What went wrong.

[Arthur_Parker]

Who the fuck knows?  Why don't you just say MJ said 250k doesn't look great to investors, isn't that a good enough quote?  You don't need to make it out to be any worse than it is, it's quite bad enough already.

[khaine]

Yeah, I'd have loved him to have said 250k would be a failure, but he didn't, the closest he got was saying 250k "doesn’t look great to investors".

“Let’s just say north of half a million would mean we’re successful"

So you're telling me that doesn't mean 250k would be a failure by his own definition ?

[Nebu]

Why argue about it?  If WAR is successful, we'll see more games like it.  If not, we'll see more WoW clones crash and burn.  Seems like we lose either way.  Personally, I'd like to see WAR turn things around and have some success.  There just isn't a decent Fantasy PvP MMO out there and I'd love to have something to play.

[Lantyssa]

"... Do we have to be number one to be successful? No. I want us to be no less than number two; that would make me very happy.” For the number two spot, Jacobs reasoned that “Warhammer” would need at least a half-million subscribers, ..."

There.  I highlighted the important bit as to why less would be a failure.

[khaine]

Why argue about it?  If WAR is successful, we'll see more games like it.  If not, we'll see more WoW clones crash and burn.  Seems like we lose either way.  Personally, I'd like to see WAR turn things around and have some success.  There just isn't a decent Fantasy PvP MMO out there and I'd love to have something to play.

I'd like to think the opposite , that maybe , just maybe , after Vanguard to PotBS to WAR , that someone with half a fucking brain and in charge would think , maybe if we spend that extra time and money needed to polish and test and get it right at launch , it'll be well worth it $$ wise for us in the long run

Maybe if enough Vanguards and WAR's and AoC's happen they will get a clue to either do it right and go all out without rushing or to not do it at all

I'd rather see a couple WoW's (as in fairly polished at launch ) every 4-5 years that worked well out the gate,  than "launch and hope we can turn it around" games once or twice a year

I'll admit after the Vanguard fiasco and then AoC in this same year I would have thought that mmorpg companies would have learned this lesson by now

But apparently not

[Grim]

Nothing to see.

[Arthur_Parker]

"... Do we have to be number one to be successful? No. I want us to be no less than number two; that would make me very happy.” For the number two spot, Jacobs reasoned that “Warhammer” would need at least a half-million subscribers, ..."

There.  I highlighted the important bit as to why less would be a failure.

Jesus Christ, why put words into the guys mouth?  His game is totally fucked up.  He didn't say failure, he didn't even say he would have to be number 2 to be successful, in that quote he said he wants them to be no less than number two.  Well guess what, we won't know sub numbers till the next quarter and even then they might do the bullshit thing of only releasing character numbers or accounts made.

[Arthur_Parker]

Yeah, I'd have loved him to have said 250k would be a failure, but he didn't, the closest he got was saying 250k "doesn’t look great to investors".

“Let’s just say north of half a million would mean we’re successful"

So you're telling me that doesn't mean 250k would be a failure by his own definition ?

Hey I replied to Bismallah thinking it was you.

Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying.  Is there some sort of shortage of quotes from him saying stupid things I'm not aware of?  Make fun of stuff he's said like the opening new servers comment after 6 weeks or something, don't take your meaning of "failure" and try to tie him down to it because he's not going to admit failure no matter what the subs say with Korea in the pipeline.

[Bismallah]

I understand his game is totally fucked up, but what I was asking was what does that really mean? Games these days seem like they can have a horrible launch, tank in sales, tank in subscriptions and still pull it out and hang on for years. So really, failure needs a new definition by default when it comes to MMOs. That's why I asked what really is the end result. Yeah, WAR tanks, but they will probably make their initial investment back within a year, or sooner, so did it really "fail"?

So they lay a few folks off, they fire maybe some of the dev team, but then what? Shit look at Star Wars Galaxies, they basically redid the whole damn thing and did a re-launch in a sense... is this what we could see from WAR?

[Arthur_Parker]

Yeah, if we are making up our own definition of "failure", then I think it failed massively to grab the market share it could have.  The individual game elements failed to fit together and the game engine failed to deliver (big time) for a lot of people.

As you said, it's too early to tell if will be a failure at generating a profit.

[Lantyssa]

Jesus Christ, why put words into the guys mouth?  His game is totally fucked up.  He didn't say failure, he didn't even say he would have to be number 2 to be successful, in that quote he said he wants them to be no less than number two.  Well guess what, we won't know sub numbers till the next quarter and even then they might do the bullshit thing of only releasing character numbers or accounts made.

I don't need to.  Jacobs was shooting his mouth off all over the place in the lead-up to launch.  He set the tone that they are going after WoW and everything else was a tiny game not worth considering even existed.  We're it one instance, I'd be willing to let it slide.  But it wasn't, it was every time he opened his fool mouth.

For my terms the game isn't a failure as long as people are still employed.  By the expectations Jacobs set though?  It's looking like a failure.

[UnSub]

For my terms the game isn't a failure as long as people are still employed.  By the expectations Jacobs set though?  It's looking like a failure.

That WAR shifted 800k box copies is a good start. I'm sure Mythic prepared EA for the hit that was going to be WotLK and are focusing on the number of box sales they have. Marketing will shift to re-activating those bought box copies - wouldn't be surprised if there would be some kind of 'play free over Xmas' offer, especially if the Classes patch goes in before then.

Server closures have to be coming too. Have to be. You can't have a large number of empty servers costing you money, even if it looks bad in PR terms.

[Kageru]

I'm pretty sure the game is drastically under-performing on their expectations, and as such let's just call it a failure.

It's a self inflicted failure though. They clearly had the money, time, IP, gameplay niche and development experience that should have resulted in a game that was well populated, growing and getting good word of mouth. However the core game mechanics are just such a bizarre and unlovely creation that were destined not to work and will require some deep redesign to make sense. The time and disruption that will cause is going to continue hammering their sub numbers.

And they're not going to remove the ward armor because they don't have any other carrots to offer than a single raid mob. A raid mob who by their own lore is the ultimate commander of the faction. I personally hope they survive long enough to demonstrate how they intended to extend the game, because I can't see what openings they've left themselves.

Good forum reading though.. and watching MJ talk big and then turn out to be mostly wind puts him right up there with McQuade.

[Redgiant]

I registered to post a reply here. I'm a DAoC vet from its first few years, and I notice that every single person enamored with that style of play dislikes WAR's scenario over-focus. It isn't even close at this point, after expecting it to be 80-20 open RvR and instead it is 95-05 ScenarioHammer. It is like they unlearned everything they, um, learned from DAoC. Every guildmate has left, 2 solid guilds at launch said fuck it and left, every RL friend playing left. if what I am experiencing is widespread, they must have a hell of a cancellation exodus going. And many more like me (still) are probably sitting on the fence waiting, hovering over the cancellation button.

No persistent RvR and world simulation of the caliber that DAoC used to have in its heyday. Problem numbers one through ten IMHO.

Every person coming from a background like that expected it to be there in spades, given that Mythic should already "know better" what works and what doesn't to spin up a 24/7 open world like that. But they apparently got WoW-itis and scenario'd the shit out of the place. Reminds me of that crappy gem game-within-a-game; something to waste time and take emphasis away from the real game backbone and purpose.  I have yet to see a game that is instance-heavy not bore the shit out of me and my friends in short order.

The game's biggest mistake was not being totally committed to the one thing they could pull off aces above WoW: true open world RvR and all the subsystems that go along with supporting it. They tacked on open world after they heard that mostly instanced warfare would suck to vets who like things like DAoC's systems. Suckling at the WoW teat was a mistake. MJ is playing defense instead of offense about this; if you build awesome open RvR with all the systems geared up for it, you would have won big. Now it may be too late since the sorts of rejiggering needed to really change things is not trivial. And MJ is so worried about pissing off the ADD WoWettes (that speaks volumes for why there is a problem to begin with).

No economy, no crafting dependence, no communications, no realm pride motivation, no frontiers that makes sense and separate lands in a "stay the hell out of ours" way, no incentive to have large-scale strategy beyond "take a BO, sit 3 minutes, go to the next one".

Anyone remember relic raids, taking 6 keeps simultaneously with heavy coordination, sneaking past border forts and raising hell, getting Darkness Falls control and steeling yourselves for the inevitable influx to try to defend against, 3-way RvR with backstabbing each other. Your RL brain involved, thinking, debating strategies and communicating as your avatar's brain is good; in WAR there is an absolute disconnect and you feel like you are just watching something disembodied go through repetitive motions.

This could have been a great winner if it had taken the high road.

[ashrik]

There's about a million and one things they could have done differently.

I'm going to venture that if they had gotten the WoW sourcecode, stripped out the bigger raids, dropped in their own classes, and lastly dropped in a few keeps between Alliance and Horde towns in the same zone, they would have something better than what we have now. Mythic should have made a PVP mod for Blizzard. There- I said it.

[eldaec]

The game's biggest mistake was not being totally committed to the one thing they could pull off aces above WoW: true open world RvR and all the subsystems that go along with supporting it. They tacked on open world after they heard that mostly instanced warfare would suck to vets who like things like DAoC's systems. Suckling at the WoW teat was a mistake. MJ is playing defense instead of offense about this; if you build awesome open RvR with all the systems geared up for it, you would have won big. Now it may be too late since the sorts of rejiggering needed to really change things is not trivial. And MJ is so worried about pissing off the ADD WoWettes (that speaks volumes for why there is a problem to begin with).

You aren't wrong, but to be fair to mythic, they openly said from early on that this game was going to be all about the sport pvp. The RvR-lite that WAR includes was added late in the day - originally we were just going to get scenarios and the dumb battlefield objective switches.

You can read any number of long circular whine threads about the lunacy of this approach written during WAR development on this very website.

The reason given was that good RvR would make the game too much like daoc. I have no idea why that was deemed to be a bad thing.


Excluding obvious trainwrecks like Vanguard, I think we can reasonably say this is the first time a major MMOG has face planted for PRECISELY the reasons predicted on this forum over a year ago. Yay for us.

[Nebu]

The reason given was that good RvR would make the game too much like daoc. I have no idea why that was deemed to be a bad thing.

I wonder if it's that an illusion exists that a game like WoW will have WoW-like numbers?  WoW made sport pvp very popular, but I always thought it was through incentives moreso than gameplay.  DAoC remains the best group vs group or RvR MMO pvp game I've played to date.  So much was done right in that game that it seems a crime to not carry much of it forward.  Perhaps the fear was that DAoC v2.0 would only garner DAoC numbers.  I think that all it would take is exposure to the WoW pvp crowd to make DAoC v2.0 a success.  I'm naive like that. 

[Bismallah]

Or possibly DAOC 2 wasn't jiving with the EA bosses? Sure they bought Mythic but did they also buy the rights to all Mythic products? So if Mythic put out a DAOC 2 would the DAOC label/realms/gameplay/ideas remain proprietary to Mythic?

[eldaec]

Design was pre-EA, and I doubt EA go that close to it tbh.

The reason given was that good RvR would make the game too much like daoc. I have no idea why that was deemed to be a bad thing.

I wonder if it's that an illusion exists that a game like WoW will have WoW-like numbers?  WoW made sport pvp very popular, but I always thought it was through incentives moreso than gameplay.  DAoC remains the best group vs group or RvR MMO pvp game I've played to date.  So much was done right in that game that it seems a crime to not carry much of it forward.  Perhaps the fear was that DAoC v2.0 would only garner DAoC numbers.  I think that all it would take is exposure to the WoW pvp crowd to make DAoC v2.0 a success.  I'm naive like that. 

You may be right.

But a bit of common sense should really have told people that imitating WoW was never going to beat WoW either.

[Grim]

Nothing to see.

[Arthur_Parker]

That's complete crap, the Warhammer IP is very different to Blizzards version of Warcraft.  If anything the Warhammer IP let Mythic get carried away in making destruction too attractive.  Don't make me link a webcomic.

[raydeen]

That's complete crap, the Warhammer IP is very different to Blizzards version of Warcraft.  If anything the Warhammer IP let Mythic get carried away in making destruction too attractive.  Don't make me link a webcomic.

If you're referring to that one Penny-Arcade strip from a year or two ago, the link would be worth it if only for the froth that Tycho goes into when Gabe dares to compare WoW to WAR. That was hands down one of the funniest things I've ever read. I know a guy who talks just like that.

[eldaec]

Which is why I think there was a lot of common sense flooding into Microsoft when they cancelled the Halo MMO. Warhammer was in an even worse position: It's IP was essentially copied and made less "dark" by Blizzard way back in the day. They don't even have the advantage of feeling like they're in drastically different universes.

This is half right.

WAR doesn't have the advantage of a dramatically different universe to WoW.

But the reason is that on a thematic level WAR isn't anything like Warhammer.

If WAR had been based on Warhammer, it might have been easier to differentiate from WoW.

[Grim]

That's complete crap, the Warhammer IP is very different to Blizzards version of Warcraft.  If anything the Warhammer IP let Mythic get carried away in making destruction too attractive.  Don't make me link a webcomic.

Nothing to see.

[Grim]

Nothing to see.

[Soln]

That's complete crap, the Warhammer IP is very different to Blizzards version of Warcraft.  If anything the Warhammer IP let Mythic get carried away in making destruction too attractive.  Don't make me link a webcomic.

If you're referring to that one Penny-Arcade strip from a year or two ago, the link would be worth it if only for the froth that Tycho goes into when Gabe dares to compare WoW to WAR. That was hands down one of the funniest things I've ever read. I know a guy who talks just like that.

bam.

[ghost]

But the reason is that on a thematic level WAR isn't anything like Warhammer.

WAR seems to take a lot from the Warhammer game to me.....

[Arthur_Parker]

Trolls are different, yay?

Virtually nothing about the problems WAR has are down to the IP, except balance issues caused by the attraction of Destruction (I'd say that's Mythic's fault rather than the IP considering the IP doesn't have 2 realms) .  Crap was too kind, you typed all that shit and still don't get it, why don't you make another list with LOTRO this time and completely miss the point again. 

They jumped at the chance of making a fantasy game instead of Romans in Space, they grabbed the Warhammer licence which  is one of the more interesting fantasy licenses.  They tried and failed to copy WoW the game, not WoW the IP, the Warhammer IP is one of the few positive points they have going for them.  Otherwise name a fantasy IP that they would have been better off with?  Tool.

[Arthur_Parker]

I'm not enough of a Warhammer lore nut to say

Say something we don't know.

[Grim]

Trolls are different, yay?

Virtually nothing about the problems WAR has are down to the IP, except balance issues caused by the attraction of Destruction (I'd say that's Mythic's fault rather than the IP considering the IP doesn't have 2 realms) .  Crap was too kind, you typed all that shit and still don't get it, why don't you make another list with LOTRO this time and completely miss the point again. 

They jumped at the chance of making a fantasy game instead of Romans in Space, they grabbed the Warhammer licence which  is one of the more interesting fantasy licenses.  They tried and failed to copy WoW the game, not WoW the IP, the Warhammer IP is one of the few positive points they have going for them.  Otherwise name a fantasy IP that they would have been better off with?  Tool.

Nothing to see.

[Grim]

I'm not enough of a Warhammer lore nut to say

Say something we don't know.

Nothing to see.

[hammurabi]

What went wrong is basically everything in beta.  I beta tested from June '07 until late spring of '08 when it was clear that the game couldn't be salvaged and was a big steaming pile of shit.

I maintained a beta diary of sorts during that time and thought you folks might like to take a look at it.  For reference, I haven't played WAR retail and won't, but I was a member of an 8man guild in DAOC for a long time, then went to wow, then went back to DAOC for the classic servers.  I've also played EQ, AC1, PS, LOTRO, SB, etc. etc. etc.  Big wall of text INC:

June 16 '07 #1:  Got in!  Finally!  Downloading files now along with the other four guildies who got in during the first wave.  No download manager, and the download site keeps timing out.

June 16 '07 #2:  Hmm, files keep timing out or claiming they're corrupted when I click the EXE and it checks the four bins upon download success.  They're like 1 gig each with no par files or other method of recovery.  Logged into the beta forums and there are like 100 threads since the F&F alpha, but no md5s.  Lots of threads popping up with everyone else having the same problem.  Looks like there are about 100 people viewing the forums.  Keep trying, will post md5s when/if I get this dl'd.

June 17 '07:  Well, I finally downloaded all files and got them to install.  Posted md5s but no response when I asked why Mythic wouldn't post them on the download page or the forums.  Can't login, servers down.

June 19 '07:  Logged in, crashed to desktop (CTD) in 5 minutes.  Forums blowing up, everyone having CTD issues.  Guildies can't even get in game before CTDing.  Engineer looks cool for what little bit I saw of it.  Dorf area is pretty buggy.  Rolled a Choppa, greenskin area looks a lot more 'polished' and has some neat shit.  First PQ was boring as fuck even with 5 other ppl in the area, prolly cuz they keep crashing.  No RVR areas yet.

June 30 '07:  Just saw on the forums that they're finally tossing up the Empire open RVR area.  New client to download and STILL no md5s or a download manager.  Seems like filefront is horrible, can't take the whole 100-150ish ppl downloading the client without shitting the bed.  Update:  downloaded and installed at 3:00AM, posted md5s for other testers.

July 1 '07:  As expected, the 100 people playing the game repeatedly crashed the dorf T1 RVR area.  This crappy DAOC engine can't really handle any more than 10 people onscreen at once.  Forum announcement that you can't talk about the game AT ALL on guild forums, irc, or even on ventrilo.  Way to deny your game some free publicity!

July 8 '07:  Pretty much no real CC in the game (like MEZ or STUN), and everything's broken.  The PQs have an obvious progression through T2 and since there's no quest content (or its broken) chaining PQs with AE is the way to go.  No real RVR in T1 or T2 in greenskin areas except for zerging from one warcamp to the other.  The forums have maybe 30 active people, even though popular estimates say some 2000 have been invited (including F&F alpha).  It's pretty much dead in-game aside from guildies.  Still can't make the guild, in fact.  /who command finally makes an appearance, and primetime pop is about 30-50 per faction in the last week.  Announced they'll have a modular UI just like WOW, but with significant 'restrictions' which weren't disclosed.  Also, lots of feedback in the C&C forum on stats not doing anything for anyone - any stat accumulation is worthless.  The only thing that works is AC.

July 21 '07:  Why the fuck don't they have any keeps or castles or towers in RVR?  RVR is a fucking zergfest.  No answer to tons of feedback on the forums about how to do RVR - almost everyone wants DAOC 2.0 and MBJ says absolutely no DAOC 2.0, but we will have BGs?!?  WTbad.  Hope it's not like WOW BGs, but I'm sure it will be.  Seriously, that's been done before, Mark, and it caters to some people, but you better make sure it's not the emphasis.  The zone control map from the marketing department makes me cringe.  It's basically PVE to RVR, kinda like cap city raids in WOW originally.  Lots of questions why/how they think they're gonna launch retail this year, shit's obviously borked.  Near constant discussion on forums of the wrong direction the game's dev. is taking.  There is only one good idea in the whole dev plan so far - PQs - but if they don't scale (rewards and difficulty) with the number of people participating, they're gonna suck ass when they're nerfed (coming soon).  Inf rewards are pretty much horrible across the board.

Aug 3 '07:  Big wave of invites and a huge influx of new blood on the forums.  200 people viewing.  WAR doesn't really have any RVR system yet, and the tactics/MAs are horrible.  Quests for every racial pairing are pretty nonexistent past T1, and what's there is broken.  Lots of feedback in-game.  Stupid feedback forms popup every time you exit a contested zone or complete a quest/PQ.  They popup at the worst fucking times.  Engineer is fun with AE CC.  Itemization is still a huge problem, looks like gear was given random stats, even set pieces.  RVR gear is the best you can get, but getting RR is rough, so you only use that gear in T1 and the beginning of T2.  Don't feel like any toons are getting better with more stats.

Aug 14 '07:  Hahahahahahahaha fucking crybabies complaining about exploiting engineer's AE snare nade and explosive MA.  Every tick of the snare pops an explosion for extra dmg.  Killed like 20-40 people in huge meatbombs a bunch of times in Dorf T1.  Made a thread about it in the C&C forum telling them it needed to be nerfed, no red response.  Had to post screenshots of the ridiculous ownage.  Got four separate threads from crybabies.  Too bad I can't kill anyone 1on1 if they snare me :(.  The game has so many bugs that ppl don't really have any good feedback on the forums unless they're fanbois of the Warhammer IP, but MBJ is starting to ban testers if they trash the game concepts too much.  No clue how they're gonna release in 2007.

Aug 23 '07:  New client again, and another ridiculous 8gig download with NO DL MANAGER OR MD5S POSTED.  Thank god other ppl are getting a clue posting md5s.  Rolled a BW, kinda gimpy with a shit firecage and horrible dots.  Some of the tactics at 22 look crazy good, with mana regen and AE fireball with a crit stun component.  Big discussion on art direction lacking compared to WOW, three years later.  The graphics in WAR just aren't very good, which reminds me of the gameplay.  Animations are all fucked up across the board, and interacting with the environment (like gathering quests) doesn't work 99% of the time.  B still can't login due to CTDs which appeared with the new client.  No news on crafting, although "YOU'RE GONNA LOVE IT!!!™" from MBJ.  Classically bad.  No 3rd realm pretty much eliminates all RVR dynamic, although the lore squad on the forums claims there can't be a 3rd realm due to IP conflicts.  Whatever.  Did Mythic learn anything from what happened to DAOC after TOA?  All this focus on PVE and it still sucks.  Doesn't bode well for a PVP game.

Sept 1 '07:  BW is pretty much the ultimate farming toon.  Super easy, but itemization is still horrible.  Engineer nerfed, which was needed.  Quests are still horrible and don't seem to be getting any better.  We keep telling them to do something like DAOC for RVR, since RVR doesn't exist, but they continue to tell us to bugger off.  Paul is an idiot.  I hear from the devs inside that all he does is cause chaos and interrupt people, with the full backing of "The Hickman."  Peas in a fucking pod.  Seriously, the marketing is horrible.  It's essentially only WAAAAAAAGH YOU'RE GONNA LOVE IT!!!™ and nobody believes it besides the fanbois with their Warhammer dildos.  Failhammer.

Sept 9 '07:  Yeah, not gonna launch this year.  Devs have been told they get a 3mo reprieve on the deadline.  Announcement soon.  Apparently now we're gonna start having "focus testing" sometime around the holidays because they don't have a department specifically focused on categorizing and cataloging all the feedback.  Pretty much 50 active people on the forums out of 3000ish invites.  Primetime pops are down to 20-35 each side.  Everyone logs in for the first two or three days after a patch (in which they spend an entire day trying and retrying to download this shit), then logoff in disgust.  Man on the inside says morale is high at HQ but feedback is bad.  Each department's devs are supposed to look at their team's feedback and categorize it themselves.  Can't believe they don't have another department doing that... the devs are fucking developing, not reading fluffy bunny feedback from dick-in-ass fanbois.  Devs are overwhelmed with the feedback, and I'm guessing that's not overwhelmed in a good way.

Sept 18 '07:  Down for a week.  But, YOU'RE GONNA LOVE IT WHEN WE COME BACK!!!™  God... MBJ is pretty clearly biased and is pushing bad ideas.  Any direct criticism of him results in a permban from the beta.  He's like the forum police.  Almost all of the pro testers are old DAOC/EQ/AC1 types.  Everyone's played WOW.  Everyone wants DAOC RVR + WOW PVE - 40man (25man) raids.  Leveling through RVR doesn't happen, although I guess scenarios are going to provide that.  RP distribution doesn't really happen right, as it's based on "contribution" which is obviously skewed.  Healers get more contribution than everyone.  Why can't they just copy the method in DAOC?  It's like they're trying to reinvent the wheel ON EVERYTHING. T3 & T4 are a shithole.  Spent an hour making a post proving how bad the new chicken mechanic is, how it prevents helping, and how the imbalance of T3 (no chicken for lvl 40 in T3) will make it pretty much an epic disaster.  All zones seem very constricted but huge and boring at the same time.  RVR seems to try to funnel you into chokepoints in T3 and T4 and pretty much nobody does it.  There are 20 people in T4 on a daily basis, and they're all only doing PQs.  Still no instanced dungeons.  We've done the PQ progression from 1-40 in 5 nights.  Pretty much the worst PVE in any game since LOTRO.  Tried telling them they need separate lvl 40 RVR-only zones but fell on deaf ears.

Sept 29 '07:  Great.  First wave of nerfs and the announcement of something they said they wouldn't do - STEALTH.  WTF?!?  Hahahahahaha ok.  Again several of us tried to appeal to them regarding lifting the NDA or loosening it a bit, but no luck.  Most of the big daoc 8man guilds are positive about WAR and it hurts not being able to tell them how bad it is.  Still no UI modding, no idea when that's happening.  Bela is the big nig of that gig right now, although they have him working on categorizing feedback as a part time telecommuting employee.  Hah.  Apparently any NDA leaks are being PROSECUTED.  Yikes.  Hope they don't find out about our guild forums!  :)  Big discussions about crafting and some great ideas from testers about how to create a crafting system that's both beneficial and helps the economy.  Lots of references to EVE, but nobody wants Spreadsheets Online.  Just the level of market research in EVE is cool.  Overall, WAR feels like all the worst implementations of features from other games rolled into one.  How hard is it to copy the good from WOW and DAOC and make a game around it?  Jesus FUCK!  There's not a single point in the game that's fun other than fast leveling via AE PQ farming, and that's only good with the hope & promise of *something* to do at cap.  For now, there's exactly jack and shit in RVR and no real PVE.  What PVE there is can be duo'd or trio'd easily.

Oct. 14 '07:  Looks like the game's down again after several nights of unplayable zone crashing.  In a nutshell, nothing is even close to ready.  They're dumping the tactic and morale ability mechanics and replacing with ... unknown.  The overall state of the game thread by MBJ has been a disaster.  Several bans.  PVE is horrible.  No instanced dungeons.  No working map markers.  No UI mods.  No bank.  No Auction house.  No mail.  No mounts.  No mounted combat.  Pets suck.  Stats still do nothing.  PQs getting nerfed.  Quests buggy as shit.  No incentive to RVR.  RVR that exists is just mindless zerging like WOW beta's TM town-to-town zergs.  Tome isn't revolutionary (and doesn't work).  No crafting.  BGs still supposedly coming.  Still no download manager or official md5s.  No patching mechanism.  Tons of red feedback on the forums but it's all pretty much useless.  They're making the game they want you to play, not the game you want to play.  Typical Mythic.  No clue how they think this is gonna be ready in March '08.  


That's pretty much the first half of my beta diary.  The beta never really was very popular, even though so many thousands were clamoring to get in.  My beta diary goes significantly downhill after their 1mo holiday layoff becomes 10 weeks and results in focus testing.

I'll think about editing the 2nd half of the beta diary later.  A synopsis of it would be that my guildmates and pretty much all RL and online acquaintances end up hating the game and comparing the beta test to the TL positions from DAOC.  Even if 100% of the feedback was bad on a particular mechanic, Mythic still stubbornly went forward with it.  Focus testing was a disaster and almost all of the huge problems everyone's complaining about now were discussed ad infinitum in beta forums, at least before they started banning people for criticizing the beta.

[Rasix]

 

[tolakram]

Nice wall of text, you were so positive going in I'm quite surprised you didn't like it.  


For some good content and great ideas it's always fun to review this thread:

http://forums.f13.net/index.php?topic=11052.0

There are some older threads too, of course, but that one has some commentary that, to me, predicts some of the issues WAR is having today.

It also gives me some hope that the game can be fixed, even though the fix might not satisfy some here.

Too bad hrose had to bogue out, some of his/her? posts were excellent.

[Grim]

What went wrong is basically everything in beta.  I beta tested from June '07 until late spring of '08 when it was clear that the game couldn't be salvaged and was a big steaming pile of shit.

I maintained a beta diary of sorts during that time and thought you folks might like....
I'll think about editing the 2nd half of the beta diary later.  A synopsis of it would be that my guildmates and pretty much all RL and online acquaintances end up hating the game and comparing the beta test to the TL positions from DAOC.  Even if 100% of the feedback was bad on a particular mechanic, Mythic still stubbornly went forward with it.  Focus testing was a disaster and almost all of the huge problems everyone's complaining about now were discussed ad infinitum in beta forums, at least before they started banning people for criticizing the beta.

Nothing to see.