Brad McQuaid doesn't have a good track history, IMO. He's known for having quite the temper, that's led to him leaving several projects. Most of them are written up under the guise of moving to new projects. For that time, there wasn't a lot of choice in playing MMOs, and the devs of that time were iconic for what they created.
His leaving his dream MMO, Vanguard (EQ's supposed spiritual successor) in the hands of Sony left a lot of people raising their brows. Maybe his niche will make it in today's gaming world, but there's reasons EQ changed drastically from the model it was, and why Vanguard wasn't successful.
Let's hope the 3rd time's a charm for McQuaid and that he's learned from the past.
You have to evaluate something on how well it achieves its goals, how good it is compared to other similar examples.
And that was my point - people make any game a 'niche', instead of realistically comparing it to other similar games.
Pantheon isn't a niche game, it is just a game with unpopular feature set and for that very same reason will follow destiny of all the previous failed attempts for 'oldschool' MMO remake...
They have to deliver a technically sound, polished game first
I hope they pull it off, because then we can finally put to rest the debate of how viable the veteran playerbase is today.
Otherwise, bugs crashing, poor performance will be blamed for low population
Private and/or legacy servers already give us an idea of the viability of the veteran playerbase.
The prevalence of modern F2P MMORPGs indicates those that choose the "inconveniences" of vanilla-style private servers do so for reasons other than simply saving some change.
Whether or not the game succeeds or is to anyone's taste or not remains to be seen. I still think that what McQuaid writes about is legit and spot on to the problem in the MMO genre today. The fewer "market to all for long term success" games are made, the better for the genre as a whole. Targeting audiences with dedicated and devoted community members is the way to go. Make multiple games that cater to smaller groups of players and you have a recipe for success. Blizzard, while still developing WoW, is already doing this. Others need to follow suit.
No one disagreed with that, people just expressed their opinion the game will be terrible regardless of the audience they target and that its the same old cash grab dressed up differently. Targeting an audience and providing a quality product have zero relation to each other.
By the way I could present the opposing argument that factually worse for the industry for these niche targeted games to be done poorly, flop and destroy customer confidence for the entire industry, thus when this flops it just adds to what is already a dismal performance record for the mmo genre.
I for one am tired of the mindless sheep who throw their money away at the never ending pile of steaming garbage games which then reinforces the cycle where these developers are confident they can put out trash tier products and still make money off the desperate gaming customers. It makes it worse for all of us.
You have to evaluate something on how well it achieves its goals, how good it is compared to other similar examples.
And that was my point - people make any game a 'niche', instead of realistically comparing it to other similar games.
Pantheon isn't a niche game, it is just a game with unpopular feature set and for that very same reason will follow destiny of all the previous failed attempts for 'oldschool' MMO remake...
But it is a niche game as its feature set appeals to a small segment of the mmorpg population. That's what "niche" means in this case.
AS far as "previously failed attempts", did they fail because of their features sets or because they were implemented poorly? Because I have to say that latter seems to be the case.
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
If they are going to self publish - they will need to secure datacenter colo space in US and EU, buy the network and server gear, hire operations and IT staff, hire security team, hire CS, hire BI etc..
They havent even moved an inch on this yet.
So who will publish and host?
They use cloud hosting. The info is right in their wiki for all to see. They can secure it from a number of providers at any time. It wouldn't be required at this stage in development just like Camelot Unchained hasn't finalized yet who will host there game (although they currently use AWS).
Hopefully you realize this means they don't hire the staff and purchase the hardware themselves nor would they anyway beyond what is required at this stage in development for testing even on conventional tech.
Sadly I do and more so, I can use the term properly and won't call every game(read: the one that fits my bias) with audience a niche game because well, it has audience therefore it must be specialized...
SBFord said: How many people kvetch about "watered down and dumbed down" games in the MMO genre?
Drops in a bucket...
They did evolve.Again, just a preference whether you like what they evolved into.
You speak of a different entity that came later. The change to mmorpgs was directed by business and not the players (the very term was change to "mmo" because of business model reasons). If the original game design evolved it would have expanded the feature sets that kept it's original audience interested and intact. The genre instead changed it's target audience to mass market appeal (aka the casual). The genre that has evolved since has changed to perfect a business model and not a game concept (which has clearly shifted in focus even across a single game over the years. E.g. Wow).
Pantheon is clearly attempting to target the audience interested in the original mmorpg feature set. This is the feature set that was abandoned and was never allowed to evolve (meaning the problems of the original games were not resolved with interest of preserving the original design concept). They are features that are not supported by the current business model meta and therefore could not evolve. What has is the mass market beast that replaced the original design that is created to attract as many people as possible (across ANY game design or genre ... therefore genre to them is fucking irrelevant) in order to increase cash earning metrics.
The very irony of this is that those cash earning metrics (the ones that now largely sculpt the core design of the game) now target the smallest segment of this so called "mass market" appeal (and it pains me how ignorant so many people are of this).
I am not here to debate whether or not the game will succeed. That is irrelevant and prophetic bullshit, and in this case hiding one's ignorance of projecting false-consensus bias over features they hate in a game which boldly claims has features not targeting that very audience. The point is anyone should be allowed to design any game they wish for any audience (within the confines of local laws obviously).
With even multiple mainstream projects failing or living on F2P life support, it begs the question: What has made you people so scared and insecure that majority consensus and popularity is a measurement of success? It's not even a real majority anyway and largely driven by false-consensus. Is it the social media factor from the safety of it's anonymity barrier? It certainly wasn't from socially focused mmorpgs where actions can have consequences.
Sadly I do and more so, I can use the term properly and won't call every game(read: the one that fits my bias) with audience a niche game because well, it has audience therefore it must be specialized...
I guess you don't.
"It has audience therefore it's specialized"? What the heck are you talking about?
If it has a "small" audience, a small segment of a larger population then it is niche. But having an audience just means having an audience.
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
Sadly I do and more so, I can use the term properly and won't call every game(read: the one that fits my bias) with audience a niche game because well, it has audience therefore it must be specialized...
Don't overthink it. A niche game is a game targeting a niche audience:
"denoting or relating to products, services, or interests that appeal to a small, specialized section of the population."
There is no "and more so". It is a very simple concept and you delude yourself by thinking otherwise. You fit into this audience or you don't ... or you are confused over your own self-interests.
If it has a "small" audience, a small segment of a larger population then it is niche.
No, it means smaller market share. Like you said yourself, it just means having an audience - being it small implies less success than those with larger audience.
If it has a "small" audience, a small segment of a larger population then it is niche.
No, it means smaller market share. Moot discussion...
It means neither. It is based on interest.
A niche market is defined by the interest of the people and nothing else. You either target that interest or don't and no other factor shapes the market size. It is consumerism in it's purist form and a reflection of the sheer level of corruption in the industry that it is considered a bad word and unsustainable venture.
If it has a "small" audience, a small segment of a larger population then it is niche.
No, it means smaller market share. Like you said yourself, it just means having an audience - being it small implies less success than those with larger audience.
Moot discussion...
Ok fine a smaller share of the mmorpg market. Your quibbling. I don't see the point of that.
It's 6 of one/half Dozen of the other.
Pantheon has smaller share of the mmorpg demographic. Unless of course you are stating that "no it doesn't, it has a larger share"?
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
If this game launches it will do well imo. I've followed all the walkthroughs so far and read quite a bit. It's trying to set the temperament of EQ and they seem to be doing that. I've played so many mmorpgs and even went back and played EQ 1999. If he can make that interdependence real again, it will work. It's what I miss the most.
That having been said.....I dumped money into EQ next and got (we will say disappointed). I won't do that again. If he can get the game to launch there are tons of old school players I know that will jump. All I want to hear is that it is a viable game and I'm in. However I won't put money into it on the hope it will become a great game. He bit me once on that so I will just be watching for now.
McQuaid writes about is legit and spot on to the problem in the MMO genre today.
You mistake problem with preference,bias.
Hardly. Niche and bad are mutually exclusive. Niche games can be hugely successful over the long term if a stable and "large" enough population is curated that will "stick" to the game. But obviously, it has to be a good game to do that.
But, honestly. How many people kvetch about "watered down and dumbed down" games in the MMO genre? Groups of players have very specific wants and needs and that's where niche games fit in and can be very, very successful servicing that niche.
The issue is that there never will be a WoW killer -- it's doing that just fine on its own. MMOs needs to evolve past 2000 -- it's nearly 2 decades ago, after all. Regardless, niche titles seem to be a decent evolution to the genre. Does that mean there never will be another WoW that captivates the masses? No, but it's going to have to be something so wildly outside the current box as to pull players from other genres.
Retreating to ideas that worked 20 years ago isn't 'evolving' by any stretch of the imagination. Trying to slap an 'evolution' label on games embracing the past is borderline offensive to the archaeologist I once was. It's much more akin to 'regression' than evolution. Certainly, VR isn't threatening the boundaries of that current box.
Specialization, in biology or business, has risks. Focusing on a niche market is a risk. It assumes that there is market for the product is there, is large enough to support a business, and will remain there. There's no evidence of any of that that is available to the general public. Pantheon, and other games in development aiming at this niche market, may find that the population of customers that existed in 1999 has evolved and moved on.
Only taking steps that worked in the past will most definitely not lead the industry out of the current box.
Logic, my dear, merely enables one to be wrong with great authority.
Its like saying "lets aim at old rock and rollers and make 70s rock and roll in 2017 and we will sell millions to these people!"...There probably is some demographic there but many of the old EQ1 players now have married, have families, etc and are most likely not going to support a game much. I'd like this games chances much better if this was 2005
There is no competition for CHOICE the only competition is for the same type of design and that is won by name alone "Blizzard" and not by quality of game. If anyone thinks Blizzard will not sell more of an identical product just because it is Blizzard,they have not been paying attention at all.
So why would anyone even try to compete in that market,easy,they figure using the FREE to play moniker will garner enough to make a tidy profit,not Blizzard like profits but enough.it also happens to be an EASIER type design,very few menus,sub programs and easy to add ongoing content for,so overall just a cheaper more cost effective design.
Weather you like a typical design or not does not matter,we SHOULD have choice and right now we do not.Brad is aiming for that other "original" type market and obviously hoping that SOME newer generation like to actually play an ENTIRE game and not just 1% "end game raiding".
To me if all you do is login to play end game,you are a foolish gamer.,you are not even gaming,at least not rpg gaming,you are just playing a very shallow version of what a game could and should offer.Obviously if a game doesn't offer anything more,you are stuck with that and if that is your thing,great,some of us want a more well rounded game,not some $5 game pretending to be a $80 dollar game. Do i THINK Brad and team can deliver?VERY remotely,i feel they will give us CHOICE which is a good thing but i do not feel they wil improve much on what has already been done and that is sad because there is a boat load of room to improve both sides of the river.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Sensible talk that sounds reasonably to me. The current "direction" of so many of these MMO's out there now, and in-development is just more going down a bad road. I hope the follow through happens. I hope this turns out like a real and worthy EQ3. Only the finished product will tell the tale.
McQuaid writes about is legit and spot on to the problem in the MMO genre today.
You mistake problem with preference,bias.
Hardly. Niche and bad are mutually exclusive. Niche games can be hugely successful over the long term if a stable and "large" enough population is curated that will "stick" to the game. But obviously, it has to be a good game to do that.
But, honestly. How many people kvetch about "watered down and dumbed down" games in the MMO genre? Groups of players have very specific wants and needs and that's where niche games fit in and can be very, very successful servicing that niche.
The issue is that there never will be a WoW killer -- it's doing that just fine on its own. MMOs needs to evolve past 2000 -- it's nearly 2 decades ago, after all. Regardless, niche titles seem to be a decent evolution to the genre. Does that mean there never will be another WoW that captivates the masses? No, but it's going to have to be something so wildly outside the current box as to pull players from other genres.
Retreating to ideas that worked 20 years ago isn't 'evolving' by any stretch of the imagination. Trying to slap an 'evolution' label on games embracing the past is borderline offensive to the archaeologist I once was. It's much more akin to 'regression' than evolution. Certainly, VR isn't threatening the boundaries of that current box.
Specialization, in biology or business, has risks. Focusing on a niche market is a risk. It assumes that there is market for the product is there, is large enough to support a business, and will remain there. There's no evidence of any of that that is available to the general public. Pantheon, and other games in development aiming at this niche market, may find that the population of customers that existed in 1999 has evolved and moved on.
Only taking steps that worked in the past will most definitely not lead the industry out of the current box.
I think this might be, at least partially, a semantic argument. Many folks think the genre evolved in the wrong direction; regressing back to the core and then attempting to move in a new direction, one that plays directly to the unique strengths of the genre, is what many wish to see when they say "evolve."
It'll be interesting to see how this game turns out. If nothing else, it'll show whether there's still a market for these games, or just a few very loud people claiming this is the case. And if the niche is too small, are they going to be willing to whale it up?
My SWTOR referral link for those wanting to give the game a try. (Newbies get a welcome package while returning players get a few account upgrades to help with their preferred status.)
Why do you guys argue about such non-sense? Pantheon is catering to a group of gamers who played MMO's when they were actually MMO's. You folks don't get it because all you know is WoW and MMO's after WoW. I'm hoping Brad can pull this off and I can't wait to play it for myself and then pass judgement.
Comments
His leaving his dream MMO, Vanguard (EQ's supposed spiritual successor) in the hands of Sony left a lot of people raising their brows. Maybe his niche will make it in today's gaming world, but there's reasons EQ changed drastically from the model it was, and why Vanguard wasn't successful.
Let's hope the 3rd time's a charm for McQuaid and that he's learned from the past.
Pantheon isn't a niche game, it is just a game with unpopular feature set and for that very same reason will follow destiny of all the previous failed attempts for 'oldschool' MMO remake...
The prevalence of modern F2P MMORPGs indicates those that choose the "inconveniences" of vanilla-style private servers do so for reasons other than simply saving some change.
No one disagreed with that, people just expressed their opinion the game will be terrible regardless of the audience they target and that its the same old cash grab dressed up differently. Targeting an audience and providing a quality product have zero relation to each other.
By the way I could present the opposing argument that factually worse for the industry for these niche targeted games to be done poorly, flop and destroy customer confidence for the entire industry, thus when this flops it just adds to what is already a dismal performance record for the mmo genre.
I for one am tired of the mindless sheep who throw their money away at the never ending pile of steaming garbage games which then reinforces the cycle where these developers are confident they can put out trash tier products and still make money off the desperate gaming customers. It makes it worse for all of us.
But it is a niche game as its feature set appeals to a small segment of the mmorpg population. That's what "niche" means in this case.
AS far as "previously failed attempts", did they fail because of their features sets or because they were implemented poorly? Because I have to say that latter seems to be the case.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
Hopefully you realize this means they don't hire the staff and purchase the hardware themselves nor would they anyway beyond what is required at this stage in development for testing even on conventional tech.
You stay sassy!
Are you sure you understand what "niche" means? here, let me help you...
IT seems to me that the population that is interested in this game is a "small and specialized section" of the mmorpg population.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
Pantheon is clearly attempting to target the audience interested in the original mmorpg feature set. This is the feature set that was abandoned and was never allowed to evolve (meaning the problems of the original games were not resolved with interest of preserving the original design concept). They are features that are not supported by the current business model meta and therefore could not evolve. What has is the mass market beast that replaced the original design that is created to attract as many people as possible (across ANY game design or genre ... therefore genre to them is fucking irrelevant) in order to increase cash earning metrics.
The very irony of this is that those cash earning metrics (the ones that now largely sculpt the core design of the game) now target the smallest segment of this so called "mass market" appeal (and it pains me how ignorant so many people are of this).
I am not here to debate whether or not the game will succeed. That is irrelevant and prophetic bullshit, and in this case hiding one's ignorance of projecting false-consensus bias over features they hate in a game which boldly claims has features not targeting that very audience. The point is anyone should be allowed to design any game they wish for any audience (within the confines of local laws obviously).
With even multiple mainstream projects failing or living on F2P life support, it begs the question: What has made you people so scared and insecure that majority consensus and popularity is a measurement of success? It's not even a real majority anyway and largely driven by false-consensus. Is it the social media factor from the safety of it's anonymity barrier? It certainly wasn't from socially focused mmorpgs where actions can have consequences.
You stay sassy!
I guess you don't.
"It has audience therefore it's specialized"? What the heck are you talking about?
If it has a "small" audience, a small segment of a larger population then it is niche. But having an audience just means having an audience.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
"denoting or relating to products, services, or interests that appeal to a small, specialized section of the population."
There is no "and more so". It is a very simple concept and you delude yourself by thinking otherwise. You fit into this audience or you don't ... or you are confused over your own self-interests.
You stay sassy!
Moot discussion...
A niche market is defined by the interest of the people and nothing else. You either target that interest or don't and no other factor shapes the market size. It is consumerism in it's purist form and a reflection of the sheer level of corruption in the industry that it is considered a bad word and unsustainable venture.
Think long and hard on this.
You stay sassy!
Ok fine a smaller share of the mmorpg market. Your quibbling. I don't see the point of that.
It's 6 of one/half Dozen of the other.
Pantheon has smaller share of the mmorpg demographic. Unless of course you are stating that "no it doesn't, it has a larger share"?
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
That having been said.....I dumped money into EQ next and got (we will say disappointed). I won't do that again. If he can get the game to launch there are tons of old school players I know that will jump. All I want to hear is that it is a viable game and I'm in. However I won't put money into it on the hope it will become a great game. He bit me once on that so I will just be watching for now.
Specialization, in biology or business, has risks. Focusing on a niche market is a risk. It assumes that there is market for the product is there, is large enough to support a business, and will remain there. There's no evidence of any of that that is available to the general public. Pantheon, and other games in development aiming at this niche market, may find that the population of customers that existed in 1999 has evolved and moved on.
Only taking steps that worked in the past will most definitely not lead the industry out of the current box.
Logic, my dear, merely enables one to be wrong with great authority.
If anyone thinks Blizzard will not sell more of an identical product just because it is Blizzard,they have not been paying attention at all.
So why would anyone even try to compete in that market,easy,they figure using the FREE to play moniker will garner enough to make a tidy profit,not Blizzard like profits but enough.it also happens to be an EASIER type design,very few menus,sub programs and easy to add ongoing content for,so overall just a cheaper more cost effective design.
Weather you like a typical design or not does not matter,we SHOULD have choice and right now we do not.Brad is aiming for that other "original" type market and obviously hoping that SOME newer generation like to actually play an ENTIRE game and not just 1% "end game raiding".
To me if all you do is login to play end game,you are a foolish gamer.,you are not even gaming,at least not rpg gaming,you are just playing a very shallow version of what a game could and should offer.Obviously if a game doesn't offer anything more,you are stuck with that and if that is your thing,great,some of us want a more well rounded game,not some $5 game pretending to be a $80 dollar game.
Do i THINK Brad and team can deliver?VERY remotely,i feel they will give us CHOICE which is a good thing but i do not feel they wil improve much on what has already been done and that is sad because there is a boat load of room to improve both sides of the river.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
My SWTOR referral link for those wanting to give the game a try. (Newbies get a welcome package while returning players get a few account upgrades to help with their preferred status.)
https://www.ashesofcreation.com/ref/Callaron/