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Darkfall: History repeating itself?
I would first like to make a disclaimer to the effect that the following is meant in no way to be inflammatory or trolling. I hope most people can remain civil and give their insights into the issue…
I have begun to see a trend on these forums in which people are starting to compare Darkfall to an ill-fated development that many of you may have heard of. Namely: Dark and Light.
I came onto the MMO scene pretty late, and my knowledge of the whole DnL debacle is limited. Therefore, I thought it was time to educate myself and see if the comparisons people are drawing have any basis whatsoever. What I discovered really surprised me.
To cut a long story short, I had a quick scour through the posts on the DnL forum from way back in ’04 to today. What I saw there was an almost carbon copy of the posts that are being made about Darkfall. Secretive development, lack of Beta updates, confusion over Beta invitations and entry, delays, dates that keep changing and of course the raging Fanboy Vs. Troll war.
I can’t help but find these comparisons rather disturbing in their similarity. The only real difference I can see is that the DnL developers were quite heavy-handed in their moderation of their forums (although there are of course rumours of this happening at Forumfall).
I noticed a lot of staunch supporters of DnL have long since disappeared (bar one or two who I’ve since seen making pro-DF posts) and wonder whether they left MMORPG.com in shame after the true nature of DnL was revealed.
I am curious to see whether anyone here remembers the DnL fiasco first hand, and can offer a better insight into whether they feel the development of DF is going down the same path and it’s not just my paranoia going crazy.
Try and keep this flame-free, folks. 
EDIT as of 16.1.07: Looks like the comparisons are starting to becoming disturbingly similar with recent events...
Comments
i was wrapped up in the whole dibacol that was DnL. It was going to be an open world with pve/pvp, player cities, keepts, etc -- the whole shabang, just like Darkfall, except for full looting. After seeing that and experiencing it first hand, I'm pretty confident that Darfall is going to be the same.
I followed DnL a little before release, and I can think of at least one major difference - DnL made people pay to get into beta/head start 'pioneers' thingy, had pre-orders and life subscription options before the game was even feature finished.
They knew they had a bad game, and tried to scam people to recoup some of their costs. Until Aventurine do the same thing (ask for money before open beta/release) they aren't in the same league as DnL.
The really big debacle was the early release. DnL came out wiht some sort of Settlers of Garenth release, or whatever it was called. Basically, you could buy the beta and start playing the game before an actual release.
It was so horrible, that lots of these early adopters screamed for their money back, and a lot of them got it.
It was all downhill from there.
But yes, the followers of DnL before release sounded just like Darkfall fans. I'ts going to be the best game ever, and anyone that says different is a troll, etc., etc.
Nah, DnL was never as hyped as DF is..
______________________
Give a man some fun and you entertain him for a day. Teach a man to make fun and you entertain him for a lifetime.
/end thread
I was interested in DnL at first but became disgusted when they said beta characters would not be wiped past a certain level. That kind of unfair advantage is something I won't tolerate in a MMOG.
Also someone else mentioned the settler preorder where those folks could start playing before retail customers. Another unfair advantage I won't tolerate in a MMOG I choose.
Darkfall isn't into preorder and collector's edition gimmicks to make a few extra bucks while ruining the game by destroying a level playing field.
DnL also suffered from bad publicity surrounding the theft of the terrain software.
I also don't recall DnL having produced so much ingame footage as Darkfall has to date.
Yeah they share some things in common, we've all noticed it. I'm not going to say that DF will be another dark and light (it was a distaster that I can't see being topped in fact its still going on in courts). Not to say that I believe all the hype about massive pvp battles with combat like oblivian, to me thats a pipe dream if you consider latency its just not feasible.
Its funny I play a game that currently has a pseudo real time model to it with mmo elements. Its basically as close to real time combat as you can get with mmo elements and you know what I find funny about it? Even with the game simply being 8v8 latency is a huge issue at times. Now take that 8v8 and multiply it by 50 and tell me that the game won't be a slide show with latency issues. They claim they have tested but honestly until they have that first GIANT battle with people from various regions of europe or the usa whichever you prefer they really can't say for sure how the engine will handle the delay and the lag associated with massive battles.
Would I love DF to be a giant success for those that like a open world pvp game sure, I myself would love the game if it delivered on all the promises. Problem is every mmo makes alot of promises pre beta etc and many times they can't deliver on a majority of them.
That's the thing when a game seems to good to be true often it is. In darkfalls case yeah it is hidden and secretive, does that doom the game to a Dark and Light future? only time will tell I guess.
Nah, Darkfall isn't repeating DnL's history, Darkfall is repeating their own history. forums.darkfallonline.com/showthread.php
Tried: LotR, CoH, AoC, WAR, Jumpgate Classic
Played: SWG, Guild Wars, WoW
Playing: Eve Online, Counter-strike
Loved: Star Wars Galaxies
Waiting for: Earthrise, Guild Wars 2, anything sandbox.
/end thread
Was DnL really a scam from the beginning though? I get the impression that originally their intentions may have been genuine (despite the questionable ethics surrounding the engine) and their eventual scam was simply a contigency plan to recoup money that they knew they would never gain through consistent subs.
I don't mean to cast aspersions on Aventurine, but speaking hypothetically, if they pulled a similar trick knowing they had a bad game on their hands and it couldn't be delayed any longer, I wonder how many people would fall into the same trap again. Perhaps even those who had suffered at the hands of DnL.
/end thread
Was DnL really a scam from the beginning though? I get the impression that originally their intentions may have been genuine (despite the questionable ethics surrounding the engine) and their eventual scam was simply a contigency plan to recoup money that they knew they would never gain through consistent subs.
I don't mean to cast aspersions on Aventurine, but speaking hypothetically, if they pulled a similar trick knowing they had a bad game on their hands and it couldn't be delayed any longer, I wonder how many people would fall into the same trap again. Perhaps even those who had suffered at the hands of DnL.
DnL was never intended as a hoax or scam. They licensed the Big World Tech engine, which wasn't cheap. Then they built their own software to generate the terrain.
That was one of their "features". The idea was no dev team could economically construct such a big world by hand, so they built software that would auto-build the world, but give it a hand crafted look, rather than just a big cut and paste world.
And of course all the other vague "features", it's a world not a game, players can do what they want, yadda yadda.
DnL is the reason I am keeping my distance from Darkfall. I had high hopes for DnL, and was a very vocal supporter of it. I wanted it to succeed.
I learned my lesson, and it will take more than some pretty screenshots and videos to make me drool. I want Darkfall to succeed, but that's about the most support I'll give it. When/if it releases, I'll give it a shot.
I think the settlers of Garenth was the 10,000 free beta keys, I got one but they all went in a few minutes.
It was the pre order to get the dragon mount as well as early access that people paid for I believe.
The silly thing about the whole “Aventurine have not asked for money yet “ excuse , is they obviously will ask for money at some time, so its rather fallacious.
If the game really is launching this year , they will be asking for money in a few weeks.
Its almost a tacit admission that they are similar or the same in many respects apart from this one condition.
People used the very same excuse for DnL and many other games up until they inevitably asked for money.
Just because Tasos might of said he hopes everyone will get a chance to try the game before they pay for it does not mean they will.
Just because Tasos might of said they have no plans to offer any pre orders does not definitely mean there wont be.
He recently said he hopes to see all of us in beta, does not necessarily mean we actually will all be in beta, and we are obviously no where near yet.
He said open beta was scheduled to end on early December, its not even started yet.
Aventurine still have an official company commitment to launch Darkfall within the year thats not a gustimate that they are resolved to stick with, how embarrassing.
Personally I’m very dubious about everything concerning this game, after years of misleading statements who wouldn’t be?
Including this whole “you wont have to pay before trying the game” thing, this seems to be mostly based on personal assurances and wishful thinking from the supporters and defenders in my opinion.
/end thread
Was DnL really a scam from the beginning though? I get the impression that originally their intentions may have been genuine (despite the questionable ethics surrounding the engine) and their eventual scam was simply a contigency plan to recoup money that they knew they would never gain through consistent subs.
I don't mean to cast aspersions on Aventurine, but speaking hypothetically, if they pulled a similar trick knowing they had a bad game on their hands and it couldn't be delayed any longer, I wonder how many people would fall into the same trap again. Perhaps even those who had suffered at the hands of DnL.
You can say that any MMO in development will hypothetically become the next DnL though, if they try to scam people. I don't see the link between 'an indie developer promising a big, open world' and 'an indie developer scamming players because they screwed up'. Aventurine are similar to DnL in the first case (which isn't a bad thing), that doesn't really mean they'll be like DnL in the second case.
Of course they could end up like that. Or they could end up with a game like EVE, because CCP was also an indie developer promising a big, open world (who were also tight-lipped on the screenshots and videos up to release, incidentally).
It also helps that Aventurine have said they want players to try the game for free before they pay. Assuming they follow through on that, it makes it hard to scam people.
Its almost exactly the same. I recall DnL well. It was hyped because it wasnt one of the big studios, and a certain kind of people call everything big companies do trash and all smaller ones do golden. Its more a defensive line of mental program than actual geniune thought. People are often taking bigger organizations generally are more viscious and vice versa with small ones. DnL as well as Darkfall live(d) to 95% from the sympathy with the underdog many humans have. It has little to zero to do with reality.
And then of course there are those who praise every MMO which does things different than the mainstream, because in that way they design themself to appear as elite. The more hardcore the more the praise it, when it reality almost all so called hardcore features are just dull timesinks and needless complications for the sake of making things different.
Has more to do with the psychology of "how do I appear more elite than the noobish rest" compensation than with the games itself. Anyone looking at Darkfall with open eyes could see it is trash.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
Its almost exactly the same. I recall DnL well. It was hyped because it wasnt one of the big studios, and a certain kind of people call everything big companies do trash and all smaller ones do golden. Its more a defensive line of mental program than actual geniune thought. People are often taking bigger organizations generally are more viscious and vice versa with small ones. DnL as well as Darkfall live(d) to 95% from the sympathy with the underdog many humans have. It has little to zero to do with reality.
And then of course there are those who praise every MMO which does things different than the mainstream, because in that way they design themself to appear as elite. The more hardcore the more the praise it, when it reality almost all so called hardcore features are just dull timesinks and needless complications for the sake of making things different.
Has more to do with the psychology of "how do I appear more elite than the noobish rest" compensation than with the games itself. Anyone looking at Darkfall with open eyes could see it is trash.
So you're saying it has the same appeal as an Apple Computer?
You wouldn't believe the level of hype the fanbois developed with DnL, nothing compared to DF fanbois. They invented all kinds of strategies and situations from a few developer's notes that only existed in their (fanbois) heads.
To the OP yes I believe both situations *look* similar, but time will tell.
Wrong forum.
Actually in this case it's pretty on topic.
I find it amazing that by 2020 first world countries will be competing to get immigrants.
I remember 2005 pretty well... DnL was all over these Forums, much like DFO is now.
"DnL VS WoW"
"DnL = PvPers Dream!"
etc etc
The extreme hardcore Darkfall fans, of course, at the time were touting their "Clan Beta" which never started, but that's besides the point.
Dark and Light fans would find a way of inserting Dark and Light into ANY given topic. Off Topic, the Forum for Anarchy Online or EverQuest or WoW... like cockroaches almost, they were everywhere. They'd make new threads and post in old ones, there were Guilds ready to go and "organized".
At the time though, there was a multitude of information, videos, screenshots being shown of the gameworld. I remember that one of the silliest "features" I ever saw was DnL - Shield Boarding down Snowy Slopes... I'm not sure that even made it into the game though. NPCube ran small booths at the different tradeshows at the time, a coworker said when he attempted to visit their booth, it was empty.
When NPCube launched "Settlers of Garnath" (I'm pretty sure thatw as the name), I recall the servers for preOrder were overloaded, and they were sold out within several minutes.
...rewind back another year...
When Mourning (or whatever it's iteration was at the time) was looking ready to release, people were boasting THAT continually.
it's of my opinion that this genre of game, that this style of this genre, of games attract these sorts of people. It's not the people who are "desperate for a new game" that participate in the Forum tactics that make DFO seem like DnL, it's something else... perhaps it's the same people, or perhaps there's a mental state comon between them...
The biggest problem being that when the fans become TOO ravenous, that the facts become blurred to the point of wrong (think beer goggles)... they see what they want to, and anybody who disagrees is a troll (or whatever derogatory word you chose to insert there... I personally think "heathen" is the way it's expressed best). These fans can lull a Studio into believing they can do no wrong, the same fans are the first to turn on their previous beloved Studio/Game.
THAT, my friends, is the biggest similarity between the travesties of these MMO games.
- CaesarsGhost
Lead Gameplay and Gameworld Designer for a yet unnamed MMO Title.
"When people tell me designing a game is easy, I try to get them to design a board game. Most people don't last 5 minutes, the rest rarely last more then a day. The final few realize it's neither fun nor easy."
While there may be some similarities, I don't think its fair to clasify Aventurine in the scam category until the day comes when they ask for money, and fail to deliver the goods. They won' t even sell you a DF t-shirt right now, which says volumes about their intent.
So far the only money they've wasted is their own and their investors, so really doesn' t matter to me when or if ever they release.
I say give them a chance until they've proven otherwise.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Well I don't think there is a comparison personally. Although some of the Fanboys have gone off the deep edge as usual. I think Darkfall will be ok, it will have issues and some of the advertised features won't work right or just won't be there at first, just like many other games.
My concern is that the server technology has never been tested. Some of the fanboys have argued that it has via bots, but anyone conversant with the state of computer AI will know for a fact that you just can't simulate live players by using bots with the technology as it exists today.
We will just have to wait and see. II don't think it will be near as good as the fanboys seem to think, nor as bad as many of the detractors have posted.
I really hope they succeed. Would be very good for the industry.
Untill Averturine try to scam people, no.
And Aventurine definately won't let people keep their levels after beta. They're doing beta for testing, and testing only. At the beginning they were wiping characters more than once a day I read.
They really don't appear to be that kind of company. And please stop assuming it's a bad game when we haven't played it yet.
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Currently playing: Black Desert Korea (Waiting for EU)
Always hating on instances in MMOs! Open worlds, open PvP, territory control and housing please. More persistence, more fun.
It's a quibble, but you can't scam someone over a T-shirt, unless you just dont' send them the Tshirt.
If you order a Tshirt, and they send you one, you got what you paid for even if the game never releases.
This man speaks the truth! Read the date on that link.
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"Its sad when people use religion to feel superior, its even worse to see people using a video game to do it."
--Arcken
"...when it comes to pimping EVE I have little restraints."
--Hellmar, CEO of CCP.
"It's like they took a gun, put it to their nugget sack and pulled the trigger over and over again, each time telling us how great it was that they were shooting themselves in the balls."
--Exar_Kun on SWG's NGE
This isn't just Dark & Light, this happens with most small, no name companies that promise the world.
Mourning anyone? Yup. Thrones of Chaos? Absolutely. Irth online? pass me the cool aid.
I'm not saying small companies can't make MMO's, just look at games like Tibia. they work because the developers knew what they could manage, it's a simple 2D game which doesn't even have combat animations but it's still widely popular because developers weren't overly ambitious,they knew what they could handle and what they couldn't. unlike DarkFall and D&L.