41 replies to this topic

[Unclecid]

so far we have the crown jewel which is the closest to canon that i have seen of the 3...MW:O

my concern is will the other 2 take away from the potential playerbase?

with one im not so sure since with it(MW: Tactics) being a Turn-based-strategy title i think there is room.
but not alot of info on it other then it being TBS lance on lance combat.
there is some artwork out for it that i am no too impressed with as some it of just doe not seem right.

then we have a revival in all but name of Mechassualt in a new arcade actiony called Reign of Thunder.
meks are not even recognizable.

i am more concerned with RoT pulling folks away from a proper BT game as it is so consoley.

any thoughts?

[Garth Erlam]

One very interesting economic concept (the name of which, of course, I forget) is that if there are many similar things together, sales of all of them go up. For example, here in Vancouver there was an old furniture place, mostly semi-custom-made chairs, tables, etc. Been around ages. Then one day across the street, an Ikea opens up.

Now obviously your first thought is 'well there goes the smaller store, everyone will just go to Ikea now.' However, because people went to the Ikea across the street they also went to the furniture store, bringing in more and more new faces. Within a few months the business had never been better at the furniture store.

So in this case, no it won't fragment players - in fact I hope it brings in more people to all of these games.

I can tell you right now - steam sales never stop me from gaming

[Omigir]

Never heard of Reign of Thunder

Though I highly doubt that WM:T is going to seriously hurt the community of MW:O. They will most likely share the community rather successfully.. if not MW:O will be more so.

Games like these don't tend to suck the life out of each other... they are too closely related and are both free to play. its like saying SWTOR would kill sales of star wars the force unleashed (if they were in the same time era being released close to each other) that is just an example though.

And to jump off Garth.. its like doubling your advertisement... You hear about MW:T you look it up in google and you see MW:O and your like what is this? XD it works.

Edited by Omigir, 22 February 2012 - 08:47 AM.

[Dihm]

So wait, are we (MWO) IKEA or the old furniture place?

[MaddMaxx]

It may be a blessing in disguise. Tactics seems to be a Continuous TBS setup with funky designs. The Web Page has some Mech with an Atlas mask. (woah! on that) while as you noted, RoT is very fast paced and more Console oriented. Perhaps, depending on Launch times, folks will get a change to try more than one and settle in on a favorite thus providing everyone with what they really prefer.

So MW/BT folks get Online.

TT folk get Tactics and

Consolers can be consoled via RoT.

Converts always have a place to go as well.

P.S. Do not forget the iOS version MW:Tactical Command. Praise be the MW Gods. When they play, it doesn't just Rain. By gummer, it Pours MechWarrior...

Edited by MaddMaxx, 22 February 2012 - 09:00 AM.

[Maris]

RoT is not a serious contender for MWO as the playstyle is definitely different. They are Mech games but are not directly competing with each other.Plus, RoT is not battletech so again, its not pulling the BT audience who wishes for a more authentic BT experience, that's for sure.

MWTactics is a totally different genre, MechCommander is not a threat to the old MechWarrior games and they actually benefit from each other by offering more presence(and options) of the BT universe to the current day masses.

The only one that could seriously compete would be Hawken. The game looks absolutely brilliant. But I think that there's enough room for 2 hot battlemech games, in fact, I don't mind seeing a revival of Heavy Gear/Earthsiege titles as well. The Mech genre has been barren for so long, right now every new title helps the whole genre overall.

Edited by Maris, 22 February 2012 - 08:51 AM.

[Omigir]

So ROT is as much a threat as Hawken ; p

[Frosty Thundertrod]

MW:LL I think would be the only real comption to MW:O since thay will be simmaler games.
MWO will have persistance that MWLL does not but MWLL has clan mech that most people like better

[Kaemon]

Let's clearly define this please -

Kaemon, on 16 February 2012 - 10:37 PM, said:

Let's see if we can get up a proper list of all 'mechy' games coming out this year.

MW:O - Mechwarrior Online (F2P)

MW:LL - Mechwarrior Living Legends (Mod)

MW:T - MechWarrior Tactics (F2P - Unity3 Browser Based)

MW:TC - Mechwarrior Tactical Command (iOS)

MT:SAT - MekTek Solaris Assault Tech (Unity3 engine)

Mechlike games

AC5 - Armored Core 5 (console)

Hawken - Matrix style?

RoT - Reign of Terror (that's an unfortunate abbrev.)

These are all 'mech' based games that are out, or coming out this year.

There's a phenomenon know as 'Oversaturation' that's proven as well, that people play 2 or 3 of these games, say 'all these mech games are the same' and blow off the entire genre.

IMO - This will hurt ALL the games, including MW:O (which of the ones listed above, is the only one I'm currently interested in).

What happened to exclusive rights? Wasn't that thrown around at some point regarding MW:O and an 'online BattleTech game"?

*goes to hunt for post*

*found*
http://www.mektek.ne...r-updates-r1350
'It is to our understanding that Piranha Games Inc. is the exclusive in-home MechWarrior/BattleTech IP rights holder on the PC and console platforms'

Edited by Kaemon, 22 February 2012 - 09:04 AM.

[Omigir]

Exclusive rights to Mechwarrior tittle? Hmm.. technically its debatable since MW:T and the IOS game are both strategy games. Hell the IOS game is for the iPAD for crying out loud lol. the other games.. ROT, hawken and AC5 are mech games, true, but they all fall in line more along the lines of Mechassault. If any one has seen mechassault they would recognize it in hawken immediately by the way the mech flip their hips back and forth quickly when strafing. its seen in the ROT official announcement trailer

[Curon Hifor]

Man, I'm excited for MW:O, but I will likely get into MW:T as well (big tabletop fan, so even if its a little like the tabletop, I'll be ecstatic about it). I don't own an iPhone, though MechWarrior Tactical Command might very well prompt me to get one!

[Demi-Precentor Konev]

Garth is correct. This isn't mere coincidence, the MechWarrior ball got rolling and now stuff is coming out of the woodwork.

Expect Catalyst to capitalize on this as well.

[CoffiNail]

Maybe we will get mini's in production that are comparable to quality to the Hellbringer and Summoner in the 25th anni box set.

[Adridos]

Dihm, on 22 February 2012 - 08:46 AM, said:

So wait, are we (MWO) IKEA or the old furniture place?

Furniture place. You can not try things out before buying in MW:O.

[Unclecid]

to be honest im as excited about a mechcommander-like game (MW Tactics) as i am about MW Online.

i just hope these other mecha games that are not in the BT Universe do not take away from those that are.

but i think being f2p will give tham a edge over those that are p2p as long as quality is up to snuff.

[Exilyth]

Adridos, on 22 February 2012 - 10:36 AM, said:

Furniture place. You can not try things out before buying in MW:O.

That and if we were ikea we'd have to assemble the game ourselves... by hand!


Also, the question shouldn't be if there's enough room for more games...
the question should be: Do you have enough time to play them all?

Personally, I've got no mobile device and no modern console, so I'll skip the titles that need thoose.

Edited by Exilyth, 22 February 2012 - 10:58 AM.

[spicy cho]

The gameplay video for Hawken was really impressive I must admit. Though I hear they only have one or two programmers working on the game right now. I think the fight will be between MW:O and that. Their beta signup was pretty crafty as well, requiring you to refer 3 people to reserve your handle.

[Nik Van Rhijn]

Will definately play Tactics as a rest from MWO. Not interested in M'insult and I don't have "i" anything. Hawken isn't BT, might try it tho'.

[Tsen Shang]

Garth Erlam, on 22 February 2012 - 08:44 AM, said:

One very interesting economic concept (the name of which, of course, I forget) is that if there are many similar things together, sales of all of them go up. For example, here in Vancouver there was an old furniture place, mostly semi-custom-made chairs, tables, etc. Been around ages. Then one day across the street, an Ikea opens up.

Now obviously your first thought is 'well there goes the smaller store, everyone will just go to Ikea now.' However, because people went to the Ikea across the street they also went to the furniture store, bringing in more and more new faces. Within a few months the business had never been better at the furniture store.

So in this case, no it won't fragment players - in fact I hope it brings in more people to all of these games.

I can tell you right now - steam sales never stop me from gaming

What you have here is competition. People go to Ikea because Ikea is a well known brand name, even if they don't want to buy anything. Once they arrive, they look around, decide they want to buy something and check to see if maybe the furniture store across the street has anything they want, too. The online equivalent of this is Steam and Gamersgate. Steam offers online games at discount prices, so everyone signs up, and then Gamersgate does the same thing, and sometimes one is cheaper than the other, but people spend more money alternating than they would otherwise because prices are lowered by competition.

How that translates is that you essentially have two Battletech games competing against each other.

This model doesn't work with time. There is a finite amount of time in the day, and considering the games are free to play, time is what people are 'paying' to play. One heavy time investment is all most people have. College kids and highschoolers (Timers) have more time, but they also don't have nearly as large a disposable income as people with jobs who are earning money (Spenders), so you'll have a large amount of people playing both games and spending no money, and a large amount of people who have lots of money, but time for only one.

The second part of this is willingness to spend. If there are ways to advance a character that don't involve time (see end of post), Spenders will usually pay money to catch up to their friends that might have more time. If there are ways to do that in both games, they MIGHT spend heavily in both games to keep abreast with friends, but will more likely choose to heavily invest in one game only. Timers will spend unbelievable amounts of time in both games and get everything for free, or earn everything. This allows them to save money for beer and chips. They may spend a little from time to time, but will more likely than not save their money.

The third part of this is game type. One is a strategy, one is a simulator/tactical FPS. This will absolutely split the crowd that plays these games of the people who don't know about Battletech or Mechwarrior based solely on gametype. This should mean that both games have steady amounts of new people playing them, and some crossover based on Battletech (if I enjoy one Battletech game, I may enjoy another). The old/familiar crowd will probably attempt to play both at the same time, which may lead to more spending on their part.

If there are no ways to essentially buy time, most Spenders will pick one, and ignore the other once they figure out which one they like more. This is bad for both games.

So the real question is, can we buy time?

[Caballo]

I don't think it's bad that there are a lot of mech games on the way from some point of view. More games on the same theme will mean more diversity, so if a potential customer doesn't like one of them, can get another one which gets closer to his likes, until he finds what suits him well. That can only lead to a growth of the fan base.

Anyway, as we don't know the main component of all those games (simulation, arcade, etc) we can only speculate about the differences between them yet. BTW, there are differences between genres and their customers: Arcade games tend to have more people moving in and out, while sims use to have a smaller, but more loyal to the game community, so strategic games. I guess the numbers in the long run will depend on what kind of community the developers/publishers target to.

Edited by Caballo, 22 February 2012 - 01:35 PM.