Why all the nerd rage against Vanguard?

[Utnayan]

Originally Posted by Draegan

Ok first, this is a video game we're talking about. Second, this happened a while ago. Why are you all worked up in teenage angst about something like this? You do realize this is the real world of business. PR and spin are king. Why would he be honest about a fuck up? Get over it already.

Because it is happening again.

Want to see what has been missing from Vanguard? Here is a small snippet from a page long fucking post that I promised not to post - so I am only taking a small segment from it. This is from an actual employee who is employed right fucking now at Sigil. For the record, this post does not come from anyone that posts here or has access to this forum.

I won't hide from the fact that the 35+ game is light on content, but it is coming as quickly as we can pump it out. I am trying to avoid shitting out the content incomplete or buggy, so bear with me. The 35+ areas complete or due very soon are:
Thestra
Vol Tuniel
Thelaseen - Lair of the Drake Riders
Dargun's Tomb
Old Targonor - needs tweaks
Greystone - soon
Beranid Downs - in progress, soon
Southwatch - in testing now, coming next week
Gorgoluk - huge Sebilis style dungeon in the deadland swamps; next on schedule for the team finishing Southwatch
Ancient Port Warehouse - Art is almost complete and getting patched in next Wed; content is a few weeks away.
Basically the terrain and content on western thestra is getting a huge facelift

This is all 35+ fucking content. Where is the truth on this one bitch? That's right, the same people that "did this years ago" are doing it again right fucking now.

What's funny are the fanboy's that defend this type of bullshit time and time again because 1> They either work for the company. 2> Are VN board transplants where this type of mentality of doing nothing but talking positive about games is popular. Like our fanboy poster child Camerous. Who has single handedly helped moderate the VN boards back to 1939 Germany.

Here is another snippet from that same employee:

I'm not making excuses, because we all know that we had to launch early. Our schedule is to have all of the 35+ content online with the second major art push, which is mid April. At that point the originally planned content will all be live, with a few additions as well. Then we will split into 'live' and 'expansion' teams and press forward.

MID FUCKING APRIL. Here is an idea McQuaid... How about you held off on release until APRIL instead of charging for shit that was completely buggy and incomplete? I love how in 3 weeks they will start working on the first expansion when the game as it stands is the biggest fucking mess this genre has seen since SoL.

Common sense hits you for 5 points of damage since your subscription rate is about the size of Camerous's IQ right now.

[Astennu]

We were the first guild into Plane of Mischief and no it was not finished as Kendrick said but it was in game. I'm not sure if I remember Verant saying PoM was finished but I do remember them saying it was "in game". Giantt got into the zone and then dragged and ressed a mage at the zone in house in the back of ToV North using a Vox stick, at which point we CoH'd everyone online so they could zone in. When we popped in there and started running around Ester popped in to ask how the fuck we got in there and that we weren't supposed to be there, but they didn't port us out. We stayed in there for the next two days trying to figure out what to do, but never did obviously because the armor quests and stuff were not in yet. They were patched in not long after we exposed the zone as not ready. Here is part of our group in there the first couple of hours:

[Faille]

As long as there are Dirge Singers then there will be enough 40+ content in vanguard!!

[kasey]

way cool screenshot

[Rayne]

Originally Posted by Lyenae

It just comes off as Blind Hope.

What makes it worse, is that blind hope is held with total disregard for the competition coming down the pike. Vanguard stumbled and fell out of the gate. WoW continues kicking it while its down. LoTRo is right around the corner waiting to join in. Warhammer and AoC are down the street waiting to pound it out of existence. And those are just the top contenders. There WILL be others.

Such utter disregard is both reckless and suicidal. 350k subs is a lot of ground to gain in 10 months. Vanguard won't survive it with just "some changes". The changes they make will need to be pretty drastic. Nudging up the exp rate, and adding a few npc teleporters isn't going to be enough to turn this around.

[Twobit Whore]

I don't think they should even worry about some mythical fantasy numbers a year away and instead should focus on keeping what they have. If they can creep up to 250k within a year, then it's a start.. and since that's all he needs to satisfy the investors, it should take a little heat off of him. More exp, better travel and grouping options, more solo content that is both viable and fun, and other things would all go a long way to doing that.. of course you run the risk of pissing off the fanatical fanbase that make up a good portion of the existing subs atm.

[Laerazi]

MID FUCKING APRIL. Here is an idea McQuaid... How about you held off on release until APRIL instead of charging for shit that was completely buggy and incomplete?

Because they ran out of funding? I mean, hasn't that been made abundantly clear about the entire game, even before release? It's no surprise that they pushed the game out early because they had no alternative. In no way is it an acceptable route to take, imo, but I don't think there's another answer.

[Utnayan]

Originally Posted by Laerazi

Because they ran out of funding? I mean, hasn't that been made abundantly clear about the entire game, even before release? It's no surprise that they pushed the game out early because they had no alternative. In no way is it an acceptable route to take, imo, but I don't think there's another answer.

And that's fine. At least be HONEST about it. Instead of scapegoating MS, playing the fluff card, and actually having the balls to say they will not ship the game until it is ready a month before they launched it in the shit state it was in.

Then on top of that, have a complete lack of answers for anyone wanting to know just what the hell is going on with the game.

[Twobit Whore]

Originally Posted by Utnayan

And that's fine. At least be HONEST about it. Instead of scapegoating MS, playing the fluff card, and actually having the balls to say they will not ship the game until it is ready a month before they launched it in the shit state it was in.

Then on top of that, have a complete lack of answers for anyone wanting to know just what the hell is going on with the game.

I'm with you on most stuff, but let's be real. Brad simply cannot (or will not at least) come here and say "We know we released the game 6 months early, it's a pile of shit right now and you need a Cray to play it effectively, but please buy it and play anyway so that we can get the money to finish it. Yes, Microsoft called our bluff and when we didn't have the hand to back it, they kicked us from the table. But hey, we love SOE, always have and you do too! So come play it! Please!" If you read between the lines and look past the spin, this is essentially what he is saying, but he cannot put it in the terms that we can.

The only thing he can do is come here and spin and downplay the pitfalls while trying to highlight the few positives there are.

[holymight]

Originally Posted by Utnayan

This is all 35+ fucking content. Where is the truth on this one bitch? That's right, the same people that "did this years ago" are doing it again right fucking now.

You know, at least you can get your facts in order. Lets look at the list one by one:

Vol Tuniel In since months before beta. It is actually the first dungeon they every made.
Thelaseen - Lair of the Drake Riders In since beta
Dargun's Tomb In since beta
Old Targonor - needs tweaks In since beta
Greystone - soon In for 2ish weeks now
Beranid Downs - in progress, soon Not sure what this is
Southwatch - in testing now, coming next week In for 2ish weeks now
Gorgoluk - huge Sebilis style dungeon in the deadland swamps; next on schedule for the team finishing Southwatch Partially in
Ancient Port Warehouse - Art is almost complete and getting patched in next Wed; content is a few weeks away.Missing
Basically the terrain and content on western thestra is getting a huge facelift

The big giant content hole that existed at release is not quite so big any more. Yes there are tons of unfinished content, everybody knows this, but there are also finished content.

[Lyenae]

I hope one day we can hear Microsoft's insider story.

[glaucus]

even with all the shit wrong with VG, best game i have played since eq. when VG community comes around is when the game will explode

[Shaof]

Originally Posted by holymight

You know, at least you can get your facts in order. Lets look at the list one by one:



The big giant content hole that existed at release is not quite so big any more. Yes there are tons of unfinished content, everybody knows this, but there are also finished content.

Makes you wonder how long ago he got that information. The guy can't even spell GrAystone right. How can we trust him now? It's probably the janitor giving out the infoz.

[Utnayan]

They can't spell, nor can they get anything right in the game either.

[Twobit Whore]

Holy shit he spelled grey instead of gray.. that means everything he has ever said is full of shit! The proof is right there in that one letter!