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Bioware Does Not Understand MMO Players


Zelrik

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I love Bioware and SWTOR but their lack of MMO experience and unwillingness to look at other MMOs as examples on how to do things (like launch) will possibly ruin them.

 

Here's what I know from over a decade of play.

 

- Tons of people want to be the First to do something on their server. This is the whole game to them. So it's already ruined for many people. Luckily I'm not like that but many are.

 

- MMO Players are some of the meanest, whiniest most fickle customers you can ever have. Do not underestimate their negativity. A few bad decisions will destroy your game.

 

- Negativity breads more negativity which seriously brings down MMORPGs - all by itself. If you underestimate the negativity feedback loop then you've already lost.

 

- No company is too big to fail with MMOs.

 

- Just like in the stock market, it doesn't matter if you're a stable player who likes the stock/game, droves of pissed off negative people leaving your stock/game WILL HURT YOU. It hurts the game, which hurts you. So "Go back to WoW" is not a fix.

 

- Bioware has already started removing/closing posts to control the complaints. This sort of thing usually backfires.

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- Tons of people want to be the First to do something on their server. This is the whole game to them. So it's already ruined for many people.

 

The rules of early access have been known since july. So if its ruined for them, they only have themselves to blame for not preordering early enough.

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- MMO Players are some of the meanest, whiniest most fickle customers you can ever have. Do not underestimate their negativity. .

 

Only thing I can really agree with. Today in our society no one has patience, we are the instant gratification society. Its sad!!!

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Exactly as i've been thinking. This is a highly negative start to the game for a lot of people, and that won't go down well for Bioware.

 

This launch will be talked about for years, as an epic fail, where most people could not play. Yeah, there's a chance that some people would be stuck in queues and perhaps even some server crashes and lag if they had just let everyone in, but it would have been hugely better than the current situation.

 

Bioware tried to play it too safe, but the plan has backfired and angered many customers. For me, this is the worst mmo launch i've been a part off. I'm sure the people who already in game would disagree, or those people who are not ready to play yet, they arn't going to care one bit.

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Negativity breads more negativity which seriously brings down MMORPGs - all by itself. If you underestimate the negativity feedback loop then you've already lost.

 

Imagine the negativity that would result from everyone logging in and creating new chars on the same 4 starter planets and killing the servers on launch day.

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This launch will be talked about for years, as an epic fail, where most people could not play.

 

Actually, no one is going to give a flying crap after the 20th.

 

I'm confused, do you people exist in real life? Because I've never actually met anyone as whiny as the people on these forums.

Edited by Lord_Itharius
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People complaining about getting two days extra, amazing, you do realise this means that those who would have waited till the 17th to get in will now get in on the 15th, I think Bioware have done an outstanding job so far and those who complain loudest at the minute will be the ones who forget all about this come a month hence, then they will move on to whinge about something else.

 

Game launches on the 20th, not today, not the 15th, the 20th, it is no one elses fault that you did not preorder on the day preorders became available.

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I love Bioware and SWTOR but their lack of MMO experience and unwillingness to look at other MMOs as examples on how to...

 

fail at launch?

 

Let me ask you this fair question - what is a bigger disappointment: staggered launch or burning, lagging and crashing servers with everyone zerging in at once?

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Imagine the negativity that would result from everyone logging in and creating new chars on the same 4 starter planets and killing the servers on launch day.

 

I've been in many recent MMO launches that did this with epic success. Rift is a recent one.

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There's a difference between knowing MMO players will whine about everything until they get what they want and actually catering to them.

 

They paid for and/or registered a pre-20th account and they get to use it before people who did so later. Just because other MMOs don't honor pre-orders the way they do orders doesn't mean BioWare shouldn't.

Edited by Dymensia
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Actually, no one is going to give a flying crap after the 20th.

 

I'm confused, do you people exist in real life? Because I've never actually met anyone as whiny as the people on these forums.

 

People are refering to wow's launch problems even now, i've heard it repeated many times today by people as an example of a failed launch.

 

They seem to forget that WoW's launch was almost a decade ago and many mmos have launched without many problems since.

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fail at launch?

 

Let me ask you this fair question - what is a bigger disappointment: staggered launch or burning, lagging and crashing servers with everyone zerging in at once?

 

So you have that little faith in the SWTOR servers? Aion, Rift, Warhammer, all more recent mmos, they had a million preorders each and they did just fine, yeah there was some long queues for some servers but at least everyone got a chance to play.

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Exactly as i've been thinking. This is a highly negative start to the game for a lot of people, and that won't go down well for Bioware.

 

This launch will be talked about for years, as an epic fail, where most people could not play. Yeah, there's a chance that some people would be stuck in queues and perhaps even some server crashes and lag if they had just let everyone in, but it would have been hugely better than the current situation.

 

Bioware tried to play it too safe, but the plan has backfired and angered many customers. For me, this is the worst mmo launch i've been a part off. I'm sure the people who already in game would disagree, or those people who are not ready to play yet, they arn't going to care one bit.

 

I don't think BW is too worried about angering the 50-100 people that post on here regularly.

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I love Bioware and SWTOR but their lack of MMO experience and unwillingness to look at other MMOs as examples on how to do things (like launch) will possibly ruin them.

 

Here's what I know from over a decade of play.

 

- Tons of people want to be the First to do something on their server. This is the whole game to them. So it's already ruined for many people. Luckily I'm not like that but many are.

 

- MMO Players are some of the meanest, whiniest most fickle customers you can ever have. Do not underestimate their negativity. A few bad decisions will destroy your game.

 

- Negativity breads more negativity which seriously brings down MMORPGs - all by itself. If you underestimate the negativity feedback loop then you've already lost.

 

- No company is too big to fail with MMOs.

 

- Just like in the stock market, it doesn't matter if you're a stable player who likes the stock/game, droves of pissed off negative people leaving your stock/game WILL HURT YOU. It hurts the game, which hurts you. So "Go back to WoW" is not a fix.

 

- Bioware has already started removing/closing posts to control the complaints. This sort of thing usually backfires.

 

 

Actually I would argue that they DO understand MMO players which is why they have the Early Access and the two extra days. It's more like MMO players are just completely clueless the about the difficulty of game development and server resourcing.

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You may be right. Or maybe... just maybe... Bioware understands those players, but didn't make a game for them?

 

Personally, I'm thrilled to see a game that isn't bothering to cater to the "Must be first!" basement narcissists, that treats the entire game as content rather than the last 10% of it, and cares more for the mass of players than those who skip the actual game to get to max level and go "Where's my game?!?" before most people have had a chance to log in.

 

Anyone who's only in it to be "First!" wouldn't be around more than two weeks anyway. Better to have them ragequit now than throwing a fit about how we need more 90-person raids rather than new planets for low- and mid-level content.

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