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Turbine Gives Up

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  • trash656trash656 Member UncommonPosts: 361
    edited July 2016
    The MMORPG market has been declining for along time. A lot of people have quite playing MMO's all together. Including myself. I don't like these MMO's these days because I can tell they are mostly designed for kids just from playing them. The majority of gamers that play these new MMO's are generally 15 - 25 year olds. A lot of them new to MMO's or from WoW. Guild Wars 2, Black Dessert Online, Runescape, SWTOR, WoW, WildStar, You can tell just from playing them the designers made them for kids with ADHD obviously. The market is also completely way over-saturated with so many MMO's and way to many Genres of MMO's.

    I'm surprised this website is still here because now a days most of the gamers are on steam playing other games. Not MMO's. Even most of the members of this website here are all "newish" users. Most of the older users have left. There is proof all over the place in the gaming community, online and listening to gamers that people are not as interested in most modern MMO's as people were back 16 years ago.

    Lord of the Rings was indeed a good game for what it was, nice community, but no offense to any LoTRO fans... even though it was "good" Had a simplistic crafting system, nice little lore clickables, deeds .ect. A lot of people like myself had no interest in playing story book, theme park games designed for ex WoW players who were looking for a similar formula but was more story-based. Even William Murphy who's into themepark mmo's who's around my age you can tell he doesn't really stick to any one of these newer MMO's either. I'd be surprised to see him play ESO for an entire year and still be playing. A lot of people now just MMO hop. Because they all suck.
    Post edited by trash656 on
  • Thomas2006Thomas2006 Member RarePosts: 1,152
    Turbine has been circling the drain for some time. At one point in time they really pushed the MMO engine side of things with some advanced next gen engines.  But as soon as they *lost* or removed the talented developers / programmers / designers that was creating these engines, they lost there ability to truely compete in the market.

    I think the true turning point was when Warner Brothers purchased the company. Ever since that time it seems that they lost the will to inovate and try new things.
  • observerobserver Member RarePosts: 3,685
    edited July 2016
    I hear ya.


    From what I've gathered, the license expires again in Fall 2017.
    Hopefully they don't renew it.  They ruined a good chance with the franchise, and they ultimately turned it into another themepark.  Here's a link that explains the history for anyone interested.

    “I believed in the sandbox school of MMP design,” Daniel James wrote. “Give the players the tools and a rich environment in which to exercise them. This part of the design did a complete 180, much to my delight.”

    To cut down on the amount of content creation the limited team had to do, the devs designed MEO’s systems to let the players shape the world such as build and destroy structures and random adventures would be generated for those looking to quest.

  • ArakaneArakane Member UncommonPosts: 204
    http://massivelyop.com/2016/07/07/rumor-more-layoffs-for-turbine/


    Update: Warner Bros. PR has issued the following statement to Massively OP:

    “Turbine is transitioning into a free-to-play, mobile development studio, and as a result we are eliminating some positions. The Lord of the Rings Online and Dungeons and Dragons online games will continue to operate as they do now. Re-focusing and reducing the studio size was a difficult decision for the company, and we are grateful to all of the Turbine staff for their considerable contributions.”


  • Xeno.phonXeno.phon Member UncommonPosts: 350
    trash656 said:
    The MMORPG market has been declining for along time. A lot of people have quite playing MMO's all together. Including myself. 
    Saturation is not "decline". The number of users playing mmos has skyrocketed in fact. There are just so many out there now.
  • RasiemRasiem Member UncommonPosts: 318
    Ya this is a really sad event, I was really hoping for an Asherons Call remake.
  • netglennetglen Member UncommonPosts: 116
    It sounds like a desperate move IMHO. It's like a aircraft manufacturer suddenly shifting production to start making mopeds as their main product line while still producing spare parts for their existing aircraft customers. I liked both DDO and LoTRO, but neither were homerun MMORPG in my book. Looking back the one unique thing that I saw LoTRo offer was Freeps vs Creeps pvp. 


  • TheCliffordTheClifford Member UncommonPosts: 18
    edited July 2016
    Its not a bad move, its just an unfortunate move.  And this move comes after a series of bad moves.  LOTRO was a good game for its time, but they refused to refine and reinvigorate core mechanics.  They chose to introduce more clunky and half-finished mechanics and systems onto their old clunky mechanics and systems.  Whatever you think about the game itself, this is why WoW has remained at the top of the heap.  They are constantly looking back and reiterating stuff that doesn't work or stuff that just isn't quite there.  Turbine left their successful IPs in the dark, to collect dust, funneling their money into an already cluttered MOBA market that had no tie-in whatsoever with their existing fanbase.
  • FrodoFraginsFrodoFragins Member EpicPosts: 5,898
    syriinx said:

    At the time LOTRO went f2p it still had a healthy player base, over 200K.
    However, the issue was their poorly thought out lifetime sub.  Many of those players werent paying.

    LOTRO didnt hop on a bandwagon and go F2P, they built the bandwagon.  They had this huge spike of players that 'inspired' others to make the transition.

    However once the dust had settled, their were less players than there were before and the quality of the game nosedived (as is the case in every AAA freemium transition).  Of course it was probably still more profitable for Turbine, but a much worse experience for the players.


    lifetime subs were definitely a massive mistake by turbine and their bean counters.  Moria was interesting but bug ridden and mirkwood pretty much killed players hope in the future of the game.  Going freemium definitely has extended the games lifespan by years though and players should actually feel lucky that it's still being supported at this point.
  • TheocritusTheocritus Member LegendaryPosts: 9,739
    LOL you guys kill me with the "if it had only remained p2p stuff".....Like that solves every single games issues.....They were p2p and it failed...Thats why it went f2p and lasted a few more years.
  • jonp200jonp200 Member UncommonPosts: 457
    LOTRO had a great player base and was a beautiful game.  With that said, its old by MMO standards and always kind of had a niche appeal.  I thought they did a nice job with the game but to be fair it never really captured me long term.  My wife bought me a lifetime sub at launch but I haven't logged in for a couple years despite being a big fan of the genre. 

    Always sad to see the decline of any game.  I hope those laid off land somewhere else soon.  The genre isn't exactly booming at present.

    Seaspite
    Playing ESO on my X-Box


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  • ceratop001ceratop001 Member RarePosts: 1,594
    Rasiem said:
    Ya this is a really sad event, I was really hoping for an Asherons Call remake.
    I would love a new Asheron's Call. Preferably by someone other than Turbine. The people who worked on AC are all long gone. Like Bioware they are more name than a team we remember them for. 
    The good old days. Classic games are like old girlfriends we reminisce about.
     
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  • netglennetglen Member UncommonPosts: 116
    LOL you guys kill me with the "if it had only remained p2p stuff".....Like that solves every single games issues.....They were p2p and it failed...Thats why it went f2p and lasted a few more years.
    I wonder how much profits that they lost over the years when they offered Lifetime Memberships at launch? 
  • SulaaSulaa Member UncommonPosts: 1,329
    Looks like life support soon for LOTRO, one of my favorite MMO's.
    Weren't Lotro getting bad quality content and general shoestring budget game feel for last several years already?
  • SulaaSulaa Member UncommonPosts: 1,329
    edited July 2016
    Xeno.phon said:
    trash656 said:
    The MMORPG market has been declining for along time. A lot of people have quite playing MMO's all together. Including myself. 
    Saturation is not "decline". The number of users playing mmos has skyrocketed in fact. There are just so many out there now.
    MMORPG market in west is declining in players and has been for last few years.  It is not saturation, players are just not there anymore.
    Former western MMORPG game studios are either sold, closed, gave up on MMORPGs or decreased in size giving up on AAA MMORPGs. 

    Players went to single player games, mobile games, non-MMORPG online games, Co-OP games, MOBAs, etc
  • ImpmonImpmon Member UncommonPosts: 81
    Having beta tested LOTRO both closed & open beta I will state again what I said then.  The game is dead on arrival.

    It became too obsessed with appeasing vapid ignorant fanboys who freaked out over any deviation from lore.  This prevented the developers from improving the game.  When your main competitors already have aspects of MMO's that LOTRO refused to acknowledge due to lore constraints & release the game anyways they crippled the game.

    I even suggested ways to bend lore to make these additions to gameplay fit however loremongers foamed at the mouth and did whatever they could to get me banned.  Ironically when the game went FTP they began implementing almost every one of my suggestions.
  • gervaise1gervaise1 Member EpicPosts: 6,919
    syriinx said:

    <snip>

    lifetime subs were definitely a massive mistake by turbine and their bean counters.  Moria was interesting but bug ridden and mirkwood pretty much killed players hope in the future of the game.  Going freemium definitely has extended the games lifespan by years though and players should actually feel lucky that it's still being supported at this point.
    Tough to say. Prior to launch sales of DDO had been dire so they obviously wanted money in the bank so to speak.

    Essentially the Lifetime sub was an "expensive" b2p option - and we know that b2p can work but it does need high sales. And yet LotR was a game with a sub and sub based games get lower sales.

    So I think they ended up being caught twixt and between.  With no plan to deal with the - inevitable - sub drop off and the "long timers" are on the lifetime option.
  • TillerTiller Member LegendaryPosts: 11,125
    edited July 2016
    cheyane said:
    SBFord said:
    http://mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/game/45/view/news/read/40481/Lord-of-the-Rings-Online-CONFIRMED-Layoffs-Hit-Turbine.html

    This thread has 91 posts. WE broke the story. WE got the statement from Turbine. *huffs* Why will no one use the news page. :(((((
    His title is a little more click baity than the other.
    Plus it seems like when you comment on news articles you chances of having your opinion squelched if it is disagreeable by staff members goes up. I prefer posting in user threads. People posting something like "I thought the game was terrible" I've seen removed, especially from sponsored articles. If I see "sponsored articles I just try to avoid posting in those threads. That and most people will hit and run post in those since long drawn out conversations tend to be frowned upon by staff, sorta like the pokemon article about the girl who found the body. Half that thread was moderated and removed.

    Another sad thing, I've actually had some of my own threads locked due to the fact that there was already a news article over the same news story (which I missed) because a certain staff member didn't like the fact that my thread was gaining more popularity over her article. That just seems shady.


    As for Turbine, this was expected. They really haven't had their game face on for years. They have been just kind of slowly catering to those who stuck with them, which isn't a bad thing, but haven't tried to bring new players into the fold or developed anything new.
    SWG Bloodfin vet
    Elder Jedi/Elder Bounty Hunter
     
  • TheocritusTheocritus Member LegendaryPosts: 9,739
    I know for me I always wanted to play an opposing faction in LoTRO and never could...IMO the game could have been alot better
  • IselinIselin Member LegendaryPosts: 18,719
    The writing has been on the wall since WB took over. Even if one of the brands under WB occasionally hits it out of the park, that is usually just a fluke. Big multimedia coorps that happen to have a games division don't really give a shit or know anything about games. Hence the F2P mobile conversion just to try to cash in on the mushrooming of casual gaming... a few years too late at that.

    This is not your dad's Turbine we're talking about here and it hasn't been for quite a while.  
    "Social media gives legions of idiots the right to speak when they once only spoke at a bar after a glass of wine, without harming the community ... but now they have the same right to speak as a Nobel Prize winner. It's the invasion of the idiots”

    ― Umberto Eco

    “Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?” 
    ― CD PROJEKT RED

  • observerobserver Member RarePosts: 3,685
    I know for me I always wanted to play an opposing faction in LoTRO and never could...IMO the game could have been alot better
    The Tolkien estate didn't allow it.  They have strict guidelines about people playing evil characters.  Turbine was lucky enough that they were able to have Monster Play in Lotro at all.
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