Originally posted by Ikonis When the fans cone in to a thread and claim they see people everywhere,what hey really mean is they see people in those few large events that are on a timer that they farm for rares and exotics.
This isn't true at all. I always announce a DE in map chat and people show up to do it. Does it happen every time? No, but it does happen, just not the frequency people expect it to.
Let's take Swtor or Rift for examples. Ask for help on a Heroic Quest in Swtor, and you'll have to wait awhile before someone finally joins with you. You will eventually get a group though while questing.
I was just playing Rift a couple weeks ago, and the 2nd zone seemed dead one day, but the next day, there were at least 6 people doing a rift event next to me.
The populations fluctuate in every MMO.
Why do people expect GW2's population to be 100% filled to capacity in every zone?
How many subs did SWTOR had during the years of development?
The subscriptions only pay the infrastructure and the live and support team, the rest goes to cover the development costs.
Game development is paid by investors money and past profits.
Do you think Anet has all of its studio working on gw2 live?
They have like 50 pp. on it that is paid by gem revenue. The rest is working in other stuff.
SWTOR didn't pay for its development cost on the other hand, so no point keeping developing it like they were doing it before.
Business model:
Get money from investors (or your own)-> develop your product-> sell your product and payback what you promised to your investors plus profit for yourself (if you didn't promised all the revenue in exchange for your salary).
It is a myth that subs are there to develop future content.
Currently playing: GW2 Going cardboard starter kit: Ticket to ride, Pandemic, Carcassonne, Dominion, 7 Wonders
I actually am on blackgate server, which op claims he is on. I see plenty people around. How about this op, next time you find the server seems to be dead hit me in game, and we can look around together to see if your claim is true? My In game name is reslinal.
How many subs did SWTOR had during the years of development?
The subscriptions only pay the infrastructure and the live and support team, the rest goes to cover the development costs.
Game development is paid by investors money and past profits.
Do you think Anet has all of its studio working on gw2 live?
They have like 50 pp. on it that is paid by gem revenue. The rest is working in other stuff.
SWTOR didn't pay for its development cost on the other hand, so no point keeping developing it like they were doing it before.
Business model:
Get money from investors (or your own)-> develop your product-> sell your product and payback what you promised to your investors plus profit for yourself (if you didn't promised all the revenue in exchange for your salary).
It is a myth that subs are there to develop future content.
And your source for your numbers is.......
James T. Kirk: All she's got isn't good enough! What else ya got?
How many subs did SWTOR had during the years of development?
The subscriptions only pay the infrastructure and the live and support team, the rest goes to cover the development costs.
Game development is paid by investors money and past profits.
Do you think Anet has all of its studio working on gw2 live?
They have like 50 pp. on it that is paid by gem revenue. The rest is working in other stuff.
SWTOR didn't pay for its development cost on the other hand, so no point keeping developing it like they were doing it before.
Business model:
Get money from investors (or your own)-> develop your product-> sell your product and payback what you promised to your investors plus profit for yourself (if you didn't promised all the revenue in exchange for your salary).
It is a myth that subs are there to develop future content.
And your source for your numbers is.......
And where is your source for claiming GW2 is not growing? I want official reports, and not pseudo ones like Xfire numbers.
How many subs did SWTOR had during the years of development?
The subscriptions only pay the infrastructure and the live and support team, the rest goes to cover the development costs.
Game development is paid by investors money and past profits.
Do you think Anet has all of its studio working on gw2 live?
They have like 50 pp. on it that is paid by gem revenue. The rest is working in other stuff.
SWTOR didn't pay for its development cost on the other hand, so no point keeping developing it like they were doing it before.
Business model:
Get money from investors (or your own)-> develop your product-> sell your product and payback what you promised to your investors plus profit for yourself (if you didn't promised all the revenue in exchange for your salary).
It is a myth that subs are there to develop future content.
Who's implying it was? It's there to support the business plan and nothing more. Which includes, yet is not exclusive to supporting content development.
As far as why A-net would be hiring I'd guess it's in the realm of staffing up for expansions. Which will be their lifeblood in the future.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
How many subs did SWTOR had during the years of development?
The subscriptions only pay the infrastructure and the live and support team, the rest goes to cover the development costs.
Game development is paid by investors money and past profits.
Do you think Anet has all of its studio working on gw2 live?
They have like 50 pp. on it that is paid by gem revenue. The rest is working in other stuff.
SWTOR didn't pay for its development cost on the other hand, so no point keeping developing it like they were doing it before.
Business model:
Get money from investors (or your own)-> develop your product-> sell your product and payback what you promised to your investors plus profit for yourself (if you didn't promised all the revenue in exchange for your salary).
It is a myth that subs are there to develop future content.
With a dedicated live team more than ten times the size of the Guild Wars live team, we think you’re going to be blown away by the size and scope of live additions to the world of Tyria for a very, very long time.
Their attempt to "promote play across zones' didn't work as well as they wanted I think. There is no incentive to do anything so why bother joining up? It would contribute to why those zones are just empty wastelands. The game itself really didn't do as good as people wanted and as such I just don't see lots of influx of players.
If it wasn't for it being B2P with people having already shelled out the cash, chances are the numbers would be lower. Events are about all the game has and they can be a mixed bag it seems from what I hear/read up.
Thriving? No, but to some credit its how MMos work as populations are quick to move on. GW2 just wasn't as good as people expected and as such its left rather stripped down as players just have no desire to play it, even if they can play free anytime they want. I feel it just makes to many bad decisions with its gameplay choice that really hampers the game down. If you are going to lack 'goals' in terms of things to obtain, you need to have fun enough gameplay of some sort to promote random playing of the game. Unfortunately, the combat in the game is probably one of its weaker points and it just lacks much to really do (or at least that feels worth wild, don't give me that 'bs' it has plenty to do, other games have stuff to its all about if people feel its 'worthwild' or not.).
Simply put: [mod edit] Its just yet another MMo that has come and gone, much like RIft (A game I enjoyed greatly, btw, just incase your thinking I'm hating) where its pretty much left in the dust, having to find ways to attract players. Even good games have this problem sadly.
Their attempt to "promote play across zones' didn't work as well as they wanted I think. There is no incentive to do anything so why bother joining up? It would contribute to why those zones are just empty wastelands. The game itself really didn't do as good as people wanted and as such I just don't see lots of influx of players.
If it wasn't for it being B2P with people having already shelled out the cash, chances are the numbers would be lower. Events are about all the game has and they can be a mixed bag it seems from what I hear/read up.
Thriving? No, but to some credit its how MMos work as populations are quick to move on. GW2 just wasn't as good as people expected and as such its left rather stripped down as players just have no desire to play it, even if they can play free anytime they want. I feel it just makes to many bad decisions with its gameplay choice that really hampers the game down. If you are going to lack 'goals' in terms of things to obtain, you need to have fun enough gameplay of some sort to promote random playing of the game. Unfortunately, the combat in the game is probably one of its weaker points and it just lacks much to really do (or at least that feels worth wild, don't give me that 'bs' it has plenty to do, other games have stuff to its all about if people feel its 'worthwild' or not.).
Simply put: [mod edit] Its just yet another MMo that has come and gone, much like RIft (A game I enjoyed greatly, btw, just incase your thinking I'm hating) where its pretty much left in the dust, having to find ways to attract players. Even good games have this problem sadly.
Must be the reason diessa plateau and wayfarer foothills were full during the flame and frost living story.
Must be the reason southsun cove is packing with the new living story.
Must be the reason areas where they added the bonus chest to the world events are packed.
[mod edit]
Currently playing: GW2 Going cardboard starter kit: Ticket to ride, Pandemic, Carcassonne, Dominion, 7 Wonders
To two posters above me. Once again..there are 51 servers in this game. if OP has no leg to stand on to make a claim about dwindling population neither do you guys or anyone else posting screenshots from couple of servers.
Data my a**!
What servers are dying then?
You are asking the wrong person. I think i made it pretty clear that neither OP or you have any reliable data to prove anything here.
To two posters above me. Once again..there are 51 servers in this game. if OP has no leg to stand on to make a claim about dwindling population neither do you guys or anyone else posting screenshots from couple of servers.
Data my a**!
What servers are dying then?
You are asking the wrong person. I think i made it pretty clear that neither OP or you have any reliable data to prove anything here.
You are you using a strawman.
The OP claims are simple:
"So I like to log in every few weeks to just see how the game is going. I warp to around 10 different zones, the starting cities ect...and they are empty. I even did map chat in a zone and got that response "No one hears you", you know, when no one is in an area? That's nuts!"
"But then there is all this talk about how the game is getting lots of new players...but I can go to Queensdale and at certain hours get "NO one hears you" In Queensdale!"
They aren't your imaginary claims of "dwindling population".
The evidence presented by me are to counter the bold and absurd OP claims.
And you associated yourself with those OP claims by stating the evidence of two servers presented to claim the OP statement wrong were not representative of the 51 servers and then you go on an try to change the OP claims to "dwindling population".
Now, can you point to me to the server or servers where the OP claims are valid?
Otherwise we have nothing to talk about because I didn't say anything about growing or dwindling population and I read thriving as an healthy game that is profitable for the devs and fun for the players.
Currently playing: GW2 Going cardboard starter kit: Ticket to ride, Pandemic, Carcassonne, Dominion, 7 Wonders
A picture with 5-6 other players is not proof a game is "thriving". I can go to Ultima Online and make a similar screenshot. People are not arguing the game is "dead", MMOs don't die. But GW2 is just another MMO, saw a massive population and now is had dwindled significantly. I would say it has faired as well as SWTOR did about 6 months after its launch in terms of player population, and that was considered a disaster.
We can actually look at the facts, these are the best facts we have until Arenanet actually provides concrete numbers:
GW2 lost 73% sales from Q4, 2012 to Q1, 2013. Excepted due to holiday sales boost but "thriving" games don't lose 73% sales regarless.
Based on Raptr (has 20 million users), for the latest week, GW2 is ranked 5th in terms of MMOs (WoW, Rift, Neverwinter & Defiance are ahead of it) http://raptr.com/dashboard/games
If you log into the Mists and check the sPvP servers during Primetime. There are about 200 players across all sPvP servers (both NA/EU) during Primetime. Cheap knockoff MMOs have more players in PvP than that.
Almost no viewers on Twitch. Games like SWTOR and Tera have higher viewers constantly. Hence, no interest.
I could name half a dozen more including webstats and video views on fansites. But you get the point, it is not dead, but by no means is it some type of success or "thriving".
A company hiring more and more people each month for its game is a quite reliable way to assess that the game is thriving, thriving meaning, as said above, the game as enough players spending enough money on it to make it viable for the company to even hire more people than it's actual team and pay them.
xfire, raptor, all this is worthless bullshit. Box sales dropping after a while is normal, people owning the game won't buy it 10 times. All those numbers pulled out of the blues ignore the important thing, gem sales, aka what I said above, "enough players spending enough money".
No business hires for a failing product, and we have seen those layoffs in other MMORPGs recently.
Simple logic, without the need to use numbers pulled out of the darkest part of the place I sit on.
This is not exactly true, because MMOs as small as DAoC today hire people. Mythic Entertainment for example, has dozens of openings and their most successful current product? Either DAoC or Warhammer Online.
Hatere of games just have this script, that generally works with many of the games, but it is just makes one laugh on how ridiculous it is for anyone actually playing GW2, that is constantly playing with strangers they bump into.
A picture with 5-6 other players is not proof a game is "thriving". I can go to Ultima Online and make a similar screenshot. People are not arguing the game is "dead", MMOs don't die. But GW2 is just another MMO, saw a massive population and now is had dwindled significantly. I would say it has faired as well as SWTOR did about 6 months after its launch in terms of player population, and that was considered a disaster.
We can actually look at the facts, these are the best facts we have until Arenanet actually provides concrete numbers:
GW2 lost 73% sales from Q4, 2012 to Q1, 2013. Excepted due to holiday sales boost but "thriving" games don't lose 73% sales regarless.
Based on Raptr (has 20 million users), for the latest week, GW2 is ranked 5th in terms of MMOs (WoW, Rift, Neverwinter & Defiance are head of it)
If you log into the Mists and check the sPvP servers. There are about 200 players across all sPvP servers (both NA/EU) during Primetime. Cheap knockoff MMOs have more players in PvP than that.
I could name half a dozen more including webstats and video views on fansites. But you get the point, it is not dead, but by no means is it some type of success or "thriving".
it is not a picture of 5 or 6 players - it is a picture of 5-6 players multiple times, across several zones at different times.
Yeah go and take pictures of those games, where you are leveling in a starter areas with another 5 or 6 people and come back.
The 4th quarter of 2012 included the lion share of the sales of the 3q12 as well, so around 2.5M boxes were there. By the way December sales are 4q12 as well. Also GW2 box sales aren't fixed revenue to win or lose.
WoW dropped from 92K hours played in XFire to the current 16K hours played.
By the way it is fun that those numbers of GW2 XFire show a decline when the sales of 3Q12->4Q12 shown an increase of 246%.
Raptr being the program that give rewards like free rift+storm legion+30 days rift time if you log at least 14 hours playing rift, amongst other .
Raptr with 20 million users that can put 100K hours a week for the most played games? They even use share % instead of hours played.
What does the sPvP numbers have to do with the absolute game population, especially in a game where the large majority of the population is playing PvE and the WvW to a lesser extent?
Currently playing: GW2 Going cardboard starter kit: Ticket to ride, Pandemic, Carcassonne, Dominion, 7 Wonders
it is not a picture of 5 or 6 players - it is a picture of 5-6 players multiple times, across several zones at different times.
Yeah go and take pictures of those games, where you are leveling in a starter areas with another 5 or 6 people and come back.
The 4th quarter of 2012 included the lion share of the sales of the 3q12 as well, so around 2.5M boxes were there. By the way December sales are 4q12 as well. Also GW2 box sales aren't fixed revenue to win or lose.
WoW dropped from 92K hours played in XFire to the current 16K hours played.
Raptr being the program that give rewards like free rift+storm legion+30 days rift time if you log at least 14 hours playing rift, amongst other .
Raptr with 20 million users that can put 100K hours a week for the most played games? They even use share % instead of hours played.
What does the sPvP numbers have to do with the absolute game population?
This takes me back to discussing with SWTOR fans and how their defended their game.
Yeah your screenshot conveniently taken during the "limited" time content because that was one way to force people to the game.
Found the most recent video of Ultima Online on Youtube from today:
At least 10 people hovering around as soon as he logged in.
What does it matter? GW2 sales in Q2, 2013 are going to be lower than Q1, 2013 and lower the next quarter extra. It isn't "growing".
Yes, WoW dropped. In fact, if WoW dies tomorrow and goes to zero. It was a successful MMO for 10 years. And it will still be a phenom in the gaming industry.
I agree with you, Rift was inflated due to the Storm Legion giveway, without it GW2 would have been 4th. But after Rift goes F2P you better believe it will be more population than GW2. And off course Raptr is based on a sample, most statistics are based on samples.
Ah ha, so when we can actually measure a metric in game that shows abysmal population. You pretty much say "who cares".
SWTOR had >half of their CORE team fired, including high ups (2 rounds of layoffs) 2 rounds of server merges and is now at 20 servers from original 220 or so. EA never released any financial results for SWTOR and Riccitello (you know, former head of EA) at one point called it a miss.
Yah, i see soooooooooo many similarities there, how couldnt i hve seen it sooner, thank you for opening my eyes rofl
Tera was always a niche game was a niche target, unlike Rift. Rift can have mass market appeal in NA. Rift will be more popular than GW2 in the West no question about it.
I agree with you SWTOR was a bigger disaster because it had a bigger budget. GW2 didn't have as big of a budget as SWTOR and it shows due to the games non-existent end-game content.
A company hiring more and more people each month for its game is a quite reliable way to assess that the game is thriving, thriving meaning, as said above, the game as enough players spending enough money on it to make it viable for the company to even hire more people than it's actual team and pay them.
xfire, raptor, all this is worthless bullshit. Box sales dropping after a while is normal, people owning the game won't buy it 10 times. All those numbers pulled out of the blues ignore the important thing, gem sales, aka what I said above, "enough players spending enough money".
No business hires for a failing product, and we have seen those layoffs in other MMORPGs recently.
Simple logic, without the need to use numbers pulled out of the darkest part of the place I sit on.
This is not exactly true, because MMOs as small as DAoC today hire people. Mythic Entertainment for example, has dozens of openings and their most successful current product? Either DAoC or Warhammer Online.
EA - fired staff from SWTOR and sent Mythic away from SWTOR
Blizz - fired staff from WoW
Trion - fired staff from Definace
Cryptic - fired a lot of staff
Turbine - fired staff from LOTRO
Yes, its a festival of "hiring people"
ANet - hired more people from launch and is further hiring
I made no claims about the population other than it isn't empty.
When my server change timer resets I can go into black guard and screenshot from the empty server.
The reason people don't care much for screenshots is because it is very easy to fabricate those. Even on most populated servers i can go to regions which are empty and take screens to make a point. But it doesn't mean anything. That is why like he said..there is no proof or facts here. The real data lies with Anet and it is next to impossible for players to know the population decline or increase just through screenshots of handful of servers.
I usually go by the server status. Mine was medium so i knew it isn't good for a game this huge and i transferred to TC.
"The problem is that the hardcore folks always want the same thing: 'We want exactly what you gave us before, but it has to be completely different.' -Jesse Schell
"Online gamers are the most ludicrously entitled beings since Caligula made his horse a senator, and at least the horse never said anything stupid." -Luke McKinney
The "whole game is endgame" could have tricked people before launch, but it won't work anymore as that mantra turned out to be complete hogwash and most people know it. GW2 lacked content in general, it released with 8 dungeons at launch. Most MMOs including Tera, Neverwinter and even FFXIV etc will have 16 at release. So even if GW2 released a dungeon a month it would be behind in terms of content.
I agree SWTOR was a huge failure. To me the two biggest disappointments in MMO history are GW2 and SWTOR, easily. FFXIV the first might be up there too.
Comments
This isn't true at all. I always announce a DE in map chat and people show up to do it. Does it happen every time? No, but it does happen, just not the frequency people expect it to.
Let's take Swtor or Rift for examples. Ask for help on a Heroic Quest in Swtor, and you'll have to wait awhile before someone finally joins with you. You will eventually get a group though while questing.
I was just playing Rift a couple weeks ago, and the 2nd zone seemed dead one day, but the next day, there were at least 6 people doing a rift event next to me.
The populations fluctuate in every MMO.
Why do people expect GW2's population to be 100% filled to capacity in every zone?
How many subs did SWTOR had during the years of development?
The subscriptions only pay the infrastructure and the live and support team, the rest goes to cover the development costs.
Game development is paid by investors money and past profits.
Do you think Anet has all of its studio working on gw2 live?
They have like 50 pp. on it that is paid by gem revenue. The rest is working in other stuff.
SWTOR didn't pay for its development cost on the other hand, so no point keeping developing it like they were doing it before.
Business model:
Get money from investors (or your own)-> develop your product-> sell your product and payback what you promised to your investors plus profit for yourself (if you didn't promised all the revenue in exchange for your salary).
It is a myth that subs are there to develop future content.
Currently playing: GW2
Going cardboard starter kit: Ticket to ride, Pandemic, Carcassonne, Dominion, 7 Wonders
That is because it isn't thriving. It has a stabilized player base, but it is assuredly NOT growing....
James T. Kirk: All she's got isn't good enough! What else ya got?
And your source for your numbers is.......
James T. Kirk: All she's got isn't good enough! What else ya got?
And where is your source for claiming GW2 is not growing? I want official reports, and not pseudo ones like Xfire numbers.
Who's implying it was? It's there to support the business plan and nothing more. Which includes, yet is not exclusive to supporting content development.
As far as why A-net would be hiring I'd guess it's in the realm of staffing up for expansions. Which will be their lifeblood in the future.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/colin-johanson-outlines-guild-wars-2-live-game-development/
With a dedicated live team more than ten times the size of the Guild Wars live team, we think you’re going to be blown away by the size and scope of live additions to the world of Tyria for a very, very long time.
GW1 live team is (was) 4 people
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Live_Team
Currently playing: GW2
Going cardboard starter kit: Ticket to ride, Pandemic, Carcassonne, Dominion, 7 Wonders
Their attempt to "promote play across zones' didn't work as well as they wanted I think. There is no incentive to do anything so why bother joining up? It would contribute to why those zones are just empty wastelands. The game itself really didn't do as good as people wanted and as such I just don't see lots of influx of players.
If it wasn't for it being B2P with people having already shelled out the cash, chances are the numbers would be lower. Events are about all the game has and they can be a mixed bag it seems from what I hear/read up.
Thriving? No, but to some credit its how MMos work as populations are quick to move on. GW2 just wasn't as good as people expected and as such its left rather stripped down as players just have no desire to play it, even if they can play free anytime they want. I feel it just makes to many bad decisions with its gameplay choice that really hampers the game down. If you are going to lack 'goals' in terms of things to obtain, you need to have fun enough gameplay of some sort to promote random playing of the game. Unfortunately, the combat in the game is probably one of its weaker points and it just lacks much to really do (or at least that feels worth wild, don't give me that 'bs' it has plenty to do, other games have stuff to its all about if people feel its 'worthwild' or not.).
Simply put: [mod edit] Its just yet another MMo that has come and gone, much like RIft (A game I enjoyed greatly, btw, just incase your thinking I'm hating) where its pretty much left in the dust, having to find ways to attract players. Even good games have this problem sadly.
Must be the reason diessa plateau and wayfarer foothills were full during the flame and frost living story.
Must be the reason southsun cove is packing with the new living story.
Must be the reason areas where they added the bonus chest to the world events are packed.
[mod edit]
Currently playing: GW2
Going cardboard starter kit: Ticket to ride, Pandemic, Carcassonne, Dominion, 7 Wonders
What's your definition of 'thriving'?
Gamer definition and a working profitable corporate definition appear to be two very, very different animals.
You are asking the wrong person. I think i made it pretty clear that neither OP or you have any reliable data to prove anything here.
You are you using a strawman.
The OP claims are simple:
"So I like to log in every few weeks to just see how the game is going. I warp to around 10 different zones, the starting cities ect...and they are empty. I even did map chat in a zone and got that response "No one hears you", you know, when no one is in an area? That's nuts!"
"But then there is all this talk about how the game is getting lots of new players...but I can go to Queensdale and at certain hours get "NO one hears you" In Queensdale!"
They aren't your imaginary claims of "dwindling population".
The evidence presented by me are to counter the bold and absurd OP claims.
And you associated yourself with those OP claims by stating the evidence of two servers presented to claim the OP statement wrong were not representative of the 51 servers and then you go on an try to change the OP claims to "dwindling population".
Now, can you point to me to the server or servers where the OP claims are valid?
Otherwise we have nothing to talk about because I didn't say anything about growing or dwindling population and I read thriving as an healthy game that is profitable for the devs and fun for the players.
Currently playing: GW2
Going cardboard starter kit: Ticket to ride, Pandemic, Carcassonne, Dominion, 7 Wonders
A picture with 5-6 other players is not proof a game is "thriving". I can go to Ultima Online and make a similar screenshot. People are not arguing the game is "dead", MMOs don't die. But GW2 is just another MMO, saw a massive population and now is had dwindled significantly. I would say it has faired as well as SWTOR did about 6 months after its launch in terms of player population, and that was considered a disaster.
We can actually look at the facts, these are the best facts we have until Arenanet actually provides concrete numbers:
I could name half a dozen more including webstats and video views on fansites. But you get the point, it is not dead, but by no means is it some type of success or "thriving".
This is not exactly true, because MMOs as small as DAoC today hire people. Mythic Entertainment for example, has dozens of openings and their most successful current product? Either DAoC or Warhammer Online.
it is not a picture of 5 or 6 players - it is a picture of 5-6 players multiple times, across several zones at different times.
Yeah go and take pictures of those games, where you are leveling in a starter areas with another 5 or 6 people and come back.
The 4th quarter of 2012 included the lion share of the sales of the 3q12 as well, so around 2.5M boxes were there. By the way December sales are 4q12 as well. Also GW2 box sales aren't fixed revenue to win or lose.
WoW dropped from 92K hours played in XFire to the current 16K hours played.
By the way it is fun that those numbers of GW2 XFire show a decline when the sales of 3Q12->4Q12 shown an increase of 246%.
Raptr being the program that give rewards like free rift+storm legion+30 days rift time if you log at least 14 hours playing rift, amongst other .
Raptr with 20 million users that can put 100K hours a week for the most played games? They even use share % instead of hours played.
What does the sPvP numbers have to do with the absolute game population, especially in a game where the large majority of the population is playing PvE and the WvW to a lesser extent?
Currently playing: GW2
Going cardboard starter kit: Ticket to ride, Pandemic, Carcassonne, Dominion, 7 Wonders
This takes me back to discussing with SWTOR fans and how their defended their game.
Tera was always a niche game was a niche target, unlike Rift. Rift can have mass market appeal in NA. Rift will be more popular than GW2 in the West no question about it.
I agree with you SWTOR was a bigger disaster because it had a bigger budget. GW2 didn't have as big of a budget as SWTOR and it shows due to the games non-existent end-game content.
EA - fired staff from SWTOR and sent Mythic away from SWTOR
Blizz - fired staff from WoW
Trion - fired staff from Definace
Cryptic - fired a lot of staff
Turbine - fired staff from LOTRO
Yes, its a festival of "hiring people"
ANet - hired more people from launch and is further hiring
Rift team had layoffs about 2 years after launch. But this recent layoff was not the Rift team but actually Defiance.
The reason people don't care much for screenshots is because it is very easy to fabricate those. Even on most populated servers i can go to regions which are empty and take screens to make a point. But it doesn't mean anything. That is why like he said..there is no proof or facts here. The real data lies with Anet and it is next to impossible for players to know the population decline or increase just through screenshots of handful of servers.
I usually go by the server status. Mine was medium so i knew it isn't good for a game this huge and i transferred to TC.
"The problem is that the hardcore folks always want the same thing: 'We want exactly what you gave us before, but it has to be completely different.'
-Jesse Schell
"Online gamers are the most ludicrously entitled beings since Caligula made his horse a senator, and at least the horse never said anything stupid."
-Luke McKinney
Here is a good example of what Rift has to offer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w7AcbriAKLU
The "whole game is endgame" could have tricked people before launch, but it won't work anymore as that mantra turned out to be complete hogwash and most people know it. GW2 lacked content in general, it released with 8 dungeons at launch. Most MMOs including Tera, Neverwinter and even FFXIV etc will have 16 at release. So even if GW2 released a dungeon a month it would be behind in terms of content.
I agree SWTOR was a huge failure. To me the two biggest disappointments in MMO history are GW2 and SWTOR, easily. FFXIV the first might be up there too.