I think its a shame that some of the greatest intellectual properties of our life time were made into MMOs that utterly failed. I remember watching movies and reading books thinking to myself, "I wish I could live or play in this world" and eventually some corporation got involved with the creators of the IP, made a game and it ended up sucking, going free to play or closing down.
HOW CAN THIS BE? Ironically, some of the best MMO's still in play and going strong didn't really have a big following before the game ever came out. I find that kind of funny.
You answered your own question. MMOs based on popular IPs do badly for the same reason that movies based on video games do badly; people already live in this world through their initial introduction to it, and no derivitive work that comes after will ever measure up. The expectations are always higher than can be met, because your imagination and fantasies will ALWAYS tell a better story than any writer.
And this is why SWG was far and above SWTOR, one lets you watch their story and the other lets you live through your imaginanation and fantasies.
There are plenty of fan fiction in SWTOR. And some of it is awesome. If players can create such jewels based on stories in game, that means that there is something more to this game then eye can see:)
I don't think you understand his point, sure people can write great fan fics and all, but there are few if any tools in game to "live" these stories. They don't even offer bios for players and the chances for RP are minimal compared to nearly every other game. SWTOR has some decent stories in game, but they are on rails with switchs for good or evil decisions and that is it.
I agree that they could add many of mentionned things, sure it would make it better. I hope that it will happen sooner or later. But unless you want to make a niche game for the few who have unlimited time to make their own stories etc. it's just unrealistic.
You're telling me at this point SWTOR isn't a niche game? Come on, outside of WoW evey MMO is a niche game and it is a niche market. It is fine if SWTOR fits your niche, but it's not a wide market success, thus making it niche.
Originally posted by Vynt There would be no reason to make a Firefly MMO. It is kind of a generic scifi theme. Don't get me wrong, I loved the series too, but an MMO could be made without having to pay for the IP.A vast empire that does what it wants, spanning multiple worlds, many forgotten or uncard for. People making what lives they can. A beaten down rebellion, a thing of the past.What made Firefly interesting were the characters, not really the universe.
And, of course, the big reason to license an IP is to lock in the fanbase - and with a niche fanbase as small as Firefly's, again, no reason to pay for the IP.
“It's unwise to pay too much, but it's worse to pay too little. When you pay too much, you lose a little money - that's all. When you pay too little, you sometimes lose everything, because the thing you bought was incapable of doing the thing it was bought to do. The common law of business balance prohibits paying a little and getting a lot - it can't be done. If you deal with the lowest bidder, it is well to add something for the risk you run, and if you do that you will have enough to pay for something better.”
You could make an AMAZING game that is in black and white, all characters look 100% identical, the world is boring and bland, but the mechanics and gameplay are phenomenal.
If you take a great game and slap on an IP, you get a masterpiece.
If you take an IP and try to form a game underneath it, you end up with garbage that looks nice.
SWTOR was created for the sole purpose of taking money from Star Wars fans and was built on the WoW model because it is proven to work. It was never made to be a good game.
The only companies still making good games and either indie ones or big companies with their own ideas, not IPs.
I agree that they could add many of mentionned things, sure it would make it better. I hope that it will happen sooner or later. But unless you want to make a niche game for the few who have unlimited time to make their own stories etc. it's just unrealistic.
decisions and that is it.
You're telling me at this point SWTOR isn't a niche game? Come on, outside of WoW evey MMO is a niche game and it is a niche market. It is fine if SWTOR fits your niche, but it's not a wide market success, thus making it niche.
I agree that it was not wide market success. It's a game for people like me who appreciate good story as it is all about story. No question about it. This might change though, not that I would be too happy about it
Niche game? You are probably right. All games but WoW are niche /shrug.
Though I will wait and see how F2P will play out before saying the final word about it.
I think we aren't quite there yet. Before the Lord of the Rings movies got made, I and many others used to say that Tolkien's IP, his epic Lord of the Rings/Hobbit saga, was simply impossible to translate properly into a movie. However, like Lord of the Rings and The Dark Knight and Game of Thrones have shown, movie and tv studios have learnt the knack of making good IP translations into movies and tv.
For singleplayer games, studios are getting better at it as well. What's more, I think that Baldur's Gate and Neverwinter Nights were already good IP translations into games, just like Vampire the Masquerade.
However, for MMORPG's game companies are still figuring out the art of it. Besides it being subjective of course. SWG and LotrO are to some considered good IP translations, but to many others they failed in the implementation. I'd personally consider TSW a fairly good Lovecraft IP translation when it comes to vibe and atmosphere, but TSW is an independent IP (an IP btw that I think would do great as singleplayer game, movie, tv series or books)
I agree that they could add many of mentionned things, sure it would make it better. I hope that it will happen sooner or later. But unless you want to make a niche game for the few who have unlimited time to make their own stories etc. it's just unrealistic.
decisions and that is it.
You're telling me at this point SWTOR isn't a niche game? Come on, outside of WoW evey MMO is a niche game and it is a niche market. It is fine if SWTOR fits your niche, but it's not a wide market success, thus making it niche.
I agree that it was not wide market success. It's a game for people like me who appreciate good story as it is all about story. No question about it. This might change though, not that I would be too happy about it
Niche game? You are probably right. All games but WoW are niche /shrug.
Though I will wait and see how F2P will play out before saying the final word about it.
See I don't think there is anything wrong with these games being "niche" as long as the developers understand that that is what this genre is. There is no one game to rule them all, and I'm not sure when it comes to MMOers there every will be. There was WoW and WoW is an anomaly, it will never happen again, developers need to simply accept this and realize that the one thing WoW brought was more attention to the genre, so now they can split a couple million players rather than the 700K or so that were in the genere before WoW. If they would just do that and focus on making good games rather than reaching some unattainable number of subs I think we'd (including the developers) would be a lot happier.
I agree that they could add many of mentionned things, sure it would make it better. I hope that it will happen sooner or later. But unless you want to make a niche game for the few who have unlimited time to make their own stories etc. it's just unrealistic.
decisions and that is it.
You're telling me at this point SWTOR isn't a niche game? Come on, outside of WoW evey MMO is a niche game and it is a niche market. It is fine if SWTOR fits your niche, but it's not a wide market success, thus making it niche.
I agree that it was not wide market success. It's a game for people like me who appreciate good story as it is all about story. No question about it. This might change though, not that I would be too happy about it
Niche game? You are probably right. All games but WoW are niche /shrug.
Though I will wait and see how F2P will play out before saying the final word about it.
See I don't think there is anything wrong with these games being "niche" as long as the developers understand that that is what this genre is.
And the SWTOR devs clearly didn't understand that, considering it is the most expensive MMO ever made and sank faster than almost anyone could have predicted.
Failure here is really inconceivable. It is so hard to get my head around what a mess SWTOR became before I quit. Wargames really just made me wince. Where is the war if you are playing BS simulations. How did they miss the fact that PvP is an important part of SW IP MMO property? Had they said we're just a PvE game fine. But much to the contrary, they totally blew it there and I suspect most of the PvPers left for GW2.
No games launched now have roleplaying tools. The Legacy system had some features roleplayers liked, but it was not designed for them. Money is not "wasted" on the minority who launched the MMO genre, it is lavished on the solo orientated players who make up the majority of the playerbase. Solid marketing decision, but crap if you like roleplaying.
I agree that they could add many of mentionned things, sure it would make it better. I hope that it will happen sooner or later. But unless you want to make a niche game for the few who have unlimited time to make their own stories etc. it's just unrealistic.
decisions and that is it.
You're telling me at this point SWTOR isn't a niche game? Come on, outside of WoW evey MMO is a niche game and it is a niche market. It is fine if SWTOR fits your niche, but it's not a wide market success, thus making it niche.
I agree that it was not wide market success. It's a game for people like me who appreciate good story as it is all about story. No question about it. This might change though, not that I would be too happy about it
Niche game? You are probably right. All games but WoW are niche /shrug.
Though I will wait and see how F2P will play out before saying the final word about it.
See I don't think there is anything wrong with these games being "niche" as long as the developers understand that that is what this genre is.
And the SWTOR devs clearly didn't understand that, considering it is the most expensive MMO ever made and sank faster than almost anyone could have predicted.
You can't be serious. EVERYONE predicted the failure of SWTOR. Except perhaps the devs.
Also SWTOR has a shit story, which is ironic considering.
People can make fanfic of the shittiest IP you've ever seen, shit Twilight spawned 50 Shades of Grey and that thing was also garbage but also popular.
I can say with 100% certainty that I am proud of predicting, and happy with, the fall of SWTOR, [mod edit]
You know what was funny about SWG was how little we actually had at the beginning to work with and how much fun it was as the economy built up and PvP drove the economic engine. Every server was clamoring for better weapons and we all went bananas as we adapted. And then player cities came in and things really exploded.
THAT is how you make an MMORP work.
If the Devs took their heads out of their collective asses and simply added content and kept the game intact, I bet it still would be going. What I wish I had was the game redesign documents that the Player Reps were shown in Houston before the NGE threw out every single good idea the game had. I remember how jazzed the player reps were about those changes and when the NGE came in all the spirit went out of them.
The IP has nothing to do with the game being good or bad, the IP it self only provides a better or atleast deeper experience to the fans of that IP.
A good example of that is FIFA vs PES, they are both good games(and lets not get into the whole PES vs FIFA argument, since i dont play either and its irrelevant) but because FIFA is a licensed game they have the teams, players, and stadiums which enhance the experience of football(soccer for yanks) fans.
There are 2 types of licensed games, cash-ins(mostly movie or any other pop-media games), and ones that license the IP in order to use the setting.
Cash-Ins are simply there to cash-in on the relative popularity of the IP at the time of release, they can be good or bad but the sole purpose of the license is to sell more copies.
IP's that are licensed for the setting could also cash-in on the relative popularity of the IP but in most cases the licensed is used to use a pre existing setting which makes the development easier.
Ffor example if we take Arkham Asylum if you were not batman you would need to create a hell of allot more content for especially for the exposition.
Everyone knows who Batman is and why he does what he does, but if you had just a random guy with super high-tech gadgets roaming around the city at night you would need to give the players much more information about who he is and why he does that.
For an open world game like AA it would actually hurt the overall quality of the game since you would have to put much more linear elements into the game to provide the needed exposition of the main character and the story.
How do you take a great IP and make a bad game you say?
.. . . . . E.A.
. . . . RIP Star Wars, Warhammer
I love when people that never worked with or had any ties to EA blame it for every thing, Warhammer was a bad game because of Mythic not because of EA, it had tons of design issues at it's core which had nothing to do with EA, EA could've pushed its release data which would have resulted in a unpolished game, but it was as polished and even more polished than WoW when it was launched in the US, just not a very good game.
With SWTOR it was BIOWARE not EA, since the very early beta there was an outcry of players about issues, every major core issue was still there at launch, BW simply did not listen it's testers. And LucasArts did much more micro managment with the development of the game than EA ever did.
You might disagree with how EA handles its buisness but if you really think that EA ruins games then you're well fill in the blanks your self. Takle EA's longest running IP atm(not including sports titles, and or the sims) - Batlefiled, have they ruined the game? i would say not, if any thing the Dice improved on the game with every title they released, some might say that BF2 was more "tactical" than BF3, but BF3 is a hell of a better game than BF2 ever was.
Yeah i don't like the fact that EA is selling "unlocks" for like 50 euros but it has nothing to do with the game it self...
BIOWARE tought that their story elements would work well in an MMO they were wrong, SWOTOR was not a good game, but it was not the horrid train wreck people are setting it up to be. If any thing it was more viral and sheep like behaivour that caused the game to lose as many subs as it did, just because the amount of B&M from ex-SWG fans, and people who wanted WoW2.0 did not find what they were looking for.
I stopped playing SWTOR mostly because of the negative attitude of every one around me, but when talking to the guild members of the guild i was in, and to the general population of the server most people could not actually say why the game what exactly makes them dislike the game so much. I've seen a platitude of people spending hours every day making the same post over and over on the forums and spewing the same crap in the fleet chat about how much the game sucks.
Honestly it felt like they were intentionally puting salt on their wounds so it will hurt more and more untill they get numb from the pain. Like children that discovered that the gift they got was not as good as they tought it was so they intentionally smash it to pieces so they would have a good reason to cry it out...
90% of IPs are rotten games for every Batman Arkham Asylum there is 10 absolute stinkers. I think the worse game ever as voted by critics is an IP (E.T. I believe). I think the industry see it as a way to make a quick and easy buck without having to work too hard on promoting the game. For example if Skyrim was a new and original game world without the history of all the previous games. the marketing of the game is a x100 times harder than it was. As it is, because of the popularity of TES all they had to do was release a 1 minute clip on youtube and the internet was buzzing with excitement.
Personally with the odd exception I think that when IP like starwars or the LoTRO puts developers in a straight jacket because they have to respect the lore and yet create a game world that has plenty of content and has balanced between characters and races. Both these IPs have approached this problem differently with varying success.
Originally posted by skydiver12How do you take a great IP and make a bad game you say? .. . . . . E.A. . . . . RIP Star Wars, Warhammer
I love when people that never worked with or had any ties to EA blame it for every thing, Warhammer was a bad game because of Mythic not because of EA, it had tons of design issues at it's core which had nothing to do with EA, EA could've pushed its release data which would have resulted in a unpolished game, but it was as polished and even more polished than WoW when it was launched in the US, just not a very good game.
With SWTOR it was BIOWARE not EA, since the very early beta there was an outcry of players about issues, every major core issue was still there at launch, BW simply did not listen it's testers. And LucasArts did much more micro managment with the development of the game than EA ever did.
You might disagree with how EA handles its buisness but if you really think that EA ruins games then you're well fill in the blanks your self. Takle EA's longest running IP atm(not including sports titles, and or the sims) - Batlefiled, have they ruined the game? i would say not, if any thing the Dice improved on the game with every title they released, some might say that BF2 was more "tactical" than BF3, but BF3 is a hell of a better game than BF2 ever was.
Yeah i don't like the fact that EA is selling "unlocks" for like 50 euros but it has nothing to do with the game it self...
BIOWARE tought that their story elements would work well in an MMO they were wrong, SWOTOR was not a good game, but it was not the horrid train wreck people are setting it up to be. If any thing it was more viral and sheep like behaivour that caused the game to lose as many subs as it did, just because the amount of B&M from ex-SWG fans, and people who wanted WoW2.0 did not find what they were looking for.
I stopped playing SWTOR mostly because of the negative attitude of every one around me, but when talking to the guild members of the guild i was in, and to the general population of the server most people could not actually say why the game what exactly makes them dislike the game so much. I've seen a platitude of people spending hours every day making the same post over and over on the forums and spewing the same crap in the fleet chat about how much the game sucks.
Honestly it felt like they were intentionally puting salt on their wounds so it will hurt more and more untill they get numb from the pain. Like children that discovered that the gift they got was not as good as they tought it was so they intentionally smash it to pieces so they would have a good reason to cry it out...
So have you been a big shot at EA, or just another litter cleaner who talks big now? Coming from a guy who quit a mmo over opinions of others, yet try to convince me of their opinion over EA? It's EA. I love when people are delusional and try to convince me their opinion is fact.
Everyting you wrote is pure bullshit and wishfull thinking to me. But i respect your opinion.
Because your a sheep doesn't make anyone else one.
Besides, just between the two of us, i play mmo's as a hobby since 15 years, aka. i'm like a nascar driver since 15 years. I don't need some bystander telling me i should or shouldn't like my wheel supplier because someone else told him their are bad.
Originally posted by skydiver12How do you take a great IP and make a bad game you say? .. . . . . E.A. . . . . RIP Star Wars, Warhammer
I love when people that never worked with or had any ties to EA blame it for every thing, Warhammer was a bad game because of Mythic not because of EA, it had tons of design issues at it's core which had nothing to do with EA, EA could've pushed its release data which would have resulted in a unpolished game, but it was as polished and even more polished than WoW when it was launched in the US, just not a very good game.
With SWTOR it was BIOWARE not EA, since the very early beta there was an outcry of players about issues, every major core issue was still there at launch, BW simply did not listen it's testers. And LucasArts did much more micro managment with the development of the game than EA ever did.
You might disagree with how EA handles its buisness but if you really think that EA ruins games then you're well fill in the blanks your self. Takle EA's longest running IP atm(not including sports titles, and or the sims) - Batlefiled, have they ruined the game? i would say not, if any thing the Dice improved on the game with every title they released, some might say that BF2 was more "tactical" than BF3, but BF3 is a hell of a better game than BF2 ever was.
Yeah i don't like the fact that EA is selling "unlocks" for like 50 euros but it has nothing to do with the game it self...
BIOWARE tought that their story elements would work well in an MMO they were wrong, SWOTOR was not a good game, but it was not the horrid train wreck people are setting it up to be. If any thing it was more viral and sheep like behaivour that caused the game to lose as many subs as it did, just because the amount of B&M from ex-SWG fans, and people who wanted WoW2.0 did not find what they were looking for.
I stopped playing SWTOR mostly because of the negative attitude of every one around me, but when talking to the guild members of the guild i was in, and to the general population of the server most people could not actually say why the game what exactly makes them dislike the game so much. I've seen a platitude of people spending hours every day making the same post over and over on the forums and spewing the same crap in the fleet chat about how much the game sucks.
Honestly it felt like they were intentionally puting salt on their wounds so it will hurt more and more untill they get numb from the pain. Like children that discovered that the gift they got was not as good as they tought it was so they intentionally smash it to pieces so they would have a good reason to cry it out...
So have you been a big shot at EA, or just another litter cleaner who talks big now? Coming from a guy who quit a mmo over opinions of others, yet try to convince me of their opinion over EA? It's EA. I love when people are delusional and try to convince me their opinion is fact.
Everyting you wrote is pure bullshit and wishfull thinking to me. But i respect your opinion.
Because your a sheep doesn't make anyone else one.
Besides, just between the two of us, i play mmo's as a hobby since 15 years, aka. i'm like a nascar driver since 15 years. I don't need some bystander telling me i should or shouldn't like my wheel supplier because someone else told him their are bad.
Not gonna happen. Sorry. Carry on:)
"Respect other opinions" ROFL, well since you're American so I guess that cesspool which is your post is as much respect as any one could get
The rest of your post does not makes any sense either, and even if I disregard the grammar, but lets try to decrypt it any how.
Playing a games at most gives you the ability to formulate an opinion about the game, it's not like having a profession. A NASCAR driver,(AKA white trash with a chevy since AKA is as known as, so you should've used I.E(In Example)) is a profession not a hobby.
A proffession allows you to actually formulate a much more informative opinion about related subjects than a hobby, heck gaming is not even a hobby its a leasuire activity which gives you as much ability to formulate an objective and informative opinion as sun bathing.
I have not worked at EA, i have worked as a software developer for big corporarions, mainly Microsoft so i have exprience with "corporate involvment" in the development lifecycle of projects, but even that does not give me the ability to formulate a true opinion on how EA operates since every company has its own policies.
Currently I work as a consultant, when we have allot of clients that at least in how they are structured are similar to how big game publishers work. And although they do not publish games but they do publish allot of software products utilizing multiple internal development companies, and sub contracted 3rd parties.
Being a consultant that is brought in by the management actually allows me to have some insight into how different companies operate, and if you think EA has the will not to mention the ability to totally trash(other than scrapping the entire thing( a game which would've been otherwise great you are greatly mistaken.
EA might set ground rules, deadlines, request and suggest features based on their own market and focus group research, but they don't come to a developer and say do this this and that.
EA like any other corporation cares about its business, it does not involve it self in the nooks and crannies of the game as much as you think, they cant afford it. If you really think some E C, or even V level exec from EA is thinking about class balance, zone structure and other core game design issues and mechanics you are either very ill informed, or highly delusional.
Before DOAC Mythic has developed some really horrific games, and WarHammer Online was not developed by the same team as DOAC, Mark Jacobs played a much smaller role in the overall development of the game, and most of the shots were called by Jeff Hickman. The game had major core issues at it's design way above what EA or any other publisher or corporate management would ever get their hands involved in.
SWTOR was developed by a new studio, BW Austin, it had many people that worked on other MMO's such as Everquest and Ultima online, which could be one of the reasons why it had issues as well, too many schools of thought, too many people bringing old baggage from their previous games, and Lucas Arts having the final call as with any other Lucas IP.
Bioware was too keen on having their story telling experience in an MMO and as of result many other aspects took the back seat.
They did not listen to fans, and if you read what many people what actually played trough the beta like I did posted about the game you would find that they have no fixed a single core issue that was expressed by the players a year or even more before the release of the game.
I'm not sure if the beta forums are still available, but it might be a good exercise for you to check them out and see just how many complaints pre and post launch are similar to one and other.
And no I did not stopped playing it because I'm a sheep like you so gracefully pointed out, i just do not like to spend my leisure time in an environment which is spewing negativity and self hatred.
The Star Wars univers will never translate well into an MMO. The nature of the Jedi is much much more powerful than what a normal person would be capable of. Jedi are super heroes. Playing a SW MMO with Jedi mixed in would be like playing a super hero game and trying to decide whether to play Superman or Robin. These two will never be on equal footing without destroying the canon of the universe they came from. The only way I can see a SW MMO remaining true to SW canon, would be one set in the time period after RotJ and all players have their chosen roles and all players have "force sensative" abilities, but no one's a Jedi.
Comments
You're telling me at this point SWTOR isn't a niche game? Come on, outside of WoW evey MMO is a niche game and it is a niche market. It is fine if SWTOR fits your niche, but it's not a wide market success, thus making it niche.
And, of course, the big reason to license an IP is to lock in the fanbase - and with a niche fanbase as small as Firefly's, again, no reason to pay for the IP.
How do you take a great IP and make a bad game?
Make an MMO.
--John Ruskin
Just like great books can make terribad movies, a great IP/story can make a terribad game.
The IP is the skin of the game.
You could make an AMAZING game that is in black and white, all characters look 100% identical, the world is boring and bland, but the mechanics and gameplay are phenomenal.
If you take a great game and slap on an IP, you get a masterpiece.
If you take an IP and try to form a game underneath it, you end up with garbage that looks nice.
SWTOR was created for the sole purpose of taking money from Star Wars fans and was built on the WoW model because it is proven to work. It was never made to be a good game.
The only companies still making good games and either indie ones or big companies with their own ideas, not IPs.
I agree that it was not wide market success. It's a game for people like me who appreciate good story as it is all about story. No question about it. This might change though, not that I would be too happy about it
Niche game? You are probably right. All games but WoW are niche /shrug.
Though I will wait and see how F2P will play out before saying the final word about it.
Sith Warrior - Story of Hate and Love http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxKrlwXt7Ao
Imperial Agent - Rise of Cipher Nine http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBBj3eJWBvU&feature=youtu.be
Imperial Agent - Hunt for the Eagle Part 1http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQqjYYU128E
For singleplayer games, studios are getting better at it as well. What's more, I think that Baldur's Gate and Neverwinter Nights were already good IP translations into games, just like Vampire the Masquerade.However, for MMORPG's game companies are still figuring out the art of it. Besides it being subjective of course. SWG and LotrO are to some considered good IP translations, but to many others they failed in the implementation. I'd personally consider TSW a fairly good Lovecraft IP translation when it comes to vibe and atmosphere, but TSW is an independent IP (an IP btw that I think would do great as singleplayer game, movie, tv series or books)
See I don't think there is anything wrong with these games being "niche" as long as the developers understand that that is what this genre is. There is no one game to rule them all, and I'm not sure when it comes to MMOers there every will be. There was WoW and WoW is an anomaly, it will never happen again, developers need to simply accept this and realize that the one thing WoW brought was more attention to the genre, so now they can split a couple million players rather than the 700K or so that were in the genere before WoW. If they would just do that and focus on making good games rather than reaching some unattainable number of subs I think we'd (including the developers) would be a lot happier.
And the SWTOR devs clearly didn't understand that, considering it is the most expensive MMO ever made and sank faster than almost anyone could have predicted.
You can't be serious. EVERYONE predicted the failure of SWTOR. Except perhaps the devs.
Also SWTOR has a shit story, which is ironic considering.
People can make fanfic of the shittiest IP you've ever seen, shit Twilight spawned 50 Shades of Grey and that thing was also garbage but also popular.
I can say with 100% certainty that I am proud of predicting, and happy with, the fall of SWTOR, [mod edit]
Scot you have a good point.
You know what was funny about SWG was how little we actually had at the beginning to work with and how much fun it was as the economy built up and PvP drove the economic engine. Every server was clamoring for better weapons and we all went bananas as we adapted. And then player cities came in and things really exploded.
THAT is how you make an MMORP work.
If the Devs took their heads out of their collective asses and simply added content and kept the game intact, I bet it still would be going. What I wish I had was the game redesign documents that the Player Reps were shown in Houston before the NGE threw out every single good idea the game had. I remember how jazzed the player reps were about those changes and when the NGE came in all the spirit went out of them.
The IP has nothing to do with the game being good or bad, the IP it self only provides a better or atleast deeper experience to the fans of that IP.
A good example of that is FIFA vs PES, they are both good games(and lets not get into the whole PES vs FIFA argument, since i dont play either and its irrelevant) but because FIFA is a licensed game they have the teams, players, and stadiums which enhance the experience of football(soccer for yanks) fans.
There are 2 types of licensed games, cash-ins(mostly movie or any other pop-media games), and ones that license the IP in order to use the setting.
Cash-Ins are simply there to cash-in on the relative popularity of the IP at the time of release, they can be good or bad but the sole purpose of the license is to sell more copies.
IP's that are licensed for the setting could also cash-in on the relative popularity of the IP but in most cases the licensed is used to use a pre existing setting which makes the development easier.
Ffor example if we take Arkham Asylum if you were not batman you would need to create a hell of allot more content for especially for the exposition.
Everyone knows who Batman is and why he does what he does, but if you had just a random guy with super high-tech gadgets roaming around the city at night you would need to give the players much more information about who he is and why he does that.
For an open world game like AA it would actually hurt the overall quality of the game since you would have to put much more linear elements into the game to provide the needed exposition of the main character and the story.
How do you take a great IP and make a bad game you say?
..
.
.
.
.
E.A.
.
.
.
.
RIP Star Wars, Warhammer
I love when people that never worked with or had any ties to EA blame it for every thing, Warhammer was a bad game because of Mythic not because of EA, it had tons of design issues at it's core which had nothing to do with EA, EA could've pushed its release data which would have resulted in a unpolished game, but it was as polished and even more polished than WoW when it was launched in the US, just not a very good game.
With SWTOR it was BIOWARE not EA, since the very early beta there was an outcry of players about issues, every major core issue was still there at launch, BW simply did not listen it's testers. And LucasArts did much more micro managment with the development of the game than EA ever did.
You might disagree with how EA handles its buisness but if you really think that EA ruins games then you're well fill in the blanks your self. Takle EA's longest running IP atm(not including sports titles, and or the sims) - Batlefiled, have they ruined the game? i would say not, if any thing the Dice improved on the game with every title they released, some might say that BF2 was more "tactical" than BF3, but BF3 is a hell of a better game than BF2 ever was.
Yeah i don't like the fact that EA is selling "unlocks" for like 50 euros but it has nothing to do with the game it self...
BIOWARE tought that their story elements would work well in an MMO they were wrong, SWOTOR was not a good game, but it was not the horrid train wreck people are setting it up to be. If any thing it was more viral and sheep like behaivour that caused the game to lose as many subs as it did, just because the amount of B&M from ex-SWG fans, and people who wanted WoW2.0 did not find what they were looking for.
I stopped playing SWTOR mostly because of the negative attitude of every one around me, but when talking to the guild members of the guild i was in, and to the general population of the server most people could not actually say why the game what exactly makes them dislike the game so much. I've seen a platitude of people spending hours every day making the same post over and over on the forums and spewing the same crap in the fleet chat about how much the game sucks.
Honestly it felt like they were intentionally puting salt on their wounds so it will hurt more and more untill they get numb from the pain. Like children that discovered that the gift they got was not as good as they tought it was so they intentionally smash it to pieces so they would have a good reason to cry it out...
90% of IPs are rotten games for every Batman Arkham Asylum there is 10 absolute stinkers. I think the worse game ever as voted by critics is an IP (E.T. I believe). I think the industry see it as a way to make a quick and easy buck without having to work too hard on promoting the game. For example if Skyrim was a new and original game world without the history of all the previous games. the marketing of the game is a x100 times harder than it was. As it is, because of the popularity of TES all they had to do was release a 1 minute clip on youtube and the internet was buzzing with excitement.
Personally with the odd exception I think that when IP like starwars or the LoTRO puts developers in a straight jacket because they have to respect the lore and yet create a game world that has plenty of content and has balanced between characters and races. Both these IPs have approached this problem differently with varying success.
So have you been a big shot at EA, or just another litter cleaner who talks big now?
Coming from a guy who quit a mmo over opinions of others, yet try to convince me of their opinion over EA? It's EA. I love when people are delusional and try to convince me their opinion is fact.
Everyting you wrote is pure bullshit and wishfull thinking to me. But i respect your opinion.
Because your a sheep doesn't make anyone else one.
Besides, just between the two of us, i play mmo's as a hobby since 15 years, aka. i'm like a nascar driver since 15 years. I don't need some bystander telling me i should or shouldn't like my wheel supplier because someone else told him their are bad.
Not gonna happen. Sorry. Carry on:)
"Respect other opinions" ROFL, well since you're American so I guess that cesspool which is your post is as much respect as any one could getThe rest of your post does not makes any sense either, and even if I disregard the grammar, but lets try to decrypt it any how.
Playing a games at most gives you the ability to formulate an opinion about the game, it's not like having a profession. A NASCAR driver,(AKA white trash with a chevy since AKA is as known as, so you should've used I.E(In Example)) is a profession not a hobby.
A proffession allows you to actually formulate a much more informative opinion about related subjects than a hobby, heck gaming is not even a hobby its a leasuire activity which gives you as much ability to formulate an objective and informative opinion as sun bathing.
I have not worked at EA, i have worked as a software developer for big corporarions, mainly Microsoft so i have exprience with "corporate involvment" in the development lifecycle of projects, but even that does not give me the ability to formulate a true opinion on how EA operates since every company has its own policies.
Currently I work as a consultant, when we have allot of clients that at least in how they are structured are similar to how big game publishers work. And although they do not publish games but they do publish allot of software products utilizing multiple internal development companies, and sub contracted 3rd parties.
Being a consultant that is brought in by the management actually allows me to have some insight into how different companies operate, and if you think EA has the will not to mention the ability to totally trash(other than scrapping the entire thing( a game which would've been otherwise great you are greatly mistaken.
EA might set ground rules, deadlines, request and suggest features based on their own market and focus group research, but they don't come to a developer and say do this this and that.
EA like any other corporation cares about its business, it does not involve it self in the nooks and crannies of the game as much as you think, they cant afford it. If you really think some E C, or even V level exec from EA is thinking about class balance, zone structure and other core game design issues and mechanics you are either very ill informed, or highly delusional.
Before DOAC Mythic has developed some really horrific games, and WarHammer Online was not developed by the same team as DOAC, Mark Jacobs played a much smaller role in the overall development of the game, and most of the shots were called by Jeff Hickman. The game had major core issues at it's design way above what EA or any other publisher or corporate management would ever get their hands involved in.
SWTOR was developed by a new studio, BW Austin, it had many people that worked on other MMO's such as Everquest and Ultima online, which could be one of the reasons why it had issues as well, too many schools of thought, too many people bringing old baggage from their previous games, and Lucas Arts having the final call as with any other Lucas IP.
Bioware was too keen on having their story telling experience in an MMO and as of result many other aspects took the back seat.
They did not listen to fans, and if you read what many people what actually played trough the beta like I did posted about the game you would find that they have no fixed a single core issue that was expressed by the players a year or even more before the release of the game.
I'm not sure if the beta forums are still available, but it might be a good exercise for you to check them out and see just how many complaints pre and post launch are similar to one and other.
And no I did not stopped playing it because I'm a sheep like you so gracefully pointed out, i just do not like to spend my leisure time in an environment which is spewing negativity and self hatred.
As always have a nice day.
EDIT: MMORPG please fix your editor
The Star Wars univers will never translate well into an MMO. The nature of the Jedi is much much more powerful than what a normal person would be capable of. Jedi are super heroes. Playing a SW MMO with Jedi mixed in would be like playing a super hero game and trying to decide whether to play Superman or Robin. These two will never be on equal footing without destroying the canon of the universe they came from. The only way I can see a SW MMO remaining true to SW canon, would be one set in the time period after RotJ and all players have their chosen roles and all players have "force sensative" abilities, but no one's a Jedi.
My Thoughts on Content Locust