Wednesday, November 20, 2013

EA To Destroy Star Wars IP By Making Games Like SWTOR For Another 10 Years.

So...EA's chief financial officer "Blake Jorgensen" just said this on Eurogamer:

"Yes the original expectations obviously were very, very large and obviously the multiplayer MMO world has - the popularly has come down over time and we tried to restructure the Star Wars business to better match the economics. It's a great business that's very repeatable," he added. "We brought the economics in line so it's a profitable business for us."


Notice a pattern? BUSINESS! BUSINESS! PROFIT!

Dear Jedi Jesus: Please Make Disney See The Light And Stop EA From Making More Star Wars Games.


No.

Don't "RESTRUCTURE THE BUSINESS". This is the EXACT problem. Look at how he talks about the VIDEO GAME. They aren't worried about players having fun or enjoying the game. They are worried about how much money they can make every quarter.

RESTRUCTURE THE WHOLE GOD FORSAKEN GAME!

Make REAL games that aren't meant to MILK the IP!

Put REAL effort into listening to your community!

Only people that currently play SWTOR are the people they thought would be the majority, the people who are die hard Star Wars fan. They are the only ones who don't care or don't notice just how bad the game is because they don't know any better or anything else.

I am seriously tired of EA and their sh--!

Shit.

Tuesday, November 19, 2013

Wildstar Will Probably Fail and Go F2P. Sadly.

Getting kind of tired of this same MMO pattern. It's like these developers never learn or it could just be that...oh I don't know MMOs have just become a "Get Rich Quick" scheme...of sorts. So I am going to keep it short and to the point. Actually, I will post this way from now on.

I've been following "Wildstar" for quite some time and though the overly cartoon style ALMOST threw me off completely, I managed to continue checking up on the game from time to time.

Don't get me wrong, I like the Wildstar development team and I really wish they never made this mistake. Especially since they will in essence be going against an IP like The Elder Scrolls.

So now, here we are further into the development of Wildstar and we have talks of release dates, classes, pricing models and etc. etc. That's all great. Wildstar seems to be the game that has everything and is for players who have been waiting for a good MMO were developers "care" about their players. Everything about this game seems to be perfect right?!

Wrong.

Wrong because Wildstar is an IP jumping into a market where word of mouth will make or break your game into a thousand pieces and it's a shame that developers of MMOs still haven't learned this simple fact:

When it comes to a RPG of any sort, LORE is king over all.  For example, The Elder Scrolls Online might be complete garbage game-play wise but that won't matter at the start. People know TES. And even if they hate MMOs or never played one, people will play for the IP alone.


Lore...lore...lore...does no one care about lore anymore? Or does everyone just love their MMO fastfood?



I Barely Know Anything About The Elder Scrolls Lore... But It's More Than I Know About Wildstar's!
And no, I don't mean the lore INSIDE your MMO that most players are going to be skipping anyways, I am talking about the lore that is established long before you even created that MMO. Lore people are familiar with or can get familiar with outside of the MMO. This is why, in my opinion, any MMO developed should be based off some sort of existing franchise. Whether it's a book, comic, movie or game doesn't really matter but it SHOULD have established some sort of lore people can reference. People just feel more connected to things they know and feel they understand. It doesn't matter if everyone knows the lore because your core fan base will be there to rant on and explain it via forums, role playing servers and video blogs.

This disturbs me because I am currently writing my own fantasy novel and hope to create some sort of game based around it in the future

Right. Point.


Who Needs Lore When You Have Stereotypical English Accented Villains!


Now if this game was fully voiced such as SWTOR (which is a terrible game) that could help sell your lore but so far what I have seen from this game is the same reading, boring objective missions and "AIN'T NO BODY GOT TIME FOR THAT!" mob grinding.

 Your random MMO and IP that popped out of no where probably will never be a top MMO or retain even 50% of it's user base due to the fact no one has really "grown" with your IP. No one knows anything about the story, characters, world....ANYTHING. Nor will most players care to learn once they get past the first once and something new and shiny they ARE familiar with comes out.

Then again, using SWTOR as an example again, you could have all the lore and money in the world and still managed to develop one of the worst MMOs created. How is that possible?

 It's called putting money first and player satisfaction last.

Sunday, October 21, 2012

In Guild Wars 2...You Buy Leadership... but Grind For Armor...

Yes.

Though it appears to be nothing more than a nice blue icon on the map....

....Anyone with 100 gold can become a "Commander".

 A Commander which is supposed to lead their world to victory but usually just lead their group to jumping puzzles.

100 gold is not that easy to come by unless you have been working the trade market or saving every gold you earned. Yet still, I can't help but wonder about the failed logic behind allowing something which SHOULD have come from experience to be bought.

If anyone can buy Commander...how the hell am I supposed to know who actually knows what they are doing if I am new?

Instead of pratically GIVING leadership titles away, there really should have been some type of requirement set in place. To be a commander, you should have to prove yourself or...SOMETHING.

Not just be another one of Guild Wars 2 MANY "money sinks".

But to top this off... you have the end armor in WvW which cost over 1000 "Badges of Honor" for the whole set.

You get the BoHs off bags from killing players or NPCS in WvW.

Most times there is no BoHs in the bags....so hmmm...

Which makes more sense...?

Letting any random player who could have just went into WvW his first day and bought the Commander book...?

...Or buying the book with 1000s badges that at least show you are some what a veteran in WvW?

But don't worry...this is just one of the many backwards and illogical features in Guild Wars 2.

I'll get to the trade market soon enough...

Thursday, September 6, 2012

Guild Wars 2: Die. Die. Repair. Die. Die.

 I am not going to sugar coat anything for raging fanboys...by saying "I enjoy GW2" and "I like the game" to ease you into it. If you don't like to hear negative things about your "favorite game" then please...MOVE ALONG!

Anyways!

So...

 There is dying in MMOS... and then there is Guild Wars 2. 

I've played many (not all, obviously, but it's my genre) MMOs and really I have never been killed as much as I have been in this GW2. I know what you are thinking..."Hmm...perhaps you aren't using your skills properly?"...because really, I had hoped it was just a skill issue. But it's not...it's the way the game was set up. Some call it a challenge, I call it a terrible design of death mechanics.

For a game that prided itself on being able to play how I want...it sure is obvious that it does not work. Especially if you aren't a class wearing heavy armor. I can't help but feel Arena.net (Arenanet? Anet? Whatever!) designed the game like this purposely.

And by "purposely" I mean purposely so you are forced to waste your money...well...look...The cashshop...uhhh....uh...

I think this picture speaks for itself.

Dying and repairing in Guild Wars 2 is like...it's own little mini game. 

So much of a mini game... there is actual achievements for not dying. 

This wouldn't be so bad if the many of the mobs weren't LITERALLY hitting you twice and either killing you or nearly killing you (most apply to classes that wear lighter than heavy (I think))...echo...

Take for example the dungeons. I mean...there is literally very little...scratch that...  no strategy whatever in dungeons. It's basically a bunch of high HP slash High DPS mobs that randomly focus fire on someone.I mean...it's a mess...Your "evade/dodge" skill rarely is useful. Soon as you use it, you get hit by some other random AOE attacks...

Let's not even get started on the super high aggro mobs outside  dungeons...

Saturday, May 12, 2012

Just Thinking: Michael O'Brien and Guild Wars 2 Team.

Now that the MMO world has become a world of "Get Rich Quick" schemes, seldomly do you have developers or team members that really seem to care. And by "care" I mean, actually take time to address player problems and issues in a timely manner.

But not in the case of the Guild Wars 2 team. You don't need to question if they feel their fans are important. They show it constantly by their sheer number of responses, blog additions and time they take out for interviews.  And not just when it's something negative printed about them or their game.

Sure, the FaceBook thing was kind of...strange, but I understand the reasoning for that. They want more fans. Who doesn't? Compared to *Other Game I Will Not Name!* Guild Wars 2 has more information about videos about it by a very long shot.

All together though, the Guild Wars 2 team seems more like a family rather than a team. And I kind of admire that. I feel that is how your work place SHOULD feel. I know all MMOs are about "wars" but tou don't get the best efforts out of people running your business like actual an warzone.

And I should know.

I worked at retail stores.

Monday, May 7, 2012

SWTOR Subscriptions Down 25%...

...but of course there is a reason.

And according to the diehard fans, it's either never Biowares' fault or it doesn't mean there is anything wrong. Everything is perfect in the land(s) of SWTOR...even if your server has 1 person on it.

Funny. I know.

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=447469

Today's earning call provided facts that allowed us to finally understand that the dead servers we were playing on weren't just part of our "hater" imagination.

So now, the defense comes up.

On the forum, you have people who once said "SWTOR would surpass 2 million subscribers " saying , "I told you haters this game wasn't dying!"

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/ea-sales-beat-targets-star-wars-takes-hit-2012-05-07?siteid=yhoof2 

Yes, it makes perfect sense!

Because losing a quater of your playerbase means the game is still growing!

Sometimes, I really believe it's the fanboys that helped destroy SWTOR.

Sadly, it's probably the "haters" like me, that are big MMO fans, who saw this coming long ago. Instead of listening to us, Bioware tried to do the bidding of the people who have no idea what makes a good MMO.