lol, what? Bioware's development team were the ones who made the game, not EA. EA gave them the financial support that Bioware said they needed and the time frame to get the game made. Bioware then notoriously picked up a terrible engine and hackjob modded it to make it work for the game which gave them more problems then they anticipated resulting in slow production of the game. (gg hero engine). EA gave them the freedom that they needed to do what they had to do and Bioware -failed- at producing due to their own choices which you can mostly chalk up to being a MMO virgin in development. (And this stands out with how single player orientated the game mostly is.)

 

Bioware was told repeatedly throughout beta the changes that needed to be made and the warning signs of a stale life at 50. They did not listen and told the beta testers that they were there to look for bugs and that was it.

When you have a stubborn development team from the start that didn't listen to the feedback of the testers and didn't make the necessary changes to keep the initial huge flow of players, it is their own fault that the game imploded.

 

Again: EA went wrong with letting Bioware make the mmo in the first place. Bioware failed to meet expectations because they had no idea what they were getting themselves into.

 

SIDENOTE: Rift's development team is the best in the business. I wish this game had them because they are on the ball with fixing things and giving the players what they want. I think the story/setting is really the only thing that held the game back.

Also Bioware has started making the MMO befoe EA bought them.. EA bought bioware so they could make money off the game.

The one major thing holding Swtor back these days is its terrible business model. they'd have many, many more customers if they had a more user friendly business model like most other popular f2p mmos.

Being the biggest western audience freemium MMO on the market right now.. your statement makes no sense at all.

Whats the point of going F2p if you are going to make the f2p model so invasive you might as well continue your sub. It's completely counter intuitive.

LOL... really?

Do you understand how Freemium business models even work for internet games? Sincere question. Not "free", but "freemium"

I ask because this statement indicates a complete lack of understanding of the model from a business perspective. It's written from the "user wants to play for free" perspective.

Freemium as a business model is designed to extract ~ the same revenue per active account as a subscriber model. It just does it in a different, and more flexible manner for the players. Different games approach it slightly differently, but they all want the free side to be tedious enough to encourage either "pay to unlock and stay free" OR subscribe.

I encourage players of MMOs to get to a point where they understand the business side of freemium in MMOs. Take time to research the topic before leaping in with comments like what I quoted above. A great starting point is: http://casualconnect.org/mag/summer2012/CGA_F2PGames_Report.pdf

From this comment, IMO you completely misunderstand the community and you over-value your personal opinion in the context of what a development team does (for any MMO, not just this one).

 

Most of the community understands that it's a game of a million + active users (about half of which are subscribers and the rest preferred/free), with broadly diverse needs/wants/desires (sometimes at odds with one another) and the developers role is to move the game forward in a broad and controlled manner.

 

Besides, if they did not give a rat dropping.. they would just shut the game down. So I consider your entire original post to be provocative and designed to target EA for your perceived misgivings about the game.

Was wondering when you'd chime in.

Thanks for the incredibly opinionated view on why MY post was far too opinionated and thus obsolete.

 

Do you understand how Freemium business models even work for internet games? Sincere question. Not "free", but "freemium"

 

I ask because this statement indicates a complete lack of understanding of the model from a business perspective. It's written from the "user wants to play for free" perspective.

 

Freemium as a business model is designed to extract ~ the same revenue per active account as a subscriber model. It just does it in a different, and more flexible manner for the players. Different games approach it slightly differently, but they all want the free side to be tedious enough to encourage either "pay to unlock and stay free" OR subscribe.

Again, YOU misunderstand. I tho k this poster was saying, why make it so restricted she. You could do what (Yes I'm saying it again) Rift has done.

You get everything a sub gets, but subs get perks, and you still want to pay money for the awesome looking things in the rift shop!

actually bioware was making an engine for the game and EA stormed in and said the hero engine is a pile of shyte but its cheap so use it.

 

Also Bioware has started making the MMO befoe EA bought them.. EA bought bioware so they could make money off the game.

Bioware Licensed the hero engine in 2006. EA announced the deal for Bioware in October 2007 with the deal closing in January of 2008.

http://www.1up.com/news/bioware-licenses-heroengine-mmo

http://www.gamespot.com/news/ea-buying-bioware-pandemic-for-860m-6180818

Engine choice. The engine is old and led to the major problems of the game which are older style gameplay mechanics, lack of open world pvp and slow deployment of new content.

actaully content is not coming out slow... just most pf the player base is a heap of childish whiners... Blizzard with its billions releases content slower.

Again, YOU misunderstand. I tho k this poster was saying, why make it so restricted she. You could do what (Yes I'm saying it again) Rift has done.

You get everything a sub gets, but subs get perks, and you still want to pay money for the awesome looking things in the rift shop!

The business model is actually pretty well tuned IMO, from a business perspective.

It's not designed to let you play unrestricted for free. It's designed to give you the flexibility to decide how you want to access content (either full sub, or pay to unlock content). The SWTOR implementation is better then most IMO, because they opened the player economy up to allow players to exchange unlocks for credits within the player base, thus allowing people with lots of in game wealth to operate preferred and simply buy unlocks from other players as they need access to content.

Engine choice. The engine is old and led to the major problems of the game which are older style gameplay mechanics, lack of open world pvp and slow deployment of new content.

While the engine has limitations, it gets the job done for the most part.

The only place where I think it fails is it's not conducive to large scale open world PvP. Oh well. It's not like this is really a strong PvP centered game anyway.

Then again, all MMO game engines have shortcomings, and all of them are sensitive to large scale open world PvP.. because let's face it.. that's demanding in terms of graphics and processing.

Thanks for the incredibly opinionated view on why MY post was far too opinionated and thus obsolete.

You make an extremely biased and narrow opinion piece about what you dislike about the game, and then you get bent when someone offers disagreement and foundation for disagreement.

Priceless.

Released it too early.

Released it 5 years too late. With that engine, this should have been a contemporary of WOW.

While the engine has limitations, it gets the job done for the most part.

 

The only place where I think it fails is it's not conducive to large scale open world PvP. Oh well. It's not like this is really a strong PvP centered game anyway.

 

Then again, all MMO game engines have shortcomings, and all of them are sensitive to large scale open world PvP.. because let's face it.. that's demanding in terms of graphics and processing.

If the engine isn't the problem with building new PVE content, then what is? We've been told voice work isn't the problem, so what is?

Being the biggest western audience freemium MMO on the market right now.. your statement makes no sense at all.

 

 

 

LOL... really?

 

Do you understand how Freemium business models even work for internet games? Sincere question. Not "free", but "freemium"

 

I ask because this statement indicates a complete lack of understanding of the model from a business perspective. It's written from the "user wants to play for free" perspective.

 

Freemium as a business model is designed to extract ~ the same revenue per active account as a subscriber model. It just does it in a different, and more flexible manner for the players. Different games approach it slightly differently, but they all want the free side to be tedious enough to encourage either "pay to unlock and stay free" OR subscribe.

 

I encourage players of MMOs to get to a point where they understand the business side of freemium in MMOs. Take time to research the topic before leaping in with comments like what I quoted above. A great starting point is: http://casualconnect.org/mag/summer2012/CGA_F2PGames_Report.pdf

Your're such a freaken fanboy. Is this your first and only F2p game you've ever played? Trust me. there are many MMO's that have far more players and make much more money than swtor and there business models don't make you want to rip your hair out due to the blatant nickel and diming of swtor's current business model.

Released it too early.

Every MMO is released too early. So I really don't get your point on this.

MMOs are ALWAYS a work in progress. That's the nature of the genre. They are never finished, they always have bugs, and as they patch new content they remain unfinished and have old bugs and inject new ones. Been that way for as long as I have played MMOs (which as been close to 15 years).

Is this your first and only F2p game you've ever played?

My 4th actually. Thank you for your concern. (I hold lifetime subscriptions on two of them and still play them).

Trust me. there are many MMO's that have far more players and make much more money than swtor and there business models don't make you want to rip your hair out due to the blatant nickel and diming of swtor's current business model.

Name them.

I agree completely that they did this, but it begs the question of "Where did EA go wrong?"

 

They did not and have not.

 

You are talking about people who are completely addicted to gaming, the 40 hours per week and up people. And then you are assuming it is these very same people who will make or break the game, breaking it by leaving after a month when they've burned through the content, plus complaining about every minute detail of game play. The OP is flat out wrong by saying, "just about the entire community thinks...."

 

No, they don't. "Just about the entire community" doesn't even show up on these forums. "Just about the entire community" does not complain that the dye color green is really not green at all, but an off-shade of green that is inappropriate and must be fixed as soon as possible. "Just about the entire community" does not need customer service, ever, because they have no problems logging in, no problems with the launcher, and have never seen an OTP, so they don't even know that customer service sucks, which it does.

 

The "future of the game" has nothing whatsoever to do with this addicted group of players who will never be satisfied, who, if they are playing 40 hours a week plus, don't have a real life anyway. Everyone here claims to know all about subscriber numbers, but in fact no one knows about them at all. It's all fantasy.

 

The future of the game depends on EA/BW attracting a new group of players who are nowhere near as fanatical and nowhere near as "fast" as the current crop. These people will take a couple of years to level a few characters to 50. They'll play just a few hours a week, and they will be well satisfied with the type and pace of play.

 

In other words, the future of SWTOR is not you because you'll be going away, and they know it. In fact, they can't wait.

Dude....YES. YES. YES.

Props to you.

If the engine isn't the problem with building new PVE content, then what is? We've been told voice work isn't the problem, so what is?

You are mixing breakfast with lunch here.

Engine performance concerns and PvE content releases are two different components in the game.

I agree completely that they did this, but it begs the question of "Where did EA go wrong?"

 

They did not and have not.

 

You are talking about people who are completely addicted to gaming, the 40 hours per week and up people. And then you are assuming it is these very same people who will make or break the game, breaking it by leaving after a month when they've burned through the content, plus complaining about every minute detail of game play. The OP is flat out wrong by saying, "just about the entire community thinks...."

 

No, they don't. "Just about the entire community" doesn't even show up on these forums. "Just about the entire community" does not complain that the dye color green is really not green at all, but an off-shade of green that is inappropriate and must be fixed as soon as possible. "Just about the entire community" does not need customer service, ever, because they have no problems logging in, no problems with the launcher, and have never seen an OTP, so they don't even know that customer service sucks, which it does.

 

The "future of the game" has nothing whatsoever to do with this addicted group of players who will never be satisfied, who, if they are playing 40 hours a week plus, don't have a real life anyway. Everyone here claims to know all about subscriber numbers, but in fact no one knows about them at all. It's all fantasy.

 

The future of the game depends on EA/BW attracting a new group of players who are nowhere near as fanatical and nowhere near as "fast" as the current crop. These people will take a couple of years to level a few characters to 50. They'll play just a few hours a week, and they will be well satisfied with the type and pace of play.

 

In other words, the future of SWTOR is not you because you'll be going away, and they know it. In fact, they can't wait.

Accurate assessment in my opinion, and nicely stated.

The concept of pacing oneself through a game of course is anathema or foreign to many MMO players in the player base. But pacing oneself is actually how one copes with things in an MMO that do not meet every whim and desire a player may have. People seem to forget that MMOs are broadly designed to appeal to a broad player base, a player base that is at odds with itself in terms of what's important, wanted, needed (every gaming forum is evidence of conflict within the diverse needs of the broad set of players). They are by definition, imperfect for everyone.

Which brings me back to my often presented position: Play an MMO for what it offers you. It's a game, enjoy it. When it's no longer fun... find something that is. If your needs are high and you want lots of content.. play multiple MMOs (as many as needed to keep you from getting bored or overplaying the content).

My 4th actually. Thank you for your concern. (I hold lifetime subscriptions on two of them and still play them).

 

 

 

Name them.

so star trek and champions online.

Most prominent f2p on the market are going to be gw2, aion, tera, and probably Rift.(i've played them all) Do all of them do better than swtor? hard to say. I found it hard to find hard data. Aion has at least 3 million players with Tera floating around a million.

Then you have your long(er) running games such and Lord of the rings and Runescape.

I hear Defiance is doing fairly well after its release issues.

Then you have the more niche MMO's with fewer players but still bring in profits without invasive restrictions.

A few still in beta that are all f2p without being invasive. Ones I have personal experience with are going to be Firefall and Dragon's prophet.

I found it hard to find hard data. Aion has at least 3 million players with Tera floating around a million.

Asian markets don't count when judging success of a game. The $$$ just isn't there to justify talking about them.

If you released SWTOR in Asia, you'd have "millions" of new players, but it's so trivial money wise they haven't even put that plan on the table.

Biggest thing Bioware did wrong in my opinion is forget around the re-playability.

The class quests are great for the three chapters you get. Each class you play has a different and fun story. But once you level one Imp and one Rep, going back though the world quests is pretty boring and repetitive. But you have to do them or you end up underleveled and/or under geared. Going from 50 to 55 is just as repetitive. Instead of having 8 stories, Bioware chose to opt for 2 stories. Which means that the second Republic character I level though Makeb is exactly the same as the first.

I have two monitors and now when I level characters, I have a DVD or other video content running on the second monitor and pay very little attention to the game. Which is sad.

And, as a space fan, it saddens me that they opted to turn the space portion of TOR into a mini-game rather than a full fledged space sim (Like SWG had.)

so star trek and champions online.

 

Most prominent f2p on the market are going to be gw2, aion, tera, and probably Rift.(i've played them all) Do all of them do better than swtor? hard to say. I found it hard to find hard data. Aion has at least 3 million players with Tera floating around a million.

 

Then you have your long(er) running games such and Lord of the rings and Runescape.

 

I hear Defiance is doing fairly well after its release issues.

 

Then you have the more niche MMO's with fewer players but still bring in profits without invasive restrictions.

 

A few still in beta that are all f2p without being invasive. Ones I have personal experience with are going to be Firefall and Dragon's prophet.

It's not at all clear that any of those games is larger in population (or revenue) then SWTOR at this time. Rift, having just turned F2P and with it's replay surge of prior subscribers is probably in the same range as SWTOR at the moment, but no way to tell yet if it lasts.

As for the millions playing Tera and Aion... NOT in the west. When comparing MMOs, you need to compare in the West and Asia separately because the economic models and the player motivators are entirely different. Tera and Aion populations on Western servers is small compared to SWTOR.

Asian markets don't count when judging success of a game. The $$$ just isn't there to justify talking about them.

 

If you released SWTOR in Asia, you'd have "millions" of new players, but it's so trivial money wise they haven't even put that plan on the table.

Exactly.

Everyone here claims to know all about subscriber numbers, but in fact no one knows about them at all. It's all fantasy.

 

.

You keep saying this in a lot of your posts. You are flat out wrong. EA releases the sub numbers in their quarterly reports. Since ToR launched, there has only been 1 quarterly report where they did not release the numbers and that was just before FTP launch. Last report they said they have ~500k subs.

Of course it's opinion, that's actually one of the stupidest things I've read on these forums.

Almost all of this forum is opinion! That's the whole point!

 

 

And I never said it wasn't fun. I said they didn't put the small little things in that make you smile, and laugh.

You either can't read, or didn't bother reading my post.

You state almost everything as fact eg. Rift Revolutionized Skill Trees not" I personally think X did Y.

Swtor just doesn't really have the fun aspect of an MMO,

Yes you did.