Is ESO going to self destruct before it even launches?

[norseamd]

pay to win failing is not going to wipe the success of microtransactions in free to play games out of the minds of people.

 

[Subyman]

Where are people getting pay-to-win? ESO doesn't have a store full of pay-for gear or skill buffs. The devs have said the store will only carry stuff like name changes and cosmetic items. I see no problem with that for people that want it. The race locked behind the collectors edition is questionable. Hopefully they unlock that at a future date.

 

[asteldian]

If the game crashes and burns, it will likely be more to do with the ridiculous initial cost than the actual player subscription.
Companies are blowing far too much money on these games which means so much is invested that they need to have stupidly high amounts of subscriber numbers to claw the cash back, which also then leads to overinflated purchase costs.

You don't need to spend a crazy amount of money on an MMO. Rift was on a budget of $50M, and while it was nothing groundbreaking, it was very polished game with a good amount of content and lasted 18+ months and an expansion before having to go F2P, meanwhile SWTR spent stupid $ and crash and burned fast and had a serious lack of end game content.

Heck, you only need about 100k subscribers to keep a game up and running and slightly profitable with a decent sized dev team (about 20), but when you also need to claw back $200M you are really paddling upstream

 

[PrincessFrosty]

I don't think it's different enough and unique enough to ask for a purchase amount, sub and then pay gates and shit on top, it's marginally better than a lot of the MMOs currently out, I'd consider a sub for a few months or paying into a F2P model but it looks like they've designed the game around maximum money rape so I'll probably skip it, partly because I genuinely don't think it's worth it, and partly on principle.

 

[Arglebargle]

While I do agree that it is disappointing that they allow any race unlock, but if it ONLY a pre-order bonus and will not be unlocked at a later time (unless like 3-4 years if it survives that long) then I would be somewhat ok with it

The imperial race unlock is ok, as from a lore point, they are kinda lost as their empire fell and they would be joining anyone who will bring it back

IF the game was DaoC2, the racial/faction locks could make some sense. If you are going to try to appeal to the Elder Scrolls fanbase, you have to actually pay attention to what they want. The number of Elder Scrolls fans dwarfs the number of DaoC hardliners. It wasn't a good idea from the get go, and was an un-imaginative port.


The race locking was the major reason I was not interested in the game.

 

[Markbnj]

IF the game was DaoC2, the racial/faction locks could make some sense.

Are you thinking of the new races that came with the expansions? Wasn't there precedent for this in Oblivion? I thought one of the expansions unlocked Khajit as a playable race, or something like that.

 

[tidy]

.

 

[Markbnj]

Well, maybe I'm in the minority, but I had fun tonight. There are some things I don't like, quite a few things I do. Finally got out of the second zone and hoping to see a lot more of the game tomorrow.

 

[Feneant2]

It's definitely a stress test, just tried to login and there's over an hour queue.

In beta, I'm ok with that, but if I pay for this game, there had better not be a queue when I try to log in.

 

[sushicide]

Well it ain't bad as some make it out to be, though nor is it good enough to warrant a monthly sub for me.

After 3 beta weekends it gives me the same vibe as SWTOR - Could've been fine as a singleplayer game but they just had to tack on bunch of multiplayer elements awkwardly to force it into a MMO, there is no way half-assed pvp(which the combat system is very ill-suited for, imo) and lack of raiding content would be able to support the pressure generated by its franchise fame; besides, a lot of MMO junkies tend to swallow all the hype and wind up with unrealistic expectations going into the game until honeymoon period's over, then it's just gonna be abandoned like a leper colony.

 

[Lil Frier]

I did a little playing (made it to the cell and decided to take a break). I'm 100% sold on not buying this game, because it's DEFINITELY not worth $15/month. Granted, that's an assessment I can make about every game ever.

It does seem to be very much Skyrim in an online setting, with some MMO attack spells, which isn't bad, but it's also nothing special. It's probably got a fine story, but I worry that it'll be too much grinding.

 

[Arkadrel]

Theres nothing wrong with grind.
Look at FF11, all grind not a one quest, all dependent on group focus exp parties.

And yet its by far the most enjoyable leveling experiance in any MMO ive ever had.

That said Im in the "not sold on buying this game" as well.
Im just waiting for Everquest next now, for my next mmo to try out.

 

[Lil Frier]

Grinding's not necessarily bad, but I'm concerned that the Skryrim style of play just won't translate well to a grinding game. In WoW, you could easily grab a big group of enemies and use an AoE to kill them. If the amount of enemies needed to complete stuff is similar to WoW, it'll be MUCH worse with grinding, because it's going to require killing those enemies one at a time.

I liked Skyrim for the exploration and major plot advancement, not the grindy progression through the 50th tomb that looked like all of the others.

 

[TidusZ]

I do my part by not spending a dime on pay2win or any EA game and I recommend you do the same.

p.s. diablo 3 expansion boycott is in effect

 

[NickelPlate]

I've leveled a mage now to 12 and have played enough to honestly say it's a fun game in the usual ES style. But I don't get the MMO aspect. It plays more like single player Skyrim with a bunch of other people running around doing the same thing. The MP portion just feels like an afterthought. Tried grouping with some people but some of the quests are either broken or won't allow a party to team up. And when you team up, it's still just a group of people playing a single player game along side each other.

I like the combat, the UI is decent, the chat interface is terrible. I'd pay $60 for the game but I'm just not sure what the $15/month value proposition is.

 

[techie81]

Played for about an hour last night and I just felt underwhelmed. Its exactly as described above, Skyrim single player with some MP crap. I'm just mad I downloaded 30 GB's for this.

 

[norseamd]

watched some gameplay videos and the combat does look more like neverwinter or swtor. like there is no weight behind anything and you just bash each other until you win. and the ai awareness looks like such easy for the masses crap. think skyrim had nicer combat

 

[Scooby Doo]

There was no such thing in Oblivion. Khajit were there from the get-go.

Morrowind was the last game to introduce a new playable race, the Orc. Although I do wish they had do something better with the snow elves than what they did :|

 

[norseamd]

morrowind had orcs

 

[MalazanEmpire]

Eso has a price tag, a monthly sub, locks away Imperials and the choice to be in any alliance with any race behind a preorder paywall or behind a specific purchase. I predict this goes F2P in the first 6 months. I am currently playing the beta and it feels like a watered down skyrim, that has 20% of content that skyrim had BEFORE you started adding mods. Too much space between quests, and its boring. The only thing that ESO does right is the music and the feeling that i need to play Skyrim more. I really do not know what were they thinking with this game. We even prepared a gameplay video, but they wont let us show it unless its only 15 mins, up to lvl 15 and nothing more. They are banking on the fanbase to simply love the game, heck i would choose Rift before this game ANY day. Stick to skyrim, it is 10x the game in EVERY regard.

 

[BrightCandle]

I lasted one hour and 45 minutes, and I was bored 10 minutes in. I think this might actually be the worst MMO I have seen in a long time.

 

[lilrayray69]

I can get the idea - wanting to play Skyrim with some of your friends...but this aint that. Nothing seems as immersive as Skyrim or Oblivion or Morrowind are. Graphics are maybe up there, but the combats pretty awful, I for one didn't pay any attention to the lore with the way the questing is set up, all the quests feel sort of cheap and forced, and I honestly didn't interact much with other players. Granted I didn't play for long, but it's nowhere near the idea of booting up and running through Skyrim killing dragons with a couple friends. I think a co-op 4 player TES title would have been a much smarter way to start, then see if maybe they want to transition bigger.

 

[Nintendesert]

My issue is that if I want me some Elderscrolls fix I'll just fire up Skyrim and if I want something a little different I can check out some new mods.

 

[Markbnj]

Graphics are maybe up there, but the combats pretty awful, I for one didn't pay any attention to the lore with the way the questing is set up, all the quests feel sort of cheap and forced, and I honestly didn't interact much with other players. Granted I didn't play for long, but it's nowhere near the idea of booting up and running through Skyrim killing dragons with a couple friends.

To each his own, I guess. I find the combat quite visceral and fun. I enjoy the lack of hard targeting. I think it will work well in RvR (having recently played Darkfall, which has a very similar system, I think it works well there too). It seems much more immersive to just charge in and start swinging, or to have to actually aim your bow.

As I said in an earlier post, there are definitely things I don't like, about which I will say more when the NDA is lifted, but overall I had a lot of fun during my last two sessions, and I would describe myself as likely to sub for at least a couple of months to see how it plays out.

 

[mizzou]

I lasted one hour and 45 minutes, and I was bored 10 minutes in. I think this might actually be the worst MMO I have seen in a long time.

If i were to have played this beta, I imagine that Bethesda/Zenimax played this one too safe....from what I've read.

It's too vanilla, too much like everything else we've seen, like a combination of old successful MMO's, a greatest hits album of last years top hits.

Not to say it couldn't be fun....because it may be fun, but what would this offer, that we haven't already seen in other MMO's?

F2P was a hit because it took a tired old genre, and let people play or try it out for free. Now that we are in the third generation of these things, we are actually getting tired of playing them...for free! D:

I don't know...I'm sure it will be an enjoyable and successful game...I'm interested to hear about the PVP system...that could potentially be a huge lynchpin on this whole thing.