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What was Richard Garriot thinking?

ProfRedProfRed Member UncommonPosts: 3,495

It is a pretty polished game, but content bugs and lack of content are unforgiveable.  You test the content/story of your game in house if you are making a game like this.  You make your players in god mode where 1 shot kills enemies and they have endless armor, you have in house testing of the quests and story line where XP is rewarded as normal and quests give normal rewards before you get feedback from beta testers who 90% of the time just want to play a free game they are excited about. 

How could someone like Richard Garriot not say, "Hmm, well a good bit of the content at launch is buggy, and once you level up a bit the content is hardly acceptable."?  They had to know that they would lose players who played for over a month or two once the content fell off.  Either make a skill based sandbox game, a quest driven PVE game, or some mix but do it right.  If you make a quest driven PVE game you need content for your players.  I am really in shock that someone with as popular of a name as this to not test the content themselves and say...  You know what this isn't acceptable.  We need to spend a few months on content since this is a content based game.

Instead they release early thinking they will add it early?  After a release technical bugs take months to iron out and priority by that time the dedicated player base has found out how unfinished the game is.  This stuff doesn't take a rocket scientist, and obviously it doesn't take Richard Garriot either.

Sorry if this is too much but this trend is getting really lame and all of you should expect more.  The worst part is this really had a chance to be something unique and interesting. 

 **Edit:  I forgot to mention that they hardly even listened to their beta testers anyway.  So don't test it out yourselves, but leave it up to the beta testers and then after that ignore 97% of what they say and respond with 'It is working as designed.' and then release an unfinished game.  I love how much that insults me.

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Comments

  • jinxitjinxit Member UncommonPosts: 854

    Im not entirley sure he had much input at all into the game, i do remember a statement by ncsoft saying the logos system was designed by Garrot and....i think thats all he did with tabula besides add his name to the credits lol

  • TyrranosaurTyrranosaur Member UncommonPosts: 284

    How long did your play time last before you exhausted it? Like number of days/hours to level from 1 to 50, for example. Just curious, as I've been playing for the last three weeks (about 3 days' logged time) and gotten to level 21 on my main, with two clones. The impression I am getting is that I will probably have seen most all I will want to see of this game after about 3-5 months at the pace I play, although that sounds fine to me (I will never do another 2.5 year stint like I did with WoW, again....I can never get those wasted days of my life back, sigh)

     

    Current MMOs: Rift, GW2, Defiance
    Blog: http://realmsofchirak.blogspot.com (old school tabletop gaming and more)

  • _Shadowmage_Shadowmage Member Posts: 1,459

    Unfortunately when the publisher who is paying the bills says it needs to ship then games ship - in whatever condition they are in at the time. They did manage to push back the release - but the two weeks gained werent enough to correct all the bugs.

    With the beta test - on any given feature you have people arguing for/against so at some point the developers need to say - this is how its going to be. Eg the Death Penalty - I think they did a good job with this. As much as people whine about it - its not that big a deal.

    I have found the game to be stable, gameplay fast and fun. Yes there are bugs in quests but so far its been a minority. Of course in saying that I should clarify - I am a casual player (maybe 10 hours a week) and have almost finished the palisades map as well as doing quite a few quests in plains. With patches out every 2 weeks that fixes bugs and add content - I think I will have plenty to do for quite a few months.

    I feel sorry for the people who have rushed through the game and hit the level cap and found theres not enough to do. Unfortunately game companies just cant produce content fast enough for these people. But hey if players dont research a game properly to see if they fit its target market - then thats what happens.

  • ThompsonSubThompsonSub Member UncommonPosts: 147

    Originally posted by jinxit


    Im not entirley sure he had much input at all into the game, i do remember a statement by ncsoft saying the logos system was designed by Garrot and....i think thats all he did with tabula besides add his name to the credits lol

    Actually this craptastic product is entirely Richard Garriotts fault.

    This game was his "vision" of an outside the box MMORPG and it has, by his own statements, been in his mind since he was at Origin.

    What it boils down to is that NCsoft Korea's Ultima-Fanboy CEO was hypnotized into giving the Garriott brothers free license to spend money however they wanted, so they spent 3 years making an MMORPG that didn't look very good and had poor gameplay, Garriot shitcanned all the other devs in the "dreamteam" and they left with a huge amount of money, and very likely a large amount of code, because these guys were not some punks out of high school and they had solid contracts...

    So then he hired a bunch of underpaid yesmen fanbois **cough** Starr Long **cough** to try and slap the concept on the Auto Assault engine in the hopes of saving face with NCsoft Korea who put their trust in his "vision" only to find out he is a prima donna that has taken them for a very long and very expensive ride.

    Tabula Rasa is 100% the fault of the Garriott brothers, no ifs, ands, or buts about it.

     

     

  • BedaBeda Member Posts: 86

    Anything for money....I wasn't impressed.  I'm having a blast in Mythos Beta anyway.  Just another Mountain Dew coaster for my desk.  Richard Garriot...i'm not impressed with him either. 

     

  • ThompsonSubThompsonSub Member UncommonPosts: 147

    Originally posted by Tyrranosaur


    How long did your play time last before you exhausted it? Like number of days/hours to level from 1 to 50, for example. Just curious, as I've been playing for the last three weeks (about 3 days' logged time) and gotten to level 21 on my main, with two clones. The impression I am getting is that I will probably have seen most all I will want to see of this game after about 3-5 months at the pace I play, although that sounds fine to me (I will never do another 2.5 year stint like I did with WoW, again....I can never get those wasted days of my life back, sigh)
     

    Three days logged time = 72 hours of gameplay...

    You have only made it to level 21 in 72 hours of gameplay in this incredibly shallow game...

    You might want to try leaving the base and shooting some of those clowny aliens outside.

     

     

  • enhaxedenhaxed Member Posts: 87

    In the first 5 regions of the game I have encountered less bugged quests than I can count on one hand.  I've been playing since pre-order and I have by no means run out of content yet. 

    Name one MMO that was bug-free at release - I have played mature games with more bugs than TR had at release (AO anyone?)

    What makes you think they didn't listen to the beta testers?  What you mean is they didn't appear to listen to your concerns.  Strangely enough just because you were a beta tester doesn't mean the devs at DG were under any obligation to inform you of what issues they as devs saw as needing a priority fix. 

    It appears from your post that you are simply another opiniated troll like 50% of the people making negative posts here, and like them your comments simply do not stand up to scrutiny.

    Over and over we seem the same people jumping on any positive post.  You know a normal person who dosen't like a game just doesn't play it - they don't stop playing then haunt the forums for months trying to destroy the experience for everyone else, to me that indicates issues that have nothing to do with TR.

     

     

    image
  • _Shadowmage_Shadowmage Member Posts: 1,459


    Originally posted by ThompsonSub
    What it boils down to is that NCsoft Korea's Ultima-Fanboy CEO was hypnotized into giving the Garriott brothers free license to spend money however they wanted, so they spent 3 years making an MMORPG that didn't look very good and had poor gameplay, Garriot shitcanned all the other devs in the "dreamteam" and they left with a huge amount of money, and very likely a large amount of code, because these guys were not some punks out of high school and they had solid contracts...
    So then he hired a bunch of underpaid yesmen fanbois **cough** Starr Long **cough** to try and slap the concept on the Auto Assault engine in the hopes of saving face with NCsoft Korea who put their trust in his "vision" only to find out he is a prima donna that has taken them for a very long and very expensive ride.
    Tabula Rasa is 100% the fault of the Garriott brothers, no ifs, ands, or buts about it.

    Link please - otherwise the only facts I can see in the post are you spelt the game and developers names correctly.

  • ThompsonSubThompsonSub Member UncommonPosts: 147

    Originally posted by enhaxed


    In the first 5 regions of the game I have encountered less bugged quests than I can count on one hand.  I've been playing since pre-order and I have by no means run out of content yet. 
    Name one MMO that was bug-free at release - I have played mature games with more bugs than TR had at release (AO anyone?)
    What makes you think they didn't listen to the beta testers?  What you mean is they didn't appear to listen to your concerns.  Strangely enough just because you were a beta tester doesn't mean the devs at DG were under any obligation to inform you of what issues they as devs saw as needing a priority fix. 
    It appears from your post that you are simply another opiniated troll like 50% of the people making negative posts here, and like them your comments simply do not stand up to scrutiny.
    Over and over we seem the same people jumping on any positive post.  You know a normal person who dosen't like a game just doesn't play it - they don't stop playing then haunt the forums for months trying to destroy the experience for everyone else, to me that indicates issues that have nothing to do with TR.
     
     

    ^^^^^ NCsoft damage control team ^^^^^

    Can't attack the message so you attack the messenger.

    Doesn't matter, word of mouth is out and the only new players you are picking up are stragglers outside of mainstream gaming and grandmothers that think Timmy would like that nice "discount" game for X-Mas...

    I think I'll take a Tabula Rasa box over to the neighbors and take a pic of their kid holding it and standing in front of the Christmas tree screaming and crying... :)

    The caption for my new avatar will be "If you don't want to see this on Christmas day..."

     

     

     

  • ThompsonSubThompsonSub Member UncommonPosts: 147

     

    Originally posted by _Shadowmage


     

    Originally posted by ThompsonSub

    What it boils down to is that NCsoft Korea's Ultima-Fanboy CEO was hypnotized into giving the Garriott brothers free license to spend money however they wanted, so they spent 3 years making an MMORPG that didn't look very good and had poor gameplay, Garriot shitcanned all the other devs in the "dreamteam" and they left with a huge amount of money, and very likely a large amount of code, because these guys were not some punks out of high school and they had solid contracts...

    So then he hired a bunch of underpaid yesmen fanbois **cough** Starr Long **cough** to try and slap the concept on the Auto Assault engine in the hopes of saving face with NCsoft Korea who put their trust in his "vision" only to find out he is a prima donna that has taken them for a very long and very expensive ride.

    Tabula Rasa is 100% the fault of the Garriott brothers, no ifs, ands, or buts about it.


     

    Link please - otherwise the only facts I can see in the post are you spelt the game and developers names correctly.

     

    Except for the admission about the Auto Assault engine all of that is in the interviews that Garriott gave himself.

    <modedit>

  • _Shadowmage_Shadowmage Member Posts: 1,459

    But I take such great delight in debunking your ridiculous conspiracy theories and fact-distorted posts.

    For example


    So then he hired a bunch of underpaid yesmen fanbois **cough** Starr Long **cough**

    So lets see the Tabula Rasa redevelopment happened in 2004.


    Destination Games is the computer game development company created in April 2000 by Richard Garriott, Robert Garriott and Starr Long, following their departure from Origin Systems.

    So not only has Starr Long been there since 2000 he co-founded the company. Which shows how factual your post is.

  • Vato26Vato26 Member Posts: 3,930

    Originally posted by enhaxed


    In the first 5 regions of the game I have encountered less bugged quests than I can count on one hand.  I've been playing since pre-order and I have by no means run out of content yet. 
    Name one MMO that was bug-free at release - I have played mature games with more bugs than TR had at release (AO anyone?)
    What makes you think they didn't listen to the beta testers?  What you mean is they didn't appear to listen to your concerns.  Strangely enough just because you were a beta tester doesn't mean the devs at DG were under any obligation to inform you of what issues they as devs saw as needing a priority fix. 
    It appears from your post that you are simply another opiniated troll like 50% of the people making negative posts here, and like them your comments simply do not stand up to scrutiny.
    Over and over we seem the same people jumping on any positive post.  You know a normal person who dosen't like a game just doesn't play it - they don't stop playing then haunt the forums for months trying to destroy the experience for everyone else, to me that indicates issues that have nothing to do with TR.

    I've found that majority of beta testers just get onto beta because they want to have free time playing the games.  They don't really care about the development of the game, just the ability to play before anyone else can.  Then, when they get a beta key, and play the nowhere near finished game, they complain about how it isn't finished and leave.  Hence, why there's a lot of "This game in beta sucked" posts.  Of course it sucks... it's beta for crying out loud.  That's the point of beta, to have players help test the game for the devs.  I wouldn't be surprised if majority of these TR-bashing trolls fell under this type of beta-er.  Thus, I believe that this tends to be why a lot of games are not bug-free upon release.  The only reason these trolls keep bashing any positive posts about TR is because they figure that the belief that beta "failed them" thus the game "must suck." 

    Personally, I enjoyed my 3-day trial, and ordered the game.  The game isn't perfect, but no other mmorpg I've played at close to release has been.  And, I find that the developers continue to fix the bugs while providing additional content at the side, which is more than a lot of other gaming companies have done.  Also, I find that being the first true MMO-FPSRPG (Planetside was just an MMO-FPS game) is a breath of fresh air from the normal fantasy games like WoW, EQ2, etc...  Yet, seeing as how this is a positive post, I foresee the TR-bashers to try and bash my post.

  • DelzoDelzo Member UncommonPosts: 143

    I support every word you said. I'm loving this game and plan on playing for a long time. Launch was as smooth as it gets. More content and bug fixes are coming and coming often for an mmo.

    Some people just can't be satisfied.

  • curiindicuriindi Member Posts: 488

     

    Originally posted by Delzo


    I support every word you said. I'm loving this game and plan on playing for a long time. Launch was as smooth as it gets. More content and bug fixes are coming and coming often for an mmo.
    Some people just can't be satisfied.

    I like your perspective. It is good to see a decent game for what it is and not what it was hyped up to be. TR is growing to become the unique and interesting title that it was meant to be despite its birth defects. TR should be one of those games that will reward you for your decision to make a long-term commitment.

     

    Many seem to place TR under fire due to elevated expectations that were not met or details that the developing team may have overlooked. Compared to V:SoH, TR's launch problems may seem ordinary. Vanguard seems to be effectively recovering from its problems since launch, and I believe given the same amount of time TR will undergo more improvements and eventually earn its consideration as one of the better MMOs available. Although, (I must admit) I did not give TR fair judgement of first impression - for some odd reason the game gave me an atmosphere hauntingly similar to Entropia Universe.

    With so many individuals feeling disappointed with titles being released prematurely, a partial solution (I can be totally wrong!) is to follow games that are being developed and published by the same entity - risk of premature release are much higher with titles having separate developers/publishers. In the specific case of ProfRed, I'd like to suggest waiting for his/her MMO Xmas present. I am hoping for the same thing, but I do not expect my present until well after Summer 08; good news is that sources previously stated that regional releases will take place simultaneously!

  • bachanambachanam Member Posts: 335

    I'll get in 1 troll-like comment and be done with the conversation.

     

    The game has been out for how long? I see.. Mmm-Hmm.. Yes I see...

    Yes bugs? Mmm-Hmm...

    No Bugs? Mmm-Hmm...

     

    What's that? 3-day trial before 90 days? No no don't go on about forum trolls, go back to that part about the 3-day trial in under 90 days? No don't close the forum threat. Where are you going? Don't lock the doors, come out and talk about this like a civilized person. You enjoy sounding civilized and above the forum trolls when you try to discredit their forum thrashing, why now are you suddenly so eager to end the conversation?

    What, is a 3-day trial this early a bad thing? If it isn't bad then why now are you out of retaliations against the dirty forum trolls?

    "Sometimes, things that may or may not be true are the things a man needs to believe in the most. People are basically good. Honor, courage, virtue mean everything. Power and money, money and power mean nothing. Good always triumphs over evil. Love, True Love Never Dies."
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    Which Final Fantasy Character Are You?

  • sadnebulasadnebula Member UncommonPosts: 263
    Originally posted by ThompsonSub


     
     
    Three days logged time = 72 hours of gameplay...
    You have only made it to level 21 in 72 hours of gameplay in this incredibly shallow game...
    You might want to try leaving the base and shooting some of those clowny aliens outside.
     
     



    lol,,,, good  one. 

  • infesterinfester Member Posts: 15

    I would like to state here that TR isn´t my type at all

    But throwing rocks at a game only over early-release bugs is quite non-sense

    Anyone that works or study the development of an MMO should know that there are many parts that are totally impossible to detect without having everything up and running, that´s what we call the beta phase, but TR brought this to itself, as that pop-star Richard Garriot overdid the game way too much and I suppose they didn´t do a proper beta phase test...

    But anyway it doesn´t stop the game of havin great content, bugs can aways be fixed, instead of failed systems, like WoW has, that they are gonna take much longer to overcome them :)

    Tho I must agree that looking to MMOs that give more respect to the players (on the forums and tests and the community in general) like you can see in AoC or WAR, both wich extended their release period to make the proper adjustments, based on the testers report, that some systems didn´t actually work is quite rewarding in the end :)

  • kovacevdkovacevd Member Posts: 9

    Worsest MMO i have played.

    Others might like it, but its defantly not for me, Dont like the UI, and feels the futuristic to ever immerse me one littlle bit.



    8.4 ratting ?? certainly has a question mark from me, Not many players in game, Doesnt seem to be top MMo at all,



    I wonder how muhc they payed MMORPG.com to get that ratting.

  • Experimemt13Experimemt13 Member Posts: 188

     

    Originally posted by ThompsonSub


     
    Originally posted by Tyrranosaur


    How long did your play time last before you exhausted it? Like number of days/hours to level from 1 to 50, for example. Just curious, as I've been playing for the last three weeks (about 3 days' logged time) and gotten to level 21 on my main, with two clones. The impression I am getting is that I will probably have seen most all I will want to see of this game after about 3-5 months at the pace I play, although that sounds fine to me (I will never do another 2.5 year stint like I did with WoW, again....I can never get those wasted days of my life back, sigh)
     

     

    Three days logged time = 72 hours of gameplay...

    You have only made it to level 21 in 72 hours of gameplay in this incredibly shallow game...

    You might want to try leaving the base and shooting some of those clowny aliens outside.

     

     

     

    My good man.... Your complete and utter ignorance(TM) is showing.

    Haven't you gotten the idea yet that your beta play a month or more before release is obsolete info?

    I have a litlle over 4 days time ingame and have made it to lvl 25. (and I have most definitely been working at it in those hours)

    Your "knowledge" of the current game is faulty(TM)!

    Why do you come here to misinform and insult people? You don't even PLAY the game!

  • Vato26Vato26 Member Posts: 3,930

     

     

    Originally posted by kovacevd


    Worsest MMO i have played.

    Others might like it, but its defantly not for me, Dont like the UI, and feels the futuristic to ever immerse me one littlle bit.



    8.4 ratting ?? certainly has a question mark from me, Not many players in game, Doesnt seem to be top MMo at all,



    I wonder how muhc they payed MMORPG.com to get that ratting.

    <Hands kovacevd some tinfoil to make himself a hat>

     

     Seriously, that paranoia is unwarranted.  Has it ever dawned on you that the people who are actually enjoying the game are not even responding here as they are enjoying the game?  Therefore, they just placed their rating of what they thought TR deserves, then went on playing.  And, about the number of players you see in game... maybe you should stop playing on the instanced world areas 2 through 6 and just play on 1 as it is always populated.  Then you will see players, and stop stating baseless opinions like what you just did.



    However, I still do respect that you don't like the game.  As you said, TR isn't for you.  But stop trying to turn others against this game with your baseless dribble.

  • ReklawReklaw Member UncommonPosts: 6,495

     

    Originally posted by ThompsonSub


     
    Originally posted by Tyrranosaur


    How long did your play time last before you exhausted it? Like number of days/hours to level from 1 to 50, for example. Just curious, as I've been playing for the last three weeks (about 3 days' logged time) and gotten to level 21 on my main, with two clones. The impression I am getting is that I will probably have seen most all I will want to see of this game after about 3-5 months at the pace I play, although that sounds fine to me (I will never do another 2.5 year stint like I did with WoW, again....I can never get those wasted days of my life back, sigh)
     

     

    Three days logged time = 72 hours of gameplay...

    You have only made it to level 21 in 72 hours of gameplay in this incredibly shallow game...

    You might want to try leaving the base and shooting some of those clowny aliens outside.

     

     

    Lol thats the thing with newbies in this genre, the rush thru the content without any thought, they play the game shallow while the game isn't shallow at all, but then again i'm a oldschool GAMER and am not limited to one type of genre of games.

     

    You might want to try and ACTUALY PLAY a game and not rush like some noob new to this genre, once you get the hang of actualy playing a game you DO NOT NEED NOOB RUSH.

    Also why rush in a MMO it's not the genre for that, we have linear single player games that do that for us, and again stop playing games shallow, understand it's your playstyle which is obviously shallow, once you get out of that shallow playstyle maybe you TOO can enjoy a MMO like TR

  • WiccanCircleWiccanCircle Member Posts: 336

    Originally posted by ProfRed


    It is a pretty polished game, but content bugs and lack of content are unforgiveable.  You test the content/story of your game in house if you are making a game like this...
    I was logged in to the Launch Day of Anarchy Online... At least I think my characters were logged in

    AO set the benchmark in my mind's eye for a terrible launch that everything else simply seems wonderful by comparison.  Tablua Rasa is lacking, no doubt about it and really nobody here is fanboi-ing far enough as to claim that it has much as far as content... yet. 

    But content comes.  These games take some time to get up to speed in adding little trinkets for the players.  I don't doubt at all that this game will crawl around the fringe-niche MMO catagory for quite a few years.  But what is lacking from the game aside from content is depth.  That I fear has been lost for good.  This title tried for a Splinter-Cell, Diablo3-in-space type of design.

    I guess it got what it was shooting for, but that isn't a compliment.

    "The reality of the poor in America isn't the difference between The Haves and The Have Nots, it is the difference between The Haves and The Have Lots."

  • fordiepiefordiepie Member Posts: 102

    Until you spread your wings, you have no idea how far you can walk.

  • nimbulusnimbulus Member Posts: 2
    Originally posted by kovacevd


    Worsest MMO i have played.

    Others might like it, but its defantly not for me, Dont like the UI, and feels the futuristic to ever immerse me one littlle bit.



    8.4 ratting ?? certainly has a question mark from me, Not many players in game, Doesnt seem to be top MMo at all,



    I wonder how muhc they payed MMORPG.com to get that ratting.



    This proves the basic intelligence level of most little kids that come here to.... nevermind

  • SarcazmoSarcazmo Member Posts: 105

    I have no idea what the hell is even going on in this thread.  Am I playing a different TR?  Are you on drugs?  27th level now and I've got no bugs to speak of. 

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