Pantheon Shares Year End Producer's Letter

Kumapon · December 2019

Chris "Joppa" Perkins shared the year end Producer's letter. In it he talks about what has happend in 2019, the state of the game, and what to look forward too in 2020. Also talks about the funding of the game.

http://www.pantheonmmo.com/newsletter/2019_december_producers_letter/

There will also be a Holiday stream tonight over on https://www.twitch.tv/visionaryrealms at 9pm est. More gameplay and Joppa will do a Q@A. Check it out if your interested.

Amathe · December 2019

Thanks for linking that.

kitarad · December 2019

Thanks for that link. Interesting news about the investment syndicate. Hope their funding is secure.

Kyleran · December 2019

Was a good, concise summary, with a clear list of work accomplished and work remaining.

Of course, a lack of dates for anything mars the report some.

Wizardry · December 2019

I appreciate the link and their efforts to release this but sadly i am not watching Cohh and his pay to stream offerings.Perhaps i am a hypocrite since ALL streamers are only in this for the money,idc what they say,they made streaming their job.However i have been watching far fewer streamers of late,can't be bothered,too much drama and too many sellouts and well a lot of BS streamers saying a lot of BS.

I wanted to watch the video on warrior and climbing but yet again i see Cohh so it's a no go.No i do not think he is a real bad person but he is also not a straight streamer either,he chose his path to be a money streamer,nobody made him do it.
There is another layer to this and involves all the crowd funded games.Hmm not great at wording stuff but i'll try....

They want us to be in the know but hold us OUT of the game,you get in the testing if your a paying customer.So in essence,they don't care much about us until we hand over money,ok fine,it's their business to do as they please.I realize the double edge sword,if they allow anyone to take a look,if even for say an hour session,it alienates those that paid to get in and perhaps creates some added drama,but hey remember that so called NDA everyone throws around,why not use it?

The true way to do this properly is as i hinted at,short sessions,then you MUST fill out a Q/A feedback form before getting another look see.IDK what...maybe 20 people a day?You see this is sort of like all devs want their cake and eat it too,you want us to know but not really,what they really want is our money.

Wizardry · December 2019

Then again,MOST likely 99% devs can't take honesty,they ONLY want to hear praise or what they like to call "constructive feedback".
So if i told them a certain system was terrible and needed an entire remake,they and likely others would toss around babble like "your just trolling".

if i said a certain Class need tons of changes,they likely would just scoff and say "we haven't time for that kind of changes".

The true reality is what we see is MARKETING by devs,the part where they tell us they want to listen is PR talk,they like to listen if your praising,giving high fives or asking for something that is super easy for the team.

I could go through the game piece by piece and likely see what i call MANY flaws in the design,but we will never know and Visionary really doesn't care what i think.Then again maybe i could look it over see a lot of potential,maybe only minor tweaks,again we will never know because i guarantee 100% i will never pay for crowd funding just to look at a game and PRETEND the team cares what i have to say.

Mylan12 · December 2019

Most games in the past only allowed outside testers in during beta. If they want to charge for pre-alpha testing then I see nothing wrong with it. At least the person has something to lose if they don't follow the NDA.

Most developers of course do prefer "constructive feedback". It does little good tell them that "oh your game sucks" or " Your crafting is terrible", ect

Its much better to tell them ways in detail how you think they can improve the systems that do exist in the game.

I use to beta and alpha lots of games and saw all kinds of testers. Some looked for bugs and for things not working as they were supposed to at that stage of development. Some had " a favorite game" such as "EQ, UO, WoW, or whatever" and seem to think everything else should be like it. These testers the devs usually ignored as they should.

In alpha most of the game systems are in very early stages so you test and provide feedback on what they are currently working on.

I remember one alpha I was in, the only place I could go was one racial area of these very short people and that was it. Should I have been running around saying this game sucks as it has no humans,elves or other races like they promised. Nope I tested what existed and understood that they game was in alpha and had a long ways to go.

That being said, I find it hard to understand why so many people seem to think everything should be in this game and working perfectly and its only in pre-alpha .

achesoma · December 2019

Wizardry said:

I appreciate the link and their efforts to release this but sadly i am not watching Cohh and his pay to stream offerings.

FYI, this link is NOT a Cohh stream. It's just the developers playing and answering some questions. Not that I have anything against Cohh, but this is a better, more organic showing of gameplay imo.

killahh · January 2020

there comes a time when the devs should just say f it and release the game, and continure working on it.
Thats how the great games did it, imho, if pantheron doesnt release this year, its not going to release, at all.

BazgrimTV · January 2020

killahh said:

there comes a time when the devs should just say f it and release the game, and continure working on it.
Thats how the great games did it, imho, if pantheron doesnt release this year, its not going to release, at all.

What great games have done this? This runs a huge risk of an unfinished, unpolished product being spread around the internet so people can complain about how buggy it is and how it lacks enough content to keep people interested. There is simply no logic to the statement "if pantheon doesn't release this year, its not going to release at all."

Sovrath · January 2020

achesoma said:

Wizardry said:

I appreciate the link and their efforts to release this but sadly i am not watching Cohh and his pay to stream offerings.

FYI, this link is NOT a Cohh stream. It's just the developers playing and answering some questions. Not that I have anything against Cohh, but this is a better, more organic showing of gameplay imo.

He usually just assumes and goes on a tirade.

nicosima · January 2020

Not that I have anything against Cohh, but this is a better.

delete5230 · January 2020

BazgrimTV said:

killahh said:

there comes a time when the devs should just say f it and release the game, and continure working on it.
Thats how the great games did it, imho, if pantheron doesnt release this year, its not going to release, at all.

What great games have done this? This runs a huge risk of an unfinished, unpolished product being spread around the internet so people can complain about how buggy it is and how it lacks enough content to keep people interested. There is simply no logic to the statement "if pantheon doesn't release this year, its not going to release at all."

People seem to say funny things when they know something is wrong. Most can't deeply comprehend the deep true problems and "blurt out statements" such as this.

Because he "blurted out a silly statement" and people are calling him on it, doesn't stop the fact that he is frustrated....... More people will become more and more frustrated because of the way Visionary Realms are handling their project.

Six years in development and the project looks weak !!!!

A hype newsletter can only carry so much hype until people start questioning it.

It will only get worst unless Visionary realms shows prof of life instead of BASIC TESTING. This is the true fact of where Pantheon stands !

lahnmir · January 2020

delete5230 said:

BazgrimTV said:

killahh said:

there comes a time when the devs should just say f it and release the game, and continure working on it.
Thats how the great games did it, imho, if pantheron doesnt release this year, its not going to release, at all.

What great games have done this? This runs a huge risk of an unfinished, unpolished product being spread around the internet so people can complain about how buggy it is and how it lacks enough content to keep people interested. There is simply no logic to the statement "if pantheon doesn't release this year, its not going to release at all."

People seem to say funny things when they know something is wrong. Most can't deeply comprehend the deep true problems and "blurt out statements" such as this.

Because he "blurted out a silly statement" and people are calling him on it, doesn't stop the fact that he is frustrated....... More people will become more and more frustrated because of the way Visionary Realms are handling their project.

Six years in development and the project looks weak !!!!

A hype newsletter can only carry so much hype until people start questioning it.

It will only get worst unless Visionary realms shows prof of life instead of BASIC TESTING. This is the true fact of where Pantheon stands !

100% agree. I wish the article had a video, three would be even better. And it would be great if these video’s not just had people talking or artwork but actual characters rendered, a flythrough of some ingame zones perhaps or maybe some actual gameplay. Or maybe some UI development, game mechanics explained or improved animation shown ingame, anything!

Ahh well, too bad.

/Cheers,
Lahnmir

Xarko · January 2020

Let me point out the fact someone just said 100% agree to delete5230' post.

delete5230 · January 2020

Xarko said:

Let me point out the fact someone just said 100% agree to delete5230' post.

Can't help your naive..... Go on and brush off the huge amount of procrastination in building a game. That's if its even started ?

How about some prof, something. anything !

ManifestFX · January 2020

I absolutely loved EverQuest... that being said I do not know if I can back this game. Brad was a great inspiration for me and every game he touched I fell in love with, except for Vanguard. I do not like how they are adding similar mechanics that made certain classes obsolete once the players power curve improved.

An example is how Enchanters were so easy to bot because of their spells became so resistant that they ended up being useless in 95% of raids. Once you applied Haste, clarity/GOM/KEI, and Tash you were pretty much done. Eventually as an Enchanter you would be able to charm a mob to assist with a fight then that would be nerfed AKA the Avatar encounter.

Reading the forums of Pantheon which I feel is terrible you have to donate to post the class seems to be going down that road. Top that with their weekly videos not keeping up with their own schedule, I feel the game is becoming vaporware. The whole process is mimicking how Vanguard was pushed out.

Bard and Enchanter are going to be the only support classes and even with them stating the classes have been finished. There has been no information posted about Bard on their own website. Bards ended up killing the Enchanter class along with KEI lasting for hours. People would just keep an Enchanter to do a small task and sit them back on the bench. No one on the forums are really stating the glaring issue with the class. There is mostly epeen discussions about how they were able to solo this or that, pulling, etc. Nothing to improve the class themselves. Granted it is very early.

It would be the perfect time to release a slower MMO with dungeon crawling, crafting, etc. a true virtual world. WoW and the genre today is to much like ARPG. A lot of WoWs abilities are the same as Diablo's and vice a versa. Mythic+ is to similar to rifts. The constant re-itemization and items becoming worthless by the next patch or expansion is disheartening and feels like a waste of time. Quiet a few of EQ items would last a few expansions. I never have liked when a game would remove/nerf an item aka Manastone, Tinkerers Mask from waking the Sleeper, Avatar weapons, etc. It takes away another reason to do old content.

Anywho, I like the idea of a MMO like EQ. They should really address the issues that killed EQ. Multiboxing, time-vs-reward, graphics, AA system, etc. Refine those and push a great MMO. Becareful with the abilities given to each class. Make sure you are not constantly hitting classes with a nerf bat or they become so worthless you only need to bring one or two with you for a raid. Destroy this whole idea of meta. We need more information and should not have to donate to voice an opinion that to me is crazy. I wrote a book and I am sorry about that. This is the first time I have ever been vocal on MMORPG. I have came here for years attempting to chase the dragon of my first MMO EQ. SWG is the only one that even came close to that feeling.

TwoTubes · January 2020

Manifest, you didn't play EQ during its prime. What you are describing is when it had degraded into something that can barely be described as the same game.

Utinni · January 2020

TwoTubes said:

Manifest, you didn't play EQ during its prime. What you are describing is when it had degraded into something that can barely be described as the same game.

I think he played on a TLP server or something and thinks thats how EQ has always been. He also doesn't seem to think that druids and shamans are support classes. All the reasons he lists for EQ dying are TLP talking points too. People don't want to accept that EQ lost subscribers because new games came out. SOE even made another competing MMO in EQ2.

lahnmir · January 2020

delete5230 said:

Xarko said:

Let me point out the fact someone just said 100% agree to delete5230' post.

Can't help your naive..... Go on and brush off the huge amount of procrastination in building a game. That's if its even started ?

How about some prof, something. anything !

You do realise that everything I mention in my post is actually shown in the three accompanying video’s right?

/Cheers,
Lahnmir

Hawkaya399 · January 2020

My concern with Pantheon is it stretch itself too thin on too many goals. It runs the risk, like so many early development MMORPGs, of losing its way and running out of steam. The best way to make money sometimes is have something people can play and then build on it with expansions--so start small and judicious. But that can't always be the case, and especially with Pantheon, the goals were ambitious. Brad spirited this at the start, and he's not known to make small MMO's.

I think there's a lot to be optimistic about. I think a lot of people are selling this game short, submitting themselves lazily to their doubts and worst fears. I think when Brad said the game could be released now with some limited success he meant it. He said it had two to three weeks of content. Personally, I think he was being cautious when he said those things. I think there's been enough information and videos produced so that everybody should know Pantheon is not vaporware--not yet. It's understandable why skepticism is present, since most MMORPGs in early phases never reach release. People have a right to be skeptical.

Don't be like this guy Pantheon, don't let it linger--don't lose your way:

HINT: The scene doesn't end well. It's on youtube.

Howdy, Stranger!

Pantheon Shares Year End Producer's Letter

Comments

Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV

Howdy, Stranger!

Quick Links

Pantheon Shares Year End Producer's Letter

Comments

Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV