The Elder Scrolls Online

Cinge · Mar 22, 2014

I get the overflow, I mean maybe there is some limit to the tech of a megasever(especially given the numbers this will most likely see) and you just can't add anymore into the equation. So you have some servers able to deal with the left overs. What is dumb is that the overflow doesn't queue you for the regular servers, instead making you choose either wait for the queue or go play but you will have to log out and wait in a queue to get on the real server. This will not go over well with players.

Abefroman · Mar 22, 2014

Byr_sl said:
i never thought in this day and age people would be so critical of a company for trying to ensure a game launch isnt a clusterfuck.(it still will be)

The problem is the measures they took ensure it's a clusterfuck. We know the overflow communicates with the megaserver because it saves your progress. Simply putting you in the queue while playing the overflow would pretty much eliminate those complaints. The overflow is not an option for pvp players at all as it is. I'll admit I'm probably oversimplifying this since I remember GW2 had broken ass queues forever.

Jackdaddio_sl · Mar 22, 2014

Dahkoht_sl said:
Also no worries , again you all are forgetting , Matt Firor has guaranteed through his promise you will have have a smooth and lag free launch experience. He promised.

ZOS doesn't read Forbes apparently...

Five Lessons Learned as SWTOR Surrenders

1. A Beloved Brand Can Only Carry You So Far
2. The Development Costs are Too Damn High
3. To Beat the Best, You Have to Do More Than Copy
4. Don?t Rely on an Aging Model

and (the biggie)

5.What Fans Want is Not Necessarily What You Think They Need

Forbes_sl said:
For example, when an Elder Scrolls MMO was recently announced, the reaction from longtime Bethesda fans wasn?t cheering, it was more of a collective eye roll. Very few played through the past few Elder Scrolls games and wished there were a hundred other champions roaming around with names like ?xXxDarkSlayer69xXx? above their heads. It was a beautiful single player experience, why ruin that?

Cinge · Mar 22, 2014

There's room for both, it's not mutually exclusive.

esloan_sl · Mar 22, 2014

Abefroman_sl said:
The problem is the measures they took ensure it's a clusterfuck. We know the overflow communicates with the megaserver because it saves your progress. Simply putting you in the queue while playing the overflow would pretty much eliminate those complaints. The overflow is not an option for pvp players at all as it is. I'll admit I'm probably oversimplifying this since I remember GW2 had broken ass queues forever.

Every game has had broken ass queues. If they are not going to enable it so that the overflow puts you into the queue, maybe they are counting on PvE'ers going overflow and PvP'ers going to the queue? For the first ten levels, its not going to matter where you play. After that, if you are a PvP'er just queue up for the megaserver and if you want to PvE, jump into the overflow. Its a really inefficient way to do it but it might work to lessen queue times and let people play.

This, of course, is all assuming that they are not going to enable the ability for the overflow to put you into the queue. If they do, it will be just like every other MMO launch.

Dahkoht_sl · Mar 22, 2014

On that note , I've often wondered if ESO as full into development before the SWTOR debacle after launch banking on the same thing. In other words it was riding the idea of the money train that SWTOR promised that never materialized. But by the time that SWTOR was exposed as never going to survive as a sub game , much less compete and surpass WoW like the devs had implied , it was too late to change the idea of ESO ?

Byr · Mar 22, 2014

Dahkoht_sl said:
On that note , I've often wondered if ESO as full into development before the SWTOR debacle after launch banking on the same thing. In other words it was riding the idea of the money train that SWTOR promised that never materialized. But by the time that SWTOR was exposed as never going to survive as a sub game , much less compete and surpass WoW like the devs had implied , it was too late to change the idea of ESO ?

off the wiki

The Elder Scrolls Online had been in development for 5 years prior to its announcement in May 2012.[1] It is the first project for ZeniMax Online Studios, which was formed in 2007. Matt Firor, studio lead at Zenimax Online, is also the director of The Elder Scrolls Online.[2]

so they were 4 years deep when swtor launched.

Abefroman · Mar 22, 2014

Dahkoht_sl said:
On that note , I've often wondered if ESO as full into development before the SWTOR debacle after launch banking on the same thing. In other words it was riding the idea of the money train that SWTOR promised that never materialized. But by the time that SWTOR was exposed as never going to survive as a sub game , much less compete and surpass WoW like the devs had implied , it was too late to change the idea of ESO ?

Well the SWTOR model did end up working for them. It wasn't original enough to ever be a contender for long term play. They cashed in on the box prices, milked subs for awhile and are now making big money off of the FTP model. Teso will probably follow a similar path and end up turning a nice profit.

Jackdaddio_sl · Mar 22, 2014

Cinge_sl said:
There's room for both, it's not mutually exclusive.

I look at the game and the amount of money they spent and wonder why couldn't they just make the same game but use a different name so as to protect the IP?

I mean, they could have said something like"A new mmo from the makers of The Elder Scrolls series headed by people who brought you DAoC"and still sold a shitload of boxes. Then they wouldn't have to worry about API bullshit and other crap ("where's ma first person view???")

Game could have sold just as many boxes with half the headache.

Dahkoht_sl · Mar 22, 2014

Abefroman_sl said:
Well the SWTOR model did end up working for them. It wasn't original enough to ever be a contender for long term play. They cashed in on the box prices, milked subs for awhile and are now making big money off of the FTP model. Teso will probably follow a similar path and end up turning a nice profit.

Oh I didn't mean it didn't turn a profit , just more the expectations fell well short of what they were saying/hoping before launch was all. The voice acting emphasis and so on I wonder if ESO will be the last for a while that bothers with that for an mmo, meaning known actors and much time dedicated to it.

esloan_sl · Mar 22, 2014

Jackdaddio_sl said:
I look at the game and the amount of money they spent and wonder why couldn't they just make the same game but use a different name so as to protect the IP?

I mean, they could have said something like"A new mmo from the makers of The Elder Scrolls series headed by people who brought you DAoC"and still sold a shitload of boxes. Then they wouldn't have to worry about API bullshit and other crap ("where's ma first person view???")

Game could have sold just as many boxes with half the headache.

I don't know, I think you might be underestimating the size of the Elder Scroll fanbase. Its pretty big. Of this didn't have the Elder Scrolls name and lore attached to it, I think there might be a lot less interest. Development would have probably been much easier but that might be a lot of box sales to miss out on.

Abefroman · Mar 22, 2014

Dahkoht_sl said:
Oh I didn't mean it didn't turn a profit , just more the expectations fell well short of what they were saying/hoping before launch was all. The voice acting emphasis and so on I wonder if ESO will be the last for a while that bothers with that for an mmo, meaning known actors and much time dedicated to it.

Yah I agree. Hopefully we finally get away from tons of voice acting, quest hubs and following the same formula.

Jackdaddio_sl · Mar 22, 2014

esloan_sl said:
I don't know, I think you might be underestimating the size of the Elder Scroll fanbase. Its pretty big. Of this didn't have the Elder Scrolls name and lore attached to it, I think there might be a lot less interest. Development would have probably been much easier but that might be a lot of box sales to miss out on.

I'm not underestimating anything.

What I'm saying is the fanbase is SO big, that many of them would have bought the game in a similar world based on that alone. It's like how there is a segment of Square Enix fans who will buy any game they make simply because they like the games they make genre wise.

That's pretty obtuse to think fans of a company would ignore a 200 million dollar game they were making simply because it didn't have 'TES' splashed on it.

esloan_sl · Mar 22, 2014

Jackdaddio_sl said:
I'm not underestimating anything.

What I'm saying is the fanbase is SO big, that many of them would have bought the game in a similar world based on that alone. It's like how there is a segment of Square Enix fans who will buy any game they make simply because they like the games they make genre wise.

That's pretty obtuse to think fans of a company would ignore a 200 million dollar game they were making simply because it didn't have 'TES' splashed on it.

Your key words there are "many of them" and a "segment". They thought, by going with the Elder Scrolls name, that they could get more than a few of them or a segment. They wanted as many as they could get and the easiest way to do it is by setting it in the Elder Scrolls Universe.

Hal_2005 · Mar 23, 2014

I have to agree with Esloan. Many market watchers looked at the heavy subscription fee, plus box costs and the only reasonable conclusion is that Zenimax is fully pricing in a cash grab for the first 6 months, and then a sharp fall off in subs. An interesting point I am shocked the thread did not pick up on was that Kotaku a few weeks ago had a rumor floating around that most of the TESO art and development staff contracts are set for negotiation in October 2014. Read: Get your 5-year coke snorting asses off our premise you hipsters.

Predatory brand destruction is pretty common in the gaming industry. Superman 64, Command & Conquer knockoffs, Final Fantasy MMO's, Need for Speed knockoffs and the Old Republic (and 99% of star wars merchandise) are excellent examples of projects that were launched to cash in on a marketing gimmick that has a 50-50 chance of failing but does no lasting damage to your main product offerings.

EDIT: OH SWEET, you guys saved my Hal eye from like 5 years ago! awesome.

Ukerric · Mar 23, 2014

Abefroman_sl said:
You defended it, that's the point. The people making the bots are better at what they do then Teso Engineers anyway, this wont stop bots.

People were making bots in EQ, a game with no API whatsoever.

Ukerric · Mar 23, 2014

esloan_sl said:
They are apparently testing the overflow server right now.

So, there's a mega-server, then an overflow to the mega-server (that is not an additional instance within the mega-server)???

Oh, my. Suddenly, you are filled with confidence with their software engineers.

Ukerric · Mar 23, 2014

Abefroman_sl said:
I can also understand a queue system early on because a mega server still can only handle so many people at a time. The overflow doesn't make sense at all because why not just include that in the megaserver?

Yep. The whole idea of the mega-server is that basically, you have a central character DB (with appropriate replication and distribution so that it can sustain the load), and then a bunch of server rack full of server blades where you spawn as many copies of any zone as necessary to accommodate the amount of players. You deal with launch by having a rack of rented servers, which you'll use and abandon after a month. And you get a queue if you reach the end of your stack of servers, while you wait for Amazon to spawn additional servers (because you have made contingency plans to run copies of your zone servers in the cloud, in case you don't even have enough dedicated infrastructure at launch. What? You didn't? What year is this, 2004?)

It sounds like their mega-server is unscalable since they need a second mega-server, separate from the first.

Ukerric · Mar 23, 2014

Jackdaddio_sl said:
The funny thing is, the craziest guy in the whole movie was right all along in the end.

Every time I see that, I'm reminded of anold novelin which there's a civilization that's barely incomprehensible, is spewing some ramblings that seem disconnected from reality...

... and when you read the author's notes (on CD! In hypercard format!) you discover that basically, the guy had access to data a few hundred million years old, knew about the traps that our heroes will stumble upon in a few chapters, and so on. It's just that no one paid any attention to him.

Ukerric · Mar 23, 2014

Dahkoht_sl said:
Am I missing something or does that just seem , well , moronic ?

Intern programmers in action. Enjoy them.

esloan_sl said:
Not doing it seems inefficient at best.

That assumes their architecture is capable of doing that. They probably banked everything on the mega-server being the be-all-end-all, discovered there's an absolute cap, found out that they would need six months to rip and redo the intern's code, and cobbled together this overflow kludge.

The Elder Scrolls Online

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