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All Points Bulletin: Bring 'Em Back Live
SBFord
Former Associate EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 33,129
In his latest Free Zone column, MMORPG.com columnist, Richard Aihoshi, takes a look at the rumored resurrection of All Points Bulletin by K2 Networks. Richard wonders if APB will finally live up to its potential when it's re-released as a F2P title later this year. Check out Richard's thoughts and then add yours to the mix on the forums.
While I've yet to see any form of official confirmation, GamesIndustry.biz reported last Thursday that according to unspecified sources, K2 Network, which operates the GamersFirst portal, is the new owner of the All Points Bulletin IP. According to the story, the purchase from Realtime Worlds is a done deal, and we can expect to see an announcement this week. The site notes a price of approximately 1.5 million pounds ($US 2.4 million) and says there's a possibility the game will re-launch by the end of the year, presumably as a free to play offering, although this isn't explicitly stated.
Read more of The Free Zone: Bring 'Em Back Live.
Comments
I too am happy with APB's second return. I hope that K2 can do what RTW couldn't. The game was fun and anyone that really played the game knows that. It might be seen even better if it becomes FTP; although I have been playing it for free for months after I first bought it with RTW point but we shall see.
I can't wait to get back in and blow some shit up. Garbage-Truck farming anyone? xD
Veritas Vos Liberabit- The truth will set you free.
I highly doubt K2 will do any better than RTW did. I see K2 releasing it in the condition it was when it shut down, and not doing much to add to it.
I also wonder how they are going to make money on it being F2P. Are they going to have you pay for the gear? The gear and customization options? Or buy points to spend on time in the action districts?
In any of those cases, I believe K2 will charge more for them than what RTW would have (seems to be typical of the f2p companies). And then I would ask, "How is that better than what RTW was doing?"
I don't think K2 will do the game justice and will ultimately shut it down just the same. I will still check it out to see what's going on with it when they launch it, but I hold no hope.
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The pen is mightier than the sword, and authority is mightier than the pen, but the sword is mightier than authority.
If you can't beat 'em, hold 'em off 'till you come up with a better plan.
What was the point of this article?
" However, changing the business model to F2P would only address one of the aforementioned flaws and issues"
The payment model wasn't a "flaw" or an "issue". Nice try at a dig there though. The payment model was flexible, and indeed, you could "play for free" (after buying the box of course), if you sold enough on the AH for the RTW currency to pay for more time. So, in essence, it was "F2P" already, and that couldn't save it from its REAL flaws and issues: hacking, hacking, and more hacking. To combat hacking, K2 will have to constantly SPEND money on the game to actively police it, and fight the never ending battle against new hacks (punkbuster failed miserably).
The game itself, aside from a couple of balance issues, was a blast to play. Never felt like I was "grinding" (Except trying to get the achievments for stealing cars, etc).
Will K2 actually, SPEND money on a game to a) get it to a playable state (without hackers) and b) keep it that way? From what we've seen from F2P publishers, the answer is: no.
So im guessing, all of our character's will be erased ,all of my progress will be gone, all of my items and cash will disappear, and i will have to rebuy everything and try to remake my character exactly as i previously did to be happy?
Il happily pay to play APB again, its a game like few others and unlike most MMOs its actually fun to play
Ahoy Mr Aihoshi. Decent article.
You know, taking a dead game and making it F2P is all well and good, but in some cases it's just not going to happen, no matter how regrettable that is.
Personally I think that when a game is to be taken offline for good, it should be open sourced. Sure the company loses control of that product but unless they are making a sequal, which if the game is taken offline a sequal is often out of the question (unless one is already made.)
I found myself wishing that NCsoft would get off their high horse and release a Tabula Rasa open source. The game had so much potential that others could actually bring to the surface. Willing fans could make such a game with potential go somewhere.
Of course they had those issues with Mister Garriott, but still.
I'd also like to point out for the Open Source option that many 'fan' programmers would likely work in a collective (We are the Borg) and thus completely outdo the original programming teams, which for such games tend to be rediculously small due to 'project management' and the reshuffling of the programmer deck.
When your fanbase states that your game has a lot of potential that isn't showing, do you honestly leave it on maintenance mode with a tiny team, or do you keep a decent sized team to help the game flourish? When a game hasn't made as much profit as was projected or hoped, producers often pick the former when really they shouldn't. Because they pick the former, the games often die, and we're left with what we have now. Either a game being bought and made F2P by some other company, or left as an untouchable product that gathers dust. Really they should Open Source the products if no other company is interested in continuing the project. Why? Because for these games which had to be bought and paid for, often with a subscription, they kinda owe it to the masses who wasted their money for nothing at least that much.
MMO's played: Ragnarok Online (For years), WoW (for a few weeks only), Guild Wars, Lineage 2, Eve, Allods, Shattered Galaxy, 9 Dragons, City of Heroes, City of Villains, Star Trek Online (Got someone ELSE to pay for it), Champions Online (Someone else paid), Dofus, Dragonica, LOTRO, DDO and more... A LOT more. I've played good AND bad. The bad didn't last long. :P
I dont know.
If my aihoshi would read this sites other articles sometime he would have seen that this topic was already covered by jon wood a few days ago.
I always thought the problem was APB was shoddy coding and buggy design. The concepts were solid enough, and I never heard anyone say it was improperly priced. Making a game free doesn't magically make it better. It just makes it cheaper. No one wants a bad product, no matter what it costs.
Important facts:
1. Free to Play games are poorly made.
2. Casuals are not all idiots, but idiots call themselves casuals.
3. Great solo and group content are not mutually exclusive, but they suffer when one is shoved into the mold of the other. The same is true of PvP and PvE.
4. Community is more important than you think.
K2 games being no more bugged or filled with hacks than WoW or any other game, APB will be welcom. It wasn't a buggy game, but a game that bugged the hell out of most because most mmo gamers are not competitive and do not like non-consensual or dynamic intrusion of their game-play by another player.
Most mmo/mmorpg gamers are accustom to being puppets on a static string or a dog on a leash that is lead safely from one encounter to another with a pause or 'do no harm to my character' clause.
So yea, I'd have another go at it, but....K2 has got to minimize and actively address hacking, which is something that RTW never did, though they want you to 'think' they did, communicate actively with the community and show active appreciation for the community and the willingness to hold onto it, which is something that RTW never did, and provide plans for content and feature adds, which again, is something that RTW never did.
Players will keep hacking all over again. Hacking is what killed the game in the first place. If Artificialaiming.com will support APB hack after resurrection - there is no point to play it. Game needs adjusted mechanics to defeat the purpose of using an aimbot.
Um...the PvP was 100% concensual, and pretty much the entire point of the game. I find it hard to believe that anyone would look at the game, install the game, and then play the game with the expectation that there wouldn't be PvP. At least in the action districts.
BTW, can anyone do a comparison between Crimecraft and APB in terms of gameplay? I'm sure APB has the character customization down pat, but what about the action zones between both games?
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
Yes I hope the game comes back again I really do miss the game itself. Based on Over 200 Hours of actual game play, I have to say I miss APB. The thing that will make me not want to play the game again is if they make the game with cash shops, and I do not know if K2 Networks is a trustworthy company to actually host a game like this. I have played games by K2 Networks before, and unless it is hosted like RTW had it but without the Aim Botting, the game itself will not be that good. The reason I say this is because I have played games by K2 Networks such as War Rock, and Sword OF The New World, and based on my game play from both of these games, War Rock sucked, and was full of exploits and cheaters, and at one time I did not even play on their service for such a long time that I forgot my password and tried to recover it which they told me if Ididnt remember my secret answer, or password I would have to be a premium member to recieve help for any of the games. Also the K2 Network Client Downloader is so buggy that when some people use it their internet explorer stops working correctly because the Launcher uses torrents to download the games I think instead of a server which creates massive lag for background applications and such.
I really do miss the Dump Trucks lol.
The payment model was a flaw and a issue as far as I am concerned.The game was not f2p in essence or otherwise,you can play Eve for free too after buying plex for isk but it isnt considered a f2p game.And as far as APB it was a sub par shooter with excellant customization and a few(very few) mmo characteristics that didnt warrant a subscription.I guess we will see at the end of 2011 how many people are willing to pay a sub for a shooter when COD gets a subscription fee tacked on it.http://www.joystiq.com/2010/11/06/new-transformers-spider-man-and-more-next-year-activision-doin/
As far as a grind I havnt found a shooter game I play yet that felt like a grind so thats not saying much.
F2P means just that. You do not have to pay anything up front. Stating that the game is F2P (after paying for it) would mean that everything is free in this world (after you have paid for it).
The payment model was a major discouragement for many people. They were not willing to put their money down on the game, as they didnt feel that they would get their moneys worth... and it appears that they were right.
If the game had been F2P, they would not have had to put down anything, and as such, more people would have tried it. Will this approach work this time? We will see, but they have a lot less to lose, so they do not need to be as demanding for money up front.
Your argument doesn't hold water. If people were afraid to buy the game with buying the box and getting free time after, why would they be not be afraid to plunk down cash on the microtransactions instead? Obviously, "F2P" doesn't mean "free to play". The game has to make money somehow, else it cannot be supported. If the game were truly "F2P", no one would bother making games outside of a few opensource minded people who weren't in it for money.
I hope they release this and dont just use it for character creation technology.
Sic semper tyrannis "Democracy broke down, not when the Union
ceased to be agreeable to all its constituent States, but when it was upheld, like any other Empire, by force of arms."
Heh, they'd have to redo the entire gameplay and purpose from scratch, and possibly even remove the 2 factions cops and robbers to make the game work.
APB was just a failed and abandoned concept. It fails because its over exploitable. Any 2 people could exploit the game by making alternate characters on the other faction.
The game is also a resource hog that created too much lag, it was cool creating your own getups, but having all that stuff constantly downloading in the background as you play, coupled with anticheat services created a poor game experience.
I doubt the sale of this game included any source code, just basic editing of certain things to change the game, which would mean, there's little they could do to make it fair.
The questing system was dumbed down because of this and the game was given up on and RTW exploited and scammed and frauded every game purchaser so they could get their invested money back,
Kinda funny how a lot of you guys will forgive all this and get a chance to play what is a poor concept.
Making this game F2P would be the dumbest thing ever, if you thought the exploiting and cheating was bad in retail, lol what would anonymous accounts add to this failure..
Sorry, I have to laugh at anyone attempting this, even if they got the IP for free
Regards,
Nobotters - A better gaming experience
I played the game at full graphical glory, and I never had a bit of problem with lag or "resource hog" related issues.
I like the game, and I laugh at anyone who laughs at anyone attempting this, even if they get the IP for free.
I played the game at full graphical glory, and I never had a bit of problem with lag or "resource hog" related issues. yeah because they had to turn PB off as it couldnt work.
Regards,
Nobotters - A better gaming experience
Oh my god, the concentration of idiocy, misinformation and misunderstanding in this post is over 9000!
"Heh, they'd have to redo the entire gameplay and purpose from scratch"
Why? the game was fun to play.
"remove the 2 factions cops and robbers to make the game work"
Yeah because an MMO based on 2 factions is bound to fail... oh wait!..
"APB was just a failed and abandoned concept"
It wasn't abandoned untill the very day RTW dissolved.
"It fails because its over exploitable"
No, it failed because many different reasons, this being only one of them.
"Any 2 people could exploit the game by making alternate characters on the other faction."
Yeah because any RvR game ever made makes that impossible... oh wait!..
"The game is also a resource hog that created too much lag"
The game was obviously released when the average gamer rig wasn't ready for it. For one thing it didn't work properly on 32bit OSes because of their inherent limitations. It might have worked out much better if they released it a year later.
That being said i've ran it on maximum graphic settings and it worked just fine.
"but having all that stuff constantly downloading in the background as you play"
It wasn't downloading in the background, all the compounded textures were preloaded (that's why the loading screen took ages) and cached.
"coupled with anticheat services created a poor game experience"
The anticheat services that weren't actually enabled as it turned out...
"I doubt the sale of this game included any source code, just basic editing of certain things to change the game, which would mean, there's little they could do to make it fair."
You have no idea WTF you are talking about.
"The questing system was dumbed down because of this and the game was given up on and"
Dumbed down compared to what?
"RTW exploited and scammed and frauded every game purchaser so they could get their invested money back"
How did they scam anybody? The product, it's state and future was as clear as they get for MMOs.
"Kinda funny how a lot of you guys will forgive all this and get a chance to play what is a poor concept."
Yeah that concept is horible, yet so many wan't to play it... oh wait!..
"F2P would be the dumbest thing ever"
^ The only thing that's actually coherent in your post
Making the game a free to play option does little to fix the problems taht killed it the first time, Im like they learned nothing. At this point it will be a cash grab.
You still have the massive hacking, griefing, and bugs that went with the game.
No thanks, I will stay clear of this game.
My two biggest concerns were that the combat was muddy (poorly coded) and there was a severe lack of gameplay options. You basically did missions to progress. But the missions were boring to me. I would like to see something more free-form, like the chaos districts RTW talked about in development. Have some open servers where you don't have to be in a mission just to kill each other.
Vault-Tec analysts have concluded that the odds of worldwide nuclear armaggeddon this decade are 17,143,762... to 1.
No thanks,
I waited this game since a while so... i bought game this summer, charge with plenty of gametime for see it dead one month later.
So... GO TO HELL APB :P
Hmm, sounds interesting. Like you, Richard, my play style these days seems to be very much a bit of this, a bit of that, so paying subscriptions (as I used to) doesn't appeal atm.