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Why APB will probably fail
Terranah
Member UncommonPosts: 3,575
The gameplay is only about one thing: combat. And because of this, APB's success will rise and fall on that feature. Now I suppose they wanted to appeal to the rpg aspect of the game by incorporating upgrades, but does this really make sense. If there was an alternate method of advancement besides pvp, perhaps. But since there is no alternate method of advancement, it makes no sense whatsoever.
Let's look closer. In a few months, most players will be maxed on upgrades. That means any new players without upgrades will have to fight them. Now wait, you say, aren't they redoing matchmaking. Yeah they are, but it will not fix the problem that servers have low populations. So in the future instead of getting a horribly outmatched opponent, you may not get any opponents. So most likely new people will be forced to run the same, monotonous missions which previously only created the context through which combat occurred, but now becomes the slow, tedious grind of hell. It's one thing to run similar missions over and over, and it's quite another to run the same missions over and over...and over and over and over and over for a pittance of xp.
Oh wait, you say, aren't they making a pure skill server. Why yes they are. Now if you were joining this game in a few months, which server would you join as a newbie? The server with level 300's and max character/weapon/vehicle upgrades, or the one that gives all players the same weapons irregardless of how long or how good they are. Unless you are someone that likes pain, you will pick the pure skill server. This sets up a situation where new players will be joining the new servers, but the original servers with upgrades will stagnate for new players and die, because when everyone has the same weapons and same upgrades it is essentially a pure skill server anyway. Hence, you will see players from the original servers migrating to pure skill servers eventually.
Now besides matchmaking, which they claim they will fix, and the upgrade system, which they claim they will also look at besides adding pure servers, they are going to change combat itself....a core game mechanic. This is very risky to change a core mechanic of a game. This is basically a kind of NGE, as they are changing how characters level (upgrade system), how characters drive, how they fight and how the game structures matches. Essentially they are changing everything. But ofcourse, mmo's are constantly changing, balancing, etc. But reallly? The entire game is being changed.
Now the problem with changing everything as I see it, is you have a greater chance for pissing off a large number of the playerbase who may not like the new changes. This wouldn't be so bad except for the almost immuteable law of mmos that states you only get one launch...if you screw it up you hang it up. Maybe not today or tomorrow...but someday soon you die a slow wasting kind of death or a quick death, but you die nonetheless. So they are gambling their future success on these changes. But based on their previous game design choices does it appear the odds are in their favor? Not really.
And then there is the cheaters. This game at it's very core is competitive because it's really only about one thing, pvp. How can you remove the impetus to compete, but by not insuring the integrity of the game. Whether there are cheaters or not is a mute point, but to what degree is debateable. Can APB catch the cheaters? So far no, and RTW is sending a lot of mixed messages. First Punkbuster was off. Then it was on. Now it's off again. So what's going happening on this front. Silence.
It's really a two tier question. First, does RTW have the will to catch the cheaters. Second, do they have the capability to catch the cheaters.
In closing, I will say this. The game has some nice features, like the ability to customize your character and vehicles, but they become inconsequential if the core game is flawed. In essence, there is nothing to do with your pretty character or pretty car but fight and if fighting is no fun or percieved as unfair for any number of reasons the game will not flourish in numbers beyond the initial month. Further, by creating a system whereby the most skilled players have the best weapons and upgrades in a game where there is but a single method for advancement, and pitting it against a pure skill server in which upgrades and levels are obsolete will do nothing but either collapse the first servers or see their numbers dwindle until it is of little consequence. APB offers something unique in it's setting within the mmo genre, but is it enough to see it through the years where other more sophisticated titles failed. I don't think so.
Still, APB can be an exhillarating if not frustrating experience.
Comments
xfire already shows 30% drop this week
All MMOs fail after a few months of release when the devs can't magically make it all better accoring to _ person. What makes APB any different?
Seeing these threads all the time is beyond silly.
there's really no such thing as a game that doesn't get boring. shooters tend to get boring the fast because they're, like you said, based on combat. i don't really see the point to this thread though, it's like telling people that once they eat the slice of cake on they're plate it'll be gone. yes, that's pretty obvious. basically everything else you said could be summed up by saying "the game has a lot of flaws" because that's pretty much all i got out of it. the real mistake was charging a fee. unless the game is good, don't even bother with a fee.
not trying to be mean or anything, but everything in this thread was kinda obvious. >.> well i'm glad you can atleast see the problems and don't try to cover them up with "but the character custimization is amazing!".
Confirmation of what some people have said over and over including me...this game is not an mmorpg, its a shooter with imba costumization, period..its fun in a party of friends during 1-2 h a day for the first 1 to 4 weeks ..after that its dead.
And its the way it is..an mmorpg has years many months, years of gameplay, has many stuff to do, exemple in the first year i played wow, 4+ years ago i played many many hours a day everyday of my life and didnt do everything the game had to offer...and never will...
APB is a shooter, you do missions and costumize stuff...it becomes old very very fast.
The game is not bad, needs some tweaking all over but even with everything tweaked its still the same game...has no lifespan...mmorpgs have that lifespan, so APB will survive for some time with a dropping playerbase, only people really really mad about the game will continue playing it...for a fact this game is not, was not meant to have a very large population playing for a long time everyday...
Everyone already knew this before it was released its not like your telling us anything new so threads like these are stupid and no we dont think your some kind of mmo expert because you make a long post either:P If you are gonna waste are time at least choose a serious mmo like wow or eve if you are going to tell us the future.
I think it's a combination of the developers not listening to players during beta and the publishers rushing the product, basically. That's the way many MMO game companies operate these days. I often wonder if they make enough money off initial sales to justify such practices.
Vault-Tec analysts have concluded that the odds of worldwide nuclear armaggeddon this decade are 17,143,762... to 1.
One month after release and they're basically re-doing the entire game. Matchmaking, weaponry, upgrades, driving, missions...
Upgrades have TOO MUCH of an effect on the game. APB in its current form is a lot like going into WSG at level 19 as a noobie against people who have spent thousands of gold twinking their character - you're pretty much just useless fodder.
Why RTW would go and give out buddy keys at this point in the game is beyond my imagination. Invite a whole customer base to log into San Paro to be the b!!ch of veteran players for 7 hours? Is there anyone on the face of this planet who is going to say "This is fun!"?
Matchmaking isn't about people declining missions, it's not about bounties or calls for backup from afk players. It's about blatant mis-matching of opponents, threat levels are FAR TOO VOLATILE to base skill level on and in practice don't seem to be very important to the current matchmaking process. They would be 10000x better off dividing the player base into 2 categories: 1-149 and 150+ (label the servers and enforce rank restrictions). This will 100% prevent anyone with rank 3 upgrades going up against anyone without any upgrades. I will gladly spend days playing a game, that puts me into fair fights. I will not put up for long with a game that constantly puts me into fights where I don't stand a chance.
The most telling story I have about the hideous matchmaking is a bounty I did at rank 59, i was around threat level 8. I was put up against a rank 243 that had a threat level of 3. This guy was given the option to call for backup and the backup he received was a rank 281. It's like, WTF is the point in even trying? I was never given a chance to call for backup.
The game is quickly losing interest, matches are typically one-sided, either I can't kill my opponents because they ridiculously out equip me, or I'm put up against a bunch of new players with crappy guns who can't touch me. Being out geared so often has made me a better player, however, it also makes any strategical advantage I can gain over my opponents moot - as the upgrades easily make up for blatant stupidity.
The game is absolutely unforgiving to new players, or those who have fallen behind the curve. I have absolutely zero faith in RTW to fix it based on what they have released. I doubt RTW is even concerned about dwindling numbers on the servers, from the ridiculous amount of RTW points I've accumulated selling APB$, it seems there's no shortage of suckers willing to pay out the nose to be competitive in this game.
Gameplay doesn't get old. New players new things happen.
New zones are being worked on. Pure SKill District. Chaos District. Newbie District.
Lots of reblancing with weapons, upgrades (to work as gems in wow in a sense). spawn points, missions, and the gameplay itself in the near future.
Next patch fixes tons of shit.
The devolopers work very hard and this is one of the best games for customization and a unique experience. This game has a ton of potential and the devolopers use the communities opoinions and responses to make changes accordinagly. The people who enjoy this game are pc shooter lovers while the haters are the world of warcrafters / mmorpgers who want to grind mobs all day.
The game is pvp only which is why I love it. The customization is endless. Nobody looks the same.