Vanguard is a "nitch" game?

WuduLarch · May 2006

I have read in the V:SoH forums and here that Vanguard will be a "nitch" game. Nitch games can be some of the best games but has there been any estimate as to how many players Sigil is expecting or projecting?

_Shadowmage · May 2006

Well Vanguard seems to be a very Everquest like game.

So that means it should appeal to the people playing EQ and EQ2 so thats what 4 or 5 hundred thousand people.

So whilst it may be niche theres a lot more people playing this type of game than other niche games like Eve.

So as a guess 400,000 to a million seems like a good target to start with.

But hey until its out and people are playing your guess is as good as mine.

beautyisin · May 2006

Niche

, i don't think it is a niche game, it has huge market appeal.

Shayde · May 2006

If it gets more than 200k subscribers I'd be stunned.

Morneblade · May 2006

Originally posted by Shayde
If it gets more than 200k subscribers I'd be stunned.

I agree, I'm thinking more like 100k. Alot of the people that played EQ originally (when it was big) hated EQ. I new alot of people that stayed because "I have too much invested" or "there is nothing else to play". Also, people didn't have much of a clue with what is good and bad in a MMO, since there wasn't anything much to compare too. Now there are MMO's everywhere. People can shop around. I think alot of Vanguards ideas are kinda archaic, MMO-wise and it's going to keep most players away. People that actually enjoyed old EQ, and actualy have that kind of time to throw at it will msot likely love that game, if it has a stable release. But like hardcore PvPers, I think they hugely overestimate their numbers. Through out that fact they lost alot of people with the whole SoE thing and bad reports from beta, Nothing really mainstream here. It might sell a fair amount of boxes initially but I don't think people trying their ideas for the first time (Blizzard fanbois brought to MMO's by WoW) are going to like it at all and will cancel quickly.

Gearhardt · May 2006

When the game's released, and people actually *like* it, you'll play it yourself and hopefully feel like a dumbass for bashing it in the first place.

Good day, sir.

Shayde · May 2006

Originally posted by Gearhardt
When the game's released, and people actually *like* it, you'll play it yourself and hopefully feel like a dumbass for bashing it in the first place.

Good day, sir.

You, sir, are hilarious!

Rayx0r · May 2006

Originally posted by Shayde
If it gets more than 200k subscribers I'd be stunned.

I'll put a substantial bet on this.

anyone who has a station all access pass would be included in this figure, along with individual subscribers

that figure of 200k subscribers is pretty much a joke.

why the hell are you guys taking the success or failure of a friggin MMO so personal anyway? neither is going to get you laid or put your kids through college.. in fact.. caring about this matter as much as you do will have the opposite effect.

..look outside the window? wow.. its a world!

Vengeful · May 2006

Originally posted by Rayx0r

Originally posted by Shayde
If it gets more than 200k subscribers I'd be stunned.

I'll put a substantial bet on this.

anyone who has a station all access pass would be included in this figure, along with individual subscribers

that figure of 200k subscribers is pretty much a joke.

why the hell are you guys taking the success or failure of a friggin MMO so personal anyway? neither is going to get you laid or put your kids through college.. in fact.. caring about this matter as much as you do will have the opposite effect.

..look outside the window? wow.. its a world!

pwned

Shayde · May 2006

Originally posted by Rayx0r

Originally posted by Shayde
If it gets more than 200k subscribers I'd be stunned.

I'll put a substantial bet on this.

anyone who has a station all access pass would be included in this figure, along with individual subscribers

that figure of 200k subscribers is pretty much a joke.

why the hell are you guys taking the success or failure of a friggin MMO so personal anyway? neither is going to get you laid or put your kids through college.. in fact.. caring about this matter as much as you do will have the opposite effect.

..look outside the window? wow.. its a world!

Simmer down sparky.

The launch of an MMO will be counted by BOX SALES, not the falsely-inflated Station Pass numbers. They'll have hard numbers on boxes sold.

But sure... go ahead and throw in personal attacks to "win" the debate. To follow your lead, you are a doodyhead.

Fade · May 2006

why must we start doing the personal bashing? grow up guys.

im rather surprised at the amount of large scale mmos coming out (by largescale i mean games of the caliber of WoW, EQ, FFIX as opposed to small scale games like runescape). in the past games like EQ would knock out other MMOs developed by unknown companies. Now we have several games taking aim at the mainstream market.
i hope the market doesn't get saturated because until other games, on average cosumers will only play 1 - 2 mmos at a time. imo vanguard will take the older crowd of mmo gamers while games like huxley and tabula rasa will take the younger generation of mmo gamers.

Rayx0r · May 2006

Originally posted by Shayde

Originally posted by Rayx0r

Originally posted by Shayde
If it gets more than 200k subscribers I'd be stunned.

I'll put a substantial bet on this.

anyone who has a station all access pass would be included in this figure, along with individual subscribers

that figure of 200k subscribers is pretty much a joke.

why the hell are you guys taking the success or failure of a friggin MMO so personal anyway? neither is going to get you laid or put your kids through college.. in fact.. caring about this matter as much as you do will have the opposite effect.

..look outside the window? wow.. its a world!

Simmer down sparky.

The launch of an MMO will be counted by BOX SALES, not the falsely-inflated Station Pass numbers. They'll have hard numbers on boxes sold.

But sure... go ahead and throw in personal attacks to "win" the debate. To follow your lead, you are a doodyhead.

dude..that burns..

Neurox1 · May 2006

after having read in depth reviews of the game ... id say it is a rehash of everyquest ... with updated graphics ... a crafting system that encompases more items, including boats ...

but all in all it seems the game is kind of picking off where everyquest left off ... and is offering MORE .. but not necessarily anything new ...

so those hardcore everquest purists will find a home in this game i believe .. and in that i DO think of it as a nitch game ..

_Shadowmage · May 2006

I agree with you that its a niche game that wont appeal to the mainstream. Still I think potentially its got a pretty big niche.

And you can hvae the best game around (EVE often gets this award) and still be a pretty small niche.

Honestly I dont think its the kind of game I will enjoy so I expect I will be playing Hero's Journey and Tabula Rasa. But to each their own.

And I think any successful game that draws in new players is great for the market as a whole as those players will eventually move onto other games increasing the market size and profit potential for companies so that more games will be developed.

Anofalye · May 2006

Dear Shayde,

I agree with you, however I would really recommend that you just let's it die as is.

I recognize names of folks who 'raid' and embody the 'worst' aspect I see in raiding, which mean they wait, they never organised anything, they believe in DKP, they don't care if the raid work or not, they bitch and improve guild drama, they trash guild officers who selfishellesly devoted themselves to the guild, they show up and expect automatically rewards, they guild hoop, they join guilds who willingly shaft the whole servers in the hope of getting phat loot, all guilds they join decline, even the most hardcores Uber Guild suffer from their presence and decline, even guilds who achieve server first show off decline after they join...finally they trash non-raiders.

Discussing with those folks is less interesting then talking with a wall, they are exactly the folks Brad is aiming his game at, dunno if he realize that himself however.

In 2 years, Brad will be claiming Vanguard is a Niche game and folks at EvE will tell him to STFU because he is FAR from having enough peoples to call it Niche.

Vengeful · May 2006

Originally posted by Anofalye

Dear Shayde,

I agree with you, however I would really recommend that you just let's it die as is.

I recognize names of folks who 'raid' and embody the 'worst' aspect I see in raiding, which mean they wait, they never organised anything, they believe in DKP, they don't care if the raid work or not, they bitch and improve guild drama, they trash guild officers who selfishellesly devoted themselves to the guild, they show up and expect automatically rewards, they guild hoop, they join guilds who willingly shaft the whole servers in the hope of getting phat loot, all guilds they join decline, even the most hardcores Uber Guild suffer from their presence and decline, even guilds who achieve server first show off decline after they join...finally they trash non-raiders.

Discussing with those folks is less interesting then talking with a wall, they are exactly the folks Brad is aiming his game at, dunno if he realize that himself however.

In 2 years, Brad will be claiming Vanguard is a Niche game and folks at EvE will tell him to STFU because he is FAR from having enough peoples to call it Niche.

Here you go---

Vanguard is targeting the 'core' gamer. It will have three types of content: casual, group, and raid. Casual and raid will be the minority, with most content group oriented.

I know some people accuse EQ of being too raid oriented. I would say Vanguard will be less so. But we also think raiding is very important and fun. Our goal from the beginning was to create a world that would support core gamers, as well as more casual or people with less time, as well as those crazy raiders you refer to

Aside from that, well, Vanguard is a new game with a lot of new features and a whole new world to explore. I don't think we'll have any problem enticing hard core raiders to migrate over.

Source: Aradune Mithara

The plan is to have the majority of content be for groups, with the minority for solo/casuals and raids. Lots of game mechanics in or planned to make sure this works and to let us make group dungeons, even at higher levels, appealing and rewarding. Easier said than done, but we gotta do it.

Source: Aradune Mithara

Morneblade · May 2006

Originally posted by Shayde

Originally posted by Rayx0r

Originally posted by Shayde
If it gets more than 200k subscribers I'd be stunned.

I'll put a substantial bet on this.

anyone who has a station all access pass would be included in this figure, along with individual subscribers

that figure of 200k subscribers is pretty much a joke.

why the hell are you guys taking the success or failure of a friggin MMO so personal anyway? neither is going to get you laid or put your kids through college.. in fact.. caring about this matter as much as you do will have the opposite effect.

..look outside the window? wow.. its a world!

Simmer down sparky.

The launch of an MMO will be counted by BOX SALES, not the falsely-inflated Station Pass numbers. They'll have hard numbers on boxes sold.

But sure... go ahead and throw in personal attacks to "win" the debate. To follow your lead, you are a doodyhead.

beautyisin · May 2006

Anyone who thinks this is a niche game needs to go and look the word up.

Kem0sabe · May 2006

Well, take the beta for example, thousands were invited to play it, and only a couple of dozen still remain beta testing it.

I find it funny when i here people claim that vanguard will have at least 400k or even some claiming it can chalenge any of the other "big" mmorpg´s out there, when they clearly have problems just maintaining their beta testers.

It got to the point where sigil has sent a survey to all their beta testers asking what was wrong with the beta and why werent they playing. Wich only goes to show that the ammount of actual feedback they were geting from the small number of testers was insignificant and very lacking.

Finaly, i just want to add, Sigil is planning on relasing the game with 3 continents full of content... the game has been in development for several years... and they only have one continent to show us, wich is about 10% populated with content and the content that does exist is severely lacking any form of apeal or cohesiveness in terms of lore or gameplay.

n2sooners · May 2006

Originally posted by Shayde
If it gets more than 200k subscribers I'd be stunned.

You won't be stunned. It could sell 500,000 boxes in the first week and you will still be on here telling everyone how much it will suck and what a big failure it will be. Big sales numbers won't stun you for a second.

n2sooners · May 2006

Still spouting the same old BS I see.

joshl68 · May 2006

Originally posted by Kem0sabe
Well, take the beta for example, thousands were invited to play it, and only a couple of dozen still remain beta testing it.

I find it funny when i here people claim that vanguard will have at least 400k or even some claiming it can chalenge any of the other "big" mmorpg´s out there, when they clearly have problems just maintaining their beta testers.

It got to the point where sigil has sent a survey to all their beta testers asking what was wrong with the beta and why werent they playing. Wich only goes to show that the ammount of actual feedback they were geting from the small number of testers was insignificant and very lacking.

Finaly, i just want to add, Sigil is planning on relasing the game with 3 continents full of content... the game has been in development for several years... and they only have one continent to show us, wich is about 10% populated with content and the content that does exist is severely lacking any form of apeal or cohesiveness in terms of lore or gameplay.

if this was true then wouldn't they be inviting more? the fact it isn't stop making up things.

Kem0sabe · May 2006

posting Beta information and the simple fact that you say you are in Beta is a serious violation against Vanguard's EULA.

Failure to stop WILL result in your IP being sent to Vanguard and your beta account being revoked.

Enigma

anarchyart · May 2006

Originally posted by Shayde

Originally posted by Gearhardt
When the game's released, and people actually *like* it, you'll play it yourself and hopefully feel like a dumbass for bashing it in the first place.

Good day, sir.

You, sir, are hilarious!

Ahh so that's what you say when you get pwned! SOE's publishing the game so now you're trolling the Vanguard forums too eh Shayde? Wel,l make yourself at home, the beanbag chairs mine.

Nick316514 · May 2006

It is my belief that most of the gaming population does not know what makes a good game. Most of the gaming population interested in mmorpg's has only played World of Warcraft, so anything that deviates from WoW's formula of success can't be good to them.

Eight years ago, Vanguard's "nitch" was exactly what a traditional mmorpg really was. Unfortunately, WoW's popularity has made it the standard in online gaming for many people. So looking at it today, Vanguard is less of a "nitch" and more of a step back to an older generalization.

Looking at it rationally, Vangaurd is not a nitch at all. Vanguard's three playing spheres make it a fairly broad game that is being made to appeal to all sorts of players. It is only being labelled a nitch because only a small fraction of WoW's playerbase can relate to its playstyle; most of them have never experienced anything like it.

I personally believe that this step back to a more traditional playstyle is going to be very positive for the mmorpg community. I hope that the success of Vanguard erases all of the negative changes WoW has made to the corporate view on mmorpgs.

Vyava · May 2006

Every game is a niche game. If they weren't then there would only be one game...most likely Pong

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