LotRo is a huge disappointment

I’ll tell you why: It has more elves and dwarves that loot and scoot their way up in levels, the exact same boring crud – just another lame fantasy clone in an already saturated market. When you’ve played one, you’ve played them all and there is zilch, nada, nothing groundbreaking about this game. It’s all the same – want a good versus evil story? Read the damn books – no one plays for the story, and if they say otherwise, they’re another hobbit loving idiot that will learn real fast how their precious reeks of mediocrity.

Welcome to the Thunderdome, where blanket generalizations like these shroud any new fantasy based mmogs because progression is based on levels and loot – it wasn’t the first nor will it be the last mmog either. There is a method to some madness and he who shall not post anymore but still does, doomcasts eMiddle Earth™ claiming it will have little staying power because it lacks innovative shiny and is filled with “gimmicks.”

I agree with some points, the “already seen” is sort of a disease that eats away at the jaded player - some vets want to experience that shock and awe again and it’s hard to replicate, so when another player versus experience fantasy derivative hits our desktops featuring the basics, it’s not revolutionary for us, but it is for first time mmog players and with this property there is huge untapped base (at least one million) out there waiting to be discovered. Those of us burnt out, it’s more about our mindsets rather than whether or not the game is actually good. Really, no non-fantasy based mmog is the savior - the best medicine is to move on and keep an open mind until finding something palatable.

I’ve done more than read forums and blogs - when sauntering around looking for famous hobbits to make a pass at, I ran into many super Lord of the Rings geeks who had never played a mmog before nor did they care about the comparisons being made to World of Warcraft, this was about their affinity to Tolkien and if they were comparing anything it was to the books. Mostly, they were having a blast, a lot of these new players aren’t going to post on forums either. The forum collective represent a very small fragment, but it’s true, most discussion about the beta on various forums tends to be positive, but as for his point about the hype being centered around “gimmicks” - that’s a very superficial argument.

On subscription retention, I address the same theory Abalieno mentions. I believe each game has its own potential, their own projections to strive towards, while they may not have that market penetration and super growth the one juggernaut controls, each one can expand over time and their growth is relative to their own exposure.

How do we find out LOTRO’s projections? The best way is to gauge the beta signups. Turbine claims over 1 million players have signed up through this flash banner ad that is manipulatable, it’s a lie; try it out for yourself. 300k is mentioned elsewhere on the site and since there aren’t enough beta servers to support a million players this sounds like more of a reasonable number and it is actually old - I estimate somewhere between 400-500k have signed up for the beta.

That’s a lot of beta sign ups, World of Warcraft had over 500k beta participants and has sold over 20 million boxes pre-TBC. Everquest sold somewhere between 6-7 million boxes, that included a boatload of expansions. There are a lot of players who tried World of Warcraft and didn’t stick around, same with both Everquest games, but they have been exposed - and it’s possible many will try LotRO and stick with that for one reason or another - you can’t count them out.

The big question is will LotRO take away 500k+ subscribers away from World of Warcraft? The answer is no, at least 15% of what they get (probably more) will have never played World of Warcraft. Will it take any? Sure, thousands - maybe 100k at the most. People will stop playing WoW because it’s no longer fun for them, LotRO won’t be a huge factor and I believe Blizzard will replace any subscribers that leave for LotRO. In the grand scheme of things it doesn’t matter. This isn’t about a subscription war, if LotRO gets 500k subs and retains that much for even a year it will be a wild success.

Codemasters is being a bit overly optimistic, must be getting their numbers from those nappy-headed (I stole your joke, Amber!) prognosticators; however, playing the guessing game is fun – I think LotRO will see 500k in NA/UK in a subscriptions after three months and I base this on a hell of a lot more than reading the forums for a couple of days and judging some screen shots or the first ten minutes in game, because I’m sure those ten minutes will tell me how much fun I can have with my friends, or what the end game and what the epic storyline will be like!

EDIT: Psssh. Overall, I like LotRO.