EQ 'Next'

[pants]

[Surlyboi]

SWG died because of executive greed and mismanagement, not because it was a failure.

On point. If it weren't for a desire by a crew if people that didn't know their collective asses from a Salaac pit, SWG could've survived with fairly decent numbers. Instead, they saw WoW, thought they could hop on that bandwagon by upping the shiny and screwed the pooch  

Also, we need houses made of fetuses and tits.

[Paelos]

The fact that nobody has even tried to replicate SWG's crafting system is beyond stupid to me. It was amazing. Unless you make differentiation in your items crafted, it's pointless to even have the system in place.

[Stormwaltz]

I thought I was the only one who still had that image...

[Margalis]

The forum has had this argument before, as far back as 2004 but I can't be arsed to search for it.  What sandbox has arisen in those 9 years that leads anyone to believe we're going to see another big success in the next 5?  Particularly since, as you allude to, MMOs in the traditional sense are dying.  Lobby-based microtrans games are the future of the next 5 years.  (Which is why I suspect Blizzard scrapped Titan, which was likely following the old model.)

Most MMOs range from moderate successes to dire failures. Theme park games have had larger successes, but also a far larger number of entries, especially big budget entries, so it's only natural that a larger absolute number would succeed.

Sandbox MMOs are in many ways more fitting for micro-transaction models. Will there be a big sandbox success in the next 5 years? I have no idea, because that involves someone attempting to competently make one on a reasonable budget. However I don't see any reason to believe that a good MMO sandbox would still be doomed to failure.

SWG was a totally broken game on a number of levels and still did OK. Minecraft has a lot in common with a sandbox MMO and is huge.

[Fabricated]

If anyone gets it right it'll be entirely by blind luck and not by their design documents or budget.

[Scold]

For EQN to be successful, the world is going to have to be very large.

Or individual servers very small. I'd still like to see the "neighborhood" server concept seriously tried. A "soft cap" of ~500 active accounts, beyond which you have to be "invited in" by a guild.

But the "where everybody knows your name" server is my personal pie in the sky.

I would love this.  Back when I played NWN persistent world servers it was basically just like this.  I've been waiting for something similar for a decade.

The 2d MMO I've been playing around at building with various tools for quite some time theoretically works on exactly this principle.

[patience]

Counterpoint: Runescape is sandboxy and has more active players than any MMO except possibly WoW (I think they're both on about 10 million).

This always surprises me. In twelve years ince its launch I have never met a single person playing Runescape, I've never met anyone playing Runescape, and I've never met anyone who said they at least played Runescape at some point. Did you? Where are these 10 million hiding?

I played Runescape during the 1st 2 years then took a break for a year. I actually subbed for 4 months but had to quit because Runescape required constant left clicking to do anything. It was very easy because I could literally do real work and just slip back in at 5-10 second intervals to do an action without having to worry about positioning. When you do something like that for days on end you cripple your hand. I'm glad it wasn't permanent.

[Scold]

I played Runescape for maybe 6 months back in the day.

[Venkman]

SWG died because of executive greed and mismanagement, not because it was a failure.

That is true. However, when I say "fail", I mean in the business sense of not having achieved what was expected. And the reason it didn't are because of a bunch of factors stemming from what the game was trying to be versus what ended up actually shipping versus the dissonance between what Star Wars fans expected versus what MMO players expected.

The most functional systems were the ones the smallest percentage of players cared about, whereas the front and center ones all marketing departments need to use to sell a game of that scale were broken on a scale from can-be-worked-around to you-let-this-ship?!

The game failed on day one (literally, unplayable). It failed in many different systems, shedding players before those were fixed. They pulled it together over the first two or so years, when the remaining players (including me) were having a great time, having seen the game improved or managed to work around the bugs. But then the big shocker came, and the rest is history.

I think we all agree that if World of Warcraft launched today in the same way that it launched in 2004, the outcome would be different.

I love these kinds of questions In some timeline, WoW is launching in 2013. However, it wouldn't be up against all of the iterations from LOTRO through GW2, because those wouldn't have shipped those ways without the specific steps that followed WoW or failed because they didn't.

So how would the space have evolved through 2013? Continually inched up through more incremental records of subs? Earlier import of Asian-style MMOs and business models? SWG gotten proper resources to finish what was started rather than all the good stuff ripped out to make way for a totally different game, such that it's big enough for iteration?

There's room for a sandbox, especially a multi-device/multi-screen experience. We just need someone to take a BIG chance at a time when everyone seems to prefer taking small ones.

[Lantyssa]

That is true. However, when I say "fail", I mean in the business sense of not having achieved what was expected. And the reason it didn't are because of a bunch of factors stemming from what the game was trying to be versus what ended up actually shipping versus the dissonance between what Star Wars fans expected versus what MMO players expected.

When what is expected is wholly unrealistic, it's not the product which failed but the evaluation of its worth.  Companies need to spend more time considering how to put out a solid product rather than finding suckers to pay for a mediocre one.

That SWG did as well as it did despite its hiccups speaks to how good the idea was.

[koro]

But did SWG do as well as it did because of the game itself, or the license?

[Paelos]

But did SWG do as well as it did because of the game itself, or the license?

The license. The game itself outside of being a full-time crafter wasn't good.

Were I to take what we know of that system and compare it to the achiever combat system, I would have the mats drop from bosses, and those be fully tradable to crafters who make all the equipment. And those mats would have various levels of quality just like the rest of the mats. People would farm bosses for the highest level of quality and trade the lower versions, establishing markets within markets.

[Surlyboi]

But did SWG do as well as it did because of the game itself, or the license?

The license. The game itself outside of being a full-time crafter wasn't good.

Were I to take what we know of that system and compare it to the achiever combat system, I would have the mats drop from bosses, and those be fully tradable to crafters who make all the equipment. And those mats would have various levels of quality just like the rest of the mats. People would farm bosses for the highest level of quality and trade the lower versions, establishing markets within markets.

Negative.

If the game existed without the license, it'd still be alive. The need to push for WoW-like numbers was tied completely to the fact that LA thought the license should have been bringing in more players.

[Paelos]

That's not related to the license. That's the people running it with an expectations gap.

What pulled in people to the game wasn't the ability to play a moisture farmer, even though that turned out to be really fun.

[Furiously]

That's not related to the license. That's the people running it with an expectations gap.

What pulled in people to the game wasn't the ability to play a moisture farmer, even though that turned out to be really fun.

I just wanted to dance!

[MediumHigh]

License pulled in the players that made the playerbase that stuck around where others fled, and kept playing till it was closed. If it was released minus a major IP it would have crashed and burn.

[Lantyssa]

Both.

The license got the initial views, but the world is what kept the people in the end.  I suspect it would have been more EVE-like in growth and growing problems had it been an unknown IP.

The NGE saw their numbers crater, so gameplay was a factor.  But without the IP, what kind of resources would it have had?  It's tough to say what the outcome would have been under differing circumstances.  The only thing we can know for sure is not to take a dump on the players you have in pursuit of players you want.

[Ingmar]

I was under the impression that the NGE 'crater' was just a small crater inside the larger crater of everyone else who tried it and quit.

[Rasix]

It was a Russian doll of craters.  There was the "Holy shit, where's my lightsaber" crater, the minor "buggy piece of shit" and "land of broken dev promises" craters,  the CU crater.. and I'm sure I'm missing some craters. The only positive thing the game ever did post launch was player towns.   Before then the post live development time line should be best viewed with Yakety Sax playing in the background.

edit:  Wait, was JTL good?  I seriously don't remember. I think only the diehards were left at that point.

[Ingmar]

But did SWG do as well as it did because of the game itself, or the license?

The license. The game itself outside of being a full-time crafter wasn't good.

Were I to take what we know of that system and compare it to the achiever combat system, I would have the mats drop from bosses, and those be fully tradable to crafters who make all the equipment. And those mats would have various levels of quality just like the rest of the mats. People would farm bosses for the highest level of quality and trade the lower versions, establishing markets within markets.

I only just noticed the 2nd half of this post. Yes, clearly, the solution for the only game that's ever made crafters happy, is to make them beholden to raiders for their materials. 

[Sjofn]

The thing with NGE, as I understand it, is that it was just ... stupid. SWG had its core of diehards who were never, ever going to quit unless something like NGE happened, sort of like how UO and DAoC still have their crazy-ass players, but SWG had a lot more of them (I think?). So it was this really weird "Everyone loses! Yay!" decision.

[Lantyssa]

Yes, that.

While the other craters were significant in volume compared to boxes at launch, every large game had that decline in some fashion.  (EQ peak 800k to now.  Conan and WAR 1 million to nada.  WoW's millions of churn [they just still have millions...])  This was a huge number in one fell swoop two or three years into the life of the game.

JtL was excellent.  Should have been a part of the base game, but it was good.

[Furiously]

I know only one thing...that's dont argue with Lant in a SWG thread.

[Surlyboi]

Or me. JTL was the best thing about the game. And I ground out a jedi before the CU.

[Simond]

https://www.everquestnext.com/

The lamentations of the neckbeards about shoulderpads has already started and it is glorious.

[Sky]

I just wanted to dance!

[Sjofn]

https://www.everquestnext.com/

The lamentations of the neckbeards about shoulderpads has already started and it is glorious.

PUT ON SOME FUCKING PANTS, LADIES

ARGH

They don't ALL have to be wearing pants, but come on. Give ONE of those ladies a pair of pants. The world wouldn't end!

[Abelian75]

Don't give up.  There's still one last hope for female pants behind one of those blacked-out figures.

Spoiler:  She won't have pants.

[Merusk]

While the piece says it's a 'reimagining' of Parkinson's work, The Barbarian is the only direct riffs off of Parkinson's original work with regard to women's pants.
http://www.keithparkinson.com/images/eq.jpg

I figure the DE not having pants is just to fit in, though it might be a riff off the "Blue Butt" syndrome DE's had in the original.  Leather pants were assless. 

Firiona won't have pants.  She's always been the chest-heaving, half-naked bondage princess of the franchise.

http://www.keithparkinson.com/images/rok.jpg

[Paelos]

Pants are overrated. I only wear them because society makes me.

[palmer_eldritch]

While the piece says it's a 'reimagining' of Parkinson's work, The Barbarian is the only direct riffs off of Parkinson's original work with regard to women's pants.
http://www.keithparkinson.com/images/eq.jpg

I figure the DE not having pants is just to fit in, though it might be a riff off the "Blue Butt" syndrome DE's had in the original.  Leather pants were assless.  

Firiona won't have pants.  She's always been the chest-heaving, half-naked bondage princess of the franchise.

http://www.keithparkinson.com/images/rok.jpg

I like the way the Erudite in that first painting is looking at Firiona's boobies and saying "hmmm".

[Kageru]

That art is so strongly tied in my mind to dragon-lance books and other 80's indiscretions.

[Surlyboi]

Firiona will be back?

[Merusk]

Yes, as will Nagafen.  When you hover over the dragon and the elf they name them both as such.  Which leads me to believe it's a reboot of the old world rather than a continuation from EQ2's lore.  (Whoops, Nag unlocked since I last went to the page. He's there now.)