106 réponses à ce sujet

[Brockololly]

Nyoka wrote...
Do you think the situation for Dragon Age 3 is this dire? Is Bioware facing the loss of something more besides their fans' money or is it all exaggeration?

Depends.

For Dragon Age as a franchise specifically? I'd imagine that if DA3 has a mediocre critical and/or commercial reception, then Dragon Age as a franchise will probably disappear for a while.

I don't think that BioWare's games have this massive mainstream appeal such that they can really afford to make games that end up alienating a core part of their existing fanbase. They're not making GTA or Call of Duty or Elder Scrolls level blockbuster games. For DA specifically, I think DA2, coupled with TOR, coupled with ME3's ending debacle possibly really soured people to the BioWare brand. Not everyone certainly, but at minimum its likely made people more reluctant and at worse has probably put people on a firmly "wait and see" approach.

It seems EA has been rather generous in their handling of BioWare compared to how they've dealt with other studios in the past. But I think a lot of that is predicated on BioWare being their studio capable of being a critical darling that can rack up lots of high metacritic scores even if they don't sell Call of Duty numbers. But once you start getting sub 90 metacrtic games like DA2 (hell, the Xbox version is at 79) and then you might see EA shakeup BioWare.

[Yrkoon]

Ninja Stan wrote...

Yrkoon wrote...

"Strike 3" would NOT be the final nail on the coffin, financially or otherwise. It would, however, represent stagnation, or "continuing to just stay afloat", which is a situation that no company wants to be in. The point is to keep advancing, keep moving forward, keep improving.

If you check out some of the other posts on the forum, you'll probably see that people believe that BioWare's "new direction" is the issue and that they should go back to the "old way" of doing things. Your comment implies that BioWare should not "rest on their laurels" and should be doing new and innovative things in future games.

Bioware cannot do both at the same time.

Well, I was talking more about  moving forward and growing from a financial standpoint, but your point  matters too.  The  old Bioware would never have gotten as big as it is today had it not decided to  branch out and embrace   both the Console market and the Action RPG genre (for example).

We "old schoolers" can wax nostalgic  all day about  Bioware's Baldurs Gate era, but  ME2  outsold both BG1 and BG2  *combined*, and this fact is impossible  to ignore.

Modifié par Yrkoon, 09 juillet 2012 - 09:40 .

[FedericoV]

Nyoka wrote...

We know the next game is going to be Dragon Age 3. SWTOR and that other tanks game don't count. Do you think the situation for Dragon Age 3 is this dire? Is Bioware facing the loss of something more besides their fans' money or is it all exaggeration?

The situation for the DA franchise is dire and a critical or commercial insuccess would mean the end of the series. imho. They really need to make a great game on any level, avoid mediocrity at all cost and do something that can be compared in positive terms with the past and future competition.

The situation for Bioware at the short/medium term is not dire imho and the doom sayer are clearly exagerating, just because it has become trendy to bash Bioware. I mean, Bioware is not Blizzard. They never have a real flop but some of their games have not been that popular. They never sold 5+ million copies and probably they will never do if they stick to their format. But the company is making money and it's one of the most profitable brand for EA.

[Cultist]

Yrkoon wrote...
We "old schoolers" can wax nostalgic  all day about  Bioware's Baldurs Gate era, but  ME2  outsold both BG1 and BG2  *combined*, and this fact is impossible  to ignore.

hat's wrong analogy. Game market bac then was many times smaller than today. It's like comparing 1930 and 2012 car production.

Dragon Age 3 is the last real chance for BioWare to redeem themselves as top-company. They suffered three horrible blows in a row. Dragon Age 2, Mass Effect 3 and SWTOR. Wrath of Heroes already depopulated as much as WAR was after several months and still there's little hope for improvement.
Dragon Age 3 is one of the big franchises that, if fail, will cement BioWare's reputation as mediocre-quality company.
And competitors are here to stay - CD-Projekt already exploiting their success of Witcher 2, Bethesda already using their tremendous revenues from Skyrim, Dark Souls already surpass DA2 as action-RPG, especially after PC release. I can't see any other project, except for DA3, that can elevate BioWare above all that sea of fanbase dissatisfaction. Should they stick with DA2 formula and finish the game's transformation into jRPG with arcade combat and rudimentary dialogue system, they will lose "oldtimers", should they try to go back to their roots and try to recreate Origins' success, "Call of Duty Crowd" will be disappointed. So they have to choose who to lose, as all efforts to appease both will lead to inevitable fail and alienating both of them.

[TonberryFeye]

Ninja Stan wrote...

Yrkoon wrote...

"Strike 3" would NOT be the final nail on the coffin, financially or otherwise. It would, however, represent stagnation, or "continuing to just stay afloat", which is a situation that no company wants to be in. The point is to keep advancing, keep moving forward, keep improving.

If you check out some of the other posts on the forum, you'll probably see that people believe that BioWare's "new direction" is the issue and that they should go back to the "old way" of doing things. Your comment implies that BioWare should not "rest on their laurels" and should be doing new and innovative things in future games.

Bioware cannot do both at the same time.

Actually, they can.

A lot of great games, from Mario to Total War, succeed because of two factors:

1) The original game had unique, inventive and incredibly fun elements.
2) They did not change those elements; instead, they refined them, expanded on them and added complimentary elements over time.

Case in point, has Mario ever really changed? Mario 1 and 2 were virtually identical (note, I'm talking about the 'Lost Levels' here; the Mario 2 most of us think of was a reskin of a different game entirely). Mario 3 gave us new powerups, new enemies, new graphics and level layouts... but the core gameplay is unchanged. Super Mario World, perhaps the best of the side-scrolling epoch, did the same. Even the 3D installments work on this formula.

The same is true of other franchises. When I pick up a Zelda title I know it's going to involve going through an Ice Temple, a Fire Temple, a... a... (c'mon, damn it, you can do this!) a Water Temple *shudder* and by now it's pretty much a given that we will discover bombs, boomerangs, a slingshot, a bow, a hookshot and so on. Yet despite the fact that a Zelda fan can go into a new title and know 70% of the content by having played the last game, it's that last 30% that really makes a difference.

There is no reason Dragon Age could not have kept to this formula. There is no reason DA2 had to be a pathetic 2-star hack'n'slash pretending to be an RPG. DA2 could easily have taken Origins, polshed its graphics, refined its gameplay, added some new mechanics and given it a new and exciting plot.

Resting on their laurels would be just releasing an expansion pack and calling it a true sequel. Actually, I'd say resting on their laurels could be exactly what they did; they released a crap RPG/Action hybrid and stuck the name 'Dragon Age' on it so it'd sell better.

[Jerrybnsn]

SirGladiator wrote...

For all the negatives of DA2, none were present during the DLCs, so clearly there's no reason to expect anything less in DA3. They made some mistakes, they learned from them, its not an issue going forward.

Besides a completely different area to explore, what exactly did the dlc do to offset the negatives heaped on DA2? Or do you believe that reuse maps was DA2's only negative?
 

[TonberryFeye]

As to whether this is Strike Three for BioWare... based on their ExecuSpeek announcements, insistence on trying to make DA3 "Mass Effect but-not-in space", their mentally-retarded belief that DA2 was a good thing and that 'it just needed a little bit more work so we'll make it the basis for DA3', their insistence on dropping cliffhangers and then refusing to pick up the only one anyone gives a **** about - Morrigan and the OGB... all of this and more mean I won't be buying DA3 new. I'll get it second hand on the cheap, because I already know it won't be worth full price, if it's worth paying for at all.

[Jerrybnsn]

I'm definitley not preordering. Unless Morrigan's voice is used in the DA3 trailer, then I'll shame myself. Of course, Bioware then has to weigh the cost of keeping someone like me by bringing back Morrigan and her story and risk losing their new fans that don't want to see any continuation of storyline from Origins.

[Shadow of Light Dragon]

Ninja Stan wrote...

Currently, Neverwinter Nights is seen as one of BioWare's greatest games,

Wow, really? Because NWN is one of the few games I own that I got so bored of I stopped playing right after getting out of the starter area.

I suspect more people liked the moddability of the game, personally...

[ashwind]

I personally will judge each product individually. The only thing that would stop me from buying a game is if multi-player is in anyway forced on me - like how they did with ME3 before the fix.

Dont get me wrong, I play ME3 multiplayer and other multiplayer(mmo) but when I do that I am in the mood to forget about the story, role-playing, etc - I just want to shoot/hack something - have 30 minutes of fun and move on. Forcing multiplayer into a single player game makes as much sense as forcing me to use stupid iPhone/Facebook Apps to unlock guns or levels in shooters like CoD or Battlefield. There is only one way to describe such a decision - Monumental Stupidity.

I do enjoy Bioware's story a lot. So as long as DA3 and any other future Bioware games do not do that AND do not reuse environment (at least change the texture for god's sake) silly, I would still buy them as long as they dont dumb the story down to TES level.

[Fallstar]

Although I didn't play ME3 (or 2 for that matter) I thought that the game sold well despite the negative feedback about the ending. So I'm not sure that qualifies as a 'nail in the coffin'.

I think to keep the DA franchise going they need to pick a direction and stick with it. Whether it's a more streamlined and cinematic experience like DA2, or the kind of rpg we had with Origins. Sort of like whenever you buy a TES game you know give or take the kind of experience you'll have with the game.

So I think the DA franchise could stick around for a while. Personally I'll get DA3 regardless and if it's a DA2.5 then I'll be done with DA.

[Yrkoon]

Cultist wrote...

Yrkoon wrote...
We "old schoolers" can wax nostalgic  all day about  Bioware's Baldurs Gate era, but  ME2  outsold both BG1 and BG2  *combined*, and this fact is impossible  to ignore.

hat's wrong analogy. Game market bac then was many times smaller than today. It's like comparing 1930 and 2012 car production.

  The market today has more platforms,  and more games.  But the number of gamers hasn't changed.  Or at least Sales of individual titles don't suggest  a change.  Some of the biggest selling games of all time came out before 2001

Hell, Super Mario Brothers Sold 40 million copies.... on a single platform....in 1985.

Modifié par Yrkoon, 09 juillet 2012 - 02:56 .

[Brockololly]

Jerrybnsn wrote... Of course, Bioware then has to weigh the cost of keeping someone like me by bringing back Morrigan and her story and risk losing their new fans that don't want to see any continuation of storyline from Origins.

I think its usually cheaper to keep an existing customer/fan on board than to try and bring in a new one. And even if that's not exactly the case, you don't want to drive off your existing customers in chasing some other customer base since your existing customers are going to be the ones giving you and your product any word of mouth to other potential customers.

Its like Gabe Newell says here.

Shadow of Light Dragon wrote...
Wow, really? Because NWN is one of the few games I own that I got so bored of I stopped playing right after getting out of the starter area.

I suspect more people liked the moddability of the game, personally...

Yeah, I don't know very many people that would hold up the campaign to NWN as one of BioWare's greatest works. The reason people still play that and most praise is due to the modding tools and community created content.

Modifié par Brockololly, 09 juillet 2012 - 02:51 .

[Cultist]

Best selling at what time span? We can compare ME2 with old games yet we can count a game that sold for 10-15 years with game that sold for 2 years with digital distribution. Again, it is incorrect to compare the games by amount of copies sold in different decades with different methods of product delivery.

Hell, Super Mario Brothers Sold 40 million copies.... on a single platform....in 1985.

What? Can you provide a source of that information?  Because i doubt there were that many NES at that time across all planet.

I think
its usually cheaper to keep an existing customer/fan on board than to
try and bring in a new one. And even if that's not exactly the case, you
don't want to drive off your existing customers in chasing some other
customer base since your existing customers are going to be the ones
giving you and your product any word of mouth to other potential
customers.

Its like Gabe Newell says here.

Oh, stop, you. We all know, that Gabe knows absolutely NOTHING about games and how to make money out of them. He should learn from EA and BioWare.

Modifié par Cultist, 09 juillet 2012 - 03:02 .

[Yrkoon]

The avenues and platforms was part of my point. ME2 sold more than the BG series BECAUSE of Bioware embracing the consoles,  the online community and tapping into the Shooter genre, etc.

Modifié par Yrkoon, 09 juillet 2012 - 03:07 .

[Yrkoon]

Cultist wrote...

Hell, Super Mario Brothers Sold 40 million copies.... on a single platform....in 1985.

What? Can you provide a source of that information?  Because i doubt there were that many NES at that time across all planet.

Sure thing.    It's common knowledge. 

http://en.wikipedia....tainment_System

Modifié par Yrkoon, 09 juillet 2012 - 03:06 .

[AkiKishi]

Cultist wrote...

Yrkoon wrote...
We "old schoolers" can wax nostalgic  all day about  Bioware's Baldurs Gate era, but  ME2  outsold both BG1 and BG2  *combined*, and this fact is impossible  to ignore.

hat's wrong analogy. Game market bac then was many times smaller than today. It's like comparing 1930 and 2012 car production.

Dragon Age 3 is the last real chance for BioWare to redeem themselves as top-company. They suffered three horrible blows in a row. Dragon Age 2, Mass Effect 3 and SWTOR. Wrath of Heroes already depopulated as much as WAR was after several months and still there's little hope for improvement.
Dragon Age 3 is one of the big franchises that, if fail, will cement BioWare's reputation as mediocre-quality company.
And competitors are here to stay - CD-Projekt already exploiting their success of Witcher 2, Bethesda already using their tremendous revenues from Skyrim, Dark Souls already surpass DA2 as action-RPG, especially after PC release. I can't see any other project, except for DA3, that can elevate BioWare above all that sea of fanbase dissatisfaction. Should they stick with DA2 formula and finish the game's transformation into jRPG with arcade combat and rudimentary dialogue system, they will lose "oldtimers", should they try to go back to their roots and try to recreate Origins' success, "Call of Duty Crowd" will be disappointed. So they have to choose who to lose, as all efforts to appease both will lead to inevitable fail and alienating both of them.

Games markets been huge since the NES was around. PC games market, possibly. Now there are way more games/systems around and the market is more fragmented.

Modifié par BobSmith101, 09 juillet 2012 - 03:26 .

[bEVEsthda]

Two questions:
What console was needed to play Super Marios?
What games was that console bundled with, when you bought it?

[AkiKishi]

bEVEsthda wrote...

Two questions:
What console was needed to play Super Marios?
What games was that console bundled with, when you bought it?

NES 

Have to ask my parents that one.

[bEVEsthda]

Brockololly wrote...
I think its usually cheaper to keep an existing customer/fan on board than to try and bring in a new one. And even if that's not exactly the case, you don't want to drive off your existing customers in chasing some other customer base since your existing customers are going to be the ones giving you and your product any word of mouth to other potential customers.

Its like Gabe Newell says here.

Which is a good place to inject some sales figures of CoD on the XB360.

CoD: Modern Warfare 1     4.22mil

CoD: Modern Warfare 2     7 mil

Cod: Black Ops                12 mil

[Fast Jimmy]

BobSmith101 wrote...

bEVEsthda wrote...

Two questions:
What console was needed to play Super Marios?
What games was that console bundled with, when you bought it?

NES 

Have to ask my parents that one.

[facepalm]

bEVEthesda's point is tracking how many copies of Super Mario Bros. sold, when it was given away with the NES for free, is more of a metric for how many NES were sold worldwide.

Super Mario Bros. 3, the best Mario game on the NES, sold much less than this amount. Not because it was an inferior game, but because it wasn't sold as a bundle with every NES in existence. 

Modifié par Fast Jimmy, 09 juillet 2012 - 04:54 .

[FieryDove]

Brockololly wrote...

Yeah, I don't know very many people that would hold up the campaign to NWN as one of BioWare's greatest works. The reason people still play that and most praise is due to the modding tools and community created content.

I loved HoTU...played it...gah 40 times maybe, lol. I also adored about 8-9 user made campaigns...they were awesome.

Jerrybnsn wrote...

SirGladiator wrote...
For all the negatives of DA2, none were present during the DLCs, so clearly there's no reason to expect anything less in DA3. They made some mistakes, they learned from them, its not an issue going forward.

Besides a completely different area to explore, what exactly did the dlc do to offset the negatives heaped on DA2? Or do you believe that reuse maps was DA2's only negative?
 

I was wondering this too. Maybe because re-used levels don't bother me as much as some, level design is long and hard work. No choices bothers me much more. Very much.

Example:
Pro Qunari Hawke -YES
Anti Qunari Hawke - NO

That's all I'll say on the matter.

[shadow7warlord]

Well, after Bioware's latest games everyone is going to be more cautious and will think more before buying DA3.
So the only way for DA3 to sell much is if it's a GREAT game not just an OK one.

SO if it receives scores like 9-9.5 by the critics but most importantly by gamers then that's gonna count.

The most important thing for most however is that Bioware shows the game before launch and details all it's features without relying on hype and previous games...

Modifié par shadow7warlord, 09 juillet 2012 - 09:44 .

[Fredward]

shadow7warlord wrote...
Well, after Bioware's latest games everyone is going to be more cautious and will think more before buying DA3.

You liar you. It's a policy of mine not to think so this comment is a lie.


I think people need to realize that despite the utter debacle of the last two Bioware games that were indusputably on the scale of recent natural disasters [this is sarcasm. I feel the need to state this] that the largest majority of people who buy Bioware's games don't even visit these forums. And I actually do think that affects the outrage factor since I had no idea they were such horribly awful games until I started visiting. In fact I'd be suprised if more than 50% of people even read the reviews of a game before they buy 'em. I'm looking at you 52 year old mother entering a game store to innocently ask for a "fun RPG" for her son's birthday present. Yes you. Don't look away.

So no I don't think Bioware will spontaneously combust if DA3 doesn't meet the level of perfection Baldur's Gate or whatever the actual example of perfection is nowadays. Skyrim? -shudder-

[Cimeas]

Jerrybnsn wrote...

SirGladiator wrote...

For all the negatives of DA2, none were present during the DLCs, so clearly there's no reason to expect anything less in DA3. They made some mistakes, they learned from them, its not an issue going forward.

Besides a completely different area to explore, what exactly did the dlc do to offset the negatives heaped on DA2? Or do you believe that reuse maps was DA2's only negative?
 

uhh they had interesting bossfights, new mobs, new areas, new gameplay system (weren't great, but at least an attempt), more puzzles, better story, higher story:fighting ratio, and Hawke had personality.   Only thing they didn't solve was companion gear and wave combat, but that would have been hard in a short DLC.