Poll: The Old Republic: Will it fail?

[Smertnik]

I don't think TOR was ever meant to be a WoW killer. It appeals mostly to BW and SW fans (so people like me, basically) but I presume "hardcore" muhmorpegers will be put off by the rather strong focus on the personal story and a gameplay which doesn't quite excel.

 

[HalfTangible]

If anyone can pull off an MMO better than WoW, it's bioware. But it's sort of a toss up whether they will in this case.

 

[Temah]

It's Star Wars, it's physically incapable of not making a fortune on launch, from what i've heard though (which is all speculative or 'leaked') it's very, very similar to WoW which, like it or not, is getting old. So probably, after the Star Wars fanboys decide they don't want to pay for the sake of the setting.

 

[juraigamer]

There is STILL no info on what the monthly fee is going to be, and considering they are already taking pre-orders I'm gonna have to say I won't be playing it unless they offer a lifetime subscription.

 

[Temah]

companys
WoW is an old game, the graphics and gameplay are starting to look a bit dated already.

This, WoWs built on the Warcraft 3 engine, it was getting outdated when it launched.

 

[thepyrethatburns]

I voted Average. As a Star Wars fan, I can't say that this game has elicted anything stronger than a "meh" from me. Perhaps it is because Lucasarts keeps trying to haphazardly kill it's top franchise through shoddy quality media releases or idiotic edicts from on high but I identified with Gabe from Penny Arcade when Tycho described Gabe's feelings as:

After a long while of not quite knowing how to feel about Star Wars: The Old Republic, he had a chance to play through an instance at the show, and felt the ancient stirrings. Star Wars is something his son likes now, in many ways. Not him.

I could tell that, in a way, he felt relieved. (Apr 6 2011 newspost)

And, speaking of Penny Arcade:

Well, every time I've seen or heard of people playing it, they were largely positive. Every person that I've heard even claim to play the BETA was overwhelmingly positive. Mike Krahulik, Gabe, of Penny-Arcade even wrote a little update on their site where he stated how much he has enjoyed his time in the BETA. And, yes, from what I've heard, the storytelling is that big a deal.

That doesn't really say much. You could apply that to Auto Assault (the only MMO that I was in from Beta to when it ended a year after launch). It had a very good story which kinda petered out once you hit Ground Zero. People thought that the Beta was great only to start dropping off once it was launched. You even had web comics doing comics on it.

And, yet, a year after launch, it was dead.

I think TOR is going to do better in terms of being an average MMO instead of shut down in a year but I don't think it's going to be a WOW or even a COH killer. This is, of course, presuming that Lucasarts can restrain itself from quelling protests by removing planets. this time.

 

[The Lugz]

ive seen the beta, so i'm going to cap this in spoilers,
this is my personal opinion take it as that if you want to read it.

Spoiler

it's exactly a cross between tabula rasa and wow

all techno, nice visuals ( for an mmo ) bare in mind they rely on people having 6 year old hardware it should look exactly like an old xbox rpg, with a few after-effects on top

game-play is good, class and pvp balance is nice the ui is clear and smooth
( do not take that for a moment to mean balanced )

i think it will do fairly well, but it really wont kill any other mmo, bioware will certainly be laughing all the way to the bank with this one, without a doubt.
however it has little to distinguish itself except the voice over acting and 'omg i have light sabres' the grind is still there, the atmosphere is about the same as the old bioware star wars games or mass effect
as in, it's VERY bioware ish all it does is bring a nice shiny new coat of paint to the rapidly ageing ever-quest game system
that said, the coat of paint is several layers thick and includes mini-games like the rail shooter space fights so i expect it will entertain 60+% of the community perfectly well
and at the end of the day that's what counts, it will do it's job

 

[William Ossiss]

Personally, I think it'll go down like a *****. It's main selling point is fucking voice-acting and it looks like World of Warcraft IN SPACE but with far less development time, which is usually what kills every single MMO going up against that ************.

one of its main selling points is AN ACTUAL STORY. sheesh, if your going to try and tear something down at least have the courtesy to read up on it. it has it's own art direction, and the people working on it have said "we are not trying to compete with WoW."

oh, yeah, lets compare it to WoW! let us compare it to a game that has no monumental value in its story. a game where people complain about being bored and are yet still playing that game. an elitist group of assholes that have no reason to be playing other than "getting that armor set" or "getting that proto drake". do you want to know why i pre-ordered TOR today? because of the writing. the story telling. the emotional depth from the characters. the voice acting is only a part of that. and at least we dont have some shitty text that pops up for a quest that everyone skips.

also, guild wars 2 looks to be pretty good. why cant i like both? oh, no. cant have anyone liking one console over another! cannot have someone liking to play everything, when pc gaming is the greatest! or nintendo/sony/microsoft is the best brand etc etc...

buy a game because you want to play it. not because your a flipping fan boy/girl.

 

[Aris Khandr]

Where's the option for "It will be good, but not profitable"? A year or so ago, they said that TOR would need to have a million monthly subscribers to turn a profit, and I just don't see that happening. Maybe for a few months, but certainly not 3-6 months down the road.

 

[Crazy Zaul]

It will be good at first but probably get old quite fast. The story is the only thing it has going for it so once you've seen it the gameplay might not be good enough to keep it going.

 

[Radoh]

Well let's see now.
It's Star Wars, even that god awful Force Unleased II fiasco they still manages to make a ton of money off of it.
And it's Bioware.
Not only will they be attracting attention from two different groups, they'll also be making the other side excited too.
I'm a Bioware and Star Wars fan myself, though I'm a little jaded in regards to Star Wars.
I was heavily concerned with its lack of good games recently, but then I saw that Bioware was making it and I got as giddy as a schoolgirl.

 

[DarkhoIlow]

It will cater only to Star Wars fans and people who want something new other than World of Warcraft.

For my own "tastes",I think I will try Guild Wars 2 instead.One time buy and a free game afterwards.

 

[jawakiller]

News flash:

Star Wars fans are really easy to please.

Now don't get me wrong, I like SW but history has shown us that this popular sci-fi franchise has a very small list of good games (battlefront for example). So anything that has Star wars in it and is better than farmville will do ok. I just don't understand why more developers aren't taking advantage of the easy girl of the fantasy neighborhood.

 

[Canadamus Prime]

Personally, judging by the intro on Unskippable (disregarding Graham and Paul's commentary, as humerous as it was), I would say it's doomed to fail. I think Star Wars is one of the many franchises that should've been laid to rest long before now. Now don't misunderstand me, I love Star Wars, or rather I did; but unlike most people I understand that the sometimes even the best things in life have to come to an end at some point and when dealing with franchises like Star Wars, ideally that point would be before they grow into a huge convoluted mess.
Other examples of such franchises:
- Sonic the Hedgehog
- Pokemon
- Star Trek (actually they past that point some years back)
- Metroid (ideally before Other M)
- Final Fantasy (maybe)
- The Legend of Zelda (although, there may still be some potential left in this one)

...and that's all I can think of at the moment. And no, before anyone says anything, I think Mario still has potential, although I think they need to rework the formula a bit, maybe bring back Smithy...

EDIT: I should also point out that all the franchises I've listed are ones that I enjoy or once enjoyed.

 

[AlternatePFG]

Personally, I think it'll go down like a *****. It's main selling point is fucking voice-acting and it looks like World of Warcraft IN SPACE but with far less development time, which is usually what kills every single MMO going up against that ************.

oh, yeah, lets compare it to WoW! let us compare it to a game that has no monumental value in its story. a game where people complain about being bored and are yet still playing that game. an elitist group of assholes that have no reason to be playing other than "getting that armor set" or "getting that proto drake". do you want to know why i pre-ordered TOR today? because of the writing. the story telling. the emotional depth from the characters. the voice acting is only a part of that. and at least we dont have some shitty text that pops up for a quest that everyone skips.

That's the thing though, people don't play MMO's for the story. If there isn't a solid, fun game behind it, no one is going to stay interested once they get past the story and into the endgame. Alot of BioWare fans are buying it for the story, which is great but the thing is that other MMO players are expecting unique gameplay as well. Not everyone is in it for the story, and if they want to be successful they will have to realize that.

Personally, none of the gameplay they have shown us looks very fun or different so far. Obviously other than those who've played in the closed beta, no one has actually played the game, so all I can go off is the gameplay and in-game trailers that they've showed us.

 

[danintexas]

I hope it isn't. But I just have this gut feeling that it will end up one of the greatest MMO fails of all time. It will bring much tears

 

[jim1398]

I've noticed a lot of people are assuming it's going to be successful simply because it's a popular IP and a popular developer. Well I'm sorry, but there have been other MMOs that have been based on a popular IP with popular developers behind them and it didn't stop them from failing. WAR, FFXIV, DCUO. All of these were based on popular IP's and had well known developers behind them and they all did badly.

If the game is bad, it's not going to do well. Sure, it may get a ton of pre-orders and initial sales (a lot of recent MMO 'failures' have done the same), but that doesn't mean much with an MMO. An MMO is all about sustained subscriptions and if the game is bad then they just aren't going to get them.


Does this mean I think TOR is going to fail? No, I honestly have no idea how well it's going to do and frankly, nobody else will for several months after release either. What I do know is it's going to go through the same sequence of events that virtually every recent big name MMO has gone through,

- there will be a lot of pre-orders, resulting in fanboys shouting about how it's going to be huge
- there will be a lot of initial sales, resulting in fanboys shouting about how it's going to kill WoW
- there will be people complaining that some features aren't as awesome as the developers made them sound, certain features didn't make it into the game and/or that it's not as polished as WoW and doesn't have as much content.
- it have a very significant drop in player numbers after the initial free month is over, resulting in many people shouting about how it's failed.




So in summary,
- popularity of IP/developer is not a good indication of how successful it will be
- a lot of initial sales, follwed by a large drop in population exactly 30 days after release
- we won't know how well it has done until several months after release
- anything a developer says should be taken with a pinch of salt
- fanboys and haters are idiots

 

[aba1]

Will the old republic fail?

We already know it will didn't you watch the movies