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What will the reviews say?
Now that the countdown is upon us, lets get our predictions out on the table. We can look back in a month and say "Man was I right on!" and quote ourselves as having pefectly predicted the launch reception. So, without further adu, here's my "Speculative Predictive Review" (feel free to post yours too)... 
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Two thumbs up! It's finally here and its even better than we could have imagined. Adventurine kept some big secrets during development right up to launch and blew away the gaming world with unexpected revolutionary new game mechanics and world dynamics. The graphics & animation overhaul as well was kept top secret until we all downloaded the game on the 22nd Jan 2009.
Indeed it did take 10 years to make, but in the end it is a flawless masterpiece. No bugs to be found, perfectly balanced and absolutly fair in every way, not to mention endlessly fun. Welcome to the new generation of gaming.
With a million copies sold in the first week and projections for 12 million by years end, this could be the biggest hit MMO ever. I guess all of the haters and trolls that swore it would fail will be eating crow for years to come. But I say, don't worry about your past mistakes. Come join us in Dark Fall Online. The first MMO in years to surpass the expectations of even the most die-hard fanatics.
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Comments
You can't be serious....
(holds up the plastic tarp in front of him and holds up his umbrella, waiting for the gallager like explosion of the OP when everyone else gets a hold of this post.)
He did go out on a limb here but good for you. I hope thats how it goes but ill have to see it for myself. I think your going to get flamed pretty hard tho lol.
Really? A million in a week? Really?
playing: darkfall
waiting: earthrise
wow your really geeked up bro.
Velika: City of Wheels: Among the mortal races, the humans were the only one that never built cities or great empires; a curse laid upon them by their creator, Gidd, forced them to wander as nomads for twenty centuries...
There is no possibility that they will have the server complex to maintain 1.000.000 players.I see around 30k-40k at first month at maximum.Because most people want to see if the game really offers as much as it says it does.
All the beta leaks so far don't paint such a rosey pciture for anyone to actually have these kinds of expectations, but whatever.
that a handful of 'fanbois' in a leaky boat weren't enough to make this game release on jan 22, 2009.
could we please get correspondent writers and moderators, on the eve forum at mmorpg.com, who are well-versed on eve-online and aren't just passersby pushing buttons? pretty please?
Sample review obtained from a time machine:
"The game does exist, but hasn't yet been translated from the original Greek, so we couldn't figure out what was going on. Adventurine has now announced that the English language version of the game will be released in May, with French, German, Spanish, Korean, and Japanese to follow in the succeeding months."
Pretty much.
Your review is almost exactly what I expect to see in the first couple of weeks after release.
The sad fact is that many so called 'games reviewers' are in such a rush to get their review out that they don't bother to actually play the game. I wounder how many of them even get past the Splash Screen before they write their reviews?
So, FWIW I did a quick look back to the AoC reviews to see who the culprits are and these are my predictions:
GameFocus, Gamezone and AtomicGamer will have reviews out within 24 hours (they will probably just cut an paste yours!) and score it 95-100%
Boomtown, Gamer 2.0 and PC Powerplay will say "It's not quite perfection, but it is as close as you will ever see." 90% - a week after release.
Gamespot, Gamespy and Eurogamer will take two weeks and point out a few "technical issues" which they will then excuse away. i.e. "Users with 'older' ATI graphics cards (up to the 4600 series) have reported some issues including rare cases (90% of users) of hard drive erasure and small fires and explosions... an issue the Developer continues to investigate. We encountered no such difficulties and suggest older drivers may be to blame."
80-85%
Everyone else will then hedge for the next two weeks with scores of 70-75% as users begin to report that major features are either not working or not there at all.
1 UP will then do a decent review and point out many flaws while still giving it 65-70%
By now user reviews will be coming in and at this point all game sites will manipulate their scores to match pubic opinion... or manipulate the user scores to match the advertising revenue they think they are likely to be able to get.
Two months after release... who cares? When is TCoS due out? Shouldn't we be reviewing that?
Nothing says irony like spelling ideot wrong.
Wow...
you guys really live in your own world, don't you?
The reviews will probably be a lot more like:
Darkfall was released to its waiting fans on January 22nd. After nearly a decade, developers Aventurine have finally gone public with their magnum opus. It is the work of an unproven, untested, and horribly under-funded company, all of which become steadily apparent as you play. Character movement and models will bring you back to the glory days of 32-bit consoles and poorly-done skeletal animations which strangly amble through the environment. This is when you are actually able to get into the game. Authentication and game servers appear to work by some unknown system, they go up and down seemingly at will as they seek to please some unknown and terrible deity.
After character creation, you are deposited in a your capital city and sent off on your way. Just like that, with the minimal of instructions and the absence of a tutorial. Perhaps the result of their dedication to a hardcore fanbase or the result of poor design, poor planning, and poorer execution? It is a question we appeared to be asking ourselves very often. It is as if Aventurine had looked at every innovation, every feature made in response to a complaint, every change, every fix, and every design document from every MMO released since 1998- and decided that they were unnecessary and not conducive to a good game.
The Ultimate Online nostalgia-goggles were far more comfortable when this game was still the secretive golden egg of FFA PVP fans around the world. It stands up very poorly to the harsh sunlight.
Grade: D
Review:
R.I.P.
maybe you should read the newest one on the darkfalleak blog site
according to the beta leaks this is so wrong heh
Well, we all know Aventurine has no money (yet) for going big on advertising, so don't count on the big sites being 'financially motivated' to get positive reviews out as soon as possible.
The top 'review' sites can finally take their time and be unbiased for a change, hehe. (Unless DF's competition pays them to bash the games to bits, that is :O)
My brand new bloggity blog.
o.o
Do you think they remember how?
Nothing says irony like spelling ideot wrong.
Well if WOTLK can get a 9.2 review from this site alone then anything is possible.
maybe you should read the newest one on the darkfalleak blog site
You mean the one that says that melee combat feels like trading blows and that a lot of the features are off and aren't being tested. Or that the UI is functional but needs work? and character models are just "Ok".
Hey, at least they said it has a nice sunrise. Everything else in the leak i found from Jan 2nd was just rehashed crap we already know from other "reviewers".
I think:
Well, I guess it's ok.
$OE lies list
http://www.rlmmo.com/viewtopic.php?t=424&start=0
"
And I don't want to hear anything about "I don't believe in vampires" because *I* don't believe in vampires, but I believe in my own two eyes, and what *I* saw is ******* vampires! "
^^^ this
I'm really guessing DF will be about the same quality as playing UO on a private server, especially with the billing/authenticating system and server stability/lag issues.
Um - maybe I mis-read it(?) but as I understood it the OP's question wasn't about what Darkfall will be like...
it was about what the reviews would say?
And if recent experience says anything... some reviewers in the computer games world could review shit on toast and still say:
"Once you get past the unusual aroma and nutty flavor you will find a solid nutritional meal. 90%"
Nothing says irony like spelling ideot wrong.
Um - maybe I mis-read it(?) but as I understood it the OP's question wasn't about what Darkfall will be like...
it was about what the reviews would say?
And if recent experience says anything... some reviewers in the computer games world could review shit on toast and still say:
"Once you get past the unusual aroma and nutty flavor you will find a solid nutritional meal. 90%"
And I'm telling you the early reviews will use 'private server' ' garage server' ' amateur launch' in their discriptions.
There is no open beta, there is no stress test... reviewers aren't even going to have a chance to comment on the game systems because the server issues are going to smack them in the face first.
Um - maybe I mis-read it(?) but as I understood it the OP's question wasn't about what Darkfall will be like...
it was about what the reviews would say?
And if recent experience says anything... some reviewers in the computer games world could review shit on toast and still say:
"Once you get past the unusual aroma and nutty flavor you will find a solid nutritional meal. 90%"
Precisely. The only time I have seen "mainstream" gaming sites (or magazines) dismiss a game was when it was indie -- therefore incapable of buying advertising anyway -- and undeniably bad. No advertising money lost, and you can restore your reputation by demonstrating you don't like everything.
If a major game becomes a stinker, hypocritical publications will join in on the bashfest, and the most hypocritical ones will laugh at themselves with a "ha ha, we were fooled, but we're telling you, it won't happen again". And yet...
I rely on a blend of word of mouth (with a preference for the negative) and my own wits to make up my mind.
Fair enough.
It will be interesting to see in this case because Darkfall is not backed by a 'Giant' like SOE or EA that they feel they have to suck up to.
Then again, it just seems to me like most of the reviewers are afraid to commit to anything these days in case they give "the next WoW" a bad review and get shunned by all their reviewer buddies?
Nothing says irony like spelling ideot wrong.
Um - maybe I mis-read it(?) but as I understood it the OP's question wasn't about what Darkfall will be like...
it was about what the reviews would say?
And if recent experience says anything... some reviewers in the computer games world could review shit on toast and still say:
"Once you get past the unusual aroma and nutty flavor you will find a solid nutritional meal. 90%"
Precisely. The only time I have seen "mainstream" gaming sites (or magazines) dismiss a game was when it was indie -- therefore incapable of buying advertising anyway -- and undeniably bad. No advertising money lost, and you can restore your reputation by demonstrating you don't like everything.
If a major game becomes a stinker, hypocritical publications will join in on the bashfest, and the most hypocritical ones will laugh at themselves with a "ha ha, we were fooled, but we're telling you, it won't happen again". And yet...
I rely on a blend of word of mouth (with a preference for the negative) and my own wits to make up my mind.
Remeber reviews are based on how big the company is... so like AoC and WAR... they get great reviews (cough*bribes*cough), but for small companies/devs releasing (who can't afford bribes for good reviews) most likely it will get bad reviews ... really guys when will you learn you can't trust website reviews from zinesites... u want fair and impartial reviews then stick to what actual players will post when the game is released and just ignore "official reviews" from IGN, 1up, and even this site as they are not objective nor impartial becuase it's all busine$$
Um - maybe I mis-read it(?) but as I understood it the OP's question wasn't about what Darkfall will be like...
it was about what the reviews would say?
And if recent experience says anything... some reviewers in the computer games world could review shit on toast and still say:
"Once you get past the unusual aroma and nutty flavor you will find a solid nutritional meal. 90%"
Precisely. The only time I have seen "mainstream" gaming sites (or magazines) dismiss a game was when it was indie -- therefore incapable of buying advertising anyway -- and undeniably bad. No advertising money lost, and you can restore your reputation by demonstrating you don't like everything.
If a major game becomes a stinker, hypocritical publications will join in on the bashfest, and the most hypocritical ones will laugh at themselves with a "ha ha, we were fooled, but we're telling you, it won't happen again". And yet...
I rely on a blend of word of mouth (with a preference for the negative) and my own wits to make up my mind.
Remeber reviews are based on how big the company is... so like AoC and WAR... they get great reviews (cough*bribes*cough), but for small companies/devs releasing (who can't afford bribes for good reviews) most likely it will get bad reviews ... really guys when will you learn you can't trust website reviews from zinesites... u want fair and impartial reviews then stick to what actual players will post when the game is released and just ignore "official reviews" from IGN, 1up, and even this site as they are not objective nor impartial becuase it's all busine$$
i did not the read whole post, just this last one and i am agree... its obvios that the reviews are based on bribes generally. And that makes people to biase their opinions. Videogame computer reviews are not like movie reviews...