Do you feel that the people making Shroud of the Avatar and Crowfall don't know what they are doing and are using an engine that is unsuitable for an MMO?
Do you feel that the people making Shroud of the Avatar and Crowfall don't know what they are doing and are using an engine that is unsuitable for an MMO?
Apples and oranges.
The teams working on both of those titles are proven industry veterans with multiple decades of experience, and both of those games have more content and polish right now in the current phase of development than your game does.
They also don't have upper management rallying for the cause on public gaming forums, and do you know why that is? It's because the product they are offering speaks for itself and doesn't require reinforcement to try and convince the general populace that is it something it isn't.
I don't understand how you can come on here and attempt to tell people you have a fully functioning sandbox MMO when you do not. There is zero truth to that statement. Your own customers make no attempt to debate that fact, and many seem rather unhappy with the state of the game.
You seem very out of touch with what the standards are within this industry and the fact that you continue on with this one-note pony routine about the game not being an alpha is insulting to gamers as a whole. You can label it however you choose, that is your prerogative, but you're not fooling anyone and those of us who have actually played the game know that what you're claiming is far from the truth.
All anyone needs to do in order to see this is go to the Goblinworks channel on Twitch and checkout the past broadcasts, then compare that to other products with an Alpha label. What you choose to call it is irrelevant, the reality of the situation is that you have a product that is currently equivalent to other products that are in an alpha phase of development.
It seems weird to me that you want to insist on using the term "alpha". We had an alpha. It ran from June to December.
We are not calling the game an alpha because we are not alpha testing. We aren't calling it a beta (despite an early-on misuse of that term) becuase we aren't beta testing. We are being really transparent with everyone by not representing the game as "finished" (whatever that means for an MMO....) but we need a term that descibes what we are doing and so we coined one. Steam has "Early Access". We have "Early Enrollment". I think it is entirely appropriate. We are trying something new, and we used a new term. Some folks might not want to play at our current feature level, and that's ok. But that level is a playable fantasy sandbox MMO. It isn't "missing" anything that would make it "really work". There is tremendous opportunity for improvement and development, but the basic game is working, and working well.
`The game isn`t finished, but its also not alpha or beta`
Do you feel that the people making Shroud of the Avatar and Crowfall don't know what they are doing and are using an engine that is unsuitable for an MMO?
We have yet to see a released MMO running on unity 5, so it is hard to say at this point. I do feel that Shroud of the Avatar is very subpar at this point. Of course it is easy access and blah blah, but it doesn't feel quality in any regard.
I don't know why you are suggesting there has been some kind of mass attrition. There has not. May will be the first time most January Kickstarter players have to make a stay/no-stay decision. I surveyed the player population several weeks ago, got what I consider to be a statistically significant number of responses, and was delighted to see that approximately 80% intended to continue to play when their game time expired. There are more people in the game today than there were at the end of January. We have not grown as fast ad I would have liked and that I thought we would, but I also had planned to have been doing substantial pid marketing during this period, and we have not - instead focusing on features and polish.
Please clarify the measurement you are using when you state "There are more people in the game today than there were at the end of January". Are you inferring that actual IN GAME POPULATION is higher? If so, that dramatically contradicts most eye witness accounts in game. Including my own.
Let's be honest here. You had nearly 9000 Kickstarter backers. If you had retained them, you would be fine for population. Nowhere NEAR that many people are actively playing the game. They left, because their impression of a Minimal Viable Product differs form yours.
Also- please do share the amount of "statistically significant number of responses" you received.
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It seems weird to me that you want to insist on using the term "alpha". We had an alpha. It ran from June to December.
OK so the game Alpha tested for 6 months. How long was the beta test? I'm pretty sure (feel free to correct any inaccuracy) that you started "Early Enrollment" at the end of Dec, or Jan 1st...
So please do clarify when exactly the beta occurred? Because if Early Enrollment isn't beta... when exactly was the beta test?
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
It's good to see more people speaking up against this practice. Pathfinder should do the right thing, stop charging monthly until they're ready to call the game in "release state". It's not right to make people pay to witness someone's explorations and misadventures in free Unity engine. It's just a bad deal and it's exploitive of your customers.
Originally posted by Adjuvant1 It's good to see more people speaking up against this practice. Pathfinder should do the right thing, stop charging monthly until they're ready to call the game in "release state". It's not right to make people pay to witness someone's explorations and misadventures in free Unity engine. It's just a bad deal and it's exploitive of your customers.
I doubt they are using the free version of unity. That being said, it is a one time fee that costs less than some of our computers do. I do agree with most of what you said though. What benefit does the player get for paying the monthly fee at this time? Do they get free months for each month paid at the games release? Do they get to keep their characters? Do they get anything at all to incentivize the monthly fee aside from playing a game that is no where completed?
Originally posted by Adjuvant1 It's good to see more people speaking up against this practice. Pathfinder should do the right thing, stop charging monthly until they're ready to call the game in "release state". It's not right to make people pay to witness someone's explorations and misadventures in free Unity engine. It's just a bad deal and it's exploitive of your customers.
I think they should do it for their own sake, not for anyone else. I'm not worried about them "exploiting" anyone, because people are paying of their own volition. I think someone should be able to sell anything they want for any amount, but if people aren't buying it they should make a smart business decision.
I don't want to see Goblinworks go under. I don't want to see another indie MMORPG fail, especially on account of pride and poor business decisions. Its bad for the genre when games do poorly, especially the ones that are taking the road less traveled.
Do you feel that the people making Shroud of the Avatar and Crowfall don't know what they are doing and are using an engine that is unsuitable for an MMO?
We have yet to see a released MMO running on unity 5, so it is hard to say at this point. I do feel that Shroud of the Avatar is very subpar at this point. Of course it is easy access and blah blah, but it doesn't feel quality in any regard.
Agreed. I tried SotA awhile back, and it was just terrible. Crowfall doesn't look any better. The Unity engine is powerful, and an MMO can be made on it, but it will never be as good as an in-house game engine from scratch. It's like taking a scripting language and trying to code without limitations, when it would've just been better to learn the underlying programming language in the first place.
If they want to make more money and want me to recommend the game they need to remove gender locked classes from the game and actually design it decently before I will recommend the game on a massive scale, there are a huge number of different games with recent patches I would say are decent not the best like ESO, and Rift.
Also why does the installer say it only supports windows 7 and windows 8
Its... quite sad. First they come up with an idea and for the sake of getting more attention pretty much throw in pathfinder while having practically nothing to do with it. Then they make people pay to test, not only a straight fee but also a subscription fee to TEST a game. THEN they require those people PAYING to test an INCOMPLETE game to get more people to do the same.
Yeah... I'm just going to count this as a major flop. If you got an idea don't just use some name to sell your idea expecting it to carry your idea. I really do hope we do see a good pathfinder game though one day, one that is actually pathfinder based and not just trying to get money for throwing the name up as a strange lie to get people to play some other idea you had and weren't remotely ready to work on creating an actual MMO with.
This thread alone is helping the marketing of the game.
I had forgotten that Pathfinder Online even existed.
Granted, of all tabletop games to attach a license to, next to D&D this is probably the one that would interest me the least.
Still, hearing that it is a sandbox intrigues me.
It's marketing for the game for sure but its also bad marketing. Who wants to pay for a game that people are saying, and you can verify yourself, is a feature incomplete game and should not be charging a box and sub price?
It seems weird to me that you want to insist on using the term "alpha". We had an alpha. It ran from June to December.
We are not calling the game an alpha because we are not alpha testing. We aren't calling it a beta (despite an early-on misuse of that term) becuase we aren't beta testing. We are being really transparent with everyone by not representing the game as "finished" (whatever that means for an MMO....) but we need a term that descibes what we are doing and so we coined one. Steam has "Early Access". We have "Early Enrollment". I think it is entirely appropriate. We are trying something new, and we used a new term. Some folks might not want to play at our current feature level, and that's ok. But that level is a playable fantasy sandbox MMO. It isn't "missing" anything that would make it "really work". There is tremendous opportunity for improvement and development, but the basic game is working, and working well.
Interesting.
Seems a lot of people supporting PO only do so thanks to their hopes that the game is in alpha and will get much better in the future (from what I read here or on your forum).
You're doing a terrible PR job telling them they're wrong.
Edit: For those who say the game isn't finished, listen to the guy! It is "finished", but not as good as you were hoping it'd turn out.
2: 80% of our expense goes to the salaries of the people who make the game. The other 20% goes to things like licensing tools, rent, legal fees, etc. We also had substantial costs associated with fulfilling the kickstarter rewards.
3: About 1/3rd of the capital spent so far came from Kickstarter. The other 2/3rds represent investment into the company.
Making an MMO is expensive. That we have succeeded so far at the budget we have spent is a tremendous victory.
Typically in high-tech companies it is a safe assumption that every "developer" has a total overhead of salary, benefits, workstation, software, tax, rent, etc. of ~$100k/year. We currently have a team of about 20 people. The only non-developer in the company is me.
To put that in comparison, CCP spent over $75 million on World of Darkness, and failed to get it to market. It's widely reported that the cost of Star Wars: The Old Republic was more than $200 million. Most AAA Theme Park MMOs released in the past 5 years have had budgets in excess of $100 million.
We have been in full production since January of 2013. Prior to that we spent about a year in partial production getting the company formed, recruiting our leads, and making the Technology Demo. So we have had about 2 years of nearly full burn rate to get to this point.
We have not, as of yet, invested any substantial money on marketing the game. We've been working on improving it steadily and relying on grassroots support as we iterate towards a product that we can do a more widespread marketing campaign for. We're getting there.
Making videogames is a tough, expensive business. Making an MMO is the toughest, most expensive part of that business. I'm incredibly proud of the team and the work they've achieved so far.
You have 20 developers and spent 4 million and all you have is this! I am sorry but that does not actually inspire confidence in your product.
The "game" looks amateurish at best. It's build with the Unity Engine which is simply not up to standards. This alone shows your have no technical knowledge on how to make a MMO, or you would not have chose Unity. The reason you chose Unity is because it's free and you trying to make a buck from creating yet another MMO scam.
This Project is dead already as you will have ZERO ability to optimize net code or engine code. You might as well just scrap the whole thing and start over with a real engine like UDK or CryEngine if you actually intend of finishing it.
I would also say its true. And Unity is certanly not engine made for open sprawling MMO
However , they made huge improvements with Unity 5
It seems weird to me that you want to insist on using the term "alpha". We had an alpha. It ran from June to December.
We are not calling the game an alpha because we are not alpha testing. We aren't calling it a beta (despite an early-on misuse of that term) becuase we aren't beta testing. We are being really transparent with everyone by not representing the game as "finished" (whatever that means for an MMO....) but we need a term that descibes what we are doing and so we coined one. Steam has "Early Access". We have "Early Enrollment". I think it is entirely appropriate. We are trying something new, and we used a new term. Some folks might not want to play at our current feature level, and that's ok. But that level is a playable fantasy sandbox MMO. It isn't "missing" anything that would make it "really work". There is tremendous opportunity for improvement and development, but the basic game is working, and working well.
`The game isn`t finished, but its also not alpha or beta`
How stupid do you think we are?
+1
I used to be curious about this game. Not anymore. Now it's on my personal blacklist.
It seems weird to me that you want to insist on using the term "alpha". We had an alpha. It ran from June to December.
We are not calling the game an alpha because we are not alpha testing. We aren't calling it a beta (despite an early-on misuse of that term) becuase we aren't beta testing. We are being really transparent with everyone by not representing the game as "finished" (whatever that means for an MMO....) but we need a term that descibes what we are doing and so we coined one. Steam has "Early Access". We have "Early Enrollment". I think it is entirely appropriate. We are trying something new, and we used a new term. Some folks might not want to play at our current feature level, and that's ok. But that level is a playable fantasy sandbox MMO. It isn't "missing" anything that would make it "really work". There is tremendous opportunity for improvement and development, but the basic game is working, and working well.
Interesting.
Seems a lot of people supporting PO only do so thanks to their hopes that the game is in alpha and will get much better in the future (from what I read here or on your forum).
You're doing a terrible PR job telling them they're wrong.
Edit: For those who say the game isn't finished, listen to the guy! It is "finished", but not as good as you were hoping it'd turn out.
I'm still hoping for a response from him about when the BETA happened. I'll copy my question below:
OK so the game Alpha tested for 6 months. How long was the beta test? I'm pretty sure (feel free to correct any inaccuracy) that you started "Early Enrollment" at the end of Dec, or Jan 1st...
So please do clarify when exactly the beta occurred? Because if Early Enrollment isn't beta... when exactly was the beta test?
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
The game may turn out good when its eventually ready, but the way they have tried to fund it through things like charging a sub at this early stage has already given me a bad impression of it.
2: 80% of our expense goes to the salaries of the people who make the game. The other 20% goes to things like licensing tools, rent, legal fees, etc. We also had substantial costs associated with fulfilling the kickstarter rewards.
3: About 1/3rd of the capital spent so far came from Kickstarter. The other 2/3rds represent investment into the company.
Making an MMO is expensive. That we have succeeded so far at the budget we have spent is a tremendous victory.
Typically in high-tech companies it is a safe assumption that every "developer" has a total overhead of salary, benefits, workstation, software, tax, rent, etc. of ~$100k/year. We currently have a team of about 20 people. The only non-developer in the company is me.
...
You have 20 developers and spent 4 million and all you have is this! I am sorry but that does not actually inspire confidence in your product.
The "game" looks amateurish at best. It's build with the Unity Engine which is simply not up to standards. This alone shows your have no technical knowledge on how to make a MMO, or you would not have chose Unity. The reason you chose Unity is because it's free and you trying to make a buck from creating yet another MMO scam.
This Project is dead already as you will have ZERO ability to optimize net code or engine code. You might as well just scrap the whole thing and start over with a real engine like UDK or CryEngine if you actually intend of finishing it.
I would also say its true. And Unity is certanly not engine made for open sprawling MMO However , they made huge improvements with Unity 5
So lucky break i guess
The only thing they added in 5 is physical based shaders and some PhysX and other cosmetic stuff. The core engine is still a hot mess of C,C++ and C# and not up to industry standards.
I have developed in C++ on UDK, Cry, HavokVision and some lesser known like Torque3D, Irrlicht or the OGRE type engines. Unity is not able to manage big open worlds and massive multiplayer. The core is simply not able to handle the load and there is no way to optimize it without a full core re-write.
You just need to look at all the Unity games, they are all what i call, small scene based games. You go from small map to next small map.
Don't get me wrong, it's a great tool for people to take first steps into game development. It's absolutely fantastic what they give you, but do not make the mistake to think you get a highly optimized professional engine.
If you want sprawling open world go get the free Unreal Engine.
It's a shame that this game was successfully funded through Kickstarter. I think that they low-balled their KS funding, hoping for backend deals or additional funding (obviously) and it simply never happened. Unfortunately, I think PFO is hurting crowdfunding at this point.
Wow. I just don't know what to say. This is is supposedly not released (although you have to buy it AND pay a sub which is laughable) but the CEO complains that people are not recruiting enough players?
Pathfinder Online lost me when they announced it was going to have a PvP focus.
It's a shame, I'm a huge fan of the tabletop game.
Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain and most fools do. Benjamin Franklin
Comments
Do you feel that the people making Shroud of the Avatar and Crowfall don't know what they are doing and are using an engine that is unsuitable for an MMO?
Apples and oranges.
The teams working on both of those titles are proven industry veterans with multiple decades of experience, and both of those games have more content and polish right now in the current phase of development than your game does.
They also don't have upper management rallying for the cause on public gaming forums, and do you know why that is? It's because the product they are offering speaks for itself and doesn't require reinforcement to try and convince the general populace that is it something it isn't.
I don't understand how you can come on here and attempt to tell people you have a fully functioning sandbox MMO when you do not. There is zero truth to that statement. Your own customers make no attempt to debate that fact, and many seem rather unhappy with the state of the game.
You seem very out of touch with what the standards are within this industry and the fact that you continue on with this one-note pony routine about the game not being an alpha is insulting to gamers as a whole. You can label it however you choose, that is your prerogative, but you're not fooling anyone and those of us who have actually played the game know that what you're claiming is far from the truth.
All anyone needs to do in order to see this is go to the Goblinworks channel on Twitch and checkout the past broadcasts, then compare that to other products with an Alpha label. What you choose to call it is irrelevant, the reality of the situation is that you have a product that is currently equivalent to other products that are in an alpha phase of development.
`The game isn`t finished, but its also not alpha or beta`
How stupid do you think we are?
We have yet to see a released MMO running on unity 5, so it is hard to say at this point. I do feel that Shroud of the Avatar is very subpar at this point. Of course it is easy access and blah blah, but it doesn't feel quality in any regard.
Ranghar LoD
Lords of Death
Please clarify the measurement you are using when you state "There are more people in the game today than there were at the end of January". Are you inferring that actual IN GAME POPULATION is higher? If so, that dramatically contradicts most eye witness accounts in game. Including my own.
Let's be honest here. You had nearly 9000 Kickstarter backers. If you had retained them, you would be fine for population. Nowhere NEAR that many people are actively playing the game. They left, because their impression of a Minimal Viable Product differs form yours.
Also- please do share the amount of "statistically significant number of responses" you received.
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
OK so the game Alpha tested for 6 months. How long was the beta test? I'm pretty sure (feel free to correct any inaccuracy) that you started "Early Enrollment" at the end of Dec, or Jan 1st...
So please do clarify when exactly the beta occurred? Because if Early Enrollment isn't beta... when exactly was the beta test?
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
I doubt they are using the free version of unity. That being said, it is a one time fee that costs less than some of our computers do. I do agree with most of what you said though. What benefit does the player get for paying the monthly fee at this time? Do they get free months for each month paid at the games release? Do they get to keep their characters? Do they get anything at all to incentivize the monthly fee aside from playing a game that is no where completed?
Ranghar LoD
Lords of Death
I think they should do it for their own sake, not for anyone else. I'm not worried about them "exploiting" anyone, because people are paying of their own volition. I think someone should be able to sell anything they want for any amount, but if people aren't buying it they should make a smart business decision.
I don't want to see Goblinworks go under. I don't want to see another indie MMORPG fail, especially on account of pride and poor business decisions. Its bad for the genre when games do poorly, especially the ones that are taking the road less traveled.
Agreed. I tried SotA awhile back, and it was just terrible. Crowfall doesn't look any better. The Unity engine is powerful, and an MMO can be made on it, but it will never be as good as an in-house game engine from scratch. It's like taking a scripting language and trying to code without limitations, when it would've just been better to learn the underlying programming language in the first place.
This thread alone is helping the marketing of the game.
I had forgotten that Pathfinder Online even existed.
Granted, of all tabletop games to attach a license to, next to D&D this is probably the one that would interest me the least.
Still, hearing that it is a sandbox intrigues me.
If they want to make more money and want me to recommend the game they need to remove gender locked classes from the game and actually design it decently before I will recommend the game on a massive scale, there are a huge number of different games with recent patches I would say are decent not the best like ESO, and Rift.
Also why does the installer say it only supports windows 7 and windows 8
Its... quite sad. First they come up with an idea and for the sake of getting more attention pretty much throw in pathfinder while having practically nothing to do with it. Then they make people pay to test, not only a straight fee but also a subscription fee to TEST a game. THEN they require those people PAYING to test an INCOMPLETE game to get more people to do the same.
Yeah... I'm just going to count this as a major flop. If you got an idea don't just use some name to sell your idea expecting it to carry your idea. I really do hope we do see a good pathfinder game though one day, one that is actually pathfinder based and not just trying to get money for throwing the name up as a strange lie to get people to play some other idea you had and weren't remotely ready to work on creating an actual MMO with.
It's marketing for the game for sure but its also bad marketing. Who wants to pay for a game that people are saying, and you can verify yourself, is a feature incomplete game and should not be charging a box and sub price?
Interesting.
Seems a lot of people supporting PO only do so thanks to their hopes that the game is in alpha and will get much better in the future (from what I read here or on your forum).
You're doing a terrible PR job telling them they're wrong.
Edit: For those who say the game isn't finished, listen to the guy! It is "finished", but not as good as you were hoping it'd turn out.
I would also say its true. And Unity is certanly not engine made for open sprawling MMO
However , they made huge improvements with Unity 5
So lucky break i guess
+1
I used to be curious about this game. Not anymore. Now it's on my personal blacklist.
I'm still hoping for a response from him about when the BETA happened. I'll copy my question below:
OK so the game Alpha tested for 6 months. How long was the beta test? I'm pretty sure (feel free to correct any inaccuracy) that you started "Early Enrollment" at the end of Dec, or Jan 1st...
So please do clarify when exactly the beta occurred? Because if Early Enrollment isn't beta... when exactly was the beta test?
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
The game may turn out good when its eventually ready, but the way they have tried to fund it through things like charging a sub at this early stage has already given me a bad impression of it.
The only thing they added in 5 is physical based shaders and some PhysX and other cosmetic stuff. The core engine is still a hot mess of C,C++ and C# and not up to industry standards.
I have developed in C++ on UDK, Cry, HavokVision and some lesser known like Torque3D, Irrlicht or the OGRE type engines. Unity is not able to manage big open worlds and massive multiplayer. The core is simply not able to handle the load and there is no way to optimize it without a full core re-write.
You just need to look at all the Unity games, they are all what i call, small scene based games. You go from small map to next small map.
Don't get me wrong, it's a great tool for people to take first steps into game development. It's absolutely fantastic what they give you, but do not make the mistake to think you get a highly optimized professional engine.
If you want sprawling open world go get the free Unreal Engine.
I found it surprising that Paizo was willing to let some no name company with no track record of success damage their IP.
Crazkanuk
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Azarelos - 90 Hunter - Emerald
Durnzig - 90 Paladin - Emerald
Demonicron - 90 Death Knight - Emerald Dream - US
Tankinpain - 90 Monk - Azjol-Nerub - US
Brindell - 90 Warrior - Emerald Dream - US
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Pathfinder Online lost me when they announced it was going to have a PvP focus.
It's a shame, I'm a huge fan of the tabletop game.
Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain and most fools do.
Benjamin Franklin
You misheard! He said customers aren't recruiting enough new players to pay for his Alpha Romeo 4c.
I kid! I kid!