I'm sure they will sell as many copies as possible, but you can bet at launch they will do their best not to open extra servers just to see them get merged or emptied later on.
The sheer numbers of players trying to get in on launch day is going to be ridiculous and I imagine wait times and lots of instancing of the beginner worlds until the players start to spread out through the game levels.
Did you not see what happened to FF XIV on open beta day? They couldn't handle the numbers of people trying to get in the game. And the same thing would happen with TOR.
If you can't make a decision on whther or not you want to play this game by now, then an open beta isn't going to cut it for you anyways. It will be a typical MMORPG with Bioware's flare and the Star Wars IP.
The same thing will happen regardless so what's the difference, none really. Servers will be bouncing like pole dancers and starting zones will be a nightmare.
I simply don't buy into any hype anymore and judging by all the comments here there is no objectivity when it comes to starwars fans. I understand you like it and most likely would play it if it is a turd dressed in a chewbacca costume.
I for one do pick my games and where my money goes more carefully.
Ok, i will throw my curve ball at ya. So if GW2 , AA or any other new game coming out doesn't have a open beta, what are you gonna do then. This game and the way Bioware is gonna release without a open beta may start a new trend especially if those games are very popular.
I'm sure many studios would love to have DA2 as the game people judge them on.
Seriously. If a mediocre rush job like DA 2 is your worst game, that speaks volumes of how good you are when you put the time and effort into a product.
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums: Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
Smart move. Millions people are a waste of time. 50k closed beta would be enuff to get a good metric.Of course launch day is going to be chaos but it always is for new AAA games of this caliber.
Biggest issue with open beta is unrealistic stress test. When everyone and their mom will grab a key and try to log into the game, people who will never buy it will still try it. So now you got numbers that are probably 3 to 4 times of what you will see at game launch all hammering your beta servers. For those of you how don't work in IT, your beta servers are almost crap compared to what you will have in production. So you will see a lot of problems that simply will not be there if it was running on a real hardware.
Next. People will try to log in, it will be laggy due to the fact that you are being hammered by unrealistic numbers. They will try it for 2 - 3 hours and then will run to the forums to bitch about how bad the game is because it lags so bad. Lets be honest statistically how many people actually report bugs in open beta. At this point most of the people have already made their decision. If you love it, you will use every argument to defend the game and if you hate it you will use everything to put it down, open beta will simply give ammo to both sides to fling at each other.
Stress test is a good idea however any developer will tell you that uncontrolled stress is stupid. "Your game breaks when 5m people hammer it with requests!" .... yeah that helps. To a developer that data is almost useless, what is useful is at what number does peformance start to degrade. You can gather that by letting in more and more people into beta thus observing performance under 100k, 500k, 1m, etc. Given that they got over 1m people wanting to be in beta they can emulate what they will see on the release day very well w/o open beta.
I have worked for game dev companies when open betas came out. From developers perspective, it is hell. It takes away our attention from real issues and force is try to figure out why beta login server has problems authenticating certain trial accounts.
Must be some very good reason, although i can only think of one. It's not as polished/finished as they make us beleive.
I agree indeed
Trion had a solid game and launched Rift with an open beta, and it has been a success in terms of box sale (pity about the longevity though)
If someone has a good product has nothing to fear from an open beta which in fact become a great marketing tool.
I doubt it's because they have anything to fear. I'm inclined to believe the reason they already gave for no open beta, they don't need one. They have a million and a half people signed up for testing, that's a more than sufficient pool to grab numbers from to stress out the servers.
Over the past few years some games have used open betas to promote their games and this seems to have become the meaning fo the term for many. It's not. TOR has no need to do this considering the hype surrounding it, they don't require it to get the numbers for stress testing and they certainly have no obligation to let people taste the pie before buying it.
Bioware has always said they would probably not do the traditional "Closed/Open Beta" routine. Not a surprise. Bioware has been letting select individuals in to do testing for some time.....just not letting everyone in. Being one that has done a lot of Closed and Open Beta on MMO's, I am a little burnt out anyway. I think on just one MMO that I am interested in I would like to start it at launch and be surprised and amazed like everyone else rather then be in the "ho-hum, another launch day but I already am past that".
Ok, I'm a bit confused. I was under the assumption that they were doing closed beta testing for quite some time now
He talked about 'closed beta' as a stress test thing, isn't that what open beta usually is?
They can still stress test in a closed beta. All they have to do is invite more of those 1 million people that have already signed up to test the game.
In theory, open betas are supposed to be stress tests for the servers, etc. In reality, they turn into extended free trials filled with people who don't actually test anything or give any feedback. They just play a game for free and then move on to the next one. Why waste money and manpower on that when you can do stress tests on your terms with people who have already signed up to play and who aren't just looking for a free ride?
if there was going to be any kind of beta, then it would have been before now, at least with projected release date for november/december.. as for the rest.. who knows.. tbh, after dragon age II... all bets are off..
There IS a beta. People are beta testing the game now. It's just not going to be open to everyone before the game goes live.
Also, from what I've seen of TOR, the reason DA 2 was mediocre is because they were focused as a company on ME 3 and TOR. DA 2 was an obvious rush job. TOR more than makes up for it, IMO. It's honestly a great game. I think people will like it, especially if they like both Mass Effect and KOTOR.
while i am waiting for ME3 .. Kotor was nowhere near in the same class as ME1, or even ME2.. i still don't see what people liked so much about Kotor.. personal preferences i guess, personnally i found it to be mediocre at best .. so i really hope the reason why DA2 was so bad, is because their focused on ME3 etc.. its the only game i am really waiting on from Bioware.. so far at least..
k, i will throw my curve ball at ya. So if GW2 , AA or any other new game coming out doesn't have a open beta, what are you gonna do then. This game and the way Bioware is gonna release without a open beta may start a new trend especially if those games are very popular.
I do what i have always done. I wait until there are free trials or the game gets cheaper.
Seriously, if you can't wait 4-6 months for a regular Console/PC game to drop price in half, you deserve to pay $60. And to be honest, MMO's really need 6 month to get into gear anyways.
The last time i payed full price for a game was 15 years ago or more.
I don't have this urge to buy and play a game at release date, in fact, i still have plenty games i can play way before i even need a new game. I can buy 3 games for $60.
"Give players systems and tools instead of rails and rules"
I think they just know that the game isn't going to live up to the hype and an open beta would just help hundreds of thousands of potential consumers realize it's not what they were hoping it'd be. If I'm right, we're talking about a HUGE loss for them, and probably worth catching some flak over.
When I want a single-player story, I'll play a single-player game. When I play an MMO, I want a massively multiplayer world.
Ok, I'm a bit confused. I was under the assumption that they were doing closed beta testing for quite some time now
He talked about 'closed beta' as a stress test thing, isn't that what open beta usually is?
Everything takes place on one server right now in CB so its likely they're just trying to get a large enough number of testers so that they completely max the server and see how much it can handle.
Really they don't need 10 servers to do that... just one optimized to capacity will get them the data they need.
I think they just know that the game isn't going to live up to the hype and an open beta would just help hundreds of thousands of potential consumers realize it's not what they were hoping it'd be. If I'm right, we're talking about a HUGE loss for them, and probably worth catching some flak over.
Even if it ends up the best game on the market there are still going to be tens and maybe hundreds of thousands of people who decide it's not for them anyway. Might as well get the box sales outta them i say.
Ok, I'm a bit confused. I was under the assumption that they were doing closed beta testing for quite some time now
He talked about 'closed beta' as a stress test thing, isn't that what open beta usually is?
for the most part bioware has been trying to stay away from refering to it as closed beta and just refer to it as game testing because they feel "betas" have become more of a marketing thing and not so much for actual testing anymore.
k, i will throw my curve ball at ya. So if GW2 , AA or any other new game coming out doesn't have a open beta, what are you gonna do then. This game and the way Bioware is gonna release without a open beta may start a new trend especially if those games are very popular.
I do what i have always done. I wait until there are free trials or the game gets cheaper.
Seriously, if you can't wait 4-6 months for a regular Console/PC game to drop price in half, you deserve to pay $60. And to be honest, MMO's really need 6 month to get into gear anyways.
The last time i payed full price for a game was 15 years ago or more.
I don't have this urge to buy and play a game at release date, in fact, i still have plenty games i can play way before i even need a new game. I can buy 3 games for $60.
thats pretty much what i did for ME1 and 2.. i think i only paid about £10 for either of them, i think $60 is about £45 which is a lot more than i'd pay anyway.. once the price drops to £20 - £25 then thats a 'reasonable' sort of price.. tbh, for PC's paying more than that is a waste of money...
Hmmm...no open beta could be concerning. A developer offering an earlyish open beta has basically become a signal of confidence in their product. Showing they don't have anything to hide, getting a lot of exposure etc.
On the other hand, EA/BW may just feel that they have nothing to gain from an open beta. If the hype is sufficient enough then they may think that an open beta may cost them more than it could gain them in sales.
So basically I think the two possibilities are:
1. EA/BW has something to hide, and they don't want to offer an open beta because they are afraid is will generate negative word-of-mouth. Of course, if they lower the NDA I think this could assuage this concern.
2. EA/BW just doesn't feel that an open beta will gain them anything. Could be possible, the game already has tons of hype and basically guaranteed buyers. It's not like they need an open beta for more exposure.
Hmmm...no open beta could be concerning. A developer offering an earlyish open beta has basically become a signal of confidence in their product. Showing they don't have anything to hide, getting a lot of exposure etc.
On the other hand, EA/BW may just feel that they have nothing to gain from an open beta. If the hype is sufficient enough then they may think that an open beta may cost them more than it could gain them in sales.
So basically I think the two possibilities are:
1. EA/BW has something to hide, and they don't want to offer an open beta because they are afraid is will generate negative word-of-mouth. Of course, if they lower the NDA I think this could assuage this concern.
2. EA/BW just doesn't feel that an open beta will gain them anything. Could be possible, the game already has tons of hype and basically guaranteed buyers. It's not like they need an open beta for more exposure.
The problem with 1 to me is if they have such big problems to hide, why wouldn't they just give it more time in the oven? To iron out those problems. They've shown no rush to have this game released, if anything they've shown they don't want to set a hard release date because they want the game to be done, at least as done as possible before releasing it.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Hmmm...no open beta could be concerning. A developer offering an earlyish open beta has basically become a signal of confidence in their product. Showing they don't have anything to hide, getting a lot of exposure etc.
If you were EA/BW, would you honestly sink the money into all the additional servers and manpower you would need for an open beta when you think they're just for marketing and not for actually testing anything, or would you just keep things as they are and focus your resources on your game instead?
Think like a developer for a moment. Where would you rather spend the money -- on BETTER testing with a more optimized server in a controlled setting, or on a BIGGER "test period" which wouldn't be anything more than an extended free trial that would divert your resources away from the game itself and towards things like validating promo codes and beta keys?
They've got over a million people signed up and ready to play. Why offer an open beta when they have a ready pool of players for whatever size stress tests they want to plan for and run? And honestly -- does this game need any more hype? Open betas are just for marketing, and SW:TOR already has a ton of that.
I think they just know that the game isn't going to live up to the hype and an open beta would just help hundreds of thousands of potential consumers realize it's not what they were hoping it'd be. If I'm right, we're talking about a HUGE loss for them, and probably worth catching some flak over.
Even if it ends up the best game on the market there are still going to be tens and maybe hundreds of thousands of people who decide it's not for them anyway. Might as well get the box sales outta them i say.
Exactly. One might call it underhanded, maybe even harmful to Bioware, if their reputation gets trashed by enough people feeling they've wasted money, but from a purely financial perspective, a sound decision for EA.
When I want a single-player story, I'll play a single-player game. When I play an MMO, I want a massively multiplayer world.
it was already said at E3. since they have 1mil+ people already signed up for testing(not in testing yet, just signed up), they feel there is no reason to just let in everyone that wants to play or try it out for free, because they have a large enough pool of people right now to select from for any stress testing they need to do.
This seems pretty reasonable. Open betas are usually just a mess and serve little perpuse anymore. Just like previous posters, its a free trail. I am sure they would rather try and pick people who actually want to test the game and report bugs, than most open beta players who just want a free trail. It only can lower there sales, or burn out power players who try and see everything in open beta. For a game that has this much hype, there is no reason for them to deal with an open beta
This pretty much hits it dead on. Open beta's are a joke now, instead of being used for any testing purposes, as they were originally used for, they are used by people as a free trial.
Another thing I want to point out is people keep pointing to Rift or other games that offered OB's. What has been the end result of most of those games? OB didn't tell anyone there would be nothing to do once they reached endgame, OB's don't tell you what's important, that's how an MMO will stack up in longevity, it's as blind a purchae as it is buying a game before trying it at all in the end.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Another thing I want to point out is people keep pointing to Rift or other games that offered OB's. What has been the end result of most of those games? OB didn't tell anyone there would be nothing to do once they reached endgame, OB's don't tell you what's important, that's how an MMO will stack up in longevity, it's as blind a purchae as it is buying a game before trying it at all in the end.
Not really though. People discovered in Rift for instance they did not even enjoy the first 20 levels so why stick around and that was the attitude of many. AoC beta people discovered the first 20 levels were the only good thing at the time about the game. So its not as blind a purchase if they find out the first little bit sucks in their mind and its not worth the purchase. By not having a open beta then odds are they would have sold even more boxes on the front end.
Well that applies to those who didn't like the game-play or style of game, which is not what I'm talking about. There will always be people who don't like a games approach. Whether they tried before they bought or not. That's part of the risk involved in buying any game.
My point is an MMO isn't about what you experience in a few days play, it's about something you want to pay 15 a month to continually play. You bring up AOC, it actually had a lot of hype all the way up to release, once people got past level 20 they were utterly disappointed in what was there, OB told them it would be a different experience than it turned out being.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Ok, I'm a bit confused. I was under the assumption that they were doing closed beta testing for quite some time now
He talked about 'closed beta' as a stress test thing, isn't that what open beta usually is?
for the most part bioware has been trying to stay away from refering to it as closed beta and just refer to it as game testing because they feel "betas" have become more of a marketing thing and not so much for actual testing anymore.
Ok, so, it's focused closed beta testing, but it's still closed beta what people have been busy with for a year now, not alpha testing.
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums: Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
Comments
Ok, i will throw my curve ball at ya. So if GW2 , AA or any other new game coming out doesn't have a open beta, what are you gonna do then. This game and the way Bioware is gonna release without a open beta may start a new trend especially if those games are very popular.
Seriously. If a mediocre rush job like DA 2 is your worst game, that speaks volumes of how good you are when you put the time and effort into a product.
Ok, I'm a bit confused. I was under the assumption that they were doing closed beta testing for quite some time now
He talked about 'closed beta' as a stress test thing, isn't that what open beta usually is?
The ACTUAL size of MMORPG worlds: a comparison list between MMO's
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums:
Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
Smart move. Millions people are a waste of time. 50k closed beta would be enuff to get a good metric.Of course launch day is going to be chaos but it always is for new AAA games of this caliber.
Biggest issue with open beta is unrealistic stress test. When everyone and their mom will grab a key and try to log into the game, people who will never buy it will still try it. So now you got numbers that are probably 3 to 4 times of what you will see at game launch all hammering your beta servers. For those of you how don't work in IT, your beta servers are almost crap compared to what you will have in production. So you will see a lot of problems that simply will not be there if it was running on a real hardware.
Next. People will try to log in, it will be laggy due to the fact that you are being hammered by unrealistic numbers. They will try it for 2 - 3 hours and then will run to the forums to bitch about how bad the game is because it lags so bad. Lets be honest statistically how many people actually report bugs in open beta. At this point most of the people have already made their decision. If you love it, you will use every argument to defend the game and if you hate it you will use everything to put it down, open beta will simply give ammo to both sides to fling at each other.
Stress test is a good idea however any developer will tell you that uncontrolled stress is stupid. "Your game breaks when 5m people hammer it with requests!" .... yeah that helps. To a developer that data is almost useless, what is useful is at what number does peformance start to degrade. You can gather that by letting in more and more people into beta thus observing performance under 100k, 500k, 1m, etc. Given that they got over 1m people wanting to be in beta they can emulate what they will see on the release day very well w/o open beta.
I have worked for game dev companies when open betas came out. From developers perspective, it is hell. It takes away our attention from real issues and force is try to figure out why beta login server has problems authenticating certain trial accounts.
I doubt it's because they have anything to fear. I'm inclined to believe the reason they already gave for no open beta, they don't need one. They have a million and a half people signed up for testing, that's a more than sufficient pool to grab numbers from to stress out the servers.
Over the past few years some games have used open betas to promote their games and this seems to have become the meaning fo the term for many. It's not. TOR has no need to do this considering the hype surrounding it, they don't require it to get the numbers for stress testing and they certainly have no obligation to let people taste the pie before buying it.
Bioware has always said they would probably not do the traditional "Closed/Open Beta" routine. Not a surprise. Bioware has been letting select individuals in to do testing for some time.....just not letting everyone in. Being one that has done a lot of Closed and Open Beta on MMO's, I am a little burnt out anyway. I think on just one MMO that I am interested in I would like to start it at launch and be surprised and amazed like everyone else rather then be in the "ho-hum, another launch day but I already am past that".
Let's party like it is 1863!
They can still stress test in a closed beta. All they have to do is invite more of those 1 million people that have already signed up to test the game.
In theory, open betas are supposed to be stress tests for the servers, etc. In reality, they turn into extended free trials filled with people who don't actually test anything or give any feedback. They just play a game for free and then move on to the next one. Why waste money and manpower on that when you can do stress tests on your terms with people who have already signed up to play and who aren't just looking for a free ride?
while i am waiting for ME3 .. Kotor was nowhere near in the same class as ME1, or even ME2.. i still don't see what people liked so much about Kotor.. personal preferences i guess, personnally i found it to be mediocre at best .. so i really hope the reason why DA2 was so bad, is because their focused on ME3 etc.. its the only game i am really waiting on from Bioware.. so far at least..
I do what i have always done. I wait until there are free trials or the game gets cheaper.
Seriously, if you can't wait 4-6 months for a regular Console/PC game to drop price in half, you deserve to pay $60. And to be honest, MMO's really need 6 month to get into gear anyways.
The last time i payed full price for a game was 15 years ago or more.
I don't have this urge to buy and play a game at release date, in fact, i still have plenty games i can play way before i even need a new game. I can buy 3 games for $60.
I think they just know that the game isn't going to live up to the hype and an open beta would just help hundreds of thousands of potential consumers realize it's not what they were hoping it'd be. If I'm right, we're talking about a HUGE loss for them, and probably worth catching some flak over.
When I want a single-player story, I'll play a single-player game. When I play an MMO, I want a massively multiplayer world.
Everything takes place on one server right now in CB so its likely they're just trying to get a large enough number of testers so that they completely max the server and see how much it can handle.
Really they don't need 10 servers to do that... just one optimized to capacity will get them the data they need.
Even if it ends up the best game on the market there are still going to be tens and maybe hundreds of thousands of people who decide it's not for them anyway. Might as well get the box sales outta them i say.
for the most part bioware has been trying to stay away from refering to it as closed beta and just refer to it as game testing because they feel "betas" have become more of a marketing thing and not so much for actual testing anymore.
thats pretty much what i did for ME1 and 2.. i think i only paid about £10 for either of them, i think $60 is about £45 which is a lot more than i'd pay anyway.. once the price drops to £20 - £25 then thats a 'reasonable' sort of price.. tbh, for PC's paying more than that is a waste of money...
My friend got into beta last week and I signed up before him!! Grrrrr.
Hmmm...no open beta could be concerning. A developer offering an earlyish open beta has basically become a signal of confidence in their product. Showing they don't have anything to hide, getting a lot of exposure etc.
On the other hand, EA/BW may just feel that they have nothing to gain from an open beta. If the hype is sufficient enough then they may think that an open beta may cost them more than it could gain them in sales.
So basically I think the two possibilities are:
1. EA/BW has something to hide, and they don't want to offer an open beta because they are afraid is will generate negative word-of-mouth. Of course, if they lower the NDA I think this could assuage this concern.
2. EA/BW just doesn't feel that an open beta will gain them anything. Could be possible, the game already has tons of hype and basically guaranteed buyers. It's not like they need an open beta for more exposure.
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
was it like this
http://www.cad-comic.com/cad/20110706
http://www.cad-comic.com/cad/20110708
http://www.cad-comic.com/cad/20110711
http://www.cad-comic.com/cad/
The problem with 1 to me is if they have such big problems to hide, why wouldn't they just give it more time in the oven? To iron out those problems. They've shown no rush to have this game released, if anything they've shown they don't want to set a hard release date because they want the game to be done, at least as done as possible before releasing it.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
If you were EA/BW, would you honestly sink the money into all the additional servers and manpower you would need for an open beta when you think they're just for marketing and not for actually testing anything, or would you just keep things as they are and focus your resources on your game instead?
Think like a developer for a moment. Where would you rather spend the money -- on BETTER testing with a more optimized server in a controlled setting, or on a BIGGER "test period" which wouldn't be anything more than an extended free trial that would divert your resources away from the game itself and towards things like validating promo codes and beta keys?
They've got over a million people signed up and ready to play. Why offer an open beta when they have a ready pool of players for whatever size stress tests they want to plan for and run? And honestly -- does this game need any more hype? Open betas are just for marketing, and SW:TOR already has a ton of that.
Exactly. One might call it underhanded, maybe even harmful to Bioware, if their reputation gets trashed by enough people feeling they've wasted money, but from a purely financial perspective, a sound decision for EA.
When I want a single-player story, I'll play a single-player game. When I play an MMO, I want a massively multiplayer world.
This pretty much hits it dead on. Open beta's are a joke now, instead of being used for any testing purposes, as they were originally used for, they are used by people as a free trial.
Another thing I want to point out is people keep pointing to Rift or other games that offered OB's. What has been the end result of most of those games? OB didn't tell anyone there would be nothing to do once they reached endgame, OB's don't tell you what's important, that's how an MMO will stack up in longevity, it's as blind a purchae as it is buying a game before trying it at all in the end.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Well that applies to those who didn't like the game-play or style of game, which is not what I'm talking about. There will always be people who don't like a games approach. Whether they tried before they bought or not. That's part of the risk involved in buying any game.
My point is an MMO isn't about what you experience in a few days play, it's about something you want to pay 15 a month to continually play. You bring up AOC, it actually had a lot of hype all the way up to release, once people got past level 20 they were utterly disappointed in what was there, OB told them it would be a different experience than it turned out being.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Funny
Ok, so, it's focused closed beta testing, but it's still closed beta what people have been busy with for a year now, not alpha testing.
The ACTUAL size of MMORPG worlds: a comparison list between MMO's
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums:
Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."