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Will Darkfall be what community hopes it would be, or is it going to be a total flop?
This is nothing to do really with it being vaporware but instead to do with; will this game really be a success or is it a waste of hype?
Ok guys, no more dreaming, if you have hard facts then please share them, if you don't, don't say a word in this topic....I don't want forum rumours, I want hard pure facts about the progression in this game. I will give you what I predict and what I have heard about this game, and I don't know if they will be forum rumours but please correct me if they are....nobody add anything which they aren't sure about, I on the other hand am an exception because I am starting this topic.
Now, its not a case of whether this game is Vapourware or not, that time has passed. It is now a case of whether this game is really going to be what the community wants, or is it going to be a total flop on release if not before release. All the people who are crazy about this game talk about what game features are promised, yet I have not seen really any progression on the forums.
Everyone hopes it to be a game similar to Ultima Online, while I see it as a game which is going to flop before release, or going to turn into a rushed job on release, or a game which is different from what it promised in the begining, or just a game with all the features promised Open PvP, FPS Twitch Combat, and Skill based and Full Loot, but then combat is so crap its about who clicks faster, or who plays more....or crafting is pointless or no crafting is present.....or will it be the game everyone really is hoping it would be.
Now I don't know weather this is true, but people probably on the IRC channel told me that the initial release of this game was predicted to be in 2003....that was two years ago!....further more, they also told me that there was 2 years of development still to go before this game was anywhere close to ready.
At the same time another thing popped up...last month or the month before latest, they got their new project leader!!!!
Now compile these facts together and think about it. A Game Dev Team with very few developers, have been developing their first game and still are, 2 years after their initial projected release, and still have 2 years left of work to do before it is close to being ready. Also they just got a new Project Leader, 2 years after initial projected release. I myself have not found anything about any progression on their forums, but I read a lot of people who dream about this game, because of the features it proposes. Till now all I've seen is a mega hype over all the features it proposes but no progression.
All the hype created for this game is definitley through forum rumours, the screenshots made to show its eye candy, and without a doubt the proposed features.
Now do you guys really think this game is going to be what the whole PvP community is hoping it will be? I do not, at this moment, because the team to me seems like it can progress and I see bad team work for some reason. I also see the game changing a lot, for many reasons, and one of the main reasons is because they have a new project leader, so will it be the same game the features really promise? I again do not believe that, at this moment. How do we know this game really is what we have wanted after its been in development for so long? If this game really is going to meet all it promises to feature and what the community hopes and dreams it will be, then this will be one of the best MMORPGs to be released.
Do you think it has a game dev team which is capable of doing this!?....This is my true and orignial question.
So many PvP fans think this game will be amazing, because of the features it promises. I think we have to stop dreaming and accept that this game will need a miracle to be completed as the game everyone wants it to be. If this game could possibly meet every feature it would have to be one of the best, but how can you think that, when the developing team doesn't seem capable of that, has a totally new Project Leader, and lastly is a low budget game!
Answer this ONLY if you have hard facts, I don't feel like too many posts in this topic and no forum rumours please!
Comments
Bro.
The problem is that THERE IS NO HARD FACTS ABOUT THIS GAME.
no, it will not fullfill the hopes of all the ex-UO players...
nothing will....
i have realized that, and so should they.
I BELIEVE!
I CREATED MYSELF!
"<Claus|Dev> i r pk"
SW:TOR|War40K:DMO|GW2
lol, you have a real problem with this game dontcha?
'Ok I was proved wrong about it being vapourware so I'll move onto another argument against it'
If you consider recent statements from the lead dev as facts then read the 6th of August IRC chat...
http://www.bttg.net/images/teth/sprite-08-06-2005-edited.txt
The alpha video then confirms how the game roughly looks and plays with proof of certain features such as twitch combat, first person view and aiming, and the interface shows there are no levels or auto targeting. Just that is enough to set it apart and make it stand out. The other diffirenting features such as full pvp, full loot, player governed society are the the main focus of the game and have been promised by the devs for the past 4 years.
As for funding, Razorwax have repeatedly confirmed they have a strong financial backbone.
If you go to the official forums you will see every issue with release herdles has been faced and dealt with by the dev team. So the facts are promises and statements from RW, you can either believe them or just stay quiet and stick to another game for the time being.
A lot of people believe this will be a great game, most used to play UO, SB, or AC and are not idiots. They want a full pvp rpg and know a game with promise when they see it.
Basically outside of the above there is no 'hard facts' if you ask the same question on the official boards they will give you a better answer and they will NOT be rumours.
The hype is no where near as bad as some games, some people just have more faith than others. If you have a problem with them then just ignore them.
lol, you have a real problem with this game dontcha?
Listen, I think I made it quite clear that I don't have a problem with this game!
Please don't try to make yourself feel grand by making me look bad but I will forgive you this once. And yes you gave me the impression you wanted people to think I am a troll.
My concern is that the probabilities at the moment are against the game being a success or what the community has hopes for. I hear this game's name all the time, and so I keep getting tempted to follow it up, but then I remind myself that there has been no progress still. All I hear most of the time are dreamers, comming up with forum rumours.
Anyway
big thumbs up for that link you game me!
This is to doobster
Wow, another guy taking my post as if i hate the game! Instead of understanding, that its my personal view, what I think of the game when ever I am tempted to follow it up! I was just sharing what feelings I get when tempted to follow up this game and how I decide not to follow it up.
"I think we have to stop dreaming and accept that this game will need a miracle to be completed as the game everyone wants it to be."
What I said above, I was definitley out of line to say, sorry! I think I just got overwhelmed with a lack of faith for this game.
Now back to what you said doobster....most of your replies are horrible, mate sorry but they are!
You disagreed that I think this game has a probability of becomming a rush just on release. Well, how do you know it won't? I don't have any faith in the developers, so you can't say they promised they will release the game when its ready. Being 5 years in development is irrelevant, it has nothing to do with whether the game will be a rush job or not before release! They can start rushing right now, and release in 6 months. Now you think that would never happen, but you stating that it is not on a low budget, means that they are probably under lots of pressure from their investors, especially because the game is vapourware (this is not the discussion of this topic). Eventually their investors will get too impatient that they won't want to hear of anymore extensions and that they want the game to be released as they were expected after so many extensions to release. Thats how it can become a rush job, and telling me they are not on a low budget just increases the probability.
About your second reply, I know what FPS games are alllll about. I have been playing them for half my life. But I think I over reacted about the game itself. Now I noticed that the developers aim not to make the graphics anything special anymore. I doubt the graphics will be anything special, but I admire the fact that they want good FPS in the game so, now I am timidated to follow up on this game. Before I wasn't sure about the quality of the gameplay not what the features proposed are about!
What rumours I gave by the way, I stated were rumours....please stop being negative towards me because I already admitted those to being rumours! What you are telling me, I already admitted in my initial post! By the way, Beta hasn't started yet, so you are clueless as well as I am about the actual release date, and it won't be within less then a year, unless it becomes a rush job!
About me stating the new project leader.....I meant it as in can we expect a best quality game from a team who has been reshuffled, so its not the initial team that started the project. By the way I never stated anything about new developers, I don't recall people telling me about that. But there is a probability that over the large amount of years that passed, that the team has changed, not just the project leader. Now it seems you don't understand what the development of a game really requires other then the basics, a dev team, money and features+plans. Well what about good teamwork, cooperation, this is what makes a great game, and what makes it progress properly, and what makes it meet its expected release on time! Knowing that the initial dev team for this project has been changed, I am not so confident that they can make the game the whole pvp community still desires.
Now, it seems you don't know what we actually mean by hype when we say it....hype means the amount of excitement everyone has for this game. It doesn't only include forum rumours, but includes, everything including the facts, the progressions and the game itself....thats the hype.
What you were talking about was Over hyped....when a game is over hyped, it means people are now excited for this game because of forum rumours and proposed ideas and features. Its called over-hyped because people expect more from the game, then what its really going to provide and feature.
As for evidence, about the game, I use forums, to gain the evidence I need, to know whether the game is progressing or not. I gather evidence indirectly, in otherwords; if a developer is talking about a feature they have implemented for a reason and they talk about why its there, thats evidence of their progression and what they have already included. If they start mentioning what will be in the game, to me thats not evidence of progress, because I haven't heard the dev talk about the feature being used, or problems encountered about it or anything about encounters with that feature. This is how I gain evidence of the progression of a game. I listen to how a dev speaks about a feature, and can tell whether its been implemented or not.
Now lastly, you totally got my aim wrong in some areas of your post. You tell me about having to have faith that this game can be done successfully, I will tend to agree with you there. But at the moment, only way I can get that faith is by seeing a new dev team developing the game. In otherwords, my real lack of faith is with the current developers, developing the game and have taken 5 years to make a game which you say is not a low budget game! After this developing team's history (new project leader, their flag ship game turned into vapourware, another year or more of development is projected, game is over-hyped), I lack a lot of faith in the developing team currently developing the game and would feel a lot more comfortable if another developing team were developing the game. One thing doesn't add up, if they are not making a low-budget game, then why are they such a small developing team? Doesn't a low-budget game, mean it will take time to be developed because of the strain money they currently have and so they are forced to keep a small team, or do the dev team see themselves as something special?
A side note - Roma Victor's developing team (Red Bedlam) literally make DF's Dev team look crap. They have made a game, which has offered more features then Darkfall, most of the features that darkfall offered are in Roma Victor, except magic ofcourse and there is no fantasy. Ship battles also are currently a problem, but thats the limit. I have been following Roma Victor because their dev team are an incredibly succesful team, who have been working closely with the community and have made a game with total ambition including never included before features. Their projected release for their flag ship game is 3 months from now, but that may change, they are promising nothing except that the game will be released when its ready and they are very confident that release won't extend to next year.
Now I didn't want to include Roma Victor really into this post, I am not comparing the games. But I am comparing the teams behind the games. Roma Victor is seen by its community to be the game that will be No.1 MMORPG. And it is a low-budget game....the dev team admitted that. Its been in around 5 or 6 years development and is comming towards release very soon. They are already in commercial test phase, and the game is nowhere near vapourware. This is all because of the capabilities of Red Bedlam and because they know how to work as a team. Now compare the successes of both teams to eachother!
I am 99.9% sure that the project leader remains Claus Grovdal, as it has been since 2000. The team has expanded over time, but I am fairly sure that none of the devs - and definitely none of the old Razorwax devs! - have quit over the years.
I'd like to know where you got this scurrilous little rumour from...
Oh, and there's no way in hell RV will make launch in a solid, content-complete form within 3 months, or even six months. Trust me on this one. I like what the RedBedlam guys are doing, and they're much better about keeping their fanbase in the loop than the Aventurine people are, but Roma Victor still has a loooong way to go yet before it's genuinely ready to see the light of day.
Well I didn't know Claus was project leader, but a little over a month ago people (on the official game IRC channel) were warning me and letting me know the status of this game. Of course they were the faithful people to the game, but they warned me that there was a long long time (some said 2 years) of development left and they just changed the dev team leader, what ever that meant. I also heard that Darkfall had a very small team (starting at 6 men, but no one said it grew untill you just said that). Ofcourse all of these are possible rumours. I just don't see any possibility of the game being what the PvP community hopes it to be, with the current dev team....I just don't have faith in them when comparing them to other dev teams who have proven themselves to be more capable, as I explained in my previous post.
Mikey, Mikey, Mikey....
There's no new "project leader" for Darkfall. It is still being developed by the same core guys that started it. All four of the original developers are still with Darkfall and the employee number is at around 22 now. Read the MMORPG.com interview for more info:
http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm?setview=features&loadFeature=86&gameID=4/&fp=800,600,372393265,20050906015856
Claus is still the lead developer and producer. Their vision is still the same and hasn't changed. If you really want to know more about this game, you should read more about it like the MMORPG.com interview and the logs from Claus' recent IRC visit.
Not one developer has even hinted at 2 more years for release. In fact, beta is still "soon"(tm). So hang in there, don't start rumors or feed the trolls and wait to see what happens like the rest of us.
My last bit of advice: the people hanging out in Darkfall IRC channel LOVE to tease new folks and tell them all sorts of false crap just to mess with them. IRC is generally a bad source for information unless you get it directly from an op.
But yeah, both Preston and I are members of the Darkfall Community Staff (he's a forum mod and I'm an IRC op), and neither of us have heard anything to this effect...especially not several months ago.
And yes, all of the original Razorwax devs - every single one of the original Norwegians - are still on the team. I'm not so sure about Aventurine's employee turnover (Aventurine being the 2003-and-later Athenian side of things), but all of the 'major' Aventurine people continue to be at the helm to this day. As it stands, the dev team is floating around two dozen people, which is a fairly substantial improvement over the "original four" of Claus, Kjetil, Ricki, and Erik. Most of the delays have been due to the dev team underestimating the amount of time it'll take to get things done, and they'll be the first people to admit it. For example, they spent a year and a half just on worldbuilding, and, on top of that, earlier this year they decided to go back and completely redo all the racial capitals so that they could do a better job.
Stuff like that - the notorious perfectionist streak of the dev team - is the primary reason why everything is taking so long. Funding is not really an issue (and you can quote me on that); the devs are taking their time to do things as right as they humanly can. They're even more frustrated with the slow pace of development than the fanbase is, but their committment to putting out a complete and stable product takes priority.
Ok finally, some people who know facts !!!!
Listen, I didn't start rumours, I admitted in the begining of this Topic that what I was going to say are probably mostly rumours and my opinions and thoughts. But I am always tempted to follow up on this game, because its the type of game I want, but I still don't see it being delivered.
Mainly because I lack faith in the developing team! I mean, from all the replies I just got, it seems they have the resources, so whats the damn problem and what was with the lies about a new project or team leader leading the development of darkfall? I got that from the IRC channel, and they made it seem very believable....it was one of the reasons, they encouraged me not to wait for this game for another 1 or 2 years, but I keep getting tempted since I hear the game's name so much.
Now how can Razorwax pull off the game they are promising? I included Roma Victor, but was really comparing the developers behind the 2 games. They are both quite similar, except Roma Victor offers a lot more features, except for magic, and (temporarily due to problems they encountered) sea battles, but sea travel they will include for sure.
I am put off by the game because in my head, what comes to mind is, I find the game to be over hyped, and I just don't have faith in the developers because of lack of progression they have had over 5 years.....can you tell me something that could possibly change my mind please? I am an open minded person, I just need the right facts to give me new ideas of whats probable.
___________________________________________________________________________________
Edit:
Alright Ignore all the above, sorry your edited post wasn't there when I started doing this, but no problem!
Alright I believe you! I still don't think they are a great developing company, but now after reading what you just said in the edited part of your last post, I definitley believe you. I have followed a few facts on this game, and something claus stated impressed me! He was talking about what the minimum requirements were and that a GF4 type computer could run the game, meaning literally below standard pcs would be able to run the game. He mentioned things about how he's focusing more on FPS then graphics. That is ok, sort of!!! I am not a graphics type myself, but I hate trying to see whats in the distance when the pixels cause the images to turn all fuzzy....thats something I should state in the forums. A good example is WWIIO, its an incredible handicap, not to have Binoculars, especially because of the graphics! You can barely see clearly at a distance which is quite annoying, especially if you did not have the rank yo have binoculars. Graphics don't have to be special, just clear for me, especially in FPS games! Now unless Claus is allowing the graphics to be set to a range between the graphics set for old pcs to run the game to graphics set that can only be handled by standard pcs if not higher, would be a great idea. If not, he's risking major consequences!!! I have seen the Alpha video, and the graphics are very fuzzy, but I do expect them to improve....MMORPGs with Twitch Combat which are FPS based require clear graphics!
Anyway aside from that just let me know anything extra to convince me to followup on this game, which doesn't include plans or promises, but what has been accomplished.....when you say a beta is comming up soon....soon can mean 6 months, as EA has shown! Tell me something to make me be more impressed by the skills of the team developing the game. Right now I know they are dedicated, but I don't believe they are capable! Sorry!
Anyway thanks! Just remember, I didn't create rumours, and most of what I said are personal views, except there are some facts also now!
Yeah, either people were lying in #darkfall - which is entirely possible! - or we were just having a lark at the expense of the new kid. I obviously wasn't around at the time, because I tend to remember when we tell fantastical stories to new people! No, the only thing that happened involving the dev team within the last month-and-a-bit was Claus popping in #darkfall to chat with everybody for a few hours...well, that and the leaked video.
RedBedlam and Aventurine (there is technically no longer a Razorwax, as they merged with some Greek fellows on an equal basis to create Aventurine) are both new, untested dev teams. They are both pushing highly innovative games, albeit with slightly different slants. Roma Victor is shaping up to be more targeted at the really hardcore segment of the MMO playerbase, while Darkfall is taking a somewhat broader approach where fun, satisfying gameplay is priority #1. The capability of the two teams to net results is about equal - they have no real resumes to speak of, so putting faith in their work is basically a leap of faith. Just because they're unknown teams doesn't mean they can't produce some incredible results, however; Half-Life was Valve's first game, and yet it is arguably the most popular FPS of all time!
Note that most of the hype for Darkfall is propagated by the fans! Tasos Flambouras, who is in charge of Darkfall's PR when he isn't busy being the company VP or something along those lines, has an avowed stance of minimizing hype until they have serious results to show.
If you haven't already seen the leaked alpha video, you should do so - I am pretty sure Preston posted a link to it on these particular boards. Yar!
Yeah, I have seen the leaked video and the my previous post shows my opinions on what Claus has admitted and what I saw...ofcourse that was Alpha, and extremely early in development, which really to be honest wasn't that bad. But I think if they don't ensure clear and sharp imagery in the game, there will be consequences for an FPS game like that. WWIIO is a good example!
Anyway as to comparing RedBedlam and Aventurine....I compared them through facts of progressions, RedBedlam has shown more progression then Aventurine in the forums, and they have created a gameworld which....I am clueless of how big it is when comparing it to Darkfalls....probably Darkfalls is bigger. But then the progression of the game itself seems to be good....I know many people including beta testers, so I know a little extra detail on the game. It will be definitley be a successful game, if their new revenue system (called "VERM") works out. Its the big worry!! People have their doubts about the revenue system, but then because of the proof on the forums, and the incredible interaction the community has with the developers, this game has a good chance of being No.1 for PvP MMORPGs.
One thing you need to know about Roma Victor was that its targeted at the majority of the PvP community! I say this because RedBedlam used the community to help modify the game through their ideas. Roma Victor is based on the ideas of the PvP community and ideas also from experts of Roman History, to make the game seem as authentic as possible to a certain point. Of course events in the game won't be historically accurate, such as big battles....and the such will not take place and that. Its a game thats focused at the hardcore, the PvP community, and mainly, I have to say the people into the time of the Roman Empire. But it won't attract only the hardcore, the game allows players to avoid getting Pked, and the game encourages a lot of community and guild team work. With out aiding the community and getting aided by the community in the game, the character won't progress in the game. Its a total community game, you can't solo, you can't craft without the aid of the community, you can't do much without help from the community. I wouldn't really say its targeted at the Hardcore alone, but at everyone! The only thing that there isn't much of really is PvE! But then people seaching for a great community game, or people searching for a game about rome, or people searching for a game with incredibly intense crafting or a game which is hardcore, or a game for those Pking PvP loving types.....its focused at a major part of the community!
Anyway I think I said a little bit that was unesscary, but I would consider that Roma Victor and Darkfall are in competition with eachother. My apologies for comming up with so much detail on Roma Victor, but I have followed the game up quite a bit and it is one remarkable game. Sadly I prefer the fantasy setting more the roman setting.
Anyway just let me know of more facts....not faith, about the progression of Aventurine, I am aware that they are dedicated now! But are they capable?
I dunno about the entire dev team, but their art director - one Henning Ludvigsen - is a well-established figure in the field of digital art, and according to a fellow who helped scrounge up funding for Darkfall back in 2002-2003, their server guy Erik is brilliant, no questions about it. So it's obvious that they have some genuine talent going on there.
Beyond that, visitors to their offices - namely, Deyth of the Combine - have all commented that the devs exuded confidence and capability, and were quite gleeful to show off their work. This was back in 2003, but as there has been no substantial change of the core dev team since then, I see no reason to believe anything has changed.
So yeah, I think they've got the talent to pull things off. Inexperience doesn't necessarily preclude talent, after all - once again, I cite the Valve example.
As for RV, the way some of the gameplay elements are designed - like travel and crafting - will cause most of the more casual players to shy away. Indeed, even the critical reliance on other players will make the game less palpable to your casual gamer, as they tend to lean towards the solo experience (from what I've seen, anyways). The two are something of competitors, yes, but I think they'll end up pulling slightly different audiences. There are a lot more 'established' PvP guilds - Lords of Death, Weapons of Mass Destruction, Rerolled, House of Errants, ect. - following Darkfall, for example. There'll be some overlap, but Darkfall has more mass market appeal.
It's prettier too, for what little that counts.
Hmm you had some good points. I can't say I don't believe you, but I have troube accepting what you said! What the problem is the fact that the game turned into vapourware, years ago, and I heard why, but I find it hard to believe.
But Eye Candy deceived you! Those Screenshots are definitley not the same screenshots of what Darkfall is going to be like in truth. I read in an mIRC chat log, that Claus stated the minimum graphics card needed to play this game is going to be a GF4, his reason was FPS. In truth, the problems that will be encountered with standard graphics in a game is FPS lag. Now it is possible to go around the problem and still have standard graphics, but it takes a bit of time to do. I know that the devs don't have that time...probably cause their investors are impatient and also the community is getting impatient. I asked if this could be possibly something I had predicted before (sort of)...I predicted a rush job....but I stand corrected...the developers want to release something the is good.
But they are still taking the easy way out! Who normally has a GF4 card anymore these days? .... and the worst thing is that even if you don't care about graphics, in games like Darkfall and Roma Victor...you ned to see clearly and sharply. You cant see all fuzzy and unclear...it tends to be quite annoying. Roma Victor team stated one of the reasons why they intend to make the graphics standard. Darkfalls excuse (is what I call it) of making the graphics low was to guarantee high fps....but we all know high fps isnt a requirement and with a little configuration and patience people fix the problem of FPS, and normally developing teams manage to do something to keep the FPS at a stable rate aswell.
As for Darkfall....the graphics will be somewhat similar....maybe a bit better then. I am being honest, you can't really make a game's graphics go a long way, when its built to allow cards like GF4 to run the graphics.
I believe Claus said the minimum was a GF4 MX, which is basically a glorified GF2 and an exceptionally feeble card by modern standards...not to mention a few years old. So that tells me that the engine scales fairly well and/or is not hardware-intensive, both of which are huge boons!
DF's graphics are fairly nice and the art direction is solid, as can be seen in the video. Things look good in motion, and performance appears to be smooth in the midst of action. View ranges are also fairly solid - once again, in the video, notice that you can see a mountain on the far side of the lake below the fortress town. I can safely say that DF looks a lot better than Roma Victor so far; RV is about on par with EQ at launch in terms of visuals. I realize full and well that RV isn't aspiring to excellent visuals, though; they too want an engine that can support massive numbers on screen at the same time.
And it's nice to actually see an MMORPG actually concentrate on engine performance. It's pretty sad when people have computers that can thrash out Doom3 at 100+ fps, but are lucky to get over 40 - 50 in an MMO.
Also, the devs don't really have investors or shareholders per-se. They got a nice whack of venture capital and are being allowed to run with it with pretty much no interference. They got a pretty sweet deal going, mostly because they secured funding from outside the typical gaming/electronics/multimedia domain. Smart move on their behalf, considering that 2002 was still "z0mgs dot-com crash!" paranoia to some degree.
And hey, HL2 can be dragooned into running on GF4 MXes. It's all a matter of how well your engine scales and how intelligently it enables/disables fancy graphical features...
yes it will be a flop because you simply can't build a quality mmorpg with 15 people..
just look at DnL for the perfec example..
If you insist... *looks at 'the most anticipated' charts on the home page*
Its not really the number of people. The same number of people currently in a different developing team are comming close to finishing a game exactly like Darkfall, except maybe a lot more features. Roma Victor is that game. They started around the same time on their projects as DF started, but Roma Victor is practicaly completed and already in Commercial testing stage. People expect it to be released some time in Decemeber, maybe a little later.
And yes, it does include a lot more features (except magic, PvE isn't really focused on much in the game and sea battles), but its besides the point, I am not comparing the games, but their developing teams. Now explain to me how the dev team of Darkfall is capable of making one of the best MMORPGs expected, while the dev team have cut themselves off from the community.
Roma Victor was so intouch with their community that the community had a part in building the game. Many suggestions and such were given to the developers and now a big part of the game has been built on what the players asked to be implemented. Compare your developer teams now. Which sounds more capable of making a game that would be the best MMORPG out for the PvP community.
Roma Victor and Darkfall are similar because, Player runned economy, Full open pvp, full loot, 1 shard world (no zones), FPS Twitch styles combat. Ofcourse RV is aimed at a different community. But its proven that the game is great, and I hope 4 months away from completion.
Teth and Preston...
Question as it relates to this thread.
Not too long ago the races each had their own special powers and abilities. Some even had special mounts.
Now, it seems from Claus's comments in IRC posted you the forums, that most of the 'uniqueness' of the races have been shelved in favor of 'balancing'.
I have read the old lore on the powers of the races and now, with the current information, it just seems so much has changed from the original design they started with.
Do you believe that Darkfall can meet the expectations of those who were intially interested in the differant player types when so much has changed to 'equalize' them?
If you want example I will list some but I know you know what I am talking about as I was once a fan of Darkfall and remember you both from the boards.
Claus has always said that the differences between the races will be slight, but noticeable. The only real news on that front is that the race-specific gear is becoming a touch more standardized to prevent balancing nightmares, which is somewhat understandable. I doubt, say, alfar are going to lose their trademark sithras, though!
But yeah, statwise, the races were never going to be too different from one another. The dev team never wanted anybody to feel that they were completely gimped because "wah, I am race X but I want to be charactertype Y".
Oh, and Mikey, Darkfall is having multiple servers. There appears to be this running misconception that Darkfall is doing a Wish-style single game world, which is not correct. The game servers are gonna be capable of supporting 10k and upwards concurrent connections, but there are still going to be geographically-oriented ala Ultima Online so as to let people get optimal connections.
Furthermore, you need to remember that the DF devs are all diehard gamers themselves; I actually happened to play Shadowbane in the same guild as Claus (didn't know until afterwards, though). Incidentally, that guild did extremely well on their server. A bunch of the devs are old Black Rose people from AC-Darktide. They more or less know the score as well as any of the playerbase could ever hope to, and are further bolstered by the fact that they have a vision for what they want the game to be while fanbases tends to pick and chew on individual components with no real regard for the overarching image.
That being said, the devs have commented repeatedly - including in the interview they had here on MMORPG.com - that a lot of their design decisions have been influenced to some degree by community feedback. The devs don't fish for answers, but they do read the majority of the threads on the forums, according to them.
I think its time to address this post's question so I am casting a ressurection spell on it. I think there is a bit of chaos going on with Dark Fall and the community needs to know if in 2005 when this question was posted was there some vision to its message.
4 years ago it was asked, would this game pass or fail... Its time to answer the OP's Fated Question...