They really need to get this out sooner rather than later otherwise the community interest will slowly begin to evaporate ... I think that's happening already.
IMO - They need to have a fun, competitive game. If it's not ready, it's not ready.
I 100% agree with you but if they can't get that game out the door in a reasonable amount of time the technology they're trying to implement may end up being too far behind the curve to be interesting to their proposed audience. Whatever it is that's holding up production, they need to fix that shit and soon.
The tech they are developing isn't seen in any game released yet ... not anywhere. When the game is released (not sure if it will be 2018 but beta announcement is likely early 2018) it will be using server and network tech/code no major developer has even bothered to begin developing for games.
The only server tech available (and is also still in development) is 3rd party designed for use with existing game engines. Games using it won't likely launch before CE anyway.
Let's be honest, you people know jack shit about what's cutting edge tech when it comes to massively online games and think purdy pictures the height of any tech curve. No game will offer as many players in one area when CE finally launches. It merely won't look as good as those games that cheat to look good (limited players and view range).
Hype? CSE shut down the hype train on purpose until a real beta candidate exists. This is the result of it. Perhaps they could sell land plots for cash to maintain the hype like other games do to server the self importance of the tiny few who visit these sites to follow a niche genre game develop from day 1. I would bet only a single percentage of players even knew EQ was in development compared to how many played it within a year of launch. CE is only partially crowd funded and we are told money isn't a current issue. Hopefully this is true.
Perspective is everything. It defines your mortal life.
I'm beginning to wonder, with giving out refunds and no Beta ETA is the writing on the wall?
The game looks ok enough even though the combat is rather basic and it doesn't really bring anything new to the MMO genre
I guess only time will tell, I was really hoping for something I'd be able to buy and play by now.
Interesting that a CoE shill (meantime banned for the 5th time) talks that way about roadmap and estimates!?
On topic: "Rather basic combat"(?) and "doesn't bring anything new"(??) aside, CU is in full development for bit more than four years, i.e. "since late 2013" per MJ - tho they roughly completed their body of programmers just a year ago.
Also, unconditional refunds are not "writing on the wall"(???) but rather a sign of confidence, other games just can't afford it - your beloved CoE being an excellent example.
There are updates from them, in my e-mail box from:
11/30 12/8 & 12/13 with live stream schedule 12/15 & 12/18 with their live stream schedule 2 for 12/22 though one is a sort of "Happy Holidays" thing
I could go on but there is absolutely no silence.
what more? 11/28, 11/22 thankgiving thing, 11/20
it just continues.
Cmon Sovrath , I get Newsletters from a dozen games also , (which ironically 98 out of 100 arent news at all, they are shit) , and you know it ... Yea Merry Xmas , Happy Thx Giving .. ..weee Happy New year ,
"hey we hired a new sound guy working on new intro music " " Hey we hired a community manager ""
blahh blah w" We have some nice concept art to share today ..(here is a new hat) "
This isnt News , as in this thread . people are becoming complacent (which is bad), They havent shown anything signifigant for months its been very very quiet Publicly , at a time of year when they should of shown somwthing (end of year ) ...
Hopefully they show something soon or have a major announcement ... They are becoming the backburner for many folks
Did they raise a surplus of funding or something to be able to survive these delays? Money doesn't last forever.
It can be speculated that they may have secured further funding or even found a publisher. The game has already been delayed beyond imagination, and yet they're about to go on a hiring frenzy. They have to have money to hire people.
Funding wise I am sure they are in a fairly good position. Mark has enough cash to keep this going as long as needed to get a good quality game out of it. That combined with his smarts on how to run a company goes along ways. I think there bigger problem has been finding quality programmers and such to add to the team. Its one thing to hire just any old joe. But its another thing entirely to find quality experienced joes when your companies HQ is not located at the high tech cross roads.
They really need to get this out sooner rather than later otherwise the community interest will slowly begin to evaporate ... I think that's happening already.
IMO - They need to have a fun, competitive game. If it's not ready, it's not ready.
I 100% agree with you but if they can't get that game out the door in a reasonable amount of time the technology they're trying to implement may end up being too far behind the curve to be interesting to their proposed audience. Whatever it is that's holding up production, they need to fix that shit and soon.
That's a great point, take too long and overall technologies change and you may end up having to rework everything or be obsolete.
In the past 5 years the product I support has under gone a full forklift upgrade in hardware, (switched from Solaris to Linux) one major vendor version upgrade on the back end, (another is planned to start this year), two major vendor version upgrades on the front end GUI which now has to do a hardware refresh this year. The amount of reconfiguration, updates to ancillary tools and testing is staggering.
Due to the changing marketspace we have recently developed and incorporated machine learning into the vendor decision engine and cloud migration is in the near future.
My guess is game development is undergoing similar changes as well, and it all cost a lot of money to keep up with.
Every year they delay puts the project at increasing financial risk if they can't find additional funds like the SC and Crowfall teams have.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
I am one of those players who know jack about what is cutting edge, but my humble opinion is that I wouldn't worry about technology creep for this game.
CU is not trying to draw the attention of players who play what's better looking or cutting edge. CSE are trying to fit a niche that at the present moment is under-represented, and that's putting it mildly. Even if another developer would start on a game that would have physical projectiles, collisions, thousand-player battles, discord integration and whatever other more or less innovative feature I am missing, they would have to develop a game in record time to release before CU.
I know I personally care very little about the looks of a game, graphic quality and level of detail is awe-inspiring in the first 2 hours of play, then what matters is having fun. I remember this argument from the days of Age of Conan release. Damn those tits sure looked good! but I still couldn't keep playing the game.
CSE just hired 3 new people and soon to be "lots" more according to MJ. Sounds like they have another private investor (or more from existing). More announcements to come. Sounding like this game is turning more toward privately invested over crowd funded but pre-release hype should increase that as well to some degree.
What I am more interested in is how they choose to fund expansions later. My guess is some operational profits combined with short crowd funding surges but time will tell. CSE has been great so far in being very consistent with how they crowd fund (very traditional packages with limited redundancy). I can stomach that over the "anything goes" funding tactics other studios do that is more akin to prostituting any possible feature.
Good sign and movement toward far faster development.
LOL. MJ joked he would bet 10-1 on people who double their pledge if they were actually bought out by EA/etc. Obviously any additional money isn't from something like that.
they could have learnt lessons from past mmorpg failures e.g. shadowbane, great game but letdown
shadowbane wasn't a great game.. it was a pile of shit.. the graphics were horrid.. the game world was an empty desert... it was pure shit..
wolf pack studios can lick my asshole
Sounds like someone got bullied.
I thought Shadowbane was incredible... just fatally flawed with the SB.EXE error.
Old mmorpgs strove to accomplish something never attempted before on tech too primitive to fully be resolved. Those developers should be applauded for attempting innovation even if their vision wasn't fully realized because today's large developers don't even fucking try.
Or player's can simply continue to act like old game developers touch their penis as a child and cry like we see above.
The worries in this thread about fading hype, lack of funds or outdated tech are misplaced in my opinion.
On the hype thing, that is deliberate. Mark has repeatedly said that he deliberately turned off the hype train. They turned it on for the kickstarter, got the money they needed, then turned it off. Why waste money hyping a game that you can't sell?!?! They are waiting until the game is close to launch before turning on the hype train again. That strategy makes total sense to me.
On the lack of funds, sure, the delays are a slight cause for concern with regards to funds. However, their budget is actually quite good. I think Mark said in the last few months that total investment was around $20m now, most of which is from actual investors and his own pocket. CSE are actually in a better financial position than most indie MMOs, they just needed the kickstarter money to get the project moving. Now that it is moving, more of our money isn't needed.
On outdated tech......yeh, 5 years is a lifetime in terms of fundamental tech (processor speeds etc) but it's absolutely nothing in terms of MMORPG features. The genre moves at a snails pace. Beyond that, the features that CU will have, mainly 1000+ player battles, the building engine and the ability builder, are features currently not seen in any existing MMO and, as far as I'm aware, aren't part of any of the other MMOs currently in development. So, feature wise, this game will still feel very new and unique.
I really don't think there is anything to worry about in terms of it releasing and living up to it's design goals. If you do want to worry about something, worry about the narrow scope, or the assymetrical class design or something like that. Those are the things that worry me. I love everything this game is trying to do, but I can't help wondering what will happen if I can't find a group for my evening's PvP. WAR was like that - get in a premade group and it was great, but outside of that the game sucked. Very few classes could solo, pug groups were ineffective etc.
When I went to their web site they said backers were already playing with Engine that allowed them to build terrain, something like a million blocks placed and growing.
So I assume that at least parts of the game are live and running. Which is a total confidence booster.
Animations and combat balance are a real issue for games like this, realms v realms.. is always a mess on that point, I would rather they take the time to do it right, then rush it and we suffer through a million and one balance patches, and people crying that their OPed, flavor of the month build is dead and they are going to quit the game.
Also, 5 years is not a huge amount of time to build a game from the ground up, many other games have hit the 4 - 5 year mark and still have a ways to go, So in that venture, while I am not a backer, I would not be worried if i was.
I used to think that it would have been faster, but, I see AAA titles with big name backers still take several years to come out, most of these indie games are doing quite well in their time frame.
I can't speak for anyone but myself, but when this game goes live, I hope to see you all there.
Egotism is the anesthetic that dullens the pain of stupidity, this is why when I try to beat my head against the stupidity of other people, I only hurt myself.
They really need to get this out sooner rather than later otherwise the community interest will slowly begin to evaporate ... I think that's happening already.
IMO - They need to have a fun, competitive game. If it's not ready, it's not ready.
I 100% agree with you but if they can't get that game out the door in a reasonable amount of time the technology they're trying to implement may end up being too far behind the curve to be interesting to their proposed audience. Whatever it is that's holding up production, they need to fix that shit and soon.
Less relevant when the technology is a game, and the type of tech they're offering has no visible competitors. If the game is enjoyable, people will play.
Source: hundreds of thousands of people (millions?) playing old school freeshards, emulators, old consoles, etc.
They really need to get this out sooner rather than later otherwise the community interest will slowly begin to evaporate ... I think that's happening already.
This is a constant for all the crowdfunding projects. Some projects just spend more time attempting to maintain hype than CU (a LOT more time, in some cases).
I'm not overly optimistic for the results of any of these projects. However, those who are controlling the hype and focusing on the niche seem a much better bet. If the idea behind SC was so fucking awesome, how come no investors have tried funding a project like it? Same for any of these titles.
Folks wanna say investors are scared. That's ironic, seeing as investors regularly take higher financial risks than most of the posters here would ever consider taking. They just also aren't stupid, and take calculated risks instead of funding with their hearts.
From that perspective, less is more on the hype train.
Investors invest in what will get them the most bang for their investment buck.
Most of these projects aren't going to be huge financial successes.
CU won't be a huge financial success (though probably better than Mark's 50-100k projected, at least for a few years).
So, no, investors aren't stupid, but they also have completely different motivations than backers/players ("will this be profitable on a hundreds-of-thousands-of-people scale?" vs. "will I personally enjoy and be immersed in this game?").
Finally got some extra cash coming in this month. I definitely gonna send it in on this game. These devs are really convincing. Either they are going to put out an awesome game or they are fooling a very experienced gamer. Either way they’ve earned it.
They really need to get this out sooner rather than later otherwise the community interest will slowly begin to evaporate ... I think that's happening already.
They really need to get this out sooner rather than later otherwise the community interest will slowly begin to evaporate ... I think that's happening already.
IMO - They need to have a fun, competitive game. If it's not ready, it's not ready.
I think both of those are right strange as that may seem. Launching a game that isn't fun would be pointless. But taking another 5 years to launch (possibly even 3 years) risks having a lot of backers and other potential players lose interest and move on to other games or forms of entertainment.
You're not wrong, but the game doesn't need the original backers or currently interested players to succeed. It just needs people who want to play the game. If it's a solid fantasy pvp game, with a solid crafting and building system, where people who play it *want to keep playing*, players will tell their friends, websites will write articles, word of mouth will spread, more people will play, and people will stay.
Comments
The only server tech available (and is also still in development) is 3rd party designed for use with existing game engines. Games using it won't likely launch before CE anyway.
Let's be honest, you people know jack shit about what's cutting edge tech when it comes to massively online games and think purdy pictures the height of any tech curve. No game will offer as many players in one area when CE finally launches. It merely won't look as good as those games that cheat to look good (limited players and view range).
Hype? CSE shut down the hype train on purpose until a real beta candidate exists. This is the result of it. Perhaps they could sell land plots for cash to maintain the hype like other games do to server the self importance of the tiny few who visit these sites to follow a niche genre game develop from day 1. I would bet only a single percentage of players even knew EQ was in development compared to how many played it within a year of launch. CE is only partially crowd funded and we are told money isn't a current issue. Hopefully this is true.
Perspective is everything. It defines your mortal life.
You stay sassy!
On topic: "Rather basic combat"(?) and "doesn't bring anything new"(??) aside, CU is in full development for bit more than four years, i.e. "since late 2013" per MJ - tho they roughly completed their body of programmers just a year ago.
Also, unconditional refunds are not "writing on the wall"(???) but rather a sign of confidence, other games just can't afford it - your beloved CoE being an excellent example.
"hey we hired a new sound guy working on new intro music "
" Hey we hired a community manager ""
blahh blah w" We have some nice concept art to share today ..(here is a new hat) "
This isnt News , as in this thread . people are becoming complacent (which is bad), They havent shown anything signifigant for months its been very very quiet Publicly , at a time of year when they should of shown somwthing (end of year ) ...
Hopefully they show something soon or have a major announcement ... They are becoming the backburner for many folks
Funding wise I am sure they are in a fairly good position. Mark has enough cash to keep this going as long as needed to get a good quality game out of it. That combined with his smarts on how to run a company goes along ways. I think there bigger problem has been finding quality programmers and such to add to the team. Its one thing to hire just any old joe. But its another thing entirely to find quality experienced joes when your companies HQ is not located at the high tech cross roads.
In the past 5 years the product I support has under gone a full forklift upgrade in hardware, (switched from Solaris to Linux) one major vendor version upgrade on the back end, (another is planned to start this year), two major vendor version upgrades on the front end GUI which now has to do a hardware refresh this year. The amount of reconfiguration, updates to ancillary tools and testing is staggering.
Due to the changing marketspace we have recently developed and incorporated machine learning into the vendor decision engine and cloud migration is in the near future.
My guess is game development is undergoing similar changes as well, and it all cost a lot of money to keep up with.
Every year they delay puts the project at increasing financial risk if they can't find additional funds like the SC and Crowfall teams have.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
CU is not trying to draw the attention of players who play what's better looking or cutting edge. CSE are trying to fit a niche that at the present moment is under-represented, and that's putting it mildly.
Even if another developer would start on a game that would have physical projectiles, collisions, thousand-player battles, discord integration and whatever other more or less innovative feature I am missing, they would have to develop a game in record time to release before CU.
I know I personally care very little about the looks of a game, graphic quality and level of detail is awe-inspiring in the first 2 hours of play, then what matters is having fun. I remember this argument from the days of Age of Conan release. Damn those tits sure looked good! but I still couldn't keep playing the game.
What I am more interested in is how they choose to fund expansions later. My guess is some operational profits combined with short crowd funding surges but time will tell. CSE has been great so far in being very consistent with how they crowd fund (very traditional packages with limited redundancy). I can stomach that over the "anything goes" funding tactics other studios do that is more akin to prostituting any possible feature.
Good sign and movement toward far faster development.
LOL. MJ joked he would bet 10-1 on people who double their pledge if they were actually bought out by EA/etc. Obviously any additional money isn't from something like that.
You stay sassy!
shadowbane wasn't a great game.. it was a pile of shit.. the graphics were horrid.. the game world was an empty desert... it was pure shit..
wolf pack studios can lick my asshole
I thought Shadowbane was incredible... just fatally flawed with the SB.EXE error.
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
Or player's can simply continue to act like old game developers touch their penis as a child and cry like we see above.
You stay sassy!
Awesome.
/Cheers,
Lahnmir
Kyleran on yours sincerely
'But there are many. You can play them entirely solo, and even offline. Also, you are wrong by default.'
Ikcin in response to yours sincerely debating whether or not single-player offline MMOs exist...
'This does not apply just to ED but SC or any other game. What they will get is Rebirth/X4, likely prettier but equally underwhelming and pointless.
It is incredibly difficult to design some meaningfull leg content that would fit a space ship game - simply because it is not a leg game.
It is just huge resource waste....'
Gdemami absolutely not being an armchair developer
On the hype thing, that is deliberate. Mark has repeatedly said that he deliberately turned off the hype train. They turned it on for the kickstarter, got the money they needed, then turned it off. Why waste money hyping a game that you can't sell?!?! They are waiting until the game is close to launch before turning on the hype train again. That strategy makes total sense to me.
On the lack of funds, sure, the delays are a slight cause for concern with regards to funds. However, their budget is actually quite good. I think Mark said in the last few months that total investment was around $20m now, most of which is from actual investors and his own pocket. CSE are actually in a better financial position than most indie MMOs, they just needed the kickstarter money to get the project moving. Now that it is moving, more of our money isn't needed.
On outdated tech......yeh, 5 years is a lifetime in terms of fundamental tech (processor speeds etc) but it's absolutely nothing in terms of MMORPG features. The genre moves at a snails pace. Beyond that, the features that CU will have, mainly 1000+ player battles, the building engine and the ability builder, are features currently not seen in any existing MMO and, as far as I'm aware, aren't part of any of the other MMOs currently in development. So, feature wise, this game will still feel very new and unique.
I really don't think there is anything to worry about in terms of it releasing and living up to it's design goals. If you do want to worry about something, worry about the narrow scope, or the assymetrical class design or something like that. Those are the things that worry me. I love everything this game is trying to do, but I can't help wondering what will happen if I can't find a group for my evening's PvP. WAR was like that - get in a premade group and it was great, but outside of that the game sucked. Very few classes could solo, pug groups were ineffective etc.
Anet said the same thing about GW2. The scaling system is about the only thing they delivered on.
So I assume that at least parts of the game are live and running. Which is a total confidence booster.
Animations and combat balance are a real issue for games like this, realms v realms.. is always a mess on that point, I would rather they take the time to do it right, then rush it and we suffer through a million and one balance patches, and people crying that their OPed, flavor of the month build is dead and they are going to quit the game.
Also, 5 years is not a huge amount of time to build a game from the ground up, many other games have hit the 4 - 5 year mark and still have a ways to go, So in that venture, while I am not a backer, I would not be worried if i was.
I used to think that it would have been faster, but, I see AAA titles with big name backers still take several years to come out, most of these indie games are doing quite well in their time frame.
I can't speak for anyone but myself, but when this game goes live, I hope to see you all there.
Source: hundreds of thousands of people (millions?) playing old school freeshards, emulators, old consoles, etc.
Investors invest in what will get them the most bang for their investment buck.
Most of these projects aren't going to be huge financial successes.
CU won't be a huge financial success (though probably better than Mark's 50-100k projected, at least for a few years).
So, no, investors aren't stupid, but they also have completely different motivations than backers/players ("will this be profitable on a hundreds-of-thousands-of-people scale?" vs. "will I personally enjoy and be immersed in this game?").
You're not wrong, but the game doesn't need the original backers or currently interested players to succeed. It just needs people who want to play the game. If it's a solid fantasy pvp game, with a solid crafting and building system, where people who play it *want to keep playing*, players will tell their friends, websites will write articles, word of mouth will spread, more people will play, and people will stay.