Why wasn't MXO on the list? It had a rough launch, one of the worst I've seen...
I don't think that many people realize that MXO is still around. Is it still around?
I played it for a few days a couple of years ago and it was fun enough. The combat was interesting but I couldn't get the hang of jumping--it just felt artificial and unintuitive to me. That and the fact that the PC I had at that time had trouble running the game made me forget about it.
I had to go with SWG considering the login servers crashed multiple times on launch day and if you weren't one of the 1st few thousand players in or you logged out, you couldn't get play the game for most of the day on launch day. The rest of the "how not to run a MMO story" is history repeating itself with every update.
I voted for Vanguard out of this list, but to be honest, WW2 Online was definitely the worst launch I have ever seen. It was so bad, they immediately put it back into beta and let everybody that had bought it play for free for the next six months.
Maybe I am wrong, but it seems people are saying Darkfall because they just don't like the game. Right from the NDA drop, people were posting videos on YouTube and pics on the internet, so that means the game is better than Anarchy Online, which was unplayable for the first month. And when I say unplayable, I mean the likes of which we have not seen since. I mean, no one could play. Servers containing large portions of required content were down with constant reassurance that "they will be up soon". Many player's game keys would not register, and showed that they were "unknown". Many players who were "lucky" enough to have a working key were billed 2 or 3 times upon entering their key to begin their free trial. Some players found that they could not chat with their friends, or that the game would not even acknowledge they were logged in. It was a total, unmitigated cluster F. Reading any self-respecting book about MMORPG design and implementation, you will see AO as the poster child for what not to do on an MMORPG launch, and it is the the golden example of "as bad as it can get".
The only thing in AO's favor is that somehow, they pulled everything together rapidly. For that amazing feat, I give them kudos. Vanguard is only now really recovering from many of the bugs it had since day one, and we are over 2 years since its release. Why the huge difference? AO's problems were huge, but they were primarily in the billing systems and server architecture, which are fairly simple compared to having actual code bugs. Vanguard has been plagued with a multitude of code bugs, and those bugs caused more bugs, and those bugs caused more bugs, etc etc. Debugging all of that is much harder than getting some servers up and changing the logic in your billing system.
dark and light is the worst and it's not even on this list. the guy who has a new account just to post that about darkfall doesn't even have any idea.
Agree with Dark and Light, I played al the games on the list at launch and didn't have any problems playing them at launch. Which DOES NOT MEAN those games in the list didn't have issue's, as they sure had, thing is I just didn't encounter as many issue's as I read people are having most of the times at almost any launch of a MMORPG.
But look at em now. Not too bad, its just AO is too old for me and VG is not my bup of tee, but theyre both WAY better than launch. These are mmos though, everyone experiences launch problems including the invincible WoW (remember Kalimdor crashing and anyone on that continent could log on for the whole day?)
Of the list you have there, DFO wins hands down. Saying that, you forgot some real contenders in your poll like Dark & Light and a few others. I believe D&L would give DFO a run for it's money for the title of worst MMORPG launch ever.
Fear not fanbois, we are not trolls, let's take off your tin foil hat and learn what VAPORWARE is:
"Vaporware is a term used to describe a software or hardware product that is announced by a developer well in advance of release, but which then fails to emerge after having well exceeded the period of development time that was initially claimed or would normally be expected for the development cycle of a similar product."
Darkfail and Dark and light both had the worst launches by far.
There's are striking differences between D & L and Darkfall. Darkfall opened up short of demand, yet it's a pretty much full-featured game and has plenty of people wanting to play it. D & L on the other hand was trash in every sense imaginable. I can't even begin to describe the horridness of D & L. LOTS of people wanted to play D & L (if I remember correcly 20,000 limited pre-orders), and within two days NOBODY wanted to play D & L. Then the D & L devs continued to charge people and made a complete mockery of the whole process.
Anybody who knows knows that there is really no comparison between the two games.
Darkfall and Dark and Light for sure. I'm still going to try Darkfall once it lands in the states and it isn't such a hassle to get in. Can't hurt to have some issues ironed out by the time I play, anyhow.
Although Darkfall was bad, AoC was positively terrible. They should have just stopped making the game for all that failure. In fact, they should have just pulled it and worked on player suggestions. Instead, they were cocky and now they pay a huge price for it...
Which if they turn it around and end up with as many subs as something like 100k subs, would be simply... mindblowing. That would say a lot about the game's play to overcome a launch this bad.
That would easily turn it from the Worst Launch of all Time to one of the Most Successful MMOs of all Time in terms of money spent for development.
I voted for Vanguard, but I have to point out that it's now a great game. It should have launched a couple of months ago rather than a couple of years ago. I do have to admit, though, that not actually launching at launch does give Darkfall strong "bragging" rights. Lastly, one thing I did notice was that both Auto Assault and Tabula Rasa were on the list and both are dead games now. The lesson I learned? If an NCSoft game has a poor launch, don't bother playing it; it'll be canceled.
Comments
Why wasn't MXO on the list? It had a rough launch, one of the worst I've seen...
I don't think that many people realize that MXO is still around. Is it still around?
I played it for a few days a couple of years ago and it was fun enough. The combat was interesting but I couldn't get the hang of jumping--it just felt artificial and unintuitive to me. That and the fact that the PC I had at that time had trouble running the game made me forget about it.
Quoting for emphasis. Dark and Light had the worst launch ever. The most drama, litigation, scam billing, and an unfunctional game to boot.
I answered this question months ago on my blog here at MMORPG.com/
Wish to know which was the worst launch...just read it here. <<<< clicky
I had to go with SWG considering the login servers crashed multiple times on launch day and if you weren't one of the 1st few thousand players in or you logged out, you couldn't get play the game for most of the day on launch day. The rest of the "how not to run a MMO story" is history repeating itself with every update.
I voted for Vanguard out of this list, but to be honest, WW2 Online was definitely the worst launch I have ever seen. It was so bad, they immediately put it back into beta and let everybody that had bought it play for free for the next six months.
No Horizons or Ashons Call 2?
Oh how soon we forget.
Maybe I am wrong, but it seems people are saying Darkfall because they just don't like the game. Right from the NDA drop, people were posting videos on YouTube and pics on the internet, so that means the game is better than Anarchy Online, which was unplayable for the first month. And when I say unplayable, I mean the likes of which we have not seen since. I mean, no one could play. Servers containing large portions of required content were down with constant reassurance that "they will be up soon". Many player's game keys would not register, and showed that they were "unknown". Many players who were "lucky" enough to have a working key were billed 2 or 3 times upon entering their key to begin their free trial. Some players found that they could not chat with their friends, or that the game would not even acknowledge they were logged in. It was a total, unmitigated cluster F. Reading any self-respecting book about MMORPG design and implementation, you will see AO as the poster child for what not to do on an MMORPG launch, and it is the the golden example of "as bad as it can get".
The only thing in AO's favor is that somehow, they pulled everything together rapidly. For that amazing feat, I give them kudos. Vanguard is only now really recovering from many of the bugs it had since day one, and we are over 2 years since its release. Why the huge difference? AO's problems were huge, but they were primarily in the billing systems and server architecture, which are fairly simple compared to having actual code bugs. Vanguard has been plagued with a multitude of code bugs, and those bugs caused more bugs, and those bugs caused more bugs, etc etc. Debugging all of that is much harder than getting some servers up and changing the logic in your billing system.
I voted AO, but it was a hard decision.
Agree with Dark and Light, I played al the games on the list at launch and didn't have any problems playing them at launch. Which DOES NOT MEAN those games in the list didn't have issue's, as they sure had, thing is I just didn't encounter as many issue's as I read people are having most of the times at almost any launch of a MMORPG.
I voted Darkfall-
To bad the game is so damn good. Otherwise i wouldnt play it.
Technically speaking : Anarchy Online
Subscriber speaking: Vanguard
But look at em now. Not too bad, its just AO is too old for me and VG is not my bup of tee, but theyre both WAY better than launch. These are mmos though, everyone experiences launch problems including the invincible WoW (remember Kalimdor crashing and anyone on that continent could log on for the whole day?)
I don't know if somebody already said it, I'm not sifting through every response. So if they did, consider this an agreement.
And it wasn't really an entire game launch, but EQ: Shadows of Luclin was an unplayable bug fest when it went live.
Science flies people to the moon. Religion flies people into buildings.
Worst launch ever...
Of the list you have there, DFO wins hands down. Saying that, you forgot some real contenders in your poll like Dark & Light and a few others. I believe D&L would give DFO a run for it's money for the title of worst MMORPG launch ever.
Fear not fanbois, we are not trolls, let's take off your tin foil hat and learn what VAPORWARE is:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaporware
"Vaporware is a term used to describe a software or hardware product that is announced by a developer well in advance of release, but which then fails to emerge after having well exceeded the period of development time that was initially claimed or would normally be expected for the development cycle of a similar product."
Darkfail, no doubt about it
In the end, I feel the worst launch is the one that never happened. Best to list all the vaporware MMOs
MMORPG Characters immortalized!
LLyncu: Star Wars Galaxies (Chimaera)
Xiode: Age of Conan (Mannanan)
Darkfail and Dark and light both had the worst launches by far.
World of Warcraft is a proof that MMORPG quality should affect schedule/budget and not the other way around.
There's are striking differences between D & L and Darkfall. Darkfall opened up short of demand, yet it's a pretty much full-featured game and has plenty of people wanting to play it. D & L on the other hand was trash in every sense imaginable. I can't even begin to describe the horridness of D & L. LOTS of people wanted to play D & L (if I remember correcly 20,000 limited pre-orders), and within two days NOBODY wanted to play D & L. Then the D & L devs continued to charge people and made a complete mockery of the whole process.
Anybody who knows knows that there is really no comparison between the two games.
Darkfall is still in the lead by a huge margain. This was fun guys I will like to do this again someday. Worst launch ever Battle #2
Darkfall and Dark and Light for sure. I'm still going to try Darkfall once it lands in the states and it isn't such a hassle to get in. Can't hurt to have some issues ironed out by the time I play, anyhow.
Where is Dark and Light on this list?
Joined 2004 - I can't believe I've been a MMORPG.com member for 20 years! Get off my lawn!
Although Darkfall was bad, AoC was positively terrible. They should have just stopped making the game for all that failure. In fact, they should have just pulled it and worked on player suggestions. Instead, they were cocky and now they pay a huge price for it...
Darkfall.
Which if they turn it around and end up with as many subs as something like 100k subs, would be simply... mindblowing. That would say a lot about the game's play to overcome a launch this bad.
That would easily turn it from the Worst Launch of all Time to one of the Most Successful MMOs of all Time in terms of money spent for development.
"TO MICHAEL!"
While I never really tried or head about dark n light, I am very suprised that Hellgate London isn't higher.
Good Lord. That was basically suppose to be Diablo 3, and jeeezus it was bad, except for the music. I mean wow.
Auto Assualt was so bad, I never heard of it past E3 and a interview on Xplay :P
Currently restarting World of Warcraft
Hello all,
I voted for Vanguard, but I have to point out that it's now a great game. It should have launched a couple of months ago rather than a couple of years ago. I do have to admit, though, that not actually launching at launch does give Darkfall strong "bragging" rights. Lastly, one thing I did notice was that both Auto Assault and Tabula Rasa were on the list and both are dead games now. The lesson I learned? If an NCSoft game has a poor launch, don't bother playing it; it'll be canceled.
Kayn