I really hate people who can"t spell a simple word like "what" correctly. Really, I do.findar said:
Green Monster Games - Curt Schilling
- Thread starter Lord Thanos_foh
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Back in the "EQ days" you had at most 400-500k tops playing. So, yeah, you remember names better since it was a smaller playerbase.Frax said:
Just listened to it, pretty good stuff. Not really much info about the game, but a good overview of your opinions of the MMO genre and business.Ngruk said:
You guys should start a 38 Studios podcast, that would be awesome.
I enjoyed the podcast too, especially the story about how Curt got the guy "killed" 3 times or whatever, talking about EQ and confusing the hell out of the media folks. I"d like to have seen that article, haha.Lonin said:
Can"t wait till we start getting some more info on what the IP is going to be like. I pray it"s generic DnD high fantasy. Yeah, that"s what I said.
Naturally EQ was far, far more competition-based because it was a game where you could actually deny content to other players.Frax said:
I"m seeing the microcosm of this on my little sandbox server in WoW right now. We are the only guild doing much progression and while we are months (weeks?) behind the best of the best, we are still in sunwell and finishing off Brute now. The closest is on Council and the next behind that has killed, erm, Rage? For ~6 months, we were the only ones to kill DLK and DL. We did it for that long because we are assholes and because we had a lot of alts. Eventually we got bored though and once a guild or two had killed them some, we ignored them entirely.
Now though, we go and pop DLK and Doomie twice a week for cash. Nope, nothing fancy, we also sell gems and patterns and the usual crap but since we are nearby or often have a little time at the end of a raid, we kill em and sell the BoEs (and enjoy the 20g a head too I guess). That makes the other guilds so very, very angry but hey, given incentive, we"ll do what works for us.
High fantasy is nice, but the market is excessively oversaturated by it. 90% of everything currently available is high fantasy in one form or another. Its at a point where its stagnating the market completely. Its also most likely that 90% of future games will be high fantasy as well, thus making it extremely unlikely that you"ll see anything "new". Primarily because its "safest" to add into the high fantasy mix and garner what you can from a niche, rather than try anything new and different.Grave said:
I seriously doubt we"re going to see anything of extreme interest after this next round of games hits the market. Unless Blizzard decides to proceed with a StarCraft mmo, I find it highly unlikely we"ll see anything take the genre by storm like WoW did. WoW is a whale in a sea of goldfish. Much the same as EQ was 10 years ago, but on a much grander scale.
If this IP is destined for "generic DnD high fantasy", or even a derivative of that, its destined to be a niche before it even comes to fruition.
You say that, but hasn"t the market proven otherwise countless times? The games that are not fantasy are the ones that end up niche (along with the poorly made fantasy games, that is). Curt has already stated that he intends to be able to compete with WoW, and if they make the right design decisions, they will. Being fantasy will actually HELP them do this, not hinder them.Rayne said:
While many may claim to be tired of it, I still hold that fantasy is the way to go. It"s simply the core of where these games come from in the first place, and it works the best. Within the realm of fantasy, DnD style worlds are simply my personal favorite. So while "generic" may normally be a derogative term, in this case I use it favorably.
I hope they don"t get carried away with new races and stuff, like Vanguard with all the furries (and making Wood Elves essentially asian in culture, lol?). I"d rather just see the basic DnD/EQ races with their own background and lore they come up with, although without straying too far from what that race IS, and always has been.
It was 90% when WOW was released. It was also loaded with EQ clones, of which WOW was one, and seemed to do ok.Rayne said:
MMO + high fantasy = safer bet. I"m not even sure if there is a mainstream market for anything but high fantasy MMOs at this point in time.
it doesn"t matter the genre, just if the game is fun and has good hooks.
He"s already said it"s going to be fantasy, whether high or low, or somewhere in between hasn"t been mentioned as far as I know. I"d love to see low or mid fantasy (Song of Ice and Fire, Malazan Book of the Fallen), but I have a feeling it will be high, which is fine with me.
If I was in a position to invest money on a new MMORPG title (which I"m not), there is no way in hell I would sign off on anything other than high fantasy. It provides the most avenues for a development house to craft an entertaining game.
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This is the reason why EQ had a community while WoW does not. If people have to rely on each other, either to share the content or to deal with antisocial behavior, they will form an alliance of some sort.Northerner said:
High fantasy is "the way to go" because no other area has yet been as over-developed to throw it off its throne. WoW took most of the best aspects (if not nearly all) of high fantasy, and wrapped them into the single most highly replayable, easy to access game ever released. Sure, yet another high fantasy game could do well in the market. But if anyone thinks there will ever be another phenomena the magnitude of WoW, especially in the high fantasy sector, they"re only kidding themselves. Ask Sigil. Completely new IP, yet never really amounted to much. Warhammer? LOL..... we"ll see. I"m betting most will see it as a WoW clone, and it"ll be lucky to see 10% of WoW"s market share. Ask Turbine. LotRO is doing well, but hardly the "WoW killer" so many predicted it would be. FunCom has a good shot if they can get things together with AoC. I think they"ll do well once they get it together, because its more a "historical" angle than fantasy. But I still have my reservations.
This is supposed to be a "new" IP. Just how many ways can you tell the story of orcs, dwarves, elves and dragons, etc....? The market is hemorraging variations from every orifice. Yeah, you can try and tell a story a "different way", but when it revolves around magic and mystical creatures and beings, its not much more than more of the same, in a shiney new package. Which is why I brought up StarCraft. While certainly not a new IP by any means, as an mmo it has the highest potential for high-end success of anything in current discussion.
Did I mention I was sick of high fantasy? LOL
Seriously though, if thier mind is made up that this is destined to be another high fantasy IP, then i"ll wish 38 Studios the best of luck, but also suggest they not elevate expectation too far. WoW is a tough nut to crack. Constantly pushing the bar upward. And if Blizzard puts a StarCraft mmo in the gamespace, its pretty much a given they"ll dominate the market near completely, and simply dwarf (no pun intended ) everything else.
This is supposed to be a "new" IP. Just how many ways can you tell the story of orcs, dwarves, elves and dragons, etc....? The market is hemorraging variations from every orifice. Yeah, you can try and tell a story a "different way", but when it revolves around magic and mystical creatures and beings, its not much more than more of the same, in a shiney new package. Which is why I brought up StarCraft. While certainly not a new IP by any means, as an mmo it has the highest potential for high-end success of anything in current discussion.
Did I mention I was sick of high fantasy? LOL
Seriously though, if thier mind is made up that this is destined to be another high fantasy IP, then i"ll wish 38 Studios the best of luck, but also suggest they not elevate expectation too far. WoW is a tough nut to crack. Constantly pushing the bar upward. And if Blizzard puts a StarCraft mmo in the gamespace, its pretty much a given they"ll dominate the market near completely, and simply dwarf (no pun intended ) everything else.
High fantasy will rule the roost until World of Starcraft shows what a well polished Sci-Fi MMO "done right" can really do.
I think I know the guy. We actually exchanged a few tells when Raging Fury was first at something and he was monitoring our progress. Must have been during GoD if I remember correctly.Punko said:
Anyways, he seemed to be one of the cool devs, so even though EQ is way over the hill, it"s still a big loss for SoE.
Pancreas
Vyemm Raider
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Personally.. (right there you know this post is not going to be very enlightening)
I wouldn"t mind seeing a low?-fantasy setting. Fewer mythical beasts and magic and more political, kingdom versus kingdom style conflicts.
I think a game like this would do well to avoid the loot centric drive most high fantasy relies on and instead place emphasis on a players skill sets and reputation/ranks. Those elements would make it mimic EVE in a way.
Actually if the game were to include magic I would like to see it be treated with hostility by some factions. Have some big overzealous inquisition that has been persecuting magic users and driven them to the fringe of society or the deep wilds.
I mean you could have lots of factions with different attitudes towards the use of magic. However, I think an overall oppressive tone would make things a lot more interesting. People would have to decide if it"s worth it to reveal they are a magic user in any given situation or to just play it normally.
Bleh lots of possible variations on fantasy that have not been touched.
I think no matter what setting the next great MMO finds itself in, it will have to do one thing no MMO to date has managed... bring NPC"s out of the dark ages and turn them into something more than simply million hit point punching bags.
I wouldn"t mind seeing a low?-fantasy setting. Fewer mythical beasts and magic and more political, kingdom versus kingdom style conflicts.
I think a game like this would do well to avoid the loot centric drive most high fantasy relies on and instead place emphasis on a players skill sets and reputation/ranks. Those elements would make it mimic EVE in a way.
Actually if the game were to include magic I would like to see it be treated with hostility by some factions. Have some big overzealous inquisition that has been persecuting magic users and driven them to the fringe of society or the deep wilds.
I mean you could have lots of factions with different attitudes towards the use of magic. However, I think an overall oppressive tone would make things a lot more interesting. People would have to decide if it"s worth it to reveal they are a magic user in any given situation or to just play it normally.
Bleh lots of possible variations on fantasy that have not been touched.
I think no matter what setting the next great MMO finds itself in, it will have to do one thing no MMO to date has managed... bring NPC"s out of the dark ages and turn them into something more than simply million hit point punching bags.
Unfortunately, its just too hard to avoid the magic aspect to counter damage in high fantasy. Because realism can"t work in a game. You can"t have players getting slashed with a sword, running away, and waiting 10 weeks to heal up, repair thier armor, and eventually come back to finish the mob off. Sci-fi deals with this in a much more sensible manner without the use of "magic". As you mentioned, take Eve or even AO for instance. Damage is countered with highly futuristic styled technology. Push that envelope too far in a fantasy game, and you tread into steampunk. That kind of technology in a fantasy game wouldn"t make any real sense.Pancreas said:
Ideas like restricting magic and such sound good on paper, and you"re right it would add an interesting little facet to the world. However, at the end of the day you have to ask yourself "is this fun?" and I think most people would agree that having their magic (one of the defining points of fantasy) limited is not in the best interest of fun gameplay.