BrookM wrote:Somehow I doubt that WAR will topple WOW from the throne of best MMO ever. I agree that WAR is superior but about 99% of the people who play MMO's will stick to the real thing and don't bother with the "knock offs".

If that was true no one would be playing WoW.

And you forget that WAR is starting with two massive fan bases, first from WarHammer and then from DAoC (Also created by Mythic)

BrookM wrote:Somehow I doubt that WAR will topple WOW from the throne of best MMO ever. I agree that WAR is superior but about 99% of the people who play MMO's will stick to the real thing and don't bother with the "knock offs".

Knock off?



http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2006/04/10/

Look, I am not calling it a knock off myself, I know that WOW is the far-off rip off from WAR, just try telling that to the legions of idiots and Koreans who are on their knees for Blizzard most of their spare time.

BrookM wrote:Look, I am not calling it a knock off myself, I know that WOW is the far-off rip off from WAR, just try telling that to the legions of idiots and Koreans who are on their knees for Blizzard most of their spare time.

I'm not even refering to the rip off Blizzard did to come up with Warcraft and StarCraft. WoW did nothing but take ideas from Everquest and Dark Age of Camelot and make everything look like a cheap cartoon, then spend 5 million dollars shoving it down our throats for 6 months before it went gold. WoW brought nothing to the MMO world other then removing all the slow 9 year olds from the good games.

Please tell us more about your hatred of popular franchises.

WoW is the real deal. If the other games that came before it were the real things, why did they die off and become forgotten? WoW is THE MMO game. Listen to any of the recovering WoW addicts and you'll realize that WoW's carrot-baiting recipe was the perfect one for MMOs. Addictive enough that even though everyone talks about how unoriginal and boring it is, they'll still play it for hours on end for no reason. That's what an MMO should be - like a drug.

I've tried WAR. It doesn't have that feel. It's like TF2. You hop on and get off an hour later. It's not the ideal MMO.

stonefox wrote:Please tell us more about your hatred of popular franchises.

WoW is the real deal. If the other games that came before it were the real things, why did they die off and become forgotten? WoW is THE MMO game. Listen to any of the recovering WoW addicts and you'll realize that WoW's carrot-baiting recipe was the perfect one for MMOs. Addictive enough that even though everyone talks about how unoriginal and boring it is, they'll still play it for hours on end for no reason. That's what an MMO should be - like a drug.

I've tried WAR. It doesn't have that feel. It's like TF2. You hop on and get off an hour later. It's not the ideal MMO.

Yes, because I am a real gamer and know my history I hate WoW just because it is popular with 40 year old house wives and little kids.

You don't hear about DAoC because it has everything WoW has AND MORE 10+ years ago. The game is a decade old with a crap load of expansions and still holds a few hundred thousand subscriptions

MMOs are not supposed to be like a drug, there supposed to be fun and let you emirs your self in a fantasy world for a few hours every now and then, not keep you playing for 40+ hours a week and do nothing els. WoW is a complete disgrace to the gaming world.

Yes, let's blame Korea. Blizzard made a lot of great games. I'm a huge RPG lover.

But WoW was always such an obvious way for the company to amass gold, that I simply had to turn away. WAR is no different for me - I WILL NOT SUBSCRIBE TO A COMPUTER GAME. I also play a hacked version of HL2, because Steam can blow me. I was on dial-up when HL2 first came out; it was another day before I could play it thanks to Steams's all-star dumbness. Playing games online is one thing.
I love it and I've done it for years. I pay for my internet connection and my downloads. In fact I fork out a premium, mostly so I can get less than 60 pings on UT04.

If you buy a game, you shouldn't have to download anything else to make it run, except for patches, which aren't generally needed - there is some choice in the matter.

If you buy a game like WAR at full price, and are paying for your internet connection AND subscriptions to god knows how many other fanboi games... Geez, thanks losers. THAT's were the powerful economy our parents built for us went.

Blizzard did their homework, their studies and weren't pushed out the door by a money grubbing producer like EA. Enough said.

Hrm, calling MMO players losers because they pay for server upkeep and further development?

Arctik_Firangi wrote:Yes, let's blame Korea. Blizzard made a lot of great games. I'm a huge RPG lover.

But WoW was always such an obvious way for the company to amass gold, that I simply had to turn away. WAR is no different for me - I WILL NOT SUBSCRIBE TO A COMPUTER GAME. I also play a hacked version of HL2, because Steam can blow me. I was on dial-up when HL2 first came out; it was another day before I could play it thanks to Steams's all-star dumbness. Playing games online is one thing.
I love it and I've done it for years. I pay for my internet connection and my downloads. In fact I fork out a premium, mostly so I can get less than 60 pings on UT04.

If you buy a game, you shouldn't have to download anything else to make it run, except for patches, which aren't generally needed - there is some choice in the matter.

If you buy a game like WAR at full price, and are paying for your internet connection AND subscriptions to god knows how many other fanboi games... Geez, thanks losers. THAT's were the powerful economy our parents built for us went.

Wow, way to make your self look stupid. People pay monthly for large content patches and server maintenance so they can keep playing the game they enjoy. Sounds to me that your just pissy because your stuck on Dial-up.

And I hate to brake it to you but by paying the monthly you are helping people keep there job so they can keep the rotation of wealth going. People paying monthly fees for entertainment is not "ruining the economy" its the same as you paying to go see a movie on the weekend.

JokerGod wrote:
Yes, because I am a real gamer and know my history I hate WoW just because it is popular with 40 year old house wives and little kids.

You don't hear about DAoC because it has everything WoW has AND MORE 10+ years ago. The game is a decade old with a crap load of expansions and still holds a few hundred thousand subscriptions

MMOs are not supposed to be like a drug, there supposed to be fun and let you emirs your self in a fantasy world for a few hours every now and then, not keep you playing for 40+ hours a week and do nothing els. WoW is a complete disgrace to the gaming world.

Yeah, too bad that really popular game is successful with everyone and not just the "gaming elite". DAoC and other MMOs were never popular. They never caught the attention of the news and you'd be hard pressed to find a random person who knew about it.

MMOs are role playing games. Ideally, they'd be so good that you'd want to actually believe that your character and his makebelieve life was real. They should get you wrapped up in the fantasy world and assert the image of the basement junkie who gets laughed at. Last, they should make you feel utterly vulnerable so much that you can feel better about your pathetic waste of a life by being this grand hero who's strong, smart, and popular - qualities you don't possess IRL. This provides endless entertainment for you and for those who view you - everyone wins!

This is what the ideal MMO should do:

Yes because a games popularity is only based on how many lives it destroys. :S

The only reason games like DAoC and EQ2 are not "Popular" as you put it is because the companys behind them put there money in to the GAME and not advertising the crap out of it to the point where the advertisements where great but the game was generic crap.

Most of the people that play WoW have never played any other MMO so they don't know what a real MMO is like and end up basing every other game they play off of WoW, its destroying the MMO genera

So, yeah, I think WAR eventually has the capability of turning WoW into what EQ is today. A game that'll still exist

A ludicrous statement. Eventually WoW will become what you described, but where the players are going isn't into WAR, but into the new MMO Blizzard is set to release in about (?) five years. Untill then WoW will reign supreme by an absolutely massive margin. The share Blizzard has in the MMO market is over 50%, with the other half split between dozens of games. The same was essentially proven true of Starcraft, as the only proper worldwide competitor in the same genre is Starcraft 2. I've now played WAR for what, three or four weeks, and it's been nothing short of a big disappointment for me, and I've already gone back to WoW now that 3.0.2 was released on live and the expansion CD is only three weeks away. To me it seems the hype of WAR has already ended before it ever truly began, and popular gaming blog sites like Gameriot aren't writing anything much about it anymore. The only people I know still talking about WAR are desperate WAR players trying to round up WoW players from WoW forums into their game to fill the empty servers.

Double post.

Therion wrote:

So, yeah, I think WAR eventually has the capability of turning WoW into what EQ is today. A game that'll still exist

A ludicrous statement. Eventually WoW will become what you described, but where the players are going isn't into WAR, but into the new MMO Blizzard is set to release in about (?) five years. Untill then WoW will reign supreme by an absolutely massive margin. The share Blizzard has in the MMO market is over 50%, with the other half split between dozens of games. The same was essentially proven true of Starcraft, as the only proper worldwide competitor in the same genre is Starcraft 2. I've now played WAR for what, three or four weeks, and it's been nothing short of a big disappointment for me, and I've already gone back to WoW now that 3.0.2 was released on live and the expansion CD is only three weeks away. To me it seems the hype of WAR has already ended before it ever truly began, and popular gaming blog sites like Gameriot aren't writing anything much about it anymore. The only people I know still talking about WAR are desperate WAR players trying to round up WoW players from WoW forums into their game to fill the empty servers.

The only people left playing WoW we don't want on WAR. you can feel free to keep all the stupid kids and 40 year old house wives. We don't want them ruining out game.

And I Hate to brake it to you but WAR has slaughtered WoWs starting month, they where twice WoWs beta and close to twice WoWs first month.

The only reason WoW is still bigger is because it is years older and has spent over a billion dollars advertising it, WAR hasen't even spent 100,000 on advertisements and it is growing faster then WoW ever did.

WoW could have 900,000,000 players and I wouldn't care. This isn't how I choose to play my games. WAR is fun in a way I find engaging. thus I play it. WoW is fun, but it doesn't really engage me, so I don't play it.

Not that it matters as this thread was derailed awhile ago and now we are someplace unfortunate.

The only people left playing WoW we don't want on WAR

So aggressive. The only people? Oh yes, the 10.9 million monthly subscribers. I don't know any serious gamers at all who have left WoW for WAR. Actually, the only people I know at all who've made a serious switch to that game, were two unbelievable casuals who got tired of WoW Arena PvP demanding much more individual skill than they had to offer. Thus, they're now 'capturing castles' in a 'superior' game.

And I Hate to brake it to you but WAR has slaughtered WoWs starting month

A lot of WoW players were curious if the game was any good. I'm one of those 700K so called 'WAR players' who bought the box, and by the way, won't subscribe.

The WAR case hasn't been in any real way different to AoC so far a little previously, and it will suffer the same fate. The noise quiets down everywhere else than on Warhammer 40K/Fantasy Battle fansites, and then the game dies a slow death.

EDIT: The WoW market share is actually 62%, not 50% as I previously stated.

I'd play MMOs if it wasn't for all the other people. Several of them look interesting and cool, but I just don't want to have to deal with the average online gamer. Not my type of crowd.

And I Hate to brake it to you but WAR has slaughtered WoWs starting month, they where twice WoWs beta and close to twice WoWs first month.

The only reason WoW is still bigger is because it is years older and has spent over a billion dollars advertising it, WAR hasen't even spent 100,000 on advertisements and it is growing faster then WoW ever did.

The reason WAR has broken records is because WoW paved the way by introducing the MMO genre to players who normally had no interest in it or in PC gaming at all. Due to WoW, the MMO scene has changed dramatically between the time that WoW was released and now, so comparing subscription numbers between WAR and WoW at release is meaningless.

That's not to knock WAR because it's obviously having a more successful release than LotR online, Vanguard, DDO, AoC, etc. One further caveat to add, though, is that one should be cautious about using subsciption numbers to determine the quality of a game. Good games tend to be successful, certainly, but just because one game has more players than the other doesn't necessarily mean it is a better game. McDonald's sells the most hamburgers in the world, but that doesn't mean they're the best hamburgers in the world.

Saying WoW is the only reason WAR has its numbers is like saying Apple only sells computers because Microsoft invented it first :S

WoW came out as the internet was growing and more and more people where getting computers for more then E-mail and surfing, Dial-Up was going out the window and things like Online banking, Flash Games and Easy to use E-mail where coming in to play. Blizzard was smart and relised the game when people where starting to explore the options of the online world, they got lucky and all the little kids loved the cartoon images and so easy a slow can do it game play.

The people still playing WoW can stay there, thos of us playing WAR don't want your care bear crying in our game, have fun doing the same thing 600 times to get your "epic loot" We will be playing a revolutionary game that doesn't require us to play for 10+ hours a day.

And WoW has 10.9Million ACCOUNTS, not subscriptions. Blizzard has out out false reports since WC2, there press reports can not be trusted.

Yes because a games popularity is only based on how many lives it destroys.

The only reason games like DAoC and EQ2 are not "Popular" as you put it is because the companys behind them put there money in to the GAME and not advertising the crap out of it to the point where the advertisements where great but the game was generic crap.

The cost of WoWs development cycle was well over both of those games. It cost more to make, it costs far more to upkeep, and it is BETTER. Thats why it has 11 million subscriptions. Not because of advertising (that began occurring well after the games release). I like WAR, i play WAR, I think it's better than WoW. I also think DAOC is overhyped garbage and EQ2 was about as revolutionary as a madden sequel.

The same was essentially proven true of Starcraft, as the only proper worldwide competitor in the same genre is Starcraft 2.

Actually, outside of korea C&C 3 and Dawn of War both saw superior numbers in the tournament sector. They just don't have the longevity of starcraft because the companies that produce them don't wait a decade to release a sequel.

To me it seems the hype of WAR has already ended before it ever truly began, and popular gaming blog sites like Gameriot aren't writing anything much about it anymore.

There is no such thing as a "popular gaming blog". There are blogs about gaming that attract diehards but to be popular you have to have some pretension of being mainstream. Penny arcade is a popular gaming blog attached to a mainstream comic and they talk about WAR all the time. The initial release hype is dying down because the release has HAPPENED not because the game sucks.

The only people I know still talking about WAR are desperate WAR players trying to round up WoW players from WoW forums into their game to fill the empty servers.

The fact that you actively surf the sesspit that is the WoW forums means your not the kind of player Mythic is likely to win over. You have too much invested to switch, as will anyone that is able to USE WoTLK. MMOs gain and lose memberships in the longterm if they are successful, the first months entry and exit numbers are rarely indicative of more than the health of the industry.

The only people left playing WoW we don't want on WAR. you can feel free to keep all the stupid kids and 40 year old house wives. We don't want them ruining out game.

Facepalm.jpeg

I don't know any serious gamers at all who have left WoW for WAR.

"serious WoW gamers" won't leave WoW for WAR. They are "serious WoW gamers". Thats like saying a "Serious Reuben Fan" will drop it because there is a new sandwich on the menu. If he did he wasn't too serious.

WoW Arena PvP demanding much more individual skill than they had to offer.

If by individual skill you mean rock paper scissors metagame.

I'm one of those 700K so called 'WAR players' who bought the box, and by the way, won't subscribe.

And you have made it painfully obvious that you were just using it as a stopgap measure before WoTLK so you could grind more lootz in NEW neon caverns with giant monsters in them.

The WAR case hasn't been in any real way different to AoC so far a little previously, and it will suffer the same fate.

Actually AoC is dying because of a horrifying amount of launch bugs, a total lack of upper level content, and soul crushing system requirements. All of which are admitted by the development team.

None of which WAR has. Most of your posts are rabid fanboism, but really, do some research.

Saying WoW is the only reason WAR has its numbers is like saying Apple only sells computers because Microsoft invented it first

No, its akin to saying that apple sells computers because the computing industry exists and is large enough to support their products. Which happened in no small part thanks to the lowest bidder system that Microsoft put forth. If there wasn't a massive computing industry apple wouldn't sell as much. If WoW hadn't grown MMO genre five times over, WAR wouldn't sell as much.

nd WoW has 10.9Million ACCOUNTS, not subscriptions. Blizzard has out out false reports since WC2, there press reports can not be trusted.

Saying WoW is the only reason WAR has its numbers is like saying Apple only sells computers because Microsoft invented it first

Taken from the WIKI article. Maybe its lower maybe its higher, but its probably damn close, since its illegal to lie to shareholders in that way.

JokerGod, your argument seems to suggest that prior to the time WoW was released, the internet wasn't growing and computers were only used for e-mail and web surfing and everyone was still using dial-up, none of which is true. Those changes pre-date WoW by several years at least (and, in fact, PC gaming is on the decline, not the rise).

The truth of the matter is that Blizzard put out the most polished, user-friendly, and generally appealing MMO ever made. EQ 2 came out at almost EXACTLY the same time and never reached anywhere even close to the same number of subscriptions--and that's with the advantage of being the sequel to the definitive MMO (at the time) and a large fan base to boot. WoW was better able to widen the MMO-playing demographic. It's not luck, as you suggest, that is responsible for the most successful MMO in history (by a huge margin).

And this is coming from someone who has grown to hate Blizzard as a company. But I still give credit where credit is due.

And WoW has 10.9Million ACCOUNTS, not subscriptions. Blizzard has out out false reports since WC2, there press reports can not be trusted.

Actually, any press reports coming from Blizzard can be trusted because they are now part of a publicly traded company (Activision). Providing false reports would leave them liable.

I play WoW and I picked up War and am slowly leveling up an Archmage and just started a Zealot. I enjoy it and the pvp is fun.

I still play both games when I can find the time. I think the big test will be what will War's subscription number look like after WOTLK comes out. If they can keep players or do people flock back to WoW.

Kirika wrote:I play WoW and I picked up War and am slowly leveling up an Archmage and just started a Zealot. I enjoy it and the pvp is fun.

I still play both games when I can find the time. I think the big test will be what will War's subscription number look like after WOTLK comes out. If they can keep players or do people flock back to WoW.

It's be nice if WAR can hang around. Competition spurs innovation. The most recent gaming example is Rock Band vs. Guitar Hero - look what Harmonix' success has forced/encourage Activision to do there!

Oh right you are there. But stick to Rock Band or wait for Rock Band 2, my girl had to play the drums and guitar of Guitar Hero World Tour for a promo thing and it just didn't feel as great as the RB instruments. Not to mention the musical tracks! /off topic

WAR wont die that easily when the new expansion is cranked out. Worst case scenario servers will be merged and new content will move in a little slower. The game is still young though, a lot of people wait out for a year or so before diving in, waiting until most bugs and whatnots have been hammered out. We've got good stuff ahead of us yet with two new classes coming this December and a lot of other features that they had to cut will be put in as well. Mounted combat sounds like good fun.

I've got both RB & RB2; I'm mostly curious about the drums for GH:WT, as I don't especially care for the RB drum kit - it's the four drum distribution. I guess I need to visit with the Best Buy demo (before it gets destroyed by visitors).

OT but you can always pick up that new kit for the RB drums:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001E2UGVQ/ref=s9sdps_c6_63_at1-rfc_g1-frt_g1-3215_g1-3102_p?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-2&pf_rd_r=1W3TZS0JDQNEH3AAMNXE&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=436516001&pf_rd_i=507846

Ozymandias, King of Kings

stonefox wrote:

Yeah, too bad that really popular game is successful with everyone and not just the "gaming elite". DAoC and other MMOs were never popular. They never caught the attention of the news and you'd be hard pressed to find a random person who knew about it.

Lets be fair, World of Warcraft would never have had the success it has if it didn't have the Blizzard name attached. If you took WoW back in 2004, called it "Quest World" (or whatever) and took the Blizzard name away, it would just be another obscure MMO. What made WoW was the Blizzard tag and Blizzards ability to market it, it was all about name recognition. The *vast* majority of WoW players have never even played another MMO, and probably never would have in the first place, and most never will. If you look at other MMO's, the vast majority of the player base in such games typically have played other MMO's, WAR, EQ, EQ2, Planetside, Lineage, Guild Wars, etc...

Other games have done the MMO thing much better, lets be honest about that. Even when I played WoW (and I played it just as hardcore as many other people for 2 years) I knew there were better MMO's out there, and its part of the reason I quite (in addition to it just being a boring grindfest)




And no, an MMO needn't be like cocaine to be great, in fact I much prefer MMO's that I can walk away from when I want to. I'd never buy another MMO that required the time investment of WoW.

Also WoW's "addictiveness" doesn't come from immersing yourself in the world, it comes from everything taking forever and always having a carrot (just do two more quest lines to get a new sword!) to keep going. Immersion isn't the factor there.

Lets be fair, World of Warcraft would never have had the success it has if it didn't have the Blizzard name attached. If you took WoW back in 2004, called it "Quest World" (or whatever) and took the Blizzard name away, it would just be another obscure MMO.

Thats pretty baseless. Bungie was an unknown and HALO is now a household name. Developer name recognition doesn't take a game very far, hype and quality are vastly more important. I would attribute its success more to the reletively well known warcraft brand then to blizzard.

Other games have done the MMO thing much better, lets be honest about that.

Oddly enough then, WAR is the only MMO to have gained close to the same agregate rating (88 to WoWs 93) via metacritic. So if other games have done the MMO thing much better they managed to suck enough to not warrant good reviews while doing it.

Also WoW's "addictiveness" doesn't come from immersing yourself in the world, it comes from everything taking forever and always having a carrot (just do two more quest lines to get a new sword!) to keep going. Immersion isn't the factor there.

Immersion has never been a factor with MMO's. Of any game genre they are the least immersive, with long boring quests, comparitively dated graphics, and layers and layers of math on top of a story that really only exists to justify the scenery. MMO's excell at the social aspect of the game, creating a sizeable game world and then tossing thousands of players in there to interact with EACHOTHER as well as that world.

Want to know where the rest of othe MMO Markety is? Off playing guild wars for free every month. My brother who plays more than most WoW players I know tells me it has just under 5 million accounts. Compared to 10.9 thats not too bad for a game that you never hear hype about and is rarely discussed. Overall though it is a decent game. And it does actually have most of the things that WAR has. The only significant difference is the MMO part consists of towns and outposts. More of a mix of KOTOR and WOW than a true MMO, but one of the best nonetheless.

The *vast* majority of WoW players have never even played another MMO

What the heck is this based on? Most of the officers in my previous guild ran guilds in Everquest, and three of my real life friends who play WoW in addition to me even have a history in MUDs and later other nolife games like Planetarion. I know a ton of WoW players like this.

MMO's excell at the social aspect of the game

This is spot on. Some people generally don't care what happens in the game as long as there are new challenges to overcome as often as possible for themselves and their online friends and guildmates. MMO's are rather boring places in the long run if you're going at it alone (essentially refusing to make any friends and contacts while playing).

As far as E-sports are concerned, WoW arena is very entertaining and competitive (which is why it's one of the few traditional computer games that you can win serious money from [Quake 3, CS 1.6, Starcraft, Warcraft 3, World of Warcraft]) , and although flavour of the month comps exist the arena seasons are very exciting especially in the early and late stages. Things will get even more interesting now when a new class is introduced and now that the hybrid classes were completely revamped. WoW players were handed more prize money this year than any other cyber athletes outside Korea (Starcraft is still the national sport over there), and next year both the prize money and the monthly subscriber pool of 11 million are only going to get bigger. Even though casual guys don't have a snowball's chance in hell of ever seeing any of that money, I know quite a lot of them who still enjoy playing games in which they could 'potentially' progress to sky high limits. As a side note, the same phenomenon applies to online poker players, and a lot of other sports. Star players are 'idols' of sorts and give the elite of the game an actual face and the new kids on the block some dreams to strive for.

The future of WoW PvP is quite bright as the game has been developed with mostly PvP in mind for well over a year. In a recent interview of Kalgan & Tigole, they said that in Wrath of the Lich King they also want to shift the focus slightly towards competitive large scale siege battles and battlegrounds in the form of 10 and 15-man team ratings. Like they explained, the problem in the past has been how to reward players. Will you reward them for having played more than the other guy, or having played better? If everyone agree we want to reward the best players, how will we figure out who played the best in a 40 vs 40 public battleground? Capping flags or objectives and maxing out your DPS or HPS doesn't really tell anything about your team or your opponents and whether they were clueless AFKers or not. That's why the only real solution is an arena type ladder system for the larger battlegrounds as well. Arena became the automatic focus of WoW PvP because it was easy to track the up and down progress in the ladders and the higher you got the tougher teams you faced and the better rewards you received. When the casuals noticed that the arena potentially gave out the best items nearly everyone started playing it. The endgame is what everyone are interested in afterall. The two designers did say they are adding the feature to queue from everywhere in the WoW world and that they are exploring the possibility of EXP and other rewards from playing battlegrounds, although in my opinion the EXP aspect isn't needed at all as 99% of an MMO player's online time is spent at maximum level. Anyway, good times.

Therion, so amusing to read your posts.

It's like a car crash, everyone has to stop and look...but nobody has any real clue what happened.

If you think WOW PVP is "bright", no wonder WAR isn't for you.

Arena's take skill?

Stop trying to fool those of us that quit the WOW universe because all PVP in it is a joke, and PVE is more sony-style scripted events that don't work for 3 months after release.

ShumaGorath wrote:
Thats pretty baseless. Bungie was an unknown and HALO is now a household name. Developer name recognition doesn't take a game very far, hype and quality are vastly more important. I would attribute its success more to the reletively well known warcraft brand then to blizzard.

Bungie was an unkown yes (although not totally), but Halo had developed an extremely intense following after it was initially shown, then after Microsoft bought Bungie and had Halo redeveloped, they pumped an *enourmous* amount of cash into marketing it, it was *the* killer App for the Xbox, and MS made sure it got out there. That said, Halo wasn't anything revolutionary in any way as an FPS, it just had decent coop and was on a console, compared to most PC FPS games at its release, it was a pretty bog standard shooter with bland and repetitive level design (there's a reason Halo games have *tanked* on PC). Halo would have been a much different game (it was originally an online type third person persistent game) and Microsoft redeveloped it and pumped a huge amount of cash and marketing into it. Had HALO (at the time of its release) been launched as a PC game, it would have flopped horribly, but it was the new thing that many console players hadn't experienced, on the new hardware system, with a ton of very good marketing.

That said, honestly, Blizzard could release a dog turd in a box, call it "Blizzard Canine Remnant Adventures" and get a 93 average review and sell a million units. After Starcraft, they just have to say its "Blizzard" and it'll sell as long as it'll run on just about anything.

I'm not saying WoW wasn't well polished, It did what the other big PvE MMO's did at the time and did them extremely well, but without the Warcraft title, would definitely not be the giant it is today.

Developer and name recognition *will* take a game very far. Doom 3 outsold Far Cry by almost 3.5 to 1, even though Far Cry was by most accounts the far superior game and had just as impressive visuals (if not more so) and slightly lower system specs. Hell, Barbie Pet Rescue outsold the critically acclaimed Deus Ex (not even joking). How well would many franchise games (Madden, Mortal Kombat, etc...) sell if they were otherwise identical but lacked their franchise name, especially given some of the Lemons in such series?

Oddly enough then, WAR is the only MMO to have gained close to the same agregate rating (88 to WoWs 93) via metacritic. So if other games have done the MMO thing much better they managed to suck enough to not warrant good reviews while doing it.

Guild Wars got an 89, the original Everquest got an 85. Also, look at many of the reviews for some other MMO's that Metacritic includes (which isn't necessarily its fault), are rather stilted, such as for Ultima Online where much of the negative part of the reviews comes from pessimism about its online-only & pay to play model and initial launch issues (and a much different game paradigm from '97), don't really review the gameplay. Reviews alone don't necessarily give you the whole picture, even if they are the easiest metric to obtain.

Immersion has never been a factor with MMO's. Of any game genre they are the least immersive, with long boring quests, comparitively dated graphics, and layers and layers of math on top of a story that really only exists to justify the scenery. MMO's excell at the social aspect of the game, creating a sizeable game world and then tossing thousands of players in there to interact with EACHOTHER as well as that world.

my comment there was a counterpoint to Stonefox's point about a good MMO immersion. I typically actually agree with your viewpoint.

Therion wrote:What the heck is this based on? Most of the officers in my previous guild ran guilds in Everquest, and three of my real life friends who play WoW in addition to me even have a history in MUDs and later other nolife games like Planetarion. I know a ton of WoW players like this.

For big established guilds this isn't necessarily true, but for the player base as a whole it isn't. Look around the Blizzard forums, ask most of the people on your server, hell ask Blizzard themselves. Most WoW players simply have no other MMO experience. The fact that the game is so huge and most others are nowhere near the size is fairly self explanatory in that regard as well. Have you yourself really been involved in another MMO like EQ, Guild Wars, Planetside, Ultime Online, etc other than "nolife" games?

This is spot on. Some people generally don't care what happens in the game as long as there are new challenges to overcome as often as possible for themselves and their online friends and guildmates. MMO's are rather boring places in the long run if you're going at it alone (essentially refusing to make any friends and contacts while playing).

Agreed, they are.

As far as E-sports are concerned, WoW arena is very entertaining and competitive

I really don't find it to be either, the main reason its used as an E-Sport is because its so big, everyone has experience with it and can relate to it. Guild Wars I think actually would work better, but its a far smaller profile game.

The future of WoW PvP is quite bright as the game has been developed with mostly PvP in mind for well over a year.

Having had a chance to play some WoW recently, I still don't think WoW's PvP is on par with WAR's, Guild Wars, or many other games PvP aspect. Sure its got a lot of content *now*, but its mostly reiterations of the same thing, open world PvP is balls (even with WotLK, the single open world event isn't much of an offering compared to other games)

In a recent interview of Kalgan & Tigole, they said that in Wrath of the Lich King they also want to shift the focus slightly towards competitive large scale siege battles and battlegrounds in the form of 10 and 15-man team ratings.

With one open world battle area? For top level characters? Again, this is still mired in Tigole's iron view of MMO's being all about high end content (part of the reason WoW has had so many class and content redo's, Kaplan originally was so focused on high end large group multi-hour raids that he didn't get the big picture, if you have any experience with his time from EQ, this becomes very apparent)

Like they explained, the problem in the past has been how to reward players. Will you reward them for having played more than the other guy, or having played better? If everyone agree we want to reward the best players, how will we figure out who played the best in a 40 vs 40 public battleground? Capping flags or objectives and maxing out your DPS or HPS doesn't really tell anything about your team or your opponents and whether they were clueless AFKers or not. That's why the only real solution is an arena type ladder system for the larger battlegrounds as well. Arena became the automatic focus of WoW PvP because it was easy to track the up and down progress in the ladders and the higher you got the tougher teams you faced and the better rewards you received. When the casuals noticed that the arena potentially gave out the best items nearly everyone started playing it. The endgame is what everyone are interested in afterall. The two designers did say they are adding the feature to queue from ever

Why does it have to boil down to rewards? Why can't it just be about defeating your opponent, winning battles, and generally just beating the crap out of each other? *this* is the big thing WoW has a problem with when it comes to PvP, it treats it much like the PvE aspect in that it gets reduced to a grind for gear and rewards, rather than really being about the PvP itself.

That said, Halo wasn't anything revolutionary in any way as an FPS, it just had decent coop and was on a console, compared to most PC FPS games at its release, it was a pretty bog standard shooter with bland and repetitive level design (there's a reason Halo games have *tanked* on PC).

Yeah, and thats because of the horrible netcode and a combat system that functions far better on the console then it does a PC. It also doesn't help that the graphics on both releases were dated due to the fact that microsoft waited over a year to release to the PC. The Halo games were quite revolutionary, and before the first no FPS had integrated either vehicles or large scale objective based online matches so well.

That said, honestly, Blizzard could release a dog turd in a box, call it "Blizzard Canine Remnant Adventures" and get a 93 average review and sell a million units. After Starcraft, they just have to say its "Blizzard" and it'll sell as long as it'll run on just about anything.

Or it could just be that they release very good games. Every Diablo, Starcraft, and nearly every Warcraft (not counting the animated adventure game) is a AAA title. They don't sell games based on their name, they sell games based on the fact that their games are fantastic. Even Starcraft, their golden goose sold terribly on the N64 because it was a bad port. The name didn't help much there.

Doom 3 outsold Far Cry by almost 3.5 to 1, even though Far Cry was by most accounts the far superior game and had just as impressive visuals (if not more so) and slightly lower system specs.

Doom 3 outsold Far Cry because of the Doom title, not because of ID software. Which was your whole point wasn't it? That the developer name sells the game? Or is that being altered to franchise name now? If we're going by franchise I could point out a dozen games that were sequels of popular franchises that flopped because they altered what made the franchise popular (C&C renegade comes to mind).

'm not saying WoW wasn't well polished, It did what the other big PvE MMO's did at the time and did them extremely well, but without the Warcraft title, would definitely not be the giant it is today.

And you base that on nothing. Starcraft didn't sell as well as it did because of the blizzard name. Back when it released blizzard wasn't a household name (it still isn't) and through quality and timing became one of the most successful games of all time. Same with the Diablo series. Hell, when it released warcraft 3 wasn't even a huge success. It sold well, but not by comparison to WoW, the diablo series, or starcraft. If name recognition sold MMO titles EQ2 would be on top.

Guild Wars got an 89

Guild wars isn't a traditional MMO, and leaves many tropes of the genre behind, and by previous admittance is doing very well for itself (further lending credence to the idea that in the MMO realm quality trumps brand). As for EQ 2, there is a big difference between an industry average score of 93 and 85. That difference is about 10 million people.

The MMO industry polarizes and will continue to do so. The king of the hill will likely always enjoy a considerable amount of superiority over its competitors due to the social aspect of the game. Unlike with any other genre the larger your playerbase the more likely you are to gain new customers. People will naturally want to play a socially driven game with their friends. Name brand doesn't drive an MMO's success. The only thing that matters is the quality of the experience. The name brand may well drive the initial sales of the game (like with AoC) but after the first month people stick around because the game is fun to play.

ShumaGorath wrote:
Yeah, and thats because of the horrible netcode and a combat system that functions far better on the console then it does a PC. It also doesn't help that the graphics on both releases were dated due to the fact that microsoft waited over a year to release to the PC. The Halo games were quite revolutionary, and before the first no FPS had integrated either vehicles or large scale objective based online matches so well.

The vehicle thing wasn't new when Halo came out, they just did it better than others up to that point, however that alone doesn't make a decent shooter, nor was the vehicles thing an original concept (although it did do them very well). The level design was boring and repetitive (compare Halo CE to Unreal for instance) and the AI, while good, also wasn't anything new either. the big draw was the Coop (which, I will admit, was a very nice feature), and the fact that it was the killer App for the brand new Xbox.

While the PC version had many technical problems, other games did too (look at Unreal 1's netcode, ugh), but Halo never really matched up to other PC shooters. Had it been released as a PC game instead of an Xbox game at its initial release, it wouldn't have anywhere near the impact it did. There's a big difference in the demographic between Console Halo players and PC FPS players, a big part of that is experience with the genre (at least at the initial Halo CE launch) and how/where the game is played (couch in front of the TV vs on the Computer, and this actually makes quite a difference not only in gameplay but audience)

Or it could just be that they release very good games. Every Diablo, Starcraft, and nearly every Warcraft (not counting the animated adventure game) is a AAA title.

I'd agree to a point, Diablo 1&2, WC1/2 were all excellent. SC had a great atmosphere and story, and was very easy to learn, and was a decent strategy game (even if I think it got a lot of undeserved credit and overshadowed many other great titles) but WC3 was bunk, every time I've played it, people always complain why we can't play something else, but its the only thing everyone has that will run on everyones machine.

Even Starcraft, their golden goose sold terribly on the N64 because it was a bad port. The name didn't help much there.

Neither did Command & Conquer. There wasn't any market there, wrong type of game on the wrong system. There's some things that nothing can really save.

Doom 3 outsold Far Cry because of the Doom title, not because of ID software. Which was your whole point wasn't it?

The point was the power of names, not just the developers name, but the franchise name too. Either can apply equally well if its got reasonable brand equity. Take WoW, remove the Warcraft and Blizzard titles entirely from it. Do you still think it would have sold as well? I don't. Look at Command & Conquer. It was made great by Westwood. Then C&C 3 was developed entirely by EA, and it still sold very well. If the core gameplay had been left intact but the C&C been removed from it, it wouldn't have sold as well. Fallout 3 is being developed by Bethesda, not Black Isle/Interplay, but it too will likely sell well (even if it turns out to be crap).

If Blizzard outsourced a World of Warcraft or Starcraft expansion pack, had nothing to do with it in terms of development, would it fail to be a commercial success? I doubt it so long as it was reasonably priced. That said, I do thinks Blizzards SC2 sales strategy is likely to end in failure, or at least not meet expectations, as each different version has the same ending and multiplayer.

If we're going by franchise I could point out a dozen games that were sequels of popular franchises that flopped because they altered what made the franchise popular (C&C renegade comes to mind).

Sure (although to be fair, I bought C&C renegade ) I'm not saying that its absolute, but that it's not something that can be discounted.

And you base that on nothing. Starcraft didn't sell as well as it did because of the blizzard name.

It didn't? I'll grant that much of its success was due to its own works, but it wouldn't have gotten the great launch or initial recognition either after Blizzards success with the Warcraft series.

Back when it released blizzard wasn't a household name

In the computer gaming industry? Are you kidding me? Blizzard was already very popular thanks to Warcraft and Diablo.

Hell, when it released warcraft 3 wasn't even a huge success

However, it did much better than it would have under a different title/brand. It would have quietly slid under the radar had it not been for its Warcraft name.

If name recognition sold MMO titles EQ2 would be on top.

EQ2, really? I doubt it. I'm not saying its *just* the name either, however the name can do a lot for a game.

Guild wars isn't a traditional MMO, and leaves many tropes of the genre behind, and by previous admittance is doing very well for itself (further lending credence to the idea that in the MMO realm quality trumps brand). As for EQ 2, there is a big difference between an industry average score of 93 and 85. That difference is about 10 million people.

And there's a huge difference between the sales of Deus Ex and Barbie Pet Rescue, or Doom 3 and Far Cry, sales alone don't necessarily mean anything when it comes to determining how good a game is. Industry reviews aren't necessarily the best indicator either, I tend to generally ignore the end score and focus just on the text and pick out what I think is relevant.

The MMO industry polarizes and will continue to do so.

No doubt, I won't argue there.

Name brand doesn't drive an MMO's success.

Not in the long run no, but at the initial launch hell yes it can. And its the initial launch that makes or breaks an MMO.

The only thing that matters is the quality of the experience.

Mmm...that depends on what you are referring to. If its the core gameplay, I disagree, if its successfully integrating the social aspect, sure I'll agree there. There are plenty of examples of successful (in terms of sales) games that were crap games.

The name brand may well drive the initial sales of the game (like with AoC) but after the first month people stick around because the game is fun to play.

I agree to a point. If the game is totally crap nothing will save it. If the game has a tremendous brand (game name, developer, etc) backing it and it can pass off *acceptable* gameplay, then its good to go. WoW at its inception had a huge spate of problems, class issues (how many times have they redone talent trees now?), and a lack of content, but had enough to keep people from getting bored, especially the Crafting aspect (which WoW does really well with the exception of Engineering).

I'm not trying to argue that WoW is a terrible MMO compared to most others (although I think that as a game, personally, it leaves a lot to be desired, which is why I left it), however I am saying that its success isn't entirely due to its gameplay attributes either. Had WoW been Blizzards first offering, it still might have been extremely popular for an MMO, but nowhere near what it is now.

EDIT: Also, much the same can be said of WAR too, I know I wouldn't have been as interested in it as I have been over the years if it wasn't "Warhammer". Even if the core gameplay and atmosphere remained the same, it would have the same issue, although I personally think WAR as a game is still at a far more solid point that WoW was even 2 years after its release, although they've had the benefit of hindsight as well.

Oingo-Boingo Mango-Throat-Wobbler.

Moral of the gaming industry is that you either need to have a good name (Epic, Maxis, Relic, Harmonix, Infinity Ward, former Westwood Studios) as developer or have a great idea that is backed by a big publisher (EA, Activision, Vivendi or THQ to name a few) who is willing to present the idea with mucho pesos. Now Bungie was a renown studio before Halo and Microsoft came along, just look at Marathon and the Myth series. Halo did one thing: put the X-Box on the market as a gaming console. As a shooter it is sub-par. Sure it looked shiny and ooh, the levels were big, but other than that it was boring and bland, nothing new. Same for Halo 2 with its below standard ending and Halo 3 with its faked attempt at epic space opera. Halo did however popularize console multiplayer and ugh, the art of dipping ones scrotum into the face of a recently slain opponent.

I think the biggest threat for WAR right now is EA, who has taken over Mythic and slapped on the title EA Mythic. I am seeing a pattern here, as Westwood Studios got the same treatment before being killed and devoured. Worst case scenario EA will axe Mythic and put more company stooges there instead of the actual designers, resulting in the EA Sports thing.

On a more related note I finally met Gotrek and Felix in Altdorf, it gave us a really geeky moment to meet such legendary WHFB characters like that.

As much as it is fun to hate on halo, halo is the first game I can remember that did the 2 weapons system, had good vehicles, and this on top of a great storyline. I didn't like halo 2 much except for multi player, and halo 3 was pretty close to halo 2, but halo original was good stuff.

I must say that I have to be really friggin wierd.

I play WoW, just because my wife and I wanted a online RPG to play (we used to play Diablo, Neverwinter Nights, etc).

I don't do PvP, battlegrounds, or any of that. After like 3+ years of hearing about WoW from friends who played, we signed up. All we do is go around in a party together and kill stuff on a PvE server and have fun with it. Every once and a while we try to group with others, but we've had some bad experiences since we're "new" to playing. Hell I don't even know where to go to get "into" battlegrounds, can you even do that on a PvE server?

Oh and some people are donkey-caves online, I happen to realize this from playing FPS's online in the past and just move on. My wife tends to get more annoyed.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:I must say that I have to be really friggin wierd.

I play WoW, just because my wife and I wanted a online RPG to play (we used to play Diablo, Neverwinter Nights, etc).

I don't do PvP, battlegrounds, or any of that. After like 3+ years of hearing about WoW from friends who played, we signed up. All we do is go around in a party together and kill stuff on a PvE server and have fun with it. Every once and a while we try to group with others, but we've had some bad experiences since we're "new" to playing. Hell I don't even know where to go to get "into" battlegrounds, can you even do that on a PvE server?

Oh and some people are donkey-caves online, I happen to realize this from playing FPS's online in the past and just move on. My wife tends to get more annoyed.

Battlegrounds. There are NPCs in the cities in WoW where you essentially queue up and
wait for an opening.

malfred wrote:

Voodoo Boyz wrote:I must say that I have to be really friggin wierd.

I play WoW, just because my wife and I wanted a online RPG to play (we used to play Diablo, Neverwinter Nights, etc).

I don't do PvP, battlegrounds, or any of that. After like 3+ years of hearing about WoW from friends who played, we signed up. All we do is go around in a party together and kill stuff on a PvE server and have fun with it. Every once and a while we try to group with others, but we've had some bad experiences since we're "new" to playing. Hell I don't even know where to go to get "into" battlegrounds, can you even do that on a PvE server?

Oh and some people are donkey-caves online, I happen to realize this from playing FPS's online in the past and just move on. My wife tends to get more annoyed.

Battlegrounds. There are NPCs in the cities in WoW where you essentially queue up and
wait for an opening.

Can you do that on PvE servers? I probably need to go look this up, if it's like a Deathmatch in WoW then I probably won't be playing it if my wife is on at the same time.

Ugh. Now people are saying Halo is good.

Sigh. Popularized by MS, yes.

Good? Can't stand it myself.

I admit I have a strong bias against consoles, always end up feeling like I am playing Dirk adventures...every, single, game.

Now Bungie was a renown studio before Halo and Microsoft came along, just look at Marathon and the Myth series.

No it wasn't. The marathon series was practically unknown and the myth series was a flash in the pan.

Halo did one thing: put the X-Box on the market as a gaming console. As a shooter it is sub-par. Sure it looked shiny and ooh, the levels were big, but other than that it was boring and bland, nothing new.

Except it broke with the genre by creating sizable and good looking outdoor levels, responsive and enjoyable vehicles to use in those areas, and a competitive and enjoyable multiplayer system to play on those levels. All new. And it did it on a console, something previously thought impossible.

Same for Halo 2 with its below standard ending

Oh noes, a cliffhanger! Halo 2 improved the system halo 1 set down with far better weapon balance (the autoaim harmed it though), online play (Which was superior to any pc shooter of the day), and much better designed online maps. The only PC title that could contend with halo 2 for successful online integration at that time was counterstrike. Which was and still is a barebones unbalanced twitch shooter with two maps (dust2 and aztec).

and Halo 3 with its faked attempt at epic space opera.

You're really reaching with these scathing comments here. SPACE OPERA!

Halo did however popularize console multiplayer and ugh, the art of dipping ones scrotum into the face of a recently slain opponent.

No worse than counterstrikes addition to the modern lexicon of games.

\
I am seeing a pattern here, as Westwood Studios got the same treatment before being killed and devoured.

Odd how red alert three looks tremendous though. Or do you mean the team working on C&C tiberium?

A game that took the great concept of console shooters (a la Goldeneye for N64), allowed your buddies to join up, and had seamless vehicle interaction? Nah that ain't good at all.

PCs 4 lyfe yo. You consoletards go back to your moms' basements.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:
Can you do that on PvE servers? I probably need to go look this up, if it's like a Deathmatch in WoW then I probably won't be playing it if my wife is on at the same time.

Yes, you can and yes it is.

ShumaGorath wrote:
No it wasn't. The marathon series was practically unknown and the myth series was a flash in the pan.

Amongst the mainstream populace maybe, not amongst the gaming industry. Marathon may not have been as widely played, but its impact was felt far and wide.

Except it broke with the genre by creating sizable and good looking outdoor levels.

Unreal did it just as well if not better in 1998. Halo was nothing new here.

responsive and enjoyable vehicles to use in those areas

it did it better than others, but again was not the first, and really was only a few months ahead of games like Battlefield 1942 (something *very* akin to Halo's original design) and C&C Renegade (say what you will about it, it's vehicle system wasn't bad at all) that integrated such things. Other games had similar vehicle systems in development at the same time Halo did, Halo just got released first.

and a competitive and enjoyable multiplayer system to play on those levels

This was new by 2001? I played competitive and enjoyable MP games in Doom2, Quake, Duke Nukem 3d, Quake 2, Unreal Tournament, Quake 3, etc years before Halo.

The only PC title that could contend with halo 2 for successful online integration at that time was counterstrike.

The Quake, Doom, Unreal, Half Life, Far Cry, Battlefield, etc series games did not exist by the time of Halo2 in late 2004? You can't honestly tell me that these didn't have extremely successful and well integrated multiplayer and had been around for years. Methinks your FPS-Fu is lacking here. The idea that CS (a rather lacking endeavor from my PoV anyway) was the only PC shooter with decent integrated multiplayer at the time is bull****.

No worse than counterstrikes addition to the modern lexicon of games.

Can't argue there, Halo didn't invent it, neither did CS, as soon as one could crouch and kill an enemy player, it was done.

Odd how red alert three looks tremendous though.

I'm a Die Hard C&C fan, hell I even *OWN* C&C Sole Surivor. I'm in the RA3 beta, its great fun if you like C&C, but its nothing revolutionary or new though, it'll mostly be more of C&C3 with a couple extras and coop multiplayer (which may be its big draw feature), and if you don't like the C&C style, you won't like RA3. However EA hasn't always been kind to C&C. It was interference by EA that caused the excessive delays of Tiberian Sun, and much of the development that resulted in the crappy output of C&C Renegade (although I won't lie, it wasn't as terrible as most people made it out to be, mediocre yes, but it did have its moments).

Stonefox wrote:A game that took the great concept of console shooters (a la Goldeneye for N64), allowed your buddies to join up, and had seamless vehicle interaction? Nah that ain't good at all.

PCs 4 lyfe yo. You consoletards go back to your moms' basements.

For consoles, it was revolutionary. Compared with the FPS genre as a whole, it wasn't anything special except the vehicles, which I've already made a point about above.

Pre-order Red Alert 3 and you can get a special hat (Soviet Ushanka) for WAR that allows you to turn into a bear for five minutes..

I wish I was making this up.

a bar of what?

BEAR DAMN IT, buster brown on his hairy holly-knockers! Have you ever tried to take one down?

Click the link when in doubt..

mongst the mainstream populace maybe, not amongst the gaming industry.

Yeah, the gaming industry doesn't buy its own games.

Unreal did it just as well if not better in 1998. Halo was nothing new here.

http://www.gamershell.com/static/screenshots/149/5274_full.jpg

Yeah, unreal: Where everything is in a box canyon. They did an outdoor setting before halo, but they didn't do it better. They didn't even do it well. It was novel for the time when you consider that every other FPS was in a drab metal hallway, but it wasn't done well.

t did it better than others, but again was not the first, and really was only a few months ahead of games like Battlefield 1942 (something *very* akin to Halo's original design) and C&C Renegade (say what you will about it, it's vehicle system wasn't bad at all) that integrated such things. Other games had similar vehicle systems in development at the same time Halo did, Halo just got released first.

Yeah, not quite. The vehicles in the battlefield games are to this day floaty and unresponsive (the same with everything else in the battlefield games). The same goes for renegade.

This was new by 2001? I played competitive and enjoyable MP games in Doom2, Quake, Duke Nukem 3d, Quake 2, Unreal Tournament, Quake 3, etc years before Halo.

With the exception of unreal tournament not a single one of those games succeeded at being anything but a hallway deathmatchfest. Even when they had other modes, no one used them.

The Quake, Doom, Unreal, Half Life, Far Cry, Battlefield, etc series games did not exist by the time of Halo2 in late 2004?

They existed, and sure, deathmatches were fun. But besides battlefield thats all they were. It was halos integration of the vehicle and objective based online gameplay that made it revolutionary. Battlefield can be taken into consideration as having done it before (as with tribes) but neither game did it on a level that could be construed as competitive or balanced.

You can't honestly tell me that these didn't have extremely successful and well integrated multiplayer and had been around for years.

Funny then how quake 3 arena deathmatch gets more players these days then all those games combined. And halo 2 gets far more than Q3A.

Methinks your FPS-Fu is lacking here. The idea that CS (a rather lacking endeavor from my PoV anyway) was the only PC shooter with decent integrated multiplayer at the time is bull****.

Metal wall interior deathmatch games do not a good online shooter make. They were the standard for a time because the technology to render outdoor environments was lacking (which is why the outdoor environs in unreal were ugly compared to the interiors) but they are not competitive, they are not innovative, and for the most part they aren't fun once you pass the age of twelve. Thats why you don't see them any more. Counterstrike was and still is one of the most successful online FPS games to have ever existed, easily trumping every other game mentioned. And you know why? Because it payed attention to combat pacing, weapon realism, and most importantly objective driven multiplayer. Its not a crappy interior deathmatch shooter like everything Id makes and it succeeded because of it.

I'm a Die Hard C&C fan, hell I even *OWN* C&C Sole Surivor. I'm in the RA3 beta, its great fun if you like C&C, but its nothing revolutionary or new though, it'll mostly be more of C&C3 with a couple extras and coop multiplayer (which may be its big draw feature), and if you don't like the C&C style, you won't like RA3. However EA hasn't always been kind to C&C. It was interference by EA that caused the excessive delays of Tiberian Sun, and much of the development that resulted in the crappy output of C&C Renegade (although I won't lie, it wasn't as terrible as most people made it out to be, mediocre yes, but it did have its moments).

Even before the EA buyout westwood was never really very innovative. They stuck to their one gun and have produced three takes on the same game with it. C&C has only ever incrementally improved between games and even now is strikingly similar to the original. I own all of them, and really, they progress into one another like the madden franchise.

For consoles, it was revolutionary. Compared with the FPS genre as a whole, it wasn't anything special except the vehicles, which I've already made a point about above.

Successful integration of vehicles that didn't suck (Still a rarity in FPS games), online that is more than a deathmatch shootemup (something that came around at about the time of Halo2, whether it spurred it or not), and a game engine that could render vast outdoor environments seamlessly (something required for good vehicle integration) made it a hallmark game. It was revolutionary for its time, and no game to this day can compare to halo 3 in these three areas at the same time.

Shuma, did you ever play Team Fortress (the original Quake mod)?

Getting Doom to work for co-op multiplayer required some rather specialized hardware, back in those pre-ethernet days.

As I noted earlier, the best thing about Halo was the co-op multiplayer on the same console. The worst thing about Halo & Halo 2 was the lack of co-op multiplayer over the Internet.

ShumaGorath wrote:
Yeah, the gaming industry doesn't buy its own games.

Again, Sales volume does not necessarily mean everything. Some games and producers attain great interest even having sold very few copies, Deus Ex being another example.

http://www.gamershell.com/static/screenshots/149/5274_full.jpg

Yeah, unreal: Where everything is in a box canyon. They did an outdoor setting before halo, but they didn't do it better. They didn't even do it well. It was novel for the time when you consider that every other FPS was in a drab metal hallway, but it wasn't done well.

Ugh, what the hell, did you go out of your way to find the worst rendered Unreal screenshot ever? What the hell was that taken on? An Ngage?

I won't argue that Halo was superior graphically (there's only so much a developer can realistically do when your top-end gaming machines are running VooDoo 2's and the GeForce is still 2 years away), but in terms of feel and level design, Unreal was, at worst, on par. Unreal had great big open environments, local fauna, both big, small, neutral and hostile, hugely varied environments (spacecraft, lakes, ruins, mines, jungles, etc, where Halo really had just valleys, a couple beaches, and a lot of shiny spacecraft), great sounds of nature in open areas, etc.

screenies:

Yeah, not quite. The vehicles in the battlefield games are to this day floaty and unresponsive (the same with everything else in the battlefield games).

You are confusing something here. The battlefield vehicles are *supposed* to be less responsive. They use a much more realistic physics set. This isn't to say its necessarily more complex, just that Halo's vehicles react unnaturally fast. You can get up to full speed in any vehicle in Halo instantly, it takes a while for a tank to accelerate in Battlefield. These are thought out game decisions. A tanks turret isn't going to instantly swing around to target something, it takes a couple seconds to move that machine gun mount or to make a u-turn in a vehicle, which is what Battlefield tries to do, whereas Halo's vehicles are much more of a fast paced low-friction type intent. Don't confuse slower responding vehicles for poor implementation.

With the exception of unreal tournament not a single one of those games succeeded at being anything but a hallway deathmatchfest. Even when they had other modes, no one used them.

I've played plenty of Quake CTF matches, people *do* play those. Either way, given that most of those were 2-3 years old at the time of Halo's launch, and that UT had *amazing* CTF and Assault modes, again, my point still stands.

They existed, and sure, deathmatches were fun. But besides battlefield thats all they were.

Really? Unreal Tournament didn't have anything besides Deathmatch? Quake 3 didn't have CTF? Tribes didn't exist?

It was halos integration of the vehicle and objective based online gameplay that made it revolutionary

Sure, but only really by dint of being released first, other games under development at the same time had similar systems.

Battlefield can be taken into consideration as having done it before (as with tribes) but neither game did it on a level that could be construed as competitive or balanced.

I'd consider Tribes as being far more balanced than Halo vehicles personally.

Funny then how quake 3 arena deathmatch gets more players these days then all those games combined.

Where on earth are you getting that metric? I can't get on Quake 3 anymore as my copy wont install on XP 64, but last I saw it wasn't anywhere *near* as popular as you are making it out to be. It had roughly equivalent sales to the original UT, and certainly didn't pack more players than UT, half life, etc combined.

And halo 2 gets far more than Q3A.

I'd hope so, Quake 3 is a 9 year old game without even a tenth the marketing effort of Halo 2.

Metal wall interior deathmatch games do not a good online shooter make.

I never said it did, but Deathmatch can still be very fun.

They were the standard for a time because the technology to render outdoor environments was lacking (which is why the outdoor environs in unreal were ugly compared to the interiors)

Again, look at Unreal, it did it quite well.

but they are not competitive

How so? How is Halo any more so?

they are not innovative

I thought Team Fortress, Unreal's Assault mode, Battlefields gamestyle, etc were all very innovative at the time.

and for the most part they aren't fun once you pass the age of twelve.

Total subjective opinion, I much prefer playing Unreal Tournament at a LAN to this day than Halo. Halo to me is a party game, something you play when everyone is boozed up and in a silly mood. When people want to actually play an FPS, we hit up UT or UT3. Halo is the stereotypical Frat guy FPS for a reason.

Thats why you don't see them any more.

You don't see Unreal tournament being played? As I'm writing this, I've got UT up, there's 1263 people playing the *original* Unreal Tournament right now, and over a thousand still active dedicated servers, about as many as are playing *UNREAL 3* right now. That's not too shabby

Counterstrike was and still is one of the most successful online FPS games to have ever existed easily trumping every other game mentioned.

Can you provide any metrics to back that up? Even at its peak, it wasn't *dominating* every other FPS. UT player levels were never much worse. What made it so popular was that it was able to run on anything, was free for a while as a mod for the *hugely* successful Half-Life, and always easily cracked and able to be cheated in for great lulz, and was essentially turned into an E-Sport. It was *high profile*, not necessarily more widespread, and certainly never made as much cash (owning in large part to it being a free mod for its first few years) as UT for instance. Maybe if you add in CS:Source and Condition Zero. Oh, and LAN centers didn't need top of the line hardware or license agreements to run it for years after its introduction, making it a very popular offering at such places.

Because it payed attention to combat pacing, weapon realism

Bunny hopping and headshotting someone in mid-air with a sniper rifle is realistic? Sure it was a little more realistic than Quake 3, but only in some respects (like shot dispersion)

and most importantly objective driven multiplayer.

Again, not unique, reference UT Assault mode for instance.

Its not a crappy interior deathmatch shooter like everything Id makes and it succeeded because of it.

Interior Deathmatch isn't necessarily crappy, it can be very fun depending on what you want. There's a reason its still in every major FPS game.

Even before the EA buyout westwood was never really very innovative. They stuck to their one gun and have produced three takes on the same game with it. C&C has only ever incrementally improved between games and even now is strikingly similar to the original.

Oh I won't argue that, however EA did manage to basically sink Tiberian Sun and Renegade.

I own all of them, and really, they progress into one another like the madden franchise.

As do I, (I've got 2 DOS copies of C&C95, a Win95 Gold copy, a German Win95 copy, 2 copies of Covert Operations, 2 copies of Red Alert and each expansion, Sole Survivor, 2 TibSun copies, Firestorm, RA2, Yuri's Revenge, Renegade, Generals, Zero Hour C&C3, and Kain's Wrath sitting in my game closet ) however they are a bit more varied than Madden Games (oh look, new players! thats it!) even if the basic game style remains the same (which I'm fine with.)

Successful integration of vehicles that didn't suck (Still a rarity in FPS games)

Again, sure, but only really by dint of beating a couple other games to market by a few months. And current games like UT, Battlefield, FarCry (my personal favorite in this area out of every game I can think of) and others manage it quite well. Vehicles furthermore aren't mandatory or even a good thing in every FPS.

online that is more than a deathmatch shootemup (something that came around at about the time of Halo2, whether it spurred it or not)

Apparently you missed that CS, Team Fortress, UT, Tribes, etc... all had much more than just deathmatch out there way before Halo CE came out.

and a game engine that could render vast outdoor environments seamlessly (something required for good vehicle integration)

Again, refer to Unreal. While it may not have the polygon count of Halo (would you expect it to for a 1998 game?), it did have stunning and huge outdoor environments that transitioned seamlessly.

It was revolutionary for its time

Again, refer to the above.

and no game to this day can compare to halo 3 in these three areas at the same time.

On a console maybe. I don't think Halo3 holds a candle to Unreal Tournament 3 (or even UT2k4), the Battlefield games, or many others. Halo 3 just got a metric ****ton of marketing by Microsoft and is again made out to be *the* killer app for the 360 along with Gears of War (which I thought was a much better game). Halo 3 really didn't do much that the other Halo games didn't do other than expand the story and look very, very good. Halo had probably the most intensive marketing campaign of any video game ever, the marketing campaign for the game has rather extensive Wikipedia article. Given the below average level of console FPS players compared with PC FPS players (given the nature of the two platforms) it's not hard to see why Halo 3 did so well considering its massive marketing campaign and a primary incentive to produce graphics and a similar experience to the other Halo games, rather than keep up with PC shooters. Had Halo3 released on the PC at the same time, I can assure you it would not have done anywhere near as well on that platform, especially had the massive marketing effort not been there.

Wow Shuma.

Who doesn't know that Q3A was crap?

Original Quake, while ugly, had more going for it.

Team Fortress (aka Weapons Factory) was and remains the best mod out there for all these games.

You can buy the orange box and go see for yourself how good it is (or isn't).

A mod became a game. Across every major PC FPS out there.

Halo? I could care less if 20 million uber kids love it. It sucks, there's no skill in it. Counterstrike is in that same boat.

Get tired of killing idiots using hitscan weapons a monkey can aim?

Play Weapons Factory.

Available for Quake, Unreal, and Half-Life.

Even have a turret named after me. (I was a bastard of an engineer back in the old school days).

Thread has gone way off topic.

Anyone has new info on warhammer online sales figures can post them here, otherwise you can continue discussions about games in the video games form.

THREAD LOCKED.