I posted this on another site but its so good I'll post it here to.
Here is my prediction of SW:TOR.
First month out they will see huge numbers of players in the game, so much so they will add additional servers to keep up with the capacity after the servers crash. After a few game play tweaks and bug fix patches, the devs start working overtime to get more content in the game and to squash gold-sellers. Estimated players are 3 - 4 million in US alone.
Second month out 75% of players have hit max lvl on main toon and are working on alts, grinding pvp or finishing mastering the raids. The devs have a massive hiring frenzy to help complete additional content and features. The game gets negative reviews on a few of the hardcore MMO sites, with complaints ranging from "It doesn't feel like Star Wars","Its a WOW clone with spaceships"," This isn't an MMO, Its a co-op with PVP" to other complaints ranting about how it was doomed from the start and EA just wants your money. Estimated players are 5 - 6.5 million world wide with an increase in china due to gold farming.
3 to 4 months out the first "major" patch comes out with some interesting features and new "dungeons". 500k players have left because to them it was an ok game but it really wasn't for them or they've seen or played something to similar to it or just game burn out. EA start to get worried because most of the profits are going to LucasArts and they're just making enough to keep up with the server fees and dev staff support. The hardcore MMO sites start reporting horror stories of awful customer service, accounts getting deleted because they players were mistaken as being bots and or gold farmers, videos detailing bugs that have been in the game since release and youtube rants of people with anger issues just ripping into the game and Star Wars in general. Estimated players are 4.5 to 5.5 million.
6 to 7 months out the "Off The Rails" patch hits, offering players total space freedom to fly around in, servers crash and remain down for 5hrs to 6 days, angering MANY players. Servers are back up but no compensation (free days) is given on order for either EA or LucasArts. 300k to 560k players rage quit, 9.5 out of 10 reviews on MANY gaming websites drop down to 7.5 of 6 due to negative responses from players. Lay-off occur due to cut backs or re-organizing, many sites record this as the beginning of the end for TOR. Estimated players are 3.25 to 4 million
9 to 11 months out EA and/or LucasArts tweak to game a bit to appeal to a broader (younger) audience, alienated the hardcore Star Wars fans and leading to massive rage quits. EA starts to consolidates servers and merge player groups due to costs. Estimated players are 1.5 to 3 million.
14 to 15 months out LucasArts sues EA/Bioware for botching everything up, wins the case and sells the game rights to Activision/Blizzard. Estimated players are 350k to 700k on two of the surviving servers.
24 to 36 months out after some TLC and a few mini expansions the game sees a modest resurgence. Estimated players are 2.5 to 3.75 million and remain stable.
I've mentioned everywhere on the Star Wars forums and in-game feedback that if they do not get support staff active in the game for the first few months they will lose a lot of players.
Parents will not let their children play if the kids are being upset by rage quitting nerds, 30 year old losers who through tantrums in a major fashion are the worst. They can put a downer on an entire game for a day.
I think this is exactly what is going to happen and the game won't be so big.
STO is safe Season 5 and 6 on STO will be enough to ensure STO is not threatened by another game for many years. WoW is losing players, people are finally realising WoW is old and it is a bit sad to play a game for more than 5 years without at least considering trying something like Star Wars.
Considering even SW:G after the TRIBBLE of the game with the NGE lasted far longer than that, I'm going to look back on this prediction and smile when I'm still playing a year or two down the road.
14 to 15 months out LucasArts sues EA/Bioware for botching everything up, wins the case and sells the game rights to Activision/Blizzard. Estimated players are 350k to 700k on two of the surviving servers.
Wouldn't they have done this to Sony?
Twice? Once for the original mess, and again over the NGE?
STO is safe Season 5 and 6 on STO will be enough to ensure STO is not threatened by another game for many years.
Now I have picked this bit of your post to ask one thing.
After seeing season 5, are you still going to put your faith into season 6, I came back for a month only to find out that Cryptic added everything they promised for season 4 and called it season 5, this is both very disconcerting and also very very disappointing, 20% new (read as old) content and 80% c-store items as well as stuff that was pulled from the game which used to be free and added to the c-store (talking about the t3.5 ships, nebula and excelsior).
As of this moment I think STO is losing a lot of players who are going to go and play SWTOR, they will likely be watching this game to see if there are any improvements over the next 3 months, which i personally doubt there will be in all honesty, Cryptic is going the way of the cash cow and I think season 6 will prove me right, which in of itself is a shame.
That's around 1/100 American citizens. A bit high, don't you think?
That's not counting...
the elderly, who may think computers are this strange box sitting on their grandkids' desks.
infants/toddlers/small children who have yet to learn to read, let alone read the dialogue on games.
people who don't give a rat's TRIBBLE about Star Wars.
You do realise that SWTOR is not only going to be released/played in the US right?
But as of December 1st, the preorders for SWTOR were counted in around the 2.5million mark, and that is not counting that digital order numbers which are not released, so it is quite possible that SWTOR will have around 3-4million players world-wide on official launch day. This in of itself will make it the biggest launch in history if I remember correctly, feel free to correct me though if needs be ok.
On a different note however you don't have to be a Star Wars fan to play a Star Wars MMO, you could simply be burnt out on your current selection of MMO's, now while this is not true for the most part I am pretty sure it is true for a lot of people who will be playing it.
Anyways back to what i was originally going to post.
SWTOR will be a significant threat to a lot of mmo's imo, look at Blizzard/WoW, as soon as the pre-orders for SWTOR began they rolled out the 1 year subs with a free copy of Diablo 3, Rift started selling the Lifetime Subscriptions again on the same day too and at a lower price, and I believe STO also pushed back the release for F2P to try and get it working as much as possible to avoid losing as many subs as possible, however that plan does not seem to be working for them atm imo.
After playing the open Beta, i propose a name change from SW: The Old Republic to SW: The Kids Republic.
Sorry but I played it for 2 weeks and walked away feeling it was a kids game.
And what open beta was this you played in?, I'm only asking because there was NO open beta, ever.
The closest to an open beta SWTOR has had was where they invited all previous beta testers to play for 3 days, and that was the last weekend of November, so either you are full of BS, or you don't know what you are talking about, sorry.
now I meant no offense here, but your statement just rings false to me.
And what open beta was this you played in?, I'm only asking because there was NO open beta, ever.
The closest to an open beta SWTOR has had was where they invited all previous beta testers to play for 3 days, and that was the last weekend of November, so either you are full of BS, or you don't know what you are talking about, sorry.
now I meant no offense here, but your statement just rings false to me.
well sorry if you got left out.
and with such reaction as yours i see nerdrage explosion building.
so, your headed back over to play the kids game on the 20th, or are you doing the 5 day early access?
After playing the open Beta, i propose a name change from SW: The Old Republic to SW: The Kids Republic.
Sorry but I played it for 2 weeks and walked away feeling it was a kids game.
You really felt that?....STO has to be the most immature example of Trek that i've ever tired. Grab bags at the fairground kids roll up, get your pretty ships.
And what open beta was this you played in?, I'm only asking because there was NO open beta, ever.
The closest to an open beta SWTOR has had was where they invited all previous beta testers to play for 3 days, and that was the last weekend of November, so either you are full of BS, or you don't know what you are talking about, sorry.
now I meant no offense here, but your statement just rings false to me.
I got invited to the final beta test weekend which was the first weekend of December 2-4th, so the final beta test wasn't the last weekend of november
You really felt that?....STO has to be the most immature example of Trek that i've ever tired. Grab bags at the fairground kids roll up, get your pretty ships.
Ya I really do feel that way about it.
it had occurred to when I was playing the direction SW went after Ep1-3. The franchise was being redesigned towards being more for kids than adults.
The biggest problem I had with it, was since it supposed to take place so far back in the SW timeline, that basically... i already "know how it ends". the "spoilers" where already shown in theaters when I was a kid.
well sorry if you got left out.
and with such reaction as yours i see nerdrage explosion building.
so, your headed back over to play the kids game on the 20th, or are you doing the 5 day early access?
Lol no nerd rage here tbh, and yes I will be playing SWTOR today thankyou, as for you, you can stay here and have to pay for anything extra with REAL MONEY, while I go and play a game that I enjoy, I only came back to STO to give it another chance, but that failed as i won't pay for anything that was pulled out of the game and added to the cstore, just so they can make more cash.
And going by your reaction you obviously have not played in the SWTOR Betas.
You can pay cash to buy your 'trek' things, and i will get my SWTOR things for free.
I played the TOR beta twice and i was completely underwhelmed, it was average at best and designed more for kids than adults, the maps are too easy to get lost in, and the space combat don't even get me started on it, it was less than poor, in fact thats an insult to poor rail shooters.
I played the TOR beta twice and i was completely underwhelmed, it was average at best and designed more for kids than adults, the maps are too easy to get lost in, and the space combat don't even get me started on it, it was less than poor, in fact thats an insult to poor rail shooters.
So it's designed for kids and you got lost in the maps.
Fair enough i can see why it wouldn't appeal to you and why this game does.
I played the TOR beta twice and i was completely underwhelmed, it was average at best and designed more for kids than adults, the maps are too easy to get lost in, and the space combat don't even get me started on it, it was less than poor, in fact thats an insult to poor rail shooters.
From this post i get this:
The maps are too big, please give me a huge arrow on screen showing me where to go.
Yes while the space combat is no swg, it is however in keeping with the similar style that was in the KotOR series, though this time instead of only controlling the turret of the ship that was on rails, you are now controlling the ship as if flies along a tunnel type system, while both versions are underwhelming, they were both not a main part of the game, instead only set as a minigame, you don't have to do them if you don't want to.
All the choices made in SWTOR were done so that the widest range of players were targeted.
I can see where all the negativity is coming from though, but at the same time most people should blame themselves for expecting a game to be something that it was never going to be, putting your own expectations upon a game you are not making is just plain stupid, accept it for what it is, if you like it fine, if not move on, which after the next 15 days I will be gone again until season 6 hits STO, if it is more cash shop stuff and no new content I will not bother looking here again.
And going by your reaction you obviously have not played in the SWTOR Betas.
.
have fun. you should enjoy the flashy lights and sparkly things in that kids game
One must always remember:
the Sith?- destroyed
darth vader? blackest man in the galaxy was a crusty old white guy-formerly a whiny emo kid
the Great EMPIRE?- brought down by the care bears
Han solo?- he shot first-second-first...?!?!?
I can see where all the negativity is coming from though, but at the same time most people should blame themselves for expecting a game to be something that it was never going to be, putting your own expectations upon a game you are not making is just plain stupid, accept it for what it is, if you like it fine, if not move on, which after the next 15 days I will be gone again until season 6 hits STO, if it is more cash shop stuff and no new content I will not bother looking here again.
From this post i get a massive contradiction because your already expecting season 6 to be something and in the space of 2 lines you contradicted yourself.
And i played the original KOTOR and its sequel and was impressed with them, TOR is supposed to expand on this but hasn't really progressed the game style from the the sith lords, yes i had certain expectations ill admit that, and some of it didn't live up to what i hoped, but i also have the same high hope for STO because it has potential and like i have done with season 5, i will take a page from the borg, i will continue to assimilate all the new new changes to the game and continue to enjoy my time with the friends i have made in game (something that is hard to do on TOR) and we as a fleet will continue to enjoy having a laugh in game whether its helping on missions, just chatting in chat or pvp, i will keep coming back because Star Trek has a much closer camraderie with it's fans and what i feel imo i have found within the game in my fleet.
That's only my opinion and i realise everyone is different, so each to there own.
From this post i get a massive contradiction because your already expecting season 6 to be something and in the space of 2 lines you contradicted yourself.
You are right i am expecting Season 6 to be something, All the content we have been promised since launch, yet we will have to pay for it with real cash, at which point we will find out that most of the ingame content was pulled and is slated for season 7, but we won't actually see it till late 2012.
You see I was not contradicting myself I was being a bit on the sarcastic side, with my tongue firmly in cheek when i'm talking about anything content wise in STO.
Ah Revan steeped in so much mystery background and "where did he go" after the 1st KOTOR - and no emo complex!!
The book, Revan gives a lot of details about where Revan goes off to. It also gives loads of details on the Emperor and a companion character. The news you'll likely want to hear is that Revan lives!
Comments
aaaaah.... I'm lost for words
If only you posted that last night I could have told you how right you were
Parents will not let their children play if the kids are being upset by rage quitting nerds, 30 year old losers who through tantrums in a major fashion are the worst. They can put a downer on an entire game for a day.
I think this is exactly what is going to happen and the game won't be so big.
STO is safe Season 5 and 6 on STO will be enough to ensure STO is not threatened by another game for many years. WoW is losing players, people are finally realising WoW is old and it is a bit sad to play a game for more than 5 years without at least considering trying something like Star Wars.
That's not counting...
Well, at least it was a very creative and imaginative prediction...
Considering even SW:G after the TRIBBLE of the game with the NGE lasted far longer than that, I'm going to look back on this prediction and smile when I'm still playing a year or two down the road.
That is what I put on my Census form...
Wouldn't they have done this to Sony?
Twice? Once for the original mess, and again over the NGE?
Now I have picked this bit of your post to ask one thing.
After seeing season 5, are you still going to put your faith into season 6, I came back for a month only to find out that Cryptic added everything they promised for season 4 and called it season 5, this is both very disconcerting and also very very disappointing, 20% new (read as old) content and 80% c-store items as well as stuff that was pulled from the game which used to be free and added to the c-store (talking about the t3.5 ships, nebula and excelsior).
As of this moment I think STO is losing a lot of players who are going to go and play SWTOR, they will likely be watching this game to see if there are any improvements over the next 3 months, which i personally doubt there will be in all honesty, Cryptic is going the way of the cash cow and I think season 6 will prove me right, which in of itself is a shame.
STO: Season 6: The Final Microtransaction......
You do realise that SWTOR is not only going to be released/played in the US right?
But as of December 1st, the preorders for SWTOR were counted in around the 2.5million mark, and that is not counting that digital order numbers which are not released, so it is quite possible that SWTOR will have around 3-4million players world-wide on official launch day. This in of itself will make it the biggest launch in history if I remember correctly, feel free to correct me though if needs be ok.
On a different note however you don't have to be a Star Wars fan to play a Star Wars MMO, you could simply be burnt out on your current selection of MMO's, now while this is not true for the most part I am pretty sure it is true for a lot of people who will be playing it.
Anyways back to what i was originally going to post.
SWTOR will be a significant threat to a lot of mmo's imo, look at Blizzard/WoW, as soon as the pre-orders for SWTOR began they rolled out the 1 year subs with a free copy of Diablo 3, Rift started selling the Lifetime Subscriptions again on the same day too and at a lower price, and I believe STO also pushed back the release for F2P to try and get it working as much as possible to avoid losing as many subs as possible, however that plan does not seem to be working for them atm imo.
Sorry but I played it for 2 weeks and walked away feeling it was a kids game.
And what open beta was this you played in?, I'm only asking because there was NO open beta, ever.
The closest to an open beta SWTOR has had was where they invited all previous beta testers to play for 3 days, and that was the last weekend of November, so either you are full of BS, or you don't know what you are talking about, sorry.
now I meant no offense here, but your statement just rings false to me.
well sorry if you got left out.
and with such reaction as yours i see nerdrage explosion building.
so, your headed back over to play the kids game on the 20th, or are you doing the 5 day early access?
You really felt that?....STO has to be the most immature example of Trek that i've ever tired. Grab bags at the fairground kids roll up, get your pretty ships.
I got invited to the final beta test weekend which was the first weekend of December 2-4th, so the final beta test wasn't the last weekend of november
Ya I really do feel that way about it.
it had occurred to when I was playing the direction SW went after Ep1-3. The franchise was being redesigned towards being more for kids than adults.
The biggest problem I had with it, was since it supposed to take place so far back in the SW timeline, that basically... i already "know how it ends". the "spoilers" where already shown in theaters when I was a kid.
Lol no nerd rage here tbh, and yes I will be playing SWTOR today thankyou, as for you, you can stay here and have to pay for anything extra with REAL MONEY, while I go and play a game that I enjoy, I only came back to STO to give it another chance, but that failed as i won't pay for anything that was pulled out of the game and added to the cstore, just so they can make more cash.
And going by your reaction you obviously have not played in the SWTOR Betas.
You can pay cash to buy your 'trek' things, and i will get my SWTOR things for free.
I played the TOR beta twice and i was completely underwhelmed, it was average at best and designed more for kids than adults, the maps are too easy to get lost in, and the space combat don't even get me started on it, it was less than poor, in fact thats an insult to poor rail shooters.
So it's designed for kids and you got lost in the maps.
Fair enough i can see why it wouldn't appeal to you and why this game does.
From this post i get this:
The maps are too big, please give me a huge arrow on screen showing me where to go.
Yes while the space combat is no swg, it is however in keeping with the similar style that was in the KotOR series, though this time instead of only controlling the turret of the ship that was on rails, you are now controlling the ship as if flies along a tunnel type system, while both versions are underwhelming, they were both not a main part of the game, instead only set as a minigame, you don't have to do them if you don't want to.
All the choices made in SWTOR were done so that the widest range of players were targeted.
I can see where all the negativity is coming from though, but at the same time most people should blame themselves for expecting a game to be something that it was never going to be, putting your own expectations upon a game you are not making is just plain stupid, accept it for what it is, if you like it fine, if not move on, which after the next 15 days I will be gone again until season 6 hits STO, if it is more cash shop stuff and no new content I will not bother looking here again.
have fun. you should enjoy the flashy lights and sparkly things in that kids game
One must always remember:
the Sith?- destroyed
darth vader? blackest man in the galaxy was a crusty old white guy-formerly a whiny emo kid
the Great EMPIRE?- brought down by the care bears
Han solo?- he shot first-second-first...?!?!?
From this post i get a massive contradiction because your already expecting season 6 to be something and in the space of 2 lines you contradicted yourself.
And i played the original KOTOR and its sequel and was impressed with them, TOR is supposed to expand on this but hasn't really progressed the game style from the the sith lords, yes i had certain expectations ill admit that, and some of it didn't live up to what i hoped, but i also have the same high hope for STO because it has potential and like i have done with season 5, i will take a page from the borg, i will continue to assimilate all the new new changes to the game and continue to enjoy my time with the friends i have made in game (something that is hard to do on TOR) and we as a fleet will continue to enjoy having a laugh in game whether its helping on missions, just chatting in chat or pvp, i will keep coming back because Star Trek has a much closer camraderie with it's fans and what i feel imo i have found within the game in my fleet.
That's only my opinion and i realise everyone is different, so each to there own.
You forgot the space jesus complex. I must say though, Revan is much more interesting as a character than Vader. Can't wait to meet good old' Revan.
Ah Revan steeped in so much mystery background and "where did he go" after the 1st KOTOR - and no emo complex!!
You are right i am expecting Season 6 to be something, All the content we have been promised since launch, yet we will have to pay for it with real cash, at which point we will find out that most of the ingame content was pulled and is slated for season 7, but we won't actually see it till late 2012.
You see I was not contradicting myself I was being a bit on the sarcastic side, with my tongue firmly in cheek when i'm talking about anything content wise in STO.
The book, Revan gives a lot of details about where Revan goes off to. It also gives loads of details on the Emperor and a companion character. The news you'll likely want to hear is that Revan lives!