TDU 2 will be massive, easily the best driving game ever released. The reason it's so good is that it's NOT a racing game, racing is in there but it's only a very small part.
I fully expect TDU 2 to take up most of my 2011 game time.
why do people keep buying the atari name it has to be cursed or something. atari has changed to dozen owners everyone failed and was forced to sell the name. it had short run success in 1977 to 1980 or so before slowly hitting rock bottom.
why do people keep buying the atari name it has to be cursed or something. atari has changed to dozen owners everyone failed and was forced to sell the name. it had short run success in 1977 to 1980 or so before slowly hitting rock bottom.
Probably because the Infogrames brand name had an even worse reputation? Buying the Atari brand was a step up for them.
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan
TDU 2 will be massive, easily the best driving game ever released. The reason it's so good is that it's NOT a racing game, racing is in there but it's only a very small part.
I fully expect TDU 2 to take up most of my 2011 game time.
But will TDU2 bring Atari $40,000,000.00+ or more in revenue? Does the series sell that well? Atari has received a brief stay of execution from BlueBay, but Atari is going to need at least (roughly) $40,000,000.00 on hand to pay back BlueBay when the loan comes due early next year (although it will slightly help that they still have about €15-20,000,000.00 of the original €35,000,000.00 loan left, unless they use that up as well). I'm not sure Atari can count on yet another extension, or receiving a loan from someone else for that matter, since it appears that BlueBay is trying to dump Atari stocks as fast as it can.
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan
TDU 2 will be massive, easily the best driving game ever released. The reason it's so good is that it's NOT a racing game, racing is in there but it's only a very small part.
I fully expect TDU 2 to take up most of my 2011 game time.
But will TDU2 bring Atari $40,000,000.00+ or more in revenue? Does the series sell that well? Atari has received a brief stay of execution from BlueBay, but Atari is going to need at least (roughly) $40,000,000.00 on hand to pay back BlueBay when the loan comes due early next year (although it will slightly help that they still have about €15-20,000,000.00 of the original €35,000,000.00 loan left, unless they use that up as well). I'm not sure Atari can count on yet another extension, or receiving a loan from someone else for that matter, since it appears that BlueBay is trying to dump Atari stocks as fast as it can.
Why is it called Black Friday? Because it is the only time of the year companies are in the black. The rest of the year is in the red borrowing and what not like most companies do. I'm not a business person, and what goes on behind the scenes is just what I read. There is always atleast two views to everything. I'm sure Atari can convince investors that future projects are worth the investment, NWN for example, that CO F2P model should net bigger profits, STO has big plans, etc...
Yeah I wish they would actually sell the NW ip to anyone as it stands I don't trust Cryptic anymore enough to do business with them so this will turn out to be a game based on a beloved ip that I will not get to play.
but yeah, to call this game Fantastic is like calling Twilight the Godfather of vampire movies....
Why is it called Black Friday? Because it is the only time of the year companies are in the black. The rest of the year is in the red borrowing and what not like most companies do. I'm not a business person, and what goes on behind the scenes is just what I read. There is always atleast two views to everything. I'm sure Atari can convince investors that future projects are worth the investment, NWN for example, that CO F2P model should net bigger profits, STO has big plans, etc...
Atari has been continuously in the red for years and even by their most optimistic 'forward looking assesment,' at best they'll break even in this last quarter. Creditors aren't idiots; BlueBay was brought on board at the time that Cryptic was doing its dog and pony show, promising that they could mass-produce quality MMOs every 18 - 24 months using their Cryptic 2.0 engine. I suspect that promise was the only thing that made BlueBay decide to lend Atari the money, as prior to that Atari's previous loan was several months past the due date.
As has been shown, Cryptic really hasn't been able to produce quality MMOs in that timeframe so far. Additionally both of Cryptic's MMOs have vastly underperformed: According to Atari's financial statements, CO cost Atari as much or more than it brought in. Additionally, STO has had one of the fastest playerbase dropoffs in history (as far as I know only AO and WWIIOnline were worse, though some of the newer MMOs (Aion and the new FFIV (?) may have done worse); STO went from an estimated 250,000 - 350,000 players at launch to approximately 110,000 in just the first 30 days after launch. Atari really doesn't have much in the way of promises left to make to potential creditors/investors; BlueBay realizes that, which is why they tossed Atari a temporary lifeline by extending the credit deadline in return for Atari not dumping stock into the market so that BlueBay can.
NWN is a big risk for any investor; not only is it not an MMO (it's being billed as an 'Online Multiplayer Game'), but Atari is going to have to convince any potential investor that they will earn their profits from box sales alone, since they will not be able to count on subscription revenue. Additionally, NWN isn't due out until well after the new loan due date; Atari is going to have to convince investors that they can survive until then without having to file for bankruptcy. If they can't do that, then no creditor will touch them. CO (and possibly STO) going the 'free to play' route isn't going to be a big seller to creditors either: Not only does CO and STO not have the amount of development and content available to see as impressive gains as Turbine's games did, but most creditors are going to see that 'free to play' term and cringe due to not understanding what it means.
Atari can make whatever promises it wants to, in order to woo potential creditors/investors, but once they start looking at Atari's finances then all bets are off. Atari's best bet right now is that Blue Bay can't unload its Atari assets (stocks, etc.) by the time the new deadline hits, and they give Atari another extension.
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan
Yeah I wish they would actually sell the NW ip to anyone as it stands I don't trust Cryptic anymore enough to do business with them so this will turn out to be a game based on a beloved ip that I will not get to play.
I think you would have a better chance of Hasbro winning their lawsuit to revoke Atari's D&D franchise rights, rather than having someone else come along and buy it. Remember, Hasbro owns the rights to D&D via their acquisition of WotC several years back, and they would have to approve anyone else getting rights for D&D video games. As long as the lawsuit hasn't been settled in Hasbro's favor, Atari gets to keep on producing D&D video games.
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan
NWN is a big risk for any investor; not only is it not an MMO (it's being billed as an 'Online Multiplayer Game'), but Atari is going to have to convince any potential investor that they will earn their profits from box sales alone, since they will not be able to count on subscription revenue. Additionally, NWN isn't due out until well after the new loan due date; Atari is going to have to convince investors that they can survive until then without having to file for bankruptcy. If they can't do that, then no creditor will touch them. CO (and possibly STO) going the 'free to play' route isn't going to be a big seller to creditors either: Not only does CO and STO not have the amount of development and content available to see as impressive gains as Turbine's games did, but most creditors are going to see that 'free to play' term and cringe due to not understanding what it means.
Atari can make whatever promises it wants to, in order to woo potential creditors/investors, but once they start looking at Atari's finances then all bets are off. Atari's best bet right now is that Blue Bay can't unload its Atari assets (stocks, etc.) by the time the new deadline hits, and they give Atari another extension.
Why would investors cringe at the term free to play? It's the perfect argument since MMO's are gradually going that route. It's Atari's job to convince investors and us consumers it is a viable route for them. How many times have you heard the argument for CO and STO that they would play it if it were free? I've heard it many times.
The argument CO and STO don't have near as much content as Turbine's game is false, in my opinion. Before DDO went F2P it severly lacked content. It was easy to reach level 16 and not have squat to do but run the same instances over and over again. People wouldn't play the game because they hated the instances, no open world. Lucky for Turbine they took a big risk and learned people have a mind like a fish. Easily could have done what they did with AC2 and shut it down.
Ignoring the games they make, Atari is reducing their operating loss from 16m to 8m. Their overall Gross Margin is down (bad), but the % of their sales that are profit is up (good). From an investment point of view, they are improving by reducing their loss and increasing the amount of money from sales that goes to profits. Investing in the company would be pretty cheap right now. Buy low, sell high. Of course it's a risk because Atari could completely blow it, but if they continue the trend, it will pay off.
I wouldn't play their games, but I would consider investing in the company. I don't really know anything about investing though so that could totally change if I had actual investor knowledge.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
Why would investors cringe at the term free to play? It's the perfect argument since MMO's are gradually going that route. It's Atari's job to convince investors and us consumers it is a viable route for them. How many times have you heard the argument for CO and STO that they would play it if it were free? I've heard it many times.
The argument CO and STO don't have near as much content as Turbine's game is false, in my opinion. Before DDO went F2P it severly lacked content. It was easy to reach level 16 and not have squat to do but run the same instances over and over again. People wouldn't play the game because they hated the instances, no open world. Lucky for Turbine they took a big risk and learned people have a mind like a fish. Easily could have done what they did with AC2 and shut it down.
Investors would cringe at the term because they don't really understand it; a lot of them don't understand MMOs and how they work, which is shown by how often investors push for MMOs to be released too early in the hopes of getting a quick return on their investment. Ultimately those games who do that end up paying the price. When an investor hears the word free, it's going to set off the same warning bells that the terms mandatory recall or Federal oversight would. Sure it's Atari's job to try to sweet talk them into acceting that, but right now that's going to be difficult with their current creditor dumping stock because Atari is unable to pay the loan that was due this month.
You can try to play the 'back when...' game all you wish, but both DDO and LotRO each on their own have more content right now than Cryptic's games do right now. By Cryptic's own admission STO only had 80 hours of gameplay total, and that hasn't vastly improved with all the updates. In fact average players are still able to hit max level before the free thirty days are up and there still is barely enough content for one play through the game, let alone two.
You're missing my original point with Turbine though: They had the content to make the transition to the hybrid model in both of their games viable (i.e. keep people playing and paying), Cryptic's two games do not. To be fair though CO is a lot farther along, and far better off in that regard, than STO.
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan
Ignoring the games they make, Atari is reducing their operating loss from 16m to 8m. Their overall Gross Margin is down (bad), but the % of their sales that are profit is up (good). From an investment point of view, they are improving by reducing their loss and increasing the amount of money from sales that goes to profits. Investing in the company would be pretty cheap right now. Buy low, sell high. Of course it's a risk because Atari could completely blow it, but if they continue the trend, it will pay off.
I wouldn't play their games, but I would consider investing in the company. I don't really know anything about investing though so that could totally change if I had actual investor knowledge.
And Atari has been reducing their debt for four years now. Prior to that they were losing around (roughly) $200,000,000.00, but that really doen't mean anything much; Atari's debt only shrunk due to the fact that BlueBay threw them a lifeline and pushed back the due date on the credit they extended Atari. Otherwise, Atari would be owing about $40,000,000.00 more this quarter; that would have made Atari's debt grow instead of shrink. Any investor worth their salt is going to take a closer look at that, and it's not too difficult to see that BlueBay is trying to dump Atari assets as fast as they can.
If that wasn't enough to warn away investors, all they have to do is look at both Atari's stock trends (declining) and the current Atari financial report; you don't have to be an accountant to see that Atari wouldn't have been able to make good on paying it's loan. As a matter of fact, in order to 'shrink' their debt this quarter, they had to borrow a sizeable chunk of money from their credit line. Add to that that there are still four lawsuits outstanding against Atari that haven't been resolved yet, two of which are as close to a sure thing as you can get legally.
In fact, Atari documents and financial reports actually back up the claims made by Turbine and Hasbro in their lawsuits. If Atari can't settle out of court (favorably for them, generally speaking), they stand to lose $30,000,000.00 from the Turbine lawsuit and far more from the Hasbro lawsuit.
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan
You can try to play the 'back when...' game all you wish, but both DDO and LotRO each on their own have more content right now than Cryptic's games do right now. By Cryptic's own admission STO only had 80 hours of gameplay total, and that hasn't vastly improved with all the updates. In fact average players are still able to hit max level before the free thirty days are up and there still is barely enough content for one play through the game, let alone two.
You're missing my original point with Turbine though: They had the content to make the transition to the hybrid model in both of their games viable (i.e. keep people playing and paying), Cryptic's two games do not. To be fair though CO is a lot farther along, and far better off in that regard, than STO.
I'm saying the period right before DDO went F2P it was in dire need of content. Just like you claim in STO that people can reach max level in one month you could do the same in DDO easily. I played DDO and I am as average and casual as they come because of work and school and was easily able to hit max in DDO in no time. I got extremely tired of running the same damn instances over and over. I am saying DDO prior to F2P and STO in my opinion have close to the same amount of content.
Look at the DDO forums here before the announcement of F2P. It is a gripe fest because of lack of content updates for several months. If Turbine was able to pull DDO out of the ashes Cryptic can do the same to STO if they wanted. It's in the same condition except in my opinion Cryptic is doing more for STO than Turbine ever did with DDO the year before it went F2P.
I'm saying the period right before DDO went F2P it was in dire need of content. Just like you claim in STO that people can reach max level in one month you could do the same in DDO easily. I played DDO and I am as average and casual as they come because of work and school and was easily able to hit max in DDO in no time. I got extremely tired of running the same damn instances over and over. I am saying DDO prior to F2P and STO in my opinion have close to the same amount of content.
Look at the DDO forums here before the announcement of F2P. It is a gripe fest because of lack of content updates for several months. If Turbine was able to pull DDO out of the ashes Cryptic can do the same to STO if they wanted. It's in the same condition except in my opinion Cryptic is doing more for STO than Turbine ever did with DDO the year before it went F2P.
And once again, DDO is not that way right now. It may have been at one time, before the switch to the hybrid model, but it is not that way now. DDO has a few years of continued development post-launch before they switched over, but Cryptic's two games have not seen much in the way of additional content. Therefore, as I said before, either of Turbine's games have more content than both of Cryptic's games right now. How fast you can get through the content in DDO is a moot point; you can get through Cryptic's content as fast or faster.
As for Cryptic doing more for STO? That is complete and utter rubbish; every time they turn around they seem to drive more people away. With all of their updates so far, they have only managed to add in a few hours of actual content. Their plan to 'fix' this is to:
Start letting players repeat previously unrepeateable content, and
Release tools to allow the players to make content instead of Cryptic doing it.
The key part of your second paragraph was "Cryptic can do the same to STO if they wanted." I'm not seeing the desire on their part. In point of fact, going by past Cryptic dev leaks, Cryptic cut STO's team. Sure the guys in charge were quick to say it wasn't so, but other devs would post in their forums making the same comments. I'm going to take the rank and file devs word on it, rather than the guy who retired to play with his bees and goat.
At the time those comments regarding lack of manpower were made, it was widely thought that it was due to work on a third MMO. As it turns out, it seems to be due to both the NWN Online Multiplayer Game and an as yet undisclosed 'dinosaur themed' MMO certain game magazines have started mentioning whispers of. Hence the need for tools so that the players can fill in the content gaps. I believe that Cryptic will let CO and STO both go hybrid and let them limp along as best they can, with minimal support, while they focus on newer games.
One last thing: It's not just me saying that people can reach the endgame in less than a month, it's most of the people who post here (and for that matter on the official STO forums as well). The one person we had who played for a month and stated he was only Commander 8 admitted he was taking his time and only playing very casually.
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan
One last thing: It's not just me saying that people can reach the endgame in less than a month, it's most of the people who post here (and for that matter on the official STO forums as well). The one person we had who played for a month and stated he was only Commander 8 admitted he was taking his time and only playing very casually.
Just to support that point this dedicated Fed player , took 8 days to grind up his Klingon to get a carrier which he obviously enjoys. * grind for Klingon is impressive given the complete lack of content. It shows determination and drive .
Of course DDO isn't that way right now. F2P helped bring in more bucks for more content. Before F2P Turbine gave it little effort. I was in Alpha all the way up to F2P, look at my screenshots. DDO never saw an expansion, the module updates in my opinion only provided a few things to do compared to what they offer now. Don't get me wrong, but what Turbine did for DDO and AC2 was a shame. They showed more effort in AC and LOTRO than they ever put into DDO or AC2.
Lets look at 1. Repeatable missions. How many times have you done Vons in DDO? Or Waterworks? Deleria's Tomb, those get repeated because they were the most fun out of the game and the reward/exp was awesome compared to the other instances. Same with STO, some of the missions are a lot of fun, I wouldn't mind repeating them on a harder setting to see how it goes, add a little challenge. Nothing wrong with that.
2. From the posts I read a lot of people like the UGC in STO. A lot of people wanted that in DDO. What's wrong with that? I think it is exciting to see what people can come up with.
It's not uncommon for devs to be pulled on games after release to be moved to another game within the company. AoC, FE, DDO. The current devs in STO have the capability to make good stuff happen in STO. Will you like it? Probably not going by your post history. Can the current dev staff bring back people, sure. I'm always willing to give devs a look that the glass is half full.
I don't care that other people here can reach max in a day, two days or a month in STO, bully for them. I said "you" because I was attacking your argument. I think that argument can be applied to any MMO if they know which quests/missions offer the most experience. I did it with everquest, DDO, AoC. lists go on.
I remember when we used to use the actual stock exchange...and a NEWSPAPER to find out about "financial reports"...
I guess, lucky for me, all I have to do is log into MMORPG.com...
Just like any other thread, if you don't like it then don't read it. Some people are interested in how well Atari is doing financially (post CO/STO), and some don't care. This thread is for those that are interested.
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan
Comments
TDU 2 will be massive, easily the best driving game ever released. The reason it's so good is that it's NOT a racing game, racing is in there but it's only a very small part.
I fully expect TDU 2 to take up most of my 2011 game time.
why do people keep buying the atari name it has to be cursed or something. atari has changed to dozen owners everyone failed and was forced to sell the name. it had short run success in 1977 to 1980 or so before slowly hitting rock bottom.
Probably because the Infogrames brand name had an even worse reputation? Buying the Atari brand was a step up for them.
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan
But will TDU2 bring Atari $40,000,000.00+ or more in revenue? Does the series sell that well? Atari has received a brief stay of execution from BlueBay, but Atari is going to need at least (roughly) $40,000,000.00 on hand to pay back BlueBay when the loan comes due early next year (although it will slightly help that they still have about €15-20,000,000.00 of the original €35,000,000.00 loan left, unless they use that up as well). I'm not sure Atari can count on yet another extension, or receiving a loan from someone else for that matter, since it appears that BlueBay is trying to dump Atari stocks as fast as it can.
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan
Why is it called Black Friday? Because it is the only time of the year companies are in the black. The rest of the year is in the red borrowing and what not like most companies do. I'm not a business person, and what goes on behind the scenes is just what I read. There is always atleast two views to everything. I'm sure Atari can convince investors that future projects are worth the investment, NWN for example, that CO F2P model should net bigger profits, STO has big plans, etc...
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Promote what you love instead of bashing what you hate.
I know! They should sell their Neverwinter rights to Bioware. They get money and we don't have to watch a beloved IP burn.
Yeah I wish they would actually sell the NW ip to anyone as it stands I don't trust Cryptic anymore enough to do business with them so this will turn out to be a game based on a beloved ip that I will not get to play.
but yeah, to call this game Fantastic is like calling Twilight the Godfather of vampire movies....
Atari has been continuously in the red for years and even by their most optimistic 'forward looking assesment,' at best they'll break even in this last quarter. Creditors aren't idiots; BlueBay was brought on board at the time that Cryptic was doing its dog and pony show, promising that they could mass-produce quality MMOs every 18 - 24 months using their Cryptic 2.0 engine. I suspect that promise was the only thing that made BlueBay decide to lend Atari the money, as prior to that Atari's previous loan was several months past the due date.
As has been shown, Cryptic really hasn't been able to produce quality MMOs in that timeframe so far. Additionally both of Cryptic's MMOs have vastly underperformed: According to Atari's financial statements, CO cost Atari as much or more than it brought in. Additionally, STO has had one of the fastest playerbase dropoffs in history (as far as I know only AO and WWIIOnline were worse, though some of the newer MMOs (Aion and the new FFIV (?) may have done worse); STO went from an estimated 250,000 - 350,000 players at launch to approximately 110,000 in just the first 30 days after launch. Atari really doesn't have much in the way of promises left to make to potential creditors/investors; BlueBay realizes that, which is why they tossed Atari a temporary lifeline by extending the credit deadline in return for Atari not dumping stock into the market so that BlueBay can.
NWN is a big risk for any investor; not only is it not an MMO (it's being billed as an 'Online Multiplayer Game'), but Atari is going to have to convince any potential investor that they will earn their profits from box sales alone, since they will not be able to count on subscription revenue. Additionally, NWN isn't due out until well after the new loan due date; Atari is going to have to convince investors that they can survive until then without having to file for bankruptcy. If they can't do that, then no creditor will touch them. CO (and possibly STO) going the 'free to play' route isn't going to be a big seller to creditors either: Not only does CO and STO not have the amount of development and content available to see as impressive gains as Turbine's games did, but most creditors are going to see that 'free to play' term and cringe due to not understanding what it means.
Atari can make whatever promises it wants to, in order to woo potential creditors/investors, but once they start looking at Atari's finances then all bets are off. Atari's best bet right now is that Blue Bay can't unload its Atari assets (stocks, etc.) by the time the new deadline hits, and they give Atari another extension.
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan
I think you would have a better chance of Hasbro winning their lawsuit to revoke Atari's D&D franchise rights, rather than having someone else come along and buy it. Remember, Hasbro owns the rights to D&D via their acquisition of WotC several years back, and they would have to approve anyone else getting rights for D&D video games. As long as the lawsuit hasn't been settled in Hasbro's favor, Atari gets to keep on producing D&D video games.
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan
Why would investors cringe at the term free to play? It's the perfect argument since MMO's are gradually going that route. It's Atari's job to convince investors and us consumers it is a viable route for them. How many times have you heard the argument for CO and STO that they would play it if it were free? I've heard it many times.
The argument CO and STO don't have near as much content as Turbine's game is false, in my opinion. Before DDO went F2P it severly lacked content. It was easy to reach level 16 and not have squat to do but run the same instances over and over again. People wouldn't play the game because they hated the instances, no open world. Lucky for Turbine they took a big risk and learned people have a mind like a fish. Easily could have done what they did with AC2 and shut it down.
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Promote what you love instead of bashing what you hate.
Ignoring the games they make, Atari is reducing their operating loss from 16m to 8m. Their overall Gross Margin is down (bad), but the % of their sales that are profit is up (good). From an investment point of view, they are improving by reducing their loss and increasing the amount of money from sales that goes to profits. Investing in the company would be pretty cheap right now. Buy low, sell high. Of course it's a risk because Atari could completely blow it, but if they continue the trend, it will pay off.
I wouldn't play their games, but I would consider investing in the company. I don't really know anything about investing though so that could totally change if I had actual investor knowledge.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
Investors would cringe at the term because they don't really understand it; a lot of them don't understand MMOs and how they work, which is shown by how often investors push for MMOs to be released too early in the hopes of getting a quick return on their investment. Ultimately those games who do that end up paying the price. When an investor hears the word free, it's going to set off the same warning bells that the terms mandatory recall or Federal oversight would. Sure it's Atari's job to try to sweet talk them into acceting that, but right now that's going to be difficult with their current creditor dumping stock because Atari is unable to pay the loan that was due this month.
You can try to play the 'back when...' game all you wish, but both DDO and LotRO each on their own have more content right now than Cryptic's games do right now. By Cryptic's own admission STO only had 80 hours of gameplay total, and that hasn't vastly improved with all the updates. In fact average players are still able to hit max level before the free thirty days are up and there still is barely enough content for one play through the game, let alone two.
You're missing my original point with Turbine though: They had the content to make the transition to the hybrid model in both of their games viable (i.e. keep people playing and paying), Cryptic's two games do not. To be fair though CO is a lot farther along, and far better off in that regard, than STO.
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan
And Atari has been reducing their debt for four years now. Prior to that they were losing around (roughly) $200,000,000.00, but that really doen't mean anything much; Atari's debt only shrunk due to the fact that BlueBay threw them a lifeline and pushed back the due date on the credit they extended Atari. Otherwise, Atari would be owing about $40,000,000.00 more this quarter; that would have made Atari's debt grow instead of shrink. Any investor worth their salt is going to take a closer look at that, and it's not too difficult to see that BlueBay is trying to dump Atari assets as fast as they can.
If that wasn't enough to warn away investors, all they have to do is look at both Atari's stock trends (declining) and the current Atari financial report; you don't have to be an accountant to see that Atari wouldn't have been able to make good on paying it's loan. As a matter of fact, in order to 'shrink' their debt this quarter, they had to borrow a sizeable chunk of money from their credit line. Add to that that there are still four lawsuits outstanding against Atari that haven't been resolved yet, two of which are as close to a sure thing as you can get legally.
In fact, Atari documents and financial reports actually back up the claims made by Turbine and Hasbro in their lawsuits. If Atari can't settle out of court (favorably for them, generally speaking), they stand to lose $30,000,000.00 from the Turbine lawsuit and far more from the Hasbro lawsuit.
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan
I'm saying the period right before DDO went F2P it was in dire need of content. Just like you claim in STO that people can reach max level in one month you could do the same in DDO easily. I played DDO and I am as average and casual as they come because of work and school and was easily able to hit max in DDO in no time. I got extremely tired of running the same damn instances over and over. I am saying DDO prior to F2P and STO in my opinion have close to the same amount of content.
Look at the DDO forums here before the announcement of F2P. It is a gripe fest because of lack of content updates for several months. If Turbine was able to pull DDO out of the ashes Cryptic can do the same to STO if they wanted. It's in the same condition except in my opinion Cryptic is doing more for STO than Turbine ever did with DDO the year before it went F2P.
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Promote what you love instead of bashing what you hate.
And once again, DDO is not that way right now. It may have been at one time, before the switch to the hybrid model, but it is not that way now. DDO has a few years of continued development post-launch before they switched over, but Cryptic's two games have not seen much in the way of additional content. Therefore, as I said before, either of Turbine's games have more content than both of Cryptic's games right now. How fast you can get through the content in DDO is a moot point; you can get through Cryptic's content as fast or faster.
As for Cryptic doing more for STO? That is complete and utter rubbish; every time they turn around they seem to drive more people away. With all of their updates so far, they have only managed to add in a few hours of actual content. Their plan to 'fix' this is to:
Start letting players repeat previously unrepeateable content, and
Release tools to allow the players to make content instead of Cryptic doing it.
The key part of your second paragraph was "Cryptic can do the same to STO if they wanted." I'm not seeing the desire on their part. In point of fact, going by past Cryptic dev leaks, Cryptic cut STO's team. Sure the guys in charge were quick to say it wasn't so, but other devs would post in their forums making the same comments. I'm going to take the rank and file devs word on it, rather than the guy who retired to play with his bees and goat.
At the time those comments regarding lack of manpower were made, it was widely thought that it was due to work on a third MMO. As it turns out, it seems to be due to both the NWN Online Multiplayer Game and an as yet undisclosed 'dinosaur themed' MMO certain game magazines have started mentioning whispers of. Hence the need for tools so that the players can fill in the content gaps. I believe that Cryptic will let CO and STO both go hybrid and let them limp along as best they can, with minimal support, while they focus on newer games.
One last thing: It's not just me saying that people can reach the endgame in less than a month, it's most of the people who post here (and for that matter on the official STO forums as well). The one person we had who played for a month and stated he was only Commander 8 admitted he was taking his time and only playing very casually.
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan
Just to support that point this dedicated Fed player , took 8 days to grind up his Klingon to get a carrier which he obviously enjoys. * grind for Klingon is impressive given the complete lack of content. It shows determination and drive .
http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=190022
I doubt I could match this given that I played Klingon almost exclusively in game and know the content very well.
Of course DDO isn't that way right now. F2P helped bring in more bucks for more content. Before F2P Turbine gave it little effort. I was in Alpha all the way up to F2P, look at my screenshots. DDO never saw an expansion, the module updates in my opinion only provided a few things to do compared to what they offer now. Don't get me wrong, but what Turbine did for DDO and AC2 was a shame. They showed more effort in AC and LOTRO than they ever put into DDO or AC2.
Lets look at 1. Repeatable missions. How many times have you done Vons in DDO? Or Waterworks? Deleria's Tomb, those get repeated because they were the most fun out of the game and the reward/exp was awesome compared to the other instances. Same with STO, some of the missions are a lot of fun, I wouldn't mind repeating them on a harder setting to see how it goes, add a little challenge. Nothing wrong with that.
2. From the posts I read a lot of people like the UGC in STO. A lot of people wanted that in DDO. What's wrong with that? I think it is exciting to see what people can come up with.
It's not uncommon for devs to be pulled on games after release to be moved to another game within the company. AoC, FE, DDO. The current devs in STO have the capability to make good stuff happen in STO. Will you like it? Probably not going by your post history. Can the current dev staff bring back people, sure. I'm always willing to give devs a look that the glass is half full.
I don't care that other people here can reach max in a day, two days or a month in STO, bully for them. I said "you" because I was attacking your argument. I think that argument can be applied to any MMO if they know which quests/missions offer the most experience. I did it with everquest, DDO, AoC. lists go on.
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Promote what you love instead of bashing what you hate.
Thank you for acknowledging that STO is "in the ashes".
Many of this have known this from day one.
RELAX!@!! BREATHE!!!
I remember when we used to use the actual stock exchange...and a NEWSPAPER to find out about "financial reports"...
I guess, lucky for me, all I have to do is log into MMORPG.com...
That Guild Wars 2 login screen knocked up my wife. Must be the second coming!
Just like any other thread, if you don't like it then don't read it. Some people are interested in how well Atari is doing financially (post CO/STO), and some don't care. This thread is for those that are interested.
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan