Category: Editorials

Let’s Revisit The Turing Test: Five Years For Longevity


It’s been almost a year since I wrote the MMO Turing test and, looking back, perhaps I didn’t make the best choice of words. My goal at the time was to distinguish games with a real future from those that couldn’t cut it in the market, owing in part to the fact I don’t like throwing around terms like success and failure, because I believe the situation is much deeper than either of those two terms could ever describe. That being said, I have adjusted my views over the year to accommodate the two blanket terms, but my criteria of success and failure is based on how the game is remembered, rather than the presence (or lack thereof) of an update that personally chafes me.

So I wanted to revise my test, with the reminder that this is not a test of success, rather a test of longevity.

  • Profitability: This section used to be for population, but given a second look population directly translates to profitability. After five years, your given MMO will have significantly cut back on servers, development staff, and support since launch. Also by this point, the population is mostly made up of veterans and returning players, the game is likely no longer sold on store shelves, and the game is probably well known enough that advertising is no longer a necessity.
  • Community Awareness: This was titled “self-awareness,” but I think community awareness sums up the focus. I have a theory that the grand majority of players will quit an MMO driven by apathy related to a collection of small gripes with a title. What this comes down to from a developer’s perspective is a balance the release of enough content that every flavor of player can enjoy, coupled with knowing what your community wants (even when they don’t) in order to alienate as few people as possible. To invoke the NGE, Sony’s biggest mistake was implementing the update years after the game’s launch, and essentially telling the community what it should like. If Star Wars Galaxies had launched with the post NGE/CU systems in place from the start, there would not have been such a backlash. So you have to ask: How active in the community are the developers? Are they constantly making bad promises, content that never arrives, or expectations that are consistently tuned down?
  • Place: This remains mostly unchanged from its original incarnation, with some additions in specificity. Place refers to the specific niche that an MMO fills, because pretty much any MMO is likely a niche title. If you like superhero MMOs, you will go to Champions Online or City of Heroes. Action online super hero players have DC Universe. Large scale PvP’ers have Darkfall, Dark Age of Camelot, and more. Fantasy role players have World of Warcraft, Alganon, etc, and players who cyber with staff have Age of Conan (fun fact: This entire article revolves around this one joke). A game that can’t nail down its target audience is doomed to a long walk down a short plank, and generally is something that must be secured at launch. You can see my examples in All Points Bulletin, Earth Eternal, and a few other titles.
  • Future Outlook: Take a look at old games and see what their activity is. Are they still receiving content updates? How is the player base? Is the game being actively supported or are glitches going months without being fixed, customer support queries unanswered, and the game itself generally on life support? Have the developers been moved to a new project, or have they all been fired? This is an incredibly important factor because it depends solely on the company running the game. NCsoft, for example, is more likely to shut down a game that is under-performing while Sony Online Entertainment is more akin to keeping the game on life support via Station Pass subscribers, before pulling the plug. Just because a game is still running does not mean that it is alive.

I noted this in my previous article, but I want to completely remove the five year benchmark. Setting a point means creating a measure of success and failure, which not only goes against the point of the factors above, but is entirely unfair to certain titles. This isn’t exact science, and what works for one company may not work for another. A financial success for one game might spell certain doom for the next. I do agree with my previous conclusion, that three years is more acceptable line of “do or die,” if a line must be drawn, and five years would be the final benchmark.

As a player, I hate the idea of setting points of success and failure, and would rather a game be judged on how its players remember it post-mortem. On the other hand, MMO Fallout is also based in business, so I have to entertain both sides of the card. There is little doubt I will revisit this article once again in a year or two and adjust my terms, but such is the evolving market. A lot has changed even in the two years since MMO Fallout formed.

Let's Revisit The Turing Test: Five Years For Longevity


It’s been almost a year since I wrote the MMO Turing test and, looking back, perhaps I didn’t make the best choice of words. My goal at the time was to distinguish games with a real future from those that couldn’t cut it in the market, owing in part to the fact I don’t like throwing around terms like success and failure, because I believe the situation is much deeper than either of those two terms could ever describe. That being said, I have adjusted my views over the year to accommodate the two blanket terms, but my criteria of success and failure is based on how the game is remembered, rather than the presence (or lack thereof) of an update that personally chafes me.

So I wanted to revise my test, with the reminder that this is not a test of success, rather a test of longevity.

  • Profitability: This section used to be for population, but given a second look population directly translates to profitability. After five years, your given MMO will have significantly cut back on servers, development staff, and support since launch. Also by this point, the population is mostly made up of veterans and returning players, the game is likely no longer sold on store shelves, and the game is probably well known enough that advertising is no longer a necessity.
  • Community Awareness: This was titled “self-awareness,” but I think community awareness sums up the focus. I have a theory that the grand majority of players will quit an MMO driven by apathy related to a collection of small gripes with a title. What this comes down to from a developer’s perspective is a balance the release of enough content that every flavor of player can enjoy, coupled with knowing what your community wants (even when they don’t) in order to alienate as few people as possible. To invoke the NGE, Sony’s biggest mistake was implementing the update years after the game’s launch, and essentially telling the community what it should like. If Star Wars Galaxies had launched with the post NGE/CU systems in place from the start, there would not have been such a backlash. So you have to ask: How active in the community are the developers? Are they constantly making bad promises, content that never arrives, or expectations that are consistently tuned down?
  • Place: This remains mostly unchanged from its original incarnation, with some additions in specificity. Place refers to the specific niche that an MMO fills, because pretty much any MMO is likely a niche title. If you like superhero MMOs, you will go to Champions Online or City of Heroes. Action online super hero players have DC Universe. Large scale PvP’ers have Darkfall, Dark Age of Camelot, and more. Fantasy role players have World of Warcraft, Alganon, etc, and players who cyber with staff have Age of Conan (fun fact: This entire article revolves around this one joke). A game that can’t nail down its target audience is doomed to a long walk down a short plank, and generally is something that must be secured at launch. You can see my examples in All Points Bulletin, Earth Eternal, and a few other titles.
  • Future Outlook: Take a look at old games and see what their activity is. Are they still receiving content updates? How is the player base? Is the game being actively supported or are glitches going months without being fixed, customer support queries unanswered, and the game itself generally on life support? Have the developers been moved to a new project, or have they all been fired? This is an incredibly important factor because it depends solely on the company running the game. NCsoft, for example, is more likely to shut down a game that is under-performing while Sony Online Entertainment is more akin to keeping the game on life support via Station Pass subscribers, before pulling the plug. Just because a game is still running does not mean that it is alive.

I noted this in my previous article, but I want to completely remove the five year benchmark. Setting a point means creating a measure of success and failure, which not only goes against the point of the factors above, but is entirely unfair to certain titles. This isn’t exact science, and what works for one company may not work for another. A financial success for one game might spell certain doom for the next. I do agree with my previous conclusion, that three years is more acceptable line of “do or die,” if a line must be drawn, and five years would be the final benchmark.

As a player, I hate the idea of setting points of success and failure, and would rather a game be judged on how its players remember it post-mortem. On the other hand, MMO Fallout is also based in business, so I have to entertain both sides of the card. There is little doubt I will revisit this article once again in a year or two and adjust my terms, but such is the evolving market. A lot has changed even in the two years since MMO Fallout formed.

What Happened This Week: That’s Not Linguine Edition


Here’s a question for this week: If you could sit down and talk to anyone in the gaming industry, who would you talk to and what would you ask them? Over here at MMO Fallout, I came upon that decision rather easily. The Who: Free to play/cash shop developers. The What: Their business model. Thanks to the saturation by games in the East, the cash shop model was tainted long ago with the idea that any game bearing such a tag would be free to download, pay to win, and buy to compete. With the crowding of the market, the games that do wind up being buy to win are quickly shunned in the west (although they are still great money makers in Korea, China, etc) and have a habit of shutting down only a year or two outside of launch.

I’ll have more details in the weeks to come on that note, but let’s talk about what happened this week.

1. Go To Hell-Gate In a Handbasket

The Hellgate closed beta launched late Friday, and the resulting server implosion was exactly what you would expect with a 50-50 chance of being approved along with major giveaways from 3rd party websites. In fact, I’m not entirely sure that you could call the beta “limited,” given how many keys were being thrown around. Once again, however, a closed beta has gone up and every other video game must have closed doors, because the Hellgate forums are filled with whining about the servers being down, and an apparent lack of anything else to do with your time.

I’ll remind you: The servers for a free beta test for a free game are down, and people are already calling the game a “failure.” Well if the game is a failure, no sense sitting on the forums flailing your arms like toddlers in a WalMart parking lot, right? I’m sure it’s not worth noting, but I’m continually amazed by the amount of people who will (allegedly) call in sick, take the day off, skip school, to get opening day at a video game. Forgetting the obvious lack of priorities, you are guaranteed to be disappointed when the game’s servers are down due to the amount of other people who did the exact same thing.

I rarely suggest people preorder MMOs, because almost none of them have the mentality that accepts the inevitably broken/delayed features, laggy servers, and game breaking bugs. Forgoing income for the sake of playing a video game is just ridiculous in and of itself.

2. Perpetuum Online Mass Ban

Nothing says loving like a mass ban in the oveng. The guys over at Avatar want you to know that cheaters are being dealt with by the mighty banhammer. In a blog post, the team threw up this graph and briefly talked about a game mechanic being exploited in a way no one could mistake for legitimate gameplay, allowing for a massive amount of resource collection.

Good for Perpetuum. A smaller game with a smaller community has to work extra hard to get rid of cheaters.

3. You Remind Me Of Another MMO

Dear MMO,

I’ve had this odd feeling about you over the past year or so, and it wasn’t until just recently that I figured out why. That strange feeling not that I’ve played you before, but that I covered your company, despite being the first game your company has developed. You don’t share any names with this other game, but in spirit you are almost one in the same.

Then it hit me like a ton of bricks, sweeping me back into a series of waking nightmares I hadn’t experienced for around six years: Mourning. The name, its company…Colton Burgess’ cronies sending me harassing emails and private messages. Sending beta versions of the game on unlabeled Memorex CD’s. Refusing refunds, possible fraud, wiping the forums, administrators telling me to run away as fast as I can! Virtually the only MMO de-listed from MMORPG for harassment from the company-MOMMY!

Happy thoughts. Luckily I managed to close my notes before my brain was Shish Kebab’d by my wine opener. For those of you who weren’t around when Mourning was up (2005), do some Google research on Mourning, Throne of Chaos, Colton Burgess, and Loud Ant Software. Just in case you need a good laugh, or a horrifying night of no sleep.

4. Does Jagex Need Two Evony-Style MMOs?

Jagex are most known for their MMO Runescape, but did you know that the company has several products live right at this moment? Only two of which they developed in-house. Currently live, Jagex has Runescape (the Fantasy MMO) and FunOrb (mini-game collection) developed in house, while the company publishes War of Legends (Cash shop flash city builder). Upcoming, Jagex is developing Stellar Dawn, a sci-fi MMO, an unnamed fantasy MMO (not a sequel to Runescape), Transformers Online (a Transformers MMO, go figure) and 8Realms, an HTML based city builder.

I’m not saying Jagex can’t maintain two MMORTS games, given all they do with War of Legends is publish it, but you’d think much like the Pizza Hut having a problem with my local Target opening a Pizza Hut in-store and being just down the street, that the War of Legends guys would have an issue with Jagex opening up a direct competitor to their game. Of course, that may just be my speculation.

5. More Stellar Dawn, Less Transformers Online

While we’re on the subject of Jagex, let’s talk Transformers Online. Jagex had the character creator on display at Botcon 11, with some information on the upcoming MMO. The game is set in the Prime continuity, but the team is working with Hasbro to integrate as many characters as possible. The game will feature hundreds of customization options for each part of your bot, and you will indeed create your own transformers robot, on the side you choose. Further down the line, players will be able to create and upload their own parts, decals, and art to make their bots truly unique (or to just upload crudely drawn penis/swastika decals, I’m sure).

Only question remaining is: Why can’t Stellar Dawn get this kind of love? For a game that is reportedly going into beta this year, Jagex has been rather hush on the game. Why the lack of love, Jagex?

And on that note, I’m heading back into the Hellgate Global beta. Sure my character is going to be deleted, but listening to Russians spamming chat is just too good to pass up.

What Happened This Week: That's Not Linguine Edition


Here’s a question for this week: If you could sit down and talk to anyone in the gaming industry, who would you talk to and what would you ask them? Over here at MMO Fallout, I came upon that decision rather easily. The Who: Free to play/cash shop developers. The What: Their business model. Thanks to the saturation by games in the East, the cash shop model was tainted long ago with the idea that any game bearing such a tag would be free to download, pay to win, and buy to compete. With the crowding of the market, the games that do wind up being buy to win are quickly shunned in the west (although they are still great money makers in Korea, China, etc) and have a habit of shutting down only a year or two outside of launch.

I’ll have more details in the weeks to come on that note, but let’s talk about what happened this week.

1. Go To Hell-Gate In a Handbasket

The Hellgate closed beta launched late Friday, and the resulting server implosion was exactly what you would expect with a 50-50 chance of being approved along with major giveaways from 3rd party websites. In fact, I’m not entirely sure that you could call the beta “limited,” given how many keys were being thrown around. Once again, however, a closed beta has gone up and every other video game must have closed doors, because the Hellgate forums are filled with whining about the servers being down, and an apparent lack of anything else to do with your time.

I’ll remind you: The servers for a free beta test for a free game are down, and people are already calling the game a “failure.” Well if the game is a failure, no sense sitting on the forums flailing your arms like toddlers in a WalMart parking lot, right? I’m sure it’s not worth noting, but I’m continually amazed by the amount of people who will (allegedly) call in sick, take the day off, skip school, to get opening day at a video game. Forgetting the obvious lack of priorities, you are guaranteed to be disappointed when the game’s servers are down due to the amount of other people who did the exact same thing.

I rarely suggest people preorder MMOs, because almost none of them have the mentality that accepts the inevitably broken/delayed features, laggy servers, and game breaking bugs. Forgoing income for the sake of playing a video game is just ridiculous in and of itself.

2. Perpetuum Online Mass Ban

Nothing says loving like a mass ban in the oveng. The guys over at Avatar want you to know that cheaters are being dealt with by the mighty banhammer. In a blog post, the team threw up this graph and briefly talked about a game mechanic being exploited in a way no one could mistake for legitimate gameplay, allowing for a massive amount of resource collection.

Good for Perpetuum. A smaller game with a smaller community has to work extra hard to get rid of cheaters.

3. You Remind Me Of Another MMO

Dear MMO,

I’ve had this odd feeling about you over the past year or so, and it wasn’t until just recently that I figured out why. That strange feeling not that I’ve played you before, but that I covered your company, despite being the first game your company has developed. You don’t share any names with this other game, but in spirit you are almost one in the same.

Then it hit me like a ton of bricks, sweeping me back into a series of waking nightmares I hadn’t experienced for around six years: Mourning. The name, its company…Colton Burgess’ cronies sending me harassing emails and private messages. Sending beta versions of the game on unlabeled Memorex CD’s. Refusing refunds, possible fraud, wiping the forums, administrators telling me to run away as fast as I can! Virtually the only MMO de-listed from MMORPG for harassment from the company-MOMMY!

Happy thoughts. Luckily I managed to close my notes before my brain was Shish Kebab’d by my wine opener. For those of you who weren’t around when Mourning was up (2005), do some Google research on Mourning, Throne of Chaos, Colton Burgess, and Loud Ant Software. Just in case you need a good laugh, or a horrifying night of no sleep.

4. Does Jagex Need Two Evony-Style MMOs?

Jagex are most known for their MMO Runescape, but did you know that the company has several products live right at this moment? Only two of which they developed in-house. Currently live, Jagex has Runescape (the Fantasy MMO) and FunOrb (mini-game collection) developed in house, while the company publishes War of Legends (Cash shop flash city builder). Upcoming, Jagex is developing Stellar Dawn, a sci-fi MMO, an unnamed fantasy MMO (not a sequel to Runescape), Transformers Online (a Transformers MMO, go figure) and 8Realms, an HTML based city builder.

I’m not saying Jagex can’t maintain two MMORTS games, given all they do with War of Legends is publish it, but you’d think much like the Pizza Hut having a problem with my local Target opening a Pizza Hut in-store and being just down the street, that the War of Legends guys would have an issue with Jagex opening up a direct competitor to their game. Of course, that may just be my speculation.

5. More Stellar Dawn, Less Transformers Online

While we’re on the subject of Jagex, let’s talk Transformers Online. Jagex had the character creator on display at Botcon 11, with some information on the upcoming MMO. The game is set in the Prime continuity, but the team is working with Hasbro to integrate as many characters as possible. The game will feature hundreds of customization options for each part of your bot, and you will indeed create your own transformers robot, on the side you choose. Further down the line, players will be able to create and upload their own parts, decals, and art to make their bots truly unique (or to just upload crudely drawn penis/swastika decals, I’m sure).

Only question remaining is: Why can’t Stellar Dawn get this kind of love? For a game that is reportedly going into beta this year, Jagex has been rather hush on the game. Why the lack of love, Jagex?

And on that note, I’m heading back into the Hellgate Global beta. Sure my character is going to be deleted, but listening to Russians spamming chat is just too good to pass up.

Mortal Online’s Billing Servers Explode: Players Double Billed


If you have a Mortal Online subscription, you will want to check your bank account and email (where your payment confirmations are sent). According to several players on the Mortal Online forums, and confirmed by Star Vault, a recent billing issue has resulted in an unknown number of players being double, and reportedly triple, billed for their subscription fees.

Any double charge will of course be solved, we have recently moved parts of our shop system that I expect causes some of these issues. It should be solved asap.

I’ve contacted Star Vault to confirm whether or not the company is actively seeking out the extra charges, or if players will be required to submit a billing dispute with customer service on a case by case basis. I have not yet heard back, more than likely given today is Sunday. Those of you playing Mortal Online should check to make sure you weren’t charged twice. As for those who have expired accounts, you should be safe. Checking your bank won’t hurt, however.

I will update this when I receive a response from Star Vault.

Mortal Online's Billing Servers Explode: Players Double Billed


If you have a Mortal Online subscription, you will want to check your bank account and email (where your payment confirmations are sent). According to several players on the Mortal Online forums, and confirmed by Star Vault, a recent billing issue has resulted in an unknown number of players being double, and reportedly triple, billed for their subscription fees.

Any double charge will of course be solved, we have recently moved parts of our shop system that I expect causes some of these issues. It should be solved asap.

I’ve contacted Star Vault to confirm whether or not the company is actively seeking out the extra charges, or if players will be required to submit a billing dispute with customer service on a case by case basis. I have not yet heard back, more than likely given today is Sunday. Those of you playing Mortal Online should check to make sure you weren’t charged twice. As for those who have expired accounts, you should be safe. Checking your bank won’t hurt, however.

I will update this when I receive a response from Star Vault.

TERA: Not Meeting Financial Expectations, Major Server Merger


The Exiled Realm of Arborea, also known as TERA, has been a long time coming for North American and European markets, although Korean players have been enjoying the game since January. Well, some of them are anyway. I’ve mentioned in the past that MMOSite has done their best to trash this game’s release in Korea, and for all intent and purpose…they weren’t completely wrong. According to MMO Culture, TERA is set to undergo its second server merge since release, and boy is it a big one. The first merger dropped the list of 37 servers to 35, but tomorrow that number is set to plummet to about 15.

TERA’s major pull has been not only the graphics, but that the game is an action-based, non-targeting MMO, and the game looks beautiful. Merging servers isn’t an issue in and of itself, however in NHN’s recent revenue filings, the company stated that TERA did not meet expected sales figures.

More on TERA and its impending launch in the west as it appears.

Earthrise Is On Sale. Get It On Direct2Drive


Earthrise is relaunching today with the release of Territorial Warfare, bringing in a slew up content as well as doubling the size of the game world and bringing in territory control (go figure).

More importantly, you can find Earthrise at a lower price. Now, on the official website the price has dropped to $29.99 USD, or €29.90 (about $43 USD), OR you can head over to Direct2Drive and get the game for $29.99 USD universally.

Earthrise has released on Direct2Drive now, so those of you who preordered can now download.

My Security Idea Affirmed By Perfect World Entertainment


Back in April, I talked about how to end security issues for a good number of users, and my largest point was the separation of anything that could be compromised along with a computer. Assuming Trion’s figure that 80% of account thefts are via keylogger is correct, the company must assume that a person’s email address is compromised as well, and retrieving a frozen account should not be doable via email. Instead, I suggested offering phone services, like Blizzard and a few other companies do now. In order to protect the account before it is stolen, companies employ a variety of methods. Authenticators, on-screen PIN, computer authentication, etc. Now, my issue with this is that the phone services offered to us without smart phones is lacking, really only applicable once the account is already gone. My idea was similar to Trion’s coin lock, except instead of sending you an email, you register a phone number with your account upon creation and you will receive either a text or a robo-call with the code.

Looking through wikis for Perfect World Entertainment’s games, I found a security feature for Perfect World:

As a prevention system against account hackers, Perfect World has a Phone Lock feature for those who wish to use it. The Phone Lock, when activated, will freeze an account until the player of that account dials in using the registered phone number. Once the number is recognized, the account is temporarily activated for login. The player must login within 10 minutes of activation before the account login is frozen again. The player may continue to play despite the freeze. If the player logs out after the 10 minutes are up, that player must once again dial in to temporarily deactivate the Phone Lock. The phone lock feature is exclusive to the Chinese Malaysian version of the game.

This is a nice idea, but cumbersome in the long run. Personally, I prefer my idea of one-time activation for a computer with per-login activation (for people who use internet cafes) given as a strictly optional option. This does at least show that I’m not the only one thinking about how phones are a better source of account safety than computers and email alone.

Lord of the Rings Online Begins European Migration


The European servers for Lord of the Rings Online should be down by now, as the big migration begins toward a single global service for Turbine’s MMO. Beginning today, Turbine will be transferring users to the new Lord of the Rings global service, a transition that will take approximately two to three days. To entice players, Turbine is offering a full year of VIP for £79.99.

The global faq can be found here. Hopefully the transition goes seamlessly. It’s been a good few years for Lord of the Rings players in Europe under Codemasters, hopefully Turbine can show them just as loving of a home when the move is completed later this week.