You didn't prove your point citing that thread. Two guys as former sony devs? Big deal. If you can actually list off almost a third of the development staff being hired by Sony to work an mmo from the beginning then you would have a point. Your anecdotal evidence is lacking.
[quote]Originally posted by xpowderx http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/121845 <--read.. LOLOLOLOL [/b][/quote] You didn't prove your point citing that thread. Two guys as former sony devs? Big deal. If you can actually list off almost a third of the development staff being hired by Sony to work an mmo from the beginning then you would have a point. Your anecdotal evidence is lacking.
Dude, quit being a TOOL. I guess you play the games published by SOE. Or you just wanting to be a asshole? If its the latter, there are better posts than this one to show your true colors to.!
Sigil began growing once they reached their publishing deal with Microsoft in April 2002 and has attracted many developers who previously worked on the EverQuest series of games alongside McQuaid and Butler for Sony Online Entertainment/Verant Interactive. For example, artist Keith Parkinson, who had done the cover art for EverQuest and most of its expansions, joined Sigil in April 2002. Also around that time is when design work began on Vanguard.
Sigil has now moved away from Microsoft as their publisher and is using Sony Online Entertainment to help with publishing and billing issues.
This was actually proved by Funcom back in 2000 with the release of Anarchy Online. The game released with so many issues and lag it wasn't enjoyable. As a result, it never brought in enough subscriptions to be considered a hit. It just kind of survives now at this point. First impressions are everything. I played EQ2 during the open beta. Did not like it one bit. As a result, I have no plans to play it ever. Same with Vanguard.
Dude, quit being a TOOL. I guess you play the games published by SOE. Or you just wanting to be a asshole? If its the latter, there are better posts than this one to show your true colors to.!
Enjoy...
I'm the type of person who likes accurate knowledge you didn't provide it in your first post and citing a wikipedia usually isn't good enough if it doesn't have references. I actually took the time to check Sigil's website and surprisingly enough unlike most companies they post short bios for everyone working in that company. If they hadn't done that you would've had no verifiable proof.
After reading several positive comments about how EQ2 had evolved I thought I would take a look. I tried out the demo and thought that it looked pretty good for another PvE grindfest type game. That was until I added up that the cost for a 2 year old game would have been one hundred or so dollars by the time I got the core game and all the add-ons. At that point I recalled all the complaints about how SOE had treated its subscribers like cash cows over the years. No thanks.
You do know that the retail box contains the game, all 3 xpacks and 30 days play for around $30?
I think theres a reason EQ2 doesn't have more subscribers. I don't think it's because of it's launch, but more it's kinda a your cup of tea or not game and it has relatively high system specs. Sorry, I'll go back one statement, launch will have impacted a few. I mean when it first released it had chains and all that, that may have put off a few. But, it has probably compensated with the improvements in attracting some new players.
No it's because the majority were already playing EQ1 and didn't accept changes that came about in EQ2.The others were just tired of the game and were looking for something new.Eq and final fantasy really opened up the eyes of MMO to north americans how ever FFXI was forced group play and others were looking for a new home.Hence this is why WOW was the luckiest game on earth,it had nobody to compete with in north america as lineage was strictly a korean marketed game with very little marketing here.So the masses turned away from EQ2's changes and ffxi's forced grouping and headed for the only other option"A very highly marketed but average game in WOW".To this day EQ2 has the most complete game with a very large world and incorporated new ideas that are still only found in Everquest2.
All the people who you see argue over games ideas are pretty much in a nutshell crying for games to be easier ,everything handed to them as fast aa possible with as little effort as possible.Anything that is brought forth as CHALLENGING,is often scoffed at and ridiculed by lame arguements as "I have no time for all this BS".Ya you have no time that's why you are playing video games?pfft i seen and heard it all.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
SOE business plan = milk our customers out of more and more money.
I will never buy another SOE product.
SOE might have learned that they need to fix major issues with their games instead of making the next adventure pack or expansion. They learned that 5 years too late.
Agreed, SOE is on my shit list now and anything that has an SOE label on the game is really just a different way to say "WARNING , WE WILL MILK YOU FOR MONEY, AND WE WILL NOT DELIVER A GOOD PRODUCT".
You do know that the retail box contains the game, all 3 xpacks and 30 days play for around $30?
Nope. Did my browsing on the official site from the comfort of my own home. Would have thought SOE would mention somewhere that they offered it more reasonably through other means. Thx for the info though.
As someone who has had the full SOE experience I most likely will never buy another title they publish again. That is of course til they change the ideology they have used for the past 5 years. But that is doubtful since they keep repeating the same thing. I actually miss my old EQ days. Farming Seb.. Keying and completing VT.. But that was then, this is now. It is too bad that SOE started a great thing only to turn it into shit.
I played EQII. Was actually a fun game until I saw the 4 upgrade packs and 3 expansion packs for a total of 7 within a two year period.
Interesting marketing maneuver though. You buy the original EQII, they offer a expansion for 29.99 but it includes the original EQII.
They have done this 3 times in the past two years. Kinda like buying the same game over and over again. They did this to EQ as well. Now they couldnt pay me to play EQ. The expansions have been so many its not worth it.
As someone who has had the full SOE experience I most likely will never buy another title they publish again. That is of course til they change the ideology they have used for the past 5 years. But that is doubtful since they keep repeating the same thing. I actually miss my old EQ days. Farming Seb.. Keying and completing VT.. But that was then, this is now. It is too bad that SOE started a great thing only to turn it into shit.
I played EQII. Was actually a fun game until I saw the 4 upgrade packs and 3 expansion packs for a total of 7 within a two year period.
Interesting marketing maneuver though. You buy the original EQII, they offer a expansion for 29.99 but it includes the original EQII.
They have done this 3 times in the past two years. Kinda like buying the same game over and over again. They did this to EQ as well. Now they couldnt pay me to play EQ. The expansions have been so many its not worth it.
So you would rather not have new content for 2+ years like WoW? Sorry, I would like new content at least once a year. EQ2's original expansion release schedule was a bit much so the devs listened and toned it down, now a new expansion every 9-12 months. They also dropped the Adventure Packs idea. Oh they only have 3 expansions and 3 AP's for a total of 6 in 2.5 years.
And to the including the original game with the purchase of the game? It's a brilliant thing to do because it makes it easier for newbs to join the game without the high cost that so many of the other posts in this thread bemoan about with SOE games.
As to the OP, yes I do think first impressions are absolutely crucial. AO proved that, EQ2 has proven that too. Both games get some of the best reviews of any MMO out there but still struggle to some extent for subs. Gamers are not a forgiving bunch. I don't have much faith in Vanguard either since it's poor release.
As someone who has had the full SOE experience I most likely will never buy another title they publish again. That is of course til they change the ideology they have used for the past 5 years. But that is doubtful since they keep repeating the same thing. I actually miss my old EQ days. Farming Seb.. Keying and completing VT.. But that was then, this is now. It is too bad that SOE started a great thing only to turn it into shit.
I played EQII. Was actually a fun game until I saw the 4 upgrade packs and 3 expansion packs for a total of 7 within a two year period.
Interesting marketing maneuver though. You buy the original EQII, they offer a expansion for 29.99 but it includes the original EQII.
They have done this 3 times in the past two years. Kinda like buying the same game over and over again. They did this to EQ as well. Now they couldnt pay me to play EQ. The expansions have been so many its not worth it.
So you would rather not have new content for 2+ years like WoW? Sorry, I would like new content at least once a year. EQ2's original expansion release schedule was a bit much so the devs listened and toned it down, now a new expansion every 9-12 months. They also dropped the Adventure Packs idea. Oh they only have 3 expansions and 3 AP's for a total of 6 in 2.5 years.
And to the including the original game with the purchase of the game? It's a brilliant thing to do because it makes it easier for newbs to join the game without the high cost that so many of the other posts in this thread bemoan about with SOE games.
As to the OP, yes I do think first impressions are absolutely crucial. AO proved that, EQ2 has proven that too. Both games get some of the best reviews of any MMO out there but still struggle to some extent for subs. Gamers are not a forgiving bunch. I don't have much faith in Vanguard either since it's poor release. Nah, I would rather have a game that has a player base and doesnt demand 500-1000 dollar in upgrades everytime they release a new game. SOE is a done deal for me. They keep going back to the same dimwit developers after the first exodus of SOE developing staff. The ones that left from the initial exodus did so for a reason. They are talented!!! The ones that stayed are just EQ clones!
Brad only made Sigil after half of his develop team left for Mythic Good for Mythic. they got the talent. SOE stuck with Brad and his cloneys for the past 5 years. Same shit different name.
Once again extremely biased comments.For one thing EQ was the leading edge of MMO's,EQ2 was once again the leading edge,and now vanguard is the leading edge.You say this is same old ? lmao it appears to me that they are pushing the genre to the next step and whiners are not accepting it.For every player that complains about TOO much content there is easily the same amount that are striving for more.This is very much a fact since nowaday gamers are doing nothing but SPEED levelling therefore running out of content VERY fast,and you know this is true.Then if a game turns around and makes it a super grind so that content lasts twice as long,guess what? the same illogical people complain it's nothing more than a grindfest.PFFFT you guys come off as not knowing what the heck you want in a game,please tell me ?
Ok you want almost no new content to keep cost down
You dont want a grindfest ,you want to speed level
You want cutting edge graphics
you dont want new graphics cus they lag your system
You dont want SOE name on your product,lmao SOE owns shares in prolly 90% of every game on PS2/3..that's it everyone sell there playsation machines.
Everything you people say is so contradictory it's a joke.
Bringing up topics about developers and there members moving about and leaving one company for another is another joke,both UNREAL and QUAKE have had members leave for other companies and both are super successfull franchises.Heck even microsoft has it's members runaround.I just posted in another thread the original leaders of STARCRAFT forming a new company.It happens for way too many reasons you couldn't imagine,it's not as simple as "They leave because of failure".
Open your eyes people and quit being so dam biased,try being fair towards every game.Brad and SOE have done ALOT to the MMO scene over the years and to just outright bash them for reasons ,poster's come off not even knowing what they want.
In case you are wondering what i want lol
1 i do want cutting edge graphics
2 i do want a huge massive world
3 i want a well designed battle system
4 I want a game that is WELL balanced and fair towards all classes/jobs[this often takes tons of tweaking far beyond a game's launch]
5 I do want a challenging game from battles/crafting/quests
6 a good community that is helpful and friendly [i despise childish communities and there l33t talk/end game raiding phenomina]i play a game for ALL it's content not 5/10 % of it.
Tell me if any game in the EQ/EQ2/or vanguard series has not met these requirements?The only one you could argue is maybe quests but that's because there is SO many quests there will of course be fillers to go along with some very challenging ones.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Many claim EQ2 is the best mmorpg on the market. So how come the lack of new players? Why hasnt it broke a million dollar point? is it because its first impression was so horrible no matter how great they make the game it will still never reach fame and glory of a great mmo?
In a word: yes.
Timing is important. Your game is compared to other games when it is released, and that is the reputation that the game gets. it's nice to improve the game over time, but the first impression is going to be a lasting one for most games. Game companies will tell you that they get most of their "sales" revenue from selling the software within the first 30-60 days of release, and then it tails off dramatically. This is also the case with *most* MMOs -- WoW of course has been the great exception to the rule, but for most other games, the first 30-60 days are when the vast majority of boxes are sold. If you don't impress people enough in that time period to sell boxes, you won't catch up later, because you are a "known commodity".
EQ2's release competition was WoW, and quite frankly, EQ2 got its clock cleaned thoroughly by WoW in that competition. EQ2 was buggy, it had high system reqs for the time, it had some features people didn't like -- it was something that didn't impress people as much as its competition did when it was released. To their credit, the EQ2 team has vastly improved the game over the past 2.5 years, but those first impressions die hard. They stick to a game, for the most part, and it's extremely hard to get past them down the road.
At this point, rather than starting a new character on an old game like EQ2, it would seem to make more sense to play one of the 2007 games which is new: LOTRO, AoC, WAR, PotBS, etc. I can completely understand why people would make that decision, really.
SOE did not make Vanguard. Geez, I've never defended people slandering SOE but to rag on Vanguard and blame SOE makes no sense at all. And all this missinformation just further propogates the SOE is the root of all evil ideal. If yer gonna hate on Vanguard, at least blame the people who made it not the people who advertised/packaged it.
They were quick to try and get their name on the product, but they couldn't throw Sigil the extra money needed to at least try and polish Vanguard?
Know your history.If M$ had their way it would have been launched last year.SoE bought them extra time.If you are accusing SoE of not giving them an unlimited amount of money then i don't know what to say
Then again when you say more subs i imagine you mean compared to WoW.
But fact is WoW is miles ahead of the rest in numbers .Just the china crowd alone can swallow a number of other mmorpg subs.
But if you forget WoW ,EQ2 is sitting in that top 5 easily in subs.Just log into any server there and you see a crowded world.
Exact numbers would be nice as the only source of numbers we ever got was sirbruce who has shown for nearly 2 years to have lost his touch and his numbers across the board are very inaccurate now almost guesswork without proper sources.Sad because when he started he seems to have had good insider information which he has since lost.
I doubt we ever know the true numbers because even if they have passed 1 m mark SoE will keep quiet about it as its not an achievement nowadays with WoW 8m out there and also they will get critized as they will be counting all access accounts too..
But the ingame population is very very healthy and ofc i can even challenge anyone on this forum to create a character and see for themselves or even pm me for a tour.
Originally posted by xpowderx Well, originally EQ was a kick-butt game when it came out(out of beta for retail in early 1999). The following two years after were great as well. Then SOE bought out Verant. Some of the original developers for the original EQ left and formed a new company. This company we all know is Mythic Entertainment. Mythic made a good game with probably the best pvp of any game for the past 5 or so years. The game Dark Age of Camelot! At the time SOE had just released Luclin for EQ. Was a very good expansion. About 4-6 months after mythic released DAOC Sony online entertainment released its new mmorpg that was suppose to take the market by storm! In conjunction with Lucas Films/Entertainment Star Wars Galaxies was released.
Sony was the principle owner of Verant all along. Verant started out as a studio within Sony Interactive headed by John Smedly and with Brad McQuaid as lead developer for the Everquest project.
There was some shuffling in preparation for the launch of the PS2, and projects that were not related were shifted off. The EQ2 team was one of these, and it was spun out into a company called Verant with Smedly as president and Brad as VP/lead developer. Sony was still the principle owner though.
When EQ1 proved successful Sony reabsorbed Verant pretty much intact with and renamed it SOE again with Smedly in the top job and Brad second in command. Brad and a couple others left about a year later to form Sigil (Not Mythic, which had already been around for some time) but not before being the first lead designer on EQ2, and writing up the original design specs for both Planetside and SWG.
Then again when you say more subs i imagine you mean compared to WoW. But fact is WoW is miles ahead of the rest in numbers .Just the china crowd alone can swallow a number of other mmorpg subs. But if you forget WoW ,EQ2 is sitting in that top 5 easily in subs.Just log into any server there and you see a crowded world. Exact numbers would be nice as the only source of numbers we ever got was sirbruce who has shown for nearly 2 years to have lost his touch and his numbers across the board are very inaccurate now almost guesswork without proper sources.Sad because when he started he seems to have had good insider information which he has since lost. I doubt we ever know the true numbers because even if they have passed 1 m mark SoE will keep quiet about it as its not an achievement nowadays with WoW 8m out there and also they will get critized as they will be counting all access accounts too.. But the ingame population is very very healthy and ofc i can even challenge anyone on this forum to create a character and see for themselves or even pm me for a tour.
While SOE doesnt give numbers for specific games any more Sony did give SOEs total subscriber count as being 680 000 in last years annual report.
Unlike Blizzard or NCSoft this is almost all true monthly subscriptions, and its mostly in North America. SOE is the clear #2 outside of Asia. In Asia NCSoft is actually very close to Blizzard for revenue, if not total subscriber numbers. Europe was the last major MMO market to emerge and its pretty much all WoW with EvE running a distant second.
This makes EQ2 the flagship game for one of the top MMO companies, which is certainly quite respectable. Yes it falls far behind WoW, but who really knows where all those WoW subscribers will end up once they get tired of it. Blizzard successfully took its very large Battlenet base and moved them over to a subscription game, but are these people really going to stick with this genre?
While SOE doesn’t give numbers for specific games any more Sony did give SOE’s total subscriber count as being 680 000 in last years annual report.
Unlike Blizzard or NCSoft this is almost all true monthly subscriptions, and it’s mostly in North America. SOE is the clear #2 outside of Asia. In Asia NCSoft is actually very close to Blizzard for revenue, if not total subscriber numbers. Europe was the last major MMO market to emerge and it’s pretty much all WoW with EvE running a distant second.
This makes EQ2 the flagship game for one of the top MMO companies, which is certainly quite respectable. Yes it falls far behind WoW, but who really knows where all those WoW subscribers will end up once they get tired of it. Blizzard successfully took it’s very large Battlenet base and moved them over to a subscription game, but are these people really going to stick with this genre?
But this is Apples and Oranges if there ever was one. I mean you can't seriously be comparing the total number of subs for SOE (which includes EQ, EQ2, MxO, Planetside, SWG and VG) with the total number of subs for *one* game with a s atraight face, can you?
I understand you are making company/company comparisons, but still there it's inapposite to compare them like that, because when you take into account the "sunk-in" development costs/acquisition costs/operating costs of six titles as compared with one, then spreading the associated revenue across those six titles, and everything they need to amortize for them .... it just paints a bleak picture compared to Blizzard, with one game's costs to consider, even if you completely take away and disregard entirely Blizzard's Asian operation. Forgetting about Asia, there is no comparison to be made, really. 680k subs for 6 games is not a great record, no matter how the apple is sliced, I'm afraid, even if there were no Blizzard out there with 3.5m subs in comparison.
I mean, I appreciate your point, but I just really disagree that 680k subs for six games is a terribly good figure from the economic perspective.
But this is Apples and Oranges if there ever was one. I mean you can't seriously be comparing the total number of subs for SOE (which includes EQ, EQ2, MxO, Planetside, SWG and VG) with the total number of subs for *one* game with a s atraight face, can you?
Why not? At the end of the day it all comes down to money, and developing multiple products is a great way of keeping more people happy.
Let me give you an example, lets say Blizzard was to release a Starcraft MMO, and 2/3 of its population came over from WoW while the rest were people who would have not subscribed to a Blizzard game at all.
By your logic this would mean the project was a flop because neither WoW nor the new game would reach WoWs old subscriber numbers. In terms of business decisions, however, its a success because they have more subscribers then before. In terms of player satisfaction its also a win because players get to pick the game they like best.
In any case EQ2 is clearly the SOE flagship at the moment. Of the games you list MXO, Planetide have never had large player base, Vanguard was released after that 680K number so it isn't factored in, and neither EQ1 or SWG are doing much these days.
Originally posted by Novaseeker
But this is Apples and Oranges if there ever was one. I mean you can't seriously be comparing the total number of subs for SOE (which includes EQ, EQ2, MxO, Planetside, SWG and VG) with the total number of subs for *one* game with a s atraight face, can you?
Before WoW no company had achieved more then ~1 million real subscriptions so 680K would have been very near the top of the industry.
Many claim EQ2 is the best mmorpg on the market. So how come the lack of new players? Why hasnt it broke a million dollar point? is it because its first impression was so horrible no matter how great they make the game it will still never reach fame and glory of a great mmo?
I was impressed by it when I started playing it. But everything started to feel like a repetition of what i just had done, and that bored the hell out of me. That's why I quit EQ2, just a few weeks ago. I had all 3 expansions + all 3 adv. packs.
So for me, it was opposite of what you talk about. Great first impressions, boring game.
Oh, and I was NOT impressed by 18-20 hours update downloads. I have 1.5 Mb/s DSL, the slow updates wasn't because of any issues on my system. Everything else was fast enough.
Odd.. the longest update download time I have gotten in the past couple of years is maybe 45 minutes.
And btw, I am seeing a lot more new people in EQ2 these past few months, and much higher server and zone pops, at least on Befallen. I have heard, but not confirmed, that EQ2 subs are up about 40% since last year.
Comments
[quote]Originally posted by xpowderx
http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/121845 <--read..
LOLOLOLOL
[/b][/quote]
You didn't prove your point citing that thread. Two guys as former sony devs? Big deal. If you can actually list off almost a third of the development staff being hired by Sony to work an mmo from the beginning then you would have a point. Your anecdotal evidence is lacking.
Enjoy..
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Sigil Games Online, Inc. is a computer game developer based in Carlsbad, California that was founded by Brad McQuaid and Jeff Butler in January 2002 after leaving Sony Online Entertainment and EverQuest. The company is developing Vanguard: Saga of Heroes, a massively multiplayer online role-playing game to be co-published by Sony Online Entertainment and Sigil Games Online on January 30, 2007.
Sigil began growing once they reached their publishing deal with Microsoft in April 2002 and has attracted many developers who previously worked on the EverQuest series of games alongside McQuaid and Butler for Sony Online Entertainment/Verant Interactive. For example, artist Keith Parkinson, who had done the cover art for EverQuest and most of its expansions, joined Sigil in April 2002. Also around that time is when design work began on Vanguard.
Sigil has now moved away from Microsoft as their publisher and is using Sony Online Entertainment to help with publishing and billing issues.
I'm the type of person who likes accurate knowledge you didn't provide it in your first post and citing a wikipedia usually isn't good enough if it doesn't have references. I actually took the time to check Sigil's website and surprisingly enough unlike most companies they post short bios for everyone working in that company. If they hadn't done that you would've had no verifiable proof.
I think theres a reason EQ2 doesn't have more subscribers. I don't think it's because of it's launch, but more it's kinda a your cup of tea or not game and it has relatively high system specs. Sorry, I'll go back one statement, launch will have impacted a few. I mean when it first released it had chains and all that, that may have put off a few. But, it has probably compensated with the improvements in attracting some new players.
No it's because the majority were already playing EQ1 and didn't accept changes that came about in EQ2.The others were just tired of the game and were looking for something new.Eq and final fantasy really opened up the eyes of MMO to north americans how ever FFXI was forced group play and others were looking for a new home.Hence this is why WOW was the luckiest game on earth,it had nobody to compete with in north america as lineage was strictly a korean marketed game with very little marketing here.So the masses turned away from EQ2's changes and ffxi's forced grouping and headed for the only other option"A very highly marketed but average game in WOW".To this day EQ2 has the most complete game with a very large world and incorporated new ideas that are still only found in Everquest2.
All the people who you see argue over games ideas are pretty much in a nutshell crying for games to be easier ,everything handed to them as fast aa possible with as little effort as possible.Anything that is brought forth as CHALLENGING,is often scoffed at and ridiculed by lame arguements as "I have no time for all this BS".Ya you have no time that's why you are playing video games?pfft i seen and heard it all.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
I will never buy another SOE product.
SOE might have learned that they need to fix major issues with their games instead of making the next adventure pack or expansion. They learned that 5 years too late.
I played EQII. Was actually a fun game until I saw the 4 upgrade packs and 3 expansion packs for a total of 7 within a two year period.
Interesting marketing maneuver though. You buy the original EQII, they offer a expansion for 29.99 but it includes the original EQII.
They have done this 3 times in the past two years. Kinda like buying the same game over and over again. They did this to EQ as well. Now they couldnt pay me to play EQ. The expansions have been so many its not worth it.
And to the including the original game with the purchase of the game? It's a brilliant thing to do because it makes it easier for newbs to join the game without the high cost that so many of the other posts in this thread bemoan about with SOE games.
As to the OP, yes I do think first impressions are absolutely crucial. AO proved that, EQ2 has proven that too. Both games get some of the best reviews of any MMO out there but still struggle to some extent for subs. Gamers are not a forgiving bunch. I don't have much faith in Vanguard either since it's poor release.
And to the including the original game with the purchase of the game? It's a brilliant thing to do because it makes it easier for newbs to join the game without the high cost that so many of the other posts in this thread bemoan about with SOE games.
As to the OP, yes I do think first impressions are absolutely crucial. AO proved that, EQ2 has proven that too. Both games get some of the best reviews of any MMO out there but still struggle to some extent for subs. Gamers are not a forgiving bunch. I don't have much faith in Vanguard either since it's poor release. Nah, I would rather have a game that has a player base and doesnt demand 500-1000 dollar in upgrades everytime they release a new game. SOE is a done deal for me. They keep going back to the same dimwit developers after the first exodus of SOE developing staff. The ones that left from the initial exodus did so for a reason. They are talented!!! The ones that stayed are just EQ clones!
Brad only made Sigil after half of his develop team left for Mythic
Once again extremely biased comments.For one thing EQ was the leading edge of MMO's,EQ2 was once again the leading edge,and now vanguard is the leading edge.You say this is same old ? lmao it appears to me that they are pushing the genre to the next step and whiners are not accepting it.For every player that complains about TOO much content there is easily the same amount that are striving for more.This is very much a fact since nowaday gamers are doing nothing but SPEED levelling therefore running out of content VERY fast,and you know this is true.Then if a game turns around and makes it a super grind so that content lasts twice as long,guess what? the same illogical people complain it's nothing more than a grindfest.PFFFT you guys come off as not knowing what the heck you want in a game,please tell me ?
Ok you want almost no new content to keep cost down
You dont want a grindfest ,you want to speed level
You want cutting edge graphics
you dont want new graphics cus they lag your system
You dont want SOE name on your product,lmao SOE owns shares in prolly 90% of every game on PS2/3..that's it everyone sell there playsation machines.
Everything you people say is so contradictory it's a joke.
Bringing up topics about developers and there members moving about and leaving one company for another is another joke,both UNREAL and QUAKE have had members leave for other companies and both are super successfull franchises.Heck even microsoft has it's members runaround.I just posted in another thread the original leaders of STARCRAFT forming a new company.It happens for way too many reasons you couldn't imagine,it's not as simple as "They leave because of failure".
Open your eyes people and quit being so dam biased,try being fair towards every game.Brad and SOE have done ALOT to the MMO scene over the years and to just outright bash them for reasons ,poster's come off not even knowing what they want.
In case you are wondering what i want lol
1 i do want cutting edge graphics
2 i do want a huge massive world
3 i want a well designed battle system
4 I want a game that is WELL balanced and fair towards all classes/jobs[this often takes tons of tweaking far beyond a game's launch]
5 I do want a challenging game from battles/crafting/quests
6 a good community that is helpful and friendly [i despise childish communities and there l33t talk/end game raiding phenomina]i play a game for ALL it's content not 5/10 % of it.
Tell me if any game in the EQ/EQ2/or vanguard series has not met these requirements?The only one you could argue is maybe quests but that's because there is SO many quests there will of course be fillers to go along with some very challenging ones.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Timing is important. Your game is compared to other games when it is released, and that is the reputation that the game gets. it's nice to improve the game over time, but the first impression is going to be a lasting one for most games. Game companies will tell you that they get most of their "sales" revenue from selling the software within the first 30-60 days of release, and then it tails off dramatically. This is also the case with *most* MMOs -- WoW of course has been the great exception to the rule, but for most other games, the first 30-60 days are when the vast majority of boxes are sold. If you don't impress people enough in that time period to sell boxes, you won't catch up later, because you are a "known commodity".
EQ2's release competition was WoW, and quite frankly, EQ2 got its clock cleaned thoroughly by WoW in that competition. EQ2 was buggy, it had high system reqs for the time, it had some features people didn't like -- it was something that didn't impress people as much as its competition did when it was released. To their credit, the EQ2 team has vastly improved the game over the past 2.5 years, but those first impressions die hard. They stick to a game, for the most part, and it's extremely hard to get past them down the road.
At this point, rather than starting a new character on an old game like EQ2, it would seem to make more sense to play one of the 2007 games which is new: LOTRO, AoC, WAR, PotBS, etc. I can completely understand why people would make that decision, really.
I agree. There is also the fact that WoW is popular becasue it is simple and it has low system requirments compared to other games
and with WoW either there si a lot of kids or there are alot of immature adults that just want to kill but want to kill people not AI as they
do not seem to find it as challenging but they take there level 70 epic whatever and one shot a level 50 whatever ( explain that to me)
@Wizardry
Honestly Brad deserves to be 'bashed'.
He has not only tried to promote his game by putting other games down but he ruined his own vision.
Then after that, he trys the more subtle approach and starts giving away EXP weekends and whatnot to gain subs. It's pathetic.
Currently Playing: Everything but MMORPGs
Cancelled: L2, FFXI, VSoH, LotRO, WAR, WoW
Looking Forward To: SW:TOR
Know your history.If M$ had their way it would have been launched last year.SoE bought them extra time.If you are accusing SoE of not giving them an unlimited amount of money then i don't know what to say
Then again when you say more subs i imagine you mean compared to WoW.
But fact is WoW is miles ahead of the rest in numbers .Just the china crowd alone can swallow a number of other mmorpg subs.
But if you forget WoW ,EQ2 is sitting in that top 5 easily in subs.Just log into any server there and you see a crowded world.
Exact numbers would be nice as the only source of numbers we ever got was sirbruce who has shown for nearly 2 years to have lost his touch and his numbers across the board are very inaccurate now almost guesswork without proper sources.Sad because when he started he seems to have had good insider information which he has since lost.
I doubt we ever know the true numbers because even if they have passed 1 m mark SoE will keep quiet about it as its not an achievement nowadays with WoW 8m out there and also they will get critized as they will be counting all access accounts too..
But the ingame population is very very healthy and ofc i can even challenge anyone on this forum to create a character and see for themselves or even pm me for a tour.
Sony was the principle owner of Verant all along. Verant started out as a studio within Sony Interactive headed by John Smedly and with Brad McQuaid as lead developer for the Everquest project.
There was some shuffling in preparation for the launch of the PS2, and projects that were not related were shifted off. The EQ2 team was one of these, and it was spun out into a company called Verant with Smedly as president and Brad as VP/lead developer. Sony was still the principle owner though.
When EQ1 proved successful Sony reabsorbed Verant pretty much intact with and renamed it SOE again with Smedly in the top job and Brad second in command. Brad and a couple others left about a year later to form Sigil (Not Mythic, which had already been around for some time) but not before being the first lead designer on EQ2, and writing up the original design specs for both Planetside and SWG.
While SOE doesnt give numbers for specific games any more Sony did give SOEs total subscriber count as being 680 000 in last years annual report.
Unlike Blizzard or NCSoft this is almost all true monthly subscriptions, and its mostly in North America. SOE is the clear #2 outside of Asia. In Asia NCSoft is actually very close to Blizzard for revenue, if not total subscriber numbers. Europe was the last major MMO market to emerge and its pretty much all WoW with EvE running a distant second.
This makes EQ2 the flagship game for one of the top MMO companies, which is certainly quite respectable. Yes it falls far behind WoW, but who really knows where all those WoW subscribers will end up once they get tired of it. Blizzard successfully took its very large Battlenet base and moved them over to a subscription game, but are these people really going to stick with this genre?
While SOE doesn’t give numbers for specific games any more Sony did give SOE’s total subscriber count as being 680 000 in last years annual report.
Unlike Blizzard or NCSoft this is almost all true monthly subscriptions, and it’s mostly in North America. SOE is the clear #2 outside of Asia. In Asia NCSoft is actually very close to Blizzard for revenue, if not total subscriber numbers. Europe was the last major MMO market to emerge and it’s pretty much all WoW with EvE running a distant second.
This makes EQ2 the flagship game for one of the top MMO companies, which is certainly quite respectable. Yes it falls far behind WoW, but who really knows where all those WoW subscribers will end up once they get tired of it. Blizzard successfully took it’s very large Battlenet base and moved them over to a subscription game, but are these people really going to stick with this genre?
But this is Apples and Oranges if there ever was one. I mean you can't seriously be comparing the total number of subs for SOE (which includes EQ, EQ2, MxO, Planetside, SWG and VG) with the total number of subs for *one* game with a s atraight face, can you?
I understand you are making company/company comparisons, but still there it's inapposite to compare them like that, because when you take into account the "sunk-in" development costs/acquisition costs/operating costs of six titles as compared with one, then spreading the associated revenue across those six titles, and everything they need to amortize for them .... it just paints a bleak picture compared to Blizzard, with one game's costs to consider, even if you completely take away and disregard entirely Blizzard's Asian operation. Forgetting about Asia, there is no comparison to be made, really. 680k subs for 6 games is not a great record, no matter how the apple is sliced, I'm afraid, even if there were no Blizzard out there with 3.5m subs in comparison.
I mean, I appreciate your point, but I just really disagree that 680k subs for six games is a terribly good figure from the economic perspective.
Why not? At the end of the day it all comes down to money, and developing multiple products is a great way of keeping more people happy.
Let me give you an example, lets say Blizzard was to release a Starcraft MMO, and 2/3 of its population came over from WoW while the rest were people who would have not subscribed to a Blizzard game at all.
By your logic this would mean the project was a flop because neither WoW nor the new game would reach WoWs old subscriber numbers. In terms of business decisions, however, its a success because they have more subscribers then before. In terms of player satisfaction its also a win because players get to pick the game they like best.
In any case EQ2 is clearly the SOE flagship at the moment. Of the games you list MXO, Planetide have never had large player base, Vanguard was released after that 680K number so it isn't factored in, and neither EQ1 or SWG are doing much these days.
Before WoW no company had achieved more then ~1 million real subscriptions so 680K would have been very near the top of the industry.
I was impressed by it when I started playing it. But everything started to feel like a repetition of what i just had done, and that bored the hell out of me. That's why I quit EQ2, just a few weeks ago. I had all 3 expansions + all 3 adv. packs.
So for me, it was opposite of what you talk about. Great first impressions, boring game.
Oh, and I was NOT impressed by 18-20 hours update downloads. I have 1.5 Mb/s DSL, the slow updates wasn't because of any issues on my system. Everything else was fast enough.
Odd.. the longest update download time I have gotten in the past couple of years is maybe 45 minutes.
And btw, I am seeing a lot more new people in EQ2 these past few months, and much higher server and zone pops, at least on Befallen. I have heard, but not confirmed, that EQ2 subs are up about 40% since last year.