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A Quote from Brad McQuaid
delete5230
Member EpicPosts: 7,081
Here is a quote from Brad McQuaid himself,found on the Home page of https://www.pantheonrotf.com/
So, God-willing, the Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen team and I will be able to make or allow that magic to happen a third time, and it too will be not just a great game, but also that catalyst again that brings people together, sometimes out of their comfort zone, learning how to work together not just tactically in a virtual world but also socially in the real world. Its why we're not afraid to make a game with a target audience who enjoys grouping and being part of a team, even if that turns other potential players off. It's really the only kind of MMO I want to be involved in and it's why we're going to stick to our guns and try to re-capture that magic again. Honestly, nothing else appeals to me -- I want to always be part of creating 'more than a game' and then, after release, to personally be part of that community as well
- catalyst again that brings people together
- sometimes out of their comfort zone
- learning how to work together
- target audience who enjoys grouping and being a part of a team
- It's really the only kind of MMO
End Quote
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This reaches into the minds and heart's of the true mmo player. A Virtual World.
For this to happen, the game world MUST NOT BE DISJOINTED with modern social tools that give a false sense of community. With modern social tools, its just another game on a long list. No matter how well the game is made graphically, coded, advertised, large, enjoyable the game will turn out the same as all others made since the classics.
Modern social tools sound nice on paper. They work very well for a month or two. Then again any style works for a month or two. However the final out come is always the same. What's left are the few that decide to call the game home no matter what !
You may ask yourself why would anyone " call a game home no matter what " ? The answer is simple, they have an allegiance to there inner social Guilds. 99.999% of players don't have this allegiance. Because of modern social tools they will never attain this allegiance in a game with a Dungeon Finder, or Cross Realm Technology.
The above quote from Brad McQuaid is strong. Let's all hope he is using insight and not just nice words.
Comments
Never in my life had I put anyone or anything on a pedestal. No one is better than anyone else. Sports, politics, work nothing.
A short little story, I was out shopping one day and I encountered this guy wearing NFL Pittsburg Stealers sweatpants and jersey with a bean and cheese dip stain on his side, he was a somewhat heaver guy with a nice smile.........I asked him " do you play for the Stealers ". He blushed and responded with " No I just enjoy watching "............I make it a point to never be a person like this !
However I can say I'm counting on two guys to make things right.
Donald Trump, and Brad McQuaid, I hope neither lets me down.
Boobs are LIFE, Boobs are LOVE, Boobs are JUSTICE, Boobs are mankind's HOPES and DREAMS. People who complain about boobs have lost their humanity.
Ah.... Your one of them back woods people that come down to the big city to cause trouble, and take our women
I agree with everything except the "magic for a 3rd time" part. Vanguard was awful, there was nothing magical about it. The sooner the team comes to terms with this the better Pantheon will be. That doesn't mean there isn't some good ideas to take from VG but for the most part they should distance themselves as much as possible.
The idiots raving about how good VG was are the definition of "vocal minority." The servers were bled down to one shortly after launch then had to go F2P due to lack of players again. I played VG at launch and shortly before it's end and it was equally bad both times, just for different reasons.
That's the thing, he's targeting that vocal minority, as stated in his quote. The big question is whether they can survive on the subs / sales of another game like EQ or Vanguard? I had a love / hate relationship with both EQ and Vanguard, where the hate eventually won out. I'd love to see a more casual, but just as detailed and deep version of both. I'm tired of developers thinking casuals must be simple and brainless.
Proud MMORPG.com member since March 2004! Make PvE GREAT Again!
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Brad McQuaid
CCO, Visionary Realms, Inc.
www.pantheonmmo.com
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Just wanted to make a couple of points with some real data.
EQ peaked at 550k players and made over a half a billion in profit for Sony, while costing $8M to develop. And the game is still running, with the rumor that there are still at least 50,000 subscribers. Now, these numbers may not compare to WoW, they are most certainly not niche. In fact, EQ was (and probably still is) the most profitable venture Sony has ever experienced.
Vanguard we had to launch 6+ months early. So even though the game sold around 250k boxes in a very short amount of time, most people couldn't play the game because the framerate/performance was abysmal. I'm not going to re-hash all of the reasons, but I will say lessons were learned. We're not going to let something like that happen again. That said, for those players who stuck around, or returned later, after the client had been optimized, almost always credit Vanguard as one of their favorite games. Even though they had to play in underpopulated shards, making grouping and community development difficult indeed.
Also, since then, WoW (and to some extent a few other MMOs) have exposed millions and millions of people to MMOs.
My point is simply this: of the millions and millions of MMO players, we are very confident that a sizable subset of them will be attracted to the type of gameplay and world we are creating. And because we are not spending hundreds of millions of dollars to build Pantheon, we don't need millions of players. In fact, hundreds of thousands would make the game hugely successful. Could we 'survive' on sub/sales that EQ brought in? Absolutely -- in fact, we would be, from our perspective, fantastically successful. And Vanguard? If 250k players try out Pantheon, and we don't screw up and the game is actually ready to be played and playable, we would also be enormously successful.
Again, if you spend hundreds of millions of dollars to make an MMO then yes, you do also require millions and millions of players to subscribe, or buy the game, or monetize through cash shops in order to be successful. But the reality is that you don't need to spend anywhere near that kind of money. Instead, you can focus on making a game for a solid target audience and have a successful product with far fewer players. You don't have to beat WoW. You don't have to spend SWTOR development costs. You don't need to try to make a game that is all things for all people. Rather, you need to choose a viable target audience and make a really good game for them.
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Brad McQuaid
CCO, Visionary Realms, Inc.
www.pantheonmmo.com
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I think if one is going to create an MMO where grouping is important, where socializing is important, where community is important, and where content and game mechanics are designed to be 'sticky' and keep players attention for months, even years, then yes, you need to do what you can to help foster in-game relationships. You need to help players with similar tastes and playstyles find each other so they can become friends. You need to make it so groups are not too difficult to organize and put together. You need to create an environment that doesn't impede socializing and interaction.
That said, it has to be done right and with the goal that you're helping bring people together so that they can form relationships that last for weeks, months, even years. For example, simply creating functionality that allows several people to easily come together, form a group, zip through a dungeon with little to no need to communicate, and then disperse doesn't cut it. Sure, you technically helped 'find people to do a dungeon', but that's really about it. If the player doesn't need to interact with the other players, they're not making friends, and community is not being built. If there isn't some downtime for people to chat about RL, you're not creating an environment where real friendships are going to form.
So yes, MMOs need to help people come together. But they need to do it in meaningful ways that result in people finding friends and a community emerging from all of the interaction.
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Brad McQuaid
CCO, Visionary Realms, Inc.
www.pantheonmmo.com
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I appreciate Pantheons game philosophy and once you have shown me you can deliver these tenents I will back your game. I wish you all the success.
I plan on backing this game also, I'm not rich but if a donation to keep one or two devs working for a day or two...I'll gladly do it !
Besides, I need my EQ / Vanguard fix
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Ok, judging from a few responses here. It looks like we may have a good social structure for Pantheon. This coupled with all other features will finally have an MMO. It's been a long time
I've been watching many Youtubes in the last few hours and the game is shaping up, but could be too early to get excited. I'll be supporting this game in the near future, it's just a matter of when would be a good time, that I'll have to decide.
It's kind of sad, I may not have anything else to complain about.....What do you recommend I do now ?
Physically meeting potential party members do have advantages after all. Let potential groups get a table at the tavern, you could even make it so that hovering over the table will show you what the group want to do.
Having everyone just spamming the general chat or the local one in the main city suck, but it must be possible to make finding a group slightly more fun.
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Brad McQuaid
CCO, Visionary Realms, Inc.
www.pantheonmmo.com
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