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Lord of the Rings Online: Beta Smashes Previous Record
SBFord
Former Associate EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 33,129
According to a post on the Lord of the Rings Online forum, Turbine has had to add test server realms to match the demand of players wanting to check out the Helm's Deep expansion content and assist the team with bug squashing, etc.
It already has in some respects. It's the first expansion that we've had since Shadows Of Angmar that required us to add servers to the beta world to match the number of players trying to log in and participate. It was the first beta since Shadows of Angmar that actually tripped our login queues on the beta world and forced us to raise the max player population.
Helm's Deep will launch on November 18th. Check out the rest of the thread on the Lord of the Rings Online forum.
Comments
"If I offended you, you needed it" -Corey Taylor
Maybe I should go back, have been taking break since the rohan came.
Talent trees seems to be interesting
Not to sound overly critical but beta logins mean what exactly? If so many are experiencing beta what do the pre-orders look like?
All this tells you is a lot of people were curious about changes, it says nothing good or bad about how they felt about it.
it still says people were interested enough to check it out. that can be a real boon when reporting to the WB suits on how they are doing.
i hope its a good xpac and that they can provide some real entertainment for folks.
"There are at least two kinds of games.
One could be called finite, the other infinite.
A finite game is played for the purpose of winning,
an infinite game for the purpose of continuing play."
Finite and Infinite Games, James Carse
Perhaps, but at the end of the day WB is only going to be concerned with whether or not people drop $ on it. They are not a charity interest means nothing without a blip on the bottom line.
EDIT found the post
https://www.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?&postid=6997486#post6997486
Considering it was found in a thread titled "cut the devs some slack" witch seems to be some sort of debate over moderation, feedback, and thread closure ratios, I still remain unsure what meaning beta participation #'s mean in the real world. I've seen variations of this argument before NO ONE"S IN BETA IT"S GONNA DIE when later it has record breaking sales. I've never seen a direct correlation to beta participation to anything really other than a null value datum point.
So basically you have a link to back up your assumption? From those in my guild the same people got beta keys last got them this time. The only extra ones in our kin were the new players, so basically they had more in beta cause there are more new players and old players are coming back. See I can basically make claims too but at least mine comes with a little backing to it.Exactly. I love the game but this is misleading. They opened the beta to anyone who "liked" it on Facebook I believe . . of course it is going to have more demand than previous expansions.
Wa min God! Se æx on min heafod is!
Good news.
It is a great game and it must have been important enough to the "new" people/players to download 16+GB of game.
Also do not discount the new movie The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug out in December having a positive impact on the interest as well.
I d/l'd the beta to check it out, but was unimpressed and stopped playing again.
Rohan's lag was what pushed me away from the game.. it didn't really seem fixed.
i totally agree, i just think that until you have hard cash numbers coming in this can create a little bit of goodwill with your overseers
"There are at least two kinds of games.
One could be called finite, the other infinite.
A finite game is played for the purpose of winning,
an infinite game for the purpose of continuing play."
Finite and Infinite Games, James Carse
Oh I get what your saying from an internal organizational standpoint, while waiting on sales figures. But as an externally newsworthy item?
EDIT
It's kinda like saying the ACA site had a lot of visitors...and? I know apples to oranges but both req. inferences based on irrelevant data
SW:tor expansion? Just more space on rails... pass
Xbox, PS4, no thanks I have a PC, better graphics, better sound, more useful over all just not as cheap as a console
All I see on the forums is heavy whining, fear and loathing about the class changes that come with Helm's Deep... not that overblown rhetoric is all that unusual there
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
Well, as a long time player i've playing, learning, building and fine-tuning my main class for 6 .5 years now. Turbine decided to hit reset and redo most of how my class plays and feels. It was a very un-rpg like decision on their part and one i am not happy about at all. Most everyone i know that has invested in the game long term is not happy about it and logged on to the beta to find out how these changes impacted their class.
The joys of marketing hype
In beta there were many vocal people. Sure it can be argued that they are the vocal minority.
All I know is that for every one person saying they loved the changes, there was about 10 saying they hated the changes.
What was really concerning was how most of these were life time account holders or people that had been playing for 5+ years, they were not simply trolls.
People saying how they had lifetime accounts plus paid for say 3 other accounts, had spent about $500 a year on Turbine points but felt this was one step too far and are no longer giving Turbine a single penny, was quite alarming
Sure on beta some liked the changes a lot. But far far far more hated them
Read their forums for a more balanced view for example
https://www.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?530673-I-pre-ordered-Helm-s-Deep-today-what-about-you
https://www.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?529893-Who-thinks-his-class-gameplay-has-improved
https://www.lotro.com/forums/showthread.php?529877-Helm-s-Deep-the-newest-EoC
Only a small minority really complained, most liked the changes. Some people get stuck in a rut and won't get out without screaming and kicking.
I'm sorry, that is simply not true.
There were a few very very vocal people who didn't like it and posted loads of posts saying so, , there were also a few very very vocal people who loved it. posting all over the place.
But there were far far more individual posters saying they hated the changes than those saying they loved it. Probably something like 1 like for every 5 that dislike and often the ones that liked had played for relatively y very little time (not always)
Did you see the polls on beta that I'm not allowed to post due to NDA (nda has been lifted but we are banned from posting any threads from beta), if I could post them here, it doesn't make very good reading.
I fully understand and totally agree that many beta players liked the changes. But to say those that didn't were a vocal minority is simply untrue, or to put it another way, those that liked it were an even smaller (by a long way) vocal minority..
What has become very clear is that most people who dislike the changes do not want Lotro to fail and are glad many others like the changes. Yet every single time they voice their concerns, they are put down as screaming haters, doom and gloom merchants etc by a small but vocal part of the group who do like the changes.
If far far more people loved the changes than those that disliked them, I would happily say so on here, but that simply was not the case.
People can make their own minds up come Monday. .
Found one of the polls on another website (all individual voters, no duplicates) so am not copying it from beta
Beta 4 Poll results: 122 Qualifying responses
LOVE = 4...(3.29%)
LIKE = 23...(18.88%)
FAIR = 13...(10.65%)
INFERIOR = 17...(13.93%)
POOR = 37...(30.03%)
DREAD = 28...(22.95%)
Final poll results BETA 3 after 210 valid replies:
LOVE = 0 ... 0%
LIKE = 33 ... 15.7%
FAIR = 23 ... 10.9%
INFERIOR = 27 ... 12.8%
POOR = 86 ... 40.9%
DREAD = 41 ... 19.5%
Final poll results BETA 2 after 290 valid replies:
LOVE = 4 ... 1.37 %
LIKE = 66 ... 22.75%
POOR = 149 ... 51.37%
DREAD = 71 ... 24.48%
As you can see, as time went on, fewer and fewer people even bothered to vote in these polls, many people simply gave up on beta when they learned the changes were going ahead regardless.
Again, I'm not trying to put Lotro down, I hope it continues for years, but I detest when a small minority of people claim those on beta that disliked the changes were a small minority of people when this simply wasn't the case.
I agree with you (and I must say those links are pointing towards some great posts
)
It's always funny to read the Only a small minority really complained type of comments, when they have as well only a handful vocal supporters on the forum... but of course they're not a minority since they're saying nice things (and as a few pointed out on the forum, the number of the so-called naysayers are lower since the nda lift for obvious reasons. The numbers were *cough*hammered*cough* down
)
So, let's turn away from forums for a bit and check the personal opinions. (many of those are in the posts as well, with the voices of whole kins, irl groups, etc.)
I start with my irl result: so far I've heard 1 supporting vote. He's a recent started hunter, loves easy action mmo's, lore knowledge is just the Hobbit movie, and he likes the idea of the more powerful pew-pew after HD. (of course this all means nothing, his money smells the very same to Turbine as the others's, just put it here for the detail's sake
)
Heard a few opinions (mine as well) of: "I love the game, so I'll stay, but my wallet is not". Plan to checking the finalised changes that reaching live, playing through the storyline, and after that logging back only for festivals, rp events, meeting with ingame friends, etc. Characters will be retired, HD purchased with TP's, no further spending on the game.
And I've heard a lot (around 10) of: I'm leaving / not returning. Mostly players of 4-6years, a few lifers among them.
Not a representative list of course. I just felt it worths noting, since they don't use the forum, just as the majority of the playerbase. And yes, part of them checked the beta, the other part got first-hand infos from the first part
So they don't basing their opinion on random forum posts and official marketi... I mean dev diaries.
Sorry I have heard very few negative comments on the changes, your poll numbers are ludicrous, not even a sample large enough to count for anything.
It is ok not to like something, but making up stories about a large contingent not liking it to support your position is just ridiculous. Turbine is certainly not worrying about it.
How about a link to this poll? I would love to know what website it was and if it actually even exist. Maybe people stopped voting cause they were too busy playing LOTRO.