Warhammer Hits 800k Players

[Arthur_Parker]

Linky

Hangame and EA to Bring Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning to Korea

Mythic Entertainment's Critically Acclaimed MMORPG Brings the
Game's Signature Realm vs Realm, Public Quests and City Siege Battles
to Korea

SEOUL, South Korea, Nov 13, 2008 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- NHN's Hangame, Korea's largest game portal, and Electronic Arts Inc. (NASDAQ:ERTS), a leading developer and publisher of interactive entertainment, announced today that two companies have signed a multi-year agreement for Hangame to publish the critically acclaimed Massively Multiplayer Role-playing Game (MMORPG) Warhammer(R) Online: Age of Reckoning(TM) (WAR) in Korea. This agreement further expands the reach of WAR with servers to be available in North America, Europe, Asia and Oceanic territories.

Developed by Mythic Entertainment, WAR is a groundbreaking new MMORPG that launched in North America, Europe, Asia and Oceanic territories in September and has attracted more than 800,000 registered users since launch. The game will be launched in Korea in 2009.
..............
"I am thrilled to be working with Hangame to bring Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning to the Korean gamers," states Mark Jacobs, general manager of Mythic Entertainment. "Warhammer is a remarkably rich and exciting fantasy world and we've seen it truly come to life as an MMORPG thanks to the passion and enthusiasm of our fans. By partnering with Hangame, we hope to provide Korean gamers with a fresh, new fantasy experience and years' worth of Realm vs. Realm adventures on the frontlines of WAR."

Wook Jung, Director of Hangame, said that "it is an honor to publish Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning in Korea. It is a true MMORPG masterpiece which has received an astonishing response and rave reviews from critics and gamers around the world. With the addition of WAR to the NHN game platform and global network, we continue to expand our services in order to provide gamers in Korea with high quality games through various channels."

"I am very pleased about the mutual beneficial cooperation that we have entered into with Hangame and we will give our best efforts to meet the expectation of our gamers as well as maintain the good working relationship with Hangame," said Savannah Hahn, Vice President of Electronic Arts Asia Pacific and President of Electronic Arts Korea.

[schild]

Warhammer Hits 800k Players

800,000 registered users since launch.

Those two things don't mean the same thing.

[Arthur_Parker]

EA Results

Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning, an MMO from EA’s Mythic Entertainment
studio, sold 1.2 million copies in the quarter – with over 800 thousand current players.

I guess they don't want to use "current players" in an official press release any more, most likely because their "current players" total took a walk off a cliff in the last few weeks.

[Bismallah]

EA Results

Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning, an MMO from EA’s Mythic Entertainment
studio, sold 1.2 million copies in the quarter – with over 800 thousand current players.

I guess they don't want to use "current players" in an official press release any more, most likely because their "current players" total took a walk off a cliff in the last few weeks.

This is what I find humorous, someone pointed out (on VN) that normally on various game related boards you hear talk about class balance, pvp differences, dungeons, etc... whereas nearly all the boards you check on WAR the posts are about how the game is taking a shit, there is no one to play with, transfers what are the true subscription rates, where the fuck is everyone, etc... They are totally not focused on the typical types of issues, they are still trying to figure out what the hell happened to their player base.

[Lantyssa]

I wonder what it's like today.  Oddly, I can't be bothered to log in and find out.

[Arthur_Parker]

Linky

More on the Korea thing.

Hangame, which is operated by South Korea's NHN Corporation, will be introducing WAR to over 30 million registered members, 3 million daily visitors, and 280,000 concurrent users on its site. The company offers a variety of titles, including free, in-house developed casual games and pay-to-pay MMORPGs like Archlord and Ragnarok 2.

"It is an honor to publish Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning in Korea," says Hangame director Wook Jung. "With the addition of WAR to the NHN game platform and global network, we continue to expand our services in order to provide gamers in Korea with high quality games through various channels

[khaine]

They'll have two glaring things going against them right off the bat

Aion , close to launching in Asia and the current beta is receiving tons of praise

Also Aion to Lineage2 and others run off a version of the UT engine that is fast , responsive, and can handle tons of players in one spot with effects going off , once they get a sample of a 100 main castle siege going to a crawl it'll be dropped immediately

[Bismallah]

They'll have two glaring things going against them right off the bat

Aion , close to launching in Asia and the current beta is receiving tons of praise

Also Aion to Lineage2 and others run off a version of the UT engine that is fast , responsive, and can handle tons of players in one spot with effects going off , once they get a sample of a 100 main castle siege going to a crawl it'll be dropped immediately

I agree that fast, responsive, and can handle tons of players in one spot with effects going off is not something I would even come close to saying about WAR and will be a major turn off for most Asian gamers. It's gonna tank massively in Asia. Is Games Workshop even that recognized over there??

Looking at Aion, it will crush WAR over there.

[waylander]

Even with the server mergers, all the servers I saw at prime time last night just had medium populations.

[Arthur_Parker]

Is Games Workshop even that recognized over there??

Looking at Aion, it will crush WAR over there.

Linky

Not that well known, 4 GW stores in Japan, nothing in Korea after having a quick look.

Even with the server mergers, all the servers I saw at prime time last night just had medium populations.

I'm not really surprised, merges were only going to have a short term positive effect, there's too much wrong.  The zones are too big, the playerbase is too split up and having fun in game just relies on other players too much.  WoW has killed EU server populations too, we haven't even had the 1st merge yet.

I wonder if a slightly higher percentage of Order players are leaving the game compared to Destruction, just based on the lower Order populations.  If so, even if it's only a tiny fraction more, the side imbalance is just going to keep snowballing as they merge.

[Bismallah]

Ah excellent, thanks for that end of year statement pdf.

Arther, I can say from personal experience that Destruction just "clicked" for me in groups. I don't want to jump on the bandwagon with "omg Destruction looks so bad ass" but the group dynamic of Destruction based players is very solid. I played a WP to 38 and I saw no one, I was around no one, in groups I didnt feel like I really added anything except some weak ass heals then ran out of RF and got killed or lost group mates who then yelled at you for not healing them. Destruction was the complete opposite. My Shaman could heal like whoa, do damage, and still come out through things my WP would have died in a heartbeat to, but most classes felt like that. The WE is so superior to the WH it's almost a joke. Sure folks dig on the BWs, but how many high level Sorcs you see out there wtfowning most Scenarios? I saw dozens.

Monolith is a great example of what happens to free transfers from multiple servers with multiple options. One side gangs up and says, let's own the whole fucking server. Fuck them guys. Well... what happens in the end is the opposition gives the server the finger and Destruction is left playing with their dicks trying to find someone to fight. So you take Altdorf, big whoop. If you dont crash in the process you will have next to no opposition and it all resets after a short time regardless.

WAR had lots of potential. I am just amazed that it fell so flat on it's face like it did so fast, and really that's the honest to gods truth, I really am amazed that it shit the bed so damn fast. As they used to say in the military, you can't polish a turd.

[tazelbain]

Since you started with WP, its no wonder you didn't click with groups.

[Bismallah]

Yeah I know. I kinda wished I had done something else at creation but once I hit the wall of grind I couldnt do it again with another character so stuck with it. I did change all my gear out near the end, got a 1H hammer and book and healed pretty good. Not RP good, but good none the less.

[waffel]

WP should never be able to heal as well as a shaman or RP. Shaman/RP can never melee as well as a WP. To expect anything different shows an ignorance to class descriptions.

[Nebu]

WP should never be able to heal as well as a shaman or RP. Shaman/RP can never melee as well as a WP. To expect anything different shows an ignorance to class descriptions.

If you spec for it, the damage from a shaman or a RP is pretty decent.  I don't see any problem with this.  Giving healers the ability to spec either for damage or heals is a good thing.  Options are a good thing... especially in a game where leveling another toon would cause an exit. 

[Kail]

WP should never be able to heal as well as a shaman or RP. Shaman/RP can never melee as well as a WP. To expect anything different shows an ignorance to class descriptions.

The problem is less with class descriptions and more with usefulness.  A WP or DoK has worse armor than a tank, worse DPS than a DPS, and worse healing than another healer.  What are they supposed to do?  On the front lines, they aren't very useful, as they do mediocre damage, lack a lot of CC, and tend to draw a lot of fire.  On the back lines, they're worse than any other healer at everything except weak AoE and HoTs.  They're awesome in solo situations (in PvE, my DoK can take on two mobs plus a champion without falling below 50% health), but in terms of group dynamics, I don't know what their role is supposed to be.

[zubey]

I wonder what it's like today.  Oddly, I can't be bothered to log in and find out.

For what its worth, queues are very fast in tiers 1-3 on Gorfang, as of last night.    ORvR in tier2 (where I spend most of my time) has nightly primetime action at the keeps too.

We were a "destination" server for server transfers.

[Lantyssa]

Arther, I can say from personal experience that Destruction just "clicked" for me in groups. I don't want to jump on the bandwagon with "omg Destruction looks so bad ass" but the group dynamic of Destruction based players is very solid. I played a WP to 38 and I saw no one, I was around no one, in groups I didnt feel like I really added anything except some weak ass heals then ran out of RF and got killed or lost group mates who then yelled at you for not healing them. Destruction was the complete opposite. My Shaman could heal like whoa, do damage, and still come out through things my WP would have died in a heartbeat to, but most classes felt like that. The WE is so superior to the WH it's almost a joke. Sure folks dig on the BWs, but how many high level Sorcs you see out there wtfowning most Scenarios? I saw dozens.

I don't know why either, but I found it much easier on Destruction side, too.  Maybe it was because I was more into my character, but it felt easier to get into groups which worked and went from place to place doing things.  Other than guild groups, I can only think of once or twice where I did that on Order, and it was all in Tier 1.

[Hindenburg]

The problem is less with class descriptions and more with usefulness.  A WP or DoK has worse armor than a tank, worse DPS than a DPS, and worse healing than another healer.  What are they supposed to do?  On the front lines, they aren't very useful, as they do mediocre damage, lack a lot of CC, and tend to draw a lot of fire.  On the back lines, they're worse than any other healer at everything except weak AoE and HoTs.  They're awesome in solo situations (in PvE, my DoK can take on two mobs plus a champion without falling below 50% health), but in terms of group dynamics, I don't know what their role is supposed to be.

Provide group heals?
All I know, from playing several tanks (2 IB, 1 BO, 1 SM) and a melee (Mara) up to t2, is that wp/doks are an absolute pain to bring down, and that Absolute Devotion makes a SM with Phantom's Blade able to survive ludicrous shit. Divine Strike makes it all even worse.

Of course, to survive well, you need a tank with enough presence of mind to throw a Guard on you, and most won't do that because they're either retarded or had very bad experiences with WP/DoK's.

Since you've managed to have the patience to get past t2, something that I don't see myself doing any time soon, i'm guessing that the batshit insane dps ends up making you worthless?
--
Also, be glad that you decided to get a shaman. Zealots are horribly boring.

[Sophismata]

WP should never be able to heal as well as a shaman or RP. Shaman/RP can never melee as well as a WP. To expect anything different shows an ignorance to class descriptions.

That's not the way balance works.

[Tarami]

WP should never be able to heal as well as a shaman or RP. Shaman/RP can never melee as well as a WP. To expect anything different shows an ignorance to class descriptions.

That's not the way balance works.

That's why "true" hybrids never work well.

[Nebu]

That's why "true" hybrids never work well.

Mythic has had a classic history of not balancing hybrids well.  They tend to go through cycles or just seem built for the 1v1 game. 

[rk47]

lol turning chosen into a backline thorn-aura build worked pretty well too for my toon, was hiting like 100k+ dmg in scenarios and I didn't even had to plan anything with open zerg. Let loose with Dire Shielding and watch the numbers pop like crazy above mouth-breathing BWs heads. When 1.5 turn Baneshield into STR based skill, I'm definitely gonna make ass-plodes'

[Arthur_Parker]

GigaMedia Ltd. Q3 2008 Earnings Call Transcript

Into Warhammer Online, Age new game has been an enormous hit with gamers in the US. The game has sold over 1.2 million copies and has over 800,000 registered users already. We are now in the process of localizing the game for the Taiwan market. We expect to launch Warhammer Online for closed beta testing in Taiwan in Q1 2009 and open beta by Q2 next year.
...........
Warhammer has always been a ‘09 launch, and the game as you know the game is quite has been very well received in the US, we are just in the process of localizing the game and probably about 50% done in terms of localizing the game.

[pxib]

That's why "true" hybrids never work well.

Mythic has had a classic history of not balancing hybrids well.  They tend to go through cycles or just seem built for the 1v1 game. 

If the hybrid can do any of its tasks as ably as classes dedicated to those tasks, the folks playing the specialists tend to get upset. Still, so long as hybrids bring something unique to the table (like the unusual buffs and Robe-Wearing-Staff-Carrying of DAoC's Friar, or the blessings/totems of WoW's paladins/shamans) then they can still get groups even if its standard abilities are more ably covered by other classes. When they are truly a jack-of-all-trades and master-of-NONE, they'll find no advantages outside solo play and as choice of last resort.

[Sophismata]

If the hybrid can do any of its tasks as ably as classes dedicated to those tasks, the folks playing the specialists tend to get upset. Still, so long as hybrids bring something unique to the table (like the unusual buffs and Robe-Wearing-Staff-Carrying of DAoC's Friar, or the blessings/totems of WoW's paladins/shamans) then they can still get groups even if its standard abilities are more ably covered by other classes. When they are truly a jack-of-all-trades and master-of-NONE, they'll find no advantages outside solo play and as choice of last resort.

Depends entirely on the focus of your game. Large-scale cog in the machine play, yes, you want everyone to be as powerful as possible in a single role. Smaller scale? That flexibility is a godsend. One player falls, another can quickly step up to fill the gap.

[Fordel]

Make everyone a Hybrid and then everyone shuts the hell up about their classes right to being the best at <whatever>.

[Sophismata]

Yup, that's another way of handling it. People need to think outside the concept of a holy trinity of archetypes.