by Jeff Woleslagle on May 06, 2009
Welcome to the 1,073rd Edition of Loading...
Loading... is the premier daily MMORPG news and commentary newsletter, only from Ten Ton Hammer.
Though it's still early, we've seen something of a buzz over Runic Games action-RPG styled Torchlight, the spiritual successor to Mythos (which met an uncertain fate under Hanbitsoft when Flagship folded). In the first in-depth interview we've seen, Max Schaefer reveals Runic's overarching plan for the game - that it will be released as a single player game first, followed by a "true MMO" more than 18 months later. We'll read between the lines of this interesting interview to discover what amounts to a financing scheme that may work for gamers and the game developer alike. That plus EVE correspondent The Mittani spins an incredible tale on the power of email and the convenient interpretation of facts in his latest Sins of a Solar Spymaster column, an exclusive Perfect World Intl. dev diary explores the Genie system, and we have Ten Ton Hammer guides galore in Loading... Operation Torchlight!
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The Pulse
You vote with what you view at Ten Ton Hammer, and the result is the Ten Ton Pulse (What is Pulse?).
Here's today's top 5 Pulse results for today:
World of Warcraft EverQuest 2 Age of Conan Warhammer Online Vanguard: Saga of HeroesBiggest Movers in the Top 20 today :
Ultima Online (down 3 to #16) Star Wars Galaxies (down 2 to #9) Lego Universe (UP 2 to #13)Loading... Daily
Plenty of ex-Flagship fans and hopefuls were shocked and disturbed when Hanbitsoft made like Miyazaki and spirited away the Mythos license to development at San Francisco-based Redbana, from whom we haven't had a peep aside from an assortment of high level job postings. Yet Runic Games, crewed largely with castaways from the Flagship's sinking, knew a good thing when they developed it, and are incorporating the Dungeon Siege / Diablo action-RPG styling into their marquee project, Torchlight.
The first real interview on Torchlight was posted yesterday at Gamasutra, and it's clear that Runic isn't stopping the innovation train at gameplay unique to MMOs. Chief among Torchlight's eyebrow-knitting notions is that the game will be released as a single-player game more than 18 months before the full MMO is released. Add another year to that 18 months and you'd have the same timeframe between when Warcraft 3 and WoW was launched. Unlike Torchlight's setup, were separate games, so we'll graciously spot Blizz a year and note that it took WoW much longer than 18 months to get out the door. But, in any case, why shouldn't another game developer imitate WoW for a change?
But I have three admittedly early objections to an 18 month MMO incubation period. One: though I have no psychological studies to back this, I'll assert that most of your gameplay habits are formed within, say, a year of launch. By the time any kind of overarching multiplayer comes along, will people be willing to relearn the game? Is such a move more likely to enhance or ruin their initial experience?
Two, I can count on one hand the number of single player games that have kept my interest for 18 months. It's not impossible, and goodness knows that if there's any gaming genre that's produced a disproportionate number of classics, it's the isometric-perspective action-RPG (in addition to the two mentioned above, I'd toss Neverwinter Nights and Dawn of War into that category). And three, the end product sounds more like a multiplayer or heavily instanced dungeon crawler than a persistent world-based MMO. That's completely fine, but I'd like to hear more about what will Torchlight a "true MMO" rather than a lobby-instance style game, and a free-to-play microtransactions model alone doesn't count. The tenor of this interview is eerily reminiscent of those during another game's concept phase. That particular game tried to tack a revenue model onto a hub-and-instance game and call it an MMO, but hopefully Runic's ex-Flagship designers learned a lesson or two from Hellgate: London. But that's for another interview.
This interview with Max Schaefer , while enthusiastic, wide-reaching, and as in-depth as promised, has more lurking in between the lines than in the words, quips, and quotes. I admire any developer of quality games that attempts to make money in new (and ethical) ways, but the single player side of the game sounds more like a hedge against the potentially mammoth costs of developing an MMO. Should it flop: show's over, and at least you have yourself a single-player game to show for it. If it succeeds, you have a huge revenue influx to propel MMO development forward. It's brilliant, actually, and I'm surprised that the games business-oriented Gamasutra folks didn't run with that angle.
Looking forward to Torchlight? What did you think of this interview?You have the ball in the Loading... forum, or send me an email!
Shayalyn's Epic Thread of the Day7 new MMOG hand-crafted articles today! 15 in May! 542 in 2009!
New MMOG Articles At Ten Ton Hammer Today [Thanks Phil Comeau for links and Real World News]
EVE Online: Sins of a Solar Spymaster #10 - Bastard's BluffHot Content - Or, what I took a fancy to:
Fallen Earth - Exclusive: A Front Row Seat to the Apocalypse Part 2 Champions Online: Powers Preview Champions Online: Character Creation System Preview Guild Wars: Fourth Anniversary Event Recap geeked: Make Love, Not Warcraft Perfect World International "Age of Spirits" Dev Preview geeked: Not Kid-Friendly IPs vs. Originality - Which is Better? Premium Content: Running the Marathon - Funcom's Journey of Change Free Realms to Become Everybody's Second Subscription?Real World News
Famed Nefertiti bust is a fake, claims expertThanks for visiting the Ten Ton Hammer network!
-Jeff "Ethec" Woleslagle and the Ten Ton Hammer team