Let the countdown begin!
Moderator: Community Managers
- John Adams
- Retired
- Posts: 4581
- Joined: Wed Aug 28, 2013 9:40 am
- Location: Phoenix, AZ.
- Contact:
Let the countdown begin!
Hello, Telonians.
You may have noticed a countdown timer ticking away up top of these forums - this is a stark reminder that the end-of-days are upon us. We have approximately that much time left to get everything together we need to build this game in the years to come. There are half a dozen or so active collectors still busting their butts to gather as much of the world of Telon as possible before the timer expires. Continually, I thank them graciously for their efforts.
Initially, the blood fever raged through players across dozens of communities including this one, with people ready to take SOE's head off. That seems to have subsided considerably the last 2 months. I understand there are plenty of Free-To-Play alternatives out there, so once everyone's rage died down, they wandered off to something new and, immersed in their new world, have already forgotten all about Vanguard: Saga of Heroes.
Well, not this guy. I do not play MMOs, I build them, so this is where my interests are. Our small team has more than proven we can do it by giving you access to the world of New Telon barely 2 mos after the project went public. With developer interest, this would be a no brainer. Alas, we have none so this will take a lot longer than I had expected. But I remain hopeful that another Scatman, Xen or theFoof (or 12) will come along and super-charge this project - for you... because that's why we do what we do.
Keep an eye on the clock; there's still time to get involved, now and far into the future after Sunset.
You may have noticed a countdown timer ticking away up top of these forums - this is a stark reminder that the end-of-days are upon us. We have approximately that much time left to get everything together we need to build this game in the years to come. There are half a dozen or so active collectors still busting their butts to gather as much of the world of Telon as possible before the timer expires. Continually, I thank them graciously for their efforts.
Initially, the blood fever raged through players across dozens of communities including this one, with people ready to take SOE's head off. That seems to have subsided considerably the last 2 months. I understand there are plenty of Free-To-Play alternatives out there, so once everyone's rage died down, they wandered off to something new and, immersed in their new world, have already forgotten all about Vanguard: Saga of Heroes.
Well, not this guy. I do not play MMOs, I build them, so this is where my interests are. Our small team has more than proven we can do it by giving you access to the world of New Telon barely 2 mos after the project went public. With developer interest, this would be a no brainer. Alas, we have none so this will take a lot longer than I had expected. But I remain hopeful that another Scatman, Xen or theFoof (or 12) will come along and super-charge this project - for you... because that's why we do what we do.
Keep an eye on the clock; there's still time to get involved, now and far into the future after Sunset.
Re: Let the countdown begin!
tick tock.
Re: Let the countdown begin!
meep meep!
Re: Let the countdown begin!
Love your work John! You and the team rock for doing this
Re: Let the countdown begin!
Team rocket for sure! *shifty eyes*
- John Adams
- Retired
- Posts: 4581
- Joined: Wed Aug 28, 2013 9:40 am
- Location: Phoenix, AZ.
- Contact:
Re: Let the countdown begin!
We have officially passed into the "less than 1 month" range. Getting nervous... and starting to mourn a little.
How about you?
How about you?
-
- Posts: 99
- Joined: Mon Oct 28, 2013 2:14 pm
Re: Let the countdown begin!
What about all the people who bought marketplace mounts and what not?
Re: Let the countdown begin!
It definitely is a sad time, I am still at a loss for words as to why they feel the need to sunset one of the best MMORPGs around, instead of investing in it's success, even if it does attract EQ/2 players, it still would have been money in their pocket.
A small outlay at the start could have seen SOE make a ton of cash from this game but it wasn't to be' I hope another more reliable company decides to make a game like VG one day soon, until then, we have the VGOEmulator, thanks to you guy's!
A small outlay at the start could have seen SOE make a ton of cash from this game but it wasn't to be' I hope another more reliable company decides to make a game like VG one day soon, until then, we have the VGOEmulator, thanks to you guy's!
- John Adams
- Retired
- Posts: 4581
- Joined: Wed Aug 28, 2013 9:40 am
- Location: Phoenix, AZ.
- Contact:
Re: Let the countdown begin!
I actually believe what SOE says about Vanguard, now having looked into the belly of the beast myself; technologically speaking (not graphics, but network, memory mgmt, security, etc) Vanguard was basically MacGyver'd together by what I read was a mostly inexperienced team under unreasonable pressure to release, regardless of readiness.
Yes, Vanguard is a supremely beautiful game and the Unreal engine has amazing potential. But considering the fan base was almost non-existent, they had no players, they went F2P hoping people would get sucked in, and didn't due to the bugs, and a supremely lacking web presence, it is no wonder they did not want to spend possibly millions to revamp the entire game from the core of it's essence up. I work in the Security and Compliance industry, so I get exactly why they consider this code unsalvagable. I see products die every day around me because it would cost more than it's worth to fix. It's sad, and it sucks for those who appreciated it for what it was (everyone loves their baby, even if it's ugly!) but I believe they are making the only decision they can, as a business, in the business to make a profit. ROI and stuff.
Silver Lining: We get to build an emulator which can be customized to be even better than the actual game, and we do so without fear of legal retaliation. I think this could end up being a big win for the community, if they stick with us, get involved and help us finish this in a timely manner - before even we lose our public interest.
Yes, Vanguard is a supremely beautiful game and the Unreal engine has amazing potential. But considering the fan base was almost non-existent, they had no players, they went F2P hoping people would get sucked in, and didn't due to the bugs, and a supremely lacking web presence, it is no wonder they did not want to spend possibly millions to revamp the entire game from the core of it's essence up. I work in the Security and Compliance industry, so I get exactly why they consider this code unsalvagable. I see products die every day around me because it would cost more than it's worth to fix. It's sad, and it sucks for those who appreciated it for what it was (everyone loves their baby, even if it's ugly!) but I believe they are making the only decision they can, as a business, in the business to make a profit. ROI and stuff.
Silver Lining: We get to build an emulator which can be customized to be even better than the actual game, and we do so without fear of legal retaliation. I think this could end up being a big win for the community, if they stick with us, get involved and help us finish this in a timely manner - before even we lose our public interest.
Re: Let the countdown begin!
[quote="John Adams"]I actually believe what SOE says about Vanguard, now having looked into the belly of the beast myself; technologically speaking (not graphics, but network, memory mgmt, security, etc) Vanguard was basically MacGyver'd together by what I read was a mostly inexperienced team under unreasonable pressure to release, regardless of readiness.
Yes, Vanguard is a supremely beautiful game and the Unreal engine has amazing potential. But considering the fan base was almost non-existent, they had no players, they went F2P hoping people would get sucked in, and didn't due to the bugs, and a supremely lacking web presence, it is no wonder they did not want to spend possibly millions to revamp the entire game from the core of it's essence up. I work in the Security and Compliance industry, so I get exactly why they consider this code unsalvagable. I see products die every day around me because it would cost more than it's worth to fix. It's sad, and it sucks for those who appreciated it for what it was (everyone loves their baby, even if it's ugly!) but I believe they are making the only decision they can, as a business, in the business to make a profit. ROI and stuff.
Silver Lining: We get to build an emulator which can be customized to be even better than the actual game, and we do so without fear of legal retaliation. I think this could end up being a big win for the community, if they stick with us, get involved and help us finish this in a timely manner - before even we lose our public interest.[/quote]
I agree with most of what you said John, we were actually talking about this tonight while collecting some data.
SOE pretty much turned away from the loyal Vets in search of more money from the younger, more instant gratification market, hence the F2P and massive itemisation changes, the exp and faction boost, drop rate boosts, the cash shop items etc, which in my opinion, was the wrong thing to do but the damage was done long before that and it was their own doing.
If they had of focused on fixing the game breaking bugs and adding content that had been promised for years (Stirhaad, HoSS, Nexus, Loth...), I can almost say with certainty that the game would still be going strong today. It wouldn't of had the numbers of EQ/2 or Rift etc but it would of paid the bills and kept a fairly large and more mature community happy, but that wasn't enough for them and they took the wrong option and tried to market VG as a F2P game to a younger audience, which would never be successfully or end well, especially with the loyal community that had stuck with them through all the bad times, so against it.
But still to this day I will say that the 2 years of complete abandonment of the game and zero support, after Silius' famous Road Map letter in 2009, is what killed this game off and started a snowball that would never be stopped.
If SOE had of paid more attention and realised what their player base consisted of and what type of game VG really was, they may have been more successful, too much damage was done over the years in a few big hits to ever really get the original numbers back, or anything close but they could of settled for a comfortable income instead of being greedy, honestly, I don't think they really ever cared much for VG, the way it was managed over the years really showed that, especially lending crucial VG devs to other games during times when we needed them the most, was a big indication as to their lack of care for us and VG.
But not much can be done now, other than help you guy's as much as possible so we continue to have a game to play after SOE walk away for good
Yes, Vanguard is a supremely beautiful game and the Unreal engine has amazing potential. But considering the fan base was almost non-existent, they had no players, they went F2P hoping people would get sucked in, and didn't due to the bugs, and a supremely lacking web presence, it is no wonder they did not want to spend possibly millions to revamp the entire game from the core of it's essence up. I work in the Security and Compliance industry, so I get exactly why they consider this code unsalvagable. I see products die every day around me because it would cost more than it's worth to fix. It's sad, and it sucks for those who appreciated it for what it was (everyone loves their baby, even if it's ugly!) but I believe they are making the only decision they can, as a business, in the business to make a profit. ROI and stuff.
Silver Lining: We get to build an emulator which can be customized to be even better than the actual game, and we do so without fear of legal retaliation. I think this could end up being a big win for the community, if they stick with us, get involved and help us finish this in a timely manner - before even we lose our public interest.[/quote]
I agree with most of what you said John, we were actually talking about this tonight while collecting some data.
SOE pretty much turned away from the loyal Vets in search of more money from the younger, more instant gratification market, hence the F2P and massive itemisation changes, the exp and faction boost, drop rate boosts, the cash shop items etc, which in my opinion, was the wrong thing to do but the damage was done long before that and it was their own doing.
If they had of focused on fixing the game breaking bugs and adding content that had been promised for years (Stirhaad, HoSS, Nexus, Loth...), I can almost say with certainty that the game would still be going strong today. It wouldn't of had the numbers of EQ/2 or Rift etc but it would of paid the bills and kept a fairly large and more mature community happy, but that wasn't enough for them and they took the wrong option and tried to market VG as a F2P game to a younger audience, which would never be successfully or end well, especially with the loyal community that had stuck with them through all the bad times, so against it.
But still to this day I will say that the 2 years of complete abandonment of the game and zero support, after Silius' famous Road Map letter in 2009, is what killed this game off and started a snowball that would never be stopped.
If SOE had of paid more attention and realised what their player base consisted of and what type of game VG really was, they may have been more successful, too much damage was done over the years in a few big hits to ever really get the original numbers back, or anything close but they could of settled for a comfortable income instead of being greedy, honestly, I don't think they really ever cared much for VG, the way it was managed over the years really showed that, especially lending crucial VG devs to other games during times when we needed them the most, was a big indication as to their lack of care for us and VG.
But not much can be done now, other than help you guy's as much as possible so we continue to have a game to play after SOE walk away for good