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Attn. - SOE Haters, Blizzard Haters, EA Games Haters, Turbine Haters, etc
reavo
Member Posts: 2,173
I've read a lot from people downing SOE, Blizzard, EA, Turbine, and other gaming companies on these forums for the way they run their business. And I'm not saying you're right or wrong. I'm just curious about something.
If you could create the perfect MMO company how would it be? This isn't an exercise in creating something that can't be viable and make money either. After all, that is the lifeblood of the company, so keep that in mind. You've got to keep a successful, lucrative, and customer pleasing company. So, how would you do it?
If you could create the perfect MMO company how would it be? This isn't an exercise in creating something that can't be viable and make money either. After all, that is the lifeblood of the company, so keep that in mind. You've got to keep a successful, lucrative, and customer pleasing company. So, how would you do it?
Comments
I hate people that hate on the haters.
=====Dedeko
I play DDO and for me it´s the best mmo i can find, no grind, best quests on market...
Turbine have done well on their games, see AC, people complain about DDO, because it isnt another WoW.AC2 they had 200 online players at prime time, that is why they closed this game.
People complain about companies, because they got baned, or saw some change in their game they didnt liked.
People forguet that Devs are humans, most gamers are kids, people that have a real job, knows how some things work, this games have lots of people, is truly hard to have all players hapy.
I would not take my cashcow big name franchise mmo and completely revamp it twice in 8 months with little or no input from the playerbase, and strategically announce one of these total system makeovers a week after thousands of subscribers have just shelled out $30 to preorder a digital download of new expansion and tell the players that it will go live in 2 weeks.
But, that's just me, can't speak for everyone.
Secondly, I wouldn't spread myself too thin. Blizzard is a great example of this. WoW has been out just about as long as EQ2 and there isn't even one expansion pack or anything for people to buy other than the game, while EQ2 already has... 3 expansion packs that I can think of and more than a few adventure packs, all of which cost money. This I guess is good for SOE to a point, becuase it keeps people's cash flowing into their hands, but really, I honestly think it hurts them in the long run. I can go out and spend... 40 bucks? on WoW and get the full unadulterated experience, while if I go out and get EQ2, I have to spend another 90 bucks or so just to be able to go to the same places with any friends I might make, and that's if I spend the extra couple of bucks a month for the SOE super scammer plan so I can get the adventure packs and the like for free. This also gives people the perception that the WoW expansion pack isn't just another update that's going to cost them money, it's a friggin EVENT. People will talk about it and plan their weekends around it... it'll probably make records in sales and beat the latest PS3 mugging to the top of the news headlines. SOE's latest expansion pack is just another everquest expansion, ooohhh, now I can go to frumundacheeze! Wooooo!
Thirdly, I'd listen to my customers, but always with a grain of salt, and if they want something a certain way and I can't or won't do that for them, I'd tell them why. I don't think it's necessary for the subscribers to know every inch and minute little algorithm for the game's mechanics, but I think design choices and alterations are something that should be explained so that they can at least attempt to see it from the developer's point of view, as well as let them know that, while they may not always get what they want, The Company is not ignoring them.
Along those same lines, I think it's important to realize the difference between the numbers and what is really going on. Here is a story, again, from SWG, but hey, what do you want. My wife played SWG since the game was launched. Even continued to play for the year I was deployed in Iraq. So, she wasn't just playing to spend time with me, she actually enjoyed the game. The entire time she played, she dabbled in creature handler. It was her favorite thing to do in the game and made all the other stuff she HAD to do to make money more interesting because she could do it with her pets. A lot of the people I knew in the game were creature handlers at some point, and my brother in law went out and purchased not only his first MMO, but his first game worthy PC because he was a huge star wars nerd and wanted to "Live the Adventure." He was a creature handler as well. None of them ever mastered it because they played the game to socialize and roleplay and just goof off and have fun. When SOE came out with the NGE and removed creature handlers, saying that there was a "a very small percentage of players with MASTER Creature Handler." My wife and her brother spend a bazzilion hours in that game NOT leveling up because they were having fun with their pets. Also, the class was so buggy that the only people that even stuck with it were people like them, who were primarily social gamers and didn't grind things out or anything. So, numbers wise, SOE's decision made sence, from a certain point of view. No one cared enough to master the proffession, no one must care enough to have it in the game. The problem is that by removing one of the things that social gamers did, they removed all those subscibers, subscribers who are probably the easiest to take care of because all they need is a glorified chat room most of the time. I think the numbers in that situation didn't reveal the whole story about how much GAMEPLAY would be lost by removing the proffession. I don't know if they didn't listen to their subscribers or didn't care or were just more conserned with the numbers than the truth, or maybe it was a database issue or soemthing, but no matter what, it was a huge mistake that many old fans of the game didn't take too kindly too.
I really think that the best think an MMO company can do for themselves is make games that they want to play and will continue to enjoy playing, or, as a publisher whathaveyou, hire people to make games that THEY want to play and continue to play. I think it's horrible for a MMO to lose any member of it's development team to other projects. If a team is crafting something from their hearts, something that they want to share with other gamers who share a similar taste in games, than the loss of that team can have a huge impact on the overall life of the game. MMOs have to have a soul, they have a life that the developers and the subscribers breath into them and I think that's something that the bigger names in MMO development don't understand. SOE to me is the worst at this, but that's just because SWG was so great to me and to a lot of my friends, both on and off line, that to see what they did to it was just beyond torture, and I don't think that a group that developed the game would have been able to make a design desicion like that.
I don't think that caring for your customers or caring for your games hurts the bottom line and I think more developers should get into developing a MMO for the love of the art more so that the love of the money, which I think is going to become increasingly difficult in the coming years. Production costs have skyrocketed and the chace for the little guy to make something to actually compete and be innovative is quickly falling by the wayside. Maybe in another coupld of decades we'll see the cost of games go down, or the acceptance of them rise so that we can have independent games just like we have independent films today. Yeah, a lof of them may be overly pompous garbage, but at least they innovate and drive the industry forward. You think EA is going to innovate? Sony? Sony can't even design a controller without ripping off nintendo, how are they going to build the next great MMO? EA can't realease a game without some way to tie it in to all their other games, or charge you for cheat codes. I don't think their evil in any way. To be evil would require a soul.
1W/3L
Oh wait, LOTRO isn't out yet...
~PD
www.TheChippedDagger.com My 90-day 2D Java MMORPG project
They that can give up essential liberty for temporary safetey deserve neither. -- Ben Franklin
If opportunity doesn't knock, build a door. -- Milton Berle
AC is the only game Turbine has done well with. AC2 was rushed to market so Turbine could get another check. Why do you think only 200 people played it during prime time? Because it was a god awful game. Did you even play it?
As for DDO I am glad you like it, but you are in the minority as it is struggling. I was a big Turbine fan as AC is still one of my favorite MMO's to date but they messed up 2 MMO's in a row and I dont think they will do much better with LoTR.
1st and foremost, i'd make a game with an already stable IP so i can save $ on ads and reel in hardcore players from the start. 2ndly, i'd follow everything CCP does... this is not to say EvE is godly, this is to say it's innovative, and unique, and has a niche in the market no other game can fill, as well as the devs seem to break rules and cliches, (i.e. they have how many people are logged on in their login menue, no other game has this that i know of, or they have a single server), i'd also take an IP that focased on something other than the fantasy genre (i can't see how much longer dragons will be "cool" >_>)
staying away from how i'd design a game into more how i'd run the company, i would put a huge investment into PR, probably have a system that pre-CU SWG had, where they'd elect a member of the community for each proffession to actually make frequent contact with devs and report back what they can to the forums. it was free for SoE and it bridged the community with the developers.
the end product would be a niche game, with a steady community that after a certain point i'd be hard-pressed to enlarge, but also it would be inconceivable that i'd actually follow the trend of most MMOs and lose people after launch (EvE, WoW and L2 are the only MMOs i know of that break this trend, where they actually gain members at a steady rate)
in my ideal game, player politics and economy play a large role, therefore forces like goldfarmers and bots which oppose my ideals would be hard to find, not only because i'd put an effort to lay down the law, but also because it would be a niche game, which tends to not attract as many as the 800-lbs gorillas like WoW (don't get me started on L2 bots... my god...)
i'd run a company, not a corporation, my goal would be to make a successful game, not drive home the $. my goal would be to be my favorite company, just like if i was in a band, i'd want to be my favorite, if i made a... i don't know chair... i'd want it to be my favorite, i realize this will not pull in nearly 7million people, but it will pull in enough people so that i can sit on a very concrete and loyal player base that would only leave if i SERIOUSLY fucked up.
i don't like blizz much anymore, i hate SoE, EA annoys me too.
You cant do that, not on this planet.
Imagine you are the boss, and you demand all the things you said on your topic to your employs.
You start to lose subs because you have done a patch that most of the childish players didnt liked.
Your content director, starts doing more fast , bugy content to get subs back because you get ungry whith him.
Players dont like bugs, and you are messed.
Games dont get bad, players are the cause to their destroction.
SWG vets say SWG pre CU was the best game around, at that time SWG was rated by players on this site by 6.9-7.0 , there was so many people complaining they wanted a change, so sony changed the game.Now they have changed, people complain they have changed.
Haters = kids i dont waste my time with them, i just play te game i have fun
There is already pretty perfect company: CCP (EvE-Online). Only what they are missing is some hot nordic chicks and occasionally they servers are bit "sick". (WARNING: Soon Beatnik59 is coming to this thread and tell how bad CCP is
What I want from company:
... and I fully agree with krispydemon and his comment.
"I know I said this was my last post, but you my friend are a idiotic moron." -Shadow4482
I feel the grind in most Online RPGs is far too restrictive. It usually ends up being in one area. And that is pretty ridiculous. But I feel an RPG has to have the grind. The original RPG's in the industry had grind in them, that was practically all they were. (i.e Beginning of Final Fantasy Series on NES and Gameboy, SNES RPGs, Genesis RPGs.) I think taking the grind away actually just makes the game too easy because then all you have to do is progress the story and nothing else.
There must also be a lot of character customization. This goes down to physical appearance to class and race options. I have to give credit to the Everquest series on that one. They made sure you had a lot of option to choose from when it came to making your character. Lots of classes equal many different kinds of parties in the game. When there are only a few classes to choose from in the game on a couple of them seem to be used. Guild Wars comes to mind when it think of shortage of classes. In the end game people tend to either be Warriors, Necromancers, or Monks. Not to say the other classes aren't used but you see more of those mentioned than anything else. And then parties start becoming biased on what can be used in certain situations. So if there a lot of classes parties tend to be less biased about what classes can come with them.
Crafting skills similar to WoW are something of a tricky situation. Because adding in crafting all the items crafted, be them weapons, armor, or whatever, will be ignored unless they require a master craftsmen to craft them. So if if the best sword a person can craft is a Dragon Sword +2 no one is going to care about anything but that Dragon Sword when buying things, so all swords before the Dragon Sword +2 will be useless to most people. So crafting is then taken over only by the hardcore players. And anyone else who might not have the time to put in to be a master Swordsmith won't be able to make any significant profit being a swordsmith.
The idea of Craftin skills is good and can be very useful in a game but you have to take into account that the hardcore players will take over this part of the game and everyone else will pretty much be shut out.
There must also be a Balance to the game. This balance goes to every class and race as well. Now obviously A Warrior will do more melee damage than a Wizard would, but that is not unbalanced, each class just has a specialization that makes it unique from the other classes. A lot of people in MMORPG don't like so much balance, especially when it comes to World of Warcraft. But you must also understand that if such a balance did not exist MANY players would simply ignore some classes. If a Warrior could just dominate melee and no other class could ever come close to it then any other class that relied on melee attacking would be ignored because only Warriors would be able to get into groups where melee damage is needed. Because why would you take a knight who has moderate melee damage and moderate physical defense when you could take a Warrior who could deal twice as much damage as the knight? Parties would become severely biased in who they chose to take on quests and adventuring because some classes would be useless because other classes comepletly dominate things.
Guild Wars is a good example of such a bias. A Ritualist is a great healer, if used in the right hands. I've seen Ritualists out do monks in the way of healing a party. But most people refuse to take a Ritualist healer because a Monk is the "Natural Healer" and can heal for more HP at a time so taking a Ritualist isn't as good. This is also an example of bias that comes from few classes to choose from.
All in All Many MMORPGs try and come up with their own system. When most of the time mixing elements from many games would be the most beneficial. It just seems to make a really great MMO it takes a lot of development time. Most companies aren't willing to invest a lot of time because business' just want to make money so they take a year or two for dev time and put out a game they think people will like rather then taking 3 or 4 years for development. Look at Final Fantasy X, that game was not made in a year or even 2 years. They began that project as soon as Final Fantasy 8 was released in 1999. So the game took 3 years to make and look at how good it was. (I personally did not like it very much but most people would agree that is was indeed amazing.)
Oh and as long as customer support was absolutly amazing most people would probably like the game anyways haha.
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By far the company that has done the most to try to accommodate players to find a group is Blizzard in WoW. The find system they have is the most top notch. But I want to go even further than what they have done. I don't want it to be any work for someone to get in a group quick, easy, and get going playing.
I tried out DAoC and quit for that reason alone. They have lot's of content, a ton of neat things to do, but you try like hell to get people to team up with you to no avail. Not to pick on just DAoC, because almost all the other games are the same way.
It may take a bit of thought on how to organize the land, events, activities, and progression. But I'm pretty sure a game could be made that let's the players do what they want to do. Team up and PLAY the damn game.
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Too often MMORPG make a player start the game and play solo for the first 10 to 20 levels and then whole end game is Party party party. I think if the game switched and made the beginning VERY party oriented rather than solo oriented then the end game might prove to be a bit more fun.
There is already pretty perfect company: CCP (EvE-Online). Only what they are missing is some hot nordic chicks and occasionally they servers are bit "sick". (WARNING: Soon Beatnik59 is coming to this thread and tell how bad CCP is
What I want from company:
... and I fully agree with krispydemon and his comment.
Well said, agree on everything. SICK and TIRED of shitty customer service; vague, poor and lack of communication in particular. It's a lame trend in the games industry. Why can't they get through their heads people want honesty, clearness and want regular news on what the company is working on. Do you know it will actually help sales if you're reputation is good and will help you keep exisiting customers happy and more inclined to buy your next product. And I'm SICK and TIRED of games released in a shoddy, unexceptable state. When you buy a game you expect it be polished, to run smoothly and be relitavely bug-free. Just like any other product you buy. I'm tired of them continually getting away with the "release now patch later" mentality that's so rampant. It's plain wrong, something needs to change.
See, now that's kind of cool I guess, but what about the adventure packs? Do you get those as well? If so, than fantastic, otherwise, while better than having to go out and get them all, it still leaves a bit more to spend just to get everything.
Also, to the guy who made a comment about SWG and the players being the reason the game was changed and subsequently failed, I half agree with you, but go into any MMO game's forums, whether the game has been out five years of five days and you will have people compaining about some aspect of the game. If developers did everything that everyone wanted, there wouldn't even be enough structure left to even call it a game. People think that for the monthly expence they have to put up with, they should get exactly what they want, and that's just not possible. It'd be a black hole of code, sucking in everything good and right in
the world and only leaving behind the scraps that EA get exclusive
rights to. As far as te complaining in SWG goes, asking for bug fixes so people won't be locked in the basement of their PS hall or making it so that certain skills actually work is not cause to basically wipe out an entire game and make it anew. Yeah, there are people out there that probably prefer SWG the way it is now, after the NGE. Hell, even if there are MORE people playing the game now and SOE is making more money off the product, they've still pissed off all the people that liked it before, and that will hurt them later as their reputation (what little they may have had at this point) has been forever maimed in the eyes of those original subscribers. To me, it ends up being one of those situtions like when some dude cheats on his wife, and then his mistress gets all shocked and surprised down the road when he does it to her. Basically, what SOE did there was say that they didn't care about their current player base and only wanted to make money.
daoc pvp(seiges weapons,stealth climb walls,take out landmarks for buffs etc) - with no bots
all the best gear available through either pve or pvp
gear equal to both of those available through crafting
devs recognising that putting a +9 million damage sword in the game
means casters need a +9 million damage staff(not 27 seperate items that
= 9 million)