How to Create a Successful MMO by Jeff Strain (ArenaNet)

Kali Magdalene

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: May 2006

Washington

N/

11 Sep 2007 at 04:47 - 41
Quote:
Originally Posted by -Loki-
When you see the amount of people trying to 'justify' the $50au for EotN, you should realise there's a lot of people who have issues with paying ~$20au every month just to play the content they already paid for.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Lonesamurai
But that depends on wether you feel you are getting your monies worth or not...
Obviously, both of you missed my point entirely - I didn't say that getting your money's worth wasn't subjective. I was saying that if you feel you're required to play the game 6 hours a day to justify $15 a month, it's not the game's fault. Objectively speaking, you can see 1-2 movies during the month, or eat out 2-3 times, for the price you're paying for unlimited access to the servers.

"paying every month just to play the content you already paid for" is a straw man. If you really feel that way, just don't bother with games that have subscription fees.

Kali Magdalene

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: May 2006

Washington

N/

11 Sep 2007 at 04:56 - 42
Quote:
Originally Posted by DewBot
Rant:

B.C. is fail, major fail. Instantly dismissing a year + of work for many of players and adding a ton of new fedex quests (around 9 quests involve killing 30 animals for each quest in just one area for an example).
Rep grinds simply to get into the dungeons in order to get better gear so you can get into other dungeons that require more rep grind. If you don't want to raid the only other endgame thing to do is battlegrounds, which, if you don't have the gear you get instantly bowled over by those people that have the gear. Also alot of the endgame gear is reskins of past endgame gear, and its not so much reskins as it is simple recoloring .
The part of Blizzard that works on WoW is going downhill fast. WoW could be so much better but its not, its an updated RS and thats about it.

/end rant
Implying that the Nesingwary quests are representative of all the content in Burning Crusade = epic fail.

Kashrlyyk

Kashrlyyk

Jungle Guide

Join Date: May 2005

11 Sep 2007 at 07:33 - 43
Quote:
Originally Posted by GloryFox
Great article. Too bad they don't implement much of their own advice.
Yes, next topic should be "How to get your team to implement what I said there!"

Also known as: "10 ways to use the phrase "You know where the door is, don´t let it hit you on the way out!".

kade

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Oct 2005

Currently residing in ToA dis 1

Mo/

11 Sep 2007 at 07:43 - 44
I've always had faith in A-Net...this article only confirms for me the genius behind the company. The fact that their first game is the primary contender with a 15 year old franchise (WoW) is proof enough that they know what they are doing. Any hang-ups I had with GW or unforeseen problems they had as a company I'm certain will be worked out in GW2. Three cheers

BoredJoe

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Sep 2006

11 Sep 2007 at 10:02 - 45
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jeff Strain
..I hope some hotshot kid comes out of nowhere and changes everything out from under us before then..
I thought this was the best bit of his speech. Until then I wonder how many more titles to grind and fedex quests A.Net can throw at players.

Lonesamurai

Lonesamurai

Furnace Stoker

Join Date: Apr 2006

Cheltenham, Glos, UK

Wolf Pack Samurai [WPS]

R/A

11 Sep 2007 at 11:28 - 46
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tijger
I'm sorry? Blizzard is 100% owned by Vivendi Games and a full subsidary, just like Anet is of NCSoft, its profits are on the books with Vivendi Gaming, Vivendi also bankrolled the development of WoW.
Vivendi, like NCSoft, gives full creative freedom to Blizzard but Blizzard is not an independent company.
My bad on that, I'd completely forgotten

Tijger

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Sep 2005

Mo/E

11 Sep 2007 at 13:04 - 47
Quote:
Originally Posted by Kashrlyyk
Yes, next topic should be "How to get your team to implement what I said there!"

Also known as: "10 ways to use the phrase "You know where the door is, don´t let it hit you on the way out!".
Having a vision and bringing that vision into the real world are two different things.
Second point, Strain is not saying that Arenanet are following his ideas to the letter, he's not the only director at Arenanet plus some of his ideas that he expounds on here are obviously changed and shaped by his experience on GW.

He might be saying "This is actually the blueprint for GW2" but as a company Arenanet might not be able to realize all his points due to time, monetary and manpower constraints, having a vision however is much, much preferable to not having one but execution is equally important.

See WoW for little vision but great execution.

bamm bamm bamm

bamm bamm bamm

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Jul 2006

11 Sep 2007 at 13:20 - 48
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tijger
See WoW for little vision but great execution.
For the opposite of that, see: Peter Molyneux.

Onarik Amrak

Onarik Amrak

Forge Runner

Join Date: Mar 2007

Astral Revenants

P/W

11 Sep 2007 at 14:45 - 49
Quote:
Originally Posted by bamm bamm bamm
For the opposite of that, see: Peter Molyneux.
LoL! So true!

Guillaume De Sonoma

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Apr 2005

aFk

Me/Rt

17 Sep 2007 at 05:19 - 50
Quote:
Originally Posted by bamm bamm bamm
For the opposite of that, see: Peter Molyneux.
Oh sick burn

Clord

Clord

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Jul 2006

Finland

Victory Via Valour

17 Sep 2007 at 10:00 - 51
Quote:
Originally Posted by BoredJoe
I thought this was the best bit of his speech. Until then I wonder how many more titles to grind and fedex quests A.Net can throw at players.
In LOTRO, you can spend even days to get one new reputation level and your only reward after first time doing that repeatable quest is more reputation points, making your leveling quite slow.

SotiCoto

SotiCoto

Banned

Join Date: Jan 2007

Drazach Thicket

Temple of Zhen Xianren [Sifu]

17 Sep 2007 at 10:44 - 52
Quote:
Originally Posted by Lonesamurai
Maybe, maybe not

considering the massive numbers of writers, designers and script writers for the game, the RPG element really comes down to them, especially as RPG is all about the story and the players interaction with that story... And too be fair, most MMO's I've played, including WoW, have little to no noticeable storyline to follow that i could find, and I'm finding this especially noticeable in WoW at the moment (having just started a few weeks ago) after deciding to play for my guild and actually being a Warcraft Lore fan, I'm not seeing any storyline to follow, just quests...
I'm just waiting for Bethesda to make an MMORPG for the Elder Scrolls series.
If they can pull off something like Morrowind or Oblivion but multiplayer.... it will single-handedly rape all other MMORPGs into the ground.... at least as regards roleplaying content. It'd probably not have as large a playerbase due to the lack of appeal to pick-up-put-down casuals.... but they're not worth crap anyway.

Lonesamurai

Lonesamurai

Furnace Stoker

Join Date: Apr 2006

Cheltenham, Glos, UK

Wolf Pack Samurai [WPS]

R/A

17 Sep 2007 at 10:58 - 53
Quote:
Originally Posted by SotiCoto
I'm just waiting for Bethesda to make an MMORPG for the Elder Scrolls series.
If they can pull off something like Morrowind or Oblivion but multiplayer.... it will single-handedly rape all other MMORPGs into the ground.... at least as regards roleplaying content. It'd probably not have as large a playerbase due to the lack of appeal to pick-up-put-down casuals.... but they're not worth crap anyway.
It's in preproduction as we speak...

Just so you know