115 réponses à ce sujet

[Lukertin]

Rurik_Niall wrote...
That logic seems flawed to me, Star Wars and Mass Effect are two very different universes and will appeal to different sorts of people. Star Wars is more of a scifi/fantasy hybrid, Mass Effect is more of a traditional scifi with a little bit of Lovecraft Lite sprinkled in. Star Wars has melee combat as a viable option, either with vibroblades or light sabres, Mass Effect relies solely on firearms, Krogan not withstanding. A good ME MMO would incorporate the third person elements which would further differentiate it from Star Wars. And besides that, whether people are playing one or both games they're still making money, difference being Mass Effect they'd make more money since they own Mass Effect and don't have to split the profits with Lucas.

It isn't really flawed.  People will either play MMO, or they won't (at least at this point in the development of the MMO market, the market basically matured since WoW came out).  The number of customers who were not playing an MMO that a newly developed MMO will attract is pretty small.

[Bogsnot1]

cedgedc wrote...

Like many of you, I am a big fan of the products Bioware has turned out over the years. However, I am a multiplayer/MMO fan at heart. I love the immersion that Bioware brings to their worlds. When I play the Mass Effect series, or the Dragon Age series, I put myself into my character's shoes- something I can't do in any other games.

...snip...

There is a good reason for this. You dont have a bunch of 13 year olds running around screaming "STFU N00B!!" or "YA F**KIN GAY ASS LICKER!" every 10 seconds to ruin the immersion.

Just have a look at the amount of companies that promoted their new MMORPG at launch, and have since quietly changed it to be simply an MMO.

[Raith Mano]

Aedan_Cousland wrote...

Raith Mano wrote...

Aedan_Cousland wrote...

Contalion wrote...

ummm.....Bioware is the lead developer on Star Wars: The Old Republic.....which is an MMO that is supposed to come out around the end of this year....its set in the KOTOR universe, around 80 years after KOTOR 2....so...yeah.

This. Bioware isn't going to create a Mass Effect MMO to compete with TOR, which they are also developing.

The chances of seeing a Mass Effect MMO anytime soon are thankfully slim to none. I love a good MMO, which is part of the reason why I'm looking forward to TOR, but I'd much rather see Bioware develop a new action-RPG Mass Effect game after the Shepard trilogy.

I know I've explained this before.  When you have two things both making money for the same company you're not competeing.  You're broadening your market.  As I've stated before, saying this is like telling BioWare they shouldn't make Dragon Age because it competes with Mass Effect.

MMOs don't function like other games in that they either suceed or fail depending on subscriptions. If TOR is successful and becomes the next WoW there is no way Bioware would develop another MMO, because it would be competing for subscriptions with TOR.

This differs from the Mass Effect & Dragon Age example, where the money is made on initial purchase and not based on ongoing subscriptions. These games don't compete with each other because they are not released at the same time.  Dragon Age: Origins for example was released for both the PC and Xbox 360 in November of 2009, a full 2 years after Mass Effect 1 was released on the Xbox 360 and about a year and a half after Mass Effect 1 was released on the PC. By that point Dragon Age: Origins was not in competition with Mass Effect, which was no longer a new release.

How does it compete for subscriptions? The only thing BioWare and EA care about is if their games are making money.  If 100,000 move from SW:TOR to ME:Universe (or whatever) is that 15 dollars going to be worth any less?

Either way, they make money on the initial purchase and then they make money based on the subscriptions.  If they're making it from two different sources, it doesn't matter, it's still cash going to the same bank accounts.

[Lukertin]

Raith Mano wrote...
How does it compete for subscriptions? The only thing BioWare and EA care about is if their games are making money.  If 100,000 move from SW:TOR to ME:Universe (or whatever) is that 15 dollars going to be worth any less?

Either way, they make money on the initial purchase and then they make money based on the subscriptions.  If they're making it from two different sources, it doesn't matter, it's still cash going to the same bank accounts.

So you have the same amount of money, and instead of maintaining/providing service/adding content to one game, you have to do all that for two games.  Brilliant.

[Raith Mano]

Lukertin wrote...

Raith Mano wrote...
How does it compete for subscriptions? The only thing BioWare and EA care about is if their games are making money.  If 100,000 move from SW:TOR to ME:Universe (or whatever) is that 15 dollars going to be worth any less?

Either way, they make money on the initial purchase and then they make money based on the subscriptions.  If they're making it from two different sources, it doesn't matter, it's still cash going to the same bank accounts.

So you have the same amount of money, and instead of maintaining/providing service/adding content to one game, you have to do all that for two games.  Brilliant.

Now you're talking about operations and logistics.  If each game only has 100,000 players each, totaling 200,000 subscriptions thats still a yearly income of 36,000,000 USD, not to mention the 200,000 box purchases at 50.00USD a peice.  So doing that math on that:

15*200,000*12=36,000,000
200000*50=1,000,000

So for one year, they're looking at 37,000,000 dollars.  You tell me if thats worth enough to support and continue development on two games. 

Yeah, I know a lot goes in to the development, but if the game is good, more people will play it.  If you have two, really good games, you're just casting a bigger net.

Hell, I'd kill for one years worth of earnings to cover my bills on the previous years.

[Aedan_Cousland]

Raith Mano wrote...

How does it compete for subscriptions? The only thing BioWare and EA care about is if their games are making money.  If 100,000 move from SW:TOR to ME:Universe (or whatever) is that 15 dollars going to be worth any less?

Either way, they make money on the initial purchase and then they make money based on the subscriptions.  If they're making it from two different sources, it doesn't matter, it's still cash going to the same bank accounts.

You aren't taking into account all the money that goes into development and the maintaining of an MMO. Why would Bioware spend all that money to create a new Mass Effect MMO to compete for subscriptions with another MMO they developed, that is just as expensive? That makes zero business sense.

Put it this way: You own a successful Italian restaurant that is packed most nights. Deciding to expand your business, you open another Italian restaurant a few blocks away in the same neighborhood. Since both restaurants are close to each other and offer similar fare & service, restaurant #1 is now dead most nights and losing money while restaurant #2, which is new, is now packed. Have you really expanded your business or are you just compteting with yourself, while taking on the extra expenses that went along with expanding your business and hiring new employees?

That is what Bioware would be doing if they developed two MMOs simulataneously. You want to compete for WoW's subscriptions, not compete for subscriptions with another one of your games.

Modifié par Aedan_Cousland, 31 mars 2011 - 03:04 .

[Raith Mano]

Aedan_Cousland wrote...

Raith Mano wrote...

How does it compete for subscriptions? The only thing BioWare and EA care about is if their games are making money.  If 100,000 move from SW:TOR to ME:Universe (or whatever) is that 15 dollars going to be worth any less?

Either way, they make money on the initial purchase and then they make money based on the subscriptions.  If they're making it from two different sources, it doesn't matter, it's still cash going to the same bank accounts.

You aren't taking into account all the money that goes into development and the maintaining of an MMO. Why would Bioware spend all that money to create a new Mass Effect MMO to compete for subscriptions with another MMO they developed, that is just as expensive? That makes zero business sense.

Put it this way: You own a successful Italian restaurant that is packed most nights. Deciding to expand your business, you open another Italian restaurant a few blocks away in the same neighborhood. Since both restaurants are close to each other and offer similar fare & service, restaurant #1 is now dead most nights and losing money while restaurant #2, which is new, is now packed. Have you really expanded your business or are you just compteting with yourself, while taking on the extra expenses that went along with expanding your business and hiring new employees?

That is what Bioware would be doing if they developed two MMOs simulataneously. You want to compete for WoW's subscriptions, not compete for subscriptions with another one of your games.

I am taking that into account, and companies plan to recoup that over a so many year period.  Not all at one time.  Its like buying rental property.  You won't see a return on that investment for the first 10-15 years, and MMO's, having a much shorter life-span are expected to make "X" amount back over a shorter period of years.

Not only that, but they may have that Italian restraunt open, but down the road they're opening a steakhouse.  Mass Effect is nothing like Star Wars, and while I do enjoy my Italian food, I also really enjoy biting in to a solid steak with some good potatoes.

[cedgedc]

You'll have to excuse the late reply. I'm  a 9-5 poster. Once I get home, I usually go and play the games rather than post about them lol.

Aedan_Cousland wrote...

These games don't compete with each other because they are not released at the same time.  Dragon Age: Origins for example was released for both the PC and Xbox 360 in November of 2009, a full 2 years after Mass Effect 1 was released on the Xbox 360 and about a year and a half after Mass Effect 1 was released on the PC. By that point Dragon Age: Origins was not in competition with Mass Effect, which was no longer a new release.

See the thing is, you've innadvertently made the case in favor of a ME- MMO here. You're talking as though the Mass Effect MMO is sitting on the shelves and they're deciding whether or not to release it simultaneously with TOR.

Needless to say, that is not the case. TOR and ME3 will be old news by the time a Mass Effect MMO could be released. The trilogy will have to have been finished, then we're talking atleast 2-3 years of work. 2014 or 2015.

Here's what you can count on:
 It is unlikely that they will make another story driven RPG in the same universe, and same style as the Shepard trilogy. They are very self contained, and after the universe has been saved, how many people will want to play the rpg where you're just some less important dude doing less important things? 

... Probably most people in this thread would buy it lol, but plenty of others wouldn't. More than likely they will release a product that is more world driven than story driven. An interesting new take on the mass effect universe. The story has been told, now people want to explore the world that they only got a taste of. This is why it lends itself to an MMO.

Forget what you know about cliche high-fantasy based mmo's. They suck. This is why we're here. Because, while the WoW model of mmo's is old and tired, having a virtual world with loads of people interracting and bringing the universe from a static, unchanging, predictable environment, to something alive, changing and ever-unpredictable- that is something that is still very much in demand. - increasingly more so as the pool of people that consider themselves 'gamers' either casual or hardcore only increases.

(So does the pool of people willing to join a social style game like an mmo, where it's just as much about enjoying time with your friends as it is playing the game itself.)

I don't think anyone here wants to see a boring, two faction based MMO, where you grind levels against geth mobs all day and then run instances to try and get an epic quality omni-tool.

This is about taking the concept of loads of people interracting, bringing the world to life.. playing as your quarians, geth, turians, etc.. loads of different factions.. all making the Mass Effect universe more real for the player than it's ever been before!

And keep in mind, all the Mass Effect games are rated mature. I would HOPE that they wouldn't be gearing this hypothetical title toward children/ teenagers, because were that the case in the original trilogy, I would not have played it.

[TwistedComplex]

A Mass Effect MMO could be good if done right. The problem is figuring out how to do it right in the first place

Hell Planetside was a GREAT MMOFPS. I see no reason why Bioware couldn't make a great MMOTPS.

That said, i would like to see KOTOR 3 before a ME MMO

[cedgedc]

If people are willing to give the benefit of the doubt that Bioware can wrap up the trilogy with a solid 3rd title (for the most part) then I don't see why it is assumed that they would trip over themselves in making an MMO. No one cares about the world that Bioware painstakingly put together and invented from scratch, than the dev's themselves.

And I wouldn't expect it before a solid 5 years. 'Done right'? I take that as a given. They're not going to do it wrong. Atleast not in the view of the majority of their player base.

Afterall, haters gonna hate.

[Q4Waveslr]

Raith Mano wrote...

Q4Waveslr wrote...

Hate to break it to you but Bioware will not be doing an original IP MMO for at least another decade, they will not compete with their own massive budget MMO until it is dying.

As to your dislike of the Star Wars IP, it is causing you to miss one of if not Bioware's best games in KoToR.

I suggest you give it a shot, it is on a completely different level from most other Star Wars games with much of it's own lore and story

I don't get why people say that a company won't compete with themselves when it comes to making money.

Abercrombie & Fitch also owns Hollister, Sears owns K-Mart, TigerDirect.com owns CircuitCity.com, and so on and so forth. 

Why do they do this?  Because if things at one store don't appeal to someone, theres a good chance that things at a different store of a different name will.  It doesn't matter if they make their money from you playing SW:TOR or ME: Universe

Saying they're not going to compete against themselves to make money is like saying they shouldn't make Dragon Age because it competes with Mass Effect.  Yeah, Mass Effect and SW:TOR are both sci-fi games, but Mass Effect appeals to me a lot more then Star Wars, and I love me some Star Wars- its just that Mass Effect appeals to me more because of its setting and because a lot of the technology is completely possible.

You'll note that all of your above examples are single purchase competitors, it is perfectly viable for someone to go to A&F and buy a shirt and 15 minutes later buy a shirt from Hollister.

An MMO is a subscription based purchase and the product is particularly time-intensive.

Non-subscription games that have a tangible end are closer in time scope to buying a shirt than to the perpetiuty of MMOs.

This is why you don't see many Gyms and Country Clubs under the same ownership competing in close proximity to each other under different brand names.

[cedgedc]

Q4Waveslr wrote...

You'll note that all of your above examples are single purchase competitors, it is perfectly viable for someone to go to A&F and buy a shirt and 15 minutes later buy a shirt from Hollister.

An MMO is a subscription based purchase and the product is particularly time-intensive.

Non-subscription games that have a tangible end are closer in time scope to buying a shirt than to the perpetiuty of MMOs.

This is why you don't see many Gyms and Country Clubs under the same ownership competing in close proximity to each other under different brand names.

Absolutely valid. That still doesn't change the fact that TOR will be old news by the time they could come out with a ME MMO, and they do still cater to different audiences. None of my friends who played the mass effect games, or who i talked into trying them, would ever touch a starwars based game. Myself included.

[termokanden]

Why does everything have to be an MMO or even have multiplayer anyway? Ever since WoW became so popular, everyone thinks it's a great idea to make an MMO. How many of them are even successful?

[Locutus_of_BORG]

Contalion wrote...

ummm.....Bioware is the lead developer on Star Wars: The Old Republic.....which is an MMO that is supposed to come out around the end of this year....its set in the KOTOR universe, around 80 years after KOTOR 2....so...yeah.

/thread

[cedgedc]

termokanden wrote...

Why does everything have to be an MMO or even have multiplayer anyway? Ever since WoW became so popular, everyone thinks it's a great idea to make an MMO. How many of them are even successful?

The -reason- we want more mmo's is because most of them suck! We are still looking for a good one.

Single player experiences are great, and can be a lot of fun. I don't think anyone would say we shouldn't have any single player games.

However, the world is a smaller place now. It's all about the internet, interconnectivity, being able to talk and play games with people all over. That's what makes an MMO compelling.

Why play a game where the designer is telling you 'IT's got a whole super cool diverse world for you to explore with npc's that are just like people!'

When you can play a game that -really- has an environment that is the size of worlds. And there really are populations of people there, the size of a town.

Furthermore multiplayer gives more significance to your accomplishments. If in highschool you took a test and got a 98, and then you asked your teacher.. 'well how did I compare to everyone else?'

If the teacher's response was 'Actually you're the only one who took that test. Good job though!' Well suddenly who the hell cares what you accomplished? No one else was there. No one else was competing against you, or rooting for you to succeed, or right there in the heat of things along side you. So who cares? Not me, that's for sure. Good job on that test that no one else was taking.

That's how I feel anyways. It's all about the depth of the world. The vastness of an incredible universe that you are now free to explore- not without limits of course, but with limits that are far wider, than any other genre can accomplish. It's about the shared experience that you don't get with single player games.

And to those who say things like, 'you want an MMO, go play wow or KOTOR'



i say.. you want a single player adventure? go read a book!

[termokanden]

cedgedc wrote...

i say.. you want a single player adventure? go read a book!

Don't get me wrong. I agree with your reasons for liking MMOs and have spent quite a bit of time playing them myself.

But I also think it's a bit annoying that EVERYTHING must have multiplayer and leaderboards and is all about comparing yourself to others. It seems to me that particularly the latter part has become more important than story or how enjoyable the game actually is.

I think they should keep making MMOs. But I also think developers like Bioware who generally deliver quality single-player games shouldn't just jump over to the MMO market and forget about everything else.

Doesn't seem like that's what's happening although Bioware are making an MMO. But you shouldn't have to make an MMO just because you have a successful game. My first thought when hearing about the KotOR based MMO was "oh so we're not getting a proper sequel then". Disappointment.

Modifié par termokanden, 31 mars 2011 - 06:49 .

[marshalleck]

cedgedc wrote...

Needless to say, that is not the case. TOR and ME3 will be old news by the time a Mass Effect MMO could be released. The trilogy will have to have been finished, then we're talking atleast 2-3 years of work. 2014 or 2015.

I wouldn't even consider doing a one month trial of an MMORPG which took any less than 5 years to develop. Any shorter than that suggests to me a lack of content and more importantly, a lack of content delivery infrastructure and customer support services for the growth of the game. Not to mention things like buggy/broken quests, poor gameplay balance, broken and buggy skills, a highly restricted/restrictive world which isn't actually persistent, and may even be fully instanced. 

Also, it sounds like OP wants a sandbox MMO, which usually do not attract enough players to remain solvent without adding some sort of additional revenue stream, usually in the form of an item shop which starts out promising only fun social items which won't unbalance the game, but inevitably lead to feature creep offering not insignificant advantages to people willing to pay up. They also tend to divert development away from the main game and toward the supplementary income. 

Modifié par marshalleck, 31 mars 2011 - 06:59 .

[Kingcopper1]

cedgedc wrote...

I wouldn't touch a star wars game with a 10 foot Ethernet cable.

Your loss. 

Modifié par Kingcopper1, 31 mars 2011 - 06:55 .

[Pwener2313]

If something like Phantasy Star Universe can be done, I approve.

[termokanden]

Kingcopper1 wrote...

cedgedc wrote...

I wouldn't touch a star wars game with a 10 foot Ethernet cable.

Your loss. 

Indeed. I think there are many bad Star Wars games, but some of them are among the best games I've played. KotOR, X-Wing, Tie Fighter, probably worth mentioning the Jedi Knight series as well.

[cedgedc]

marshalleck wrote...

I wouldn't even consider doing a one month trial of an MMORPG which took any less than 5 years to develop. Any shorter than that suggests to me a lack of content and more importantly, a lack of content delivery infrastructure and customer support services for the growth of the game. Not to mention things like buggy/broken quests, poor gameplay balance, broken and buggy skills, a highly restricted/restrictive world which isn't actually persistent, and may even be fully instanced.

Well to give you some sense of perspective here, Rift Planes of Telara started development ~2008. That game has launched virtually bug free and has had the most succesful beta of any MMO launch to date. It currently stands as the only competiton for WoW (that's not to say it will 'kill' wow by any means.)

I would place less importance on time and more on the people hired to make the game.

[Dazaster Dellus]

So pretty much this thread is a plea to Bioware(Again) to make a ME MMO. I personally would not want to se a ME MMO. Once you start an MMO that usually means the othe single player games from the same series get cancelled or not as much love and work as the MMO. MMO's are not that easy to make. They take a ton of time to be made right and there is a lot more that could go wrong with them. I would rather they did not make one than to make one that could potentially be bad or not as great and tarnish the ME legacy(provided ME3 doesn't).

Also because they are releasing Star Wars:TOR the likely-hood that they would release another MMO is almost slim to none. Two space based MMOs.....doubt it will happen. No company would take away profits from another one of their games just to make a few MMO fans happy. The same reason why Blizzrd hasn't made a Starcraft MMO. Not many people would pay for WoW and WoS at the same time(except the hardcore). Why would they purposely take away sales from another game which is already a massive hit?!

All in all, don't hold your breath. If they were to make one it wouldn't be for a very, very long time. I hope they don't. Now I wouldn't mind seeing them create an MMO with a new world from scratch. That way if it fails there is really no harm done other than to itself.

[cedgedc]

termokanden wrote...

Doesn't seem like that's what's happening although Bioware are making an MMO. But you shouldn't have to make an MMO just because you have a successful game. My first thought when hearing about the KotOR based MMO was "oh so we're not getting a proper sequel then". Disappointment.

Many games do not merrit an MMO, even though many fanboys will cry that it should. First and foremostly I am in favor of Bioware doing an MMO with their own IP. For starters it will be way more profitable for them, and secondly that's what a lot of us enjoy best.

And I can appreciate what you mean. An MMO is not a replacement for a sequel. But this series is self contained. This is the last we'll see of Shepard. It's not the last we'll see of the universe though.

So since we know the story can't continue but the universe will live on, then wouldn't you like to explore that universe? Create your own adventure within it perhaps? (lame as that sounds lol.)

[marshalleck]

cedgedc wrote...

marshalleck wrote...

I wouldn't even consider doing a one month trial of an MMORPG which took any less than 5 years to develop. Any shorter than that suggests to me a lack of content and more importantly, a lack of content delivery infrastructure and customer support services for the growth of the game. Not to mention things like buggy/broken quests, poor gameplay balance, broken and buggy skills, a highly restricted/restrictive world which isn't actually persistent, and may even be fully instanced.

Well to give you some sense of perspective here, Rift Planes of Telara started development ~2008. That game has launched virtually bug free and has had the most succesful beta of any MMO launch to date. It currently stands as the only competiton for WoW (that's not to say it will 'kill' wow by any means.)

I would place less importance on time and more on the people hired to make the game.

I haven't played it but I've heard that it's pretty much a clone of WoW. It's not hard for me to imagine where they took shortcuts through the development process. 

I'm curious about the game since the reaction hasn't been entirely negative, but that still doesn't mean I'm interested enough to buy it. What can I say, after having been through uncountable games, trials, betas, and several catastrophic failures and studio closures over the last decade I'm an extremely tough sale. 

[termokanden]

cedgedc wrote...

So since we know the story can't continue but the universe will live on, then wouldn't you like to explore that universe? Create your own adventure within it perhaps? (lame as that sounds lol.)

Oh I would, but I'm not going to be playing MMOs again any time soon. Got a new job coming up and I just don't want to play something I can't always just save and quit if I don't have time for some reason. I would love more single-player games though.

That's why I would be annoyed if they turned another one of my favorite games into an MMO.

Over the years I have played some MMOs, but I've had to simply quit on several occasions because real life just wasn't compatible with this. They are simply too time consuming if you don't want to be stuck in endgame doing easy instances. Probably doable for some, but it was difficult for me.