The Elder Scrolls Online
- Thread starter Anomander Rake
- Start date
moontayle
Golden Squire
- 4,302
- 165
It can certainly not be a megaserver tech issue and still be related to the fact that they're throwing everyone on a single server. What they have is a volume problem. The more people that run through an area, the more likely a quest will reach a point where it breaks. The challenge they have is determining what the breakpoint is. 10 people? 100 people? 1000 people? Something that could be determined with... a more traditional open beta test. Oh wait...
Why in the world did they NOT fix this before they did a final huge weekend beta? I'd love to know the reasoning behind presenting such a shitty buggy experience to people they want to spend money on their game?
I could understand if we were a few months from release, versus two weeks. It's like serving me raw samples and asking me to come back to your restaurant because your oven had a problem. It doesn't work that way.
I'll just leave this here. Funny how they caved to the uproar about a more TES ui but it will end up way worse than the complainers ever imagined, and yes I know you don't have to use them but everyone wants to keep up with the Joneses.
http://massively.joystiq.com/2014/03...online-addons/
http://massively.joystiq.com/2014/03...online-addons/
Byr
Ahn'Qiraj Raider
- 3,666
- 4,960
this is the current state of mmo design. Have something limited and get your players to create as much as possible for free. See Wildstar inviting modders to their offices so they start making addons, EQ Landmark, etc.
I've read most of this thread and find most of it absolutely hilarious. Utnayan has been particularly humorous. Throwing out tons of predictions disguised as insider's knowledge. He has been wrong on a few of them and right on some of the broader ones. Still the humorous aspect is his dedication and his rants. They are comedy gold at times.
I have found that listening to my gut instinct while playing has served me well. The one time I did not do that was Warhammer Online. I was in early beta and saw all the problems but I convinced myself that they were not really problems because, damnit, this was a Warhammer game made by Mythic and, thus,hadto be good.
I have not done that since. I play the beta and, at the end, I ask myself a single questions; did I have fun? That's all I care about because, in the end, that is all that matters, isn't it?
After playing the ESO beta, I can sincerely say that Ididhave fun. Lot's of it, in fact. That doesn't mean that the game is perfect. There is tons of room for improvement. There are too many bugs, there are still things that need to be cleaned up in the starting area (whoever decided to take away weapon choice in the new tutorial area should be severely beaten), server issues need to be fixed and I would like some details soon about the Adventure Zones.
With all that being said, I had a lot of fun in the beta. Frustrating at times but I had fun. Not just in PvP either, although I had a whole lot of fun there, but in PvE as well. The PvE is not revolutionary, by any means, but it doesn't need to be. It was fun for me. I enjoyed the volcano area and its last boss, Balreth, was fairly challenging. The game gets off to a slow start but picks up nicely in later levels. I enjoyed the instances and I enjoyed the quests (when they worked) more than I do your typical WoW quests. I think my enjoyment on the quests was predicated on the fact that it is somewhat like WoW but disguised a bit. There are fewer quests but the quests were longer, whereas in WoW there are tons of quests but they all seem shorter. It was nice to not walk up to an area and see 18 people with exclamation marks above their head. I realize that its not a complete departure from the hub quest style but it was different enough for me.
I also realize that the combat is not a pure action combat system and that is another thing I am okay with. I have been getting burned out on WoW style combat and this wasjustdifferent enough to not be a drag. The animations of some abilities were meh but, overall, I liked it. Adding collision helped the feel of combat tremendously for me although, again, I did not have a huge problem with it to begin with.
The PvP, however, really shone. Having been a player of DAoC, it was the closest to the feel of DAoC I have yet seen. GW2 was a valiant effort but just didn't get there. ESO comes closer. It ran pretty flawlessly through most of my time, even with a ton of players on screen. There were some lag issues some nights but not as bad as I got hit with in GW2. The couple of nights where they were having major server hiccups were unplayable but those were not often or at least not when I was on.
What can I say? I had fun. I like the class system. I enjoy the combat for the most part. After leveling awhile, the quests were pretty good. The dungeon I did was a lot of fun. The PvP was pretty close to fantastic for most of my nights.
I only ask of a game that I have fun. It I do, its worth the money. I am not looking for a perfect experience, I don't need a revolutionary game nor even an innovative one, I don't care if Paul Sage and Matt Firor are the "scourge of the industry" as Utnayan says they are. I just want to have fun and I did. Pretty simple really.
I have found that listening to my gut instinct while playing has served me well. The one time I did not do that was Warhammer Online. I was in early beta and saw all the problems but I convinced myself that they were not really problems because, damnit, this was a Warhammer game made by Mythic and, thus,hadto be good.
I have not done that since. I play the beta and, at the end, I ask myself a single questions; did I have fun? That's all I care about because, in the end, that is all that matters, isn't it?
After playing the ESO beta, I can sincerely say that Ididhave fun. Lot's of it, in fact. That doesn't mean that the game is perfect. There is tons of room for improvement. There are too many bugs, there are still things that need to be cleaned up in the starting area (whoever decided to take away weapon choice in the new tutorial area should be severely beaten), server issues need to be fixed and I would like some details soon about the Adventure Zones.
With all that being said, I had a lot of fun in the beta. Frustrating at times but I had fun. Not just in PvP either, although I had a whole lot of fun there, but in PvE as well. The PvE is not revolutionary, by any means, but it doesn't need to be. It was fun for me. I enjoyed the volcano area and its last boss, Balreth, was fairly challenging. The game gets off to a slow start but picks up nicely in later levels. I enjoyed the instances and I enjoyed the quests (when they worked) more than I do your typical WoW quests. I think my enjoyment on the quests was predicated on the fact that it is somewhat like WoW but disguised a bit. There are fewer quests but the quests were longer, whereas in WoW there are tons of quests but they all seem shorter. It was nice to not walk up to an area and see 18 people with exclamation marks above their head. I realize that its not a complete departure from the hub quest style but it was different enough for me.
I also realize that the combat is not a pure action combat system and that is another thing I am okay with. I have been getting burned out on WoW style combat and this wasjustdifferent enough to not be a drag. The animations of some abilities were meh but, overall, I liked it. Adding collision helped the feel of combat tremendously for me although, again, I did not have a huge problem with it to begin with.
The PvP, however, really shone. Having been a player of DAoC, it was the closest to the feel of DAoC I have yet seen. GW2 was a valiant effort but just didn't get there. ESO comes closer. It ran pretty flawlessly through most of my time, even with a ton of players on screen. There were some lag issues some nights but not as bad as I got hit with in GW2. The couple of nights where they were having major server hiccups were unplayable but those were not often or at least not when I was on.
What can I say? I had fun. I like the class system. I enjoy the combat for the most part. After leveling awhile, the quests were pretty good. The dungeon I did was a lot of fun. The PvP was pretty close to fantastic for most of my nights.
I only ask of a game that I have fun. It I do, its worth the money. I am not looking for a perfect experience, I don't need a revolutionary game nor even an innovative one, I don't care if Paul Sage and Matt Firor are the "scourge of the industry" as Utnayan says they are. I just want to have fun and I did. Pretty simple really.
You say that like it's a bad thing. The creativity and genius of a million people is generally better than the creativity and genius of just a handful...as long as there is a good way for the cream to rise to the top. I am neither a game designer in a company nor a tinkerer making mods but I am a gamer that benefits from both. My experience is that it's better to have both available. I thank you my fellow LUA modder types... you make my games better.
Ukerric
Bearded Ape
- 7,956
- 9,650
Yes, but then, it becomes a bet.
In this age of short leveling curves and rush-to-endgame, there's a very small window in which you actually play the game with other people. After the initial rush, the levelling zones and dungeons become empty, populated only by a handful of rerolls and latecomers (this is what the "mega-server" tech is supposed to avoid, just like WoW finally decided to collapse their empty leveling zones across servers). Any high-end (except there's still no high-end) guilds are established, opportunities have dried up.
Unless you are betting on WoW-level sustainability, where people stay subscribed for years, and the churn is low enough that, by the time you hit 80, there's a vibrant game that is recruiting YOU. Anyone wants to take that bet?
So, if you want to be serious at playing TESO, you need to play at launch. If you don't, you're going to play solo, very little in endgame... and it's no longer worth a box+sub, so if you wait, you wait until it goes F2P.
And, at that point, unless it has gone F2P, it will have 100k PC players left, with maybe a million console players (since those guys don't have as many opportunities to play something else much nicer) who can't talk to you.
History is replete with games who had widely known and talked about major crippling bugs, and who were launched. When your boss says "launch now", you answer "aye aye".
Really? First post and your second sentence is going after Ut?
This thread is turning me into Lumie. "Listen, it is not paid shills. But... It is paid shills".
Also
So you wouldn't mind if people developed a sub par product compared to the name brand, because you knew the name brand alone would sell, not caring at all about the end product only the bottom line $$? Because that sentiment that is running rampant in the industry now is what is causing old developers to break out into Kickstarters to try to get to develop their ideas properly and not be tied down to a publisher machinery only interested in shareholders not gamers.
First point: Yes, I think Utnayan is pretty damn humorous. For what its worth, I thought Blackwulf was pretty humorous himself at the start of the thread. He has since calmed down. When someone makes 5 paragraph long rants, wild accusations and calls people names; yeah, I think its funny. Especially when its about something as innocuous as a game. If you read this thread from start to finish (which took me a few days of reading while at work), Utnayan, for better or worse, is what stands out. I am sure he is fine with that because that is the whole purpose of his schtick.
Second point: I don't care if Paul Sage or Matt Firor are the scourge of the industry. This is a game, I only care about if I have fun. Period. End of story. Full stop. I don't care about the bottom line, whether it sold on name brand or whether it sold because Jesus himself blessed it. I simply do not care.
My money and time is spent for one reason alone in gaming; to have fun. If I have fun in beta, I will buy the product. I will play it for as long as I continue to have fun and I will stop once I do not. That is all I ask of a game.
Debate all you want. Draegan knew me from when Rift first released. I play lots of MMOs but am employed by none of them. Wish I were though, I could use the extra money.
Rest assured, that's usually the last thing I'm looking at. Anyway, I've just noticed Droigan already played that card, so bets are a no-go
Believe me, the game has problems and a few of them are quite large. If they don't fix them, I may not have fun for long. All in all, even with the bugs, I had fun and that is all I ask.Rest assured, that's usually the last thing I'm looking at. Anyway, I've just noticed Droigan already played that card, so bets are a no-go
I'm staying out of this thread out of respect for PRX as I think in its present state it's awful and there is no way I'm buying it at the price point they've set. But I can't ignore this.
Holy shit. You just took shilling to a whole new level. Totally writing off single player content in all MMOs to justify TESO.
In surveys over the last few years 70% of players said that single player content in MMOs was the most important part of the game for them.
The majority of people who buy this will be coming from single player ES/Morrowind/Skyrim gameplay not DaoC.
The worst thing about this is not that an ESO game is depending on its GW2 copy paste PvP to stop it from being a total disaster it's that in a few months time after this and Wildstar lose most of their customers the industry and business media will be awash with how MMOs are yesterdays news and how decent developers will struggle even more to get funded for innovative MMOs.
As an aside it's more ironic than Alannis Morissette with a fork up her ass that the devs and shills of this game have more and more been pushing the PvP rather than the PvE the closer it gets to launch to try and get away from how poor a job the developers have made and how much money has been wasted developing the PvE game.
I don't know. How much fun would EQ have been without friends? I am actually asking here because I never got into EQ.
How much fun would DAoC have been without playing with friends and other players? I can say, not much at all.
I don't know that this is a valid argument to use against someone who does not like ESO. People who absolutely hate it will not like it much more with friends but there is something to be said for playing a MMO with actual people.
I don't know that he has written off solo content for others. Just himself. Its pretty obvious he doesn't particularly like PvE content in MMOs and prefers the teamwork in PvP. For myself, I liked the PvE in ESO. At least as much as I like it in most other MMOs. The question, for me, is how good the adventure zones will be.
Regardless, I will spend most of my time, after leveling, in PvP. I am sure I will do all the dungeons and Adventure Zones. But the PvP is where its at.
Quest Hub Themepark Solo Content is dead. Then again, so are FPS shooters, ya know.
Really, the question is will PVP be able to sustain a casual population who prefers their MMOs to be all about the PVE, and especially coming from a single player RPG series with no coop, let alone PVP.
Anyways, for me the games issues are more about the bugs and lack of polish that I've seen more than design. Many of the biggest detractors in this thread who gripe about the sub or graphics will plop down their money for WOD and head right back to WOW subland, so it makes me think there are plenty of people here with agendas and it's not about the sub or design. I personally think the sub model is outdated, and a better solution is to sell content and not gate your product a la 15/mo. However, if WOW continues to do it and people pay that dinero every month for a product that goes years without content, then companies will continue to look for the goose laying the golden eggs. SWTOR still is making a ton of money on their subs, also. That model isn't going away, unfortunately.