored since they hadnt invested the high sums. Making a forum where high investors only had access to say alot about how the developers sorted players by how much they had invested.

It is laughable to see claims like this over at SOTA forums -

Gamician- I am not against PvP. I think it is an important part of the game for a small minority of players who truly enjoy it.

https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/forum/index.php?threads/everyones-thoughts-on-forcing-pve-players-into-open-pvp-areas-along-the-main-storyline.94637/page-3


The vast majority of players have left the game of reasons i said above so of course it is today a small minority that play SOTA PvP.

If the game instead had developers listen to the olsschool UO PvP crowd that were following the game from the beginning and a Ultima Online 2 had seen the light then this game would have become a smashing success.

Elvoc

I have been a backer from the start and unloaded this game months ago, will probably not reload it unless they finally finish the offline mode, this game was never going to succeed at anything more than possibly a large RPG..

BruceYee

He can buy Hero's Song from Smed, convert it into a real MMO call Ultima *whatever* and that will be more of the game I wanted him to make. SoTA really is just a real estate simulator like someone else mentioned.

Tazdrago

Bad combat & graphics.. Like my post not a lot going for it really..

Pemmin

bad combat
bad graphics
bad lore
bad monetizing methods
bad community interaction
bad game

Golelorn

Wow.... I thought this looked cool until I read the comments. What is wrong with devs nowadays.

ste2000

Golelorn said:

Wow.... I thought this looked cool until I read the comments. What is wrong with devs nowadays.

They suffer from acute "Head up their arse syndrome".
And that's not only confined to SotA Developers, it's a very aggressive type of virus which apparetly spreads quite fast particularly within the MMORPG Industry.
Unfortunately those affected have very little chance to recover.

CaptFabulous

ste2000 said:

Golelorn said:

Wow.... I thought this looked cool until I read the comments. What is wrong with devs nowadays.

They suffer from acute "Head up their arse syndrome".
And that's not only confined to SotA Developers, it's a very aggressive type of virus which apparetly spreads quite fast particularly within the MMORPG Industry.
Those affected have very little chance to recover.

Yup. This. The market is so saturated they are all fighting each other for money in the F2P arena. The problem is there isn't enough money to go around so pretty much all games have gone down the slipperly slope of catering to the whales. I said it at least 5 or 6 years ago that F2P, while on its surface looks like a good system, over time will become an epic failure because you'll wind up having the same issues as subscriptions -- too many choices and not enough money.

And if you think it's bad on the PC it's 10x worse in the mobile market. P2W is running rampant, and I see game after game that is literally designed to extract huge sums of money from people, else be virtually unplayable.

This F2P whale model is not sustainable and I think we're going to see a hard crash within the next 3-5 years, if not sooner. What's going to come after that I have no idea.

cowboyaz

This game needs to be buried in a linen shroud...

postlarval

REd-Wind said:

Hey just try the game see how it is for yourself, don't give into people getting angry because the producer didn't listen to them maybe that's the only reason they are angry.

Red wind...cute alt. 

Wind is right. Backside wind. 

Talonsin

REd-Wind said:

Hey just try the game see how it is for yourself, don't give into people getting angry because the producer didn't listen to them maybe that's the only reason they are angry.

OR...

When 50,000 have purchased the game and only a bit over 3000 cared for it enough to play it in the last two weeks, maybe the problem is a bit deeper than the producer not listening to a few players.

Source: https://steamdb.info/app/326160/graphs/

Octagon7711

I've read reviews from a few sources and even people who won't say anything bad about it just say to read reviews and make your own decisions.  A lot of reviews are not good at all.

Wizardry

To me it was obvious from the get go,aim at he easy sell,those willing to throw endless amounts of money at Garriot and forget the rest.Obviously the game cannot survive on a couple hundred easy targets giving them a thousand+ but i doubt there are many more or enough to salvage a great ongoing game.

The mistake was done right away and then how can you go back,you can't because then you step on the toes of those early backers who spent a few hundred or more.So he showed gamer's a very greedy cash shop and now he is stuck with it.
Why he would agree to market his game on his site is very odd,i highly doubt there is anyone here willing to  spend a few hundred on a very average game.
Obviously if the game was solid,he would get a lot more players and a sub fee,but Garriot knows it is not good enough ,so aim for those high rollers who make spending money look easy.

I should make a point and that is even if it was the best game on the planet,that cash shop is not getting supported by me,so no way would i play it and support it.What would i pay to give it a fair look see?Hmm maybe 10 bucks a month ,within one month i would have seen all i need to see and decide if it is worth supporting long term.

ste2000

REd-Wind said:

Hey just try the game see how it is for yourself, don't give into people getting angry because the producer didn't listen to them maybe that's the only reason they are angry.

I am not the one struggling to "sell" a F2P game, I doubt those awful reviews on Steam and the poor player retention rates (whopping 8%) have anything to do with the consequences of my damaged ego.
Maybe that has more to do with the Devs inflated ego, if anything.
But it's fine, keep shifting the blame on everyone else, that's what you do best.
Meanwhile SotA is sinking faster than the Titanic, and it's not my fault (fact).

PS: I invite everyone to try the game.
Only because I am pretty sure the bad reviews will increase exponentianelly.

Elsabolts

The Meat thermomter says this Turkey is Done.

Albatroes

What's that saying about a turd? Can polish it, dress it up, etc. Guess what though? Its still a turd.

ZerumZ

bunch of arrogant people that never get satisfied, is that you are, assuming that your opinions are the truth about all things. i feel pity for you, moved by the hype and quick to downgrade everything that isn't what you want

MightyUnclean

ZerumZ said:

bunch of arrogant people that never get satisfied, is that you are, assuming that your opinions are the truth about all things. i feel pity for you, moved by the hype and quick to downgrade everything that isn't what you want

You're talking to the developers, right?  Cause you couldn't have summed them up better.

DavodtheTutt

I tried it a little and I didn't think it was all THAT bad. It had a couple things about it that I liked and haven't seen in other games. But then, I'm not into PvP and didn't get that far, so I can see how people can be so upset, especially if they put money (and some a LOT of money) into it!

But I think Riders of Icarus is the worst game I've tried recently.

Nilden

Pictured here is the whale pod keeping this golden castle for $30k game afloat.