The Elder Scrolls Online

[BlackAdderBG]

So we'll all be DPS then!

 

[Rahdulan]

"We've only just scratched the surface"

Nah, I'm pretty sure you revealed 90% of the stuff that's in the game.

 

[Commissar Draco]

They have Big Swords BIG SWORDS; ''You can Master all skills on one Character'' kills the curiosity to try this POS; Aside from Biowhorean like Graphic Direction; Frack now must to make another coffee or fall to sleep after watching this DA3 Trailer.

 

[Metro]

This is going to be a disaster.

 

[Cyberarmy]

This is going to be a disaster.

We can only hope

 

[Caim]

Ah, I was beginning to think that they were going to drop the "be who you want to be" tagline.

 

[Scruffy]

my god, i hope they lose SOOOOO much money on this, i really do.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Ah, I was beginning to think that they were going to drop the "be who you want to be" tagline.

What if I'm inclined to exist as a flying reptilian being of mythical prowess?

 

[Mastermind]

''You can Master all skills on one Character'' kills the curiosity to try this POS;

It being like every other Elder Scrolls game kills your curiosity to try this?

 

[Jugashvili]

Well, they kept some sort of variation on the herp-a-derp-a-perks, so hopefully that should restrain people from becoming jacks of all trades. The whole levelling system looks a bit inconsistent, though, doesn't it? At one point the guy says it's EXP based, and at another it seems as if it's traditional TES train-by-use. What gives? Is it a mix of both?

 

[Caim]

What if I'm inclined to exist as a flying reptilian being of mythical prowess?

Then I point you towards Morrowind.

Well, they kept some sort of variation on the herp-a-derp-a-perks, so hopefully that should restrain people from becoming jacks of all trades. The whole levelling system looks a bit inconsistent, though, doesn't it? At one point the guy says it's EXP based, and at another it seems as if it's traditional TES train-by-use. What gives? Is it a mix of both?

Train-by-use uses XP, but for individual skills.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

What if I'm inclined to exist as a flying reptilian being of mythical prowess?

Then I point you towards Morrowind.

Hmmm, yeah, a Levitating Argonian is one way to be a dragon.

 

[Metro]

There's going to be no balance whatsoever.

 

[Genma:TheDestroyer]

So if you're limited only by time the early adopters will always have a leg up.

 

[AW8]

Character Progression: Be Who You Want to Be!

By the Nine, look at the Orcs at 3:00. What the fuck. The hair on the girl, and their skin color? Wat? Whitewashed humanwashed much? :D

''You can Master all skills on one Character'' kills the curiosity to try this POS; Aside from Biowhorean like Graphic Direction

Agree, mastering everything on one character is one of the biggest problems with TES and shouldn't exactly be talked about as a returning element in TESO.

And the art direction is just so... generic and cartoony-looking. These Argonians, Orcs and Khajiit etc. have so much potential to look unique and yet the art style kills it and makes everything look like crap.

 

[Erzherzog]

There's no way you can balance what they're bringing up and the only way you could force player cooperation in a game world where everyone can be good at everything is either HP bloat or some weird and obtuse concoction that only these guys seem capable of. It's like a fucking Frankenstein copy of a series that did that to itself already. Every news item screams bad design goals because all of it comes from a direction other than "how do we create an MMO that's fun and engaging?" Instead we see goals that detract from the ability to actually design a fucking game like resources being wasted on a blatant cash-grab by going console, and a bizarre pick-and-choose on features from the main series to placate "the hardcore fanbase."

And I bet we'll see an article in a couple years where there will be a dev bitching about "it wasn't our fault! Zenimax forced us to do those things!" But these design decisions...fucking Christ every department in this game is just fucked at this point. The game design is absurd, the art direction is both bland and unfaithful, the lore is nonsense (and also unfaithful!), and there doesn't seem to be any engaging reason to actually have the thing be fucking multiplayer! The only teamwork thing that has been mentioned are retarded things from announcement (light the oil slick on fire!) that have probably been shit-canned at this point. Everything else has focused solely on the player's own character and how they can be super awesome.

But the bad part is that I must have been the last guy on the codex giving this a chance, and at this point I just feel the a fucking dumbass for it.

 

[DeepOcean]

I find this derp so fun to watch, they thrown away any originality the Elder Scrolls games had to copy WoW when it was cool. Even the worst WoW retards are so burnt out that this thing is doomed to fail. F2P in 6 months?

 

[abija]

my god, i hope they lose SOOOOO much money on this, i really do.

Can't lose money on a project like this unless you pull a SWToR with the budgeting.

 

[Scruffy]

my god, i hope they lose SOOOOO much money on this, i really do.

Can't lose money on a project like this unless you pull a SWToR with the budgeting.

come on, are shitesda fan THAT stupid?

 

[Night Goat]

come on, are shitesda fan THAT stupid?

Oblivion sold more than 7 million copies. Fallout 3 sold even more. Yes, I think it's safe to say that Bethesda fans are that stupid.

 

[Bubbles]

come on, are shitesda fan THAT stupid?

It's the first major western MMO to be released on PC and consoles and, AFAIK, the first major MMO with a simultaneous release on all platforms. And it's not like console players will have anything else to play; TES might even legitimately be the best game available on those systems.

It'll break records.

 

[Scruffy]

come on, are shitesda fan THAT stupid?

It's the first major western MMO to be released on PC and consoles and, AFAIK, the first major MMO with a simultaneous release on all platforms. And it's not like console players will have anything else to play; TES might even legitimately be the best game available on those systems.

It'll break records.

i never thought i'd say this, but i'd rather play gta

 

[Azrael the cat]

come on, are shitesda fan THAT stupid?

Oblivion sold more than 7 million copies. Fallout 3 sold even more. Yes, I think it's safe to say that Bethesda fans are that stupid.

Mind you....we've seen a few attempts at trying to shift a single player fanbase to a mmorpg, and they've all failed except for WoW. Mmorpg fans aren't easily fooled - for one thing, you're trying to get them off their drug of choice, which is always tough. They'll check out any new mmorpg that comes along (usually using free trials, as they already know to look for those), but they rarely stick to a new one unless they greatly prefer its focus. A good PvP-oriented mmorpg might shave a long-term segment away from WoW, but that would require a company to give a realistic appraisal of what its IP is worth in the mmorpg market (as opposed to the single-player market, or 'star wars is a popular film, therefore it must be REALLY popular as a mmorpg' nonsense) and aim to capture and keep a smaller but profitable customer base instead of going head to head with a mmorpg that has 10+ years of content, while offering nothing new in the way of gameplay.

In mmorpgs, simply having newer graphics is rarely a great selling point - WoW deliberately scaled its graphical requirements down after beta (hence the 'cartoony' design), because they correctly calculated that the mmorpg market would prefer something they could run on their shitty laptop (or those tablets that were on the distant horizon back then), and that would allow the servers to handle more people/effects with less lag. This was one of the reasons why they wtf-pwned the far better looking Everquest 2. I detested WoW's raiding focus (my ideal mmorpg would be one that lets me play single player in a world with 1000s of other single players, with all alliances being part of the in-game world), but given that's what they're going for it was a masterstroke to hand oversight of the design in its later stages to the head of the most powerful EQ 1 guild: it gave them a direct insight into what the playerbase would prefer (and what mechanics would get a player hooked), that Sony Online lacked.

I can't see TES having the same insight, and from what I can tell they're going straight for a WoW clone. Which means they're likely to perform about as well as TOR at best - the TES fans will try it for a few weeks before quitting when they realise it's like any other mmorpg (mmorpgs aren't a novelty anymore, so most of those fans will already be familiar with the limitations of mmorpgs and will be ready to quit once they realise it's 'just another mmorpg'). And the mmorpg fans will try it until their free trials run out and they return to WoW because TESO isn't offering anything new.

As for consoles: do you really thing console gamers are going to schedule raiding times? If there's one thing I can't accuse mmorpgs of, it's being casual. Console gamers will give up the moment they run into a raid boss they can't kill with a first time pickup group (and what quality pickup groups there will be with all the 10yr old console kiddies running around). We're talking about the crowd that couldn't find Cassius in Morrowind. They can't even read a manual - even with raid strats published online, do you seriously think they're going to obsessively memorise and practice the raid tactics for each mini-boss (in full raid groups no less) and wipe repeatedly until they can get it right? These guys are going to rage-quit the first time they get a large repair bill.

Bethesda still might make an excellent profit from it. They're unlikely to repeat EA's mistake and spend a metric fuckton on token branching voice-overs and class questlines that have no impact on the gaming world - they've seen that doesn't work, and it was never really their thing anyway. If they keep their costs under control (i.e. spend a lot, just not TOR levels of budget insanity), the mmorpg market dynamics make it hard not to have a good profit so long as the game sells well at launch. Remember, WoW recouped its development costs from initial box-sales alone, and those expansions wouldn't have been all that expensive - all that subscription money was pure gravy, and that's why companies keep trying to tap that gravy-well. Even if TESO doesn't thrive, it will probably sell enough early to recoup its costs, and then make a lot of money over its 1st 12 months. But it's unlikely to be a titan of mmorpgs.

 

[Metro]

I'm sure they'll break even on box/initial DD sales alone. And I'm sure that, initially, the monthly fees will cover the cost of operation. At least for a few months. But, yes, an MMO where one character can master everything makes absolutely no sense.

 

[Borelli]

I'm sure they'll break even on box/initial DD sales alone. And I'm sure that, initially, the monthly fees will cover the cost of operation. At least for a few months. But, yes, an MMO where one character can master everything makes absolutely no sense.

"Every member of our party has 100 in all skills... so who is gonna heal?"