Rift: Planes of Telara

He's very right, and he has all the metrics he wants to prove it. The average.. AVERAGE person doesn't play very long or is looking to play a game for 6 months straight. The people on these forums might, or forum warriors other places are, but not the average gamer people are trying to attract.

Rift had a lot of content out of the gate, and a ton of raid content soon after release. It wasn't lack of content at all honestly, there were other issues with the game imo.

The only metrics he has are based on a 14 year old game, a 10 year old game, and a game that wasn't well received. From his perspective, yes, he is right. But just because he can't make a game that the average person want's to play for more then a month does not mean there aren't average gamer out there looking for a solid game full of content that they can spend the next year playing. The game has to be good, and it has to be better than what people are currently playing for them to make the switch. That has not happened yet. Every. Single. Game. that has come out in the last 9 years has been a shittier version of wow. So yes, he is 100% right if he can't look past the obvious.

You can be the hardest core gamer ever and not spend more then a month playing a shitty game. Does this mean no one wants to or has the time to spend more then a month playing the same game? No. It was a shitty game.

I mean, I agree that there will be a major paradigm shift in the next 5 years in regards to mmos, but this doesn't mean developers should stop making games that have the content or the game play to support more than a month of playing.

Draegan_sl said:

He's very right, and he has all the metrics he wants to prove it. The average.. AVERAGE person doesn't play very long or is looking to play a game for 6 months straight. The people on these forums might, or forum warriors other places are, but not the average gamer people are trying to attract.

Rift had a lot of content out of the gate, and a ton of raid content soon after release. It wasn't lack of content at all honestly, there were other issues with the game imo.

Click to expand...

I don't know, for the non-raiding type I found there to be a lack of noteworthy content. The initial faction restrictions made the idea of starting a new character sound terrible, too. Starting the same treadmill of zone a to zone b to zone c didn't sound like a fun time (not even race exclusive starting points), even if I branched off and fought off rifts (this was before the instant adventure stuff). I always felt like the scale in Rift sucked, too.

I don't want to bash it too much or anything because of all the recent MMOs, it's the only one I stuck it out with long enough to cap -- shit like TOR got stale before I hit level 20. Hell, I even go back from time to time and I've considered picking up Storm Legion.

Toxxulian_sl said:

The only metrics he has are based on a 14 year old game, a 10 year old game, and a game that wasn't well received. From his perspective, yes, he is right. But just because he can't make a game that the average person want's to play for more then a month does not mean there aren't average gamer out there looking for a solid game full of content that they can spend the next year playing. The game has to be good, and it has to be better than what people are currently playing for them to make the switch. That has not happened yet. Every. Single. Game. that has come out in the last 9 years has been a shittier version of wow. So yes, he is 100% right if he can't look past the obvious.

You can be the hardest core gamer ever and not spend more then a month playing a shitty game. Does this mean no one wants to or has the time to spend more then a month playing the same game? No. It was a shitty game.

I mean, I agree that there will be a major paradigm shift in the next 5 years in regards to mmos, but this doesn't mean developers should stop making games that have the content or the game play to support more than a month of playing.

Click to expand...

It's easier for him to say what he said than to admit he may of made some bad design decisions. Rift just didn't have much player attachment. It felt small and redundant and the treadmill was boring. Run the same t1's or T2's or do dailies. The class system ended up coming up short as people were pretty much forced into the same few souls to run group zones. It's been a long time since I played tho but they were my impressions by the time I quit.

I would of been happier if they skipped PvP, made a larger world and more Dynamic content. Outdoor group zones, yada, yada, yada. They typical hipster stuff..

He's right from my perspective as well.

I played EQ for.. I forget, years. I played daoc for about 2 years, a little over. Rift for a little over a year. Most of the other mmo's for less than a year.

The longest i've played one single game was CoH. Beta till the day it closed. But that wasn't continuous. It was 2-3 months on, 3-6 months off.

The causes of it vary from game to game, but the trend is that he really is right about that.

Don't you think the trend is a result of the type of games being made? That's the connection I make. I could be wrong of course but it seems like nobody considers the possibility.

Convo_sl said:

Don't you think the trend is a result of the type of games being made? That's the connection I make. I could be wrong of course but it seems like nobody considers the possibility.

Click to expand...

I've played the same DIKU-EQ/WOW/Insert-clone-here game for well over a decade now. A new mmo comes out like Rift (which I thought was well made and run), and well, it's the same damn game I've been playing for over a decade now. How is a new MMO supposed to hold my interest when its not really a new game, but the same old one in a not-very-fresh new IP/Skin?

Iannis_sl said:

He's right from my perspective as well.

I played EQ for.. I forget, years. I played daoc for about 2 years, a little over. Rift for a little over a year. Most of the other mmo's for less than a year.

The longest i've played one single game was CoH. Beta till the day it closed. But that wasn't continuous. It was 2-3 months on, 3-6 months off.

The causes of it vary from game to game, but the trend is that he really is right about that.

Click to expand...

If the game is good and engaging, people will play. If the game is bad and stale, people leave after the initial month. Seems pretty cut and dry to me. Hartsman has EQ2 and Rift to his credit which isnt saying much at all. Rift was bland and boring and was able to capitalize on people getting burnt out of WoW and looking for something else to play, and for that reason only did it have any sort of following. EQ2 had a following based off of EQ1s fan base and did nothing but lower the bar on pretty much every level except player housing.

If the developers starting making games that you couldnt hit max cap in less than a week and your left with only running randoms and the same damn 2 dungeons or something for tokens then people would play longer. I played Everquest / FF11 / WoW all for years and still never saw all the content and always had that carrot dangling in front of me to keep me engaged. There is nothing engaging in current MMOs that even want me to log in.

The developers are the problem, not the fanbase.

I think Trion should be the standard on how a team runs a game. That team was awesome. I just think they came up short..maybe thought the dynamic content and class system was enough to put the new stamp on the game?

Tide27_sl said:

If the game is good and engaging, people will play. If the game is bad and stale, people leave after the initial month. Seems pretty cut and dry to me. Hartsman has EQ2 and Rift to his credit which isnt saying much at all. Rift was bland and boring and was able to capitalize on people getting burnt out of WoW and looking for something else to play, and for that reason only did it have any sort of following. EQ2 had a following based off of EQ1s fan base and did nothing but lower the bar on pretty much every level except player housing.

If the developers starting making games that you couldnt hit max cap in less than a week and your left with only running randoms and the same damn 2 dungeons or something for tokens then people would play longer. I played Everquest / FF11 / WoW all for years and still never saw all the content and always had that carrot dangling in front of me to keep me engaged. There is nothing engaging in current MMOs that even want me to log in.

The developers are the problem, not the fanbase.

Click to expand...

The problem here is that it seems like you're basically saying, "If they make a game that people want to play for five years, then people will play it for five years!".

I mean, sure. I guess. You're not wrong. It's just that's not the issue.

He's making observations. The observation is those games are not getting made and the fanbase is not buying the way investors maybe think, or hope, they should be. It ain't personal, man.

I do think Rift and EQ2 are a bigger accomplishment than you give him credit for though. He managed to pull EQ2 out of the shitter briefly. That's a pretty big deal. And with Rift... compare it to any of the other mmo sub based projects in the past 10 years. I really think you could only claim Eve and Wow to be more successful. Eve is maybe, depends on how you count. He may not make the games you want, exactly, but I mean shit -- there's no denying that the man has proven his merit. He's one of the few guys that can actually deliver a project. Every bloated flop or over hyped turd makes him look better. There have been more of those than not in the past 10 years.

I mean seriously. Go down the list for the past 10 years. Hartsman stands out.

Convo_sl said:

I think Trion should be the standard on how a team runs a game. That team was awesome. I just think they came up short..maybe thought the dynamic content and class system was enough to put the new stamp on the game?

Click to expand...

What happened was they designed and marketed the game towards the burnt out WoW player, but didn't put enough things in to make it stand apart from WoW, at least enough to not burn out those players for the same reasons they were burned out in WoW. Player attachment is the absolute truth, there was nothing in Rift that allowed you to actually get attached to the game beyond grind.

I agree with some of the others here, if you make a game compelling andoriginalin all aspects, people will come and play for long periods of time, regardless of the subscription model. A game like Eve is a perfect example of this. They came out with a headline that they have 500k subs, that's pretty significant. There are tons of reasons why, compelling and original being at the top.

Tide27_sl said:

If the game is good and engaging, people will play. If the game is bad and stale, people leave after the initial month. Seems pretty cut and dry to me. Hartsman has EQ2 and Rift to his credit which isnt saying much at all. Rift was bland and boring and was able to capitalize on people getting burnt out of WoW and looking for something else to play, and for that reason only did it have any sort of following. EQ2 had a following based off of EQ1s fan base and did nothing but lower the bar on pretty much every level except player housing.

If the developers starting making games that you couldnt hit max cap in less than a week and your left with only running randoms and the same damn 2 dungeons or something for tokens then people would play longer. I played Everquest / FF11 / WoW all for years and still never saw all the content and always had that carrot dangling in front of me to keep me engaged. There is nothing engaging in current MMOs that even want me to log in.

The developers are the problem, not the fanbase.

Click to expand...

I kind of agree with that, and would also add that developers are completely ignoring the community development aspect of their games.
For instance, how come I spent so muchtime playing SWG pre-NGE although I believe we can agree that most recent MMO have way more content than SWG pre-NGE ? Because I felt that I wasn't playing another half-assed solo game requiring constant internet connection with people around being nothing better than NPC with improved AI, or chat/market flipping bots.

In the end, what I've never been able to wrap my head around is that current developers want to make MMO mainstream/newbie friendly in order to expand the player base by reaching new customers. But at the same time do not provide the tools/incentive to build a strong community, which is critical to keep people playing, only relying on established guild which are moving from one game to another to create a sense of community.
I mean, who the fuck is sane enough in their mind to admit that a strong community is mandatory to keep their MMO healthy but at the same time mainly relies on communities/guilds having been built through previous/competitors games ?

There wasn't enough Rift in Rift in the end. I don't think their servers could actually handle what they really wanted to do.

Fogia_sl said:

I kind of agree with that, and would also add that developers are completely ignoring the community development aspect of their games.
For instance, how come I spent so muchtime playing SWG pre-NGE although I believe we can agree that most recent MMO have way more content than SWG pre-NGE ? Because I felt that I wasn't playing another half-assed solo game requiring constant internet connection with people around being nothing better than NPC with improved AI, or chat/market flipping bots.

In the end, what I've never been able to wrap my head around is that current developers want to make MMO mainstream/newbie friendly in order to expand the player base by reaching new customers. But at the same time do not provide the tools/incentive to build a strong community, which is critical to keep people playing, only relying on established guild which are moving from one game to another to create a sense of community.
I mean, who the fuck is sane enough in their mind to admit that a strong community is mandatory to keep their MMO healthy but at the same time mainly relies on communities/guilds having been built through previous/competitors games ?

Click to expand...

Good points.

Developers have a complete and utter lack of imagination, talent, and willpower when it comes to adding any social gameplay elements to their MMO's. There is a focus on bland and uninspired combat as the core gameplay mechanic and anything else is crumbs. This is despite the fact that, taking WoW for instance, my anecdotal evidence is that the majority of players consider combat as a secondary gameplay mechanic. Most don't care about the latest raid or dungeons; they're off doing old content for transmogs and mounts, hanging around with their friends; and essentially treating the client as a glorified 3D chatroom.

An MMO doesn't need to be Secondlife or anything to have solid social elements, but one look at what players do with the scraps they are given (goldshire, etc) should give developers a clue. But the industry being so full of rehashed failures as UT has often illustrated I wouldn't expect much.

Draegan_sl said:

There wasn't enough Rift in Rift in the end. I don't think their servers could actually handle what they really wanted to do.

Click to expand...

I had a brief conversation in early beta with the developer who wrote most of the 'Dynamic Server' technology. He left (was possibly forced out) right before launch. He was so disappointed in how the technology was underutilized. According to him, Trion's dynamic server technology is capable of much more than just Rift's, invasions, and wandering salesmen, but the designers threw out all of the truly innovative dynamic ideas as being too difficult to implement or not appealing to the masses.

He also mentioned that the tech was very efficient; that the backend of beta could essentially run on a laptop. I don't know if that's true or not; I'm just sharing what I was told. But there was obviously a roadblock put up somewhere along the way where the vision of the game was changed and 'dumbed down' if you will. Likely it happened when Hartsman took over the reigns. Maybe they figured it was the only way to successfully ship the product on time and on budget, who knows.

Draegan_sl said:

There wasn't enough Rift in Rift in the end. I don't think their servers could actually handle what they really wanted to do.

Click to expand...

The actual "rifts" were plain boring. Run to a cloud and stand in the center and AE....AE more....keep AEing...more mobs spawn...more AEing...ad nasuem. No rhyme or reason to it other than to just do it. It was actually a huge step back from Warhammers public quests that at least saw some sort of progression instead of just spawning X number or random mobs.

And if Im looking at the data correctly, both EQ2 and Rift had nice launch numbers, and have done nothing but rocket downhill from there. It goes to show you that there is interest in something different, but the developers keep releasing the same game over and over and over. Hell, look at 38s game that they thought would revolutionize the genre and its EXACTLY like WoW with worse graphics. Everything from the UI to the map placement, to the icons etc are exactly the same.

If devs would stop releasing garbage and blaming everyone else, then we could move forward. The fact that the same devs move from studio to studio from failed release to failed release is telling in my eyes.

People like the Swtor devs that move from studio to studio and have failed at everything thus far, Moorgard which has done the eq2 / vanguard / 38 etc . Hartsman which has Eq2 and Rift....

These people need to leave the industry already and let new people step up to the plate...or at the very least do something else in the industry.

When the only work history people have is failed product after failed product, then its time to look at them as the problem, not part of the solution.

Got to 60 yesterday. Now i realize how gay it is to gear up at 60. Only expert marks are the 4 from the daily? super gay. want to upgrade your infinity stone gear? need a billion stones.

Here is what I remember from rift.

Head start opened, many in the guild were max level inside of the weekend (Friday, Sat Sunday). We raided, Greenscale? was it called? I don't remember, and got a few bosses in. Got some loot. I remember there being an issue with getting further but I don't recall what it was because in the end it really didn't mean anything to me.

All of this was inside head start.

So what was left? Grinding some dailys for some accessories that were marginally better. Some world events for more faction? PvP was pathetic.

Umm yeah. No thanks. Rift was cool it just was MMO lite. Sad because they churned out some nice content after that it was just shallow as hell getting there.

What I do know is that if your game can be beaten inside of a week then don't expect people to stick around.

ThunderCougarFalconBird_sl said:

I had a brief conversation in early beta with the developer who wrote most of the 'Dynamic Server' technology. He left (was possibly forced out) right before launch. He was so disappointed in how the technology was underutilized. According to him, Trion's dynamic server technology is capable of much more than just Rift's, invasions, and wandering salesmen, but the designers threw out all of the truly innovative dynamic ideas as being too difficult to implement or not appealing to the masses.

He also mentioned that the tech was very efficient; that the backend of beta could essentially run on a laptop. I don't know if that's true or not; I'm just sharing what I was told. But there was obviously a roadblock put up somewhere along the way where the vision of the game was changed and 'dumbed down' if you will. Likely it happened when Hartsman took over the reigns. Maybe they figured it was the only way to successfully ship the product on time and on budget, who knows.

Click to expand...

From what I heard, they changed around when Hartsman came on board. Things I know the game was shooting for when the game was Heroes of Telara, or at least this is what I've heard and pieced together from different sources. This isn't gospel.:
1. There were no factions at all.
2. There were no classes. Essentially everyone could use any soul. Souls were "looted" items that you gained as you adventured. Kind of like a card collection game.
3. Dynamic content was essentially shit would take over zones, build cities and destroy environments. "rifts" would really fight each other. There was some crazy shit they could do.

What they ripped out:
1. Added factions, because, and I quote since I was at the press meeting, "People like factions and recognize them."
2. Took out real dynamic content because, and I quote since I was at the press meeting, "When someone told a friend some awesome happened 'over there,' and that friend logged on it was gone made for a disappointing game session."

They essentially took an interesting design doc and made it WOW with scripted rift events.

Sad.

Kedwyn_sl said:

Here is what I remember from rift.

Head start opened, many in the guild were max level inside of the weekend (Friday, Sat Sunday). We raided, Greenscale? was it called? I don't remember, and got a few bosses in. Got some loot. I remember there being an issue with getting further but I don't recall what it was because in the end it really didn't mean anything to me.

All of this was inside head start.

So what was left? Grinding some dailys for some accessories that were marginally better. Some world events for more faction? PvP was pathetic.

Umm yeah. No thanks. Rift was cool it just was MMO lite. Sad because they churned out some nice content after that it was just shallow as hell getting there.

What I do know is that if your game can be beaten inside of a week then don't expect people to stick around.

Click to expand...

Well to be fair, that described almost every WOW expansion that didn't have keys or artificially gated content.