Saturday, January 31, 2009

What if....

Play along...

What if....WoW added housing for solo and Guilds, enhanced the Guild system to include Guild XP and then updated the graphics to a slightly more realistic format?

What if....Tabula Rasa and Hellgate:London had been released as "Buy once, No Fee" games?

What if....Fable 2 had online Co-Op with a Persistent World?

What if....Age of Conan had launched feature complete?

What if....Warhammer Online had a better PvE system? (With housing, better graphics etc...)

And the biggie for tonight...

What if...Darkfall actually does launch? Will it change anything?

7 comments:

Unknown said...

I loved White Gold Wielder!

Tesh said...

In order?

>
WoW housing... enhanced the Guild system... updated the graphics?

<
Housing would be a huge draw, but more people would complain about "nobody grouping up". Guild enhancements aren't my forte, but that might counteract some of the whining from housing. Updated graphics aren't necessary, so as far as I'm concerned, if they did it, it would be a money sink.

>
What if....Tabula Rasa and Hellgate:London had been released as "Buy once, No Fee" games?

<
I'd be playing TR, and Hellgate mightn't have been such a train wreck.

>
What if....Fable 2 had online Co-Op with a Persistent World?

<
Beats me... but I never really thought the game was designed for that. *shrug*

>
What if....Age of Conan had launched feature complete?

<
It would have been released later, and could have found a better foothold.

>
What if....Warhammer Online had a better PvE system? (With housing, better graphics etc...)

<
I've not played it... but I suspect that it would have pulled a few more people from WoW long term... especially if WoW didn't copy it. Higher end graphics would have pushed more people away for purely technical reasons, though, and would have been more expensive.

>
What if...Darkfall actually does launch? Will it change anything?

<
I'ts not my kind of game... but if it does launch, and finds traction, I'm hopeful that it will kick off some more experimentation in the MMO genre. Will it? I'm not terribly optimistic. :(

Talyn said...

Speaking of Hellgate, it just shut down 4 minutes ago. I was on earlier today and the final hour until London went dark. I'll do a writeup tomorrow or Monday.

Lars said...

What if....WoW added housing for solo and Guilds, enhanced the Guild system to include Guild XP and then updated the graphics to a slightly more realistic format?

Then it would be called EverQuest II.

What if....Tabula Rasa and Hellgate:London had been released as "Buy once, No Fee" games?

Then people would still be playing it.

What if....Fable 2 had online Co-Op with a Persistent World?

They are probably working on a Fable Online.

What if....Age of Conan had launched feature complete?

A feature complete MMO launch? Never.

What if....Warhammer Online had a better PvE system?

Then it would called World of Warcraft. The problem with Warhammer Online is it should have gone with a focus on PVP and dropped the level and loot side.

What if...Darkfall actually does launch? Will it change anything?

No.

Crimson Starfire said...

What if....WoW added housing for solo and Guilds, enhanced the Guild system to include Guild XP and then updated the graphics to a slightly more realistic format?

Potentially this could become reality. I've heard rumors they are working on improved graphics and textures, but I'm not sure about the player housing.

I'd be more inclined to ask: "What if WoW was skill based and not item based?"

What if....Tabula Rasa and Hellgate:London had been released as "Buy once, No Fee" games?

I'd most likely be playing them now. Although somebody had to learn the importance of a good business model the hard way.

What if....Fable 2 had online Co-Op with a Persistent World?

Haven't played it, but sounds good to me.

What if....Age of Conan had launched feature complete?

I think it would have only made a minor difference. The game was good, but it had more problems than missing features.

What if....Warhammer Online had a better PvE system? (With housing, better graphics etc...)

It was the PvP that let it down. Although the PvE sucked as well. It's a great example of why you shouldn't try to rebuild WoW and then mutilate it with some buzz features.

What if...Darkfall actually does launch? Will it change anything?

Depends how good it is. The feature list is impressive, but we all know what happened with WAR's feature list. The features were the downfall of the game.

Elementalistly said...

Notice how all the "feature" items are the bane of the MMO?
Why is it...that the "features" are a problem...especially when we know all games do NOT ship feature complete (except for WoW, which in my opinion is still missing a lot of features...yet, the consensus is it was feature complete and ready on launch)
As well, why is it the "bugs" that are problems when all MMO's have them..(and notice MMO's have WAY more bugs than any other genre?)

These will be unexplained phenomena for sure.

Anonymous said...

The idea and myth that still floats aroung the communities to this day of WoW being bug-free and "complete" still makes me shake my head in sadness. So many people forget the uproar and MANY problems people had with the game at it's first showing. It took them about a year to reach a level of polish that made the game shine. Believing that the brass wasn't tarnished before then is just looking at the past with rose-tinted glasses.