Part 4 is up.

Dragon-RD · 09-22-2009, 04:17 PM

http://www.bradmcquaid.com/Brad_McQu...em_Part_4.html

Gori · 09-22-2009, 10:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dragon-RD

http://www.bradmcquaid.com/Brad_McQu...em_Part_4.html

He really doesn't seem to be saying anything that hasn't already been figured out.

mmorpeegee · 09-22-2009, 11:52 PM

Lol, he basically just posted exactly what everyone predicted he would post. Zzz. Worth a read I suppose but only barely.

Amsra · 09-23-2009, 12:37 AM

It wasn't world size that killed the game, it was bugs and performance that drove people away initially. I did stick it out about 14 months or so and after 6 months or so most of the real bugs had been been killed and performance was a whole lot better. Obvious lack of support and the quest for the mass market finally drove me out.

rhagz · 09-23-2009, 09:39 AM

Yeah world size was a huge problem, along side early lack of travel options.

The hardware couldn't support the amount of people necessary to populate the world so that grouping and community could form. That means the world was too big, but their design process was so bass-ackwards that the only thing they could do about it was take the smallest continent and make it a little smaller...

Hatto · 09-23-2009, 10:15 AM

I dunno about the whole too large to form a community aspect. But it was one huge problem for the people I used to play with back then for one simple thing. Everyone insisted on playing whatever race they liked most so we ended up all over the world and it took half the play sessions to simply get together.

Kind of sounds stupid, but well, it was like that :P

MagicNumbers · 09-23-2009, 11:00 AM

Travel times were definitely an issue when the game launched and I would consider the large number of starting areas a detriment to the game in the beginning as well.

I wonder why McQuaid didn't talk about the horrible performance and bugs in the game under his watch?

rhagz · 09-23-2009, 11:06 AM

He talked about performance some in part 3.

Talithia · 09-23-2009, 01:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gori

He really doesn't seem to be saying anything that hasn't already been figured out.

Nobody is saying anything new. Anymore the whole subject of Vanguard is a snore fest. People should at this point just play if they enjoy it, move on if they don't.
I am not even gonna go there, nothing I care to see there. Vanguard is what it is.

VoiceOfReason · 09-23-2009, 02:53 PM

I'm gonna agree with rhagz here. Word size vs. population (especially after the initial exodus after the ridiculous launch) was a significant problem. It wasn't the problem that dealt the initial serious blow to the game - everybody knows that bugs and performance did that job - but it was a long lasting problem and exists even today.

A huge world size in and of itself is not a bad thing - to me, just the opposite. However, having said "A", the developers needed to say "B", which they did not do well. By this I mean that if you are gonna have a big world, then you better to have good ways to get around it and you had better have compelling reasons to make people want to gather at certain places and at not infrequent intervals.

As for VG being old hat and all talked out and all played out (Talithia) - yeah I spose. But it certainly has provided a lot of fodder for discussion on this board - even today.

Dragon-RD · 09-23-2009, 03:01 PM

World size to me was a problem partly because I get the feeling the dev team spent more time making broken content than they did polishing what they already had. If they had "closed" off some of the content and patched it in I think VG would have been fine.

The bit where he goes on about Kojan and the races I don't understand. Why not get rid of Kojan and make the other races migrate?

Seems to me like Brad is telling the story but covering up the mistakes rather than confronting just what went wrong with the game. Still fair play to him for getting that post out! I didn't expect it after the negative comments myself and others had posted.

Off Topic ~ Who started the IBTJ thing? Anyway In Before the Joodah, noticed he was here last night but I'd beaten him to the post.

Hatto · 09-23-2009, 03:15 PM

It is still interesting to read what McQuaid thinks, or claims to think about the whole thing. Also there is not many games that people still think about after years, especially those they didn't really play that long. It had something going for it after all, whatever strange thing that was.

Travel times would not have been such a problem in itself too, it was the inability of the players to adapt to a game that was the problem. My static group could've rolled all races that started close together, it would not have made much difference. But we preferred to spread out and bitch like hell over it. It was like that with many other things in the game too. Like a huge influx of negative, self destructive energy, and reading forums back in those days amplified that alot. Don't think I've ever experienced that in all my online gaming years in any other game.

rhagz · 09-23-2009, 03:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dragon-RD

The bit where he goes on about Kojan and the races I don't understand. Why not get rid of Kojan and make the other races migrate?

Yeah I didn't get that either. The thought never occurred to them that they could drop them in on the other continents? It's not like they lacked for space. A little village here and there would have been all it took.

I think he was just stubborn. Probably figured since EQ and WoW had 3 they needed 3 as well or something equally foolish.

Joodah · 09-23-2009, 07:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rhagz

Yeah I didn't get that either. The thought never occurred to them that they could drop them in on the other continents? It's not like they lacked for space. A little village here and there would have been all it took.

I think he was just stubborn. Probably figured since EQ and WoW had 3 they needed 3 as well or something equally foolish.

Well I for one am glad they didn't go that route. Kojan has some of the nicest looking areas in the game. And the whole Asian theme thing going on, heh.

rhagz · 09-23-2009, 07:49 PM

Yeah.. how's that whole 'thriving' thing working out for you?

Oh I forgot for a second who I was talking to. Making the game better for the future is certainly worth trading so you can have a ****ing furry to yiff around with at launch...

Joodah · 09-25-2009, 01:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rhagz

Yeah.. how's that whole 'thriving' thing working out for you?

Oh I forgot for a second who I was talking to. Making the game better for the future is certainly worth trading so you can have a ****ing furry to yiff around with at launch...

I make a comment on Kojan, and you need to attack me? Cool, your troll skill just got +1.

Game's fun, we still play. Boo f'ing hoo, huh? And the second part doesn't even make sense. No surprise there.

mmorpeegee · 09-26-2009, 11:30 PM

Getting rid of Kojan would have been a good idea. It wouldn't have needed to be permanent. They just get rid of it and release with things a bit more scaled down, and then later on, they could have patched in Kojan once they had time.

They could have just populated it with high level stuff and then released it 6 months later and it could have been an uber patch, or even an expansion.

Dragon-RD · 09-27-2009, 03:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rhagz

Yeah.. how's that whole 'thriving' thing working out for you?

Oh I forgot for a second who I was talking to. Making the game better for the future is certainly worth trading so you can have a ****ing furry to yiff around with at launch...

Seems to be going quite well for Joodah rhagz if this post on Brads Blog is anything to go by:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Joodah Mcabee

It may be the case that Sony has made mistakes, hell, we know that. We all know what happened with Sigil as well. It's all been beaten to death. Thing is, the game is thriving now, lots of folks playing and enjoying the game *shrug* Vanguard is healthy and we are seeing more and more on the servers every day. There's no point in all of this negativity, come on guys lets get behind this thing and f***ing turn it around! AMIRITE?

rhagz · 09-27-2009, 03:42 PM

F'in hilarious. Part of me wants to hope that it's someone mocking him by using his name.. but the rest of me is saddened that it probably isn't. Talk about the ultimate delusion.

Dragon-RD · 09-27-2009, 04:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mmorpeegee

Getting rid of Kojan would have been a good idea. It wouldn't have needed to be permanent. They just get rid of it and release with things a bit more scaled down, and then later on, they could have patched in Kojan once they had time.

They could have just populated it with high level stuff and then released it 6 months later and it could have been an uber patch, or even an expansion.

How did I miss this post!

Yes I agree mmorpeegee! I think it would have been best to have released it 6 months later. That way the majority would have had boats and been the right level for some high end content. Would have made for a decent boat journey that's for sure.