SWTOR

[Khaldun]

I suspect that with the launch date, there is a good deal of behind-the-scenes dancing with Blizzard going on. I'm fully certain that Blizz has a semi-floating launch date for expansions that they move around depending on when they think they can sink competing products best. With AoC and WAR, that was an easy call once you could see well enough they were going to crash and burn. With SWTOR, I'm sure the question is: do you want to go with Cataclysm before they launch or after? My guess is about 3 weeks before, if you could possibly time it that well. But for that very reason, I think the game of "I'm not sure when we'll launch" is going to go on for a long while.

[Koyasha]

If that were the case it seems like it would be simple to set an internal launch date, and announce one about 3 months later.  Then launch "early".  Not only would that screw up anyone trying to time against your launch, it would also probably give them some publicity just from the novelty of an early launch instead of a late one.

[Venkman]

This comes up every so often, and I'm always compelled to ask: do you really think Blizzard needs to care? You'd need to think they weren't alongside us all in every beta since EQ1 and weren't any better than us at calling turds from a mile away. Then you'd need to think their position was assailable at all by games of the same type.

I'm sure they see dips in account activity at each launch of a new MMO. But most of those players return for the very same reasons we return: WoW's the better game. If you're into this style of game (and if you weren't, you'd not be in WoW anyway).

I'd bet the only real concern they have is from the only company that can mano-a-mano them in terms of marketing spend. But even then, your audience has left and returned to WoW countless times after getting burned because the games were similar enough but nowhere near good enough.

At this point, you're hoping for a few million new players who are graduating from Wizard 101 for something like SWTOR. You'll get some from WoW for sure. How long you keep them though depends on how many of them also enjoyed DA:O

[Koyasha]

I don't think they really need to, but it's still wise for them to strategically time their expansions to destroy potential competition anyway.  If they didn't, the number of subscribers that comes back may be somewhat less, each time.  Would it make a massive difference?  Probably not, at least not with any of the games we have seen so far.  But a few percentage points here and there is still worth putting a little marketing effort and timing into.  And SWTOR has a stronger developer than any previous competitor, and a bigger budget, from my understanding.

I'm not necessarily saying they actually do it, but it's not something that seems ridiculous either.

[Sheepherder]

They offed a significantly hyped, nearly complete game under their IP because they didn't like the way it was shaping up.  The odds of them fucking with release schedules for competition reasons are low.

[schild]

And SWTOR has a stronger developer than any previous competitor, and a bigger budget, from my understanding.

IF YOU'D JUST READ THE THREAD.

[Velorath]

And SWTOR has a stronger developer than any previous competitor, and a bigger budget, from my understanding.

IF YOU'D JUST READ THE THREAD.

You mean the one where people cry "Bioware Austin!", conveniently ignoring any long term Bioware people on the project including the guy running the team?

[UnSub]

WoW: Cataclysm comes out late 2010.

SWOR comes out early-ish 2011.

Blizzard's new MMO comes out 2011 or 2012. Or Diablo 3. Or Starcraft 2.

There's more than one way that Blizzard can fuck with Bioware if they want to.

[Malakili]

And SWTOR has a stronger developer than any previous competitor, and a bigger budget, from my understanding.

IF YOU'D JUST READ THE THREAD.

You mean the one where people cry "Bioware Austin!", conveniently ignoring any long term Bioware people on the project including the guy running the team?

I think he meant the one where people note that regardless of the bioware talent, the team does not have a good MMO track record.

[HaemishM]

What's up with Battlefield Heroes?  I'm curious.

It's a boring game, it took forever to get out of beta (and never really got out to the extent where they are able to trumpet its release) and AFAIK it isn't really making the kind of money they hoped. I think they wanted that model of game to be the next big thing, but they need a better game to prove it.

[Sky]

Duke nuke'em fucking the presidents super-model daughter(barely legal) on top of a harley while he rides across the sky(it's a space harley) shooting pig aliens with every thrust, each shot a headshot and causing a shower of brains. At the end of the opening a gigantic boss appears, duke then proceeds to dismount the harley(but not the girl) the bike flies into the bosses mouth which is then exploded by a shotgun blast to the gas tank at the same moment the girl has the best orgasm of her life.  When it's all finished duke looks to the camera and says "I am you."

fin

The Duke abides.

[eldaec]

Taris is a planet (and is in SWTOR)

This is barely news, but jesus, F13's current star wars thread was one topic away from page two. Which will not stand.

[patience]

So EAWare needs a million subs to absorb server/customer service costs or break even means something else?

[Koyasha]

Not too surprising to me to hear those kind of numbers needed to break even, although it's not entirely clear what that means in this case.  It certainly always seemed like this project is destined to be either an epic fail or a massive success, without much room for an in-between.

[UnSub]

Anyone know if SWOR is going to launch in multi-regions (complete with translations) at the same time?

Last I checked, WoW has about 5 million North American and European players, so if EA is looking for SWOR to pick up 2m players soley in these regions they really better deliver an incredible title.

[01101010]

Anyone know if SWOR is going to launch in multi-regions (complete with translations) at the same time?

Last I checked, WoW has about 5 million North American and European players, so if EA is looking for SWOR to pick up 2m players soley in these regions they really better deliver an incredible title.

Its Star Wars. What could possibly go wrong? 

[Senses]

So I just read an article over at Massively that Bioware and EA are tentatively predicting 2 million subs for this game?  I can't decide if they are stupider for thinking this, or for announcing that they think this.  Now I could be completely wrong, seeing as I am jaded by years of MMO hype-train crashes, but does anyone else really think that even if this game is good that it could get 2 milliion subs much less maintain 2 million subs after launch?

[stu]

Yes.

[Malakili]

So I just read an article over at Massively that Bioware and EA are tentatively predicting 2 million subs for this game?  I can't decide if they are stupider for thinking this, or for announcing that they think this.  Now I could be completely wrong, seeing as I am jaded by years of MMO hype-train crashes, but does anyone else really think that even if this game is good that it could get 2 milliion subs much less maintain 2 million subs after launch?

2 million boxes sold, sure.  Its star wars, its bioware.  Whether or not they are making a game that people will pay long term monthly for is another story.

[Senses]

And yet as a long term MMOGamer I am not excited at all about this title based on everything I have read.  Sure, Star Wars is neat, I liked the movies, but the gameplay isn't attractive.  Still I might try it out, especially if it gets good reviews, but predicting 2 million subs is a huge expectation for a company that doesn't have any MMO experience, or do they and I just don't know about it?

[Goreschach]

And yet as a long term MMOGamer I am not excited at all about this title based on everything I have read.  Sure, Star Wars is neat, I liked the movies, but the gameplay isn't attractive.  Still I might try it out, especially if it gets good reviews, but predicting 2 million subs is a huge expectation for a company that doesn't have any MMO experience, or do they and I just don't know about it?

I don't even really care for Star Wars, and I loved KOTOR. This game makes me sad because they're just going to (further) fuck up a good series by jumping on the WOW bandwagon. Nobody learns.

I predict 1.25 million box sales, followed shortly after by WAR/AOC style implosion.

[Venkman]

SWTOR is a bit risky because it's not just WoW in space with Wookiees. People who are "into MMOs" have a very high probability of being into the game mechanic of character optimization that is WoW, a much lower probability of being into the socioeconomic sim of Eve or those million turn-based browser titles, and probably the least probability of being into a story-driven RPG ala KOTOR.

Whatever they retain will be based on how many people want a story in their MMO after 13 years of MMOs pretty much not having them. And, of course, how well they pull it off on a persistent world platform

[eldaec]

They are trying to make Mass Effect/kotor, only with a subscription to lock you in to buying DLC.

And with you-must-be-online DRM.

They haven't announced any persistent world features yet and the game is barely multiplayer as far as we know. I'm assuming there is more to come, but at the moment it's more 'hey you can invite friends to join your Kotor3 playthroughs'.


Worrying about it being like WoW is daft. This sounds nothing like WoW. There's another recent mmog it sounds more like, but we've been over this ofc.

[Zzulo]

For those interested, here's a short new video showing some powers of one of the player classes:

http://www.swtor.com/news/news-article/20100319_001

(scroll down a bit)

[Sheepherder]

SWTOR is a bit risky because it's not just WoW in space with Wookiees. People who are "into MMOs" have a very high probability of being into the game mechanic of character optimization that is WoW, a much lower probability of being into the socioeconomic sim of Eve or those million turn-based browser titles, and probably the least probability of being into a story-driven RPG ala KOTOR.

Whatever they retain will be based on how many people want a story in their MMO after 13 years of MMOs pretty much not having them. And, of course, how well they pull it off on a persistent world platform

Because we all know that the gear mechanic has everything to do with cutscenes and dialogue.

If you want to speculate on why this one will fail, at least choose an assumption that's grounded in reality: like Bioware's attempts at making good combat usually resulting in some monstrous abortion that begs to be put out of it's misery regardless of what variables you plug into it.

[Venkman]

Selective snipping doesn't suddenly make your point contextually relevant. Go back and read what I wrote and then tell me if that was the point I was making. Obviously you'd like to speculate on why this one will fail. But I don't think it will, so there's no point in me debating that.

[Sheepherder]

Corrected: it's now the whole quote.  It's still wrong, because nothing in any of the games or systems described by you is contradictory to incremental advancement through kill -> loot or anything else you happen to list.  I get it, you question whether "story" grabs people, as opposed to economy, or... shitty Flash animations?  Whatever.  None of it matters, because players don't look at a box looking for the bullet point saying "Deep economy shit, bro."

"Story" is how this game is differentiating itself from the Galaxies abortion, Star Wars is how it's differentiating itself from WoW.  Don't get the two confused.

[Venkman]

I said it was "risky" because it is trying to position itself as a story-based somekindaMMOG in a genre that is almost entirely about character optimization only. The "risk" is that nobody gives a shit.

This was in direct response to Goreschach's post that said "This game makes me sad because they're just going to (further) fuck up a good series by jumping on the WOW bandwagon". My point was that it's doesn't seem to be trying to jump on the WoW bandwagon because it's not trying to just offer a grind-to-endgame experience of one-dimensional characters and flimsy plot devices forgotten the moment the next patch is announced.

So I'm really not sure what your beef is. I think we actually agree. You just seem to want to argue about other stuff nobody can talk about until we get our hands on it.

[Velorath]

You just seem to want to argue about other stuff nobody can talk about until we get our hands on it.

Isn't that what the past 86 pages of this thread have been about?

[LK]

I felt anxious and upset that I couldn't read all the spoiler talk for Mass Effect 2 until I played it just recently.

I imagine if I don't jump on the SWTOR bandwagon Day 1, that feeling I had will be compounded 100 fold.

[Sheepherder]

So I'm really not sure what your beef is. I think we actually agree.

Story is not a gamble.  Core MMO players might not care, but their options are Swords & Sorcery Diku; Eve; or shit that doesn't even bear mentioning because it's too niche, too broken, or is atrophying away.  There is plenty of room for Diku in space because people are getting bored with fucking swords and sorcery.

[Lakov_Sanite]

if this is a mostly single player game with a$5 a month fee it'll do fine.

[Malakili]

if this is a mostly single player game with a$5 a month fee it'll do fine.

If they only charge 5 bucks a month I think there are a lot of us who are talking bad about what this game is going to be that would probably consider buying it.   Thats a pretty big if though, and it would be pretty much without precedent.

[Lantyssa]

Free Realms.

[Malakili]

Free Realms.

...

So still without precedent then..