Belkiolle posted:
The biggest problem with all the "analysis" about why games hold people is that everyone is using WoW as the barometer. WoW has so many factors (polish, tons of money to throw at it, years of lore and a loyal established game following, etc) as to why it has 7.5 million, 10 million, 15 million or whatever number Blizzard is spitting out this week subscribers that you can't use it as a comparison. WoW is a freak event and an anomaly. There have been dozens of games come out since WoW went live that copied WoW trying to steal some of it's success. They've all failed and some of them have failed horribly.
WoW isn't my kind of game but I won't say it's a bad game. It's got great polish and if you're interested in the Warcraft lore and storyline it's a great game.
As far as normal MMOs go you have to admit that DAOC was a huge success. Other than WoW, MMOs have always been a niche in the gaming market and a game having 250k subs like DAOC was and still is outstanding. Even getting 250k subs in today's market would be considered a run away success. Somewhere along the way Mythic lost their understanding of why their game was great but at what point that happened is going to vary depending on who you talk to on any given day. Implementation was part of that loss of reference point as well. Mythic has done a good job, in a very vague sense, of giving the player base what they wanted at any given time. Implementation has always been the issue. ToA was made when the player base asked for more epic PvE. New Frontiers was made when people asked for a different RvR experience. I don't think Mythic has ignored the player base so much as they've misunderstood or been unable to execute what they came up with to fulfill the players' wishes.
DAoC was an initial success, but it is not a huge success.
Yes you can use WoW as a barometer and you can use WoW as a comparison. WoW shows how important “Polish†is. WoW shows us how important it is for a game company to offer many 'player friendly' features. WoW shows how important it is for a game to cater to the PvE centric player, to cater to the player that solos a lot (because almost all MMO players solo from time to time). WoW shows how huge the MMO market really is. WoW shows us that even when a shiny new game launches, if players are happy where they are the player may check out the new game but they do not cancel and leave the game they are happy with.
WoW shows us a huge amount, unfortunately most MMO makers are too arrogant, too myopic, too etc . . . to learn or understand.
WoW is not a freak. The reason most other games have not been able to tap into the WoW market is that (to put it bluntly) most of the game makers are to stupid to understand the typical MMO gamer.
Bellville posted:
Mythic has done a good job, in a very vague sense, of giving the player base what they wanted at any given time. Implementation has always been the issue. ToA was made when the player base asked for more epic PvE.
To say that Mythic did “a good job of giving the player base what they wanted†takes a huge amount of spin and/or very heavily tinted rose colored glasses.
Mythic has done a horrible job. While Mythic has had some brilliant people that created brilliant things, over all Mythic has done a horrible job of coordinating things and of giving players what they want.
Just because some player, somewhere, on some board, happened to create a post that mentioned some possible change suggestion for DAoC, and then later that change showed up in the game, that does not mean Mythic even knew any player asked for that change.
If we look at the responses to the TL reports, Mythic could not care less about what players want or what players ask for.
Look at how Sanya said that department heads would not even read the TL suggestions/reports unless the department heads were forced (Sanya once said that the delay in getting responses to TL reports was because she had to go and read the reports to the departments because otherwise the reports would never get read and it took a long time for her to go around reading the reports out loud over and over.)
Look at stacking pots that players begged for years to get into the game. Players begged and begged and begged, etc. . . and Mythic said it could not be coded. Then GAO coded barrels into the game. If GAO had not coded barrels into the game chances are there would be no stacking pots in DAoC.
There are many, many, many examples of Mythic not caring about what players asked for.
To look at how often Mythic totally ignored, totally patronized, totally turned their back to the customer and then to rationalize that Mythic listened because some suggestion that was posted on some board some where may/possibly/could have been the impetus behind a change to the game, it is ludicrous to jump from that to "Mythic gave players what players asked for".
There are/were hundreds of thousands of suggestions posted on hundreds of boards over the years. The only reason, in most cases, that a suggestion happened to actually get coded into the game is because the suggestion happened to accidentally coincide with what Mythic was already intending to do and Mythic was probably not even aware of the player’s suggestion.
To conclude that because some players asked for more PvE that TOA was the result of player suggestions, that is silly. Players that tested TOA warned, and warned, screamed, yelled, etc. . . that TOA was a mistake and testers told Mythic that TOA would cause terrible harm, Mythic did not listen at all.
The only time Mythic started to pay any attention to the players, is when the exodus started and even then Mythic only listened to that which agreed with Mythic’s preconceived ideas. Even after the exodus, Mythic only played lip service to listening, slapping band-aids on problems instead of fixing problems.
Belkiolle posted:
New Frontiers was made when people asked for a different RvR experience.
This is just silly. I am sorry. So sorry. I have been trying to tone down my rants and my abuse of those who post but . . . ..
Players in no way asked that the frontiers be thrown out. Players never said, “we want everything in the frontiers to be eliminated and we want a brand new game, we want new zones, we want long, long, long, long boring boat rides, etc. . . .
It never happened. Never in this reality did it happen.
Players asked for adjustments and modifications to the frontiers. Players asked that some of the problems and challenges in the frontiers be looked at. That’s all.
Even if some post on some thread on some board had some wacko suggestion, if Mythic did happen to read it and use that wacko suggestion as the basis of some game damaging change, it is not as if the player forced Mythic to suddenly become psychotic. All of Mythic’s psychotic/schizophrenic actions are all on Mythic.
Belkiolle posted:
Even getting 250k subs in today's market would be considered a run away success.
Not even close.
WAR had 800k boxes initially sold and because of the exodus from that game it may take another 5-8 years to recoup the $100 million that WAR cost to make. If WAR’s subscription numbers keep declining WAR may never completely recupe its total cost (huge amounts are still being spent on additions to WAR).
Belkiolle posted:
Somewhere along the way Mythic lost their understanding of why their game was great but at what point that happened is going to vary depending on who you talk to on any given day.
The magic of the initial game design may have been completely accidental. After the initial launch, the more time that went by, the more mistakes Mythic made. Mythic was never able to run vary far with the ball they had which indicates that, from the very beginning, Mythic never really understood the market (and one thing WoW shows us is just how huge the market really is).
Belkiolle posted:
It's got great polish and if you're interested in the Warcraft lore and storyline it's a great game.
I am not into WoW lore but I do like WoW. Play it all the time and I know very little about the lore of it all.
I like DAoC much better than WoW and have found that the lore DAoC is built on is extensive. Some of the areas/zones of DAoC are actually fashioned around actual IRL islands/countries/regions. Many characters/classes come from Norse/British/Irish/Scandinavian Mythology.
Even though I like DAoC more than I like WoW, after I finish playing a bit of DAoC I am almost always pissed off at Mythic. After I finish playing a bit of WoW, I am almost never annoyed/angry/miffed in anyway (it was just a fun experience).
Every time I have canceled my DAoC account it is not because the fun was gone, it was because I was tired of being angry all the time (angry with Mythic’s stupidity, lies, promoting bots, eclectic additions to the game, etc . . .)
Belkiolle posted:
WAR is a perfect example but it's a perfect example of what not to do. To stand out and keep people playing you'll have to give them something new and different. Recycling WoW is just beating your head against the wall because the best version available is already out there.
WAR did not fail because it was recycled WoW. WAR failed because MJ did not understand the typical MMO player.
WAR was/is PvP centric when the typical MMO player is PvE centric and WAR funneled players when most MMO players like to be somewhat independent when they explore. WAR had many other problems but WAR did not fail because WAR tried to recycle WoW. WAR failed because MJ’s lack of understanding of the typical MMO player and because of MJ’s inflated concept of just how big the PVP centric market is.
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The art of war is simple enough. Find out where your enemy is.
Get at him as soon as you can. Strike him as hard as you can,
and keep moving. - Ulysses S. Grant
Only the dead have seen the end of war - Plato
