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New World dropped their first major patch today, and they already caved to the casual players making the game far easier. Does this spell doom for Ashes of Creations future? How will Steven and Intrepid handle the backlash the week of launch from new players complaining about the more hardcore aspects of the game?
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appreciated!
I don't think AOC has anything to worry about from New World and if anything there gonna learn a lot from New Worlds mistakes on what not to do.
Wow your camera quality is so much better than before
Dude, 10% increased speed on roads is such a small difference to say that they have totally caved. I fully welcome it because I spend a LOT of time running from place to place and distance DOES matter. 10% is a small bone to toss to all the people who were losing their minds from playing running simulator.
They linked trading houses because the central towns were making all the sales revenue and the outer areas were languishing. Town maintenance and crafting station upgrades are expensive. It helps spread the wealth to let the outer towns build up a bit, which will help spread people out on the map. You still have to pay the listing cost where you sell and it and sales tax where you buy it so it does matter where you buy and sell things. You just can't play the buy low and sell high somewhere else game.
New World is now putting in things that should have already been there. The game was released half baked. I give 0 kudos for finally putting in what should have been there or found and fixed during alpha and beta. Its mind blowing they actually had testing because its like they missed everything.
Hard is not running twenty minutes to a piss poor non planned out objective, nor is hard learning to left click (combat pro). Hard is difficulty in game fighting challenging mobs. All Ashes has to do is release an actual game with large territories but ones with interesting things to find and discover within them. The territories can be spaced out and unique. The journey can be long, but no one said it had to be boring. ESO did an excellent job of this. You can literally go any direction and eventually run into a cool side quest with great, compelling stories and things to discover.
I dont think comparing New World to Ashes (eventual game) is really a good comparison. The only good I see from New World to learn is how not to be clueless about what you are making and that good visuals can get you a lot of suckers. New World is like an experiment in showing everyone how not to make a game. Any regular gamer could have advised Amazon Studios better then whatever clown they had designing the game, which is mind blowing.
Another case of a big "AAA" developer turning a good game design into casual filth to hit a wider audience. I think by this point is is well documented that the big game development companies are only capable of producing garbage.
Hopefully Steven and Intrepid stay true to their principles and we get the game we've been waiting for.
There is an intention you can pvp in town aswell. They covered that in a 2020 livestream for ashes.
Roads
Let me ask you, what is the point of roads if they DO NOTHING. Roads will attract players (cuz its a movespeed buff everybody wants). Roads will attract targets/victims. It's a risk reward thing.
Trading posts linked
This I agree with. Albion is just proof that separate markets work.
Forced PvP
Casuals carry games. That is REALITY. AoC is already gated by a sub. Can you support the game when you drive away the casuals? Why would anyone pay a sub to be forced into something they dont want to do? On a F2P game you can excuse it because no one is forcing casuals to pay a sub. That's the same mentality that crippled the comics industry. MMORPG's are already in dire straits and "hardcore PvP" games are in a worse situation. Look no further than Crowfall with its abysmally low population. It is the smaller scale version of AoC and yet with its smaller scale there aren't enough players to fight.
I think the only way Steven holds his ground, is if they go in with the knowledge and expectation that their player base suffer for not catering to the more casual crowd. If they can deal with losing the bulk of the launch players and hype players and stick to their guns as they watch the numbers drop, then they might pull it off.
I think if they're able to maintain the game successfully with like 50-150k active players then they'll be good. But if they're expecting more than that to stick around, I think it is highly unlikely. I expect 200 to 250k active players in a best case scenario situation. If they went the more casual route they'd likely see numbers 3 or 4 times higher if not more.
All assuming the game doesn't just end up sucking of course.
the whole node and caravan system would be irrelevant if the trading post/AH went global. So I doubt that would eventuate. As for NW 10% speed on roads…meh, probably a reasonable buff in a game with limited speed/travel options… I think that game still has terminal issues and an identity crisis beyond the patch scrambles.. Steven has a vision and he's bank rolled 30million so pretty sure he's making his game regardless of casual normie plebs complaining.
I think the fact that Steven has final say, that its his money that went into the game, and that he doesn't have room of suites telling him he needs to back down will make all the difference. I think that he'll budge on some things, make some subtle changes for things that the player base wants (in development) but I also believe that he realizes who his core players are and will stick to his and the studio's vision and what has been decided as the 'core principles' thru the development phase. The casual player will come and go at the drop of a hat….its poor business practice to alienate your consumer base, in favor of continually throwing carrots to the mob.
Hopefully they wont have to change anything like You said. Thanks
I think Steven will hold on the big concepts and not change his vision. I believe he will find some mechanics that exist in game to appeal to a casual audience designed for them. The only problem is, there will still be complainers, always.
Theme park vs sandbox. That's the debate. Steven has called this a sand park game. That means they will have to compromise to find the sweet spot. Does that mean fast travel everywhere and no immersion? No, but you don't want the hardcore nature of the game to become a barrier for entry. Does that mean low level PVP flagging becomes optional? Does that mean naked fast travel between cities with a long cool down so new players can find their find their friends without having to run 5 hours across the map? Does that mean faster travel on roads, boats, and in caravans to facilitate more incentive to trade and more player interaction? Does that mean loot timers on low level materials to insure that new players don't quit after killing a bunch of salamanders only to find that every time they do a faster player jumps in and steals the loot?
We don't know what the problems and issues will be. Ashes must have the ability to change and adapt or it will turn into small groups of disgruntled hardcore players running around in trying to find someone to kill in an empty world. Because of the nature of the node system servers cannot be merge. Some will inevitably die. So it's up to Steven to listen and make changes while still holding true to the core philosophy of the game. From what I have seen while playing the alpha I believe Steven and his team are up to the task.
I think they will be fine and it's because they have very good communication with the community. Everyone who follows Ashes, even casually, understands what this game is. New World changed the vision so many times and then was released with all this buzz, a lot of players went in not understanding what the game was or why it was the way it was.
I feel they'll do it by looking at the number more then the complain. They might have to compromise on some stuff if it just doesn't make sense once built. That's actually the core issue with a game such as Ashes. You have so many system that interact with each other that some are bound to fail. And so we have to keep an open mind about this, if every time someone is moving resources from one town to the next it takes 3 hours because the travel time is awful, they will likely have to make decision that may seems targeted to casual player but which has strictly been made for the enjoyment of the game. I mean catering to casual, in my opinion, is often mistaken with looking at your data. If you realize that most item looted aren't travelling more then one node over because there's an issue with the caravan system, you will have to do adjustment that will look like it is targeted at casual player. The question in my mind is how do you keep creating a massive interaction within the community while making adjustment.
If I take the point you made, briefly, about travel speed increasing 10% while on road. To me it is normal, travelling faster, I like it, you like it, everyone likes it. Making it slow doesn't help the experience. What does is making remote area more rewarding then the one close-by does and making sure remote area are an adventure to have with friend. So to me, if you want to travel faster when there's road it is amazing, but if you start creating road to reach every dungeons because it's convenient there's one issue. If I can revive everywhere… there's another issue, since remote no longer means anything either. If I have to move back to the last travel node if I can't be rezz… That's the hardmode I want ;), And honestly maybe it doesn't work flawlessly but at least the system make sure player have to rely on each other. System which are just hard for nothing usually end up being useless, and I do believe you've met some while preping for your next video ! 🙂 In my mind the answer should always be inside the title of the genre, Massive Multiplayer Roleplaying Game