New World (MMORPG, Amazon Games)

[Riggswolfe]

What annoys me the most is that they made the game easier over the past year. Combat was slower and more challenging, if you were aggroed by two mobs you were always in trouble, and defending was a much more important factor. Clearly this was great according to me as it was much more *Souls-like, but their focus groups must have revealed that the majority wanted more faceroll mowing through enemies and everything accelerated and became a matter of offense only. I still think the combat is fun enough, but it took me a minute to realize why I was enjoying it less than in 2020's closed alpha.

Too bad, really.

Or the learned from other failed MMOs that had super hard and/or grindy content and died horrible deaths because of it. I played this back then and pretty much turned it off and never went back because I assumed that was what it would be at launch.

[Sir T]

That's one of the reasons Warframe continues to thrive - its pretty easy, and gives you lots of options to mow down the opposition.

[Falconeer]

Oh I am absolutely sure that they made the right call market wise, profit wise, majority-of-people wise.

Sucks to be me.

[Sir T]

Oh I hear you. One of the reasons Star Trek Online was a great game was that it gave the player the option to play in Normal mode or Elite mode in missions if you wanted a bit more of a challenge.

[Setanta]

[Or the learned from other failed MMOs that had super hard and/or grindy content and died horrible deaths because of it.

It's called Wildstar syndrome

Man did they totally misread their audience with that game.

[Falconeer]

As usual it's a matter of how many are willing to pay for one or the other system. There are MANY who liked the old system in New World and are pissed about the changes, but in the end are they enough to pay make a game like this a commercial success? Or are they more than those who would vote with their wallet for the simpler system? The answer is no.

[Trippy]

Yeah the Alpha players are all like “BRING BACK STAGGER”. I’ve only watched a few videos of what it used to be like and can’t really judge it against how it is now but watching the streams of people participating in the current wars with people running around unimpeded like their heads are cutoff is amusing. There’s not enough movement and counter-movement abilities, it feels like.

[Chimpy]

The problem with alpha players on MMOs is that the devs will always select the hard core poopsocker types from other games to be their early testers.

Which, granted, might be the only group of people willing to put time in to alpha test a game for a developer free of charge. But it leads to a bunch of games thinking that "WE CAN MAKE MONEY OFF THIS 85 DEGREE TREADMILL!".

[Trippy]

I understand Amazon wanting to broaden the appeal of the game. The problem is the game still has many of the original design decisions that only make sense in that context including things like free-for-all looting even in PvE (e.g. I can loot / skin somebody else's kill immediately with no timer to wait for), extremely limited fast travel, no mounts, and settlement-specific (non-global) storage.

[Chimpy]

My point was kinda the opposite (apologies if you weren’t replying to me), that by using the hardcore poop in a  sock crowd as the early feedback from the devs can get tunnel vision and think that they will not succeed unless they make the group they are interacting with happy. Which means shit that would help mass appeal like making the game actually fun and interesting rather than about how “hard” it was to get an “achievement” gets put on the back burner.

[Falconeer]

They certainly didn't get tunnel vision this time. In this case they did everything they could against said alpha sockpoopers and everything to appeal to the masses. As I said, having pooped in socks a lot in my life, I can attest that I liked the game more 1 year ago. But as a company that has to make revenues they almost certainly made the right decision by making me unhappy. The only uncertainty is if the combat in its present form retains some of the stickyness of the older one. This new one is floaty and a bit tasteless, as opposed to the filling crunchyness of the old one. This one can lead to boredom quicker.

[Zetor]

I mean, if the combat is only fun with sub-50 ping, I'd consider that a failure by itself...

[Falconeer]

I mean, if the combat is only fun with sub-50 ping, I'd consider that a failure by itself...

Is that true though?

[Chimpy]

If you want a wide audience, yes.

[Falconeer]

No, it is NOT true that the combat is only fun with sub-50 ping. Up to about ping 120 there are basically no noticeable differences with sub-30 let alone sub-50. It probably gets worse over 150, and that's how it should be. If you have more than 150 ping I feel bad for you but twitch multiplayer games are always going to suck.

And I have double and triple tested it to make sure. This is just another example of false information spreading when something is somewhat instinctively disliked by many.

EDIT: expanded a bit.

[Sky]

Next thing you're going to say that games don't require a 240Hz monitor to be fun!

[Sir T]

CRT for LIFE!

[Chimpy]

No, it is NOT true that the combat is only fun with sub-50 ping. Up to about ping 120 there are basically no noticeable differences with sub-30 let alone sub-50. It probably gets worse over 150, and that's how it should be. If you have more than 150 ping I feel bad for you but twitch multiplayer games are always going to suck.

And I have double and triple tested it to make sure. This is just another example of false information spreading when something is somewhat instinctively disliked by many.

EDIT: expanded a bit.

I don't think either Zetor or myself was commenting on this specific game but more on the general concept of games that require super low ping to be even remotely playable.

[Sky]

I enjoy people complaining that you can't play Rocksmith co-op over the Internet.

 

[Chimpy]

I enjoy people complaining that you can't play Rocksmith co-op over the Internet.

 

Rocksmith isn't an MMORPG though.

[Sky]

I was continuing to talk about the disconnect from reality (in the opposite direction, RS demands almost no latency but people want to play over the Internet). It's an mmo thread in 2021, what do you want from me?

I mean, I guess we could leave Falc to discuss this game with himselves 

[Falconeer]

Yes, thanks. In that vein, it can't be stressed enough: New World has one fucking glaring problem and it's the amount of unique content, which is not nearly enough. Everything else might not be up everyone's alley but it's shockingly solid and fun, which is kind of demonstrated by the game's popularity at the moment (it hit 200k concurrent players over the weekend, I think we are clearly past the "testing it and refunding" phase).

What everyone having a blast right now doesn't know is that the honeymoon ends abruptly about 20 days in. Amazon Studios' challenge is not to retain those 200k players through the first year, it's to support it and keep fleshing it out enough in the next two years to give it the TESO/FF14 kind of delayed success.

[Trippy]

No, it is NOT true that the combat is only fun with sub-50 ping. Up to about ping 120 there are basically no noticeable differences with sub-30 let alone sub-50. It probably gets worse over 150, and that's how it should be. If you have more than 150 ping I feel bad for you but twitch multiplayer games are always going to suck.

And I have double and triple tested it to make sure. This is just another example of false information spreading when something is somewhat instinctively disliked by many.

EDIT: expanded a bit.

I haven't done any PvP in this game but I have played lots and lots of it and other games and it still feels like to me that ping will matter in this game cause combat is not auto-targeting / auto-tracking like it is in traditional MMORPGs. E.g. projectiles like arrows and bullets have travel time so it's likely somebody will have an advantage though I'm not sure which. I.e. does having a high ping make you harder to hit with ranged weapons cause where the server thinks you are isn't where people see you on their screens? Or is it always best to have the lowest possible ping in either situation (shooting or moving)? In melee combat it'll likely matter too despite removing the stagger mechanic, which presumably gave a huge advantage to those that could interrupt first / faster, since positioning still matters.

Edit: actually after reading this:

https://forums.newworld.com/t/our-vision-for-combat-what-happened/146556

Maybe ping doesn't matter for melee now.

[Falconeer]

Of course ping matters. Again, like in any game that is twitchy. Why would anyone expect that to be different? And it pretty much only affects PvP.

My point was that it's not a thing specific to this one game so to list it as a negative trait of New World seems weird. And it certainly doesn't take sub-30 ping as mentioned earlier in this thread to be fun nor functional.

Hell, ping matters in FF XIV too, the slowest game in the world. Before they opened EU servers it was super hard to do primals because their telegraphs were unforgiving and our European ping often meant death. Action multiplayer games are ping dependent. I am not going to say "it's your fault if you have 150+ ping", but how's that New World's fault?

[Belzac]

I've heard enough about this game to remember this site and see what people think here.  Must have some hype going for it.

 Can't believe I remembered my user name and password.

[Khaldun]

password1234 to the rescue again

[Ashamanchill]

This game especially, but also the hype for Ashes of Creation, and Crowfall, and isn't there another one as well? have me feel like I am taking crazy pills. I feel like Trisha Helfer's character in BSG: "all this has happened before..." and I am just waiting for the refrain.

Combat is good. If it's not your style, then bummer.
Crafting/gathering with rabdom stats is good.
Loot with random stats is good.
Game looks more than good.

All it needs is more enemies/dungeons/zones/stories. Which will inevitably come.

Yes, thanks. In that vein, it can't be stressed enough: New World has one fucking glaring problem and it's the amount of unique content, which is not nearly enough. Everything else might not be up everyone's alley but it's shockingly solid and fun, which is kind of demonstrated by the game's popularity at the moment (it hit 200k concurrent players over the weekend, I think we are clearly past the "testing it and refunding" phase).

What everyone having a blast right now doesn't know is that the honeymoon ends abruptly about 20 days in. Amazon Studios' challenge is not to retain those 200k players through the first year, it's to support it and keep fleshing it out enough in the next two years to give it the TESO/FF14 kind of delayed success.

These feel like quotes from the late aughts. They could be talking about Age of Conan, or Warhammer Online, or Aion, or SWTOR, Darkfall or any of the other detritus down in the gaming graveyard. If us nerds of F13 are good for one solitary thing on this earth, it should be spotting all the signs of yet another ambitious but ultimately vacant MMO train wreck. Quite frankly, I didn't think it was a skill that would ever see use again. We're like old gaffers in fantasy novels warning of the ancient evil we all thought defeated is ready to return, only to be ignored.

Then again, with the way "live service" games have been going these days, maybe our old MMO foes were just before their time. Maybe kids of the future will have to memorize the names in my sig* the way science students have to learn of Copernicus, Galileo, Darwin, and Einstein. Fuck man, if we are doomed to do all this again, can I at least have my physique from the late Bush administration back as well?

*With bonus marks given for St. Barnett the Silver Tongued.

[Falconeer]

Twenty years ago we had hopes this genre could lead to something amazing. Now we know it doesn't. Because of that, most left the genre behind which makes a lot of sense. While some others found themselves content enough with the basics, the idea of a big bland shared RPG. Sue me, I'm getting older, I am not getting fresher.

In that sense, this game is fine. It has ZERO ambition, the feature list is incredibly small compared to all the other games you mentioned. The only slightly novel thing that it has is the combat style. It's just what I said above: a big very bland shared RPG and if that's what you are looking for it's quite fine. I don't think "trainwreck" applies to something that is bland. It takes more spark to make a train explode.

EDIT: As an RPG it's BLAND. As a MMORPG is fun. Meaning, from within the genre if for some reason you are still attracted to this kind of games, then it's an OK and fun one. From the outside, if you are NOT into MMORPG at all or anymore, then it is what it really is: bland.
I have no problem observing and admitting the difference between what I think of something, and the entertainment I can get out of it. Take mac and cheese for example.

[HaemishM]

"Live service" games are what the AAA publishers figured out about MMOG's. They really don't (and shouldn't) spend all that money making a world that can house thousands all at once in the same space because most of the people are only going to want to share their content with a small number of people. It's cheaper and thus more profitable just to make a co-op game and add content (along with copious microtrans for cosmetics) for 2-3 years before shuttering the service than it is to try to make content that can sustain that many different types of players for a decade, with constant balance fixes, scandals, and server architecture. WoW really was the last MMOG and it killed the genre (or in a more accurate sense, it destroyed the medium as a such). All those MMOGs mentioned haven't iterated one real step from WoW, and I think I'm 5 years past really being remotely interested in an MMOG again. I've said it on Discord - Conan Exiles was the last great MMOG/multiplayer experience I've had, and I ended up playing that with less than 10 other people on our own private server.

That's where MMOG's evolved, and it's a good evolution. MMOG's from AAA publishers are doomed to be failures because they are working on an outdated, unworkable model with a player base that either got tired of the genre with WoW, or literally grew up playing WoW, or missed it altogether and their first multiplayer experience was something like PUBG or Fortnite.

[Sky]

I remember being in the F&F alpha for Rift thanks to Hartsman. Such an amazing classless system with so much potential.

They kept shutting down my suggestions about running with those innovative parts and making it the core of their product pitch, I got shouted down a couple times by a dev. At one point I asked Scott what was up with that, and he said there was a very vocal and persuasive part of the team that basically wanted to make WoW 2.0 

And thus Rift languished in mediocrity.

[Chimpy]

I remember being in the F&F alpha for Rift thanks to Hartsman. Such an amazing classless system with so much potential.

They kept shutting down my suggestions about running with those innovative parts and making it the core of their product pitch, I got shouted down a couple times by a dev. At one point I asked Scott what was up with that, and he said there was a very vocal and persuasive part of the team that basically wanted to make WoW 2.0 

And thus Rift languished in mediocrity.

If the game content (not the mechanics system) had been more WoW and less "let's remake Vanguard because that is where all of our grognard alpha testers came from" it probably would have been more fun to be honest.

[Ashamanchill]

Twenty years ago we had hopes this genre could lead to something amazing. Now we know it doesn't. Because of that, most left the genre behind which makes a lot of sense. While some others found themselves content enough with the basics, the idea of a big bland shared RPG. Sue me, I'm getting older, I am not getting fresher.

In that sense, this game is fine. It has ZERO ambition, the feature list is incredibly small compared to all the other games you mentioned. The only slightly novel thing that it has is the combat style. It's just what I said above: a big very bland shared RPG and if that's what you are looking for it's quite fine. I don't think "trainwreck" applies to something that is bland. It takes more spark to make a train explode.

EDIT: As an RPG it's BLAND. As a MMORPG is fun. Meaning, from within the genre if for some reason you are still attracted to this kind of games, then it's an OK and fun one. From the outside, if you are NOT into MMORPG at all or anymore, then it is what it really is: bland.
I have no problem observing and admitting the difference between what I think of something, and the entertainment I can get out of it. Take mac and cheese for example.

Falc, I bolded the parts of your original post for a reason. These games all failed, to a letter, because they launched with no where near enough content for the type of crowd they either hoped to attract, or attracted by their nature. Age of Conan was awesome in the first 20 levels of Tortage. 30-40 was bland but serviceable. After that was: "well, you guys grinded out boars in Everquest 1, you can damn well do it again." Warhammer was great in the first tier zone. Declined through the next 2. And by tier 4 it was just a bunch of quest givers standing on the side of the road, like their bus to the Fyre festival had broken down and they needed you to scavenge the parts to fix it. And on and on.

To be honest, although my post quoted you, it wasn't really aimed at you. A quick perusal of the Nw subreddit, and you would definitely be forgiven for thinking you had travelled back in time ten plus years to any of these games forums. All the blind hope, the "no this time it will be different" posts, the paving over of flaws T- 1 month out, the denial of cynical voices, etc.

Fun is fun. If you are having it in NW, you win. But we have been down this road before. I am already  reading articles about NW bring too grindy, only having limited quests,  having technical issues, and there is something of a surprise or indignation in the tones of them. Like this hasn't happened to us all before.

[Sky]

If the game content (not the mechanics system) had been more WoW and less "let's remake Vanguard because that is where all of our grognard alpha testers came from" it probably would have been more fun to be honest.

Oh man the things I've blocked out of my mind...yeah that test was wild. May have been the last one I really gave a lot of energy to because of the potential for a great game, the flexibility of the skill system and having presets to switch between, and the combat was one of the better mmo systems at the time. I was prepared to give that kind of energy to the Rocksmith+ beta, but whew. They bolloxed the fuck out of that beta.

[Velorath]

Release just got delayed until 9/28 (so about a month).

[Falconeer]

Maybe they are patching stagger back in. Which means they'll delay it to October later to remove it again.