Mythic-EA shuts down Warhammer beta, tells players to come back later

[Simond]

http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/13260

According to a post made on the Warhammer Online beta forums by Senior Producer Jeff Hickman, the developers will be closing down the beta servers on October 10, 2007, with plans to reopen the servers in early December 2007. Before we posted this news, we called the folks at EA Mythic to make sure we weren't breaching anything from the NDA. They gave us their blessing.

Warhammer Online fans....take a deep, deep breath. To me, this doesn't sound like anything that you need to concern yourselves with. In fact, I'd suggest the opposite and this may be just the little "break" that WAR needs to become a truly amazing game. That said, Jeff Hickman finished off his post to the beta community stating that the Realm versus Realm experience has been a totally fantastic experience and it'll only improve over this short break.

For those of you that were already in the beta, I'm sorry you couldn't continue to play the game that a whole host of people are looking forward to. The rest of us can now sit back and relax until early December, when it sounds like the next phase of the beta will roll out. Until then, let's give them EA Mythic team a round of applause for having the guts to do what they feel is necessary to create a fantastic game.

That's never a good sign.

[shiznitz]

Finally someone gets it. They clearly need to rip out some of the guts and re-design. Better to recognize that now versus one month after launch.  The good spin is how many developers would have the chops to do this? None before now.

[sam, an eggplant]

Wow. I also can't imagine any scenario where it's not a bad sign. Even a major datacenter migration can be done in a week or two if you totally don't care about downtime.

[waylander]

I expect another release delay based on this action.

[Montague]

You have gotta be fucking kidding me. I just plunked down $1200 on a new rig specifically for Warhammer.

To be honest, something smells rotten in Mythicland. Employees are being replaced/leaving left and right, and with Paul's highly entertaining rants promising everything but the fucking moon I was starting to feel it was too good to be true. That something rotten smells like EA, methinks.

[schild]

This explains so much about the clan beta.

I don't owe anyone an apology anymore. But I would like some explanations.

[Nebu]

I honestly don't know what to make of this, but anything that does come to mind isn't good. 

[sam, an eggplant]

It's obviously not good. If the game needs another 6 months, you delay it for 6 months, but you keep the beta active. Stopping beta for 2 months implies a major retooling, to such an extent that neither functional nor gameplay QA during that period would be worth anything.

I've got to agree that they did an excellent job of flimflammery. Paul's videos combined with the total lack of NDA breaking really built up momentum. Which is now lost.

[naum]

Sounds like a bout of some serious code surgery is about to be applied…

[Kaa]

Well, the *good* thing is that they had the guts to do this before launch. Evidently the Blizzard's record of releasing very polished games "when they're done" is starting to sink in, finally. And, of course, there's the example of SWG on the opposite side...

Kaa

[tazelbain]

In fact, I'd suggest the opposite and this may be just the little "break" that WAR needs to become a truly amazing game.

Fucking Kool-Aide drinkers.

Could they have caved in to all the bitching about Instatized PvP?  Removing it would be a radical redesign this late.

[Arthur_Parker]

I was following WAR really closely, then it became more and more obvious that they were only shooting for WoW with slightly better PVP.  Don't get me wrong, WoW's a great game but I have zero desire to play it again, in the end I couldn't even be bothered to fill in the beta application, I just lost all interest.

[Evildrider]

I was following WAR really closely, then it became more and more obvious that they were only shooting for WoW with slightly better PVP.  Don't get me wrong, WoW's a great game but I have zero desire to play it again, in the end I couldn't even be bothered to fill in the beta application, I just lost all interest.

Unfortunately the popularity of WoW pretty much overshadows what other people want in MMO's.  It's success is almost like a nail in the coffin for upcoming MMO's that try to copy it.  I personally dislike WoW, it just wasn't fun for me.

[AcidCat]

They clearly need to rip out some of the guts and re-design.

Well I can't say much because of the NDA of course. 

I guess I can say this is probably for the best. I hope they have some clear ideas for what to rework during this time.

[WayAbvPar]

If not for the giant wallet of EA, I would be getting Wish vibes from this. Can anyone tell me (without violating the NDA) if there was a copious number of goats in the game?

[Pendan]

Just 4 days ago a guild mate got a beta invitation to Warhammer Online. Odd timing.

[eldaec]

If not for the giant wallet of EA, I would be getting Wish vibes from this. Can anyone tell me (without violating the NDA) if there was a copious number of goats in the game?

That's daft.

Mythic know how to turn out a straightforward dku.

If WAR ends up being just that, it would still sell enough to be successful thanks to EA marketing + the license.


Sounds to me like Mythic just want more time, and EA have passed along a bucket of cash to support it.

Best case, the 'more time' is because of some Damascene revelation that open field RvR is much more appropriate than sport PvP for this game, or that 2 is the wrong number of realms.

Most likely case, the polish isn't going in quick enough and they want to shine it some more.

Worst case, EA are pushing for a simpler diku to support consoles.


Also, a 2 month beta hiatus coming one year before launch doesn't sound like a big deal. It could reasonably be attributed to not wanting to burn beta testers out during a period where nothing is going to change.

tbh, I was amazed that the game had started beta so early. Over a year of beta sounds crazy. And nobody honestly believed that 'early 2008' crap did they?

[eldaec]

You have gotta be fucking kidding me. I just plunked down $1200 on a new rig specifically for Warhammer.

Seriously, YOU'RE DOING IT WRONG. Spend money on toys by all means, but don't spend money on toys now in order to play games which might suck next year.

[Mrbloodworth]

Good lord, i can now hear the WoW V.S War fights around the net growing louder, and louder... as trolls on both sides are now emboldened cry's of anger and rage scream out!!!

They didn't release this info publicly did they?

[Modern Angel]

No, this isn't good. Even if it ends up being good this is not good. You do not shut down betas after they've started. Ever. As said above that implies that the info you would be getting is not useful. Assuming they launch 08 it's way, way too late in the game for a drastic overhaul.

I knew Lum and Tweety had left. Has anyone else?

[Lum]

My leaving had zero to do with Warhammer; I was never on that project, and I left because someone offered me a position I couldn't turn down (lead design role) in a city I wanted to live in (Austin trumps Suburbia, Virginia). Given that I had lunch with Mark Jacobs this AGC and he didn't poison my food I suspect the parting was amiable.

[eldaec]

A trouble maker might point out that it was pretty close to the time EA assimilated Mythic though.

[Lum]

At the time I left the acquisition was at "rumor we gossiped about at lunch" level; it wasn't a done deal until after I was gone.

The thought that had I stayed I most likely would have had some role on UO fills me with schadenfreude, though.

[Johny Cee]

My leaving had zero to do with Warhammer; I was never on that project, and I left because someone offered me a position I couldn't turn down (lead design role) in a city I wanted to live in (Austin trumps Suburbia, Virginia). Given that I had lunch with Mark Jacobs this AGC and he didn't poison my food I suspect the parting was amiable.

You'd spent the last couple years building up an immunity to Iocaine powder, though, right?

[Lum]

Mark is a tricky one, he switches out his poisons.

[shiznitz]

This is clearly an unplanned change in the development schedule, not that anyone has argued otherwise. The silence is also deafening. I wonder how many people left? Did Tweety see this coming?

[Soukyan]

No, this isn't good. Even if it ends up being good this is not good. You do not shut down betas after they've started. Ever. As said above that implies that the info you would be getting is not useful. Assuming they launch 08 it's way, way too late in the game for a drastic overhaul.

I knew Lum and Tweety had left. Has anyone else?

Walt (Copper) has long since gone, too hasn't he?

[eldaec]

Did Tweety see this coming?

What? A two month beta hiatus, or Mark Jacobs going about poisoning the programming staff?

Neither would be a good reason for a community rep to leave, in fact one of them would provide unique opportunities.

[Soukyan]

Did Tweety see this coming?

What? A two month beta hiatus, or Mark Jacobs going about poisoning the programming staff?

Neither would be a good reason for a community rep to leave, in fact one of them would provide unique opportunities.

Perhaps she just grew tired of the new community. Or perhaps she burned out on grown men who whine about games all day long. If you can't slap 'em, leave 'em. ;)

[Kaa]

I am pretty sure Tweety, just as Lum, was never involved with Warhammer.

Kaa

[tazelbain]

I am going to wait a few days for Mark to write up a state of the game before I start doomcasting.

[Modern Angel]

Yeah, don't get me wrong there. I'm not going to speculate on why people left or what's going on over there because it's pointless. I can draw my conclusion that it's probably not good. I was just wondering who had left besides Lum and Tweety. The specifics are and will remain a mystery until EA buys Mythic wholesale and shuts them down. 

[Rasix]

I am pretty sure Tweety, just as Lum, was never involved with Warhammer.

Kaa

She didn't program shit.  But as of 2006's AGC she was the community manager. However, that opens up a different bag of worms.  I really didn't like the way they were talking about community.  Rubbed me the wrong way.  Seems like they were merely brand stewards, not a MMO dev team.

[eldaec]

I am pretty sure Tweety, just as Lum, was never involved with Warhammer.

Tweety was involved, she was seen at shows, and wrote the grab bag, and a whole load of junk on the herald wotsit, and generally did her thing in forums. She was doing more UO toward the end, which may explain something.

[schild]

News just came out that Ninty is a bigger publisher than EA. Me thinks EA wants to regain that crown.

It'd be devious and shitty, but I think there's a lot more going on behind the scenes than we'll ever know.

Unless I can get a mole.

EA's big, it shouldn't be hard to find someone with an axe to grind.