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Wildaboutwildstar
Member Posts: 38
Jeremy Gaffney explains how to make a successful MMO.
Carbine just gets it!
They are the first company I have seen that actually understood why WoW is such a huge success. Furthermore, they are actually adopting said model.
All the other MMOs of the last decade failed, because they were merely making a cheap knockoff of WoW. You can't copy WoW's current state and succeed. Hell, even blizzard's current model isn't succeeding for them. They are bleeding subs like the a stuck pig. Why would I want to play a knockoff that doesn't try to differentiate itself from the rest? Especially when I could play the original?
That is why this game is the first true WoW clone!!! They are copying WoW's success model from 2004, instead of the current state of the game!
I can understand the skepticism about this game though, but at least we know they have the right mentality down. That is 9/10's of the battle right there. Any game dev without that just has no chance! These past MMOs post WoW, and even the new ones coming out, FF & ESO etc, just don't understand what is truly important to the success of a long enduring MMO.
Comments
There Is Always Hope!
Well I think WildStar is the first one who don't try to be like WoW, but take the good things what made WoW such a great game. I've seen some videos from the developers and they seem to understand what mistakes not to make. I think this might be my next MMO, Final Fantasy XIV is just the same Japanese style debacle, ESO could be good but I don't think the developers get it that it's not about making Skyrim into an online world, it's trying to convert a offline RPG into a MMO where players want to return to and have stuff to do. Skyrim just looks like a RPG where you can quest with friends, that's it. For Elder Scrolls fans it's awesome, because you can play your favourite game with your friends or with others online. But for the MMO community, not so much
My summary for some highly anticipated upcoming MMO's: FFXIV looks to much like WoW, ESO ignores WoW too much and WildStar (hopefully) does it just right!
This is going to be our game! Finally
FFXIV ARR is doing exactly what Jeremy is talking about almost word for word.
The biggest thing is content. To get the huge sub numbers when other games already a decade old have way more.
You gotta push content out the gate and beyond the first few years like tomorrow doesn't exist. Communities need to be built and that takes time. Not enough content, no community building time given. Endgame content too easy, no community building time given.
Let us put on our thinking caps for a second shall we? There are no major gameplay differences between Wildstar and WoW, both revolve around quest hubs raids and instanced pvp. Now if the founder of all those is dying, what do you think is going to happen to this game?
Played-Everything
Playing-LoL
WoW is declining, like a million subs lost in a year or so. Not to mention that there still are LOTS and LOTS of people buying this game everyday, so that means even more people are leaving. For a reason. I'm still subbed but chances are I'm not buying the new expansion if they don't convince me enough. So let's put up our thinking caps again, millions of people lost interest in WoW, a small section of those are still looking for a MMO who does what WoW did in his thriving days, like 40 man raids etc., but also evolved with time and learned from mistakes WoW and other games did. Imo WildStar is not the gazillionth WoW clone, it's a game made by guys who look like they actually know what they're doing. The style is even better than WoW, but that's just personal. The point is they actually made a good style. Games like Rift, Aion, Warhammer, Age of Conan, ESO and FF online only want the best graphics, but you need some artstyle which appeals to a large group of players, like WoW accomplished, and WildStar tries to accomplish in a totally different way now. So let's put up our thinking cap and let's say... 1 million subs? I think they can make it if they put up some good marketing
No reasoning behind any of the things I highlighted. That was a painful wall of nothing.
Played-Everything
Playing-LoL
Did you just say put on thinking caps, and then state WoW gameplay = WS gameplay? Then in the same breath say WoW is dying... The irony in this comment could kill a mentally challenged rhino!WoW is declining, like a million subs lost in a year or so. Not to mention that there still are LOTS and LOTS of people buying this game everyday, so that means even more people are leaving. For a reason. I'm still subbed but chances are I'm not buying the new expansion if they don't convince me enough. So let's put up our thinking caps again, millions of people lost interest in WoW, a small section of those are still looking for a MMO who does what WoW did in his thriving days, like 40 man raids etc., but also evolved with time and learned from mistakes WoW and other games did. Imo WildStar is not the gazillionth WoW clone, it's a game made by guys who look like they actually know what they're doing. The style is even better than WoW, but that's just personal. The point is they actually made a good style. Games like Rift, Aion, Warhammer, Age of Conan, ESO and FF online only want the best graphics, but you need some artstyle which appeals to a large group of players, like WoW accomplished, and WildStar tries to accomplish in a totally different way now. So let's put up our thinking cap and let's say... 1 million subs? I think they can make it if they put up some good marketing
No reasoning behind any of the things I highlighted. That was a painful wall of nothing.
Wow yet another...brain fart. Its not a WoW clone, that is easy to see. The devs obviously know what they are doing! Read the article! The Cartoony art style is appealing or at least neutral amongst a huge audience. That is why Pixar makes a truckload of money from their animated movies.Another fan in denial. The graphics are antiquated and yea, are in line with WOW. a 10 YEAR OLD GAME...and yea, the population is finally declining..AFTER 10 YEARS...this game will be lucky if it holds 1/10 of that population for more than 3-6 months max. I'm just stunned that after 10 years, they do nothing to advance the PVE questing and continue the brainless PVE tradition of most games that have copied it...Open Wall of Text, limited voice over...ignore wall of text...arrow to objective....run to explanation point...report quest...receive generic reward...oh boy what fun...oh wait..I can build a cartoon house...Ive always wanted to do that.
There Is Always Hope!
Don't know if you've played it or not, most likely not based on the graphics comment alone. Now why are you always hanging out in forums where you don't care for a game? Oh, Chrisbox is also clueless. Can't go into detail on why people have no idea what they're talking about though.
Clueless? Please do educate me then.
What is different in gameplay between WoW in WS?
Lets see...
Both share the major gameplay components- raids, instanced pvp, quest hubs, two factions
WS only has- player housing, 40 man raid over 10/25 man, telegraph combat
WoW only has - Pet battles, challenge mode dungeons
If that doesn't red flag WoW clone...idk what to say, all the differences are so minor. It's time to be realistic. People viciously defended SWTOR and RIFT as being unique too and look where they ended up. Wildstar is going down the same route.
Played-Everything
Playing-LoL
Well you may not be entirely clueless, more so poorly informed. Here are a some ways it is different.
The Devs interact with the community and receive feedback far more than any other mmorpgs devs that I can think of.
Combat is nothing like WoW, it is like GW2/Tera, but with even more movement. Not all enemy attacks or player attacks are telegraphed.
Questing isn't based on hubs. Although the game has people standing in a town where you can obtain quests, you can also wander off in the world and receive Call in missions, interact with objects (out in the world) to activate missions, find people out in the middle of nowhere with missions, defeat boss monsters (receive their skulls) and turn them in, encounter dynamic events (all sorts of missions), kill monsters and receive missions to kill them in a time period challenge. Now there are also path missions. All of these are based on going out into the world and finding them. There are numerous missions available here (like jumping puzzles), as most of the classes have 8 different mission types. The game features end game solo dungeons.
Oh, Settlers can actually build new quest hubs and by doing so unlock secret quest hub based missions for everyone, guess that is in your favor!
This game most likely has more mission variety than any theme park I've played. The only quests that may be considered fairly more different and unique are TSW's riddle/puzzle quests. WildStar does have some puzzle quests though, some simple ones are shown in various videos.
I haven't played WoW in a long time, so I'm unsure what the item upgrade system is. WildStar has a modding/item upgrading system. Another feature both games share is a seamless open world, apart from dungeons, continents, and housing (for WildStar). For Wildstar, the starting zone is instanced up to break up massive numbers. Don't know much about warplots, but they're described as pvp housing. So that will definitely change it up some.
Now onto some negative aspects, 1 weapon per class really? The game has been described, by devs, to have archetype models that fit their desired racial silhouettes. So various body types appear to be out of the picture for now. Now unlike in SWTOR, where all of the races are colored humans (one with head tentacles) at least WildStar has some alien races. Now onto those raids, it would be nice if they were something like 30-40 man raids that would scale to player numbers. Same thing goes with the 20 man raid, if that would scale for like 10-20. Not a hardcore raider, so maybe a specific number fits their playstyle. I'd prefer the raids/dungeons scale to group size. Now I really hope WildStar doesn't go down SWTORs route, and I personally don't see it heading that way.
Good article, but it actually doesn't show that Carbine understands why WoW was successful. They're making a similar mistake to a lot of people.
Most people assume that WoW was largely successful due to it's mechanics. And while that is partly true, it's hardly the whole story. WoW was essentially a gateway game. It brought a lot of people who had never played an MMO before into the MMO genre. It polished existing features in other games to make them more accessible, and since all these MMO vets' friends were now playing WoW, they managed to snag up a bunch of the established MMO player base as well.
Being someone who played MMOs before WoW came out, I remember the initial reaction to it. Many played it because it wasn't bad, albeit cartoony, and a lot of their friends were playing it. Sound familiar? In fact, a lot of my friends (we were all playing EQ2 at the time) were fully expecting to drop the game after a month or so and come back to EQ2
Because of this gateway phenomena, it's going to be impossible to recreate WoW's success using their methods. You can't introduce the same people to the same genre twice to cash in. And there haven't been enough people leaving the genre to reintroduce them, either.
- That said, I do think Carbine is doing a lot of things right with this game. I hope they aren't focusing too much on emulating WoW's successes, and instead are focusing more on what will make their game the best it can be. Definitely looking forward to playing this one.
I was tempted to reply to him myself, but I don't think I should waste my time on someone who can't differentiate graphical art style and graphical quality. Thanks for saving me the time.
You know what to do when millions and millions people all over the world play your game, pay all the expansions and pay a monthly subscription? Most companies will try to stick to what the game once was because that's why most people eventually bought the game, right? And ofcourse try to improve on dozens of aspects, but not too much because then people will start bitching about why they change their game they once loved. It's a doomed lovestory with gamers and their online game, which will always end in misery for a small part of the community. It's even harder to keep everyone satisfied with that much gamers paying monthly, because paying customers will get more critical in time if they don't get what they want and keep on paying. I'm not saying Blizzard is taking the best direction with WoW, because they aren't in my opinion. But atm still 7.7 million people are thinking otherwise. And just think how hard it is to make good decisions for almost everyone of ALL those players. It's almost impossible.
Atleast I definitely know that your idea about ''changing'' the whole core of the game because it feels outdated is the worst decision they could ever take. If people saying it feels outdated, they should play another game right? Or why did they buy WoW in the first place? If you compare these days with how the world of Azeroth once looked like in the beta there has been quite some improvements. Hell, if someone would show you how this game would evolve and how much there has been changed your head would probably explode.
The things you highlighted are all just my opinion and how I think about it. Or do you want me to convince you why to play WildStar? Well, you probably don't like it so I'm not even trying. I'm just saying I think this could be one of those few games who actually are good and I saw some of the videos of the developers and it seems like these guys know what they are doing. But ofcourse that is just my opinion, as I probably need to repeat that to you.
You don't have to agree with me, but you don't have to hate me for hyping a game that you don't like. WoW dissed every MMO player wise because of the millions playing and PAYING the game monthly, for years after years after years. You can't blame all MMO developers are comparing their game to WoW, because that's just what the standard is these days. The wrong decision most MMO developers was not only to look at WoW, how they accomplished such greatness, but how to be like them and just copycatting their game on much aspects. That's not something you can tell by facts, that's just a feeling you have with a game or with developer videos. I watched plenty of those and WildStar is the first game I like since WoW, that feeling that you are looking forward to discover a world together with thousands of others online.
Maybe it's just not your taste, but I think alot of people are going to have a good time with this game. Or are you looking forward to games like FFXIV or ESO? Please don't let me laugh, FF is just one of those many again and ESO is just Skyrim, but then online with some online functions implemented. Great for Elder Scrolls fans though, but not for the MMO market. And FF will probably be a great game for a niche market. But if there is no other MMO on the horizon and if WildStar will keep going in the right direction I think they will attract millions of people, probably because of all those WoW players looking for a new MMO right now and there hasn't been any MMO yet who could live up to our expectations.
You have to admit most people are burnt out with WoW right now, as am I. They want something new, a new challenge. But NOT a new genre as you suggesting. Or what else are you expecting from a MMO besides questing and raiding? Maybe you should stop searching for a good MMO because in my opinion that's where a MMO in it's core is all about. Maybe we could use some change in MMO world and could use a game who doesn't live up to the general ''questing to level and raiding as endgame'' thing, but as far as we are right know, I don't see anything like that happen and be happy with the game that actually looks like they know why it is going downhill with WoW, besides that WoW is getting quite dated ofcourse.
I can't answer that since there is an NDA, so everything I write for argument sake is based on what anyone can find from their videos, youtube (there are tons of gameplay videos there), or what they themselves have discussed. I will tell you that I have a powerful Sager/Clevo Gaming Laptop with two 580Ms in SLI that can play Skyrim on the highest settings and Witcher 2 on the highest settings except for Uber Sampling. The graphics/ world in this games doesn't have the same charm that one felt when turning on WOW for the first time and you can list all the useless features it may have that WOW may not, be in the end, the 'whole' of WOW and the charm of that world and just the way they implemented the small things makes it a better game. Anyone who doesn't see WOW in this game and pretends like its some unique beast is being absurd. (By the way, I haven't played WOW for at least 5 years). Currently beta testing 2 different MMOs.
As far as why I hang out here...to discuss the game, so I'll probably stop soon as I've said what I think but one thing I agree with is thats annoying when a game that people support get poisoned by a couple of people on a mission....so my only suggestion would be to get the OP and another in this thread to stop doing the identical thing on a much more frequent basis in the ESO forums and maybe we can all get away from forum PVP and get back to talking about features of something we are looking forward to...but I doubt this will ever happen because the same nonsense happened with SWTOR (even if the game didn't meet my expectations) and happens with just about every new MMO that gets to beta stages.
There Is Always Hope!
I think the guys at Carbine studios might get it right. I wouldn't bet my paycheck on it, but they just might.
All this talk about telegraph combat is IMHO completely irrelevant. It is somewhat new and inovative, but it won't make or break the game.
What can break the game is: leveling to max level in 60 hours (SWTOR, Neverwinter), no PVE end-game content (Neverwinter), ongoing technical issues (SWTOR), shallow or meaningless PVP with no progress (all new MMOs including GW2), imbalanced classes (WAR), over simplification (WoW).
Honestly, if they manage to copy-paste WoW TBC, I think they will hit a home-run. So far, they seem to be going in the right direction. Time will tell.
Good article, thanks for sharing it.
Personally I believe the only people calling WS dumbed down, a wow clone or a bad game
are the people who haven't played it yet.
The odds you are in the beta is near zero. Why post that? No one is going to believe it. In fact, it actually hurts your piss poor argument, and destroys what little credibility you had.
How does someone prove they are in beta if there is an NDA? An NDA is an NDA, so I have no choice but to respect it and fall back on what I am allowed to talk about. If you can't handle it because you have succumbed to the hype, that's not my problem. I stand by everything I wrote without breaking the NDA by discussing my specific experiences. I think I am allowed to say I am in beta, but can't discuss my personal experiences. If not, the mods will correct me. Here is part of the email I received prior to the last beta. Hopefully it helps you to not decide on professional gambling as a career.
The WildStar Beta Wants YOU!
Greetings, (My name went here)!
Congratulations! The team at Carbine Studios would like to cordially invite you to participate in our latest Stress Test. Our engineers here at Carbine have spent years working on their server hardware, software, and everything in between, and now it's your turn to break it! Oh, and you'll get to play WildStar too, we suppose.
We want to push everything to their limits this week, and that can only be done with your help! Before we get to the good stuff (you know, your beta key, the instructions for patching, and the dates and times), there are a few things we want to explain, so that you understand our goals for this test.
etc etc etc
There Is Always Hope!