All Posts by Thillian

Originally posted by Pappy13

Originally posted by Shlomo

Well the warcraft - Warhammer, Starcraft - Warhammer 40k is a no brainer. Have never seen the article that people are talking about but ..... Damn... Warcraft 2 was just to much with the dwarfs flying unit ... hehe. A well no one cares and so on.

 

No one has ever seen the article he's talking about...at least not in the US and not on the internet.  It was only in a small Slovakian magazine this is no longer in business...because of course they know these things in Slovakia.

Somehow after reading you sarcastic post, I don't feel insulted. Probably, because you rather insulted yourself with your own arrogance rather than Slovakian magazines.

Anyway after re-reading that old thread, I m quite confused what are you waiting for, because I made a pretty clear statement that I am not gonna scan anything for you even if you beg me on your knees.

You're flattering me if you stil remember what I wrote here even a year ago. I hardly remember who you are. Can you refresh my memory a little?

Wau, another long post about the same thing. You really should reconsider what are you trying to achieve here.

Originally posted by Daffid011

What on earth makes you think it is my responsibility to prove you wrong?  Not that I haven't, but when you present rumors and speculation as statements of FACT, then you are being untruth... blahblah...

Speculation for you, fact for me. I am not gonna reveal you the source, because it's simply impossible. Anyway, apart from this, the whole discussion is rather pointless. You are trying to claim here that WoW is a good game, because milions play it and that it doesnt matter it has absolutely no originality. I disagree. End of discussion. Thank you for your opinion.

Daffid stop calling me a liar. You can not prove me wrong and just because I am not gonna reveal you my source doesnt mean I'm lying. Noone is forcing you to believe what I write. Forums are all about rumours and gossip. But calling a liar is a bit too much. I am working as a gameplay designer for eastern europe single player RPG's (last one was very successful even in US) . and I hardly can give you any source for my claims, because some of the information were not official released.

I was saying WoW ripped off AC2 from the very beginning of WoW"s existence. You can see my posts history if you bother. It did not ripped EQ nor DaoC to that extent as it ripped AC2. From battle ground system and ranking throught the thousands of solo easy quests with no xp death penalties, same world rules, same crafting, same combat..

You've got to bring some better argument into this discussion that just millions play it. Is this all you manage? I tried to read your post a few times. But the only reason ou gave why we should think WoW is good is that it is played by a milion people.

I am not doing what masses do in other areas. I am not wearing the same clothes as majority, I am not eating the same food, nor listening to the same music and I don't like mass-popular movies and blockbusters either.

1) 3 spheres independent from each other (diplomacy, crafting, adventuring). It's not just a marketing slogan.

2) Classes and combat mechanics are fantastic.

3) Zoneless world with no limits. You can get anywhere you want.

4) Flying Mounts, Ships, non-instanced housing.

Originally posted by Daffid011

 

10 WoW cloned EQ and didn't create anything new.

20 Everyone is cloning WoW and not creating anything new.

30 got 10

Has anyone ever stopped to ask, if WoW is just an EQ clone and everyone else is cloning WoW then why is WoW so much more popular? 

The answer is so simple. Marketing & Advertisment. Look at Asheron's Call 2 made by Turbine. It was a game with 99% of the features WoW had at release. WoW could be called Asheron's Call 2.5

At that time most of the players were hardcore in today's terms. They found AC2 to be too easy, made for carebears and casuals. The problem was that Turbine could not sell AC2 because they lack marketing and advertisment to bring new people into genre.

What Blizzard did was simple. They made this AC2 ripoff called WoW and payed huge marketing for it and publicity to bring new players into MMORPG. The majority of old mmorpg players DID not like WoW at all just like they did not like AC2, but WoW was filling up with all the newcommers to the genre, that it eventually became a legend that "there is something good about the game when milions of play it" so even the old school players jumped into WoW.

Mass hysteria is the explanation for its success. Not a quality. Do you really believe people can SEE QUALITY? It's so naive I can hardly breathe. Do you really believe that an average person is able to see quality and is able to make a responsible decision? I say no, an average person will always fall with the hype and play what milions of others play.

I say, the fact that something is popular in compare to competition means the quality is low but marketing is high. And it applies to everything (music, cinema, food, clothing, politics..)

Originally posted by Elrynduil

I am fully aware of the monetary cost of keeping an MMO going. 200k subscribers is more than enough. Look at UO, a successful but very much niche game that never had a massive player base.

 

AoC was always a niche game. It won't have millions of players. If you're too shallow and immature to play a game because of that fact then go elsewhere.

This is so much untrue. AoC is currently placed second in the amount of money spent on advertisment (after WoW). AoC is mainstreamed MMORPG with plans to keep 300-400k subscribers otherwise they have to start kicking half of the dev team.

DaoC was far from a good game. Never enjoyed it, and never could understand the current hype about its PvP. Its PvP was almost bad as the one in WoW.

WAR is as promising as Funcon's announcment of AoC expansion.

AVG could be the worst fw ever created and wouldn't be surprised if its just a bad recognition. I have no warnings with symantec 2007.

You need to learn to not fall to any hype instead of asking for refund for your bad purchase.

Originally posted by netranger28

The lack of any good pvp is what is slowing this game down. I'm tempted to leave for WAR since it will be PVE and have some wicked PVP. The reason games like wow are so popular and good in the long run is because they mix both things very well.

 

In my opinion a great pvp with pve mix is the only way a game can compete in the big leagues. This means compete on the scale of WoW.

 

Is pvp issential for wide and mass appeal in the current MMO market. Mass appeal = more $$$$

NOT. It's all about advertisment and marketing and mass hype. It has absolutely nothing to do with the game itself. Balanced PvP/PvE? That's a myth in non-sandbox mmorpg. Im happy with the Lotro now. WAR hype just like AoC means nothing to me.

Originally posted by Daffid011

Originally posted by Thachsanh

They might.

The9, the Chinese company, paid up front around 100 million USD to release WoW in China. Roughly 35 million USD for the lisense, about 70 million USD for initial equipments and data center cost because Blizzard require all top of the line servers.

Even after paying 100 millions USD at once, remember, they have to pay this in very short amount of time, not over 4 - 5 years, they sill making money hand over fist with WoW China.

I believe they recover their investment in the first year of releasing WoW China.

 

WoW didn't launch in China until sometime in mid 2005.  The game was already a success by then and long after the $120 million dollars that Thillian claims Blizzard spent to launch the game. 

 

 

You called me a liar and you apparently know half as much as I do about all this. Success can be predicted in a way. Even as we know now AoC turned to be a flop, they made enough money on box sales to be able to announce expansion. And all this because of advertisment. People obviously underestimate the power of advertisment. WoW had even bigger advertisment campaign before release than AoC. And in a way it was kinda enjoyable game for all the pre-btnet people that either played Warcraf t 3 or Diablo.

Indeed 120$ is enough to finance a holywood blockbluster, but I'm not sure what are you trying to say here. That Blizzard should rather do a movie with all these money?

This easily could be the worst possible idea / world to use in MMORPG. It failed in movie, it would fail in game.

Originally posted by Pheace

Originally posted by Thillian

Originally posted by Pheace

Originally posted by Thillian

Originally posted by Vicksburg

WOW owns 60% of the MMORPG field.

Thousands of websites support the game and millions of videos show how the best players play in PVE and PVP.

Supporting add ons, UI adaptations, class tips, gaming tips. You name it/

One of the better: www.wowinsider.com

It is now for almost 1100 days the mosty played game on XFire (number 1) and this being backed up by all kind of independant sources.

Wow is also the ONLY game in the top 10 that you have to PAY to play. CoD4 being a far second but free to play. That alone says enough.

Of course you can play Vanguard in which there are about 40K subscribers.

Number of voters that vote with their wallets .... says it all.

 

 

Yeh because, Blizzard spent more money on marketing campaign before release (40$mil) than Sigil for the whole development of Vanguard (30$mil)

It's like comparing Titanic movie with 200$+budget with Waking Life that had 2.5$mil. Apparently Titanic saw much MORE people and many more will say it's a great movie, while waking life has much smaller fan base.

 

Marketing in the Netherlands here for MMO's was non existant before WoW (now you see the tv commercial sometimes) but I can tell you that that game spread on sheer word of mouth in my community and had *nothing* to do with any adds and the like which didn't really become visible till the Celebrity adds were made a few years in.

I know many people who never played MMO's and thought paying monthly was the last thing they'd ever do change their mind in an instant after they got to play the open beta.

This game sold itself on *merits*, not on a marketing campaign.

 

Hahahaha yeh, they spent all these milions just for the f*** of it.

 

Ahh reading is difficult isn't it. In the Netherlands, advertising for WoW was pretty much nonexistant. All the people I saw get into WoW did so because they absolutely loved playing their beta account, some of which had never given the game a second look simply because it would have a monthly fee.

 

So lol @ you

Hah yes reading is very difficult. I guess you didn't notice, but I wasn't really agreeing with your post. I was kinda being sarcastic secretly asking where disappeared all these 40$mil for adv before release? Funny to see you even did that "lol @ you" when it was actually you who misunderstood.

Originally posted by Sharkypal

Originally posted by Thillian

Originally posted by FischerBlack

Originally posted by Unfinished

Fee for the 'Open Beta'

Fee for the Early Access

Fee to DL the Client to use a 'Buddy Key'

 

FunCom aren't fools, they are trying to squeeze out every cent they can out of each customer,  they know they won't be getting many long term subscribers.  The only upside could be that Gaute Godager never helms another MMO development.

 

Agreed. One thing I can give to Brad McQuaid is that in the end he was apologetic for the outcome of VG. Guatte's smugness about his awesome launch and the 700,000 boxes sold, while the player base screams bloody murder on the forums really pisses me off.

 

Brad had very low budget for VG in compare to AoC. VG was suddently cut off from money, which is obviously a different reason why it was released early. In addition Funcom pretends everything is fine with AoC.

 

If Im not very much mistaken, the VG budget was into 30 milion US, which is anything but low.

S

30$ mil yes which is very low for a large mmorpg. It was supposed to be more, so they planned to add even more features, but was cut off from more money. Just to compare. Blizzard spent 40$ mil for adv before WoW release and another 80$ mil for development. AoC numbers were not released yet, but won't be too lower than this.

Originally posted by FischerBlack

Originally posted by Unfinished

Fee for the 'Open Beta'

Fee for the Early Access

Fee to DL the Client to use a 'Buddy Key'

 

FunCom aren't fools, they are trying to squeeze out every cent they can out of each customer,  they know they won't be getting many long term subscribers.  The only upside could be that Gaute Godager never helms another MMO development.

 

Agreed. One thing I can give to Brad McQuaid is that in the end he was apologetic for the outcome of VG. Guatte's smugness about his awesome launch and the 700,000 boxes sold, while the player base screams bloody murder on the forums really pisses me off.

Brad had very low budget for VG in compare to AoC. VG was suddently cut off from money, which is obviously a different reason why it was released early. In addition Funcom pretends everything is fine with AoC.

Freedom. As we prefer to be free in real life, we prefer to be free in games. Invisible walls, barriers, linear quests take away that freedom. If there are quests then make them with no prerequirements. To enforce grouping, the quest system must by dynamic. Always shareable, even repeatable. Remove any obstacles that could possibly interrupt players to group with each other.

Originally posted by Vicksburg

Originally posted by Thillian

Originally posted by coffee

 

No it been 10 years and the MMO genre has hit a brick wall.. its out of ideas.. you cant blame WoW if every 1 wants to copy it.. which they aint (cept maye WAR and Lotro), we just have to wait for the next revolution in a few years.

 

We can surely not blame WoW or Blizzard for it. We can only blame the community and players that are willing to pay and play games like WoW that brought no innovation. It's a proof that huge advertisment with no originality can be very succesful.

 

The Wow hate is a laugh at MMORPG.COM

tell me what game has more polished end game content than Wow? So I can laugh too....

And marketing doesn't make games a succes for 4 years ! and certainly not in the same numbers as Wow did.

Conan anyone :))))

62% of the MMORPG market and you guys are SO frustrated it comes out of your pants.

of course this gentleman may play any other MMORPG outthere, BUT ...

I am not the one who publishes ridiculous one liners... on a ... Wow forum.

So frustrated you don't even have fun anymore, while 10 million pay to play and laugh at that clown.

I remember him bashing on Wow when Conan launched. Conan was the real Wow killer (for the 7th in a row)

The man with the clown defended Conan...2 months ago... just to bash on the number one.

So who made a fool out of himself back then ?

 

 

 

The man with the clown, I guess you mean me. Anyway. Can you please find me a single topic when I defended AoC? Because I never played the game, and I never fell with the hype.
 

But these are my words from 2 months ago: http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/post/2043920#2043920

• Main MMO before AoC = Vanguard, active sub: DDo/Lotro
• Main MMO after AoC = Vanguard, active sub: DDo/Lotro

And seriously, your only argument is 10 MILLION. Do you always do what at least 10 other milion of people do? Do you always check first before your any activity, how many other people do the same? Do you wear the same clothes as majority, do you listen to the same music..? You have to come up with a bit better argument than "It has mass popularity" I do not trust people's sense for quality at all.