MMO Launches

[Scarzi]

This is by far the worst MMO launch I have ever played.

World of Warcraft vanilla - laggy but never had issues staying connected, they did maintenance for like 12 hours and it was fine.
BC - instances had issue for the first 16 hours and then it was fine after maintenance, everything else was playable
WOTLK - no issues other then minor lag and some monsters wouldn't re-spawn now and then
Cata - minor lag, that's it.
MOP - heavy lag for the first 5 hours and bugs with some respawns. Next day was perfectly fine.
Nexus TK- game was in the late 90s and it was by far the smoothest launch. Game only had like 10k people, was one of the first MMOs ever.
Guild Wars I - I don't remember any issues except a bit of lag, could be wrong.
Dragon's Nest - Servers were backed up and it lagged a bit but it was playable.

[Yes]

I've literally played hundreds of MMOs, and I've been in betas and launches in quite a few dozen of them. And never I've seen as many game-breaking server issues as in ARR, sorry.


And speaking of which, the only game from the last decade that I've had trouble after purchase because of server issues was SimCity, which is somewhat ironic because:

1) It was never supposed to be a MMO. People wanted it to be single player, but EA decided to ruin it for the sake of DRM.
2) It's Electronic Arts. Server issues and a shitty release is something we expect from EA, not Square Enix or any other AAA developers.

[Unruhe]

I have played MMOs at launch that had queues over 1,000 people long to connect to a server.
I have played MMOs at launch that lagged to hell and back.
I have played MMOs at launch that had frequent downtime due either to crashes or maintenance.

I have never, not once played a MMO at launch...

...Where my character spent most of the producer-described trial weekend unable to log in.

...Where my character was completely unable to progress in the core quest mechanics of the game because the single player content runs off of a totally broken instance server.

...And spent an entire day unable to log in even though the servers are up because the game's developers are so incompetent that they had to drastically limit the amount of people connecting to the game in order to make it playable for the lucky few that logged in.

...That had absolutely no queue system for the connection limitation.

...That had no automated logout for inactive players.

[indira]

ffxiv 1.0 i was able to play duing EA into launch all the menus slow and stuff. ARR cant even login or do class quest i get stuck in a loading screen.
age of conan was broken but i was still able to play that one and that was enough to kill that game.

but by now they should have an idea how to make a mmo work been 11 years since there first mmo. the game has nothing new and should be expected to work.
but in this day and age people are alright buying games that need patches & DLC to work right. now that lazyness is biting the dev they frogot how to QA the stuff.

[Dijana]

I had a big long response, but I just changed my mind. I'll put it this way, if you were a 1.0 player, who didn't HAVE to repurchase the game, but did so only for early access, congratulations, you spent $30-50 for 3 days of play time when you could have waited and got 2 weeks free without having to buy a thing. If you're willing to throw that kind of money around for 3 days, rebuying the game couldnt have been much of a burden.

Edit: "Free" was in regard to subscription fees, you're not paying for that.

[Hix]

I had a big long response, but I just changed my mind. I'll put it this way, if you were a 1.0 player, who didn't HAVE to repurchase the game, but did so only for early access, congratulations, you spent $30-50 for 3 days of play time when you could have waited and got 2 weeks free without having to buy a thing. If you're willing to throw that kind of money around for 3 days, rebuying the game couldnt have been much of a burden.

Edit: "Free" was in regard to subscription fees, you're not paying for that.

So I bought a service but didn't get what I paid for but it's ok because it wasn't much of a burden? If I mug you on the street is it ok because I couldn't take all the money you have in the bank too?

[redisdrunk]

This isn't World of Warcraft.
It's not 2004.
This isn't Squares first MMO.
This isn't Square's first time running this MMO.

Proclaiming you were there when <GameName> launched with bugs in no way excuses the consistent, dramatic issues occurring with the game people are actually trying to play right now.

You're doing yourself, and the game, a disservice by vehemently excusing and apologizing for a company that is letting it's customers (you can be a fan, you can be a detractor; but if you paid for the game, you're a customer) swing in the wind without clear feedback or a coherent line of communication to the.

FFXIV re-launched, in part, because of the abysmal impression it's initial launch left with the gaming press, and gamers in general. It was a second chance at a first impression. Even if you can personally tolerate the issues, it's still incredibly problematic that this is going to be the first experience with XIV for many, or for console gamers, an MMO in general.

[M4Fade]

This isn't World of Warcraft.
It's not 2004.
This isn't Squares first MMO.
This isn't Square's first time running this MMO.

Proclaiming you were there when <GameName> launched with bugs in no way excuses the consistent, dramatic issues occurring with the game people are actually trying to play right now.

You're doing yourself, and the game, a disservice by vehemently excusing and apologizing for a company that is letting it's customers swing in the wind without clear feedback or a coherent line of communication to the.

FFXIV re-launched, in part, because of the abysmal impression it's initial launch left with the gaming press, and gamers in general. It was a second chance at a first impression. Even if you can personally tolerate the issues, it's still incredibly problematic that this is going to be the first experience with XIV for many, or for console gamers, an MMO in general.

This, this, and this. ^

I am going to re-post what I threw up in another thread:
Yes, yes.. most big name MMO's have had plenty of launch issues. Us MMO-folk all know that by now.

There's one thing that bothers me though guys: SE has had MULTIPLE MMO launches before. FFXI, FFXIV 1.0, and now FFXIV ARR. Am I missing some? Dunno, but they should of known from past experiences how this was going to turn out. They HAVE the experience. They should of been a little more prepared, yeah? Makes sense. At least to me.

Maybe I am wrong here... Hmm.

[Kuzak]

This, this, and this. ^

I am going to re-post what I threw up in another thread:
Yes, yes.. most big name MMO's have had plenty of launch issues. Us MMO-folk all know that by now.

There's one thing that bothers me though guys: SE has had MULTIPLE MMO launches before. FFXI, FFXIV 1.0, and now FFXIV ARR. Am I missing some? Dunno, but they should of known from past experiences how this was going to turn out. They HAVE the experience. They should of been a little more prepared, yeah? Makes sense. At least to me.

Maybe I am wrong here... Hmm.

No, you're absolutely correct. SE is just incompetent.

[Dejann]

Now, I'm genuinely not posting to rant here - but correct me if I'm wrong in saying that this industry (gaming) is the most forgiving one when it comes to launches or new product.

Imagine a new restaurant, if you had a reservation during opening weekend and when you got there they said they wouldn't accommodate you, chances are you wouldn't return, correct? We can apply this logic to pretty much every service industry out there.

Again, I'd like to make it clear that I'm not ranting, I'm far past the age of being upset over... Well pretty much anything, since life is too short. But in any event - with the current market/trends, you'd think to only launch a new product when it was 100% fail-proof. Especially if it's your second time 'round.