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Ligi
Eager Tradesman
Joined: 27 Aug 2003
Posts: 39
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| Devs, dont follow bad examples |
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SWG could be a lesson to other MMRPGs Devs, it could show that balance, deep content and sense of accomplishment are a must on every game of this genre - SWG doesn’t have any of these ingredients.
But it isn’t a lesson. Why? Because the name is enough to attract lots of new gamers to this genre (already have more then 300000 subscribers) and those new players cant really compare it with other MMRPGs because this is the first time they play one.
For the first weeks SWG can be very fun to play but after awhile the sense of emptiness is there.
After playing SWG for some time the only positive thing I can say about it is the crafting system.
On the next 12 months there will be a boom of MMRPGs, I just hope that none of the upcoming games will follow SWG example.Dont get fooled by their subscription numbers, every upcoming MMRPG should be much better in every way.
For more detais check this last Gamespy article: http://www.gamespy.com/articles/october03/galaxies2/index2.shtml |
Mon Oct 13, 2003 11:42 am |
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Ammon777
Warrior for Heaven
Joined: 20 Apr 2002
Posts: 2011
Location: United States |
I agree completely. |
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Mon Oct 13, 2003 8:44 pm |
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Kiff
Protector of the Realm
Joined: 27 Oct 2002
Posts: 257
Location: Indiana |
That article at GameSpy that is in your link says it correctly. And we, on this forum, have said it many-a-time. MMO's need time, SWG hasn't been out that long and alot of ppl are saying it has potential. I've heard it spat out quite a few times to newbies to this forum that they should start on an already established MMO. It's a shame that many new ppl are coming to the genre due to the title of SWG, but landing in an empty game. Hopefully they'll stick around for a year, and by that time hopefully SWG will be a complete game, too bad they will have already paid $200 in montly fees by that time. I won't play SWG, it's not my type, but I wish it good luck, and please don't kill our genre. |
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Tue Oct 14, 2003 12:29 pm |
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MoonDragon
High Emperor
Joined: 25 May 2002
Posts: 1254
Location: Waterloo, Canada |
The problem is that new MMOGs don't have time. These days, the first three months is a make or break time for them. If they don't impress... they are gonners.
The whole thing about letting people into betas is even worse. Betas are used as a marketing tool these days, instead of a testing period to improve the game. The problem with that is that most hard core fans are getting fed up with playing a buggy game. They get their urges out of their system by playing for free for a year, and then quit playing once the game doesn't really improve from their beta experience, but they are asked to pay $15/month.
Mark my words... any new kid on the MMORPG block will HAVE TO impress for the first few months. If they intend to be around for any length of time, that is. A few, like EQ2 or WoW, will be able to rack up high subscription numbers off the bat, but 6 months down the road they'll have to be performing.
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Tue Oct 14, 2003 2:46 pm |
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Ekim
Eagle's Shadow
Joined: 27 May 2002
Posts: 2365
Location: Montreal, Canada |
I'm having a little difficulty with this subject. Not so much because of SWG, because I do agree that the game's "honeymoon" phase does kind of taper off after a while (although for me it was not a couple of weeks, but rather a couple of months). The subject is difficult because it doesn't only apply to SWG, but to every mmo out there. Somehow though SWG gets pointed because it's the most obvious target at the moment.
I got bored out of DAoC in about the same time as I did for SWG. Granted, DAoC had a stronger PvP system which made the "end-game" last a little longer after I got bored. But still... the same can be said of all the mmorpgs I've ever played before.
You have to keep in mind that you play an mmorpg for the equivalent of 2, 3 maybe 4 or even 5 single-player game's total worth in time! I think it's absolutely normal that you get bored, whether there is content or not (and no matter what your definition of content reads in your mind). But somehow no one seems to accept that... Even if developers were adding content on a daily basis, you'd still get bored eventually 
Also, as MD already said, betas will kill the early life of many mmo's as time goes by, and as more and more games are made available. Suddenly you'll have thousands of players comparing a beta game with the current mmo they are playing. That's not healthy.
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=Proud Father of a new gamer GIRL!=
=Member of The Nonflamers' Guild=
=Worshiper of the Written Word= |
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Tue Oct 14, 2003 5:17 pm |
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Altre
eep
Joined: 15 Sep 2003
Posts: 22
Location: Portland, Oregon USA |
I think that perhaps people are getting tired of what has become a matter of course with mmorpg's: Being promised far more than you get. A case in point, there's no space is SWG. When a Star Wars game doesn't have space ships....or even vehicles...it just feels all wrong. I'm not knocking it, I do have some idea of what it takes to make a game. Simply, I do believe that people would like it better if the devs were more honest and realistic with the content they will provide. Not say something major, then simply not make it.
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-Editor: Mmorpgdot-
I'm broke due to the fact that I spend all my cash on pens and paper. It's not funny. I need food, and that whole 'place to live' thing is way beyond me. |
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Fri Oct 17, 2003 2:47 am |
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Ammon777
Warrior for Heaven
Joined: 20 Apr 2002
Posts: 2011
Location: United States |
Developers arent the ones to blame for unfinished games. Who is to blame, really? Its the legions of players that buy the game in an unfinished state. But most of all the blame i can muster is directed at the publishers that force developers to release the game in an incomplete state, and these publishers are driven by the players. Now, if the players would be like, "Finish the damn game or im not buying it," then the publishers would be influenced to delay release until the game is ready. But no, thats not what the players do. The players are impatient, wanting to play the game that is full of hype and promise -- the players demand (especially in the case of SWG) that they want the game asap. Thats because most of them are enthusiastic and excited, so its hard to blame them for their lack of patience. But the publishers are obligated to their investors to make a profit, and so they dont care about the game like the developers or fans do. Unfortunately the developers have their hands tied by the publisher, who in turn have their hands tied by the players and the investors, and in turn the players influence the developers and the game itself (usually) a great deal through the community. Its a huge circle, a vicious cycle, so its everyone's fault!
Lucasarts released the SWG game too early from fear of losing players, and in the end, they lost some long-term players because they didnt fulfill their promises or achieve their expectations.
Btw, i know a TON of people that have played DAOC for 2+ years. Same thing with AC and EQ and UO -- they are STILL there. My old guild in AC from 2 years ago is STILL THERE. But it all depends on the person, really. Im kinda like Ekim in that i only played DAOC for a month at most. The longest i have ever played a single MMO is about 3 months (Asherons Call).
I quit DAOC because it took too much time and effort to get to the fun stuff, which is RvR. It took too damn long. I wanted RvR right away. But thats the endgame, and i was stuck at the beginning levels. Thats why i quit DAOC: out of frustration and a good deal of boredom at the monotony. And i think its lame how they use the same models with different names and sizes at different skill levels. I can understand reusing assets, but not to that ridiculous extent. |
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Fri Oct 17, 2003 3:27 am |
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Kiff
Protector of the Realm
Joined: 27 Oct 2002
Posts: 257
Location: Indiana |
quote:
Originally posted by Ammon777
Its a huge circle, a vicious cycle, so its everyone's fault![/i]
Naa. The cycle ends a revolution begins with one. One game developer, one game that does it right. They promise big, they do the work, as long as it takes and come out with a game busting at the seams with content it promised. Who will be that one? Will I be alive to see it? I sure hope so. |
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Fri Oct 17, 2003 2:09 pm |
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Chekote
Where’s my Banana?!?!
Joined: 08 Mar 2002
Posts: 1540
Location: Dont know, looks kind of green |
Just one good game wont break the cycle. Just trip it up for a second.
Everyone needs to change for it to make a difference. Like everything else in the world, the best thing to do is always the hardest.
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IMHO my opinion is humble |
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Fri Oct 17, 2003 2:29 pm |
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Altre
eep
Joined: 15 Sep 2003
Posts: 22
Location: Portland, Oregon USA |
It's more that the developers shouldn't say x feature will be in the game if it realistically can't be done. SWG was already extremely late from it's original release date just to accomplish a level of features far below what was promised. Yes, the publishers push it, but there's an element of practicality missing in blaming it on them and the players. The developers, as a matter of course often bite off more than they can chew, then ask the publishers to delay months, even years. After all of that they still don't do what they said they would. Hype aside, when it's a matter of a very specific, major feature simply not being there even after massive delays... Developers need to be more realistic and honest with what they can and will do. I, as a player, would be happier if that were the case.
_________________
-Editor: Mmorpgdot-
I'm broke due to the fact that I spend all my cash on pens and paper. It's not funny. I need food, and that whole 'place to live' thing is way beyond me. |
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Fri Oct 17, 2003 5:41 pm |
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Ammon777
Warrior for Heaven
Joined: 20 Apr 2002
Posts: 2011
Location: United States |
Our biggest foe is finite time and resources. Fortunately for us players, the projections drawn by the leaders of this budding mmo industry look very promising. However, i think the next BIG MMORPG, the next big everquest, is going to require that multiple teams and more resources are pulled together on the developer fronts, instead of developers just banding into small independent groups for small projects like they are doing currently.
And what is even better is that recent research into artificial intelligence might someday unlock infinite content for games designers. Imagine having a system that creates content non-stop, a program that runs on a super-computer somewhere that could produce believable artistic content,
and i am NOT talking about random number generators. Im talking about taking this computer machine and making it slave over content creation. Human designers could NEVER create enough for players. Players go through content like wildfire. But my friends, the machines could. But the technology isnt here yet. A.I. research is coming along very very slowly -- not fast enough for the public. So i think what will happen soon is that designers are going to just have to hand the worlds over to players so that the players can be the content creators and the designers will just be there to assist and govern over the systems.
By the way, in case none of you have done the research necessary to know this (i did this stuff in college), artificial intelligence is a field of science that has claimed to be on the threshold of something "great" for over 50 years now. They havent come up with much except for a conceptual lingo. Minsky's "Society of Mind" book is the product of more than a billion dollars of U.S. government granted research funding that has taken over 40 years to accomplish. The book doesnt talk about what they have programmable and working. You would think that they would have come up with a whole new computer system with a billion dollars, but no, all that funding has gone into making missiles lock onto their targets; and the only academic products have been purely conceptual and conjecture. The book is solely comprised of concepts used to describe a system that might be similar to what human beings have, that might one day be applied to a computer system through unknown programming algorithms and become conscious: that is the farthest Artificial Intelligence has gotten in the academic world. But you see, they dont even know how to program it yet. The capability isnt there. Nobody knows how to do it, including game developers! LISP as a language for its development is a total complete FAILURE. They are all grasping at straws because they lack the ability to grasp what consciousness really is. Cognitive science, the study of the function of the human brain, is virtually in its infancy. The only things that they know are that it works with the help of biochemicals and energy. They can tell you what region that thought happens in a brain map, but they cant tell you what processes have created or even manipulated the thought.
Computer science is still extremely young. Despite all the endless broken promises coming out of the struggling Artificial Intelligence field, i cant even imagine what MMOs will be like in 25 years into the future. I think we will all be amazed. Middleware will have a great deal to do with game design and creation by then. Maybe players will be making their own games by then with robust game development suites. But i do not believe in any future promises regarding A.I. Its just not going to happen. Perhaps the author of "What Machines Cannot Do" is right. Perhaps machines were never capable of actually thinking.
In the end, it is the players that will determine content in these games. And thus it should be. These are designed to be social games, and so they shall remain. There will always be room for single-player games, but i can imagine that virtual social environments will eventually replace chatrooms and email altogether. Just some thoughts. |
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Fri Oct 17, 2003 11:22 pm |
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Chekote
Where’s my Banana?!?!
Joined: 08 Mar 2002
Posts: 1540
Location: Dont know, looks kind of green |
We will see...
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IMHO my opinion is humble |
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Sat Oct 18, 2003 12:39 am |
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Ammon777
Warrior for Heaven
Joined: 20 Apr 2002
Posts: 2011
Location: United States |
You're right. Anything can happen. As for me, im looking forward a lot to the future of MMOs and computer gaming, i think its gonna be great. |
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Sat Oct 18, 2003 3:56 am |
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hollaholla
Guards Lieutenant
Joined: 19 Aug 2003
Posts: 161
Location: at my computer desk!~ |
quote:
Originally posted by Ammon777
You're right. Anything can happen. As for me, im looking forward a lot to the future of MMOs and computer gaming, i think its gonna be great.
Aside from all that is said here...I can't agree with you more Ammon777 about excitement for what the future holds because looking back on where we were....to where online gaming is now is amazing. I can't even being to think about what it will be like in another 5 to 10 years!!!
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**I just chose a new avatar because I just saw the characters for the new Final Fantasy and got ....excited!!! |
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Mon Oct 20, 2003 8:19 pm |
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Zakhal
Captain of the Guard
Joined: 13 Oct 2002
Posts: 188
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quote:
Originally posted by hollaholla
quote:
Originally posted by Ammon777
You're right. Anything can happen. As for me, im looking forward a lot to the future of MMOs and computer gaming, i think its gonna be great.
Aside from all that is said here...I can't agree with you more Ammon777 about excitement for what the future holds because looking back on where we were....to where online gaming is now is amazing. I can't even being to think about what it will be like in another 5 to 10 years!!!
Well the last 5 years or so have bin very slow. After UO or EQ has there bin anything new? Not really, just more of the old as in ac, ao, daoc, ac2 and swg. Hack'n'slash loot&leveling or bread baking in virtual world where noone needs to eat 15 bucks/month. Expect more of the same in future, just with more glitter to make you accept the new subscription prices $17/month.
The few who tried somthing new failed utterly due to incompetency in development (i.e shadowbane).
Well, ww2ol saw light so it was not totally lost. Maybe in the next 5 years crs manages to finish the game too.. |
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Mon Oct 20, 2003 8:45 pm |
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