Will SOE be ready for 500,000 players? - Page 5

Sledgecrushr · 2012-07-19, 11:13 AM

To me the trailer teaser is fantastic. Wait till they show the full trailer on tv..around the world. Day one they might kick off with more than a million downloads.

Xyntech · 2012-07-19, 11:25 AM

How many players and how much money does Planetside 2 have to get before SOE keep Higby and TRay on as permanent indentured developers who will never get a weekend off ever again?

Marsgrim · 2012-07-19, 11:53 AM

I said this before, but the manner of gauging numbers via marketing or political polls applies here.

When you have 70,000 people liking the game on facebook that probably represents 1 in 20 or 1 in 50 who are interested in the game and went to the effort of linking it to facebook.

MrKWalmsley · 2012-07-19, 11:54 AM

Originally Posted by KTNApollo

So many people in here saying "this isn't WoW or LoL" and "I'd be surprised if 100,000 people played this game consistently"...So you're saying you expect the game to fail? Nice! Great outlook there guys.

This is a FREE TO PLAY game. Free to play means nobody will have a reason to not try it. SW:TOR costed $60 to play, and it had well over 500,000 on the first week. PS2 is free to play, and thus a lot more than 500,000 will try the game within the first week.

Yes? Diablo 3 wasn't ready for 4,000,000 players. D3 was ready for 500,000, but not 4,000,000.

First of all, expecting PS2 to not reach the heights of WoW and LoL does not equal fail. Just like every single film that does not equal the height of the film industry at the time does not make them failures. Learn the fact that the "success-to-failure" chart is not an absolute binary system, it has degrees.

Secondly, comparing Swtor (a classic-style MMO with a substantial marketing campaign, a large group of SWG players looking for a newer version and based in such an iconic universe with an instantly recognisable name for a large proportion of the world) with PS2 (a fresh style of MMO without even a nearly comparable marketing campaign, with a relatively niche fan-base and being based in a universe which very few outside the fan-base have even heard of) is pretty damn disingenuous. Also F2P tends to put off the more snooty players instantly, which unfortunately make up too much of the gaming community already.

MrBloodworth · 2012-07-19, 12:00 PM

You know, I read the OP and it reads to me he is asking if SOE are prepared to support, with hardware and bandwidth ETC.., a large number of players.

It was not asking how popular Planetside would be.

MrKWalmsley · 2012-07-19, 12:07 PM

Originally Posted by MrBloodworth

You know, I read the OP and it reads to me he is asking if SOE are prepared to support, with hardware and bandwidth ETC.., a large number of players.

It was not asking how popular Planetside would be.

Yes but since it did come up there's no reason not to respond to it.

Xyntech · 2012-07-19, 12:16 PM

Originally Posted by MrBloodworth

You know, I read the OP and it reads to me he is asking if SOE are prepared to support, with hardware and bandwidth ETC.., a large number of players.

It was not asking how popular Planetside would be.

Right, but there is some overlap.

It's a matter of expectations. Not how popular PS2 will be, but how popular it will be compared to how popular SOE thinks it will be.

Right now, I'm assuming that SOE knows a little more accurately what to expect the numbers to be than we do, but I don't think they know much more accurately than us.

As beta goes on and as more people learn about the game heading towards launch, I think they'll start getting a better idea. It wouldn't shock me if they had more players than they were ready for at launch, but considering what they've learned from DCUO's F2P launch, I think that they'll tend to be more prepared than not.

Maybe they'll use an open beta time to act as a buffer. It's mostly pointless to have an open beta on a F2P game, but they could use the "beta" excuse to avoid criticism of not having enough servers at launch. That, or they could go Firefall's or Tribes Ascend's route and have a soft release, where they start giving out beta invites more and more freely until one day the game is just officially out of beta.

We're still a long ways off from the end of beta though, so whether or not SOE has a good idea of how many players they could expect to have if they somehow launched a completed game today is somewhat irrelevant. The number is going to change over time as more people find out about the game.

We'll have to see how the hype looks after the full trailer is released.

The Degenatron · 2012-07-19, 12:21 PM

I'm predicting...ONE BILLION!

Hamma · 2012-07-19, 12:22 PM

Nobody can truly be 100% ready for a massive influx. But they sure as hell can try their best

Oryon22 · 2012-07-19, 12:25 PM

Originally Posted by Hamma

Nobody can truly be 100% ready for a massive influx. But they sure as hell can try their best

Even with these tech tests, I'm still bracing for some server issues at launch. It will suck, but at least I know there is a great interest, and plentiful targets

Figment · 2012-07-19, 12:38 PM

Originally Posted by Landtank

Lol that idea is so bad.

I would never, ever. in a million years even suggest making two of the same continent on one server, that thread sums up why it is a terrible idea. You won't have to fight on doubles anyways, what are you talking about?

No, instead you'll fight on THE SAME CONTINENT on 50 servers.

What's the difference?

Or do you have access to secret servers and continents where you get to play on more than the same continent when you're poplocked out of your own server? Meaning you'll always have to fight on the same three continents. What's it to you that it's officially on the same server?

And why don't you like playing with your buddies who didn't get locked out of your own server? Hmm? Besides, all the continents will be continues instances that hardly affect each other when full.

It's not 6,000 per server, its around 6,500 active and more likely than not 10,000 registered per server.

Just because you talk about registered users and I talk about ACTIVE users per server doesn't mean we're talking about different numbers. Sheesh. Besides, I'm suggesting approximately 30K capacity per server, just to make sure it's easier to add new servers and receive loads of people again without having to merge unevenly in the future.

And actually, with this many players, we may well be talking about everyone being registered with the company and having to server hop for a position.

Anyways, that thread is dead for good reason.

Yeah. Half agreed, half didn't, but since we couldn't do much more with it till beta than wait, there was little point to debate further. That's a good reason to postpone debate.

Don't think that because half didn't agree and half did, there's a concensus that it was a good or bad idea.

I don't think it will end up being too much of a problem, they know more about this then we do so I'm not worried.

I'm sure there's no other game before that underestimated the amount of servers and server stress upon launch and that their fanbase was certain their devs had things under control!

"Ignorance is bliss" ("nobody knows, it must be fine!"), was that written specifically for you?

Originally Posted by Xyntech

Maybe they'll use an open beta time to act as a buffer. It's mostly pointless to have an open beta on a F2P game, but they could use the "beta" excuse to avoid criticism of not having enough servers at launch. That, or they could go Firefall's or Tribes Ascend's route and have a soft release, where they start giving out beta invites more and more freely until one day the game is just officially out of beta.

Is that viable if you consider Pro7 will eventually take up a lot of players on their own servers?

Which beckons another question: will Pro7 be ready for the amount of people?

SleepyZombie · 2012-07-19, 12:55 PM

Originally Posted by OnexBigxHebrew

This. As a non-vet with no life's work at stake, I can tell you that this game is quietly hyping up, but what my gaming friends know of PS2 almost entirely comes from me hyping it. The game is not really as anticipated By the general population as it is by most of the vets and new players in the community like myself. This game hasn't gotten a lot of coverage outside of MMO sites yet. I do, however, expect things to change, and while I don't have the false view that this game will derail the AAA fps market in any way, I do think this game and its F2P model have the potential to spawn an entirely new and large genre of games.

Basically I think PS2 has the potential to be successful and great for the industry and the ball is in SOE's court atm.

Hey I completely agree.... Planetside 1 was kind of a cult followed game that didn't have the most successful launch in the world. I think people will tend to give planetside 2 more of a shake because of its free 2 play model.

Me personally I am glad for the lack of general population hype, It takes the pressure off the devs and people don't get there expectations to such a huge level it could never live up to. So I think free 2 play is the wave of online gaming future and that ps2 is off the general populations radar are things this game has going for it and I genuinely hope SOE does well with this game because they have such a poor track record with others.

Xyntech · 2012-07-19, 12:59 PM

The argument for having multiple copies of continents at launch is also partially dependent on populations peaking at launch and staying steady or going down afterwards. If the populations keep growing over time (as has been the case with many F2P games), then adding more continents may end up being the solution instead of adding more servers, and not require any server mergers at all.

So yes, it is far too early for that discussion to matter much, and it probably won't be an important discussion until well after launch, when we actually see whether the populations are going up, staying level, or going down.

But it's still a kind of lame solution. I don't think that sever mergers will have nearly as bad of a stigma in a F2P game which still has dozens of servers after some mergers, especially if SOE is smart with some press releases and points out that the populations are still high and are being accommodated on more continents while on less servers.

Players understand that going to a different server means the same landmasses in a different state of persistence, but if you had a bunch of dupes of the same continents all pretending to coexist in the same "world," it's just going to feel lame and tacky and unfinished.

There is plenty of time to evolve the global strategy, and some potential ideas don't even require more than 3 continents to implement, so I really think the duplicate continents would do more harm than good.

We've already got 6000 people spread across one Planetside 2 server, which is more than the original ever had playing on a single server. We may as well see how that plays out before trying to artificially bump it up to 12,000.

Landtank · 2012-07-19, 01:14 PM

Originally Posted by Figment

No, instead you'll fight on THE SAME CONTINENT on 50 servers.

What's the difference?

Or do you have access to secret servers and continents where you get to play on more than the same continent when you're poplocked out of your own server? Meaning you'll always have to fight on the same three continents. What's it to you that it's officially on the same server?

And why don't you like playing with your buddies who didn't get locked out of your own server? Hmm? Besides, all the continents will be continues instances that hardly affect each other when full.

Just because you talk about registered users and I talk about ACTIVE users per server doesn't mean we're talking about different numbers. Sheesh. Besides, I'm suggesting approximately 30K capacity per server, just to make sure it's easier to add new servers and receive loads of people again without having to merge unevenly in the future.

And actually, with this many players, we may well be talking about everyone being registered with the company and having to server hop for a position.

Yeah. Half agreed, half didn't, but since we couldn't do much more with it till beta than wait, there was little point to debate further. That's a good reason to postpone debate.

Don't think that because half didn't agree and half did, there's a concensus that it was a good or bad idea.

I'm sure there's no other game before that underestimated the amount of servers and server stress upon launch and that their fanbase was certain their devs had things under control!

"Ignorance is bliss" ("nobody knows, it must be fine!"), was that written specifically for you?

You think far too highly of yourself if you think that you know more about this game than the developers.

People are complaining about how not having enter/exit animations feels unfinished, so you want them to play on continents that are clones of themselves, basically taking away the point of the game, just so they can boost server populations? They can just merge servers when they add continents, or "gasp" go back to the PS1 system.

I understand what you're saying with your system, and I see the advantages its has, but the disadvantages are simply too high. A proper system would need to be worked out.

Anyways. In terms of netcode and server capacity and whether or not they will be able to handle it, SOE has been dealing with 12 million accounts on Everquest II, so they have far more experience than anyone on this forum in terms of F2P MMO games.

Figment · 2012-07-19, 02:15 PM

Originally Posted by Landtank

You think far too highly of yourself if you think that you know more about this game than the developers.

I never said that, did I? I simply provided an alternative. Though on particular in-game elements, I'm quite sure I and many others have more experience, sure

Designers are not omniscient gods but humans. Besides, working on something can create group tunnelvision, complacency, bias, etc. as well. Worked with many design students who got completely caught in their own vision, while missing the obvious and at times dismissed my analyses as "you think too hard about that, I'm sure it's not going to be a problem and otherwise we'll fix that later" (sound familiar?). First thing mentors say when they see the result?

"Why didn't you think of that?"

Yeah... why didn't they...

Better safe than sorry. That's the point of feedback and alternatives: provide knowledge they MAY not have access to and alternatives they MAY not have thought about and let them decide. At least if they do, you know they at least considered it. Or completely ignored feedback because they thought they knew better and it would be alright. *cough*Phantasm12mm*cough*

http://forums.station.sony.com/ps/po...id=88000012392

Threads like the above wouldn't have existed had they listened to the critical "bittervets" in the threads that came before it went live.

http://www.planetside-universe.com/s...t=25087&page=4

Guess what type of players made sure it reached live with a gun?

"It'll be fiiiiine, I'm sure the devs will be on top of this!". And you see how in the end the majority of people were idiots for trusting devs implicitly. Devs make a lot of sweet things happen, but they do mess up. Regularly.

And often it's in the overlooked details that completely change everything. :/ In case of the Phant it was assumptions you could use AA on them (turned out lock on AA didn't apply), that it'd be a light aircraft (turned out to have armour of a Liberator), that it'd decloak upon firing (turned out to only slightly decloak), that the gun couldn't really be used for farming or solo and would be more like the Wasp gun (turned out to be an accurate pilot gun) and that it'd be visible from up close (turned out to not be the case, only if they're moving or got bugged after being hit).

People are complaining about how not having enter/exit animations feels unfinished, so you want them to play on continents that are clones of themselves, basically taking away the point of the game, just so they can boost server populations? They can just merge servers when they add continents, or "gasp" go back to the PS1 system.

They already took away the "point of the game" the moment the footholds were implemented as sanctuaries, so sorry, can't take credit for that. If they clearly provide disclaimers and plans for those continents and give a thorough reasoning on why it's solved in a particular way, then people wouldn't really care much about it. It's not like they could fight on other continents instead anyway. I understand your point and it's not ideal, but neither is introducing continents one by one if you for instance want to go for a larger lattice at some point or try that out.

I also wouldn't mind if there were only trial servers for different conquest meta game systems though. Do think it would help to see how a bigger server could be made stable and different mechanics could be tested on a larger scale than the "small" servers. Which would you guess would be more popular, the bigger with a global lattice meta game, or the smaller servers with "instanced" single continents?

I understand what you're saying with your system, and I see the advantages its has, but the disadvantages are simply too high. A proper system would need to be worked out.

Of course it'd be much, much better to never get to this point, but they intend to release an unfinished game anyway, regardless of how beta plays out. :/ Again, that's not my choice and we're going to have to deal with that.

Anyways. In terms of netcode and server capacity and whether or not they will be able to handle it, SOE has been dealing with 12 million accounts on Everquest II, so they have far more experience than anyone on this forum in terms of F2P MMO games.

http://www.soe.com/status/

Of course they have experience with running multiple servers. That wasn't the question. The question of the OP was whether they will have adequate and accurate expectations of the numbers coming in and have enough stable servers ready by that time. Beta will already require a large amount of servers, so will the European servers (and I do wonder how the European beta will relate to the American beta with regards to Pro7 - could well be they will use the EU beta test to make Pro7 familiar with "the controls").

Either way, I'm sure the kind of things thathappened when D3, CoD MW3 and BF3 were launched want to be avoided. If EA and Blizzard can't have accurate expectancies and severe issues on launch with their primary titles, you honestly think SOE would be an exception? I hope they took those launches as warnings.

Of course we all hope SOE prepared excessively and have sufficient (over)capacity. But if you never raise the question IF they did and trust they'll sort things out... They might just be underestimating own success.

Hell, they may even simply have issues with the client download! (They should probably create many more download sites than just from their own webby).

Either way, the Initial experiences are going to go in the first "hands on" reviews. Those will be providing the first impression for the game to many still unaware of PS2. You don't want people (who missed out and haven't been convinced so far) hear about it through reports on massive connection issues!

The world of "free to play" as of yet has to prove they can be quality games, certainly on a large scale and for the FPS genre. Having issues at launch might actually reflect on the game as amateuristic or subpar, simply because it's f2p and relatively unknown (may not either, of course - but how many players already get turned off because they have yet to hear of a good f2p FPS game? They can't quite live off the credit the title has yet).