28 replies to this topic

[Mechwarrior Buddah]

I was looking at a game called Pathfinder Online and what happened to it. It sounds kinda familiar actually...

Quote

Early Enrollment will not be a "beta test" in the classic sense. The objective is not to find and fix bugs - although that will be a part of what happens during Early Enrollment. The objective is to begin with a "minimum viable product", and then expand the game in a feedback-driven process.

anyhoo; the last update I saw was

http://massivelyop.c...t-entire-staff/

Quote

Work on the game will continue with the three remaining employees, paid by existing subscription revenue, which will also keep the servers online.

Sucks

[Heffay]

The term minimally viable product is a well known development term used... everywhere. It's part of designing something that will go through a continual improvement process. I know you like to rip on PGI for using it, but I assure you Fortune 10 companies use that term *every single day*.

It's just a way of identifying what are the must have features for release, but it is also given that the product will continue to be developed, features added and the program improved. Mocking the term "MVP" just means you don't know how business is done these days. It's a sign of ignorance on your part, not a problem with the company using it.

[S3dition]

I just gave a game development presentation in which it was used. Minimum viable product is actually a major milestone that most companies shoot for these days. Not just in games, but pretty much all deliverable software.

Still, subscription based MMO's are a bad bet. The last decade is littered with the graves of unfinished and bankrupt projects. Even AAA titles seem to run subscriptions just long enough to recoup some of the money and convert over to microtransactions. All the big subscription based games added a free to play component (eve has plex, WoW has infinite demo, etc). Considering the cost and complexity of even the most basic MMO, you'd have to be insane to back one on kickstarter.

[Kyone Akashi]

Wow, sucks for the employees who were involved in creating this ... as well as the players who invested into it. :/

Say what you will about usage of the MVP term, but 3 people on the payroll does not sound like much will happen to this product past launch. Assuming even one of them is even a programmer/designer, rather than the network engineers you'd have to prioritise when you want to keep the servers running.

[S3dition]

Kyone Akashi, on 10 October 2015 - 10:01 AM, said:

Wow, sucks for the employees who were involved in creating this ... as well as the players who invested into it. :/

Say what you will about usage of the MVP term, but 3 people on the payroll does not sound like much will happen to this product past launch. Assuming even one of them is even a programmer/designer, rather than the network engineers you'd have to prioritise when you want to keep the servers running.

Without a major income injection, the project is dead. No programmer, no matter how good, could possibly keep up with the entire workload of an MMO. One person making all the 3d and 2d assets for the game isn't going to happen either. This thing is a stick in the mud without cash to hire another team.

[Heffay]

S3dition, on 10 October 2015 - 09:52 AM, said:

Still, subscription based MMO's are a bad bet. The last decade is littered with the graves of unfinished and bankrupt projects.

Yup. How many WoW killers have there been in the last decade? How many actually killed WoW? And how many even survived?

[Mechwarrior Buddah]

S3dition, on 10 October 2015 - 09:52 AM, said:

Still, subscription based MMO's are a bad bet.

They had worse, sub, money shop and microtransactions

S3dition, on 10 October 2015 - 09:52 AM, said:

eve has plex,

EVE has had plex for longer than the term microtransaction has existed lol

Heffay, on 10 October 2015 - 03:10 PM, said:

Yup. How many WoW killers have there been in the last decade? How many actually killed WoW? And how many even survived?

WoW barely survived lol are theyu back up to 15 mil subs yet?

[S3dition]

Mechwarrior Buddah, on 11 October 2015 - 06:14 PM, said:

They had worse, sub, money shop and microtransactions



EVE has had plex for longer than the term microtransaction has existed lol



WoW barely survived lol are theyu back up to 15 mil subs yet?

Not sure if you're agreeing or disagreeing with me.

[Lily from animove]

How many standard fanatasy MMO's can the world support?

less than actually exist.

Especially subscription is an issue, too many poor kiddies not able to regulary pay are customers today. For that they occosionally throw a lot money at games when they get some money as presents.

Especially toda,y where too many MMO's end in grind-games they are too time consuming to even play multiple ones properly.

Edited by Lily from animove, 12 October 2015 - 01:31 AM.

[Heffay]

Mechwarrior Buddah, on 11 October 2015 - 06:14 PM, said:

WoW barely survived lol are theyu back up to 15 mil subs yet?

If your definition of the most successful MMO of all time is "barely survived"... yikes.

[Lily from animove]

Heffay, on 12 October 2015 - 04:56 AM, said:

If your definition of the most successful MMO of all time is "barely survived"... yikes.

It's fine, as long as the rest of MMO's are defined as: "clearly comatic and under lifesupport." Because it's just a matter of relation to each other.

[Mechwarrior Buddah]

Lily from animove, on 12 October 2015 - 05:01 AM, said:

It's fine, as long as the rest of MMO's are defined as: "clearly comatic and under lifesupport." Because it's just a matter of relation to each other.

Which is how ppl keep trying to define the one other game thats been around longer than WoW has and has 300,000 subs otherwise known as eve online

Heffay, on 12 October 2015 - 04:56 AM, said:

If your definition of the most successful MMO of all time is "barely survived"... yikes.

Point me to another game that can lose 44% of its customers and be completely fine. Or better yet, one that can even afford to lose 5.6 million players and not fold up shop. I dont care who you are, losing nearly half of your players hurts

http://www.forbes.co...but-thats-okay/

Edited by Mechwarrior Buddah, 12 October 2015 - 05:09 AM.

[Heffay]

Mechwarrior Buddah, on 12 October 2015 - 05:08 AM, said:

Which is how ppl keep trying to define the one other game thats been around longer than WoW has and has 300,000 subs otherwise known as eve online

Point me to another game that can lose 44% of its customers and be completely fine. Or better yet, one that can even afford to lose 5.6 million players and not fold up shop. I dont care who you are, losing nearly half of your players hurts

So EVE with 300,000 subscribers is super fine and everything is awesome, but WoW with over 10 times as many subscribers is on life support?

Like... LITERALLY in the same post you make these claims. Not to mention Blizzard is also running Diablo 3 and Hearthstone at the exact same time. Fold up shop? They are printing money!

Hating for the sake of hate. I never pegged you for a hipster, but I'll have to reevaluate. Apparently "Popular" == failing, and "unpopular" == best ever. Then again, you've been consistently like this for years, hating on success.

Just a quick question... how many fedoras do you own?

[Lily from animove]

Mechwarrior Buddah, on 12 October 2015 - 05:08 AM, said:

Which is how ppl keep trying to define the one other game thats been around longer than WoW has and has 300,000 subs otherwise known as eve online



Point me to another game that can lose 44% of its customers and be completely fine. Or better yet, one that can even afford to lose 5.6 million players and not fold up shop. I dont care who you are, losing nearly half of your players hurts

http://www.forbes.co...but-thats-okay/

depends what it hurts? if those players just generate money you have above your costs it hurts, but is not unhealthy. Only when this loss leads to depths or a loss it truly is hurting the game. other wise it just hurts some profits.
WoW never started to throwing away the money completely which is why they can lose that amount of playes and still "be fine"

running a server keeping a devlopement, that requires a specific crew to do. And so you need a specific amount of players to keep that up. However just adding making more Server for more players is a very variable factor in costs. you can shrink this as well. And when you have a good merging deisgn its not a very time consuming and expensive thing to do.

However when other games can operate and keep alive with 300k subs, why should WoW not with even only 1 million? All a matter of how much you "waste" the income for unnecessary stuff.

And there is a ton of asian grinder MMO's being just plain out copies of eahc others just lookign differently skinned, and yet they all keep alive as well. All those games need is the basic income to feed a few devs and keep some servers running. there are many many smaller MMO's even able to hold their ground. Planeshift, Wurm online. ever heard of them? quite old as well, getting small improvements from time to time.

[Mechwarrior Buddah]

Heffay, on 12 October 2015 - 06:40 AM, said:

So EVE with 300,000 subscribers is super fine and everything is awesome, but WoW with over 10 times as many subscribers is on life support?

A game that routinely has 300k vs a game that lost OVER HALF its subs.

yeah....

Lily from animove, on 12 October 2015 - 06:55 AM, said:

but is not unhealthy.

Losing 5-7 MILLION SUBS isnt unhealthy ROFLMAO

[Lily from animove]

Mechwarrior Buddah, on 12 October 2015 - 08:50 AM, said:

A game that routinely has 300k vs a game that lost OVER HALF its subs.

yeah....



Losing 5-7 MILLION SUBS isnt unhealthy ROFLMAO

yes, you know earning 10million dollar, one year and then only 2 million isn't bad at all, it's just less bad.The money is actually not lost it was just not earned, a GIANT difference.

[S3dition]

Mechwarrior Buddah, on 12 October 2015 - 08:50 AM, said:

A game that routinely has 300k vs a game that lost OVER HALF its subs.

yeah....



Losing 5-7 MILLION SUBS isnt unhealthy ROFLMAO

Well, if they're all accounts that hackers and chinese gold farmers use... Yeah, they are still paying the sub, but the money people are pouring into them to shortcut the normal grind walls would have been going into Blizzard. So, yeah, they might actually be making more money by dumping those accounts.

Keep in mind, they are severely damaging gold farmers, and so they're moving on to newer markets. And yes, there were ridiculous amounts of them. Both legit and accounts they steal from other people and drain.

Either way, "on life support" doesn't apply in this case. 50% of the player base is still WAAAAAAAAAAAAY above their operating costs. Did it hurt their investors? Sure. But it didn't impact the game or the company. Everyone is still getting paid and they have a nice wide margin.

"On life support" suggests they are out of money and having difficulty making payroll. Not a slightly smaller mountain of cash.

[Mechwarrior Buddah]

S3dition, on 12 October 2015 - 10:58 AM, said:

"On life support"

where did that come from anyways? I was just looking. It seems to ber the center of the argument now though

[S3dition]

Mechwarrior Buddah, on 12 October 2015 - 11:02 AM, said:

where did that come from anyways? I was just looking. It seems to ber the center of the argument now though

Well, this:

Mechwarrior Buddah, on 11 October 2015 - 06:14 PM, said:

They had worse, sub, money shop and microtransactions



EVE has had plex for longer than the term microtransaction has existed lol



WoW barely survived lol are theyu back up to 15 mil subs yet?

This lead to this

Lily from animove, on 12 October 2015 - 05:01 AM, said:

It's fine, as long as the rest of MMO's are defined as: "clearly comatic and under lifesupport." Because it's just a matter of relation to each other.

which lead to this

Heffay, on 12 October 2015 - 06:40 AM, said:

So EVE with 300,000 subscribers is super fine and everything is awesome, but WoW with over 10 times as many subscribers is on life support?

Like... LITERALLY in the same post you make these claims. Not to mention Blizzard is also running Diablo 3 and Hearthstone at the exact same time. Fold up shop? They are printing money!

Hating for the sake of hate. I never pegged you for a hipster, but I'll have to reevaluate. Apparently "Popular" == failing, and "unpopular" == best ever. Then again, you've been consistently like this for years, hating on success.

Just a quick question... how many fedoras do you own?

Edited by S3dition, 12 October 2015 - 11:45 AM.

[Mechwarrior Buddah]

Yeah, I dont see how thats being landed at my feet though