Comments on: 5 Lessons New MMORPGs Can Learn From Old Ones

By: Not Your Granddad’s Open Beta « Procrastination Amplification

Not Your Granddad’s Open Beta « Procrastination Amplification — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 12:52:21 +0000

[...] easy to demand that game companies shouldn’t put games on the market before they are finished, but that’s a promise that not even Blizzard is able to keep anymore. The Wrath of the Lich King [...]

By: Gordon

Gordon — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 21:47:21 +0000

Agreed. Vanguard had a very impressive seamless world system. I keep thinking VG could’ve been a huge success had they just been able to keep going down the track of development for another few years.

By: Kyff

Kyff — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 16:45:25 +0000

And instances don’t make a game. What’s the use of playing an MMO if everyone is sitting in a 5 man instance.

Vanguard (failing for other reasons) was actually doing abrilliant job of having a seamless world with open and accessible dungeons.

By: Gordon

Gordon — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 20:28:17 +0000

I don’t think the mature (i.e. blood and boobs) aspect of AoC was to it’s detriment. In fact, I think Funcom did a very good job at re-creating REH’s world of Conan. It felt like Conan and it was great. The problem was, as you rightly said, that the content after Tortage absolutely sucked. I think had they managed to create good content, the game would’ve been very popular. I don’t think the reason it wasn’t though had anything to do with the sex and violence in it.

By: Gordon

Gordon — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 20:25:55 +0000

Yep, “graphics don’t maketh the game”. Rule #6

By: Jasper van Weerd

Jasper van Weerd — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 17:08:16 +0000

Remember Utopia from swirve? its now from another publicer. The once 60.000 player from each server (2) now moved on to another live, sometimes I speak with friends about the great times it had. But now its graphical and the total charme is off it.

By: heartlessgamer

heartlessgamer — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 13:36:38 +0000

I always debate the don’t release early. As much as I rail against it at times, I always think in the back of my mind “would 3 or more months really help this game?”. Sometimes the developer needs the market to sort out the game before they can do any good for it (example: DDO).

Also, I think the first point about being mature is wrong. AoC placed too much emphasis on the mature rating only for it to pretty much backfire when everyone realized it was nothing more than them showing some digital boobies.

By: Good old Hammerfaust

Good old Hammerfaust — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 12:33:14 +0000

Best graphics wont help if you have to grind all day long without any instance till level 25… (Aion)
And knowing me by reading that will scatter your illusions of me: WoW does that pretty well – first instance with level 12-15+ = awesome!

By: Gordon

Gordon — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 11:24:19 +0000

Didn’t play Darkfall so didn’t want to lump it in but yeah, it did cross my mind.

By: Gordon

Gordon — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 11:23:51 +0000

Champions Online seemed pretty solid to me but then I didn’t play it enough – will take your word on it.

As for Star Trek Online… yeah, I have that suspicion too…