[Interview] Das Tal: No Disrespect Meant Towards ArcheAge

SBFord

Last week, the guys behind the indie sandbox MMO Das Tal stirred the MMO community pot by comparing their game to XLGAMES and Trion Worlds’ ArcheAge, pointing out that AA has had a rocky start and vowing to do better by the player with their own game. The statements from David Wells really struck a nerve within the MMO-verse, and we reached out to him and colleague Alexander Zacherl to comment more on the comparison and their own game’s design.

Read more of Bill Murphy's Das Tal: No Disrespect Meant Towards ArcheAge.

Nanfoodle

Ya kinda turned me off when developers start knocking other games.

hasho83

Well i gona at least try Das Tal coz they wont do the AA mistakes!Keep doing what your doing mr.Zacherl

RudedawgCDN

I have been hoping for a long time for someone to come a long and recognize that there were a lot of good concepts about Shadowbane.

We need a good pvp game similar to EVE, but not as a space mmo.

OhhPaigey

This sums it up quite nicely imo. 

As soon as any game studio starts mentioning other games, comparing them side by side in their own blog post, and then writes down why they do better.. that's meant to be disrespectful, it's meant to start drama, and make your unpopular game, popular, sorry. That's how it is. AA is a million times more popular than Das Tal will be, ever, period.

When you call out a game as much as they did, you can't take what you said back, it's just, unprofessional, it makes you look like somebody who just wants to stir up drama for your bad game, which is exactly what they did. And now they write some more long paragraphs just to waste everybody's time indirectly explaining how they wanted more hype for their game, didn't mean what they said in the first place, ect, ect. Bleh..

This is the text book definition of backpeddaling. And it's absolutely great to see. I won't be supporting Das Tal one bit lol.

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And I don't even like AA, I played it for 30 minutes and quit.

Dauzqul

Did AA have a rocky start? Yes. A rocky start is an understatement.

I don't see a problem here.

mgilbrtsn

Originally posted by hasho83
Well i gona at least try Das Tal coz they wont do the AA mistakes!Keep doing what your doing mr.Zacherl

How do you know that.  You never know until a game launches.

Wizardry

Originally posted by Nanfoodle
Ya kinda turned me off when developers start knocking other games.

Not me,it is 100% better if they start calling out each other's crap and start forcing the genre to improve.If you have a B rated game and they kiss ass to each other then next time you get C rated and they still tell you how great their games are.

The gaming industry is no different than retail stores,they pop up price matching but make sure to not have the same items as the next  store so it matters not.

The developers know every single aspect of game design,so they are the ones that could best improve the genre,they know what each developer is doing lame or not doing enough of.Reader's usually don't believe forum people so they like to hear from the actual developers.

Problem is that every single one of them are building half ass games,barely 50% of a true mmorpg,so if they call out one guy they get called out as well.

IMO as long as they all keep quiet and continue ass kissing,it tells me they are all giving us their slack effort.

Instead of always seeing ass kissing interviews,i want devs to start telling us exactly what they are doing better than the other guy,ya down play WOW tell us why you put more effort into your game than Wow or AA or whatever.

OH btw,,if you think it is disrespectful ,how about games that sell you a product w/o letting you try it,that doesn't happen in the real world.It is far more disrespectful to the gamer's who pay for these games if nothing but ass kissing comes out.

OhhPaigey

Originally posted by Wizardry

Originally posted by Nanfoodle
Ya kinda turned me off when developers start knocking other games.

Not me,it is 100% better if they start calling out each other's crap and start forcing the genre to improve.If you have a B rated game and they kiss ass to each other then next time you get C rated and they still tell you how great their games are.

The gaming industry is no different than retail stores,they pop up price matching but make sure to not have the same items as the next  store so it matters not.

The developers know every single aspect of game design,so they are the ones that could best improve the genre,they know what each developer is doing lame or not doing enough of.Reader's usually don't believe forum people so they like to hear from the actual developers.

Problem is that every single one of them are building half ass games,barely 50% of a true mmorpg,so if they call out one guy they get called out as well.

IMO as long as they all keep quiet and continue ass kissing,it tells me they are all giving us their slack effort.

Instead of always seeing ass kissing interviews,i want devs to start telling us exactly what they are doing better than the other guy,ya down play WOW tell us why you put more effort into your game than Wow or AA or whatever.

OH btw,,if you think it is disrespectful ,how about games that sell you a product w/o letting you try it,that doesn't happen in the real world.It is far more disrespectful to the gamer's who pay for these games if nothing but ass kissing comes out.

Okay, well I've played the alpha and this is a D rated game at best. And the only reason it's a D is because they actually invite people who sign up to their newsletter, unlike so many other founder pack games currently.

I agree that in theory, game devs calling each other out is a good move for us, it's not for them. You never want to burn bridges when you can, because money & jobs are involved.

What Das Tal did though, is call somebody out, then take it back, which is even worse imo than not calling anybody out, ever. Because then it feels like everything I've read in their blog post, or interview here is a big waste of time. And the same is true in their future posts.

I also dislike how companies are selling dreams instead of games, but it's the new fad, and people seem to love it, and people love throwing their money away rofl.

brihtwulf

So, what we have here is basically a top-down 2D version of Shadowbane.  And, we think that's a good idea?

This game is only going to attract the kind of players whose sole goal in a game is to grief others.  Full loot just creates roaming packs of gankers who want to take advantage of other people, and there are no rules in this game to prevent griefing, or any other sort of player-harassing behavior.

This game isn't ArcheAge, and they probably shouldn't stick their necks out there comparing themselves to it.

Fearum

Originally posted by DMKano
Why not quote what was Das Tal devs really said about ArcheAge "I, like a lot of others, have come to the conclusion that ArcheAge is probably one of the worst MMOs to come out recently" - that is what was said. This entire interview is backpedaling.

I have to agree with him. Its an opinion and he is allowed to have his own just like you do on thinking its the best game.

lugal

So the devs for Das Tal have no backbone. Chickenshits

Mitara

Interesting question : 

If you can be a fan of Archeage and play it a lot, do you really have what it takes to be a MMO good designer?

Dauzqul

Originally posted by DMKano
Why not quote what was Das Tal devs really said about ArcheAge "I, like a lot of others, have come to the conclusion that ArcheAge is probably one of the worst MMOs to come out recently" - that is what was said. This entire interview is backpedaling.

It's actually a fantastic game. However, Trion has completely destroyed it with their p2w shop.

Battlerock

I like it when devs openly bash another game, they are the professional with an actual eye for critiquing their peers. Please by all means point out the flaws of the competition. This could turn into additional revenue for your game, especially if your game is of great quality.

Talonsin

Originally posted by DMKano
Why not quote what was Das Tal devs really said about ArcheAge "I, like a lot of others, have come to the conclusion that ArcheAge is probably one of the worst MMOs to come out recently" - that is what was said. This entire interview is backpedaling.

/agreed.  If you think Archeage is crap, that is ok and many folks agree, but for petes sake stick to your guns.  Now these guys look even worse.  I sure hope the game has a backbone because the developer sure seems to have lost his. 

Razeekster

People shouldn't blame Trion for AA's payment model. It's pretty obvious they have zero control over how the game is micromanaged. Just look at two of their other games, Rift and Trove. Both payment models are more than fair for F2P players. AA's payment model is all due to the greed of XL Games (or whatever the company is called).

angerbeaver

Originally posted by Razeekster
People shouldn't blame Trion for AA's payment model. It's pretty obvious they have zero control over how the game is micromanaged. Just look at two of their other games, Rift and Trove. Both payment models are more than fair for F2P players. AA's payment model is all due to the greed of XL Games (or whatever the company is called).

Is this supposed to make Trion look better? They put their name on something and when they did that they said "We acknowledge how this will work". So they are just as much to blame. they agreed to how much control, or lack thereof, over the game they are charging money to buy things on.

If anything it makes them look more incompetent as a business to stamp their name on it, charge people money for items, then shrug their shoulders and point at XLGames

 

 

shalissar

who cares

an online version of minecraft would be more appealing than that steaming pile of dog crap archeage

but you know, good on whales for having a fun time. i'd wish you soft landings in the remorse department but it seems like that's actually required to be a whale in the first place so meh.

rawfox

This statement will be forever on their shoes.

.. and would i be an apple, i would not say i can be applepie that easy.

Mom will remember, im sure^^

Konfess

“It's equal footing for everybody.”  Alex, does that include non-spending gamers (P4F)?  Because spending gamers don’t complain about P2W.  They simply P2W.

hasho83

Originally posted by mgilbrtsn

Originally posted by hasho83
Well i gona at least try Das Tal coz they wont do the AA mistakes!Keep doing what your doing mr.Zacherl

How do you know that.  You never know until a game launches.

Well good sir im following Das Tal (and many other games),watching clips and stuff,and i pray for miracle,coz i cant stay in any of the new games more than 2monts ;(. I buyed 3new MMOS in 2014 and ressubed on 2that i have stopped but i'm disappointed from every game i play.So i dont rly care who,but please some one just make the game most of us are waiting for(just put sub on it,dont do any p2w stuff).

Foomerang

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Originally posted by Nanfoodle
Ya kinda turned me off when developers start knocking other games.

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Yep. That's the main reason I disregard GW2

Dullahan

"Themepark MMOs (especially in the post-WoW era) have massively segregated players into tiny manageable instances, distracted them with quest chains and shiny baubles and did everything in their power to prevent people from actually interacting with each other in a meaningful way. We don't enjoy that kind of gameplay at all."

Well said!!!

Regardless of what the focus of an MMORPG is, these are words of wisdom that developers should hearken to if they want to create a compelling, long term experience for players.

SomeHuman

I think Das Tal's true competitors are more along the lines of Albion Online and Shard's Online.  I will say the early combat videos I've seen of Das Tal's (even with not so great animation) crush the experience I'm having in Albion Online combat and what I experienced in Shard's Online combat.  For that reason alone, I hope this title does well.  As for what was said about AA, many people think it is a horrible MMORPG, and many people have said it.  This just happened to get picked up.  It is drawing attention to their game.  Good for them.  I think it would be more outrageous if the comments on AA were more misplaced.

Seelinnikoi

This game will be Vaporware(™).

Wait and see...