I will always be grateful to SOE for their part of the work on original Everquest. But other than that, and in all recent history, they are a game company that deservedly has a bad rep with players. John Smedley simply doesn't understand that if you make a quality product and treat your customers well, the financial model will work itself out. When Blizzard made WoW, I can guarantee you they had no income projections that contemplated 11 million people playing their game. They just focused on making a good game, and look what happened. By contrast, SOE makes shoddy products and then tries to come up with inventive ways to make money from them anyway. People are wise to this now and won't put up with it.
I see no turnaround for SOE so long as John Smedley is still there.
This pretty much sums it all up nicely.
I've read plenty about how Blizzard had not projected the amazing success they received (which of course bit them in the ass at first). But yes, they start with a good game and go from there. SOE starts out looking at the 11 million subscribers, and then goes about trying to find out how they get there with the least amount of effort. And fails every time.
Sure, it is your right to keep your grudge. But spilling it over forums and trying to incite it on everyone else is not ok after all these years. At some point ppl have to keep their grudges to themselves. You can hate SOE all you live, thats fine with me, and filling every damn thread about SOE with SOE-hate after years and years is just not right.
I will base my liking of a game on the game, not on the company. If DCU and/or Agency are fun I play them if not I don't. Its not like Smedly killed my mother or what!
So warning fellow consumers is wrong how? This is part of what makes a free market free. You don't believe in this system? You believe people with negative opinions about a company/product/service protecting their fellow consumers by voicing those opinions should not be allowed to express them? You believe competition between corporations is bad, and that companies should be protected from having to deliver what they advertise?
SOE is the only part of anything Sony I happen to like. That said I really like the station pass idea although i agree most of the games are sub-par. I like EQ2 a lot and it works for me because I am a casual player. There are so many things to do in that game it keeps me busy and keeps me from maxing my toon so I do not have to quit like with WOW and other MMO's. I can see if you are a hardcore fan that you would say the games SOE has are not interesting but casual players i think get along just fine. Just my opinion. Peace and Happy New Year.
I've only ever had good experiences with SOE customer service.
I notice that quite a few people here say that it's terrible, I don't think that's fair without backing it up.
Double standards much?
It's unfair for anyone to say anything negative about SOE without "backing it up", but you're free to say positive things?
Not that I've any bad customer service experience with them, but sheesh!
Well, the point is that a lot of people always seem to complain about SOE's customer service while a lot of people seem to have had no problem whatsoever.
In fact, from personal experience I would say SOE is better then Blizzard and miles ahead of Turbine and Funcom. No payment problems, payment options available for lots of countries, quick polite replies often within minutes, helpful answers. Actual activity on harassment complaints and a willingness to police their servers.
Granted, these are my experiences and they might not be shared by anyone else, but when I see Customer Services being ditched I wonder if people think that the NGE was somehow the fault of the Customer Service Reps.
Give credit were credit is due.
At the SOE fan faire this year there was a panel where representatives from all games and departments gave little presentations about the state of their project.
The head of customer service took the stage early in the presentation and told the crowd that soe was canceling their practice of outsourcing their customer service and was bringing it all in house. The cheering from the crowd was absolutely the loudest and most universal cheer of the entire panel.
People do not cheer when something good is canceled. They cheer when something bad is canceled. Keep in mind this was a room filled with soes biggest supporters.
That alone speaks volumes about how the service is without anyone here having to relate a single story.
Sure, it is your right to keep your grudge. But spilling it over forums and trying to incite it on everyone else is not ok after all these years. At some point ppl have to keep their grudges to themselves. You can hate SOE all you live, thats fine with me, and filling every damn thread about SOE with SOE-hate after years and years is just not right.
I will base my liking of a game on the game, not on the company. If DCU and/or Agency are fun I play them if not I don't. Its not like Smedly killed my mother or what!
So warning fellow consumers is wrong how? This is part of what makes a free market free. You don't believe in this system? You believe people with negative opinions about a company/product/service protecting their fellow consumers by voicing those opinions should not be allowed to express them? You believe competition between corporations is bad, and that companies should be protected from having to deliver what they advertise?
Interesting.
I agree. This is why 'Reputation' is so important. This is why word of mouth marketing has such an impact in the gaming world. Those that defend $OE find it easier to attack those dissatisfied with the company than actually give reasons why $OE should be worthy of praise. There certainly has been no shortage of examples outlining $OE failures.
Sure, it is your right to keep your grudge. But spilling it over forums and trying to incite it on everyone else is not ok after all these years. At some point ppl have to keep their grudges to themselves. You can hate SOE all you live, thats fine with me, and filling every damn thread about SOE with SOE-hate after years and years is just not right.
I will base my liking of a game on the game, not on the company. If DCU and/or Agency are fun I play them if not I don't. Its not like Smedly killed my mother or what!
So warning fellow consumers is wrong how? This is part of what makes a free market free. You don't believe in this system? You believe people with negative opinions about a company/product/service protecting their fellow consumers by voicing those opinions should not be allowed to express them? You believe competition between corporations is bad, and that companies should be protected from having to deliver what they advertise?
Interesting.
One person makes a post about events and actions of a company.
Another person makes a counter post, but instead of challenging the points made they focus on the person making the points.
Occasionally they will reference the NGE as if that is the only bad thing soe has ever done to upset anyone and use that to dismiss any other argument made.
That is just what most people who enjoy soe games do. They debate the person and not the persons arguments.
After all these years... Is that supposed to imply that something has changed with soe and they have stopped doing things that anger large portions of their playerbase? As if they have changed how they operate and people should give them another chance?
I've never felt the answer to an issue is to tell people to shut and ignore valid issues that are relevant and current. If a company has a long and clear history of not listening to their customers and taking actions that drive them away, I don't think their next game will make those issues go away. Odds are that it will just create a new group of people complaining about the same issues, but in a different game.
I've only ever had good experiences with SOE customer service.
I notice that quite a few people here say that it's terrible, I don't think that's fair without backing it up.
Double standards much?
It's unfair for anyone to say anything negative about SOE without "backing it up", but you're free to say positive things?
Not that I've any bad customer service experience with them, but sheesh!
Well, the point is that a lot of people always seem to complain about SOE's customer service while a lot of people seem to have had no problem whatsoever.
In fact, from personal experience I would say SOE is better then Blizzard and miles ahead of Turbine and Funcom. No payment problems, payment options available for lots of countries, quick polite replies often within minutes, helpful answers. Actual activity on harassment complaints and a willingness to police their servers.
Granted, these are my experiences and they might not be shared by anyone else, but when I see Customer Services being ditched I wonder if people think that the NGE was somehow the fault of the Customer Service Reps.
Give credit were credit is due.
Well...
I haven't played an SOE product since SWG and did dabble in PotBS which SOE did not make but only produced. I can say that in SWG I had very long waits on GM responses. More than in WoW.
My first issue was an in-game issue that wasn't resolved until the next day when I was offline.
I've also had some billing issues with them.
Admittedly I quit SWG before the NGE(the pre-NGE crap wasnt very creative), but when I went back to the game I found my toon and everything I owned was totally worthless. Not to mention the inflation got so out of hand that my millions were also pocket change to a newbie.
The funny thing is, both of us are providing anecdotal evidence to this arguement and neither are of much value. The key is that the general consensus is that the customer service is bad.
I, personally, wont be giving SOE my money very easily. I have no interest in DCUO and The Agency is too quiet to grab my interest. I'd rather just go with Global Agenda for the pseudo-spy MMOFPS.
What exactly was a comeback year for soe in 2009? The matrix online closed down. Free realms launched to 5 million users trying the game, but the game doesn't even have 1 full server. Things are going so poorly that soe had to change the revenue model within a few months of the game releasing. Still no version of Free Realms for the PS3, which is supposed to be their new focus. 7 of the 9 mmos on station pass did not see an expansion pack and most likely will never see an expansion. DCU online was pushed back The Agency was pushed back. The leadership of their Seattle office left. More loot card and cash shop antics driving more customers away this year. There has been employee turnover in almost every major leadership role for each of their projects. An overall percentage layoff of their workforce in addition to some teams being downsized beyond that.
I am sorry, but what exactly are the details of this comeback they had?
Will 2010 be any different? DCU will be lucky to be ready for release by Q4 of 2010 and even then it needs to be an unquestionable success. The agency is in big trouble despite what soe says. For a game this far along in development to be this quiet raises some questions. To see the leadership of the project walk out when they should be ramping up for release makes things seem even worse.
This > than actual article. 100% more truth and a ton less guesstimation and generalizations. Just need to add Vanguard's recent turn of events and what you have is enough material to post a bevy of interesting articles that help keep the industry from following the "self proclaimed leader of mmos".
Then again, I find it very hard to believe the writer missed the slew of layoffs, pushbacks, cancellations and misdealings by SOE that MMORPG did post this year. 2009 was far from a new start and far less of a foundation to build 2010's future upon.
Sorry folks but you must be either stupid or outright hateful to STILL regard SOE as especially bad, given how many mediocre, failed, closed and otherwise bad MMOs we had seen in the last 2 years. No chance. SWG was great until NGE, EQ2 was always great, Free Realms was great for the right audience. So I know they are CAPABLE of doing a good MMO. Which is more than I can say about Funcom or Crpytic! Seriously, guys, get a damn grip and get the heck over it already. There is nothing worse than an ex wife bitching about the bad character of the ex husband 10 years after the divorce as if was yesterday. No one has sympathy with that! I don't know any more detail about The Agency or DCU as anyone, but from what I know I think they can be cool, and I am looking forward to them. DCU seems a lot better than CO (which isn't so hard truth be told), and Agency looks like something fresh and casually entertaining. I am surely going to try them out.
And people like you are, in my humble opinion, one of the reasons why we see such crappy games rushed to release today; after all there will be enough people that buy it anyway despite the company's trackrecord. Where i come from people grow a spine and vote with their feet; fool me once and i am likely to give you another chance, fool me twice or as in Sony's case, fool me constantly (talking about their business models here) and you will have a real hard time to catch me again as a customer.
I know gaming is supposed to be a hobby and should not be taken too seriously. But for Sony and other companies, it has been a business from day 1. And as such i will treat them as the business men they are.
GREAT POST. i agree people who continue to overlook shoddy products and unacceptable business practices lead to more garbage dumped on the market.
and lets remember that bad reputations are earned...not given.
Everquest was great until they ruined it with pop and Ldon .... Vanguard was great until they ruined it when they took over SIGIL ... I will not say Never Again SOE .... but poor chance they catch me back ...
Horseshit. Brad McQuaid had his head so far up his poppy land ass to steer that game. It failed because of him. I'm a firm believer that EQ was as successful as it was because of other less idolized and substance abusing people.
Everquest was great until they ruined it with pop and Ldon .... Vanguard was great until they ruined it when they took over SIGIL ... I will not say Never Again SOE .... but poor chance they catch me back ...
Horseshit. Brad McQuaid had his head so far up his poppy land ass to steer that game. It failed because of him. I'm a firm believer that EQ was as successful as it was because of other less idolized and substance abusing people.
I think it is painfully obvious that Brad (or any of the other mmo industry legends) cannot be given full control over their own project or company. Creative people need someone else in charge who can tell them no to certain things and keep the project on course. Just like it is painfully obvious that you cannot put someone who is obsessed with revenue models in charge of making games.
There needs to be a relationship between the two to make a great game and get it done right, which is why EQ struck pay dirt.
Just as Brad ruined his game by being to passionate about the game and ignoring the business, soe is ruining their games by being passionate about nothing other than revenue models and treating games as nothing more than a vehicle to accessing your wallet. There is a reason that soe hemorrhages creative talent like no one else.
Everquest was great until they ruined it with pop and Ldon .... Vanguard was great until they ruined it when they took over SIGIL ... I will not say Never Again SOE .... but poor chance they catch me back ...
Horseshit. Brad McQuaid had his head so far up his poppy land ass to steer that game. It failed because of him. I'm a firm believer that EQ was as successful as it was because of other less idolized and substance abusing people.
I think it is painfully obvious that Brad (or any of the other mmo industry legends) cannot be given full control over their own project or company. Creative people need someone else in charge who can tell them no to certain things and keep the project on course. Just like it is painfully obvious that you cannot put someone who is obsessed with revenue models in charge of making games.
There needs to be a relationship between the two to make a great game and get it done right, which is why EQ struck pay dirt.
Just as Brad ruined his game by being to passionate about the game and ignoring the business, soe is ruining their games by being passionate about nothing other than revenue models and treating games as nothing more than a vehicle to accessing your wallet. There is a reason that soe hemorrhages creative talent like no one else.
Neither approach will produce a winner.
Very well put, I agree with that assessment. Maybe Brad is a visionary (I so want to put a hallucinogenic joke in here), but VG never showed it. Why? who knows, but it was his baby and he ran the show so he gets the rubber chicken award.
I think a lot of us really wanted that MMO to succeed. I did, but the first look at beta I had was a pragmatic one. The game wasn't going to make it.
SOE really puts it's cash foot forward, but so does Blizzard. It's business. Read the forums for each game and you see just as much bitching as the other game. Blizzard rolls content out so slow they just milk subscribers.
SOE subs (myself included) pay for the nerf bat and game changes and content updates and changes while Blizzard subs pay to wait for all of that goodness.
6 of one half dozen of another... I'm either to old or to jaded to get wound up over it.
I'm quite surprised by the diehard reactionary posts here. *chuckles* Yes there were several wrong decisions in the past and there will be in the future, that is just being a human and the people at the company change as well as the times and what the market asks for.
Personally I'm sad about what happened to VG but it was so unfinished and clunky - it was hard to get this into a polished state EVER in my opinion and just throwing more money at it doesn't mean the people working there can than do the trick. I hope it is recovering, the diplomacy thing was a great idea, the seamless world and classes were nice too. That whole things debacle though wasn't about "SOE" that was about some people at Sigil (!), design leads, programmers, artists, you name it. There is no such thing like "THE SOE". It is a huge company, for the sake of god people, stop being so black and white thinkers. *shakes head*
EQ2 for my playstyle was a real turn around and comeback in 2009. I've a job, family and private life and it is the freaking first MMO in 10 years of playing I buy addons for because I reach the level cap ... Simple truth for those bitter hardcore gamer complaining about the level speed too high: the majority of player is not making it in a reasonable time in the games YOU want so they never buy addons but leave the game as they are bored to death with the grind that going through you consider the hallmark of achievement. And that hurts every company.
I still think that VG can become a valuable piece of the SOE portfolio. EQ2 now turned into a way more family/casual friendly game while VG has a good hardcore RAID system from what I read and the diplomacy-lore-system and no zones. It could turn into something like Eve for fantasy MMO's if they managed to make it more sandbox, expand the land lord and tax system. BUT ... such a game needs years to grow a auditory, establish politics and such. And I'm not sure anyone at SOE is willing for such a long term investment or aiming a game at this auditory. So under the current conditions VG won't survive it they don't manage to attract more new player and make it less grindy, few players are willing to go through grind, it is as plain as that. Slowly the understanding makes it into MMO's too that games are for fun and the game should be fun while playing it and not while working (!) for the end content. I've even shut off the level XP in EQ2 at level 70 now to drain it into achievement points - unbelievable for me some month ago when I was still trying to finally (please!) get some new stuff to do by achieving a level. Now I play EQ2 for fun and leveling has become more a side effect. That is awesome and explains the success of FR too in my eyes. And actually the server are full, just login and go to snow ... whatever the english name is. I'm just amazed that there is no lag with so many players there. And they still have the same revenue modell (free content and membership content), just added more classes and you can now play all of them for free but not use some items. Where on earth does that tell anything about being successful or not? I see so many people running around with pets you can only buy ... I've my doubts it doesn't make money.
Conclusion: It is usual for a MMO company to make new games to earn from the fresh-hype and sales and get new money from investors. That doesn't mean at all the old games are dying. Quite contrary as far as I know most old games (more than 3-4 years at the market) are often profitable since they have become very deep and rich and polished compared to new games and the hardware and traffic costs are cheaper today than it was back at release. Basically the monthly fees rise but the costs drop. But a company with stock shares is forced to grow and not just sustain its income level. Thus they need to make new ones, useless economic laws but reality.
Played: Pretty much any fantasy MMO, some did not even make it to release ... Favorites: UO, EQ2, Vanguard, Wurm Online, Salem, ESO, Creativerse Playing: ESO, Creativerse, Guild Wars 2 Anticipating: (sigh) ... maybe Ashes of Creation
the whole debacle with vanguard happened because it is the direct competition of eq2 and the company who was making VG ran out of money They saw an opening to own the competition. they bought it to bury it and they effectively did so, but not til AFTER they tried all they could to keep the game floating. its not SOE's fault that people didnt stick it out and continue to play the game. even now with it being, imo, the best PVE/crafting game out there, people will not play it. They made the trainee island to help bring people in and it did not help. they released new content and raised the lvl cap, it did not bring new people in or old players back. what do you do to a sinking ship? leave your slaves on it and bail the f' out on your life raft. the game got as much attention and money it could get before SOE decided it was a bad investment to put anything else into it.
peoples problem with the swg: nge, yeah it sucked extremely bad and they should have left some servers with the old way of play, but as a business decision it was made to increase the profit. it may have been a bad decision but its what they, as a multi-million dollar company, decided to do. These companies are not charities. they need to make profit to continue to live and will make decisions based on the highest profit margin they can make.
some people were also upset about the item malls being put into games like EQ and EQ2. Well, eq is a 10 year old game with a dedicated community. you think they are going to spend RL money on fluff items? you bet your ass they will if they have played the game for so long and that = more profit to them.
Whoever was complaining about the station pass; its one of the best deals in MMO gaming to date. 30 bucks a month to play ANY of SOE's mmo titles is a ridiculously good deal. PoTBS, VG, EQ, EQ2 are all great games even with the small population. they should merge more servers which would cut down on the costs and increase the population on servers which may bring more people in. think of when DCU and The Agency get released (if they keep it the way it is) 30$ to play any of the games under their label.... its amazing.
So all of you SOE haters out there, you need to get your facts straight. The only game they really ruined was SWG, get over it. companies and people make mistakes. hell look at our american government, its one GIANT mistake. Get over it.
the whole debacle with vanguard happened because it is the direct competition of eq2 and the company who was making VG ran out of money They saw an opening to own the competition. they bought it to bury it and they effectively did so, but not til AFTER they tried all they could to keep the game floating. its not SOE's fault that people didnt stick it out and continue to play the game. even now with it being, imo, the best PVE/crafting game out there, people will not play it. They made the trainee island to help bring people in and it did not help. they released new content and raised the lvl cap, it did not bring new people in or old players back. what do you do to a sinking ship? leave your slaves on it and bail the f' out on your life raft. the game got as much attention and money it could get before SOE decided it was a bad investment to put anything else into it.
I agree that back than when SOE bought VG it was a direct competition. But in my opinion games auditories change with what you offer to them, what you focus on - and I think in EQ2 that has become more casually oriented people with a busy real life while VG has pretty much driven everyone away from that crowd due to the insane grinds necessary to level up, do diplomacy games, craft, get race mounts or whatever there is in content. You don't get those people back or starting by adding a trial island and raising the level cap. Those who stay are hardcore gamers or nostalgic people which cling to their guild - a stabilizing and fragile factore at the same time. Now look what Silius decided to do: add more Raid content, make the high level hard core player happy, make them stay. Unfortunatelly although those are not interested in EQ2 anymore and too spoiled by graphics and stuff for EQ they are the ones which go through content fastest. With a small development staff this is a problem and once you can't keep up anymore and have to scrape this highend content ... very bad crisis.
So in my opinion VG has a chance in one of two cases: focus hard (hard!) with more money on it as a RAID game, decrease the grind to reach the RAID content faster to increase attraction for other players, less a levelling game but a strictly item centric game with almost solely Raid content. In this case it might be relatively fast to get it stabilized but maybe not long term. The other option: focus on the community/lore/sandbox like systems and expand those to become something similar to EVE. Diplomacy needs in this case to be expanded a lot and a player-versus-player game too, people need to be able to claim land, ressource node spawn points, the crafting system must be kept and expanded, there needs to be a way to exchange ingame currency into real money and vice versa to give an appeal for entrepeneurs to build structures and thus content. Nobody invests into an economy that might fold the next day or is not good anything. But for this VG would need a long term strategy as it needs time to attract people who truly build things (in community terms) as most people come and fade and that is it. And the engine needs to be polished a lot so people building something in the game are not disturbed by bugs and lag and such. If something costs real money you can get into trouble very fast if technical problems arise. Still I believe that VG offers a useful engine with a unique huge empty world that to explore and pioneer in can attract people if they truly are allowed to make it their own. SOE could never afford to fill the world of VG with content fast enough to attract people to keep playing. The only chance apart from Raids (which focus people on a few places) thus in my opinion is to financially attract players to provide content themself.
Played: Pretty much any fantasy MMO, some did not even make it to release ... Favorites: UO, EQ2, Vanguard, Wurm Online, Salem, ESO, Creativerse Playing: ESO, Creativerse, Guild Wars 2 Anticipating: (sigh) ... maybe Ashes of Creation
I wish SoE could fix VG. Add more soloable quests and make them easier to find,event system,remake some quests and areas,another graphic so you dont need a monster computer to use the best out of it,balance all classes,a story to follow (Like primary quests in GW or like the chapter in lord of the rigns online) and a lot of other things. Vanguard need to add so much or they wont get more players,but that will take to long and other games will come out and probably will they already have what VG has and more.
the whole debacle with vanguard happened because it is the direct competition of eq2 and the company who was making VG ran out of money They saw an opening to own the competition. they bought it to bury it and they effectively did so, but not til AFTER they tried all they could to keep the game floating. its not SOE's fault that people didnt stick it out and continue to play the game. even now with it being, imo, the best PVE/crafting game out there, people will not play it. They made the trainee island to help bring people in and it did not help. they released new content and raised the lvl cap, it did not bring new people in or old players back. what do you do to a sinking ship? leave your slaves on it and bail the f' out on your life raft. the game got as much attention and money it could get before SOE decided it was a bad investment to put anything else into it. <<snip>> So all of you SOE haters out there, you need to get your facts straight. The only game they really ruined was SWG, get over it. companies and people make mistakes. hell look at our american government, its one GIANT mistake. Get over it.
How about this for a fact? The very first action soe took in their "investment" of Vanguard was to remove the most talented programmers and move them to new projects at soe. I don't know what you think is everything in their power, but the very first action by soe showed they were more concerned with everything other than vanguard.
Perhaps you bought the dog and pony show they put on about saving this game, but just looking at the minimal effort shows they didn't invest in the game. Years have past since the screw ups of Sigil and at some point soe has to take ownership of not correcting the course of vanguard. As many have said this is a great game, so why hasn't soe turned it around yet?
Soe gave up on this game long before they owned it.
So far soe has been incapable of turning around "great" games. Just like they have not turned around SWG, EQ2, Planetside, Matrix, Free Realms, EQOA, etc. They have however had a series of what you call "mistakes" that have caused them to go from the undisputed leader in the industry to a company that has a bloated and declining portfolio of dying games.
Despite the bank and forth in this thread I still stand by my original statement. As a consumer we should all be aware of the saying that goes, "those that don't learn from history are destined to repeat it." Yes, there have been a rash of very poor MMO's released over the last year. Does that trend absolve any MMO company from a history of poorly managing the MMO's that are under them? I personally don't think so. I played SWG and loved the game and was very disappointed with the direction the game took. What was more disconcerting to me was not that changes came, but that changes came despite a vocal majority of players asking that the game not change in the way that it did. Ah well, games change, times change etc.
I then went on to give EQ2 a try. I'm not a grudge holder in the sense that 1 mistake disqualifies me from trying another product from a company that I may not have had a great experience with. For anyone that played EQ2 on the day it launched I think it would be very hard to make the case that the game was "great" at release. That's a laughable statement at best. EQ2 has really only hit it's stride through 2008 and 2009. Kudos to SOE for improving the game but it came long after I got tired of "sticking with it".
I then thought about giving Vanguard a try since it seemed like a lot of the things the game said it had would be things I'd enjoy. Vanguard was trash, ran very poorly, and was a complete and utter mess even after SOE took it over. They did very little to listen to the community regarding fixes and they damn sure didn't do anything in a timely fashion.
3 poor experiences with 3 different products developed by the same company. Yes, I have watched some of the other games they have developed and I'm telling you that in my personal opinion the issues I have with SOE seem to cross over to most if not all of the games they produce. I for one have no interest in supporting MMO companies who continue to produce shoddy, broken MMO's and then repeat the same mistakes over and over again. Nothing is going to change in this industry until we the consumer demand better. The only way that we have any real voice in this market is by choosing to spend our money wisely. As such I do not feel that DCUO is going to be a product I will be purchasing. For those that do decide to spend their money on the game, good for you. You spoke with your money that you're willing to support SOE as a developer. I just really don't want to hear any bitching if they burn you the way they have repeatedly burned the players who chose to spend their money with SOE in the past. /rant off
How about this for a fact? The very first action soe took in their "investment" of Vanguard was to remove the most talented programmers and move them to new projects at soe. I don't know what you think is everything in their power, but the very first action by soe showed they were more concerned with everything other than vanguard.
yea, those people are lucky they did not get completely canned when the company/project got bought out. in the business world whenever a company gets taken over or bought out pretty much everyone gets the axe and replaced with in house people. they never wanted for vanguard to succeed as it came out the same time as EQ2 which was going to be their next big thing. they wanted the game to recoop the money they spent and drawn some profit from it with little/no effort. they moved all the best programmers (who were lucky to still have jobs) to what they invested time and money into so that they could make it better than VG. Like i said, they bought the game to bury it.
It was playable at launch. it did have issues like every game does, they just did what they wanted to with slow fixes to try to push people to EQ2. why wouldnt a company be concerned with things that they are making in house rather than a shoddy game that they bought and had to try to fix/release as quick as possible? hell they probably recooped all of their money spent to aquire the game on box sales and then they put together a team to try to keep it playable but not surpass EQ2. job done.
as for the other games you mentioned, yea like i said, swg was a mistake. they tried to mainstream it so that they would attract more people to the game. they failed. but guess what? people still play it, it still draws income, it isnt going anywhere soon. its in the same boat as UO, they made a huge game changing addition with tram, a lot of people did not like it. 12 years later its is still going strong. it just released a huge expansion. was tram a mistake? yes. are they still making a ton of money off UO? hell yes because it costs them nearly nothing to keep the servers running and a skeleton dev team. the fact that its been running for 12 years is enough said. SWG is the same.
never played planetside/matrix/EQOA or even heard about it that much, was not interested in it so i assume they were niche games that, like most niche games, crash and burn. at least they as a AAA company tried to appease smaller clusters even though they failed.
as for free realms, it is one of the most popular games out there. they are doing what they want with it, making money, attracting young people to mmo's. its a huge success.
games that run for years and years and keep people playing them, even if its small population, are pure win. you may not like it, but the fact that those games have been running for 5+ years means that people are still playing them.
its not the company but the people who let games die. you stop paying to play them, the dev crews go away and the eventual life support of money is taken away to let it die in peace.
Look at eve online. it was the dictionary definition of pure shit when it was released. seriously, have you ever seen screen shots, heard from people who started playing it at release? it was terrible. but people kept paying, and kept paying, and kept paying, and today its a huge success with multiple expansions and a supposed player base of 300k subscriptions. the players kept that game alive and made it a success. if they hadn't the game would have failed (like VG is doing, like matrix did) and CCP would be no more.
edit:
and to the above poster, games released around the time that EQ2, vanguard were released were all plagued with problems and ran just about as good as crap down the back of your leg. anyone remember WoW release? didnt we get an extre free month of play for how abosolutely terrible it was? but people stuck with it making it the largest populated, most popular game ever.
don t know about vanguard !but today i went to get newest avail everquest !the clerk told me we received some when they lunched their last (shadow odyssey if i recall)the clerk said i recieved on a few of them they were sold before they ever reached the store.clerk never heard of everquest after !i asked him ,ok then could i order some and some time card?
clerk check ontheir ebgame thingy!say to me sorry cant order them !im like ?"/%/$?they just released new content !
hes like couldnt say since we cant have em! i was so baffled ,the clerk told me everything everquest is sold before it ever reach
the store,if it ever does.i told him they release new dvd everquest soon you think i can get it!
he say i would be very surprised.soe doesnt send everquest anymore.im like but you sold everthing before it ever reached the store.clerk say:try explaining that to soe.
Vanguard was already shot down because of its crappy release.
SWG was ruined with the NGE experience. On the other hand, current SWG is very different from SWG just after NGE. With a skillbased system, it would be way better then preNGE even. Its definately one of the most feature rich MMORPG's out there. Not that it matters, because the MMO community doesnt lose a grudge. The same community also tends to look at the past with rosecoloured glasses. Any sane person would understand that preCU SWG would never have many subs nowadays.
The upside is that all other companies can look at SOE to learn what not to do.
Oh, on a sidenote. STO will be like AION. Lots of hype, lots of disappointment. STO will attract a lot of players at launch just because of the ip, but those players will discover soon enough that its really lacking in variety of content.
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He said it first, My agreement will be on my next report. Man, what a one sided story , its ok , I have the other side covered.
Unaware of the Jestor?
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He said it first, My agreement will be on my next report. Man, what a one sided story , its ok , I have the other side covered.
Was wondering when you'd show up, lol! And I believe Teala is a she, hehe.
"Many nights, my friend... Many nights I've put a blade to your throat while you were sleeping. Glad I never killed you, Steve. You're alright..."
Chavez y Chavez
This pretty much sums it all up nicely.
I've read plenty about how Blizzard had not projected the amazing success they received (which of course bit them in the ass at first). But yes, they start with a good game and go from there. SOE starts out looking at the 11 million subscribers, and then goes about trying to find out how they get there with the least amount of effort. And fails every time.
Sure, it is your right to keep your grudge. But spilling it over forums and trying to incite it on everyone else is not ok after all these years. At some point ppl have to keep their grudges to themselves. You can hate SOE all you live, thats fine with me, and filling every damn thread about SOE with SOE-hate after years and years is just not right.
I will base my liking of a game on the game, not on the company. If DCU and/or Agency are fun I play them if not I don't. Its not like Smedly killed my mother or what!
So warning fellow consumers is wrong how? This is part of what makes a free market free. You don't believe in this system? You believe people with negative opinions about a company/product/service protecting their fellow consumers by voicing those opinions should not be allowed to express them? You believe competition between corporations is bad, and that companies should be protected from having to deliver what they advertise?
Interesting.
SOE is the only part of anything Sony I happen to like. That said I really like the station pass idea although i agree most of the games are sub-par. I like EQ2 a lot and it works for me because I am a casual player. There are so many things to do in that game it keeps me busy and keeps me from maxing my toon so I do not have to quit like with WOW and other MMO's. I can see if you are a hardcore fan that you would say the games SOE has are not interesting but casual players i think get along just fine. Just my opinion. Peace and Happy New Year.
Double standards much?
It's unfair for anyone to say anything negative about SOE without "backing it up", but you're free to say positive things?
Not that I've any bad customer service experience with them, but sheesh!
Well, the point is that a lot of people always seem to complain about SOE's customer service while a lot of people seem to have had no problem whatsoever.
In fact, from personal experience I would say SOE is better then Blizzard and miles ahead of Turbine and Funcom. No payment problems, payment options available for lots of countries, quick polite replies often within minutes, helpful answers. Actual activity on harassment complaints and a willingness to police their servers.
Granted, these are my experiences and they might not be shared by anyone else, but when I see Customer Services being ditched I wonder if people think that the NGE was somehow the fault of the Customer Service Reps.
Give credit were credit is due.
At the SOE fan faire this year there was a panel where representatives from all games and departments gave little presentations about the state of their project.
The head of customer service took the stage early in the presentation and told the crowd that soe was canceling their practice of outsourcing their customer service and was bringing it all in house. The cheering from the crowd was absolutely the loudest and most universal cheer of the entire panel.
People do not cheer when something good is canceled. They cheer when something bad is canceled. Keep in mind this was a room filled with soes biggest supporters.
That alone speaks volumes about how the service is without anyone here having to relate a single story.
Sure, it is your right to keep your grudge. But spilling it over forums and trying to incite it on everyone else is not ok after all these years. At some point ppl have to keep their grudges to themselves. You can hate SOE all you live, thats fine with me, and filling every damn thread about SOE with SOE-hate after years and years is just not right.
I will base my liking of a game on the game, not on the company. If DCU and/or Agency are fun I play them if not I don't. Its not like Smedly killed my mother or what!
So warning fellow consumers is wrong how? This is part of what makes a free market free. You don't believe in this system? You believe people with negative opinions about a company/product/service protecting their fellow consumers by voicing those opinions should not be allowed to express them? You believe competition between corporations is bad, and that companies should be protected from having to deliver what they advertise?
Interesting.
I agree. This is why 'Reputation' is so important. This is why word of mouth marketing has such an impact in the gaming world. Those that defend $OE find it easier to attack those dissatisfied with the company than actually give reasons why $OE should be worthy of praise. There certainly has been no shortage of examples outlining $OE failures.
Sure, it is your right to keep your grudge. But spilling it over forums and trying to incite it on everyone else is not ok after all these years. At some point ppl have to keep their grudges to themselves. You can hate SOE all you live, thats fine with me, and filling every damn thread about SOE with SOE-hate after years and years is just not right.
I will base my liking of a game on the game, not on the company. If DCU and/or Agency are fun I play them if not I don't. Its not like Smedly killed my mother or what!
So warning fellow consumers is wrong how? This is part of what makes a free market free. You don't believe in this system? You believe people with negative opinions about a company/product/service protecting their fellow consumers by voicing those opinions should not be allowed to express them? You believe competition between corporations is bad, and that companies should be protected from having to deliver what they advertise?
Interesting.
One person makes a post about events and actions of a company.
Another person makes a counter post, but instead of challenging the points made they focus on the person making the points.
Occasionally they will reference the NGE as if that is the only bad thing soe has ever done to upset anyone and use that to dismiss any other argument made.
That is just what most people who enjoy soe games do. They debate the person and not the persons arguments.
After all these years... Is that supposed to imply that something has changed with soe and they have stopped doing things that anger large portions of their playerbase? As if they have changed how they operate and people should give them another chance?
I've never felt the answer to an issue is to tell people to shut and ignore valid issues that are relevant and current. If a company has a long and clear history of not listening to their customers and taking actions that drive them away, I don't think their next game will make those issues go away. Odds are that it will just create a new group of people complaining about the same issues, but in a different game.
Double standards much?
It's unfair for anyone to say anything negative about SOE without "backing it up", but you're free to say positive things?
Not that I've any bad customer service experience with them, but sheesh!
Well, the point is that a lot of people always seem to complain about SOE's customer service while a lot of people seem to have had no problem whatsoever.
In fact, from personal experience I would say SOE is better then Blizzard and miles ahead of Turbine and Funcom. No payment problems, payment options available for lots of countries, quick polite replies often within minutes, helpful answers. Actual activity on harassment complaints and a willingness to police their servers.
Granted, these are my experiences and they might not be shared by anyone else, but when I see Customer Services being ditched I wonder if people think that the NGE was somehow the fault of the Customer Service Reps.
Give credit were credit is due.
Well...
I haven't played an SOE product since SWG and did dabble in PotBS which SOE did not make but only produced. I can say that in SWG I had very long waits on GM responses. More than in WoW.
My first issue was an in-game issue that wasn't resolved until the next day when I was offline.
I've also had some billing issues with them.
Admittedly I quit SWG before the NGE(the pre-NGE crap wasnt very creative), but when I went back to the game I found my toon and everything I owned was totally worthless. Not to mention the inflation got so out of hand that my millions were also pocket change to a newbie.
The funny thing is, both of us are providing anecdotal evidence to this arguement and neither are of much value. The key is that the general consensus is that the customer service is bad.
I, personally, wont be giving SOE my money very easily. I have no interest in DCUO and The Agency is too quiet to grab my interest. I'd rather just go with Global Agenda for the pseudo-spy MMOFPS.
This > than actual article. 100% more truth and a ton less guesstimation and generalizations. Just need to add Vanguard's recent turn of events and what you have is enough material to post a bevy of interesting articles that help keep the industry from following the "self proclaimed leader of mmos".
Then again, I find it very hard to believe the writer missed the slew of layoffs, pushbacks, cancellations and misdealings by SOE that MMORPG did post this year. 2009 was far from a new start and far less of a foundation to build 2010's future upon.
And people like you are, in my humble opinion, one of the reasons why we see such crappy games rushed to release today; after all there will be enough people that buy it anyway despite the company's trackrecord. Where i come from people grow a spine and vote with their feet; fool me once and i am likely to give you another chance, fool me twice or as in Sony's case, fool me constantly (talking about their business models here) and you will have a real hard time to catch me again as a customer.
I know gaming is supposed to be a hobby and should not be taken too seriously. But for Sony and other companies, it has been a business from day 1. And as such i will treat them as the business men they are.
GREAT POST. i agree people who continue to overlook shoddy products and unacceptable business practices lead to more garbage dumped on the market.
and lets remember that bad reputations are earned...not given.
Wish SOE will just close down all other mmo they have and just focus on EQ2 and VG.
Yes, i'm selfish...
RIP Orc Choppa
There is a lot to be said to spreading yourself too thin. Too many of one thing, then none receive the attention needed.
Horseshit. Brad McQuaid had his head so far up his poppy land ass to steer that game. It failed because of him. I'm a firm believer that EQ was as successful as it was because of other less idolized and substance abusing people.
Horseshit. Brad McQuaid had his head so far up his poppy land ass to steer that game. It failed because of him. I'm a firm believer that EQ was as successful as it was because of other less idolized and substance abusing people.
I think it is painfully obvious that Brad (or any of the other mmo industry legends) cannot be given full control over their own project or company. Creative people need someone else in charge who can tell them no to certain things and keep the project on course. Just like it is painfully obvious that you cannot put someone who is obsessed with revenue models in charge of making games.
There needs to be a relationship between the two to make a great game and get it done right, which is why EQ struck pay dirt.
Just as Brad ruined his game by being to passionate about the game and ignoring the business, soe is ruining their games by being passionate about nothing other than revenue models and treating games as nothing more than a vehicle to accessing your wallet. There is a reason that soe hemorrhages creative talent like no one else.
Neither approach will produce a winner.
Horseshit. Brad McQuaid had his head so far up his poppy land ass to steer that game. It failed because of him. I'm a firm believer that EQ was as successful as it was because of other less idolized and substance abusing people.
I think it is painfully obvious that Brad (or any of the other mmo industry legends) cannot be given full control over their own project or company. Creative people need someone else in charge who can tell them no to certain things and keep the project on course. Just like it is painfully obvious that you cannot put someone who is obsessed with revenue models in charge of making games.
There needs to be a relationship between the two to make a great game and get it done right, which is why EQ struck pay dirt.
Just as Brad ruined his game by being to passionate about the game and ignoring the business, soe is ruining their games by being passionate about nothing other than revenue models and treating games as nothing more than a vehicle to accessing your wallet. There is a reason that soe hemorrhages creative talent like no one else.
Neither approach will produce a winner.
Very well put, I agree with that assessment. Maybe Brad is a visionary (I so want to put a hallucinogenic joke in here), but VG never showed it. Why? who knows, but it was his baby and he ran the show so he gets the rubber chicken award.
I think a lot of us really wanted that MMO to succeed. I did, but the first look at beta I had was a pragmatic one. The game wasn't going to make it.
SOE really puts it's cash foot forward, but so does Blizzard. It's business. Read the forums for each game and you see just as much bitching as the other game. Blizzard rolls content out so slow they just milk subscribers.
SOE subs (myself included) pay for the nerf bat and game changes and content updates and changes while Blizzard subs pay to wait for all of that goodness.
6 of one half dozen of another... I'm either to old or to jaded to get wound up over it.
I'm quite surprised by the diehard reactionary posts here. *chuckles* Yes there were several wrong decisions in the past and there will be in the future, that is just being a human and the people at the company change as well as the times and what the market asks for.
Personally I'm sad about what happened to VG but it was so unfinished and clunky - it was hard to get this into a polished state EVER in my opinion and just throwing more money at it doesn't mean the people working there can than do the trick. I hope it is recovering, the diplomacy thing was a great idea, the seamless world and classes were nice too. That whole things debacle though wasn't about "SOE" that was about some people at Sigil (!), design leads, programmers, artists, you name it. There is no such thing like "THE SOE". It is a huge company, for the sake of god people, stop being so black and white thinkers. *shakes head*
EQ2 for my playstyle was a real turn around and comeback in 2009. I've a job, family and private life and it is the freaking first MMO in 10 years of playing I buy addons for because I reach the level cap ... Simple truth for those bitter hardcore gamer complaining about the level speed too high: the majority of player is not making it in a reasonable time in the games YOU want so they never buy addons but leave the game as they are bored to death with the grind that going through you consider the hallmark of achievement. And that hurts every company.
I still think that VG can become a valuable piece of the SOE portfolio. EQ2 now turned into a way more family/casual friendly game while VG has a good hardcore RAID system from what I read and the diplomacy-lore-system and no zones. It could turn into something like Eve for fantasy MMO's if they managed to make it more sandbox, expand the land lord and tax system. BUT ... such a game needs years to grow a auditory, establish politics and such. And I'm not sure anyone at SOE is willing for such a long term investment or aiming a game at this auditory. So under the current conditions VG won't survive it they don't manage to attract more new player and make it less grindy, few players are willing to go through grind, it is as plain as that. Slowly the understanding makes it into MMO's too that games are for fun and the game should be fun while playing it and not while working (!) for the end content. I've even shut off the level XP in EQ2 at level 70 now to drain it into achievement points - unbelievable for me some month ago when I was still trying to finally (please!) get some new stuff to do by achieving a level. Now I play EQ2 for fun and leveling has become more a side effect. That is awesome and explains the success of FR too in my eyes. And actually the server are full, just login and go to snow ... whatever the english name is. I'm just amazed that there is no lag with so many players there. And they still have the same revenue modell (free content and membership content), just added more classes and you can now play all of them for free but not use some items. Where on earth does that tell anything about being successful or not? I see so many people running around with pets you can only buy ... I've my doubts it doesn't make money.
Conclusion: It is usual for a MMO company to make new games to earn from the fresh-hype and sales and get new money from investors. That doesn't mean at all the old games are dying. Quite contrary as far as I know most old games (more than 3-4 years at the market) are often profitable since they have become very deep and rich and polished compared to new games and the hardware and traffic costs are cheaper today than it was back at release. Basically the monthly fees rise but the costs drop. But a company with stock shares is forced to grow and not just sustain its income level. Thus they need to make new ones, useless economic laws but reality.
Played: Pretty much any fantasy MMO, some did not even make it to release ...
Favorites: UO, EQ2, Vanguard, Wurm Online, Salem, ESO, Creativerse
Playing: ESO, Creativerse, Guild Wars 2
Anticipating: (sigh) ... maybe Ashes of Creation
the whole debacle with vanguard happened because it is the direct competition of eq2 and the company who was making VG ran out of money They saw an opening to own the competition. they bought it to bury it and they effectively did so, but not til AFTER they tried all they could to keep the game floating. its not SOE's fault that people didnt stick it out and continue to play the game. even now with it being, imo, the best PVE/crafting game out there, people will not play it. They made the trainee island to help bring people in and it did not help. they released new content and raised the lvl cap, it did not bring new people in or old players back. what do you do to a sinking ship? leave your slaves on it and bail the f' out on your life raft. the game got as much attention and money it could get before SOE decided it was a bad investment to put anything else into it.
peoples problem with the swg: nge, yeah it sucked extremely bad and they should have left some servers with the old way of play, but as a business decision it was made to increase the profit. it may have been a bad decision but its what they, as a multi-million dollar company, decided to do. These companies are not charities. they need to make profit to continue to live and will make decisions based on the highest profit margin they can make.
some people were also upset about the item malls being put into games like EQ and EQ2. Well, eq is a 10 year old game with a dedicated community. you think they are going to spend RL money on fluff items? you bet your ass they will if they have played the game for so long and that = more profit to them.
Whoever was complaining about the station pass; its one of the best deals in MMO gaming to date. 30 bucks a month to play ANY of SOE's mmo titles is a ridiculously good deal. PoTBS, VG, EQ, EQ2 are all great games even with the small population. they should merge more servers which would cut down on the costs and increase the population on servers which may bring more people in. think of when DCU and The Agency get released (if they keep it the way it is) 30$ to play any of the games under their label.... its amazing.
So all of you SOE haters out there, you need to get your facts straight. The only game they really ruined was SWG, get over it. companies and people make mistakes. hell look at our american government, its one GIANT mistake. Get over it.
I agree that back than when SOE bought VG it was a direct competition. But in my opinion games auditories change with what you offer to them, what you focus on - and I think in EQ2 that has become more casually oriented people with a busy real life while VG has pretty much driven everyone away from that crowd due to the insane grinds necessary to level up, do diplomacy games, craft, get race mounts or whatever there is in content. You don't get those people back or starting by adding a trial island and raising the level cap. Those who stay are hardcore gamers or nostalgic people which cling to their guild - a stabilizing and fragile factore at the same time. Now look what Silius decided to do: add more Raid content, make the high level hard core player happy, make them stay. Unfortunatelly although those are not interested in EQ2 anymore and too spoiled by graphics and stuff for EQ they are the ones which go through content fastest. With a small development staff this is a problem and once you can't keep up anymore and have to scrape this highend content ... very bad crisis.
So in my opinion VG has a chance in one of two cases: focus hard (hard!) with more money on it as a RAID game, decrease the grind to reach the RAID content faster to increase attraction for other players, less a levelling game but a strictly item centric game with almost solely Raid content. In this case it might be relatively fast to get it stabilized but maybe not long term. The other option: focus on the community/lore/sandbox like systems and expand those to become something similar to EVE. Diplomacy needs in this case to be expanded a lot and a player-versus-player game too, people need to be able to claim land, ressource node spawn points, the crafting system must be kept and expanded, there needs to be a way to exchange ingame currency into real money and vice versa to give an appeal for entrepeneurs to build structures and thus content. Nobody invests into an economy that might fold the next day or is not good anything. But for this VG would need a long term strategy as it needs time to attract people who truly build things (in community terms) as most people come and fade and that is it. And the engine needs to be polished a lot so people building something in the game are not disturbed by bugs and lag and such. If something costs real money you can get into trouble very fast if technical problems arise. Still I believe that VG offers a useful engine with a unique huge empty world that to explore and pioneer in can attract people if they truly are allowed to make it their own. SOE could never afford to fill the world of VG with content fast enough to attract people to keep playing. The only chance apart from Raids (which focus people on a few places) thus in my opinion is to financially attract players to provide content themself.
Played: Pretty much any fantasy MMO, some did not even make it to release ...
Favorites: UO, EQ2, Vanguard, Wurm Online, Salem, ESO, Creativerse
Playing: ESO, Creativerse, Guild Wars 2
Anticipating: (sigh) ... maybe Ashes of Creation
I wish SoE could fix VG. Add more soloable quests and make them easier to find,event system,remake some quests and areas,another graphic so you dont need a monster computer to use the best out of it,balance all classes,a story to follow (Like primary quests in GW or like the chapter in lord of the rigns online) and a lot of other things. Vanguard need to add so much or they wont get more players,but that will take to long and other games will come out and probably will they already have what VG has and more.
or they could give VG to me.
just PM me SoE.
How about this for a fact? The very first action soe took in their "investment" of Vanguard was to remove the most talented programmers and move them to new projects at soe. I don't know what you think is everything in their power, but the very first action by soe showed they were more concerned with everything other than vanguard.
Perhaps you bought the dog and pony show they put on about saving this game, but just looking at the minimal effort shows they didn't invest in the game. Years have past since the screw ups of Sigil and at some point soe has to take ownership of not correcting the course of vanguard. As many have said this is a great game, so why hasn't soe turned it around yet?
Soe gave up on this game long before they owned it.
So far soe has been incapable of turning around "great" games. Just like they have not turned around SWG, EQ2, Planetside, Matrix, Free Realms, EQOA, etc. They have however had a series of what you call "mistakes" that have caused them to go from the undisputed leader in the industry to a company that has a bloated and declining portfolio of dying games.
Despite the bank and forth in this thread I still stand by my original statement. As a consumer we should all be aware of the saying that goes, "those that don't learn from history are destined to repeat it." Yes, there have been a rash of very poor MMO's released over the last year. Does that trend absolve any MMO company from a history of poorly managing the MMO's that are under them? I personally don't think so. I played SWG and loved the game and was very disappointed with the direction the game took. What was more disconcerting to me was not that changes came, but that changes came despite a vocal majority of players asking that the game not change in the way that it did. Ah well, games change, times change etc.
I then went on to give EQ2 a try. I'm not a grudge holder in the sense that 1 mistake disqualifies me from trying another product from a company that I may not have had a great experience with. For anyone that played EQ2 on the day it launched I think it would be very hard to make the case that the game was "great" at release. That's a laughable statement at best. EQ2 has really only hit it's stride through 2008 and 2009. Kudos to SOE for improving the game but it came long after I got tired of "sticking with it".
I then thought about giving Vanguard a try since it seemed like a lot of the things the game said it had would be things I'd enjoy. Vanguard was trash, ran very poorly, and was a complete and utter mess even after SOE took it over. They did very little to listen to the community regarding fixes and they damn sure didn't do anything in a timely fashion.
3 poor experiences with 3 different products developed by the same company. Yes, I have watched some of the other games they have developed and I'm telling you that in my personal opinion the issues I have with SOE seem to cross over to most if not all of the games they produce. I for one have no interest in supporting MMO companies who continue to produce shoddy, broken MMO's and then repeat the same mistakes over and over again. Nothing is going to change in this industry until we the consumer demand better. The only way that we have any real voice in this market is by choosing to spend our money wisely. As such I do not feel that DCUO is going to be a product I will be purchasing. For those that do decide to spend their money on the game, good for you. You spoke with your money that you're willing to support SOE as a developer. I just really don't want to hear any bitching if they burn you the way they have repeatedly burned the players who chose to spend their money with SOE in the past. /rant off
How about this for a fact? The very first action soe took in their "investment" of Vanguard was to remove the most talented programmers and move them to new projects at soe. I don't know what you think is everything in their power, but the very first action by soe showed they were more concerned with everything other than vanguard.
yea, those people are lucky they did not get completely canned when the company/project got bought out. in the business world whenever a company gets taken over or bought out pretty much everyone gets the axe and replaced with in house people. they never wanted for vanguard to succeed as it came out the same time as EQ2 which was going to be their next big thing. they wanted the game to recoop the money they spent and drawn some profit from it with little/no effort. they moved all the best programmers (who were lucky to still have jobs) to what they invested time and money into so that they could make it better than VG. Like i said, they bought the game to bury it.
It was playable at launch. it did have issues like every game does, they just did what they wanted to with slow fixes to try to push people to EQ2. why wouldnt a company be concerned with things that they are making in house rather than a shoddy game that they bought and had to try to fix/release as quick as possible? hell they probably recooped all of their money spent to aquire the game on box sales and then they put together a team to try to keep it playable but not surpass EQ2. job done.
as for the other games you mentioned, yea like i said, swg was a mistake. they tried to mainstream it so that they would attract more people to the game. they failed. but guess what? people still play it, it still draws income, it isnt going anywhere soon. its in the same boat as UO, they made a huge game changing addition with tram, a lot of people did not like it. 12 years later its is still going strong. it just released a huge expansion. was tram a mistake? yes. are they still making a ton of money off UO? hell yes because it costs them nearly nothing to keep the servers running and a skeleton dev team. the fact that its been running for 12 years is enough said. SWG is the same.
never played planetside/matrix/EQOA or even heard about it that much, was not interested in it so i assume they were niche games that, like most niche games, crash and burn. at least they as a AAA company tried to appease smaller clusters even though they failed.
as for free realms, it is one of the most popular games out there. they are doing what they want with it, making money, attracting young people to mmo's. its a huge success.
games that run for years and years and keep people playing them, even if its small population, are pure win. you may not like it, but the fact that those games have been running for 5+ years means that people are still playing them.
its not the company but the people who let games die. you stop paying to play them, the dev crews go away and the eventual life support of money is taken away to let it die in peace.
Look at eve online. it was the dictionary definition of pure shit when it was released. seriously, have you ever seen screen shots, heard from people who started playing it at release? it was terrible. but people kept paying, and kept paying, and kept paying, and today its a huge success with multiple expansions and a supposed player base of 300k subscriptions. the players kept that game alive and made it a success. if they hadn't the game would have failed (like VG is doing, like matrix did) and CCP would be no more.
edit:
and to the above poster, games released around the time that EQ2, vanguard were released were all plagued with problems and ran just about as good as crap down the back of your leg. anyone remember WoW release? didnt we get an extre free month of play for how abosolutely terrible it was? but people stuck with it making it the largest populated, most popular game ever.
don t know about vanguard !but today i went to get newest avail everquest !the clerk told me we received some when they lunched their last (shadow odyssey if i recall)the clerk said i recieved on a few of them they were sold before they ever reached the store.clerk never heard of everquest after !i asked him ,ok then could i order some and some time card?
clerk check ontheir ebgame thingy!say to me sorry cant order them !im like ?"/%/$?they just released new content !
hes like couldnt say since we cant have em! i was so baffled ,the clerk told me everything everquest is sold before it ever reach
the store,if it ever does.i told him they release new dvd everquest soon you think i can get it!
he say i would be very surprised.soe doesnt send everquest anymore.im like but you sold everthing before it ever reached the store.clerk say:try explaining that to soe.
i was completetly speachless!
Vanguard was already shot down because of its crappy release.
SWG was ruined with the NGE experience. On the other hand, current SWG is very different from SWG just after NGE. With a skillbased system, it would be way better then preNGE even. Its definately one of the most feature rich MMORPG's out there. Not that it matters, because the MMO community doesnt lose a grudge. The same community also tends to look at the past with rosecoloured glasses. Any sane person would understand that preCU SWG would never have many subs nowadays.
The upside is that all other companies can look at SOE to learn what not to do.
Oh, on a sidenote. STO will be like AION. Lots of hype, lots of disappointment. STO will attract a lot of players at launch just because of the ip, but those players will discover soon enough that its really lacking in variety of content.