2003, the year of the mmorpg

adnans

there's no doubt about it. you will be tempted to play at least one mmorpg next year whether it's Earth and Beyond - westwood's take on a space trading game, Neocron - fps based mmorpg or any of the many titles ready to be launched.

i've been beta testing the two above titles for a while now and they are nearly ready to be released to the public since they are both in open beta stages. whenever any game goes to open beta, it can either mean two things, it isnt popular enough to grab an audience so it will take anyone on who wants to play, or the release date is only few weeks away and it needs to hook some people into playing and paying for the game once it hits the shelves.

because at the end of the day, its all about the monthly subscription. pay to play. a bunch of people already do it, with everquest, legend of mir (do people still play that game?) and DAoC, and if the game is good and/or addictive, people will pay the usual price of 10 dollars per month.

i am dying to test and play EVE Online, Star Wars Galaxies and World of Warcraft which are looking out to be irresistable to play (at least for me). Shining Lore would be on the list but the f$#kers didnt pick me for the beta test which just isnt on

the competition is going to heat up with the announcement from Marvel licencing its 4700 characters to Vivendi in order to make a mmorpg sometime in the future. City of Heroes already has a massive following without even starting its beta stage. i guess the world is full comic book store characters waiting to play this type of game.

so the SW nerds are gonna play Galaxies, while the anime otaku will be content with either Shining Lore, Ragnarok or Priston Tale, and the EQ peeps will wait for EQ2. which mmorpg are you looking forward to play or not?

adnans

DiscoStu

EVE Online. its the only mmrpg that has ever interested me. it looks like its shaping up to be what x-beyond the frontier and battlecruiser millenium promised and never delivered.

BKtje

Eve is the one i been looking forward too. That and AC2

Venom

SW:G is where I will ne heading. It looks so close to the movies its scary.

tuxy

i think mmorpg's will finaly take off in ireland now that theres some kind of reasonably priced net package from esat and utv
before they were just too expensive to play

meglome

I've had me eye on Star Wars Galaxies for some time, can't wait to see it in the flesh.

jaggeh

you forgot to mention Asherons Call 2

which looks fantastic

star wars galaxies is due out by the end of the year (if you believe the hype)
AC2 beta is running down atm

Shinji

There's the fundamental problem that most of these are going to basically be EverQuest in new clothes - and frankly, loads and loads of people just don't want to play EverQuest, because the whole levelling-up treadmill style of gameplay doesn't appeal to them.


The EQ accusation absolutely applies to AC2, SW:G, Neocron, EnB (although it's not quite as bad, but close) and World of Warcraft.

It also applies to Final Fantasy XI to quite a degree - that's one you forgot off your list.

The Korean stuff (Shining Lore, Priston Tale, Ragnarok etc) is going to have very limited audiences over here. Even the otaku aren't that interested - they look nice but the basic gameplay isn't shockingly good.

The Marvel thing won't be out until 2005.

Eve Online looks interesting, but then again, so did EnB - which then turned out to have zero flight dynamics...

MMORPGs are certainly developing, but I think 2003 isn't going to be the "year of the mmorpg". It's going to be the year when a lot of companies working on MMORPGs go down in flames because there are a gazillion of the things on the market and not that many more people playing them than do now. This isn't going to be a golden year for online RPGs, it's going to be a bloodbath...

adnans

well basically, its much more fun then sitting down and rolling those weird ass dice. and if you're telling me that the 'dice rolling' is done by the computer in a secret way behind my back, then you're damn wrong, damn damn wrong

without levelling up, how can you increase your skills and rank against other players in the game. anyway, some games are getting away from it, like Dragon Empires which is looking something where you can put those economic classes skills to use. control your own towns, trade between cities while conquering even more. all that without even a dragon in sight. (no, you cant play as the dragon)

as Shinji the Critic pointed out, the market for the mmorpg will be very saturated in the 2003 that many companies will crawl and die, and if theres no money coming in to pay for the servers, bandwidth, the team that puts new content into the game, you will be rolling those weird ass dice at the end of the day after all.

anyway, answer the damn question, which mmorpg are you looking forward to playing or not?

adnans

meglome

Star Wars Galaxies seems to have a good system for gaining experience. Which doesn't (as far as I can tell) involve hack and slash for 16 weeks before you can set foot outside the nearest city. Which is one of the main reasons I'm so interested in it above all the others.

Tellox

christ I cant wait to play sw:g... but once I get utv, Im gunna be playing www.sgalaxy.com for a while..

Pugsley

Im looking forward to SW:G most, it seems to be the most diffrent MMORPG thats coming out in the near future. I hate that tedious standard way of levelling up tho (pull, hit 4 times, rest, repeat [DaoC style]) and im hoping SW:G will have something diffrent to offer.

El_MUERkO

Been playing Beta 4 of Neocron since it went public, they've extended it to October 1st, the retail release is October 4th.

This game is my first time playing a mmorpg and I am enjoying it alot, I'll probalby sign up to this once I sort out UTVip

jaggeh

4.01 Will Star Wars Galaxies use a skill-based system or a level-based system with classes?

Star Wars Galaxies will use a skill-based system with skill trees, and we'll have a wide range of skill trees and professions, including combat, crafting, and politics. Players will open up new capabilities as they advance by acquiring new skills. Specialized skills will require mastery of the lower-level skills in the tree, and skills may also require other sorts of prerequisites. You will not have to engage in combat to advance (well, except for combat, of course!).

4.04 How will skill advancement work?

Each skill will cost skill points. You can only acquire so many skills before you are not allowed to learn any more. The total number of skills you can acquire, however, will depend on what sorts of skills you learn. The higher up any tree you go, the more all future skills will cost to learn. Likewise, the broader across all professions you go, the more all future skills will cost to learn. The cheapest paths are to go either straight up (specializing) or straight across (jack of all trades). If you try to specialize in multiple areas, each skill will cost more skill points, and you will run out of points sooner.

.22 How many skills, disciplines and professions will be in the game?

We are currently planning to have over 700 individual skills at launch. These include basic skills, title skills, specializations and hybrid skills. These skills are grouped together into disciplines and professions. A discipline contains many skills of a similar nature. A profession is a broader grouping of skills and disciplines to create a particular role or activity. There are currently over 40 disciplines and 25 professions targeted for launch.

All taken from the official FAQ, Starwars galaxies is the game for me next year

regi

Aaah mmorpgs...

I'm sure SW:G will be fun, but be warned - Verant is a bollocks of a company for customer support. You'll love the game, but hate the people who make it, its inevitable. Venom will tell you all about much Verant, I'm sure

The only two mmorpgs I'm looking forward to are Shadowbane and Warhammer Online. I have a feeling that WO will own me for a few years. I don't think I could deal with EQ2, I feel like I need therapy because of Everquest already

Venom

Aye Regi is right when he says Verant are a bunch of cúnts but Verant are not making SW:G, Sony Online Entertainment are. Altough both games are made by the same company they have totaly different development teams and couldnt be more different from each other.

SW:G has some of the best people in the MMORPG industry working on it and EQ has a bunch of fools who never listen to their customer base.

Also Lucas is not going to let anyone mess around or do anything that will shed a bad light on Star Wars, which is his baby. Remember the players of SW:G will not just be the usual mmorpg players but will also have fans od Star Wars playing it and these will be people who probley have never played a mmorpg before.

Venom

Aye Regi is right when he says Verant are a bunch of cúnts but Verant are not making SW:G, Sony Online Entertainment are. Altough both games are made by the same company they have totaly different development teams and couldnt be more different from each other.

SW:G has some of the best people in the MMORPG industry working on it and EQ has a bunch of fools who never listen to their customer base.

Also Lucas is not going to let anyone mess around or do anything that will shed a bad light on Star Wars, which is his baby. Remember the players of SW:G will just just be the usual mmorpg players but will also have fans od Star Wars playing it and these will be people who probley have never played a mmorpg before.

jaggeh

warhammer online is going to be crap imo

having personal experience with the company the game when released will cost 120 sterling and monthly fees will be about 40 sterling

regi

having personal experience with the company the game when released will cost 120 sterling and monthly fees will be about 40 sterling

Why do you say that?

Shinji

warhammer online is going to be crap imo

Interesting, especially since I know you're basing that assumption on absolutely zero knowledge of the game since they haven't actually spoken about it publicly in any depth yet...

TacT

The only thing that has caught my attention is SW.G, although if they do implement the pay to play I'm not sure how much interest will be held depending on the initial cost of the game :eek:

Nobody

Hehe, my shortlist includes SW.G, Eve, and Neocron. I hope Lucas will have Sony for lunch if they fuxor SW.G up. (Thought's of 2,000 (whatever) closeted Jedi per server cracks me up)

Damn, I really hope 2003 will be the year of the MMORPGs, but as Shinji already pointed out... the market is only so big. Nice to see alot of alternative themes as opposed to the sword and sorcery(?) stuff.

In the interim:

Might pick up where I left off in AO, now that there's "flat rate" access in the ROI. :cool:

Venom

The only thing that has caught my attention is SW.G, although if they do implement the pay to play I'm not sure how much interest will be held depending on the initial cost of the game

SW:G along with most if not all of the other new mmorpg's will be subscription based. The cost will probley be around €10-15 per month. EQ at the moment charges that much and pull in around $3-4 million per month from its user base so I see no reasion for Sony to not charge for running the server's.

having personal experience with the company the game when released will cost 120 sterling and monthly fees will be about 40 sterling

Dont talk shíte.

jaggeh

GW are the biggest bunch of leeches in the world

in 1999 they took in 64 million pounds profit, and they still had the nerve to raise their prices 3 times

if you think thats gonna change cos its a computer game yer dead wrong.

and shinji i know about the game for a while now as i have spoken to a few people i know personally in GW head office as i used to work there.

Shinji

I think you'll find that the prices will be comparable to the prices for any other MMORPG.

I very much doubt your mates in GW head office have told you a great deal about the game, simply because a lot of the key stuff hasn't even been decided yet. Besides which, GW headoffice isn't directly involved with the title - Warhammer Online Ltd is a seperate company and the actual dev work is being done by Climax Studios.

Please take your personal grudge against Games Workshop off this forum.

jaggeh

warhammer online ltd is based out of GW head office, i was there 2 years ago when the initial formation of the company was being planned.

and i dont have a grudge against GW, just their pricing/business strategy.

although it seems to work, fair dues. it is still a leech of a company.

Shinji

and i dont have a grudge against GW... it is still a leech of a company.

Self-contradictory or what.

(Oh, and hey, MY GOD, a company that makes money out of its customers, WHATEVER NEXT?)

I told you to take your tripe off the board, and I meant it. Further posts from you whinging about GW will be removed unless you're actually talking directly about Warhammer online and backing what you say up with some facts, since it's obvious to everyone that you have a personal issue with the parent company - and last I checked this isn't the personal issues board. Comprende?

Hobbes

LOL. We'll see when the game comes out I guess.

Currently the magic price is US$10, any higher then that your not going to get a good customer base (unless it's SW:G, as they fanboi's are all on crack). For Warhammer if it's £10 sterling a month, that's €20'ish euro's, so they are already at a disadvantage with players from europe in relation to US based games.

The fanboi's are not the customer base, and MMORPG's make their money from subscriptions not selling the game.

Mavel one won't be out for a long time but City of Heroes will and looks pretty impressive.

AC2 is not everquest. I've played both, they are two different game types. It has levels, but it isn't as threadmill. If anything I'd say it's more like a graphical IRC client.

If you think players won't stand for that levelling crap, then you don't play much of MMORPG's.