It is not rude at all. Get a dictionary and look up the word rape. If you dont feel raped, then as the saying goes you cant rape the willing.

I dont see how you compared me to a fanboy, though. Im pretty sure that I am the farthest thing from, but whatever.

they have servers to maintain, they have people who need to be paid to monitor the servers 24/7, they need to pay GMs, they need to pay the people who always improve the game, making patches, etc. they need to pay the bandwidth the servers produce (which is ALOT!) etc etc. did you ever thought about how much money that all eats? if they really got that much more subscribers in the last months, they have to increase the fee. because of the increased support, servers maintainance and bandwidth produced.

More subscribers means they already have more money. They don't need to raise rates if they are getting more people. I see the rate hike as a sign that they think their subscriber rates will dwindle. There are so many new MMORPGS coming out that they are afraid many of their subscribers are going to jump to a competitor. The way they figure it, a lot of people are going to jump to the newer games no matter what the price is, and a lot of people are going to stay with UO no matter what the price is. They know this, and are preparing for it by making the first move. By raising the price, they are saying "Go ahead and leave us if you want, but those of you who are hardcore UO fans and love great gameplay should be willing to stay and pay the higher fee". The number of players will drop 30,000 or so, but they will make that up in revenue because of the higher fee they are charging the people who stay. The end result is that UO still makes money despite the fact that there are so many newer games with great graphics.

Now that I think about it, EA is really playing this one smart. Smart in a business way.

"instead of letting publishers continue to literally RAPE us"

Your metaphor (or not because your saying its literal) is really rude. In NO way is the current lack of creativity in the video game industry and your willingness or not to purchase these products metaphorically or literally related to sexual assault.

"Hire me and I will tell you."

Sorry, they dont have a position in the game industry for "fan boys"

http://pw1.netcom.com/~sirbruce/Subscriptions.html

A nice report I found on Subscription numbers, the author asumes numbers on a few games, but indicates where he does so. Also has his raw data in the form of an excel sheet for viewing if you are so inclind.

He goes into a little history with each game and has some pretty good information. This should help with some of you who have questions on subsribers per MMOG.

I only care about gameplay in games, not storyline or graphics.

Gameplay, to me, is the balance of graphics, story, sound and gaming mathmatical mechanics. When you say gameplay do you mean the mathmatical mechanics of the game?

There is very little new fun styles of gameplay that are required to be MMO or even just run by pay to play servers.

I think a MMO could be fun if we could get away from the the whole leveling up and/or making in-game money process as the point in the game. I cant see how people find whacking away at monsters that, are essintially the same, just with more hitpoints and a different look. OOO I CAN KILL LEVEL 8 MONSTERS NOW!!!! Right....

Although I think it could have alot better mechanics than it does, I think WWIIOL does a good job of proving this. When you get a bunch of people together to focus on one objective, winning the war, by making them have to accomplish several goals, winning battles, it can be very fun. MMPORPGs dont do a good job, IMO, of enforcing teamplay, at least in the begining anyways. There are no consequences to death in these games anymore so they might as well just give everyone god mode.

Secondly, I want way less game budgets, as they are spent making games not focused on gameplay...

Sadly, this is not 1985, or even 1990. Good games take time and more people than before, time is money and the devlopers do have to feed their family. The problem with the gaming industry now, is that it is run by people who think a good game is the same fucking game we played years ago, just with better graphics, you know, the whole Quake series. The other problem, is that in general, humans are stupid and actually think they are buying a new game when they arent. The Tenebrae project pretty much proves my point here. There are too many fucking sequals, also. If you are gonna try and sell me the same game I played 3 years ago, at least be creative enough to give it a new name. Oh wait...then people would bitch about how it is in fact the same game, just with a different name. Enter the franchise. Fuck Quake 3, fuck Doom 3, fuck Deus Ex 3 if Specter and Smith sell out instead of doing what they do best, being creative.

Yes, I Loved Deus Ex and Theif, yes, I will buy both DE2 and Theifx. I will personally boycot anything after. Sadly, my boycotting doesnt do much to change the industry and inspire creativity. The gaming industry needs the magicians equivlent of magic tricks revealed. We need something to inspire new ways of doing things instead of letting publishers continue to literally RAPE us.

I like what is being done with Vampire: Bloodlines. It is the same name, same universe but a completly different game from the first. This much is obvious already. Why cant more sequels do this? Quake 2 tried to be differnt at least. Quake 3 on the other hand...

Right...my point here, is, a budget doesnt make a good or bad game, neither does its name, its graphics, its mechanics, its sound, its level design. So what makes a good game?

Hire me and I will tell you.

<<Well, it may seem greedy for UO to raise it's subscription to $12.99 a month but all the other MMO*'s are charging that rate and in my opinion, UO is still by FAR the best MMO out there even with it's 2D Sprite Engine. All the new MMO's may look prettier but the base gameplay compared to UO is seriously lacking. So if people ARE going to pay to play why not bump the rate to the current standard. At least the UO user base won't be paying for a Beta quality MMO like almost all the new MMO's just coming out. I don't play any MMO's right now but I have played or at least beta'd almost all of them and UO has every right to charge equal to the current crop of Beta Quality MMO's out there.>>

You have got to be kidding me! We have been beta testing AoS for 3 months now! This latest version of UO added 100's of bugs and ruined PvP. The UO that OSI is raising thier prices for is NOT the one that you played.

This comment was edited on May 26, 11:52.

"The good thing about this is the resource boon to the industry... as more and more money is generated by subscription fees, the justification for much bigger game budgets becomes a viable option."

This is bad for me in every way. I only care about gameplay in games, not storyline or graphics. There is very little new fun styles of gameplay that are required to be MMO or even just run by pay to play servers. If everyone starts making these games it will be very boring. Secondly, I want way less game budgets, as they are spent making games not focused on gameplay and instead into stupid wannabe movies for nerds with manbreasts who live vicariously through the main charachters.

64:
Well, most games sound good when they're in planning, because the companies are trying to hype them up to get sales. I remember OSI hyped UO sooo badly, with stories and promises that it would be an 'ever-changing world' with interaction from the company to make the game interesting. However, that never happened. They were never any big battles (except for one, in the beta) and whatever storyline was originally created never seemed to be acted upon. Even worse, the support given to the players by OSI was horrid. I played UO fondly, but I think that one of the only reasons that I found it so pleasurable was because it was NEW, and no one ever really heard about a massive-mulitplayer RPG before this.

This comment was edited on May 25, 03:48.

Yeah, I followed UO2 pretty closely, it looked pretty damn cool. Most (or maybe all) of the animations were motion captured. They had a cool sounding skill system. Best of all, they had a deep background (they had a number of short stories on their web page...) and interesting game world.

I never quite bought the excuse that the game just wasn't good enough to release... Especially compared the the crap MMORPGS that are released now...

I'm not sure why they were afraid of canniablizing their existing userbase... Surely there would have been a sizable number of "old school" players who kept with the original, and *MANY* people would be willing to play a 3d MMORPG who for one reason or another wouldn't accept a 2d one.

On a similar topic... I wish AC2 had been more like AC1... becuase IMHO that was the best MMORPG i've ever played (not having played UO).

With the exception that you weren't really griefing, just choosing an alternate way to avoid getting killed.
If you were really griefing, you'd be annoying two other players who were doing something that had absolutely nothing to do with you.

This is what I put my thief in a war guild, and played with the oranges. Nothing was more satisfying than taking some LJ's axe and selling it in town right in front of him.

You have a GOOD point about the NDA. One I wanted to bring up, and probably should of earlier. Using numbers you hear from meetings is confidential information. Press releases are all you are publically able to announce. ESPECIALLY when saying you are an EA/OSI employee.

Wolf,

UO2 was not killed because it was far behind. EA saw it as cannibalizing its own game which was doing well at the time. It is typical EA; I've seen it many times in the past. Hell the game was almost finished. And don't throw this "I work at Origin so I know all about that." I worked at Origin as well. I was a programmer and technical lead and shipped multiple projects. Many good friends of mine were on that UO2 team.

I also believe upon your hiring you signed a non-discloser with EA. So you are in violation by discussing the number of subscribers with the public.

You are setting a bad example by arguing with the people here. I really think you need to be a bit more sensitive to the fact that regardless of the reason, many people feel cheated. These are the people who ARE paying your salary! Without UO you have no job at Origin.

(*&^@#%

Now I want to go buy the latest version of UO.

Sure, tree chopping and mining for a week SUCKS but its the killing afterwords.


@(#*%&#@($&

Addiction, here I come

I am DLing Endless Ages, though....

This comment was edited on May 24, 03:32.

The ability to play a greifing loudmouth combat gimp, that does nothing but frustrate you when your trying to kill me had a flavor that is missed in other MMO offerings.

With the exception that you weren't really griefing, just choosing an alternate way to avoid getting killed.
If you were really griefing, you'd be annoying two other players who were doing something that had absolutely nothing to do with you.
Don't know why you'd want to belong to the worst cockroaches on the Internet, but even so, you have to EARN the title

Creston

"Your lack of professionalism bothers me, Wolfen. Its like you are trying to brag."

Thanks for the opinion.
____________________________

I don't think it is an opinion.
When something is... it is.

If UO was the UO of say... 2.5 years ago, I would still gladly pay the hiked rate.

To bad the game went to shit in the last few years, the hope of reliving some of the same fun times / socialization that I had in UO is the only thing that really drives me to try other MMORPGS out there.

The last straw for me was when UO completely and totally gimped thieves. You see, UO allowed you to do something that no other MMO game around does, role play a thief, completely and totally. Hell you dont even need to be trained in thief skills to do what a thief does. Loot a house? Kill a passer by in a boat and loot it? "Sorry to see that you died, guess you won't be needing THIS anymore..."... None of these moments exist in other MMO's.

A few years in they gave thieves some pretty cool abilities, notably the disarm skill. Nothing was more fun they putting my combat gimp (read: zero combat skills) thief into a war guild and disarming / harasing / stealing from other war factions.

With AoS they nerfed death. No longer will you lose all your items when you die, just insure them. And us thieves could no longer steal these items as a side affect from this.

The ability to play a greifing loudmouth combat gimp, that does nothing but frustrate you when your trying to kill me had a flavor that is missed in other MMO offerings.

This comment was edited on May 23, 14:05.

This comment was edited on May 27, 17:50.

"I just love the idea that some whack-minded people have, which is that somehow paying a fee to play a game monthly actually *removes* the "leet peeps" or however you spelled it, and puts more mature, well rounded people into the environment."

Well, I don't think that is what inspired the pay to play genre. Who said it was to reduce the amount of l33t p33ps anyways? In my experience most griefers are adults who can easily afford $10-$13 a month. I don't think any of the Devs/Publishers are marketing their Pay to play games to non-l33t p33ps or the like, not really sure where you are getting this opinion...

I just love the idea that some whack-minded people have, which is that somehow paying a fee to play a game monthly actually *removes* the "leet peeps" or however you spelled it, and puts more mature, well rounded people into the environment.

Quite frankly, knowing the people I've seen and heard of who play these games religiously, I would have thought quite the opposite.

[disclaimer - yes I know that not everyone who plays these games is lame, or in any way unstable etc, so please dont reply that you are offended]

Your lack of professionalism bothers me, Wolfen. Its like you are trying to brag.