64 replies to this topic

[Kraven Kor]

El Bandito, on 12 September 2014 - 01:51 AM, said:

Current pricing scheme is still bad for player retention.

Then let's hope we see some responses / movement on that.

But we can't expect everything overnight. Three months, six months down the road we should have a clear view of how the change of command has, well, changed things

[SmithMPBT]

Khan Warlock Kell, on 12 September 2014 - 03:50 AM, said:

Do I believe everything I hear ? NO ! Do I believe this game has moved forward and that PGI has hit its set deadlines in 2014 pretty much yes. Ok they have been late a few times. But the vast majority of what they have said they would do, they have done, and its been on time. That's what im using to judge them by.

When your deadlines don't include any real content like maps or new game modes or fixes like balance or role warfare, then ya they tend to be alot easier to hit.

[DONTOR]

I agree OP the future is looking bright!

[Chuanhao]

Thanks PGI for putting together a labour of love. Been looking forward to this game since the last installment of MW4. Not able to commit enough to any established team MWO game due to family commitments so CW won't affect me in any way, but have enjoyed the many pug matches even if it is difficult to work together as a proper team.

While tweaks have been up and down, I just take it in my stride and adjust. Nerfed PPCs? No problem. Shoot a little earlier and to the front of the enemy's line of motion a little. Only two mech modules? But with more options for weapon modules including both range and cooldown tweaks, looks to make things interesting, and make up for the inability to sup up the DDC with the original 4 mech module slots. (Can we have PPC range module? Just so we can have something a little closer to ER PPC range without all that heat penalties). I even have a bad ping of >200. Hence affecting overall dmg. but overall still most enjoyable. Even the sometimes seemingly weird weapon slots for the various variants entails one to be creative.

Little things like cadet bonus, themed sales, enjoyable challenges (and too onerous ones as well) all continue to add flavour to the game.

Keep up the good work! (May we have Arrow IV and thumper please? :-) and an IS Assault that can mount Ballistic on each arm)

[Mechteric]

I'll give em a pat on the back when they make jump jets fun. I might even given them a wet slobbery on the cheek if they would remove ghost heat and make the heat system more fun (increase dissipation, lower capacity, penalties for high heat, etc).


Until then I'll stay arms crossed in slight disapproval, only occasionally playing when I'm bored.

Edited by CapperDeluxe, 12 September 2014 - 09:55 AM.

[The Wakelord]

skorpionet, on 12 September 2014 - 04:26 AM, said:

95% free ?!!? Mech Bays are for free in your country?

I agree Mech Bays are a money cost if you want to have a larger number of available mechs.

However... Mech Bays are given out fairly frequently; about 1-2 a month (occasionally with a free mech also inside said mechbay). Since I joined in March I think I've received about 6 free mechbays?

[A banana in the tailpipe]

A+? more like D+. The brightest thing about MWOs future is they hit rock bottom and have only to go up from here.

[Russ Bullock]

Any noticing of improvement is appreciated and drives us, thanks.

[Kell Commander]

Russ Bullock, on 13 September 2014 - 05:59 PM, said:

Any noticing of improvement is appreciated and drives us, thanks.

I will have to see based on new patches as they are released before I jump on the "Good job" train. But re-evaluating your MC to USD/Euro rate would be an excellent start. Still don't know how it was ever justified to charge more than $30 for a single mech.

[Johnny Z]

Bishop Steiner, on 12 September 2014 - 04:57 AM, said:

It's a niche IP. Even the Successful MW2, 3 and 4 where niche. This game, this IP will never be some sweeping WoW, even if everything were free.

Never has been. Only way to make the learning curve accessible enough to even start getting it big is to water it down even more into MechAssault territory.

Plenty of affordable to free games out there. Few ever get big. Those that do, usually belong to either and uber huge IP, are advertised the heck out of and or are super easy to jump right in and get started.

None of those are true of this IP.

I dont get the niche IP comment, Mechwarrior has had 5 major computer games titles and how ever many expansion packs, not to mention the board game editions, no idea how many of those there have been.

Off hand I can think of 2 other sci-fi titles as large although they are goliaths in the entertainment industry, Star Wars and Star Trek. And Ok aliens and a couple others are huge on the movie side but not in games.

Maybe I am missing something, let me know if I have.

Edited by Johnny Z, 13 September 2014 - 06:53 PM.

[Bishop Steiner]

Johnny Z, on 13 September 2014 - 06:48 PM, said:

I dont get the niche IP comment, Mechwarrior has had 5 major computer games titles and how ever many expansion packs, not to mention the board game editions, no idea how many of those there have been.

Off hand I can think of 2 other sci-fi titles as large although they are goliaths in the entertainment industry, Star Wars and Star Trek. And Ok aliens and a couple others are huge on the movie side but not in games. Maybe I am missing one, let me know if I did.

Yes, it had success.

Niche means small, specialized customer base. All the MW titles and expansions combined are a drop in the bucket compared to major titles like Halo, Assassin's Creed, WoW, etc.

It has always catered to, and been supported by, a smaller, but intensely loyal and passionate fanbase, which also, happened to be made up of older, usually more financially successful players, willing to shell out to support.

MW4, the most reviled of the series (even though it wasn't bad, just not...battletechy enough)was an attempt to cater to a broader crowd. And most of those arcady changes are what turned off a lot of their core crowd. We still bought it, because it was battlttech. But then they went even more arcady with MechAssault. It did decently, but was largely ignored by dedicated fans of the IP. And yet it never sold huge, either.

Edited by Bishop Steiner, 13 September 2014 - 06:53 PM.

[Johnny Z]

Bishop Steiner, on 13 September 2014 - 06:52 PM, said:

Yes, it had success.

Niche means small, specialized customer base. All the MW titles and expansions combined are a drop in the bucket compared to major titles like Halo, Assassin's Creed, WoW, etc.

It has always catered to, and been supported by, a smaller, but intensely loyal and passionate fanbase, which also, happened to be made up of older, usually more financially successful players, willing to shell out to support.

MW4, the most reviled of the series (even though it wasn't bad, just not...battletechy enough)was an attempt to cater to a broader crowd. And most of those arcady changes are what turned off a lot of their core crowd. We still bought it, because it was battlttech. But then they went even more arcady with MechAssault. It did decently, but was largely ignored by dedicated fans of the IP. And yet it never sold huge, either.

Still doesnt make sense, the last Mechwarrior game was put out years ago. The market has grown by leaps and bounds since then and stands to continue to grow for countless reasons.

Saying that the 4 previous titles and expansion packs and board game editions and their expansions didnt sell well doesnt make any sense. Unless there are some numbers involved, logic dictates that they in fact sold very well. Games dont get expanion packs unless they sell well by the way.

[The Wakelord]

MechWarrior did have a fair few games, but that was in the 90s. Since then (until MWO) it fell into oblivion, along with other games like Crimson skies, Earthworm Jim & Darkwing Duck.

Whenever I've mentioned MWO or the MechWarrior 4 that I use to play in the 90s, I get blank looks. Using inductive logic, battletech is not as well known or popular as you might hope, Johnny Z.

[Zolaz]

Russ Bullock, on 13 September 2014 - 05:59 PM, said:

Any noticing of improvement is appreciated and drives us, thanks.

Why dont you throw a bone to those of us out on the island?

[Johnny Z]

The Wakelord, on 13 September 2014 - 07:02 PM, said:

MechWarrior did have a fair few games, but that was in the 90s. Since then (until MWO) it fell into oblivion, along with other games like Crimson skies, Earthworm Jim & Darkwing Duck.

Whenever I've mentioned MWO or the MechWarrior 4 that I use to play in the 90s, I get blank looks. Using inductive logic, battletech is not as well known or popular as you might hope, Johnny Z.

Lol are we talking about how well known Mechwarrior is at the moment or are we talking the popularity of the IP.

You will likely say they are the same thing, but my point is that the Ip has proven to be far more than niche.

One of the most popular names for sci-fi gaming right now is Destiny, what's their advertising budget you think compared to what Mechwarrior has been prepared to spend?

Did their ad budget change the fact they got a reviewer rating of 6 from one of the most popular reviewers? Not sure about the rest, its unfolding now.

Dont think for a second I wouldnt want Destiny to be awsome. I go where the best game is. And I see alot of promise with this game, told others that as well in other games.

Edited by Johnny Z, 13 September 2014 - 07:26 PM.

[Bishop Steiner]

Zolaz, on 13 September 2014 - 07:10 PM, said:

Why dont you throw a bone to those of us out on the island?

I thought they had been. Like this ECM thingy.

[Quxudica]

Khan Warlock Kell, on 12 September 2014 - 03:58 AM, said:

Haters gonna hate. The reality of the situation isn't going to change your mind. Just a shame you cant even admit that the game is moving forward.

How? We have some new mechs, some new tech, and one new, lazily designed game mode, But aside from relatively minor balance niggles, the game plays exactly the same way it did back in Closed Beta. It's still just a random-match-maker shooter
with no persistence beyond the money you earn, the objectives for the "objective modes" are depressingly simplistic and lazy, not to mention entirely arbitrary and to be completely honest the game still looks really subpar compared to what the Cryengine is capable of.

For all practical purposes, it's still the same experience I had two plus years ago. It's gotten better in some ways sure, but it's not a fraction of what was promised and in my mind they have long since lost any right to be cut slack.

[Johnny Z]

Quxudica, on 13 September 2014 - 08:44 PM, said:

How? We have some new mechs, some new tech, and one new, lazily designed game mode, But aside from relatively minor balance niggles, the game plays exactly the same way it did back in Closed Beta. It's still just a random-match-maker shooter
with no persistence beyond the money you earn, the objectives for the "objective modes" are depressingly simplistic and lazy, not to mention entirely arbitrary and to be completely honest the game still looks really subpar compared to what the Cryengine is capable of.

For all practical purposes, it's still the same experience I had two plus years ago. It's gotten better in some ways sure, but it's not a fraction of what was promised and in my mind they have long since lost any right to be cut slack.

Yep no question they put alot of time into hill climb speed and tons of other mechanics to the mech combat that doesnt show at a first glance. Said myself that they have the mech in Mechwarrior but not the warrior. So they are moving onto faction wars, this will be one of the first major features other than UI 2.0 and the clan mechs that would be visible at a glance, but like the mech combat if they do it right, it will be entertaining enough to keep players entertained and having fun for a serious amount of time.

Will Mechwarrior need more than great faction wars(assuming the star map fighting is indeed great when it comes out) and mech combat some time, sure, they even said they are starting on entirely new features after its release.

But over all I cant argue with the above quote when the game is seen at a glance. The good part about all this, is one of the reasons Destiny got a 6 is that RED VRS BLUE TDM SUCKS, and Mechwarrior will be offering more than that it seems. BTW I was fairly sure their review wasnt going to be that great as soon as i seen blue vrs red tdm in their game and that was quite a while ago. Why? Because if thats the most imaginative way they can motivate players to get into a player vrs player fight then that game had to be lacking in other areas as well.

I hope they focus on adding more features and depth after dropship mode and faction wars are in also. Sure hope it isnt 2 years before any other new features are in.

Edited by Johnny Z, 14 September 2014 - 12:36 AM.

[Bandaron]

I joined MWO last September after seeing an article somewhere online saying that the game had officially launched. It didn't take me long to figure out how ... optimistic ... that launch announcement had been, but I kept playing despite the numerous and manifest issues because the core gameplay - stomping around in giant robots and shooting people - was so much fun. I played pretty religiously for about half a year, but in February/March, I slipped away. Partly, this was just burnout, but more of it was feeling frustrated with the lack of progress being made on the game. (I was there for the first rollout of UI2.0, but if you think back to that, you'll remember that the first release of the new UI was a giant leap sideways, at best). Little niggling things just sat and festered for months and nobody seemed to be bothered enough to do anything about it.

I hopped back in a few weeks ago, and I think perhaps people who've been playing steadily all year don't realize how jarring that transition was. It's true, the game is still by and large the same old grind, same maps and (mostly) same mechs and weapons, but what immediately jumped out at me were the small changes - the little things like refilling consumables and rejoining matches after DCs. The lack of little quality of life changes like that were a big part of what wore me down in the first place.

I'm not trying to say that these things are by themselves huge accomplishments (although I suspect rejoining after DCs gave a network engineer somewhere in PGI ulcers), but compared with the way the game was developed a year ago, they're enormous. They're tangible signs of progress from a team that seemed hopelessly stalled in their tracks. There's definitely a metric sh*tload more I'd like to see done, and I wasn't a founder or an alpha/beta player, so I don't have two years' worth of impatience built up. All I can say is that I am much happier with the current PGI than I was with the company I started following a year ago. +1 OP

[Quxudica]

Johnny Z, on 13 September 2014 - 06:58 PM, said:

Still doesnt make sense, the last Mechwarrior game was put out years ago. The market has grown by leaps and bounds since then and stands to continue to grow for countless reasons.

Saying that the 4 previous titles and expansion packs and board game editions and their expansions didnt sell well doesnt make any sense. Unless there are some numbers involved, logic dictates that they in fact sold very well. Games dont get expanion packs unless they sell well by the way.

Not everyone enjoys competitive games, so that decreases audience size but its still pretty large. Not everyone enjoys competitive shooters, that decreases the audience further but it's still pretty large. Not everyone enjoys competitive shooters with a one-life-per-round mechanic, decreases the audience size further. You can see where this is going.

Add in the sim-lite elements of the game, the fact its scifi themed, the relative complexity of mechanics compared to other shooters etc the end result is a very Niche titlte with a comparatively small target demographic.