DAOC, Aion, UO, Rift, AO, Age of Conan, SWG, Vanguard, SWTOR, WarHammer, FFXI, ect

VicusEQ

Following the GLOWING path with ARROWS in the likes of Everquest, EQ2, WoW classic, Lord of the Rings Online, City of Heroes, Linage II, and even Rift Prime as short as it lasted and make a classic/progression server of any of these games!  The MMORPG genre is stale right now with no fun games in sight for the next 2-4 years (My opinion obviously).  So take your already completed code, adjust it (yes it will take some work..but nothing like building a new game) to back as close as you can get to when you launched.  Advertise that you are creating a progression server (don't do just classic, release expansions slowly over time), make a few welcome back packages to sell (29.99, 59.99 and 79.99) and either make it buy to play with maybe a 5.99 sub that gives bonus xp or make it a 14.99 sub with no Buy to Play and watch the profits come in.

City of Heroes came back and had 10's of thousands of players come back on a emulated server.  They seem to be close to buying the IP and have 2000+ people online during peak hours because of their playerbase.  They launched for FREE.  EQ/EQ2 have been pushing on progression servers for the last 6 years and it is what is keeping the game alive.  WoW Classic just made as much if not more then a normal WoW expansion does for blizzard.  Lord of the Rings online launched a legendary server and the game has funding now to push expansions and a legit player base again.  Rift Prime made a lot of money on a cash grab for a year with Rift Prime (gamigo is just bad for MMO's)...they took it down and now are failing...so just don't take it down (that seems easy). But they are doing the samething with Archeage and apparently will be successful at it again, even thou their track record.  Why?  Because people want the games the love to succeed, even if it's OLD!

Greedy developers jumped onto the Battle Royal cash wheel like they were buying tickle me Elmo dolls for Christmas, how hard is it to see that classic/progression servers are the way to go right now.  Stop messing around and re-release these older games we all have a history with and want to play again.  In the process you can make a quick million or two from our addictive needs.  Yes I know Vanguard/SWG/Warhammer no longer are active but the IP is owned by someone, throw a supported license IP up and watch how stupid you feel after a month of launched that you didn't do it sooner.  Aion, DAOC, UO, AoC, AO you guys just have no excuse.  You have a fan base that threw money at games like Camelot Unchained, Darkfall, Legends of Aria, Astellia/Bless because they wanted to have that feeling like they did when they played UO, DAOC, Aion but can't find it anymore in the games because the playerbase is empty or the game is a shell of itself.

Even if you have zero funding to support this just make a kickstarter and let us get you on your way.  Someone just gave 2 million to an old creator of UO to start a new MMO.  Pantheon has made millions to support their game Pantheon because it's going to be the closest thing to Everquest original since...EQ.  Fracture MMO took in a lot of funding just because it has a UO feel.  Heck, Project 99 and Dawn of Light (DAOC) player emulators on launch had more players on their first month then on the real live servers.

How many signs do you need to make it more obvious for you.  We aren't asking you to leave these servers up for 10 years.  Just launch a supported legit registered IP server for the next 2 years and see where it goes from there.  There is no way you don't make a profit and it gives the players what they want until the MMO genre finally creates something new and good for the community (Maybe MMO VR?  Who knows). 

In the words of Shia Labeouf;

Just Do It

KnightFalz

VicusEQ said:

City of Heroes came back and had 10's of thousands of players come back on a emulated server.  They seem to be close to buying the IP and have 2000+ people online during peak hours because of their playerbase.  They launched for FREE.

CoH had a rabid fan base frothing at the mouth for a return of the game as soon as the official servers closed. Most were still dripping at the chin when servers available to all opened. Factor in that there are not many superhero MMORPGs with each quite different to the others, and that CoH itself is quite different from many MMORPGs in general, it is no surprise to those familiar with the game that the homecoming to it would be so massive.

I don't know if many of the games you mentioned would be similarly primed for that success.

Hengist

Isn't bringing back old games kind of the definition of stale? Been there and done that?


Mostly a trip down memory lane, rather than a hope for any lasting success.

DafAtRandom

Hengist said:

Isn't bringing back old games kind of the definition of stale? Been there and done that?


Mostly a trip down memory lane, rather than a hope for any lasting success.

I disagree.  Look at all the single player RPGs that are getting a remake/remaster/re-release.  There is a market for it, there is demand for it, but it has to be done right.

dekkion1

i have played all those games ..............BUT havent you guys heard.

all good things must come to an end....and nothin good last 4ever!!!!1

even tho i still play ESO  FF14..and i check on wow every blue moon.

there  has nothin good  been released yet to date.

and ya know what they say you cant play an mmo by yourself...

try queing for a dungeon on a dead ass server.

soooo with that being said.... just  for  right now eso,  and ff14 an wow...is just it for now.

we will see what 2020 brings.   virtual reality will be in full swing soon....

but these new game developers i dunno man. they were all good from 97 to 2011

but just latley they suck.

Po_gg

VicusEQ said:

Aion, DAOC, UO, AoC, AO you guys just have no excuse.

Khm... scratch AoC off that list, it already had 2 timed progression events, and before the games on your positive list too - ok, except EQ, they're clearly the first in this movement, and years before it became popular.

ed: On a second thought, I ain't sure about Prime's launch, maybe that was before AoC too, or around the same time.

Kyleran

Hengist said:

Isn't bringing back old games kind of the definition of stale? Been there and done that?


Mostly a trip down memory lane, rather than a hope for any lasting success.

Have to agree, as it turns out I've changed some over the years along with fact since I play so few games meaning dozens if not hundreds of good games to try one day there just isn't any value in do-overs, at least for me.

Sovrath

Kyleran said:

Hengist said:

Isn't bringing back old games kind of the definition of stale? Been there and done that?


Mostly a trip down memory lane, rather than a hope for any lasting success.

Have to agree, as it turns out I've changed some over the years along with fact since I play so few games meaning dozens if not hundreds of good games to try one day there just isn't any value in do-overs, at least for me.

To me it's like revisiting a movie or book. There's always time for past games. 

alkarionlog

DafAtRandom said:

Hengist said:

Isn't bringing back old games kind of the definition of stale? Been there and done that?


Mostly a trip down memory lane, rather than a hope for any lasting success.

I disagree.  Look at all the single player RPGs that are getting a remake/remaster/re-release.  There is a market for it, there is demand for it, but it has to be done right.

single player is not the same as a MMO, sometime people buy the remake just for nostalgy and then leave in a corner, you can't compare a sp who at most you will spend 10-20 hours, with a MMO who you will spend over 50 a month.

CoH have a rapid fan base because, lets get real here, how many super heroes/villains games are out there? with the whole gay uniforms, and over powered move sets? none I can remember, so it hit a huge niche, for DC and Marvel peeps, who we know the very own DC online was not as good

also lets get real on the op list most games the very own devs killed they games, the ones who still keep they essense is so outdated, the only reason someone would play was for nostalgy and they would leave later

Vermillion_Raventhal

Rather just pick up threads of old games and continue making new ones as if WoW didn't exist

DrunkWolf

Conan could pull it off, their graphics are still good for todays market. they would have to tweek some stuff for sure, but the game now is better than it was at release. there just isnt any population. the free to play model is just garbage.

alkarionlog

DrunkWolf said:

Conan could pull it off, their graphics are still good for todays market. they would have to tweek some stuff for sure, but the game now is better than it was at release. there just isnt any population. the free to play model is just garbage.

taht is a given, take notice of one little thing, most games died hard, after they did go for f2p, but the money milked was higher, since some people are addicteds to the game they alone support said game

VicusEQ

The key will be getting rid of the F2P models of games like Aion/AoC/Daoc/AO ect.  Archeage is revamping their business model to give the players that they wanted (we all hope), these older games can as well.  Aion for example was 100% at it's best when Abyss was the faction vs faction killing area with flying combat ect.  Soon as they dropped an expansion that changed the PVP to ground combat only the game slowly started to die (along with other reasons). There are 100's of post on the aion forums about this and another 100 about players wanting to come back for a classic server.  That is just one game.  The fanbase is there.  Sovrath said it best, there is always time to go back and visit the classics.

Vanguard is another one.  The finished product of the game (years later) was one of the better games on the market when it came to diversity and content, but by then the players had moved on from one if not THE worst launch in history.  I played that game at launch and was the second cleric to reach 50 on the server (guildy was 1st).  No joke at level 30 there was only about 15 quest and had to grind to 40 by mobs.  At 40 the mobs didnt even cast spells, they only meleed.  I would be fighting NPC mages and they would be meleeing me.  At level 50 the named mobs didn't have a loot table.  They would disappear and drop zero loot.  You could also charm the town NPCs and use them to kill anything in 1 hit.  Was ..crazy but kinda fun lol.  But 2 years later the game had a full quest line, side quest, dungeons, raids, loot table ect.  If that game launched it would of been a different story.  ....So why not try it for round two (Daybreak...maybe?)

p4ttythep3rf3ct

As much fun as I had playing EQ and SQG back in the day, it'd take some serious graphical updates to get me to go back...I think.  That said, Im playing Classic right now and the graphics dont bother me.

Theocritus

I logged into EQ1 about a month ago and I think they had around 8-10 progressive servers.....It amazes me that people want to start over so much.

Utinni

Most of these games have quality private server scenes. Servers that don't wipe or get CnD'd constantly like WoW private servers. Some have been around for a decade.

ultimateduck

A DAoC revamp would be the best.

Phaserlight

VicusEQ said:

 (Maybe MMO VR?  Who knows).

Already played one in 2016:

Po_gg

DrunkWolf said:

Conan could pull it off, their graphics are still good for todays market. they would have to tweek some stuff for sure, but the game now is better than it was at release. there just isnt any population. the free to play model is just garbage.

As said above, they already did, and with pretty good results (at least on Zath, the pvp-focused Saga was just a moderate success).

But that's just progression servers, I doubt they will ever do a "Classic" attempt, and for a reason... AoC's launch (same goes for AO) was a trainwreck.

Even if current gear (quad-core CPUs are basically the bare minimum today, and even the low budget GPUs are good enough) would eliminate most issues originated in performance, original AoC still had plenty of bugs, missing content, etc. 

Not to mention the fixes were random over the time, so it's really hard to pick a time where you set the "vanilla" state. Even the expansions were chronologically all over the leveling course, I can't even think on any other game where an expansion actually "expanded" the middle of the game, fixing the content draught of those level ranges

For AoC the progression approach is the best, since the game's current state is pretty good. I don't think there will be a third one though, they've pretty much abandoned the game, even removed the CS which is a clear telling sign - when you wait for a ticket respond for 3-4 months, just to see it was closed without even a solution, is disheartening.

ed: maybe it's the coffee's fault https://forums.funcom.com/t/halloween-event-2019/88924?page=2

Adamantine

Hengist said:

Isn't bringing back old games kind of the definition of stale? Been there and done that?

Indeed, if you want to be cool, you cannot possibly play a game thats older than three months.

A well designed game isnt an archievement of any kind.

People dont still play games that are hundreds of years old, like chess or skat.

Why do I even know the names of such games. Must be a misfunction of the matrix.

Reaver4525

Pretty much only MMO I'm waiting for atm is Camelot Unchained but I have a feeling its never going to see release. Til then I stick to single player RPGs (Dragon Age, witcher, etc). I played SWTOR for years but finally had enough of that game for all times to come.