Gangrel_EU
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Posts
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Joined
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Quote:You get a pay rise as well.Originally Posted by I Burnt The Toast
Luckily they just call me an NCSoft fangirl (which I know I should be bothered by since...uhmm.. I gots a weiner).
I'm sure I will make my way up to NCSoft Employee of the Month SOON though.
You jump up from feck all to a peanut (once in a blue moon) -
Quote:Does this mean that I am number 3?Originally Posted by Bad_Influence
Dear NCSoft Apologist #1 [Brillig is #2, btw]:
*WOHOO* I got a Bronze, i got a bronze! -
Quote:Personally I always bounced from being subbed to not being subbed. It all depended as to when I was playing the game, and as money was tight for me, i tried to keep the finances *sorted* (it also doesn't help in that my household could possibly lose money next year, so trying to save up to weather the storm).Originally Posted by I Burnt The Toast
Please show me where I generalized the SaveCoH group as people who came back to post on the forums. My generalization was towards freemiums/freebies hence the WHITE NAME comment...ya know..people who were not VIP/subbed at the time of the announcement. I honestly have no clue how many SaveCoHers were VIPs...if I had to guess I would say a large percentage WERE VIP.
Reading comprehension FTW - not once did I mention SaveCoH in my post regarding white names nor did the person to whom I was replying....
Anyways, I paid when I was playing... and when I wasn't playing, I wasn't paying. I was actually going to resub the day of the annoucement, but the announcement landed and billing had been stopped already. It would have been nice to be VIP level for the EU Player meet, in the end I barely played the game (thankfully due to other stuff happening), but not having a VIP account did contribute to that a *little* bit.
*shrugs* crap happens sometimes (although I think my GF has had more crap happen to her than most people here).
Anyways, not having a go at you Burnt Toast, hell, i believe that most white names here have a reason as to why they were not subbed at the time of announcement. -
Quote:And considering that I have been accused of being an NCsoft employee *several times* on these boards, I would have to agree with you. I believe that Brillig and I are now tied 3 a piece.Originally Posted by I Burnt The Toast
2. Just because someone says something you don't like that makes them an NCSoft employee.. is that what the Titan KoolAid is making people spew now? All dissenters/realists are employed by NCSoft? LOL. That's like saying if you don't support Obama you must be a Pro lifer and hate gays... Couldn't possibly be he/they have their own opinions just because theirs is different than yours..Nah.
3. If anyone is being a unicorn here it would be the one calling people trolls and insinuating they are paid employees of NCSoft. When it comes down to it that is your only "argument" since you failed to comprehend what the post you replied to was saying. The "pathetic children" remark..nice touch. -
Quote:Fair enough... for me, i bought my copy from the Guild Wars 2 website directly, instead of via the NCsoft store page. Both end up on the same actual page though, so if you are already buying the game from the NCsoft site, you already know that NCsoft are linked to the game.Originally Posted by Forbin_Project
Just double checked what I remember clicking and clicking GW2 takes me to a page advertising GW2 and has the NCSoft logo big as day in the upper left corner and a buy GW2 button in the lower right. Clicking that takes me to the GW2 site where the digital downloads can be purchased. At the bottom of that page I see where the ArenaNet is located but I never scrolled down that far when I made my order.
If, however, you bought the game direct from the Guild Wars 2 website, you *wouldnt* necessarily know that NCsoft were behind the game. Well, not unless you decided to look at the bottom of the webpages.
I do believe that when Arenanet were tweeting about where to buy it, it was direct to their own website to either buy it, or for a list of retailers for the Collectors Edition. So far, i have not seen a single tweet directing people to the NCsoft page (and i went back to the start of August). Strangely enough, on the official Guild wars 2 facebook page, there is *no* link to the NCsoft store page... everything is direct to the Guild Wars site (which does make sense).
Not saying that it is a bad thing, but those who would be going via the NCsoft store page, are more than likely going to be those who already have an NCsoft account. I (rather surprisingly) now very rarely buy stuff from the publishers website unless it is the *only* place where I can get it (like stuff on Origin right now). Well, unless I buy hard copy (which I do prefer overall though), where I then go for the best retail deal I can find. -
Quote:Sounds similar to buying games through Steam. Unless you actually *look* you wouldn't even know who half the games were by.Originally Posted by Forbin_Project
I didn't even know ArenaNet was on the box as I made my purchase online thru NCSofts store.
Side note: buying through the NCsoft store (at least now) takes you via the guildwars2 website, and yes, both the Ncsoft logo and arenanet logo are actually at the bottom of the page.
As far as I can tell, it was always this way. So I can see how you can easily make the association (because you wouldn't expect buying through the NCsoft store to take you to a different companies website) -
Quote:To be fair, even though I have been reading the NCsoft financials for a while, it was only *recently* that I actually noticed *or cared* about the fact that Arenanet were wholly owned by NCsoft as a totally seperate subsidary.Originally Posted by Father Xmas
NCSoft is just one logo on the box. ArenaNet is the logo people may be more aware of and don't realize that ArenaNet is 100% owned by NCSoft and think NCSoft is simply just a publisher. So they won't make that connection either.
So honestly, unless you are in the know, chances are you wont put 2 and 2 together.
Side note.... out of everyone who owns X-Com... did you know that Firaxis are wholly owned by Take 2, so for those of you who have a grudge against Rockstar Games and boycotted anything to do with them, why on earth are you playing X-Com!
*edit* Yeah i know that i went off thread here, but it is just to prove the point that there are some *very* strange links out there, and boycotts can remove some titles that you didn't think would be affected. -
Quote:Oh I don't disagree with that thinking, and like Lineage 1, I can see those titles being shut down in the US/EU market in the next couple of years.Originally Posted by LadyGrimrose
Lineage 2 and Aion being F2P is moot when looking at the bigger picture. GW2 is a superior product in every aspect and doesn't have the issues the other two games have. It would have made more sense to close off unworking models that will be heavily impacted by a product that has player and critic appeal. No matter what NcSoft does, from this point forward, the other two games will be continually in the shadow of GW2.
But unfortunately, due to how the financials are sorted, I cannot see what the split between the EU/US market and Asian market is in terms of how much money they are bringing in, and as to how large of an effect it would have on their financials.
I *cannot* see those titles being closed down worldwide if they stay at their current financial levels though. They are bringing in the bulk of Ncsoft's monies. Lineage 2 is more likely to be closed down before Lineage (which so far has brought in almost 18 times as much money as City of Heroes).
Guild Wars 2 is likely to bring in a fair amount of change as well.
Side note: In the 1st half of 2012, Lineage was their big money maker. Not Lineage 2, nor Aion (although to be fair, Aion was only 10% behind Lineage). -
Just to point out that as far as I am aware, Aion and Lineage are Free2Play titles in the EU/US market.
Aion is also not ran by Ncsoft in the EU market. They managed to farm that off. -
Quote:I think that one of the more important changes that happened to City of Heroes recently that affected its visibility, was when it was removed from Steam.Originally Posted by I Burnt The Toast
Just one thing regarding your statement. I think MOST people can accept that CoH was profitable, BUT that profitability was small. CoH has never been a profit making powerhouse and frankly no matter what was done to it could make it one. So NCSoft looked at the slowly declining revenue and made a decision...cut it before it starts losing money. You state most financial analyses claim the game was viable - but those analyses are based off LIMITED knowledge of the financials of CoH. NCSoft knows what the expenses are for Paragon, knows what the revenue is for the game, and their analysis is what matters; not some person on a forum speculating.
It was/is a business decision...one which NO ONE on these boards can understand because they are not in NCSoft's position of knowing everything that went into that decision. People are ASSUMING so many reasons why they chose to sunset CoH...but many fail to stop and detach themselves a little and see it was just business and nothing personal.
Not sure as to why it was pulled from the store, we can only speculate over that. But missing out on 4million+ sets of eyes is definitely a bit of a **** up.
/derail -
Quote:Actually in the case of Star Wars, a case could be made for the NGE release of it, considering that they did effectively gut out the *original* release, to make it something totally different (more WoW like), which wasn't the game that they had originally paid for and played.Originally Posted by Kangstor
Sigh why people so eager to give this false example in this situation after all this time I wonder.
First: It was not Sony that cut off Sw Galaxies it was Lucas Arts to prevent collision with SWTOR. They simply didn't renew their IP license with Sony and let game die rather gloriously.
Second People who were playing SW galaxies were mostly made up from Starwars fans (those who cared for game mechanics and such itself already left after NGE if not as early as CU) so unlike in CoH's case which we loved the game itself and not the company behind it, they were actually loving the base product.
Third which is related to second SWG was closed only after SWOTR entered its final stage and was ready as a successor so the community eventhough in a different form got what they loved from the parent company AKA Lucas Arts.
In our case;
First There is no successor to CoH around and by successor I mean a game that is in same universe with some form resemblence. Unlike in SWG's case if NCSoft jsut sit on IP we can't get a successor like SWTOR in any form legally.
Second Most of community was here becuase of CoH in general (not because of they are NCSoft fans) not just as base product but also its mechanics and such. There is no other game slightly resembles mechnaics in CoH neither its stories
What you are comparing is not even apples and pears it is more like comparing apples with fish totally on different dimensions and planes on their owns.
Did people quit the game over that? Hell yes.
That is why there is the Star Wars Galaxies Emu project up and running, to bring back the *original* experience of the game, and not the more "up to date" version. -
Quote:Well, I am surprised that this is happened. We were allowed by the mods to talk about other games on these forums.Originally Posted by DarkCurrent
Then go play GW2. Nothing is stopping you. Why is it necessary to come onto the CoH forums to recruit for a different game? Especially when it's from the same company that just closed this game? Are you expecting people to pucker up and blow kisses?
If you don't like the thread, report it and go on your merry way. There is nothing *forcing* you to reply to each thread. We are allowed to post about it.
How about this for an idea.
Go into the Secret World forum thread, and tell those guys to get out of these forums.
*snip* -
Quote:Not really. According to a report major investors in Apple owned 71.7% of Apple stock.Originally Posted by Stars_and_Stripe
The article says they are the biggest shareholder of NCSoft. Yes, Its 15% but that means no one else owns more than 15%. The article says "Nexon Co. (3659), a Tokyo-based maker of online games, bought a 804.5 billion won ($685 million) stake in NCSoft Corp. (036570) to become the South Korean companys biggest shareholder."
Kinda seems a little sad that the company itself wouldn't own more than 15% if its own stock. I wonder how accurate it is.
According to yahoo finance : Fidelity Management and Research are the largest shareholder with 5.01%
Yes, i know I am using Apple as the example, but it isn't really all that strange for the *majority* of shares to be owned by outsiders to the company. I mean, they (as in outsiders) are the ones who invested money IN the company when it went public. -
Quote:CuppaJo hit Aion.. that was news to me. I know that they went over to Dungeon Runners after a stint in TR.Originally Posted by bpphantom
CuppaJo had been moved to Tabula Rasa community, but well... then to Aion, but I don't know if she's still there or not.
I thought that they left NCsoft after Dungeon Runners.
Anyways, they are now Director of Community at ZeniMax Online Studios. -
Changing post, cos Forbin already said my point:
Quote:Actually it is a bit less than that, but that is because the conversion ratio has dropped quite a bit *at the moment*.Originally Posted by Forbin_Project
You forgot to mention how no one is forced to spend any real money to get things from their "real money store". Players can easily trade some of their in game currency in for store credit called "Gems" and get anything they want without ever spending a dime. 10 gold will get several thousands in Gems.
To be fair, I have yet to buy any thing off the gem store (apart from the free devil horns), although i have done quite a bit of buying dyes from the ingame currency market. -
Quote:Get in touch with billing and support. My GF did this and we managed to get it resolved. Now just waiting for the monies to actually land. We know how much it is for, so just waiting out the time period before we get in touch with them again, just to make sure that it is going throughOriginally Posted by Lady Arete
They still have not refunded me for my bought gametime. (feb 2013... I bought as usual 6 month a time.)
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Well, although Zynga made it yesterday, *TODAY* Turbine laid off some of their 400 staff as well...
Linkage -
Quote:Just wondering, but what evidence do you have saying that money was diverted from City of Heroes to develop Guild Wars 2?Originally Posted by houtex
This, 1000x times this. Not goin' to play it. Ever, and I mean EVEN IF ArenaNet leaves... the money was still taken from CoH to pay for GW2's development, and this is how the devs and we are treated? GW2 is dead to me. I will be the curmudgeon you hear about that still wants vinyl records and my old rotary phone.*
I just wanted to get that off my chest, thanks for the thread!
Mike
/* no way, by the way, do I want those things, just makin' a point.
Because it would had to have started being diverted around the time that the City of Heroes development team was enlarged...
Which sounds strange. "Yes, we are diverting money away from City of Heroes/Paragon Studios, but still enlarging *those* development teams."
The mind boggles.
Also, Guild Wars actually *made* more money than City of Heroes ever had, in less time, so wouldn't it make sense that they also managed to finance themselves developing their sequel?
Sure, I know that people have an axe to grind, but wouldn't it be easier to throw the agression towards Carbine Studios? A studio that has been around for *several* years, and still hasn't released their own game?
If any NCsoft game would be considered a leech, then surely WildStar would be the obvious target. -
To clarify on the costumes part.
There is a cauldron that you can jump into that will give you a "halloween" outfit for a short period of time, along with a change in abilities.
You then run around hitting *other* people who have done the same, to unlock achievements (for getting x amount of wins).
It isn't PvP in the way the normal "Guild Wars fashion", and you can easily jump out of it if you choose to (I normally dive into the water to drop the costume power, which takes me fully out of the combat that is running).
There are also a few other things out there (Trick or Treat bags, finding ghosts, carving pumpkins, haunted doors and so on), that you can easily do.
So yes, there are PvP "Halloween costumes" out there, but you *choose* to take part in it.
*edit* Remus, although you cannot actually move the skills around, you *can* rebind the keys as you wish... so even if you are relying on muscle memory for a different game, it should still be possible. -
Quote:For personal bases? Well, to be fair, personal housing is one of those things that seems to crop up as a request in several MMO's over the years...Originally Posted by Anti_Proton
Data mining from this game is obvious.
Sure, CoX shares the same genre space as DCUO, but player housing is something that crosses the genres.
Now if it brought in super sidekicking... then you can tell that they are aiming for the CoX player.
Player housing, not so much. Champions Online already has it -
QR, I actually don't suffer this problem... there is the option to lock target once you start attacking something (Promote Skill Target), as well as Auto Targetting.
I guess it helps in that I have my G13 setup for easy mob targetting, so even if i do loose lock, i can quickly regain it. -
Quote:Honestly, with a larger advertising budget, I am not so sure. Probably not all that much of a noticeable difference though to be honest. You might get a an increase at the start, but then you will suffer player retention issues (which is something that ALL MMO's suffer from), and back onto a decline again. It would be a short term success if anything.Originally Posted by Quinch
Wow.
Okay.
Let me change my question then - if NCsoft had invested a fraction of what it cost to develop Wildstar etc. etc....
And you have to remember that ideally you would be advertising *all* the time (and not just when Issues go live, although those are when you ramp it up).
*shrugs* To be honest, after 8 years of life, chances are you would have already gotten a lot of those who were already going to play the game, and advertising new expansions/issues helps, but you have to retain your *current* player base whilst getting the new ones in... and ideally get *more* players in then old players leaving.
Sure, Eve Online is a slight exception to this rule (for many years, they actually had an increasing player base), but I believe that they have finally plateaued in terms of subscriber numbers (ie new players in = old players leaving). -
Quote:I am going for $50million to be the *total* budget of development from start to finish for Wildstar.Originally Posted by Quinch
Fifty million dollars? That's... kind of a huge number. Where'd you get it?
And going by a 2003 Gamasutra article it was saying then that they *easily* exceeded $10million.
So, just 10 years later, due to rising wages and in general development costs, $50million doesn't seem so far fetched.
Warhammer Online had a rumoured budget of $100-$200million. Tabula Rasa was rumoured to cost over $100million.
So from that, even if you halve what i suggested, down to $25million... that is *still* a lot of money to be poured into City of Heroes, and in my mind, it would probably be better to burn the money over the winter months (at least then you can stay warm!)
Not saying that it would be a lost cause, but i think it would be a *very* bad investment. Even if the player base increased 5 fold, it would take at *least* 2 years to recoup that initial investment. (Assuming that the *current* profit is at $2million/year).
Do you think that pumping that amount of money into the game, could possibly increase the player base by over 500%? -
Quote:Probably not financially worth it to be honest.Originally Posted by Quinch
What would the ROI be if the investment in Wildstar's development was used to advertise CoH, an eight year mature MMO with the amount of content and gameplay balancing experience to match?
Now, if that $50million was spent to rework and improve on City of heroes *as well as* also advertising (the bulk for development work), then you could *possibly* be onto something, but it would still be a very large risk, and no way in any shape or form guaranteed to work.
Maybe a 1 in 100 chance of it working... possibly... -
I have never been able to work out why people refer to Tabula Rasa as TB.... >.<