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Upcoming/Recent DAoC Changes--Will They Also End Up in UO?

Tina Small

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Browsed the DAoC website today and noticed Broadsword's adding some new features to that game. As always, this left me wondering if the higher-ups at Broadsword might be planning to add similar features to UO. For example, see the following items from patch notes and weekly "grab bag" questions and answers documents: (I tried to bold the most interesting parts; hopefully doesn't make this post blow up into a super-unformatted mess!)

- "We have a 1.123B version coming very soon to Pendragon that will have additional class changes to several classes that didn’t make it into the 1.123A notes AND tweaks to several of the changes made in 1.123A based on your feedback. Additionally, and the reason for the wait thus far, is that we are also introducing the new Mithril currency and shop. We were able to squeeze in an armor, cloak, and weapon “patterning” system that will allow characters to copy the look of their existing items onto their other items (with some restrictions)! " Dark Age of Camelot

- "For MTX [microtransactions], we’d eventually like to add a robust item-reskinning system but for the first iteration we will only be offering existing items with different, but un-changing skins." Dark Age of Camelot

- "Users can now set which monitor they want the full-screen borderless windowed client to appear on if they have multiple monitors. Windowed, borderless windowed, and full-screen graphics settings now update on the character select screen instead of requiring users to login and logout to get the settings to update." Dark Age of Camelot

- "I am an old school player from EU-Server Stonehenge and have been playing for a total of 15 years now. To be honest, I have absolutely no overview, how many characters I have created on all the several servers. Therefore I was wondering, if there will be a website and/or a client feature, to get an overview for all of my toons on all the different servers and in addition on the old archived servers as well! This is a feature we would really like to add to our account center website but unfortunately is not quite ready yet. However, our CSRs are happy to give you a rundown of where your characters are. Simply file an Emergency Appeal in-game requesting a rundown of your accounts’ characters and their server locations. In most cases, that information will be emailed to you within a couple days. The CSRs will only provide the location of level 50 characters as accounts sometimes have many dozens of non-50 characters. If you do want to know where your non-level 50 characters are, just be sure to explicitly state so in your appeal, and they’ll name the servers in their reply!" Dark Age of Camelot

- "Dark Age of Camelot website revamp!" Dark Age of Camelot From February 17th producer letter: "Lastly, we are still hard at work on the new website and official forums. After much of the groundwork has been done, we've gone a different direction on the layout of the site and apologize for the delay in getting it out. We hope to have this new version of the site out by this Summer with tools like a searchable Item Database (an official downloadable version will be released sooner) and Realmwar/Leaderboards included! " Dark Age of Camelot

- "And finally, some detailed updates on alternate server and ongoing Ywain plans!" Dark Age of Camelot

- "Come back to Camelot Campaign. It's easier than ever to Come Back to Camelot as returning players now get several rewards to help them quickly get up to speed including a new suit of competitive gear, a cache of bounty points, champion level experience, and much more! We are offering returning players 30 FREE days to come back and explore, experience, and join the Realm vs Realm struggle! In order to participate, simply visit the Account Center, login, and re-subscribe; the free 30 days will be automatically applied to the account. This offer is only valid from April 24th through May 22nd, 2017 to accounts that have been inactive for at least 60 days and are in good standing." Dark Age of Camelot

Note that prior to the above two notes, there was this Q&A answer about the possibility of a Return to Camelot campaign: "Our last Come Back to Camelot campaign was a huge success, so we will definitely have another. However, first we’re going to focus on addressing many of the concerns we’ve received from the playerbase about classes, RvR, and items. Once those concerns are addressed appropriately, we will have a Come Back to Camelot Campaign as a way to incentivize players to come back and see the changes. Doing a campaign prior to making those changes wouldn’t be as effective. In the meantime we have the new A Dragon’s Curse PvE campaign, seasonal events, and battleground weekends to help increase the population. On a longer term though we are considering offering an alternative ruleset server that will attract players who may not be interested in Ywain and its ruleset back to the game in conjunction with either a Come Back to Camelot campaign or other incentives for players to return to and stay on Ywain as well." Dark Age of Camelot

And a few weeks before that, there was this note in a weekly "grab bag" Q&A: "Is there any update on the player-base survey and its results? The recent survey was a huge success! We were heartened by both the number of respondents and the responses themselves. In short, there appears to be an appetite for some sort of alternative ruleset server. Our team is continuing to flesh out and iterate on the the best approach to deliver one that accomplishes the following goals: (1) Closely meets the most-desired ruleset based on survey results. (2) Can be released in a reasonable timeframe. (3) Allows our team to continually develop and update the Live servers. (4) Ensures the Live servers' remain engaging in the near term after the launch of an alternative ruleset server with the long-term aim of increasing their population. We won't release an alternative ruleset server unless it can meet ALL of those goals. We will be doing a more targeted, follow-up survey in the coming weeks once we are confident in our plan. Until then, stay tuned!" Dark Age of Camelot

With regard to the above-mentioned survey on an alternative ruleset server, the dev team had this to say: "...we have been blown away by the amount of responses to our playerbase survey. Thank you for the several thousand (OMG!) responses and for taking the time to give us such valuable feedback and insight. The survey is now CLOSED while we analyse and discuss the results internally. We will return with a follow up survey soon, so keep your eyes on the Herald!" Dark Age of Camelot
 

Old Vet Back Again

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If UO added era accurate servers that had the majority of issues balanced we would see and influx of people coming back. Half the reason people are on UoR type free servers is because that is what they want to play
 

Merlin

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We need less servers - not more. 20+ shards are already virtually dead. As much as folks like to dream of the good ol' days, I have my doubts any "old rule set" server will be released for UO any time soon.

I am not familiar enough to know what state in the game's life cycle DAoC is in or how popular it is, but sounds like they're getting a nice update. Hopefully something similar will be rolled out for UO for the 20th anniversary.
 

Aeyko

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There is a fully functional AOS free server that runs very well currently. It has it's own form of currency outside of gold for special hued items like shrouds, sandals, robes etc... These are glacial colored blue and blaze. It's a very cool concept and is ran very well. The casting there is buggy, but if OSI could muster up the resources to put together an AOS specific server, I guarantee you that the population of that free server would diminish quickly as most of us want to be back on OSI. A cool concept would be an "Atlantic AOS" server within the game such as we have a Seige with a different ruleset, we could easily have this as one of our options. This is food for thought from an avid OSI player that has taken his talents to a free shard to get away from the new changes. I hope @Mesanna @Bleak hear me out on this.
 

Old Vet Back Again

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I agree we need less servers. It's time to merge or purge out the least populated to make room for Era Accurate servers. They don't need them on the West and East and Europe. In today's world they should be centrally located on the East Coast for both continental US players and European players.

There are 1000's of players they can tap into with a concept like this. Keep the Map small and should it grow then take into consideration adding more landmass. Other than that keep it Britania only, none of this eodon garbage
 

Skalazar

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Make a Pre AOS server and let us transfer characters there and you would likely see a return of players. UO is way too complex now. Lets go back to a simpler more fun time where pvp wasnt just about having l337 itemz
how could you transfer characters full of items that never existed to a new shard?
 

DJAd

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We need less servers - not more. 20+ shards are already virtually dead. As much as folks like to dream of the good ol' days, I have my doubts any "old rule set" server will be released for UO any time soon.
Yep. If they do release any kind of new server with new / old rules they really would need to close/merge some of the other servers. It will be spreading out the tiny population even further. I doubt this will ever happen because of the backlash from players if the server they play on was to be closed.

I wish some people would be willing to let stuff go and move forward. Sure I have a house, the shard I play has history, memories etc. I would let all this go have a higher population with the blink of an eye.
 

Merlin

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Yep. If they do release any kind of new server with new / old rules they really would need to close/merge some of the other servers. It will be spreading out the tiny population even further. I doubt this will ever happen because of the backlash from players if the server they play on was to be closed.
Exactly. We always hear these calls of 'bring back an old server - and so many people will come back!' or 'change XYZ about PVP and they will leave the free shards and come to OSI'. I'm just not buying it. Sure you would have a few folks return, but I have my doubts it would be a significant amount.


I wish some people would be willing to let stuff go and move forward. Sure I have a house, the shard I play has history, memories etc. I would let all this go have a higher population with the blink of an eye.
100% agree. If the Dev's were to offer a reasonable opportunity to move your house and your stuff to a new shard, possibly at a different exact location... but I understand it's easier said than done. I do find it laughable when people cite "shard history". If there is no one else around to remember that shard history, than those memories are already long gone and this history that is being preserved is at the detriment of the rest of the game in the long term. But I digress... Mesanna has made it clear they won't do shard merges, so it's basically beating a dead horse.
 

Tyrath

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Hate to say it but I finally abandoned the main prodo shard I have played since it was born and moved all but one house and acct to LS where I ping only slightly worse than I do on Legends. Yeah I have a few friends left on legends but most have either died, moved to another shard or just quit over the years. In my quest to find a new home shard I visited every shard with decent ping except atl, I keep a house there just for shard shields and a place to hide on my shopping trips 24 hour cool down between transfers before I can get back to civilized shards and folks. Anyway you either love atl or hate it and I fall in the latter.

The bottom line is they need to close the 5 deadest shards, and move folks characters and possesions to another shard. There are 5 shards I visited that could be merged into one and there would still be a low population. But it would free four servers up. Yes there is shard history I occasionally make the rounds visiting the various player memorials on legends Lady Phoenix, Mad Mardigan etc. They are scattered around the land from haven to the Islsh Mushroom cave maybe move the various shards memorials to one spot in the merged lands. One thing I know about everyone those memorials on legends are dedicated to is that they all loved the game and many of them went well beyond being just a player to support and make the game a better place. It could be argued that keeping a dead shard on life support is a insult to those folks.

Housing might not be ideal but malas on every dead shard is wide open, put castles, keeps etc there and give them to the people being merged and do something like TC copy over and a huge moving crate.

The big ballers on the low pop shards would be the biggest complainers but would either come around or not at this points they are a very small number of folks. The guilds that control and farm the power scrolls to transfer to ATlL would be up there in the complaining as it is game gold and RL Cash at stake for them.

If even possible now, make one of the closed servers a unsupported pre ren shard and see how it goes for a while. I suspect it won't go well. I have visited some of these booming pre ren free shards with thriving populations......... Not seeing the booming or the thriving on any of them. Do see high peaks and and very low downs. That being said maybe BS could bring the operators of a couple of the more popular free shards on board to support and manage the official pre ren shard.

MAKE A ADVERTISING BUDGET and use it effectively to get UO some market presence. Relying on the players is a piss poor way to market a product.
 

MalagAste

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What would get me to "move" would be if they made playstyle devoted shards....

Shards just about PvM, PvP and RP... If they did that and all events and what-not would revolve around the playstyle you chose then I would move in an instant...

If they did that with upgraded graphics... and you had to start all over but offered true 3d graphics... I'd start all over again in a HEARTBEAT.
 

Merlin

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MAKE A ADVERTISING BUDGET and use it effectively to get UO some market presence. Relying on the players is a piss poor way to market a product.
^^^^

This always boggled me. It seems as if they don't spend a dime on advertising. No one is saying they have to run a Super Bowl commercial. How much does a couple of ad banners on a few gaming websites cost? Even just that would raise UO's profile just a little bit by way of letting old gamers know that we're still around and hopefully attracting a few new gamers to give us a look.

With the upcoming Anniversary, they need to do more than just rely on a free media reports of our game turning 20.
 

Kirthag

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What metrics would constitute a "dead shard" and qualify it for a merge?
WoW did merges as they measured logins on servers for a year and merged the ones with the lowest logins AND shortest play times. Of course, they didn't have housing to deal with, nor the millions of items and server-based items as well.

Merging UO shards will not happen due to the following:
- housing: castle-spots are still premium and ppl who have a historic castles would be most put off
- shard items: not only bound items, but suits as well.
- toon limitations: you try telling ppl with toons across shards which uber pker they need to delete since the shards are merging...
- monies spent: some people spent all kinds of money to build up on multiple shards. merging those shards is like throwing money away....

I don't know all the particulars, but I know enough about programming that the item IDs from shard to shard are unique per shard in the databases that are related to each shard. Merging the shards would cause issues within the databases being merged. So ShardA has a uber weapon id of 12345, ShardB has a food item with that same id. Which one shall exist if the two are merged?

From what I understand, all of the shards are cloud based now - so computing power isn't an issue.
The only substantial reason for merging shards would be population concentration... but isn't that why they made the shard xfer service? I specifically remember them promoting it that way.

People maintain their accounts and have wonderous and plentiful items/momentos on these "dead" shards. So long as ppl pay for their accounts, I don't see the gods merging shards anytime soon.


Now this...
MAKE A ADVERTISING BUDGET and use it effectively to get UO some market presence. Relying on the players is a piss poor way to market a product.
... is very much a worthwhile venture and must be done. Why Broadsword isn't participating in the conventions is a noggin scratcher imho.
 

afk

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Do not think very many if any would leave those free shards, they play them because they are free and they have already developed communities and are not likely to leave. Also I do not think going backwards is going to help, they need to go forwards and redo the skill system. Getting rid of several shards and replacing them with a 1 player max(and new skill system), similar to seige but with pvm and pvp like the regular shards. Would definitely like to see a split skill system, with approximately 1200 skill points per char and one char per shard. i think splitting up the skills into combat, trade, and misc with a 480 point cap and a 1200 point overall cap would work. This would help build communities and help balance out pvp/pvm as well as allow more freedom for building char's.
 
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n00bPvper

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Yep. If they do release any kind of new server with new / old rules they really would need to close/merge some of the other servers. It will be spreading out the tiny population even further. I doubt this will ever happen because of the backlash from players if the server they play on was to be closed.

I wish some people would be willing to let stuff go and move forward. Sure I have a house, the shard I play has history, memories etc. I would let all this go have a higher population with the blink of an eye.
IMO ppl really moved on and thats why u see different "eras" freeshard crowded while osi population decreases

If ppl don't believe this is the real scenario they should check for themselves. I mean, I see veteran OSI players on most freeshards...

Not trying to be a smart guy/offend/insult/troll or anything, just saying what I think

My point is ppl really do like old eras style, it's not something broadsword should just ignore...(I don't even know why Im talking honestly because I think theres zero chance for this to happen) and even then, quoting someone thatI read here on stratics long time ago "why ppl would pay to play on old eras if they just can play it for free."
 

Old Vet Back Again

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That's why it's perfect for the upcoming free to play model. I would rather make 4-5 toons for 4-5 different era servers than making sure i have one in case there is a raid 1x a month on a dead server like LA. They need to merge, and if those players feel like they are losing something they should be more concerned that holding onto it will only make it worse. That argument is archaic and only holds the game back from making it feel like there is actually a 'community' of players. Look at the current economy model; Buy on atl, xfer to dead server, sell/consume then rinse and repeat. Or; farm dead server, xfer to atl and sell. I would gladly have 50people rage quit if it brought together 1000 people.
 

Uriah Heep

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I would gladly have 50people rage quit
Merging shards won't increase the overall pop...and the 50 that quit might-might-cost you 300 accounts or more lol. Remember, in this day and age, very very few people run one account...some have 10 or more. Wouldn't take many of those quitting to shut us down, I don't think
 

The Craftsman

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Why Broadsword isn't participating in the conventions is a noggin scratcher imho.
Probably because broadsword are paid a set fee on a sub contracted out basis to manage the game. EA still owns the game and pockets the subs. Why would broadsword pay to advertise the game?
 

GarthGrey

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i'd love to play on a server with no lrc, no fancy armor and no insurance like in the old days
There is a group of us who play on that server every day. I"m not talking about the ones that came over and bought castles with their Atlantic gold, I mean people who actually play on this server, not pretend to play on it.
 

Old Vet Back Again

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Merging shards won't increase the overall pop...and the 50 that quit might-might-cost you 300 accounts or more lol. Remember, in this day and age, very very few people run one account...some have 10 or more. Wouldn't take many of those quitting to shut us down, I don't think
Merging servers would A) bottle neck the community making the population feel larger and B) with a F2P model would attract players that are currently on free servers.

Going f2p will directly effect the amount of subs people have, it also throws that argument out the window. Most accounts are open to hold houses, if they adjust the model to accommodate house size/plot size etc I don't see a reason for people to be paying 12.99/month
 

Kirthag

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Probably because broadsword are paid a set fee on a sub contracted out basis to manage the game. EA still owns the game and pockets the subs. Why would broadsword pay to advertise the game?
Aye...

Although, if I were a small game house like Broadsword who is subcontracted, I'd like to expand my business and (perhaps) create new titles.... get more skilled developers... make money and expand - precisely what E3 and other conventions are really about. I wasn't talking so much about them touting UO (although that would be nice), but as a business making their mark in the industry. Right now, the general consensus is that they are just slave-to-the-machine that is EA.

Unless they have a non-compete clause in their contract with EA. If they do, I find that rather disappointing and stifling. It would explain a few things.... (the more I think about it, I suspect that is the case).

If they were hired to maintain the status quo, which would put UO and DAOC onto the path of decline in the product life cycle (so far as EA is concerned), I'd be looking at how to rebirth each title. Or perhaps diversify, get out from under the yoke of corporate dictation, and let the title(s) die honorable deaths in the corporate mire of EA which may lead to the titles going into the hands of the independents who run/develop the "free" shards.

I'm silently hoping Broadsword is looking at the rebirth path, at least for UO. I'm not much into DAOC. Seeing the amount of work being done (like the features or not), maybe they are doing that. So if that is the business plan, the titles need more subscriptions. How will the titles get that?

omg...

Advertising, marketing, getting the titles in the faces of the players looking for another avenue of entertainment.

Push UO as an investment in a longstanding title. Don't market to the casual gamers (omg that was a failure!) but to those who want something long term. UO is not a casual play game, never was.
And do something that involves the communities within the game. The EM events are lackluster, boring, and downright lag-fests filled with ppl who want a "rare drop" instead of really playing the game. Sat and watched how the last event on Pac went. The event didn't even finish and ppl were already barking to buy the drop for 200mil. I went to the EM house after, and all anyone really wanted to see was the drop. Small comments about the event, the usual: lag, powerful boss, too many tamers, blah blah blah.

I was deeply saddened by it..


I've been giving this thought the other night: What really kept me in the game all these years, struggling to pay my subscriptions even when I didn't have ramen in the pantry? Why did I risk relationships and jobs for this game? That is what Broadsword needs to figure out and work on: what has made UO so addictive to the core, veteran players? How can they leverage that and introduce that to a new generation of players?

Discussion for another thread.
 

Archnight

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What has made UO so addictive to the core?
The immersive sandbox world itself (Britannia)... where you can fight, pvp, idoc, craft, vendor, decorate, collect rares and customize your home. No other game offers the same freedom and depth as UO, that's what makes people keep coming back again and again
 

Merlin

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Hard to advertise a game this old and dated looking. Sad but true.
About five or six years back, Apple was in-progress of doing a re-boot of Lemmings. It wound up getting caught up in legal limbo with Sony and ended up not being released (an entirely different topic), but before it was even available, it's "return" was promoted on a few video game blogs by way of Ad Banners.

My point being: Even despite it's age, I see no reason why even a minimal amount of advertising dollars (or effort) couldn't be spent on some minor low-intensity promotions like Ad Banners, social media hype, etc. Anything to show an effort that this game still wants to attract new (and returning) players would be welcome.
 

Tyrath

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Probably because broadsword are paid a set fee on a sub contracted out basis to manage the game. EA still owns the game and pockets the subs. Why would broadsword pay to advertise the game?
I Broker high end beef for a guy that raises Wagyu he makes a killing on it, I make a killing on it, it is his product, he owns it....... It is in my best interest to throw a few 10k-15k per year into promoting it and advertising it. LOL from what I see my little Corporations advertising budget is about 50,000X more than broadswords. It is called return on investment. And yes advertising to the right market is very much a worthwhile investment.
 

Uriah Heep

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Going f2p will directly effect the amount of subs people have, it also throws that argument out the window. Most accounts are open to hold houses, if they adjust the model to accommodate house size/plot size etc I don't see a reason for people to be paying 12.99/month
I'm gonna be 'that' guy and go ahead and say it.

Do you seriously, really, believe that if they can';t make a decent website, run a decent store where you can make multi-purchases and get things timely manner, and build a functioning common sense account management page (yeah, remember that?) that they can go to F2P and be successful?

I have really serious doubts about this company and crew being able to pull this off with any real success...it will be rushed, bugged, and half-assed just like everything else they have done for 5 years.
 

Kirthag

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Hard to advertise a game this old and dated looking. Sad but true.
There are many "old and dated looking" things that are being marketed... *cough* Sega! *cough*
 

Pawain

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Hate to say it but I finally abandoned the main prodo shard I have played since it was born and moved all but one house and acct to LS where I ping only slightly worse than I do on Legends. Yeah I have a few friends left on legends but most have either died, moved to another shard or just quit over the years. In my quest to find a new home shard I visited every shard with decent ping except atl, I keep a house there just for shard shields and a place to hide on my shopping trips 24 hour cool down between transfers before I can get back to civilized shards and folks. Anyway you either love atl or hate it and I fall in the latter.

The bottom line is they need to close the 5 deadest shards, and move folks characters and possesions to another shard. There are 5 shards I visited that could be merged into one and there would still be a low population. But it would free four servers up. Yes there is shard history I occasionally make the rounds visiting the various player memorials on legends Lady Phoenix, Mad Mardigan etc. They are scattered around the land from haven to the Islsh Mushroom cave maybe move the various shards memorials to one spot in the merged lands. One thing I know about everyone those memorials on legends are dedicated to is that they all loved the game and many of them went well beyond being just a player to support and make the game a better place. It could be argued that keeping a dead shard on life support is a insult to those folks.

Housing might not be ideal but malas on every dead shard is wide open, put castles, keeps etc there and give them to the people being merged and do something like TC copy over and a huge moving crate.

The big ballers on the low pop shards would be the biggest complainers but would either come around or not at this points they are a very small number of folks. The guilds that control and farm the power scrolls to transfer to ATlL would be up there in the complaining as it is game gold and RL Cash at stake for them.

If even possible now, make one of the closed servers a unsupported pre ren shard and see how it goes for a while. I suspect it won't go well. I have visited some of these booming pre ren free shards with thriving populations......... Not seeing the booming or the thriving on any of them. Do see high peaks and and very low downs. That being said maybe BS could bring the operators of a couple of the more popular free shards on board to support and manage the official pre ren shard.

MAKE A ADVERTISING BUDGET and use it effectively to get UO some market presence. Relying on the players is a piss poor way to market a product.
I just noticed this. Welcome to LS. Glad you are staying!!! :danceb::thumbup:
 

Uvtha

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There are many "old and dated looking" things that are being marketed... *cough* Sega! *cough*
Old stuff like nes/snes kind of thing are nostalgia buys. If you never played UO before you won't have any nostalgia for it.
 

Uvtha

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About five or six years back, Apple was in-progress of doing a re-boot of Lemmings. It wound up getting caught up in legal limbo with Sony and ended up not being released (an entirely different topic), but before it was even available, it's "return" was promoted on a few video game blogs by way of Ad Banners.

My point being: Even despite it's age, I see no reason why even a minimal amount of advertising dollars (or effort) couldn't be spent on some minor low-intensity promotions like Ad Banners, social media hype, etc. Anything to show an effort that this game still wants to attract new (and returning) players would be welcome.
Again, that's a nostalgia purchase, or an update. People bought it because they played it before back in ye olden times. Marketing to people who used to play UO simply isn't worth it.
 

Uvtha

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We're in the golden age of Social Media, its not hard to advertise at all.
You can advertise anything, doesn't mean it's worth it or that the effort will bear fruit. Too many UO players are wearing rose colored glasses with it comes to our game. Most people wouldn't like it on looks alone, and those who might won't pay a sub for such a dated game.
 

Tyrath

Grand Poobah
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
You can advertise anything, doesn't mean it's worth it or that the effort will bear fruit. Too many UO players are wearing rose colored glasses with it comes to our game. Most people wouldn't like it on looks alone, and those who might won't pay a sub for such a dated game.
Advertising and Advertising to the right Market are two very different things. It probably won't fly with younger people, however tap into the 45-65 year old age range and you tap into a huge demographic. A few things like improving the acct management page and a basic getting started guide would help a lot. A lot of folks in this age range and older did not even have a computer 20 years ago and if they did they did not have time for a game like UO which TBH has always been a great time sink. Fast forward 20 years and those same people now have TIME, A lot more disposable income, and a very large % don't like modern graphics in games and are turned off by "How Busy" they are. My own products are "Dated and out of Touch" according to the younger generation, I started hearing that about 10 years ago and a little research showed that indeed they were for the younger generations Y & Z to and for about 40% of X. No point in marketing a product to them when only 20% of them would be viable and of that 20% you would only pick up 2%-4% of the local markets. However 60% of X and 80% of W are viable and largely ignored by 95% of businesses and are the demographic with the paid off mortgages, cars and have the fully funded 401ks and fully vested pensions with disposable income and WILL spend it on things that appeal to them and are marketed to them. When the biggest adverts I see directed at this demographic is depends, AARP, and Insurance. Some advertising directed that way for something fun and entertaining goes a long way and plays to the emotion of being younger again. Bottom line is they are going to get such a small % of the young crowd if that is who they target with F2P or any advertising directed at the wrong demographic. I would be willing to bet that 85% of the people my age and older don't even know what Steam is and 75% think their computer is limited to FB, News Sites and Spec interest forums. Another point is Older Customers tend to be long term customers,when they find something they like they typically stick with it and do not hop from product to product, which the younger folks are notorious for doing. Whether it be a package of pork chops or a game sub to legacy game the same principles apply in the target audience marketing. I can advert all year long to the millenials and will never pick up more than 4% of the local market share, unless I change my product and go with the new trendy value added prepared foods, which I am at a cost of around $350,000 wich will translate to around 35%-40% of the local market share. UO short of rebuilding the came from the ground up and basically developing a whole new game called UO at a cost of A LOT more than 350k is not going to appeal to the gen y or z and even then they would not stick around more than 2-3 months. Not being insulting to gen y or z but Y statistically have proven to be very transient in everything they do overall, something every business is struggling with now days is how do you gain and retain young customers that are flighty as hell.
 

Tyrath

Grand Poobah
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
I just noticed this. Welcome to LS. Glad you are staying!!! :danceb::thumbup:
Thought I was going to FT on Origin but the constant crashing and reverts got really old after a Month. Then found a couple of Siege friends who play on LS when not on Siege and made some other friends like Don here on the boards. LS also has a decent population but not over crowded and generally lacks the non stop GC trash talk....... although still has it moments.
 

Marquis de Sade 209

Seasoned Veteran
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
I think that dead shards can become more active and even thrive to a point if a few people on each were committed to making things better. I briefly played on Chesapeake and they have a very decent community there and things could be found on vendors. I for one play on Lake Austin and am now refusing to transfer to Atlantic anymore. I will try my level best to make Lake Austin better, but would not want to turn it into what Atlantic has become. The vast majority of resources and items found on Atlantic can be found on any dead shard as well. If people would be less concerned with getting rich and more concerned about building up the community this can be done.
 

Tyrath

Grand Poobah
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
I think that dead shards can become more active and even thrive to a point if a few people on each were committed to making things better. I briefly played on Chesapeake and they have a very decent community there and things could be found on vendors. I for one play on Lake Austin and am now refusing to transfer to Atlantic anymore. I will try my level best to make Lake Austin better, but would not want to turn it into what Atlantic has become. The vast majority of resources and items found on Atlantic can be found on any dead shard as well. If people would be less concerned with getting rich and more concerned about building up the community this can be done.
Problem with the dead shards is they are largely farmed for anything of value and that stuff is shipped to ATL to sell for premium prices. Can't count the number of times I have seen someone list off what they have for sale on a low pop shard and say last call before I transfer it to atl. Or I am making a trip to atlantic anyone need stuff brought back? I hated transfers when they were introduced, hate shard shields and not because of the transfers themselves but the hell they played on shard economies. Personally I think the only things that should be transferable should be gold, vet rewards and soul stones. That would kill the 3rd party RL sellers in many ways, the Zergs would have no incentive to Zerg, but people could still shard hop if they wanted to. And I am just as guilty of shielding and transferring stuff to ATL to sell and buy things I can't find on the shards I play. I promise if I need a 120 mage scroll I won't even see a 105 until I don't need a 120 mage scroll and then I will get 5 in a row. So take some crap to atl and sell what I have and buy what I need and bring it back. when what I am buying was probably farmed on the shard I transferred from or one just like it. The old days before transfers cross shard trading still happened you just found someone that had what you needed onyour shard and traded something the same or of equal value on their shard. There were actually 3rd party folks trusted by everyone that brokered those deals and held and transferred the items for a small fee. A much better system than the transfers IMO. Still done that way prodo to Siege of course with a crazy exchange rate.
 

Tyrath

Grand Poobah
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Unless they have a non-compete clause in their contract with EA. If they do, I find that rather disappointing and stifling. It would explain a few things.... (the more I think about it, I suspect that is the case).
IT would really depend on the specifics of the clause, if it is all encompassing clause or limited to the products they manage. Personally if BS were my baby and no limitations, I would put a team on developing early childhood educational apps and software as a consistent revenue stream. I have a friend that dabbles in making cheezy little kid apps and earns more in her retirement per year with those than she did working a FT job at top pay scale. A team pushing out several Cheezy but quality apps per month and a major software piece every 6 months to a year with no bugs should generate ample revenue to support the division, throw some significant funds into the general fund and show a healthy profit margin. Personally I would hate all of my revenue streams being dependent on a outfit like EA.
 

Marquis de Sade 209

Seasoned Veteran
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Problem with the dead shards is they are largely farmed for anything of value and that stuff is shipped to ATL to sell for premium prices. Can't count the number of times I have seen someone list off what they have for sale on a low pop shard and say last call before I transfer it to atl. Or I am making a trip to atlantic anyone need stuff brought back? I hated transfers when they were introduced, hate shard shields and not because of the transfers themselves but the hell they played on shard economies. Personally I think the only things that should be transferable should be gold, vet rewards and soul stones. That would kill the 3rd party RL sellers in many ways, the Zergs would have no incentive to Zerg, but people could still shard hop if they wanted to. And I am just as guilty of shielding and transferring stuff to ATL to sell and buy things I can't find on the shards I play. I promise if I need a 120 mage scroll I won't even see a 105 until I don't need a 120 mage scroll and then I will get 5 in a row. So take some crap to atl and sell what I have and buy what I need and bring it back. when what I am buying was probably farmed on the shard I transferred from or one just like it. The old days before transfers cross shard trading still happened you just found someone that had what you needed onyour shard and traded something the same or of equal value on their shard. There were actually 3rd party folks trusted by everyone that brokered those deals and held and transferred the items for a small fee. A much better system than the transfers IMO. Still done that way prodo to Siege of course with a crazy exchange rate.
I agree with you to a very large extent. It wasn't that long ago i sold an item on siege and got 20 times the value on Atlantic. I feel guilty about that now and am done selling my proverbial soul. There are ways to keep items on dead shards I firmly believe that though. There will always be people farming and Atlantic transfers but a strong community can make good things happen as I witnessed on Chesapeake, where I still play sometimes. I have played since 1998 and remember the old way of x-sharding, that was a lot better. Shards like Sonoma and Lake Austin were packed back then.
 

Tyrath

Grand Poobah
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Vendor fees on low pop shards are a real problem as well, things sell slower, not uncommon for something to sit on the vendor for a month or more before selling. Which does not give much incentive to keep vendors stocked, thus compounding the problem of finding the things you want or need on low pop shards.
 

Marquis de Sade 209

Seasoned Veteran
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Vendor fees on low pop shards are a real problem as well, things sell slower, not uncommon for something to sit on the vendor for a month or more before selling. Which does not give much incentive to keep vendors stocked, thus compounding the problem of finding the things you want or need on low pop shards.
Yeah that is true. It would have to be done outside vendors and there would have to be a lot of personal communication and commerce for something like this too work. The whole community would have to come together to make anything like this to be successful. I am not deluding myself and realize it would be an uphill battle, but it's not impossible. Believe me I thought about this a lot.
 

MalagAste

Belaern d'Zhaunil
Alumni
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
UNLEASHED
Campaign Supporter
You can advertise anything, doesn't mean it's worth it or that the effort will bear fruit. Too many UO players are wearing rose colored glasses with it comes to our game. Most people wouldn't like it on looks alone, and those who might won't pay a sub for such a dated game.
Not to mention the FEW folk I've gotten to look at it find it TOO complicated... They are SHOCKED by the Economy of the game seeing prices... then PISSED finding you have to pay to get anything on ATLANTIC... and not even on other shards... Can't buy anything at all worth anything it's all there... and so either you have to know someone with Shields willing to go buy the item for you ..... trust them to take your money and bring back the item... as well or pay to buy a Transfer token to go there get it and pay again to come home... They are NOT amused... and say things like good god in WoW or in FF you can do this that and the other with vendors and auction houses... etc... They are surprised there isn't a global auction house or anything...

Those rose colored glasses have also held UO back soooo many times...
 
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