they current leading persons are already burned out and blind, not realizing the reality and that they better take part in the team some stairs lower.
This game is good and can be turned into a cash cow, even an 18 year old student would know better what to do to safe this game..
Someone needs to point the above out...you call the leaders blind and not seeing reality yet you are saying this game is good and could be a cash cow.
1. people dont leave good games in mass.
2. the game isnt a cash cow now because of the above.
SWTOR is not a good MMORPG.
If however they would have either
A: made it F2P with a cash shop and just release expansions to buy to would be great.
or
B: Released it as a single player game with online capabilities to do group content...
Then it would have made more money.
SWTOR is a PoS MMO and no amount of new people is going to change that in a decent amount of time. The game would need an expansion pack the size of the original game to add enough MMO aspects to make it worth a damn to most players.
It IS time to face reality, SWTOR is a bad MMORPG in its current form that wont be fixed easily, its time for gamers to start demanding better quality games and stop blindly defending them just because it has some "fun" content or just conent that YOU enjoy...MMOs need to cater to a wide variety of player types to REMAIN successful.
I hope we shall crush...in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country." ~Thomes Jefferson
This game was doomed before it even released, many people on this site and other sites like this discussed how this game was destined to fade into nothingness in a short time. But we were haters/trolls at that point in time. Now most everyone finally sees the problems after 5 months????
Oh vindication is ohhh soooo sweet.
Waiting for:EQ-Next, ArcheAge (not so much anymore) Now Playing: N/A Worst MMO: FFXIV Favorite MMO: FFXI
Wow... there are so many haters in here tooting each others' horns... it is almost pornographic.
I guess that is to be expected around here.
Not back in December. Most of these hypocrites were riding this games nuts pretty hard. I call them band wagon fans. They are mostly band wagon fans of Guild Wars right now.
Yeah, thankfully im being a consistant hater. Been pointing out the suck since Beta and its as much the fault of the community as it is Bioware. Blind fanboys defending, blind haters just hating and not being constructive...and nothing being noticed by Bioware because of the divided community.
If faboys would stop thinking that just because THEY are enjoying whats there that it doesnt mean everyone should either be quite or that what they want doesnt count.
And if haters would be flipping constructive with what they think is missing or wrong and work together...
Game makers would take notice. It has worked in the past...hell it even worked once with SWTOR and that THING they called a cooldown update...the boards lite up with everyone complaining about it and they had an update to change it in a few days.
WORK TOGETHER...we all want the same thing in the end...a better game.
I hope we shall crush...in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country." ~Thomes Jefferson
they current leading persons are already burned out and blind, not realizing the reality and that they better take part in the team some stairs lower.
This game is good and can be turned into a cash cow, even an 18 year old student would know better what to do to safe this game..
Someone needs to point the above out...you call the leaders blind and not seeing reality yet you are saying this game is good and could be a cash cow.
1. people dont leave good games in mass.
2. the game isnt a cash cow now because of the above.
SWTOR is not a good MMORPG.
If however they would have either
A: made it F2P with a cash shop and just release expansions to buy to would be great.
or
B: Released it as a single player game with online capabilities to do group content...
Then it would have made more money.
SWTOR is a PoS MMO and no amount of new people is going to change that in a decent amount of time. The game would need an expansion pack the size of the original game to add enough MMO aspects to make it worth a damn to most players.
It IS time to face reality, SWTOR is a bad MMORPG in its current form that wont be fixed easily, its time for gamers to start demanding better quality games and stop blindly defending them just because it has some "fun" content or just conent that YOU enjoy...MMOs need to cater to a wide variety of player types to REMAIN successful.
1. yes they do IF they don't like it. Assuming that you have a girlfriend and that she loves RomComs how many movies have you gone and watched with her only to roll your eyes when she told you this was the best movie, like, ever?
2. is SWTOR a great cashcow? That would depend on how you define cashcow...
Obviously with over 2 Mio copies sold shortly after release, yeah, I'd say that SWTOR has brought in quite a good chunk of cash.
Is that cow now still giving as freely milk as it was a) upon release thru subscriptions, or b) thru box sales?
The answer is no for both... which is hardly surprising as with just about every game I've seen the sale number drop shortly after the initial release (everybody who wants it has bought it - is the same for DVD, CDs, etc.) and the resale price is usually also cut vendors.
Now, what about the subscriptions? This is the "problem" with material that is based on prominent IPs: you don't really have much chance for a sleeper! I mean of course, somebody who may now catch the SW movies for the first time ever may go and say "hey, what PC games for SW are out there?" and then find out about SWTOR and buy it.
But in general you should not expect any late-comers: if you are a SW fan, you will have given it a try already.
The best concept would be to go with word of mouth, to assume that something in SWTOR will pull people in not for the IP but for the feature/design/etc.
"SWTOR is not a good MMORPG"?
This is probably as close to wrong as you can get!
If you'd said MMO, yes, I would have found that easier to agree...
but as SWTOR actually does offer 8 indepth character stories you can play, it very much does qualify as an RPG.
Is it "Online"? Yes
Is it "Multiplayer"? hm... I'll put it this way: to the same degree that GW2 and TSW will be.
Is it "Massively"? hm... SWTOR doesn't use a persistant corral system, which means that why gamers are there (on the same server), they are just spread out over different locations: planets, cities, zones, Fleet.
Go outside this corral zones in other games annd you'll quickly see similar results where people are less likely to accidentially run into each other. L2 GoD is a perfect example: drop into the starting village and your FPS would drop to a crawl due to all the people there.
Leave the training/tutorial zone you were quick to get better FPS as the number of people around you declined leaving you rather quickly all to yourself.
And important question may also be at what point "Multiplayer" actually switches over to "Massively Multiplayer"?
Considering that in the golden days of MMORPGs FPS multiplayer games were run with around 8 to 16 characters (players and bots) on average... with 32 probably still as the usual norm these days, I'd say any number of 50 - 60 playser "together" so sharing the same server, yeah, I think "massively" may well be acceptable. But I don't think there is an official definition for thatr term.
A: made it F2P with a cash shop and just release expansions to buy to would be great.
or
B: Released it as a single player game with online capabilities to do group content...
Neither of the 2 is a smart move, actually they would have been rather dumb moves:
Going F2P BW would have completely lost the money from the box sales.
And considering that people would have reacted just the same to the story-driven setup for SWTOR as they did now, the result would a steady decline in micro transactions. Which, to be honest, would have been few anyways... I mean with the state of SWTOR right now, the only micro transactions I could think of would be purchasing access to specialty vendors (i.e. security key) and potentially the choice morsel of swapping class companions.
though obviously due to class companions entering thru the class story line, this would actually have required a complete re-design of the stories to either make short term "track jumping" possible i.e. the Smuggler suddenly swoops to Hutta to get the chosen 1st companion, or it would have to have been more of a visual swap where at his core Corta still remains himself, except that "he" now looks like Vette.
Which is sort of close to what BW has already included, except of course that the change options are limited.
Again, the simple matter of having to re-work the story lines for a not small part comes to mind...or would you think that Corto flitting with a female Smuggler would be the basis of same-gender romance just because "he" is now in Vette's body?
No, maybe purchasing an additional companion to replace an unlocked one then?
I could see that for buying droids... but considering that also living beings would have to be traded via a (basically) slavemarket, I'm not sure how well BW would react to establishing this on Republic side... though there is of course always Nar Shaddaa...
Your second suggestion - singleplayer with co-op content...
I'll be honest, it's been really long since I've played singleplayer games that offer such co-op modes.
But to me they always taste of gameports from consoles.
Which I personally wouldn't even remotely be interested in...
I'll pass on that idea, especially because with the current design you actually don't have a co-op option for Heroic 2+/4 quests but instead would actually be forced to go online, try to find someone for that quest, which would prove even harder as obviously with the SWTOR's community people would rather skip the co-op quests over trying to get something organized.
The following 2 paragrphs, especially the latter one are really just interesting for one point: how you are sort of painting SWTOR as the evil Grinch...
SWTOR is a PoS MMO and no amount of new people is going to change that in a decent amount of time. The game would need an expansion pack the size of the original game to add enough MMO aspects to make it worth a damn to most players.
It IS time to face reality, SWTOR is a bad MMORPG in its current form that wont be fixed easily, its time for gamers to start demanding better quality games and stop blindly defending them just because it has some "fun" content or just conent that YOU enjoy...MMOs need to cater to a wide variety of player types to REMAIN successful.
Over the last decade and more there have been MANY bad MMORPGs.
I'm sure gamers have been whining and crying for better quality games every step of the way.
But fact is that to some degree very little has changed - and gamers just took the pacifier of new feature X (or Y or Z) being added (which then became sort of a genre norm so that half of the devs and half of the gamers actually expected that these new features be added into any new game.
The only real change was the game companies (I'm not sure that I'd want to single out Blizz here, I'm positive that other companies have in some way, shape or form also contributated!) have found the casual gamer as a potential market segment for MMORPGs.
But this is overall hardly unique and keeps happening constantly in any number of industries.
The games you people are now putting their hopes in, they pretty much also just repeat the same process: check if there is a market segment that isn't yet tapped, give gamers who cry the sugar pill of that great promise, and then just keep going as you've been.
Which is completely understandable if calls like "stop blindly defending them just because it has some "fun" content or just conent that YOU enjoy"... there is no unified front of gamers for better games.
Rather there is a milling horde of knowitalls, crybabies, conspiracy theorists, happy-go-luckies, general misers, trolls, company brand fanboys, dreamers, etc. etc. etc.
And frankly, I'm perfectly fine with it!
Because: "MMOs need to cater to a wide variety of player types to REMAIN successful" is bull! To REMAIN successful you just need to make sure that those flies you already caught don't (want to) get away.
Trying to bring in those who sit on the fence you may have to completely re-do what you are selling, which in turn may just scare of your "hooked" customers.
Putting energy into trying to win back the customer's who already bailed? Priceless... because it'll just ruin ya!
as long as some people say I should care not about what I enjoy but, I don't know, raise my arm shouting "Revolution!" just because they don't like what I like, frankly, I know I can rest in the comfort of knowing that chances may be good I'll always find a (MMO) game that I like to play.
And if that means that in order to keep "my" game running, I'll have to pay something and I consider that amount to be acceptable to me, well, guys what, you "defenders of a better MMO" can have my one-finger salute! For I'd rather be part of a niche than be in your mainstream!
Originally posted by lizardbones Yes it is. Unless she has some sort of inside track into what's happening in the servers, she is getting anecdotal information, and then making up additional information to get subscriber numbers. Just because it's "Math" doesn't make it correct. If she really is a mathematician, as in that's her job, she knows this. This doesn't mean she's wrong, it just means the methods she's using involves making up information to get a number.
They do have an inside track into what's happening in the servers. Any idiot can log in, and see how many players are in each zone for the server. Does it account for every last person? Of course not, but it gets you pretty damned close.
Face it. She's using the numbers provided by the game itself, to generate a report on those same numbers for the game itself. Doesn't get more scientific than that. It's objective data, and math. Unless the majority of players are either always on their ship, or a warzone (which btw has slow Q times most of the time), their numbers are going to reflect the population fairly accurately. As with any averaged data, it's not perfect, but it gives a good ballpark.
Do you honestly think an 'official' report on populations released by EA is going to be more accurate? The saying 'statistics don't lie, but you can lie w/ statistics' comes to mind..
That's not an inside track. She's making up numbers. She can call it "estimating" or "calculating", but she's making up numbers.
It gets a lot more scientific than that, because "science" involves actually proving what you're talking about. She can't (and by extension, neither can you). So it's not science. It's really fancy guesswork.
Again, if she's a mathematician, as in that's her job, she knows this.
Which is actually rather important though Scorpienne plays the whole thing somewhat lowkey/without background consideration.
Yes, the servers are up 24/7 (sort of).
Now, considering that you usually have one day of maintenance per week no information was given how that was taken into calculation. As no information was given.
I won't go as far as to call the researcher that dumb but, well, maybe we can have a quick runthrough to see what would hap[pen if the data had been not correctly considered: So, let's say this is how a maintenance tuesday on Server "The not cool Thing" goes: from 0:00 - 2:00 each hour on average there are 300 gamers on the server, from 2:00 - 8:00 0 each hour, obvious, from 8:00 - 24:00 again 300 on average per hour.
The average value for that day should be 300, if instead the 0 hours are also factored in you get 225. But they wouldn't do that... would they?
Next:
"This "theoretical average population" is simply an average however, and Scorpienne notes that it "underestimates the peak population and overestimates the off-peak population."" {C}
A little bit low key, ain't we?
Yes, the servers are still running (approx.) 24/7.
But (most) players won't be logged in 24/7.
They have things like jobs, family, responsibilities, in short: a life which is likely to give them a very small window to play, maybe not even every day, maybe not even every week,
Here is a simple task for you - yes, you may use your calculator.
Take a server that has 3 hours of hardcore gaming with 10,000 gamers on the server every hours. Now, let's say that the rest of the time the server flaps along on a comfy 100 gamers.
What's the average?
If you said 1337.5, well done...
if you also noticed, that this number is pretty far away the peak population and actually much closer to the off-peak population, congrats, you are a genius!
The population numbers may well be twisted completely out of relation by having it all averaged.
Now, how about we add a bit more noise cacaphony? Weekends, public holidays, gamers from one region logging in onto servers for other regions, sickness, vacation, overtime at work, bad traffic, we can create a list a mile long of things that may modify the data.
On top of which is the simple fact that we are looking here at a very narrow time window.
And, what's even worse, but has not been mentioned at all by the researcher, this time window sits perfectly fine in that very same time when a load of beta weekends were as well as D3 was released.
Question: would you judge the amount I drive my car based on those dates and times when I was actually drive a friggin' luxury rental car instead?
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying all servers are packed and everything is perfect, but even with the lowest pop server in the US (Vrook Lamar according to the calculations) and it's approx. 390 gamers on average, if that number goes up to 450 at primetime I'd think there is enough material here to get a number of fine player constellations together, whether grouping up for Heroic missions or Flashpoints or teaming up for Warzones.
If there was a fail here, I'd paint that one straight at the community's door... afterall all you gamers are supposed to be grown-ups-ish members of society, and in turn should be able to communicate with each other.
Which is supposed to mean that if you see somebody looking for a group and you are also looking for one, try coming to terms and who know, maybe this is not just you two completing each other's quest together, maybe this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship... no? ;-)
In all honesty, the makers of Rift should have gotten the franchise, it's simply a better game and the crew behind it are vastly superior, and I didnt even like Rift that much.
+1 . The Trion developers working with an unknown IP and vastly less budget created their OWN engine which blows SWTOR out of the water. Yes I know they have only a few full really popular servers the point is everything they have done is better than SWTOR in every way, PvP, End Game, group finding. Do you know in Rift if you run up to a big public group you can just hit 1 button to join that public group? The players asked for it in beta and a few weeks later Trion had an implementation of it. I doubt you'd ever see something like that in TOR.
And I agree whole heartidly about replacing the design staff. Ultimately it was one persons decision to use this game engine. Who was it? It was 1 persons decision to focus 80% of the money on story and voice acting instead of little things like maybe being able to sit in a cantina. I havent played in months can you even sit yet in a bar to get somewhat of that Star Wars feeling? One person decided combat would be fun if it included tons and tons of CC like stuns, snares ect. Who designed combat? It really does all come from the designers, not the programmers, artists or music guys but the guys with the 'vision', or lack thereof.
There is a thread in swtor forums the lady running it is a mathematician. She thinks there is 700-800 k subs with only 76k players online at one time 10% of the total population. I disagree somewhat. I think the total population is about 500k with 30% online at one time. Either way you look at it 76k spread out over 214 servers is not good, and they are still bleeding subs.
Anyway it is bad news for swtor, There is no way they have 1.3 million active subs based on all that math. Like I said I suspect 500k and dropping.
Can't see any indication that they've taken things like free time and multiple characters into account in their calculations. But may have missed it.
A month or so ago(when they were still counting the 3 month subs) I think their number would have been accurate and inline with what bioware said.
Now I think your 500k is probably closer to the mark, with a drop to below their 300-500k to cover their operating costs when the 6 month subs are up(at around the 7 month mark)
I don't believe they ever had over a mil paying monthly subs and doesn't look like they will ever manage that now.
Yes, thats what i want, the main $cash$ investors of SWTOR should replace the complete lead staff of SWTOR´s marketing and design team.
...
And there was me thinking that somebody would come up with the brilliant idea of having BW/EA hire a few squads (well, I guess actually an army-sized taskforce) and hit every single person who has cancelled their subscription to SWTOR, corral them all, and ship them off to slave away in some 3rd world mines digging for coal and diamonds and amber and whatnot.
Because: NEWSFLASH: the ones responsible are the ones who have cancelled their subscription!
Unless I'm mistaken there is still something like free will - unless I signed that away by signing SWTOR's EULA but somehow I doubt it...
So it is not BW/EA who are responsible for clicking the "cancel" button, it's the subscriber.
Yeah yeah, of course: "but it is BW/EA with their shitty game, their horrible marketing, etc. etc. who have made the subscriber leave"
Again, wrong: it is the subscriber who has made a judgment call based on how he perceives the situation to be.
It's "I think the game is bad" not "the game is bad"... but of course as the the customer is always right, the "I think the game is bad" must mean "the game is bad".
Jeez...
Anyhow, Portland, I love how in one sentence you claim that an 18 year old student would know how to save the game while in the next sentence you are making calls based on information that gives you (and everybody else) very little details.
Unless you are telling me that there is a universal "save everything" formula that you've been aware of since you were 18 (and student), or that you are only 17 (or 18 and not yet student) now, yeah, I don't know the logic is failing in your statement...
But okay, here is a hint for you to chew on: BW has a number of locations across the world.
Supposedly there are 2 that are dedicated to SWTOR: Austin and Galway.
If BW really was that panicy about SWTOR and its numbers, and actually already button everything up to get ready for the sinking of the ship, why would you layoff 100 out of ? There was an estimate number of 800 given for the full workforce that had worked on SWTOR (including voice actors) on 4 different continents.
Going with that number BW would just have laidoff 1/8th of the SWTOR crew... though with taking out the voice actors, internal rotation within BW/EA, and that Galway is home to 200 ppl supporting SWTOR, well, let's say at best there may have been 500 ppl at BioWare Austion - hey, people in this thread love throwing out funky numbers, don't mind if I do the same.
So BioWare has just kicked 1/5th of their Austin stuff... and yet they have not touched anybody in Galway?
Anybody else feels that this logic seems to be a bit off?
I mean wouldn't you try to save as much money as possible and in turn try to cut the fat wherever possible? Including Galway?
Could it be that your 18 year old student was just a bit too American and therefore failed to see past the border of the USA?
Also, there has already been word that
A spokesman released the following statement:
“BioWare has restructured its studio in Austin today. Of the employees impacted, some will be able to join other projects within EA, others will leave the company. These are very difficult decisions, but it allows us to focus our staff to maintain and grow Star Wars: The Old Republic,”
“BioWare Austin remains a large and important part of BioWare and EA, working with other studios around the world to continue to deliver a high-quality service and exciting new content for Star Wars: The Old Republic.” ?http://ugrgaming.com/2012/05/24/bioware-austin-layoffs/ )(
The part I'd stress is working with other studios around the world to continue to deliver a high-quality service and exciting new content for Star Wars: The Old Republic
Especially after seeing that BW Edmonton is actually offer positions for Character, Concept, Environment artists and programmers, especially for the SW franchise!
I mean with the base material BW now has for SWTOR, it seems a bit like "Honey, do we still need to live right next to the hardware store now that you've bought that huge tool box? Isn't it enough to know there is a hardware store in town just in case you need something that's not in the tool box?"
Anyhow, I would rather leave the running of SWTOR to the guys at BioWare than to some 18 year old student...
Yes, thats what i want, the main $cash$ investors of SWTOR should replace the complete lead staff of SWTOR´s marketing and design team.
...
And there was me thinking that somebody would come up with the brilliant idea of having BW/EA hire a few squads (well, I guess actually an army-sized taskforce) and hit every single person who has cancelled their subscription to SWTOR, corral them all, and ship them off to slave away in some 3rd world mines digging for coal and diamonds and amber and whatnot.
Because: NEWSFLASH: the ones responsible are the ones who have cancelled their subscription!
Unless I'm mistaken there is still something like free will - unless I signed that away by signing SWTOR's EULA but somehow I doubt it...
So it is not BW/EA who are responsible for clicking the "cancel" button, it's the subscriber.
Yeah yeah, of course: "but it is BW/EA with their shitty game, their horrible marketing, etc. etc. who have made the subscriber leave"
Again, wrong: it is the subscriber who has made a judgment call based on how he perceives the situation to be.
It's "I think the game is bad" not "the game is bad"... but of course as the the customer is always right, the "I think the game is bad" must mean "the game is bad".
Jeez...
Anyhow, Portland, I love how in one sentence you claim that an 18 year old student would know how to save the game while in the next sentence you are making calls based on information that gives you (and everybody else) very little details.
Unless you are telling me that there is a universal "save everything" formula that you've been aware of since you were 18 (and student), or that you are only 17 (or 18 and not yet student) now, yeah, I don't know the logic is failing in your statement...
But okay, here is a hint for you to chew on: BW has a number of locations across the world.
Supposedly there are 2 that are dedicated to SWTOR: Austin and Galway.
If BW really was that panicy about SWTOR and its numbers, and actually already button everything up to get ready for the sinking of the ship, why would you layoff 100 out of ? There was an estimate number of 800 given for the full workforce that had worked on SWTOR (including voice actors) on 4 different continents.
Going with that number BW would just have laidoff 1/8th of the SWTOR crew... though with taking out the voice actors, internal rotation within BW/EA, and that Galway is home to 200 ppl supporting SWTOR, well, let's say at best there may have been 500 ppl at BioWare Austion - hey, people in this thread love throwing out funky numbers, don't mind if I do the same.
So BioWare has just kicked 1/5th of their Austin stuff... and yet they have not touched anybody in Galway?
Anybody else feels that this logic seems to be a bit off?
I mean wouldn't you try to save as much money as possible and in turn try to cut the fat wherever possible? Including Galway?
Could it be that your 18 year old student was just a bit too American and therefore failed to see past the border of the USA?
Also, there has already been word that
A spokesman released the following statement:
“BioWare has restructured its studio in Austin today. Of the employees impacted, some will be able to join other projects within EA, others will leave the company. These are very difficult decisions, but it allows us to focus our staff to maintain and grow Star Wars: The Old Republic,”
“BioWare Austin remains a large and important part of BioWare and EA, working with other studios around the world to continue to deliver a high-quality service and exciting new content for Star Wars: The Old Republic.” ?http://ugrgaming.com/2012/05/24/bioware-austin-layoffs/ )(
The part I'd stress is working with other studios around the world to continue to deliver a high-quality service and exciting new content for Star Wars: The Old Republic
Especially after seeing that BW Edmonton is actually offer positions for Character, Concept, Environment artists and programmers, especially for the SW franchise!
I mean with the base material BW now has for SWTOR, it seems a bit like "Honey, do we still need to live right next to the hardware store now that you've bought that huge tool box? Isn't it enough to know there is a hardware store in town just in case you need something that's not in the tool box?"
Anyhow, I would rather leave the running of SWTOR to the guys at BioWare than to some 18 year old student...
Yes, thats what i want, the main $cash$ investors of SWTOR should replace the complete lead staff of SWTOR´s marketing and design team.
...
And there was me thinking that somebody would come up with the brilliant idea of having BW/EA hire a few squads (well, I guess actually an army-sized taskforce) and hit every single person who has cancelled their subscription to SWTOR, corral them all, and ship them off to slave away in some 3rd world mines digging for coal and diamonds and amber and whatnot.
Because: NEWSFLASH: the ones responsible are the ones who have cancelled their subscription!
Unless I'm mistaken there is still something like free will - unless I signed that away by signing SWTOR's EULA but somehow I doubt it...
So it is not BW/EA who are responsible for clicking the "cancel" button, it's the subscriber.
Yeah yeah, of course: "but it is BW/EA with their shitty game, their horrible marketing, etc. etc. who have made the subscriber leave"
Again, wrong: it is the subscriber who has made a judgment call based on how he perceives the situation to be.
It's "I think the game is bad" not "the game is bad"... but of course as the the customer is always right, the "I think the game is bad" must mean "the game is bad".
Jeez...
Anyhow, Portland, I love how in one sentence you claim that an 18 year old student would know how to save the game while in the next sentence you are making calls based on information that gives you (and everybody else) very little details.
Unless you are telling me that there is a universal "save everything" formula that you've been aware of since you were 18 (and student), or that you are only 17 (or 18 and not yet student) now, yeah, I don't know the logic is failing in your statement...
But okay, here is a hint for you to chew on: BW has a number of locations across the world.
Supposedly there are 2 that are dedicated to SWTOR: Austin and Galway.
If BW really was that panicy about SWTOR and its numbers, and actually already button everything up to get ready for the sinking of the ship, why would you layoff 100 out of ? There was an estimate number of 800 given for the full workforce that had worked on SWTOR (including voice actors) on 4 different continents.
Going with that number BW would just have laidoff 1/8th of the SWTOR crew... though with taking out the voice actors, internal rotation within BW/EA, and that Galway is home to 200 ppl supporting SWTOR, well, let's say at best there may have been 500 ppl at BioWare Austion - hey, people in this thread love throwing out funky numbers, don't mind if I do the same.
So BioWare has just kicked 1/5th of their Austin stuff... and yet they have not touched anybody in Galway?
Anybody else feels that this logic seems to be a bit off?
I mean wouldn't you try to save as much money as possible and in turn try to cut the fat wherever possible? Including Galway?
Could it be that your 18 year old student was just a bit too American and therefore failed to see past the border of the USA?
Also, there has already been word that
A spokesman released the following statement:
“BioWare has restructured its studio in Austin today. Of the employees impacted, some will be able to join other projects within EA, others will leave the company. These are very difficult decisions, but it allows us to focus our staff to maintain and grow Star Wars: The Old Republic,”
“BioWare Austin remains a large and important part of BioWare and EA, working with other studios around the world to continue to deliver a high-quality service and exciting new content for Star Wars: The Old Republic.” ?http://ugrgaming.com/2012/05/24/bioware-austin-layoffs/ )(
The part I'd stress is working with other studios around the world to continue to deliver a high-quality service and exciting new content for Star Wars: The Old Republic
Especially after seeing that BW Edmonton is actually offer positions for Character, Concept, Environment artists and programmers, especially for the SW franchise!
I mean with the base material BW now has for SWTOR, it seems a bit like "Honey, do we still need to live right next to the hardware store now that you've bought that huge tool box? Isn't it enough to know there is a hardware store in town just in case you need something that's not in the tool box?"
Anyhow, I would rather leave the running of SWTOR to the guys at BioWare than to some 18 year old student...
Someone needs to point the above out...you call the leaders blind and not seeing reality yet you are saying this game is good and could be a cash cow.
1. people dont leave good games in mass.
1. yes they do IF they don't like it.
There really was no point in quoting the rest of what you wrote because it was all the same derp as what I did quote.
Your defense of people not leaving good games was that they do...if they dont like it...as if someone not liking a game is still somehow good to them. durp'd'do...
I hope we shall crush...in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country." ~Thomes Jefferson
Who know? maybe there is a bigger skim on the way.
Maybe they want to devaluate the game to go free to play, or maybe they want to rebuy it for 1 symbolic dollard .
Or maybe Lucasart corporated said to wait and see because they don't want to damage the IP or they want to flame the game to name someone responsable to clean up the IP.
For sure star wars IP did bite some dust on this one.
All we can do it's just play something else, I am pretty sure that in 1 year time SWTOR will be runnig in some way profitable, with a good amount of players, the question is who's gonna get the cake ? if there is any
Someone needs to point the above out...you call the leaders blind and not seeing reality yet you are saying this game is good and could be a cash cow.
1. people dont leave good games in mass.
1. yes they do IF they don't like it.
There really was no point in quoting the rest of what you wrote because it was all the same derp as what I did quote.
Your defense of people not leaving good games was that they do...if they dont like it...as if someone not liking a game is still somehow good to them. durp'd'do...
Errr jtcgs, it may help if you try that again?!
I'm sure that I explained that a game (or movie) can be of good quality (or at least what people consider to be of good quality) - read: is good - but you still may not like it. And therefore leave the game (or the cinema... well, maybe not when you finally managed to land your arm around your girlfriend's shoulder, then even the "bestest" RomCom may be an acceptable sacrifice.
I'll not try to explain this with more examples as obviously that would potentially generate too much text (for you).
But yeah, understand what people are saying sometimes does help... right?
Originally posted by MosesZD Sigh.... You guys are so not accountants... And it's kind of cute... But then it's the war of correcting perceptions...
Sadly, most of the people on the board of directors will be fooled by that. Most of the public will be fooled by that. Most of the analysts will be fooled by that. And to the embarrasment of my profession, most of the CPAs will be fooled by that as well even though we spent years in college learning and applying the second way.... People just do not dig into the details like they should. And this lack of curiosity... Well, that's how get Ponzi schemes, Enron and all the rest. The information is there, but you have to look... And people don't...
It's not like that. No one get's fooled, but we can't do anything about it. We can't get a nice soft NERF gun and shoot at the PR guy till he stops telling this bullshit. We can only post, and not even at the offical forums. (thread get's deleted / locked - user banned)
It's not like i have any accountats interessts in SWTOR either, i'm a player and an empty server, MY empty server is all the proof i need. Player's couldn't care less if it's 400k / 900k or 1.7M overall.
SWTOR was a fail from launch: main reason is it wasn't by definition a MMO. Just a fact and how it is!
Errr... Thorbrand... and what is the definition of a MMO?
A massively multiplayer online game. A computer game in which a large number of players can simultaneously interact in a persistent world; A massively multiplayer online role-playing game
Massively Multiplayer Online. Games like World of Warcraft (aka “WoW”) where there is a persistent “world” and thousands or even millions of players can interact in different parts of it simultaneously. Many different varieties exist.
MMORPG: See Massively-multiplayer online role-playing game. ->
Massively Multiplayer online role-playing game: Whoever invented this inelegant cancer should be executed for sins against games writing. It’s horrible. Er… online roleplaying games with kerzillions of people all killing boars and stuff.
Not trying to flame but the definition of MMO is really pretty much in the eye of the beholder in regards to certain aspects. Or maybe rather one particular aspect: "massively"
I mean, we don't really have to wonder about either "multiplayer" or "online" - SWTOR can only be played online, SWTOR does have missions that are (under normal circumstances) designated to multiple players working together (Heroics 2+/4, Flashpoints, even certain datacrons ;-) ).
And yes, a lot can be played solo in SWTOR, yet, being able to play solo was never a reason for any other MMO to get "de-MMO'd".
With "massively" (or potentially better "massively multiplayer") the thing becomes, well, a huge grey zone:
I mean, if you look at the definitions listed above, there's talk of thousands or even milions (and yes, even "kerzillions") of players being able to interact simultaneously in different parts of a persistant "world".
How many games these days just run one instance of a world? One server? How many of these have thousands or even millions of players on there?
How many MMOs actually use multiple servers/instances instead? And while overall the number of gamers may make up a million (which game?), the number of gamers per server obviously falls way below that.
So, I'm sorry, as sad as the fact is that SWTOR doesn't have all streets of all planets on servers crowded with players, I don't think the numbers are that low to justify calling it an MO... ;-)
It's probably a topic that deserves it's own special category. Frankly I don't think 90% of the games being reviewed on MMORPG.com are classified as MMO's but people think if more than 100-odd players are able to log into it then even Realm of the Mad God is an MMO... which seems nutty to me.
To me if it's not like Ultima Online or SWG with large 'sandbox' elements it's just not an MMO. Why play a game with max. 50 people in an instance, I could just setup a Quake server and get the same effect. Even if the game has 1 millions subscriptions if I can only see 5-man groups and max. 50 per instance the 1 million means nothing to me...
Exactly how many players are around you does not make a MMO, MMOs are also about the social aspect and the important thing is that you see other players, not that they are in the same zone, hiding in guildhalls and houses.¨
Sure, those games are good examples of MMOs but so are M59, EQ and AC. And frankly GW2 as well, you get a lot of people around you there with the same goal as you, or the opposite. 300 players in a massive PvP battle is more than I seen in many sandboxes.
Saying that a MMO must be sandboxy just isn't fair, themeparks can be as massive as a sandbox. I like both types of games, but the important things for me is the social interactions between players. I don't hate instances but when you use to many it takes away the massive feeling of the game.
TORs problem as I see it is that it isn´t social enough. You rarely share goals with a bunch of people and work together, you mainly soloplay with an occasional flashpoint. TOR needs to change that or the game will keep dropping.
MMOs used to be driven by cooperation, instead of being just about you. I don't say that MMOs shouldn't have solocontent, but I say it needs a lot of content that makes the players work together, no matter if it is PvE or PvP.
Think about the best point you guys have had in a MMO, all mine are together with other players.
To me if it's not like Ultima Online or SWG with large 'sandbox' elements it's just not an MMO.
That doesn't even make any sense. The whole reason people created terms like themepark and sandbox was to classify and define different mmos.
So it certainly doesn't have to have sandbox elements simply to be one.
1. For god's sake mmo gamers, enough with the analogies. They're unnecessary and your comparisons are terrible, dissimilar, and illogical.
2. To posters feeling the need to state how f2p really isn't f2p: Players understand the concept. You aren't privy to some secret the rest are missing. You're embarrassing yourself.
3. Yes, Cpt. Obvious, we're not industry experts. Now run along and let the big people use the forums for their purpose.
It's probably a topic that deserves it's own special category. Frankly I don't think 90% of the games being reviewed on MMORPG.com are classified as MMO's but people think if more than 100-odd players are able to log into it then even Realm of the Mad God is an MMO... which seems nutty to me.
To me if it's not like Ultima Online or SWG with large 'sandbox' elements it's just not an MMO. Why play a game with max. 50 people in an instance, I could just setup a Quake server and get the same effect. Even if the game has 1 millions subscriptions if I can only see 5-man groups and max. 50 per instance the 1 million means nothing to me...
TORs problem as I see it is that it isn´t social enough. You rarely share goals with a bunch of people and work together, you mainly soloplay with an occasional flashpoint. TOR needs to change that or the game will keep dropping.
MMOs used to be driven by cooperation, instead of being just about you. I don't say that MMOs shouldn't have solocontent, but I say it needs a lot of content that makes the players work together, no matter if it is PvE or PvP.
Think about the best point you guys have had in a MMO, all mine are together with other players.
I think youre on to something here, but I want to expand on it saying that if the activities are not fun, they won't be fun alone or in a group. SWTOR fails because the design is not good enough for solo play nor group activities.
This is the cancer of the game because SWTOR doesn't do either one well enough.
Some games excel at solo PvE but have no PvP, others are PvP legends but have no PvE game. SWTOR does not stand out in any of these areas. It's really a repeated formula that is not outstanding in any way. It has no hooks.
Exactly how many players are around you does not make a MMO, MMOs are also about the social aspect and the important thing is that you see other players, not that they are in the same zone, hiding in guildhalls and houses.¨
Sure, those games are good examples of MMOs but so are M59, EQ and AC. And frankly GW2 as well, you get a lot of people around you there with the same goal as you, or the opposite. 300 players in a massive PvP battle is more than I seen in many sandboxes.
Saying that a MMO must be sandboxy just isn't fair, themeparks can be as massive as a sandbox. I like both types of games, but the important things for me is the social interactions between players. I don't hate instances but when you use to many it takes away the massive feeling of the game.
TORs problem as I see it is that it isn´t social enough. You rarely share goals with a bunch of people and work together, you mainly soloplay with an occasional flashpoint. TOR needs to change that or the game will keep dropping.
MMOs used to be driven by cooperation, instead of being just about you. I don't say that MMOs shouldn't have solocontent, but I say it needs a lot of content that makes the players work together, no matter if it is PvE or PvP.
Think about the best point you guys have had in a MMO, all mine are together with other players.
You make a mistake of necessitating social interaction with having many other players on yur screen.
Just one example: if theres a strong crafting system, and you need to interact with crafters, and crafetrs need to interact with many players to be successful (actually sell their stuff) that could be much more "socially interactive" than having 300 randoms on your screen even if actual crafting process is done solo from start to end.
Point is not in large numbers on your screen, its about how and why people interact with each other.
Having gear grinds is most anti-social thing in todays MMOs. It not only necessitates and encourages anti-social behaviour, it actually divides playerbase and makes them unable to group together.
Exactly how many players are around you does not make a MMO, MMOs are also about the social aspect and the important thing is that you see other players, not that they are in the same zone, hiding in guildhalls and houses.¨
Sure, those games are good examples of MMOs but so are M59, EQ and AC. And frankly GW2 as well, you get a lot of people around you there with the same goal as you, or the opposite. 300 players in a massive PvP battle is more than I seen in many sandboxes.
Saying that a MMO must be sandboxy just isn't fair, themeparks can be as massive as a sandbox. I like both types of games, but the important things for me is the social interactions between players. I don't hate instances but when you use to many it takes away the massive feeling of the game.
TORs problem as I see it is that it isn´t social enough. You rarely share goals with a bunch of people and work together, you mainly soloplay with an occasional flashpoint. TOR needs to change that or the game will keep dropping.
MMOs used to be driven by cooperation, instead of being just about you. I don't say that MMOs shouldn't have solocontent, but I say it needs a lot of content that makes the players work together, no matter if it is PvE or PvP.
Think about the best point you guys have had in a MMO, all mine are together with other players.
But isn't that a general problem these days?
In TSW I didn't feel any real motivation to team up, actually, from what I've seen very few did.
Despite the game actually being well suited for it...
maybe it's just because the Kingsmouth beta was constructed to be a less group-y experience?
On the other hand, GW2 is even worse: they completely take out the need to do any social interaction as their system is a simple "be there and you're part of the group" setup in PvE.
In PvP... well... I'm afraid that also may still need to go a long way: most EBers will just go where the action is, unless they are part of a group that has a specific task in mind e.g. stop caravan.
And these large "hordes", well, I don't know why the word "clusterfuck" comes to mind...?
Now, united as an army i.e. really organizing the attack, having a strategy, yeah... but I don't think most PUGs can be bothered with that or even the concept of asking other people to join together...
But see, the thing is that you don't really need special content to get people to play together, well, I mean it helps... but I mean there is no reason why players shouldn't be able to generate their own "RvR" match somewhere in some contested territory on some planet. Just make sure it doesn't potentially bother any gamers not interested in sharing in the event, maybe spice thing up by setting the whole thing up straight on top of a world boss, and Bob's your Auntie, you have combat socializing.
Now, of course non-combat sozializing is different... but can also be done: out of all the cantinas and other clubs, try to establish one as the "in" place where all the players can meet. Maybe even try to use a neutral place.
If cross faction channels or just at least one open channel was possible (as well as inter-faction money/item transfer) you can bet on it that over short or long you may find any number of shady dealings and usual bar fun going on: bit of brawling, bit of putting out a contract on the head of that one guy from your own faction that has been ninjaing your stuff for a week now, etc.
Of course, the classic socializing of the grand old days i.e. getting together for a wedding or a party under the stars, well, not really sure if you can interest today's gamers in such a "waste of time", afterall they only have 1.25 hrs that night to play and with queuing for PvP, well, time is tight and can't be lost on such social stuff... ;-)
Some people get very angry if an MMORPG has solo quests or stories (nevermind that it is absolutely possible to bring others into any of them). They get furious if it is possible to level to cap solo; all they see is red. They are blinded by their rage and can't register the quests, areas in the game, instances and numerous rewards that are multi-player only. PVP is also a solo activity because no one ever stops to talk about the weather or their favorite color schemes for patio furniture in them. LFG tools kill communities because they make it too easy to access too many strangers without having to share facebook profiles first.
The part I'm lost on: if they got their wishes and the only things that could be accomplished other than raiding required groups of 2-5... how would that be a MMO? Groups of 2-5 for most activities is massive?
Comments
Someone needs to point the above out...you call the leaders blind and not seeing reality yet you are saying this game is good and could be a cash cow.
1. people dont leave good games in mass.
2. the game isnt a cash cow now because of the above.
SWTOR is not a good MMORPG.
If however they would have either
A: made it F2P with a cash shop and just release expansions to buy to would be great.
or
B: Released it as a single player game with online capabilities to do group content...
Then it would have made more money.
SWTOR is a PoS MMO and no amount of new people is going to change that in a decent amount of time. The game would need an expansion pack the size of the original game to add enough MMO aspects to make it worth a damn to most players.
It IS time to face reality, SWTOR is a bad MMORPG in its current form that wont be fixed easily, its time for gamers to start demanding better quality games and stop blindly defending them just because it has some "fun" content or just conent that YOU enjoy...MMOs need to cater to a wide variety of player types to REMAIN successful.
I hope we shall crush...in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country." ~Thomes Jefferson
Wow... there are so many haters in here tooting each others' horns... it is almost pornographic.
I guess that is to be expected around here.
This game was doomed before it even released, many people on this site and other sites like this discussed how this game was destined to fade into nothingness in a short time. But we were haters/trolls at that point in time. Now most everyone finally sees the problems after 5 months????
Oh vindication is ohhh soooo sweet.
Waiting for:EQ-Next, ArcheAge (not so much anymore)
Now Playing: N/A
Worst MMO: FFXIV
Favorite MMO: FFXI
Yeah, thankfully im being a consistant hater. Been pointing out the suck since Beta and its as much the fault of the community as it is Bioware. Blind fanboys defending, blind haters just hating and not being constructive...and nothing being noticed by Bioware because of the divided community.
If faboys would stop thinking that just because THEY are enjoying whats there that it doesnt mean everyone should either be quite or that what they want doesnt count.
And if haters would be flipping constructive with what they think is missing or wrong and work together...
Game makers would take notice. It has worked in the past...hell it even worked once with SWTOR and that THING they called a cooldown update...the boards lite up with everyone complaining about it and they had an update to change it in a few days.
WORK TOGETHER...we all want the same thing in the end...a better game.
I hope we shall crush...in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country." ~Thomes Jefferson
1. yes they do IF they don't like it. Assuming that you have a girlfriend and that she loves RomComs how many movies have you gone and watched with her only to roll your eyes when she told you this was the best movie, like, ever?
2. is SWTOR a great cashcow? That would depend on how you define cashcow...
Obviously with over 2 Mio copies sold shortly after release, yeah, I'd say that SWTOR has brought in quite a good chunk of cash.
Is that cow now still giving as freely milk as it was a) upon release thru subscriptions, or b) thru box sales?
The answer is no for both... which is hardly surprising as with just about every game I've seen the sale number drop shortly after the initial release (everybody who wants it has bought it - is the same for DVD, CDs, etc.) and the resale price is usually also cut vendors.
Now, what about the subscriptions? This is the "problem" with material that is based on prominent IPs: you don't really have much chance for a sleeper! I mean of course, somebody who may now catch the SW movies for the first time ever may go and say "hey, what PC games for SW are out there?" and then find out about SWTOR and buy it.
But in general you should not expect any late-comers: if you are a SW fan, you will have given it a try already.
The best concept would be to go with word of mouth, to assume that something in SWTOR will pull people in not for the IP but for the feature/design/etc.
"SWTOR is not a good MMORPG"?
This is probably as close to wrong as you can get!
If you'd said MMO, yes, I would have found that easier to agree...
but as SWTOR actually does offer 8 indepth character stories you can play, it very much does qualify as an RPG.
Is it "Online"? Yes
Is it "Multiplayer"? hm... I'll put it this way: to the same degree that GW2 and TSW will be.
Is it "Massively"? hm... SWTOR doesn't use a persistant corral system, which means that why gamers are there (on the same server), they are just spread out over different locations: planets, cities, zones, Fleet.
Go outside this corral zones in other games annd you'll quickly see similar results where people are less likely to accidentially run into each other. L2 GoD is a perfect example: drop into the starting village and your FPS would drop to a crawl due to all the people there.
Leave the training/tutorial zone you were quick to get better FPS as the number of people around you declined leaving you rather quickly all to yourself.
And important question may also be at what point "Multiplayer" actually switches over to "Massively Multiplayer"?
Considering that in the golden days of MMORPGs FPS multiplayer games were run with around 8 to 16 characters (players and bots) on average... with 32 probably still as the usual norm these days, I'd say any number of 50 - 60 playser "together" so sharing the same server, yeah, I think "massively" may well be acceptable. But I don't think there is an official definition for thatr term.
A: made it F2P with a cash shop and just release expansions to buy to would be great.
or
B: Released it as a single player game with online capabilities to do group content...
Neither of the 2 is a smart move, actually they would have been rather dumb moves:
Going F2P BW would have completely lost the money from the box sales.
And considering that people would have reacted just the same to the story-driven setup for SWTOR as they did now, the result would a steady decline in micro transactions. Which, to be honest, would have been few anyways... I mean with the state of SWTOR right now, the only micro transactions I could think of would be purchasing access to specialty vendors (i.e. security key) and potentially the choice morsel of swapping class companions.
though obviously due to class companions entering thru the class story line, this would actually have required a complete re-design of the stories to either make short term "track jumping" possible i.e. the Smuggler suddenly swoops to Hutta to get the chosen 1st companion, or it would have to have been more of a visual swap where at his core Corta still remains himself, except that "he" now looks like Vette.
Which is sort of close to what BW has already included, except of course that the change options are limited.
Again, the simple matter of having to re-work the story lines for a not small part comes to mind...or would you think that Corto flitting with a female Smuggler would be the basis of same-gender romance just because "he" is now in Vette's body?
No, maybe purchasing an additional companion to replace an unlocked one then?
I could see that for buying droids... but considering that also living beings would have to be traded via a (basically) slavemarket, I'm not sure how well BW would react to establishing this on Republic side... though there is of course always Nar Shaddaa...
Your second suggestion - singleplayer with co-op content...
I'll be honest, it's been really long since I've played singleplayer games that offer such co-op modes.
But to me they always taste of gameports from consoles.
Which I personally wouldn't even remotely be interested in...
I'll pass on that idea, especially because with the current design you actually don't have a co-op option for Heroic 2+/4 quests but instead would actually be forced to go online, try to find someone for that quest, which would prove even harder as obviously with the SWTOR's community people would rather skip the co-op quests over trying to get something organized.
The following 2 paragrphs, especially the latter one are really just interesting for one point: how you are sort of painting SWTOR as the evil Grinch...
SWTOR is a PoS MMO and no amount of new people is going to change that in a decent amount of time. The game would need an expansion pack the size of the original game to add enough MMO aspects to make it worth a damn to most players.
It IS time to face reality, SWTOR is a bad MMORPG in its current form that wont be fixed easily, its time for gamers to start demanding better quality games and stop blindly defending them just because it has some "fun" content or just conent that YOU enjoy...MMOs need to cater to a wide variety of player types to REMAIN successful.
Over the last decade and more there have been MANY bad MMORPGs.
I'm sure gamers have been whining and crying for better quality games every step of the way.
But fact is that to some degree very little has changed - and gamers just took the pacifier of new feature X (or Y or Z) being added (which then became sort of a genre norm so that half of the devs and half of the gamers actually expected that these new features be added into any new game.
The only real change was the game companies (I'm not sure that I'd want to single out Blizz here, I'm positive that other companies have in some way, shape or form also contributated!) have found the casual gamer as a potential market segment for MMORPGs.
But this is overall hardly unique and keeps happening constantly in any number of industries.
The games you people are now putting their hopes in, they pretty much also just repeat the same process: check if there is a market segment that isn't yet tapped, give gamers who cry the sugar pill of that great promise, and then just keep going as you've been.
Which is completely understandable if calls like "stop blindly defending them just because it has some "fun" content or just conent that YOU enjoy"... there is no unified front of gamers for better games.
Rather there is a milling horde of knowitalls, crybabies, conspiracy theorists, happy-go-luckies, general misers, trolls, company brand fanboys, dreamers, etc. etc. etc.
And frankly, I'm perfectly fine with it!
Because: "MMOs need to cater to a wide variety of player types to REMAIN successful" is bull! To REMAIN successful you just need to make sure that those flies you already caught don't (want to) get away.
Trying to bring in those who sit on the fence you may have to completely re-do what you are selling, which in turn may just scare of your "hooked" customers.
Putting energy into trying to win back the customer's who already bailed? Priceless... because it'll just ruin ya!
as long as some people say I should care not about what I enjoy but, I don't know, raise my arm shouting "Revolution!" just because they don't like what I like, frankly, I know I can rest in the comfort of knowing that chances may be good I'll always find a (MMO) game that I like to play.
And if that means that in order to keep "my" game running, I'll have to pay something and I consider that amount to be acceptable to me, well, guys what, you "defenders of a better MMO" can have my one-finger salute! For I'd rather be part of a niche than be in your mainstream!
If you have actually looked at the thread http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=449144 combined with the article on the project http://www.shacknews.com/article/73961/report-average-old-republic-server-has-less-than-350-players you may notice that we are talking about averages here for the servers based on hourly numbers taken over the last 2 weeks..
Which is actually rather important though Scorpienne plays the whole thing somewhat lowkey/without background consideration.
Yes, the servers are up 24/7 (sort of).
Now, considering that you usually have one day of maintenance per week no information was given how that was taken into calculation. As no information was given.
I won't go as far as to call the researcher that dumb but, well, maybe we can have a quick runthrough to see what would hap[pen if the data had been not correctly considered: So, let's say this is how a maintenance tuesday on Server "The not cool Thing" goes: from 0:00 - 2:00 each hour on average there are 300 gamers on the server, from 2:00 - 8:00 0 each hour, obvious, from 8:00 - 24:00 again 300 on average per hour.
The average value for that day should be 300, if instead the 0 hours are also factored in you get 225. But they wouldn't do that... would they?
Next:
"This "theoretical average population" is simply an average however, and Scorpienne notes that it "underestimates the peak population and overestimates the off-peak population."" {C}
A little bit low key, ain't we?
Yes, the servers are still running (approx.) 24/7.
But (most) players won't be logged in 24/7.
They have things like jobs, family, responsibilities, in short: a life which is likely to give them a very small window to play, maybe not even every day, maybe not even every week,
Here is a simple task for you - yes, you may use your calculator.
Take a server that has 3 hours of hardcore gaming with 10,000 gamers on the server every hours. Now, let's say that the rest of the time the server flaps along on a comfy 100 gamers.
What's the average?
If you said 1337.5, well done...
if you also noticed, that this number is pretty far away the peak population and actually much closer to the off-peak population, congrats, you are a genius!
The population numbers may well be twisted completely out of relation by having it all averaged.
Now, how about we add a bit more noise cacaphony? Weekends, public holidays, gamers from one region logging in onto servers for other regions, sickness, vacation, overtime at work, bad traffic, we can create a list a mile long of things that may modify the data.
On top of which is the simple fact that we are looking here at a very narrow time window.
And, what's even worse, but has not been mentioned at all by the researcher, this time window sits perfectly fine in that very same time when a load of beta weekends were as well as D3 was released.
Question: would you judge the amount I drive my car based on those dates and times when I was actually drive a friggin' luxury rental car instead?
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying all servers are packed and everything is perfect, but even with the lowest pop server in the US (Vrook Lamar according to the calculations) and it's approx. 390 gamers on average, if that number goes up to 450 at primetime I'd think there is enough material here to get a number of fine player constellations together, whether grouping up for Heroic missions or Flashpoints or teaming up for Warzones.
If there was a fail here, I'd paint that one straight at the community's door... afterall all you gamers are supposed to be grown-ups-ish members of society, and in turn should be able to communicate with each other.
Which is supposed to mean that if you see somebody looking for a group and you are also looking for one, try coming to terms and who know, maybe this is not just you two completing each other's quest together, maybe this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship... no? ;-)
+1 . The Trion developers working with an unknown IP and vastly less budget created their OWN engine which blows SWTOR out of the water. Yes I know they have only a few full really popular servers the point is everything they have done is better than SWTOR in every way, PvP, End Game, group finding. Do you know in Rift if you run up to a big public group you can just hit 1 button to join that public group? The players asked for it in beta and a few weeks later Trion had an implementation of it. I doubt you'd ever see something like that in TOR.
And I agree whole heartidly about replacing the design staff. Ultimately it was one persons decision to use this game engine. Who was it? It was 1 persons decision to focus 80% of the money on story and voice acting instead of little things like maybe being able to sit in a cantina. I havent played in months can you even sit yet in a bar to get somewhat of that Star Wars feeling? One person decided combat would be fun if it included tons and tons of CC like stuns, snares ect. Who designed combat? It really does all come from the designers, not the programmers, artists or music guys but the guys with the 'vision', or lack thereof.
PvP Comparison of roughly equivelent #'s
Rift PvP 20v20: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUvotIrixjk
TOR PvP 30v30: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aD77Of014WM
Can't see any indication that they've taken things like free time and multiple characters into account in their calculations. But may have missed it.
A month or so ago(when they were still counting the 3 month subs) I think their number would have been accurate and inline with what bioware said.
Now I think your 500k is probably closer to the mark, with a drop to below their 300-500k to cover their operating costs when the 6 month subs are up(at around the 7 month mark)
I don't believe they ever had over a mil paying monthly subs and doesn't look like they will ever manage that now.
LOL. Brilliant satire.
i dont think so....
Then it's even funnier.
Seems people are cancelling subs as we speak: http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=466113
There really was no point in quoting the rest of what you wrote because it was all the same derp as what I did quote.
Your defense of people not leaving good games was that they do...if they dont like it...as if someone not liking a game is still somehow good to them. durp'd'do...
I hope we shall crush...in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country." ~Thomes Jefferson
Who know? maybe there is a bigger skim on the way.
Maybe they want to devaluate the game to go free to play, or maybe they want to rebuy it for 1 symbolic dollard .
Or maybe Lucasart corporated said to wait and see because they don't want to damage the IP or they want to flame the game to name someone responsable to clean up the IP.
For sure star wars IP did bite some dust on this one.
All we can do it's just play something else, I am pretty sure that in 1 year time SWTOR will be runnig in some way profitable, with a good amount of players, the question is who's gonna get the cake ? if there is any
Diablow 3, it sucks ...
Errr jtcgs, it may help if you try that again?!
I'm sure that I explained that a game (or movie) can be of good quality (or at least what people consider to be of good quality) - read: is good - but you still may not like it. And therefore leave the game (or the cinema... well, maybe not when you finally managed to land your arm around your girlfriend's shoulder, then even the "bestest" RomCom may be an acceptable sacrifice.
I'll not try to explain this with more examples as obviously that would potentially generate too much text (for you).
But yeah, understand what people are saying sometimes does help... right?
SWTOR was a fail from launch: main reason is it wasn't by definition a MMO. Just a fact and how it is!
It's not like that. No one get's fooled, but we can't do anything about it.
We can't get a nice soft NERF gun and shoot at the PR guy till he stops telling this bullshit.
We can only post, and not even at the offical forums. (thread get's deleted / locked - user banned)
It's not like i have any accountats interessts in SWTOR either, i'm a player and an empty server, MY empty server is all the proof i need. Player's couldn't care less if it's 400k / 900k or 1.7M overall.
Errr... Thorbrand... and what is the definition of a MMO?
MMORPG: See Massively-multiplayer online role-playing game. ->
Massively Multiplayer online role-playing game: Whoever invented this inelegant cancer should be executed for sins against games writing. It’s horrible. Er… online roleplaying games with kerzillions of people all killing boars and stuff.
Not trying to flame but the definition of MMO is really pretty much in the eye of the beholder in regards to certain aspects. Or maybe rather one particular aspect: "massively"
Exactly how many players are around you does not make a MMO, MMOs are also about the social aspect and the important thing is that you see other players, not that they are in the same zone, hiding in guildhalls and houses.¨
Sure, those games are good examples of MMOs but so are M59, EQ and AC. And frankly GW2 as well, you get a lot of people around you there with the same goal as you, or the opposite. 300 players in a massive PvP battle is more than I seen in many sandboxes.
Saying that a MMO must be sandboxy just isn't fair, themeparks can be as massive as a sandbox. I like both types of games, but the important things for me is the social interactions between players. I don't hate instances but when you use to many it takes away the massive feeling of the game.
TORs problem as I see it is that it isn´t social enough. You rarely share goals with a bunch of people and work together, you mainly soloplay with an occasional flashpoint. TOR needs to change that or the game will keep dropping.
MMOs used to be driven by cooperation, instead of being just about you. I don't say that MMOs shouldn't have solocontent, but I say it needs a lot of content that makes the players work together, no matter if it is PvE or PvP.
Think about the best point you guys have had in a MMO, all mine are together with other players.
That doesn't even make any sense. The whole reason people created terms like themepark and sandbox was to classify and define different mmos.
So it certainly doesn't have to have sandbox elements simply to be one.
1. For god's sake mmo gamers, enough with the analogies. They're unnecessary and your comparisons are terrible, dissimilar, and illogical.
2. To posters feeling the need to state how f2p really isn't f2p: Players understand the concept. You aren't privy to some secret the rest are missing. You're embarrassing yourself.
3. Yes, Cpt. Obvious, we're not industry experts. Now run along and let the big people use the forums for their purpose.
I think youre on to something here, but I want to expand on it saying that if the activities are not fun, they won't be fun alone or in a group. SWTOR fails because the design is not good enough for solo play nor group activities.
This is the cancer of the game because SWTOR doesn't do either one well enough.
Some games excel at solo PvE but have no PvP, others are PvP legends but have no PvE game. SWTOR does not stand out in any of these areas. It's really a repeated formula that is not outstanding in any way. It has no hooks.
Survivor of the great MMORPG Famine of 2011
You make a mistake of necessitating social interaction with having many other players on yur screen.
Just one example: if theres a strong crafting system, and you need to interact with crafters, and crafetrs need to interact with many players to be successful (actually sell their stuff) that could be much more "socially interactive" than having 300 randoms on your screen even if actual crafting process is done solo from start to end.
Point is not in large numbers on your screen, its about how and why people interact with each other.
Having gear grinds is most anti-social thing in todays MMOs. It not only necessitates and encourages anti-social behaviour, it actually divides playerbase and makes them unable to group together.
But isn't that a general problem these days?
In TSW I didn't feel any real motivation to team up, actually, from what I've seen very few did.
Despite the game actually being well suited for it...
maybe it's just because the Kingsmouth beta was constructed to be a less group-y experience?
On the other hand, GW2 is even worse: they completely take out the need to do any social interaction as their system is a simple "be there and you're part of the group" setup in PvE.
In PvP... well... I'm afraid that also may still need to go a long way: most EBers will just go where the action is, unless they are part of a group that has a specific task in mind e.g. stop caravan.
And these large "hordes", well, I don't know why the word "clusterfuck" comes to mind...?
Now, united as an army i.e. really organizing the attack, having a strategy, yeah... but I don't think most PUGs can be bothered with that or even the concept of asking other people to join together...
But see, the thing is that you don't really need special content to get people to play together, well, I mean it helps... but I mean there is no reason why players shouldn't be able to generate their own "RvR" match somewhere in some contested territory on some planet. Just make sure it doesn't potentially bother any gamers not interested in sharing in the event, maybe spice thing up by setting the whole thing up straight on top of a world boss, and Bob's your Auntie, you have combat socializing.
Now, of course non-combat sozializing is different... but can also be done: out of all the cantinas and other clubs, try to establish one as the "in" place where all the players can meet. Maybe even try to use a neutral place.
If cross faction channels or just at least one open channel was possible (as well as inter-faction money/item transfer) you can bet on it that over short or long you may find any number of shady dealings and usual bar fun going on: bit of brawling, bit of putting out a contract on the head of that one guy from your own faction that has been ninjaing your stuff for a week now, etc.
Of course, the classic socializing of the grand old days i.e. getting together for a wedding or a party under the stars, well, not really sure if you can interest today's gamers in such a "waste of time", afterall they only have 1.25 hrs that night to play and with queuing for PvP, well, time is tight and can't be lost on such social stuff... ;-)
Some people get very angry if an MMORPG has solo quests or stories (nevermind that it is absolutely possible to bring others into any of them). They get furious if it is possible to level to cap solo; all they see is red. They are blinded by their rage and can't register the quests, areas in the game, instances and numerous rewards that are multi-player only. PVP is also a solo activity because no one ever stops to talk about the weather or their favorite color schemes for patio furniture in them. LFG tools kill communities because they make it too easy to access too many strangers without having to share facebook profiles first.
The part I'm lost on: if they got their wishes and the only things that could be accomplished other than raiding required groups of 2-5... how would that be a MMO? Groups of 2-5 for most activities is massive?
Bye Bye Georg Zoeller...... i hope some importand people read my post before acting
throw them all out and start over..