It simply is not going to happen. Certainly not with a Science Fiction game.
SW:TOR will have the same faith as all other launched MMO's in the past 8 years (well except Wow and Eve).
X = number of pre orders at launch day Y
X + 50% sales during the first 2-3 weeks.
Y + 3 months = 30% retention rate (meaning only 1 out of 3 will want to pay a subscription after 3 months).
Sales at Y+ 3 months are a meager 5% of the iniital sales.
Meaning: half of the launching servers will be void of players after 4 months.
Y + 6/9 months: game (due to no new recruitment of players) will be at around 20% of the X initial launch period.
You fill in : 1.5 M = 300K - 2 M = 400K etc.
Since it is a pure PC and western launch: 400 K subscriptions is the absolute maximum it will get after 9 months.
All the rest is filling in the blanks and a waste of time discussing the obvious.
What you are saying is all true.. but what you have not said, is that TOR has the potential to be the highest budget F2P ever (1yr after launch). You dont think that the investors are going to sit around and say 'well that was a good try' when they see the financial returns (vs the cost). They are going to ask where the money is, and look for ways to get more... which is why OTHER games are going F2P.
Pre WoW Ever Quest was king. I was an avid player, was in a guild with 180+ members and we raided alot. When i kept hearing of this thing called WoW and looked at the graphic we all agreed that it would never take off...Then a few guild members tryied it and to be honest, we all left EQ for WoW.
The reason being as the OP stated. Polish and game play, easy of game and a over all well put together game. WoW took the best features from other games and added most of them to thiers.
If BW can do the same i feel that they have a very good chance of getting a very large player base. But they have to do it right. We have all seen many games now try and fail. THe polish must be there. And as we now know a very rough budget from this game im sure that we would all feel unhappy if this was not there
There's that word again. The new buzzword for the dumbing-down of mmorpg's as far as I'm concerned; just concerned about it.
There is no difference in the height of the hoop between high school, college, and pr basketball net; they all use the same 10-foot height. But every mmo/mmorpg, most that is, have got to lower the height of thier hoop from year to year for 'accessability'.
Supposed 'accessability' did nothing, in terms of garnering a respectable or broad audience that was any more than a small fraction of the WoW subscribership when talking about most, if not all, mmo/mmorpg's in the last 5-years.
How about making a rich, challenging, player-involved and influenced, massively-multiplayer mmo. Alot of generalities there, but none-the-less...that word is the new spin for some reason, unproven.
I have been playing a lot of different games lately. In the last year I have been in EQ2, WoW, Aion, WAR, EvE, PWI, L2, ATITDV, LOTRO and FFXIV. (ugh)
First, there are a lot of people in all these other games that are WoW drop outs. Everybody has played WoW it seems at some point or another. But that also means that WoW has lost a lot of people over the years. WoW can loose it's players. The proof is out there, all over the place, in every other game. Do I think any game will be able to poach enough WoW players to hurt WoW? No, not really. But that doesn't mean that there isn't a significant cloud of people who are not especially attactched to WoW who wouldn't consider playing something that was very well done and well marketed.
Second, there is a restlessness out there. Lots of people are waiting for something. They are bored and want something new. I know at least 5 people in WoW right now who are only there because they want something to do while they wait for TOR. Will it be everything they hoped for? Dunno, we will find out, but the fact remains that they are hoping it will be. I have also run into a bunch of people who are killing time in Aion or WAR while they wait. There is a huge number of restless gamers that Bioware stands to be able to snatch up if they can but pull it off. There are also at least a dozen ways they could screw things up. FFXIV has demonstrated how a very competent company, with very deep pockets, great developers, lots of experience and a proven franchise can still completely screw things up in ways that weren't even imagined until 2 months ago. Nothing is a given in this industry. But the potential is out there. The fields are ripe, but question is: "does Bioware now how to harvest?"
It simply is not going to happen. Certainly not with a Science Fiction game.
SW:TOR will have the same faith as all other launched MMO's in the past 8 years (well except Wow and Eve).
X = number of pre orders at launch day Y
X + 50% sales during the first 2-3 weeks.
Y + 3 months = 30% retention rate (meaning only 1 out of 3 will want to pay a subscription after 3 months).
Sales at Y+ 3 months are a meager 5% of the iniital sales.
Meaning: half of the launching servers will be void of players after 4 months.
Y + 6/9 months: game (due to no new recruitment of players) will be at around 20% of the X initial launch period.
You fill in : 1.5 M = 300K - 2 M = 400K etc.
Since it is a pure PC and western launch: 400 K subscriptions is the absolute maximum it will get after 9 months.
All the rest is filling in the blanks and a waste of time discussing the obvious.
Where did you find this 30% player retention rule and why can't you apply it to WoW and EVE?
Originally posted by Antaran
Why is it not possible? are people secretly banned from playing more than one MMO?? i'm not gonna say anything about sub numbers etc but your basis for saying "its not possible" is completely daft. i know many who play multiple MMO's and i myself was subbed to SWG and AoC for a while because i liked both games, but what your saying is just because a person plays one MMO their not allowed to sub to another.
The current pricing option (monthly subscription) is an effective dissuasion from paying for more than one game at a time. Perhaps with a pay-as-you-go hourly plan like in Asia...
It just seems to me that it isn't so much of a WoW clone so to speak more of a repeat of how blizzard made their own MMO.
If this is true, we can expect a game on par and maybe subs near WoW figures.
Its not possible. Where would those subs come from? Out of thin air? Do you really think peopple would leave WoW for another WoW? Why? There is no incentive. Do you happen to think 12 million (or 3 million in NA) more people are going to join the market for SWTOR?
IMO, SWTOR is hoping to steal some of WoW subscribers, which has been shown to be impossible, thus far.
Out of millions of SW fans? Look at the sales of Force Unleashed ... it sells MILLIONS even if it is not a particularly good game. And bioware has a good sales track record. Just look up the numbers for Mass Effect.
Bioware are targetting their own audience with a single player experience mmo game. And as such a game it will bring new people to MMOs but it won't share much of the market with WoW itself as WoW is a cmpletely different experience. It is following Blizzard in the regard of targetting their own audience. But the game is made in a much narrower way. I don't see it repeating the sucness of WoW as wow is more "open" for options then SWTOR seems to be.
I've been uplinked and downloaded, I've been inputted and outsourced. I know the upside of downsizing, I know the downside of upgrading.
I'm a high-tech low-life. A cutting-edge, state-of-the-art, bi-coastal multi-tasker, and I can give you a gigabyte in a nanosecond.
I'm new-wave, but I'm old-school; and my inner child is outward-bound.
I'm a hot-wired, heat-seeking, warm-hearted cool customer; voice-activated and bio-degradable.
Bioware are targetting their own audience with a single player experience mmo game. And as such a game it will bring new people to MMOs but it won't share much of the market with WoW itself as WoW is a cmpletely different experience. It is following Blizzard in the regard of targetting their own audience. But the game is made in a much narrower way. I don't see it repeating the sucness of WoW as wow is more "open" for options then SWTOR seems to be.
Bioware does come with their own built in audience. Dragon Age / Mass Effect sold between three to four million copies. Mass Effect 2 is one of the highest rated games by gaming critics ever. Now, Bioware's previous Star Wars game sold well over six million and was also very, very well rated by gaming critics as well. Now, how well this translates into a Star Wars MMO, we have to see. Bioware will definitely sale a lot of box copies.
Bioware are targetting their own audience with a single player experience mmo game. And as such a game it will bring new people to MMOs but it won't share much of the market with WoW itself as WoW is a cmpletely different experience. It is following Blizzard in the regard of targetting their own audience. But the game is made in a much narrower way. I don't see it repeating the sucness of WoW as wow is more "open" for options then SWTOR seems to be.
Bioware does come with their own built in audience. Dragon Age / Mass Effect sold between three to four million copies. Mass Effect 2 is one of the highest rated games by gaming critics ever. Now, Bioware's previous Star Wars game sold well over six million and was also very, very well rated by gaming critics as well. Now, how well this translates into a Star Wars MMO, we have to see. Bioware will definitely sale a lot of box copies.
Box sales does not go directly into monthly subscribers. Thats the whole point. SwTOR "seems" to be a much narrower game then WoW and If it draws in the Bioware crowd then good for them. But the Bioware crowd is a single player crowd. If they are not into MMOs by now... Then i don't see them playing for a longer while and getting subscibed. They'll enjoy the story for the free month. Then move to another singleplayer game.
I've been uplinked and downloaded, I've been inputted and outsourced. I know the upside of downsizing, I know the downside of upgrading.
I'm a high-tech low-life. A cutting-edge, state-of-the-art, bi-coastal multi-tasker, and I can give you a gigabyte in a nanosecond.
I'm new-wave, but I'm old-school; and my inner child is outward-bound.
I'm a hot-wired, heat-seeking, warm-hearted cool customer; voice-activated and bio-degradable.
Aren't those the things that your SHOULD put into a GOOD game regardless? I mean, if you remove those, isn't the game going to fail? That is not following in "WoW's footsteps" insomuch as it is following what is a winning STARTING formula. IF SWTOR succeeds in those then it should be a potentially great game.
Bioware are targetting their own audience with a single player experience mmo game. And as such a game it will bring new people to MMOs but it won't share much of the market with WoW itself as WoW is a cmpletely different experience. It is following Blizzard in the regard of targetting their own audience. But the game is made in a much narrower way. I don't see it repeating the sucness of WoW as wow is more "open" for options then SWTOR seems to be.
Bioware does come with their own built in audience. Dragon Age / Mass Effect sold between three to four million copies. Mass Effect 2 is one of the highest rated games by gaming critics ever. Now, Bioware's previous Star Wars game sold well over six million and was also very, very well rated by gaming critics as well. Now, how well this translates into a Star Wars MMO, we have to see. Bioware will definitely sale a lot of box copies.
Box sales does not go directly into monthly subscribers. Thats the whole point. SwTOR "seems" to be a much narrower game then WoW and If it draws in the Bioware crowd then good for them. But the Bioware crowd is a single player crowd. If they are not into MMOs by now... Then i don't see them playing for a longer while and getting subscibed. They'll enjoy the story for the free month. Then move to another singleplayer game.
The flaws I see in this logic is people for some reason or another seem to think that mmorpg gamers are somehow different then every other video gamer out there and that is simply not the case.
As a gamer who got reluctantly pulled into mmorpg's I can say atleast one of the reasons that alot of gamers don't play mmorpg's have mostly to do with the quality of the content released in mmorpg's. By and large mmorpg's play like rpg's from ten years back and it doesn't help that they often cost about the same as an offline game and then have a sub fee added on top of all that, this is alot for games of the genre to overcome in trying to get non mmorpg gamers to play there games.
I'm not too sure if I agree with the sentiment that those gamers if they do bother to buy the game will certainly just leave after the free month, wouldn't it stand to reason that if that many people were interested in the story that they would just pay the fifteen a month to continue that story until it's end, especially for those who actually enjoy the story.
While it may seem like people have little to no interest in "story" or "linear" experiences in games I think that is a view that can be skewed greatly by spending time on sites like this one which is the only place where I hear these battlecries against linear games with in depth story telling.
but yeah, to call this game Fantastic is like calling Twilight the Godfather of vampire movies....
Bioware are targetting their own audience with a single player experience mmo game. And as such a game it will bring new people to MMOs but it won't share much of the market with WoW itself as WoW is a cmpletely different experience. It is following Blizzard in the regard of targetting their own audience. But the game is made in a much narrower way. I don't see it repeating the sucness of WoW as wow is more "open" for options then SWTOR seems to be.
I don't agree with your statement at all. TOR will have most of the same MMO features as WoW plus many of the RPG features from BW's SPG's.
As for open, TOR will be 90% open game play. Mainly the class story quest giver will be behind a seamless instance. And the dungeons (flashpoints), Warzones and world group story quest givers. After the starter worlds that will be 60% solo and 40% group, the planets open up to 60% group and 40% solo. As you get higher in level, the % of group play goes up.
So yes, BW is targetting their own audience to try to bring them into a MMO with a functioning RPG. A RPG that gives this demigraphic the ability to play the game as a uniquley repeatable SPG RPG. But it will also cater to MMO players, not the pure sandbox or FFA PvP gamers, but the themepark gamers. With a bit of the sandbox exploration and new crafting wrinkle thrown in. Plus much more we don't know about yet.
So there may be just as many if not more options than WoW in TOR's "open" game world.
How many people long for that "past, simpler, and better world," I wonder, without ever recognizing the truth that perhaps it was they who were simpler and better, and not the world about them? R.A.Salvatore
in my personal opinion i think bioware are doing things right with how they're designing the game, they are bringing back the RPG element which got lost a long time ago.
If this is true, can we expect a game on par and maybe subs near WoW figures? I'm not sure but this seems the right way to g about it
Will it be popular? Undoubtedly. It will never achieve anything greater then what a fantasy theme will though. I would venture to bet that a lot of people just really aren't into the Star Wars IP let alone a scifi setting. Im not doom and gloom, and I do hope for the large success of this game.
Im definately looking forward to this personally but my heart will always be with a fantasy setting, and it always has been for the last 13 years.
If this is true, can we expect a game on par and maybe subs near WoW figures? I'm not sure but this seems the right way to g about it
Will it be popular? Undoubtedly. It will never achieve anything greater then what a fantasy theme will though. I would venture to bet that a lot of people just really aren't into the Star Wars IP let alone a scifi setting. Im not doom and gloom, and I do hope for the large success of this game.
Im definately looking forward to this personally but my heart will always be with a fantasy setting, and it always has been for the last 13 years.
Pretty sure the whole 'fantasy' > SCIFI is false, at least from a movie point of view.
Last I checked SW beat LOTR in movie revenue. Adjust for inflation of course.
Gdemami - Informing people about your thoughts and impressions is not a review, it's a blog.
not sure about speculating if BW can reach Blizzard type numbers or not since WOW is such an exception in the genre. If I felt comfortable about guessing anything it would be that it will do better than WOW or any other mmorpg did at launch. If I was going to guess even further it would be that the retention rate may be higher than the average mmorpg (and many peoples expectations).
This is my preliminary thinking as well. It won't be EVERYTHING to EVERYONE, but I do think some people get so blinded with hatred over a) rumor b) speculation c) lies d) ONE part of a massive game, that they tend to lose sight of the scope of this game.
I may be totally off and completely wrong and I may be the 1st one posting "OMGWTF THIS GAME SUKS!", but I won't do it until I've had a chance to play it.
Its not possible. Where would those subs come from? Out of thin air? Do you really think peopple would leave WoW for another WoW? Why? There is no incentive. Do you happen to think 12 million (or 3 million in NA) more people are going to join the market for SWTOR?
Really?
You think that all the other MMO players just came out of thin air to play WoW too huh? WoW did not have 12 million subs at release. It took years to build that many. So no, it was not out of thin air.
I
Now I dont know that SWTOR can do the same thing, in fact I'd say the odds are against them. Yes, and I will say its impossible until someone proves us wrong, which in 6 years has not happened. I'm sticking to the odds on this one.
When Blizzard created WoW they had no idea it was going to turn into a serious cash cow. The success of WoW literally happened overnight. A different type of passion went into developing WoW besides creating the definitive MMO. SWTOR has 1 goal in mind, seek and destroy.
Okay, any regulars here know i'm an avid fan of Star wars the old republic. If you don't? well you'll find out soon enough. Anyhow. I've been looking at what Bioware is doing with their game and it struck in, i think it was yesterday, people keep comparing this game to WoW saying it looks so much like it. Whether you agree or not. Theres one thing if any i think BW is doing that directly copies WoW.
It's not the graphics. gameplay, or sounds. It's how they are going about making their game.
Many times i hear people say what made WoW great was the fact that it took what worked so well in other games, incorporated into their game and polished and made it better.
Now BW is taking what made WoW great: accessability. polish, story, gameplay and adding/incorporating these features into their own. Story is enhanced with VO and choice, their graphics allow for large accessablity of a wider audience. and the gameplay looks great.
It just seems to me that it isn't so much of a WoW clone so to speak more of a repeat of how blizzard made their own MMO.
If this is true, can we expect a game on par and maybe subs near WoW figures? I'm not sure but this seems the right way to g about it
Just a thought. What do you all think?
Edited the second to last line of text to make more sense.
Why WoW is so huge?
1. It had millions of people that have been playing Warcraft for years and still do.
2. Media wrote and talked about it so much that it brainwashed people to think it's the best and keep playing.
3. More people play it. Your friends, the school, work. And ofc you wanna join.
4. The game can change! They can add whatever they feel like!
This game is stuck with SW rules and the graphics, animations are poor. I don't think this one will make it.
Wow came at the right time (broadband) at the right place (booming internet economy) and with the right product (compared to the school boys attempts of earlier mmorpg's with limited budgets).
Like so many things this momentum comes once in a life time.
Blizzard was overwhelmed by it: they didn't have the servers in place, they didn't have enough copies to sell and the subscription based market was a new thing to the mass market. Never done before in those quantities.
Actually this unexpected hic-up contributed to its success: they needed 3 months to add new US servers and infrastructure, then they launched in EU and the moment it could have settled down they introduced it in the east and one year later in China.
So even the timing of the seperate roll outs over different continents was perfect.
The above conditions will never be met again until new technoloy/ideas come along.
And no voice overs from NPC's will not make this happen. It is not that easy.
Trying to emulate WOW's success was the downfall of all the later products.
Blizzard didn't have a goal of multi million subscriptions when they launched, that's a huge difference.
Okay, any regulars here know i'm an avid fan of Star wars the old republic. If you don't? well you'll find out soon enough. Anyhow. I've been looking at what Bioware is doing with their game and it struck in, i think it was yesterday, people keep comparing this game to WoW saying it looks so much like it. Whether you agree or not. Theres one thing if any i think BW is doing that directly copies WoW.
It's not the graphics. gameplay, or sounds. It's how they are going about making their game.
Many times i hear people say what made WoW great was the fact that it took what worked so well in other games, incorporated into their game and polished and made it better.
Now BW is taking what made WoW great: accessability. polish, story, gameplay and adding/incorporating these features into their own. Story is enhanced with VO and choice, their graphics allow for large accessablity of a wider audience. and the gameplay looks great.
It just seems to me that it isn't so much of a WoW clone so to speak more of a repeat of how blizzard made their own MMO.
If this is true, can we expect a game on par and maybe subs near WoW figures? I'm not sure but this seems the right way to g about it
Just a thought. What do you all think?
Edited the second to last line of text to make more sense.
They are six years to late... WoW success had a lot to do with timing.. And making an Easy game among competitors that had a Hardcore audiance. Now we have so many Casual games out there that Its not NEW anymore. What Bioware should have done Is gone back to the Original Star Wars movies And looked at What made that Film Great.
Life is like a pyramid.. Evrything we humans do is sorted that way. You have people at the Top be it in politics or In sports etc. Take away this pyramid and you FAIL.
Jedai are super BAD ase.... They are at the top of the Pyramid. If you want to be one you dam well have to work your ase off. Having Heroes and a comunity in MMOS is what makes them last. EvE would not have gained Subs if it dident use the Pyramid system... Even WoW has it... 2004-2007 40man RAIDS anyone. You had the super bad ase Elit with thier Epics then you had the masses.
Pyramid Pyramid Pyramid... do I need to repeat myself? the Human psyche is built that way.
Okay, any regulars here know i'm an avid fan of Star wars the old republic. If you don't? well you'll find out soon enough. Anyhow. I've been looking at what Bioware is doing with their game and it struck in, i think it was yesterday, people keep comparing this game to WoW saying it looks so much like it. Whether you agree or not. Theres one thing if any i think BW is doing that directly copies WoW.
It's not the graphics. gameplay, or sounds. It's how they are going about making their game.
Many times i hear people say what made WoW great was the fact that it took what worked so well in other games, incorporated into their game and polished and made it better.
Now BW is taking what made WoW great: accessability. polish, story, gameplay and adding/incorporating these features into their own. Story is enhanced with VO and choice, their graphics allow for large accessablity of a wider audience. and the gameplay looks great.
It just seems to me that it isn't so much of a WoW clone so to speak more of a repeat of how blizzard made their own MMO.
If this is true, can we expect a game on par and maybe subs near WoW figures? I'm not sure but this seems the right way to g about it
Just a thought. What do you all think?
Edited the second to last line of text to make more sense.
They are six years to late... WoW success had a lot to do with timing.. And making an Easy game among competitors that had a Hardcore audiance. Now we have so many Casual games out there that Its not NEW anymore. What Bioware should have done Is gone back to the Original Star Wars movies And looked at What made that Film Great.
Life is like a pyramid.. Evrything we humans do is sorted that way. You have people at the Top be it in politics or In sports etc. Take away this pyramid and you FAIL.
Jedai are super BAD ase.... They are at the top of the Pyramid. If you want to be one you dam well have to work your ase off. Having Heroes and a comunity in MMOS is what makes them last. EvE would not have gained Subs if it dident use the Pyramid system... Even WoW has it... 2004-2007 40man RAIDS anyone. You had the super bad ase Elit with thier Epics then you had the masses.
Pyramid Pyramid Pyramid... do I need to repeat myself? the Human psyche is built that way.
Jedi are NOT super bad ass. Grievous had no problem killing them and neither did Jango Fett. In the novels Jedi got killed by people who weren't force sensitive and the same is being played out in the Clone Wars series.
Alpha classes have no place in MMOs. SWG tried it and it destroyed PVP. Bioware is going the correct route by letting you be bad ass as a jedi.bounty hunter, trooper etc. There were many bad asses in the Star Wars universe and jedi was only one of them.
Comments
What you are saying is all true.. but what you have not said, is that TOR has the potential to be the highest budget F2P ever (1yr after launch). You dont think that the investors are going to sit around and say 'well that was a good try' when they see the financial returns (vs the cost). They are going to ask where the money is, and look for ways to get more... which is why OTHER games are going F2P.
Pre WoW Ever Quest was king. I was an avid player, was in a guild with 180+ members and we raided alot. When i kept hearing of this thing called WoW and looked at the graphic we all agreed that it would never take off...Then a few guild members tryied it and to be honest, we all left EQ for WoW.
The reason being as the OP stated. Polish and game play, easy of game and a over all well put together game. WoW took the best features from other games and added most of them to thiers.
If BW can do the same i feel that they have a very good chance of getting a very large player base. But they have to do it right. We have all seen many games now try and fail. THe polish must be there. And as we now know a very rough budget from this game im sure that we would all feel unhappy if this was not there
There's that word again. The new buzzword for the dumbing-down of mmorpg's as far as I'm concerned; just concerned about it.
There is no difference in the height of the hoop between high school, college, and pr basketball net; they all use the same 10-foot height. But every mmo/mmorpg, most that is, have got to lower the height of thier hoop from year to year for 'accessability'.
Supposed 'accessability' did nothing, in terms of garnering a respectable or broad audience that was any more than a small fraction of the WoW subscribership when talking about most, if not all, mmo/mmorpg's in the last 5-years.
How about making a rich, challenging, player-involved and influenced, massively-multiplayer mmo. Alot of generalities there, but none-the-less...that word is the new spin for some reason, unproven.
"If you think WAR is going to have anything less than 3 million subs, you're smoking some serious WoW crack." - user comment from a WAR preview.
I have been playing a lot of different games lately. In the last year I have been in EQ2, WoW, Aion, WAR, EvE, PWI, L2, ATITDV, LOTRO and FFXIV. (ugh)
First, there are a lot of people in all these other games that are WoW drop outs. Everybody has played WoW it seems at some point or another. But that also means that WoW has lost a lot of people over the years. WoW can loose it's players. The proof is out there, all over the place, in every other game. Do I think any game will be able to poach enough WoW players to hurt WoW? No, not really. But that doesn't mean that there isn't a significant cloud of people who are not especially attactched to WoW who wouldn't consider playing something that was very well done and well marketed.
Second, there is a restlessness out there. Lots of people are waiting for something. They are bored and want something new. I know at least 5 people in WoW right now who are only there because they want something to do while they wait for TOR. Will it be everything they hoped for? Dunno, we will find out, but the fact remains that they are hoping it will be. I have also run into a bunch of people who are killing time in Aion or WAR while they wait. There is a huge number of restless gamers that Bioware stands to be able to snatch up if they can but pull it off. There are also at least a dozen ways they could screw things up. FFXIV has demonstrated how a very competent company, with very deep pockets, great developers, lots of experience and a proven franchise can still completely screw things up in ways that weren't even imagined until 2 months ago. Nothing is a given in this industry. But the potential is out there. The fields are ripe, but question is: "does Bioware now how to harvest?"
All die, so die well.
I't will easily be the number 2 MMO, but I do not know if it will suprass WOW and I highly doubt it will.
In Bioware we trust!
Where did you find this 30% player retention rule and why can't you apply it to WoW and EVE?
The current pricing option (monthly subscription) is an effective dissuasion from paying for more than one game at a time. Perhaps with a pay-as-you-go hourly plan like in Asia...
Out of millions of SW fans? Look at the sales of Force Unleashed ... it sells MILLIONS even if it is not a particularly good game. And bioware has a good sales track record. Just look up the numbers for Mass Effect.
Bioware are targetting their own audience with a single player experience mmo game. And as such a game it will bring new people to MMOs but it won't share much of the market with WoW itself as WoW is a cmpletely different experience. It is following Blizzard in the regard of targetting their own audience. But the game is made in a much narrower way. I don't see it repeating the sucness of WoW as wow is more "open" for options then SWTOR seems to be.
I've been uplinked and downloaded, I've been inputted and outsourced. I know the upside of downsizing, I know the downside of upgrading.
I'm a high-tech low-life. A cutting-edge, state-of-the-art, bi-coastal multi-tasker, and I can give you a gigabyte in a nanosecond.
I'm new-wave, but I'm old-school; and my inner child is outward-bound.
I'm a hot-wired, heat-seeking, warm-hearted cool customer; voice-activated and bio-degradable.
RIP George Carlin.
Bioware does come with their own built in audience. Dragon Age / Mass Effect sold between three to four million copies. Mass Effect 2 is one of the highest rated games by gaming critics ever. Now, Bioware's previous Star Wars game sold well over six million and was also very, very well rated by gaming critics as well. Now, how well this translates into a Star Wars MMO, we have to see. Bioware will definitely sale a lot of box copies.
Wow is a good model to copy if you want to make money. It's not a good model if you don't want to make a golden turd.
Box sales does not go directly into monthly subscribers. Thats the whole point. SwTOR "seems" to be a much narrower game then WoW and If it draws in the Bioware crowd then good for them. But the Bioware crowd is a single player crowd. If they are not into MMOs by now... Then i don't see them playing for a longer while and getting subscibed. They'll enjoy the story for the free month. Then move to another singleplayer game.
I've been uplinked and downloaded, I've been inputted and outsourced. I know the upside of downsizing, I know the downside of upgrading.
I'm a high-tech low-life. A cutting-edge, state-of-the-art, bi-coastal multi-tasker, and I can give you a gigabyte in a nanosecond.
I'm new-wave, but I'm old-school; and my inner child is outward-bound.
I'm a hot-wired, heat-seeking, warm-hearted cool customer; voice-activated and bio-degradable.
RIP George Carlin.
Aren't those the things that your SHOULD put into a GOOD game regardless? I mean, if you remove those, isn't the game going to fail? That is not following in "WoW's footsteps" insomuch as it is following what is a winning STARTING formula. IF SWTOR succeeds in those then it should be a potentially great game.
Let's party like it is 1863!
The flaws I see in this logic is people for some reason or another seem to think that mmorpg gamers are somehow different then every other video gamer out there and that is simply not the case.
As a gamer who got reluctantly pulled into mmorpg's I can say atleast one of the reasons that alot of gamers don't play mmorpg's have mostly to do with the quality of the content released in mmorpg's. By and large mmorpg's play like rpg's from ten years back and it doesn't help that they often cost about the same as an offline game and then have a sub fee added on top of all that, this is alot for games of the genre to overcome in trying to get non mmorpg gamers to play there games.
I'm not too sure if I agree with the sentiment that those gamers if they do bother to buy the game will certainly just leave after the free month, wouldn't it stand to reason that if that many people were interested in the story that they would just pay the fifteen a month to continue that story until it's end, especially for those who actually enjoy the story.
While it may seem like people have little to no interest in "story" or "linear" experiences in games I think that is a view that can be skewed greatly by spending time on sites like this one which is the only place where I hear these battlecries against linear games with in depth story telling.
but yeah, to call this game Fantastic is like calling Twilight the Godfather of vampire movies....
I don't agree with your statement at all. TOR will have most of the same MMO features as WoW plus many of the RPG features from BW's SPG's.
As for open, TOR will be 90% open game play. Mainly the class story quest giver will be behind a seamless instance. And the dungeons (flashpoints), Warzones and world group story quest givers. After the starter worlds that will be 60% solo and 40% group, the planets open up to 60% group and 40% solo. As you get higher in level, the % of group play goes up.
So yes, BW is targetting their own audience to try to bring them into a MMO with a functioning RPG. A RPG that gives this demigraphic the ability to play the game as a uniquley repeatable SPG RPG. But it will also cater to MMO players, not the pure sandbox or FFA PvP gamers, but the themepark gamers. With a bit of the sandbox exploration and new crafting wrinkle thrown in. Plus much more we don't know about yet.
So there may be just as many if not more options than WoW in TOR's "open" game world.
How many people long for that "past, simpler, and better world," I wonder, without ever recognizing the truth that perhaps it was they who were simpler and better, and not the world about them?
R.A.Salvatore
in my personal opinion i think bioware are doing things right with how they're designing the game, they are bringing back the RPG element which got lost a long time ago.
Will it be popular? Undoubtedly. It will never achieve anything greater then what a fantasy theme will though. I would venture to bet that a lot of people just really aren't into the Star Wars IP let alone a scifi setting. Im not doom and gloom, and I do hope for the large success of this game.
Im definately looking forward to this personally but my heart will always be with a fantasy setting, and it always has been for the last 13 years.
Pretty sure the whole 'fantasy' > SCIFI is false, at least from a movie point of view.
Last I checked SW beat LOTR in movie revenue. Adjust for inflation of course.
Gdemami -
Informing people about your thoughts and impressions is not a review, it's a blog.
This is my preliminary thinking as well. It won't be EVERYTHING to EVERYONE, but I do think some people get so blinded with hatred over a) rumor b) speculation c) lies d) ONE part of a massive game, that they tend to lose sight of the scope of this game.
I may be totally off and completely wrong and I may be the 1st one posting "OMGWTF THIS GAME SUKS!", but I won't do it until I've had a chance to play it.
When Blizzard created WoW they had no idea it was going to turn into a serious cash cow. The success of WoW literally happened overnight. A different type of passion went into developing WoW besides creating the definitive MMO. SWTOR has 1 goal in mind, seek and destroy.
"Everything is mine and your woman too"
Why WoW is so huge?
1. It had millions of people that have been playing Warcraft for years and still do.
2. Media wrote and talked about it so much that it brainwashed people to think it's the best and keep playing.
3. More people play it. Your friends, the school, work. And ofc you wanna join.
4. The game can change! They can add whatever they feel like!
This game is stuck with SW rules and the graphics, animations are poor. I don't think this one will make it.
Wow came at the right time (broadband) at the right place (booming internet economy) and with the right product (compared to the school boys attempts of earlier mmorpg's with limited budgets).
Like so many things this momentum comes once in a life time.
Blizzard was overwhelmed by it: they didn't have the servers in place, they didn't have enough copies to sell and the subscription based market was a new thing to the mass market. Never done before in those quantities.
Actually this unexpected hic-up contributed to its success: they needed 3 months to add new US servers and infrastructure, then they launched in EU and the moment it could have settled down they introduced it in the east and one year later in China.
So even the timing of the seperate roll outs over different continents was perfect.
The above conditions will never be met again until new technoloy/ideas come along.
And no voice overs from NPC's will not make this happen. It is not that easy.
Trying to emulate WOW's success was the downfall of all the later products.
Blizzard didn't have a goal of multi million subscriptions when they launched, that's a huge difference.
They are six years to late... WoW success had a lot to do with timing.. And making an Easy game among competitors that had a Hardcore audiance. Now we have so many Casual games out there that Its not NEW anymore. What Bioware should have done Is gone back to the Original Star Wars movies And looked at What made that Film Great.
Life is like a pyramid.. Evrything we humans do is sorted that way. You have people at the Top be it in politics or In sports etc. Take away this pyramid and you FAIL.
Jedai are super BAD ase.... They are at the top of the Pyramid. If you want to be one you dam well have to work your ase off. Having Heroes and a comunity in MMOS is what makes them last. EvE would not have gained Subs if it dident use the Pyramid system... Even WoW has it... 2004-2007 40man RAIDS anyone. You had the super bad ase Elit with thier Epics then you had the masses.
Pyramid Pyramid Pyramid... do I need to repeat myself? the Human psyche is built that way.
Jedi are NOT super bad ass. Grievous had no problem killing them and neither did Jango Fett. In the novels Jedi got killed by people who weren't force sensitive and the same is being played out in the Clone Wars series.
Alpha classes have no place in MMOs. SWG tried it and it destroyed PVP. Bioware is going the correct route by letting you be bad ass as a jedi.bounty hunter, trooper etc. There were many bad asses in the Star Wars universe and jedi was only one of them.
Currently Playing: World of Warcraft