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Does the server que issue show lack of faith in their game?
I have read and fully understand why NCSoft is allowing the ques (one EU sever said it was up to 10 hours today!!??). Now the questing is, does this show they have no faith in their game? If they believed that the game would grow, or even maintain its current record numbers, then more servers would not be a waste of money. But, in the only post I have seen from NCSoft, they said the servers are what they are because they do not want, and I quote, 'Servers to become a barren waste land later'. I am sure recent AoC, LOTRO, WAR launches have played heavy on their choice.
So, am I wrong about them seeming to not have faith ?
PS, for my very short review on Aion, I will say once you get into the right server and get past quest camping the game is great. I have played in just about every recent MMO and this one I really believe has the most potential. Now, if only NCSoft would believe that as well???
Thanks for reading.
Comments
I did not have too many problems over the weekend with the head start and i play on Israphel which has a huge pop. Now NC is smart and is only allowing x amount of ppl on at one time for balance and lag. It would suck to see them open 50 servers to shut down 25 after a few months. Aion is huge in the east so i know NC has alot of faith in their game. Only time will tell if the West likes it or not
Played Aoc/DDO/FFXI/WAR / LoTRo / CO / Aion
Playing Rift
Waiting for FFXIV to be the game it should. so sad =(
After reading the official post on Aionsource and looking at the server situation it sure looks like they have no faith in their game. And what that actually does is that they'll loose many interested customers with queues of 2 to 10 hours.
I mean 12 servers for Europe and 12 for the US? Thats probably a maximum of 170.000 western customers. And I even calculated with a very high figure of 7000 players per server. They had 400.000 preorders.
So what they are currently saying is pretty much:
"Well we have no faith in our game, everyone above the 170k limit please go play another game. We don't feel like taking the risk of adding a few servers so most people can play."
I even agree that there should be "short" queues, but once the queues go over 30 minutes on 90% of the Servers they need to add capacity.
I really wonder what they will do on Friday when the game is officially released and masses of more people come in.
If they keep up their "save money" strategy the game will loose lots of customers for sure.
Yup... and AION is the first game ever to have a server que... NOT.
Any popular game (including WoW) had server queues at launch. NCSoft is trying to make sure their servers are balanced and not ghost towns within a month after the "free month" players leave.
No faith? Hardly.
_________________________________
JonMichael
Currently: AION, an MMO Beta under NDA
Played: WAR, LOTRO, Hellgate: London, CoX, GW, SotNW, DAOC, EQ2, SWG, WoW, AO, Horizons, Second Life, There, TSO
Beta'd: There, Second Life, EQ2, DAOC:LotM, LOTRO, Tabula Rasa, Gods and Heroes, Hellgate: London, Requiem:Bloodymare, AoC, WAR, DDO, Fallen Earth
The problem lies in a "Head Start" program. Companies are caught in a tough spot. On one hand, they want to give a reason for pre-ordering and enticing people to buy the game. On the other hand, and a very big justification for doing away with head starts... WAY to many people use this as a 1) let me try the game with very little possibility to buy it OR 2) let me jump in and totally bash the game to promote my game I like OR 3) lets get 500 accounts going so we can start our gold farming business early and then consolidate all funds before they shut down the accounts.
Headstarts cost almost nothing for most to get into. Takes me 5 bucks and 5 minutes to go get a pre-order from my local Gamestop. Then, after I abuse the process with no intent to buy, I'll put that 5 bucks on another game and lose no money at all.
Because of that mentality, they are either forced to 1) open WAY to many servers to cater to the false crowd, then shut down lots 6 months later (see WAR or AOC for reference) or 2) Open a smaller number of servers in anticipation of the crowd AFTER the headstart time.
Two things they are doing right. First, to not open TONS of servers. But more importantly, to shut down the non-purchased accounts only a day after launch. Way to many games allow a week or more for the headstart people to stay in game.
Hopefully, with them requiring a key by tomorrow, the queues will settle down. if they dont, then they will get new servers right away.
I don't think it's a lack of faith, but I do think they miscalculated the 'prime' number of servers they should have created at head-start. I do agree that adding too many servers at the beginning is a bad thing (ie. a %#^$ load like WAR did). However, could they not have added at least 2 more servers so that some of us that pre-ordered could actually get the head-start that we paid for? They would have filled up quick, while freeing up more room on other servers. NC will need to add extra servers either ways for launch (today) because there will be even more subscribers, more queues ... but the initial 12 servers for 400,000 players was obviously a mistake. I assume it'll all be resolved soon enough though
I've posted this before about Aion
This is going to be an interesting game of Push - pull.
NCsoft wants everyone to play their game, but they dont want to make too many servers, because they know they will lose population after the first month (every MMO does). Aion is a PvP game and is very population dependent, they cannot have too few players on any server after the population stabilizes following the 'bum rush' of release. Server mergers is seen as a 'Failure' by the MMO pundits on the forums ...NCSoft doesnt want that kind of message
I expect the number of servers to increase but slowly
Torrential: DAOC (Pendragon)
Awned: World of Warcraft (Lothar)
Torren: Warhammer Online (Praag)
they knew their preorder sales, they could have accomidated. it's a clucterfuck of laziness or bait and switch on thier end.
the problem lies with the ability to plop a shop and walk away never logging out and then you can return to game and continue playing without ever leaving....i see some messages on the shops saying No More Waiting in Line so on and so forth...so you may have about 600-1000 player shops blocking players from entering the game ...and they maybe selling 1 item for 999,999,999
''Our queues were implemented to nurture Aion's long-term health. We don't want to see a scenario where servers get beaten up, left shaking out of fear on the sidewalk, already during the first hour. We don't want to see a scenario where we put too many servers online resulting in a barren wastelands of empty worlds once the initial rush settles down. We're dynamic in the way we manage our servers, and we want to be open about this. If we see that queues are still long in a while, we'll look into opening up new servers; we'll look into tweaking maximum concurrency and maximum queue size limits. You will be able to log in - perhaps not right away - but the queues will settle down.''
FFS.
Too many empty servers = people moan.
Too few servers = people moan.
You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time but you can never please some f*cking MMO gamers EVER!
If NCSoft lacks faith in their game, who the hell cares? All that matters is whether or not you enjoy it. If I was releasing an MMO right now, I'd probably be sh*tting a brick even if I knew it was the best game ever - fact, simply because I know if you stick enough pre-pubescent punks in a forum, they could talk ANYTHING into nothing.
One day, someone will release an MMO for young males that's total immersion VR, involves nothing but pwning a-holes with cool weapons, banging women that look like playboy models, driving supercars and basically living the perfect life for someone of that age (or possibly an age for that matter). But no. If this game ever got released and the regular forum goers of MMORPG.com got their posting claws into it, it would suddenly become A TOTAL PILE OF SH*T.
Heck, if people stopped whinging like post-menapausal office temps, they may actually enjoy a damn game for once.
This isn't the game for me but FFS, why the needless politiking?
I need to vent bad cause this site is ruining the MMO genre by offering a forum to moaning little pr*cks whose only means of garnering the attention of others is stirring up disappointment, self-doubt, discontentment and misery.
Playing: Ableton Live 8
~ ragequitcancelsubdeletegamesmashcomputerkillself ~
The main issue with the long queue seemed to be related more toward population balance then anything else. I made my characters on the 18th. I tried to log on about 1pm pst on the 20th. Once i input my user name and password I had a wait in the queue listed at 3hrs+. After about 45 -60 min the queue dropped down to 5 min and I was on in 3 min.
From everything I read in the forums and their official response, their primary issue was making sure that no server 10k players and others only had 500ppl. As the servers all filled up to the capacity they had initially set they raised the population cap. NO ONE had to wait 10 hours. Anyone who says they had to wait 10 hours in the queue is lying.
The queue is there to ensure a balanced population across the servers. I waited because several of my clan mates had decited to start on that server. I'm sure I could have found a lower population on a different server and rolled on that server. Will there be a queue on launch day? Problably, and for the same reason. Does this mean they don't have faith in their game? or that they're "Failing", no. It means they're taking an active control of the game so it stays fun and balanced from the word GO.
All the fail threads and flame posts are knee jerk responses and uninformed posters. At this point I don't see anything but positive things for this game. I got to lvl 13 last night and had a great time. We'll see if it stays that way. My suggestion is to actually let the game launch before bashing it or predicting a re-enactment of the Titanic.
We're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad.
Definitely. The source of your confusion in this matter is that they are working of existing and historical trends/data and you're working off...
well, what data exactly are you basing your stance on?
- RPG Quiz - can you get all 25 right?
- FPS Quiz - how well do you know your shooters?
FFS, the word is "queue".
Q-U-E-U-E
I think you're right on the money there, Czzarre. Between the rush of people that preordered just to play a new game for a few days and not subscribe (and there are a LOT of those) and the hyper playing of everyone else, numbers right now are extremely inflated and there's really no accurate way to gauge or assess how many servers will be needed until a few weeks into release if not later.
- RPG Quiz - can you get all 25 right?
- FPS Quiz - how well do you know your shooters?
lol @ the guy above me. I agree, I hate whedn I see "que".
Anyway. I don't think it shows a lack of faith, I think it shows private shops are fail. You can put up a private shop and stay logged in forever so long as your computer doesn't shut down. So you have thousands of people putting up shop when they have to go, instead of logging off, so it causes the queues to be enormous since others cant come on.
Do realistic expectations show a lack of faith?
I'll take lack of faith over unbridled enthusiasm any day. WAR was one of these games where the devs got caught up in their own BS.
One of the reasons there is a que is because a major portion of the population is in the 10 channeled instances for levels 1-20. There is not any info on how many are allowed in those instanced channels. Once that majority move out then the que times will come down, but until then just have some patience or try another server.
Silly thread....
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...
Not at all. It shows that people want to play this game so badly that at they will have their client logged in for insane amounts of time with the personal shop in order to get on. That is the problem.
Instead of a 10 minute wait, like normal queues, we now are blessed with the 3 hour wait. Thanks to all those selfish people who don't just log out. In addition, a cap space increase on each server is needed. The thing the game could do immediately though is get rid of shops, I don't even look at them anymore because they are all afks.
It's not personal shops that are the problem, it's the number of people getting on during peak usage hours and the number of people in the channeled areas that are causing the que times. If they would increase the number of channels in game then we would see less que times. Once the channeled areas are cleared of most people then que times will come down.
I've seen some pretty odd statements in the last few days.
"The highest population an MMO will see is the day of its launch"
"You won't have to wait to login next month.."
One of those was from a NCSoftspokes person.. the first comment from a forum poster.
My person view is that any MMO that is NOT epic fail is going to grow for at least the first year if not longer. Most MMO's that have grown and last years have hit their peak more than a year after launch.
So the title of this thread along with things stated from NCSoft (you won't have to wait for long) just seem odd.
Without opening more servers... as people who didn't get to login yet.. didn't pre-order etc... there suddenly won't be a wait to login?
1) omg but there is low pop servers... um yep not everyone has logged in yet and ok so they won't ever sell another copy of the game? aka no low pop servers.
2) The concurrent numbers will drop... yes because as more people play the game they all somehow never log on again... The only way concurrent numbers can drop is due to work etc (beyond subs lost). So to be technical concurrent numbers at certain times could drop while they will be even higher at other times.
3) The design of the game is actually going to make opening new servers.. not as effective as current games. Unless they do transfers and do not allow people (unless they transferred) to make characters there. I guess WoW has done this.
Anyway...
The two things that Aion launch has made me *ponder* are...
1) They don't think the game will do that well long term. This isn't to say that it will fail but it IS to say they think the numbers will drop off and then be stable at a numer low enough to keep the servers healthy (without waiting to login). To me this seems kind of an odd perspective to have..
2) They dropped the ball in the polar opposite way of Mythic. In other words they had to few servers and people will be sick of waiting and moved on by the time they try to do anything about it. I personally know people who are... already .. no wanting to play.. as none of us has EVER bought an MMO we couldn't even log into (I've played MMO's since 1997 personally for reference).
There is a very different "aspect" to a company totally out of touch with their player base... totally out of touch with the reality of their product and running an ungodly high number of servers (yes WAR)..
and a company with a fairly decent game (for the current market) refusing to open new servers as people cannot log in day after day.
No one is saying they needed to launch with 50+ servers.. but a few more with have been an "idea'".
Hell SOE is keeping what.. 12 or 13 servers for SWG with the decimated population that game has? and NCSoft is only running 12 servers.. for a game with 400,000 pre-orders in North America...
I am not snubbing the EU customers... I just don't play there so I don't have a good perspective on the situation. Tho I have heard that the ENG-EU servers ALL have wait times. I know there are a few servers in the NA market that were low but most likely won't be by the end of this week.
/end rant
I'm not really upset as I've been so busy I can't play.. its more the perspective of a business owner that can NOT even begin to fathom wtf ncsoft is thinking right now.
That's not right, dude. He said they set the amount allowed on a server a good deal below the server capacity until everyone is out of the starter areas.
I don't exactly agree with this method, but the servers can hold a lot more people than they're letting in right now.
*actually looking at it again, 12 servers does seem kind of low for an anticipated mmo like this one. But their strategy is to keep the maximum capacity low until everyone is out of the starter zones.
Yup... and AION is the first game ever to have a server que... NOT.
Any popular game (including WoW) had server queues at launch. NCSoft is trying to make sure their servers are balanced and not ghost towns within a month after the "free month" players leave.
No faith? Hardly.
Agreed, NCsoft is doing the right thing. Making sure that the servers are balanced. Btw, I have had much better luck getting on my Elyos characters.
This statement is propably why there is a que at peak usage times.
I think its a lack of faith.
I had to wait for 5 hours to get in on the first head start day and then 2 hours the next day. If the game is so great then it can afford to have a few more servers.
Merging servers later when people have time invested is better than putting a bad taste into the mouth of your initial player base. It may look bad, but by that point people will have left the game for other reasons - hence the merge.