Expectations for the Final Wipe

I have grand expectations for the final wipe.

1. Having fun in a persistent world, roleplaying, building up my character, exploring, watching the game get better month over month. Even though the game isn't finished and we're not officially launching, I'm going to be officially playing. It's been a long wait, but I'm just as excited today as I was three years ago.

2. Higher claimed property population than active player population. The game is not finished, we've had no advertising, the "reviews" are mixed, and general player expectations are all over the map. I think it's likely that we'll get thousands of people showing up, but unlikely we'll get ten's of thousands of people showing up for the final wipe. That said, we'll get far more than we ever have before, and that will give us a lot of potential (perhaps the best chance we've ever had) to grow the active player base.

3. The future looks bright. I've been around the development of this game from the beginning, I know roughly how much improvement the developers are capable of adding in a months time. But I've learned that they often work on pieces and parts over 3 or 6 months time before the real value of those things comes into view. After the final wipe, I believe we'll begin to see a host of improvements that will slowly add cohesion to the game that simply doesn't exist today. It will be very interesting to see how many people "retry" or "come back" to the game towards the beginning of next year. My guess is that by the time the developers are ready to promote the game, advertise, and officially launch, word of mouth will have already spread.

 

I expect (/hope for):

1. A higher percentage of homes that are well decorated, heck, even decorated would be nice. People are tired of doing it and redoing it, but this time it's for real.

2. People won't be able to say "Once final wipe come <insert doomsday prediction here>". Of course, that will become "Once release comes..." (tongue-in-cheek - don't flame me).

3. A lot of dormant players coming back in and a lot of new backers coming in for the first time.

4. That landrush: the tears, the drama. Do I hear popcorn popping

Astor

 

If only tiny violins were in-game for the land rush.

 

:/ I'm going to have to wait until I get the lot deeds I need post-wipe. Or until the rental system, so I can rent on someone else's lot.
Also going to have a lot of trouble getting people to move in to the POT post-wipe, because the entry location is still on the opposite side of the island. So the whole POT will be on hold until they provide us more tools.

I guess its an encouragement for me to get a lot in an NPC city in the meantime, though I'm wondering if there will be any left available.

 

Reviews mixed is kinda funny... We have around 2/3 of people unsatisfied with the current state and development direction of the product.
To come back from this is real hard PR work, and game needs some major overhaul.

I expect the game to be quite empty after a couple of month, if changes are further pushed back.

Most POTs will be graveyards nevertheless, because player base is very small.

Up until launch in Dec. game might have more direction and more complete and working features/balance/sand in the box
Might start to see more people coming back giving it another chance if reviews get better.

My concern is what to do with all those empty pots cluttering up the world map. Once you have people coming back but the POT owners quit the game for good... what are you doing with them?

I wouldn't be surprised to see a relaunch of the game at some point if the game cannot be commercially sustained.

I would hope for a complete rebalance or change to the skills system.
More viable playstyles.
Meaningful PVP with factions, risk vs reward etc. Guild Warfare and Politics fueled through ingame mechanics.
But I think it can't be done in time for "final wipe"

 

(Ducking)...... I expect some disappointment as the final final wipe looms. Sorry, just had to re-up my prediction from a couple months ago. I really do not think that the CTD issue will be resolved anytime soon. I understand the arguments maintaining that a second final wipe will not be required, but do not agree. Best laid plans usually go south. In this case I desperately hope I am wrong. As to my expectations for the final wipe, I can't wait. I think balance issues will foment for a bit around skill gain speed, PVP mechanics and loot drops. Crafting balance issues will persist for awhile. That said, POT building will be a blast for owners, home decorating, and events will also be much more enjoyable. Guild growth and planning will take off and NPC interaction will be much better. I do not know what to think about story line or single player offline.

 

Me too...

+ Collecting $100 in Store Credit from @BDF

 

I'm looking forward to final wipe for persistence and the end of the land rush so I can get my player-owned towns up and running. Other than that, I'm mainly looking forward to official release and hopefully a more enjoyable gameplay experience overall by then.

 

I'm not worried about that. I think we'll have a lively first weekend.

 

My expectation after the Final wipe will be another oops... sorry because of <insert valid reason here> we will have to do a complete wipe

 

I give that a less than 1% chance of occurring. Will there be roll backs? Yes. But an additional wipe that causes there to be a new land rush, a complete reset of character stats, and the lost trust of their most loyal fans? No way.

 

A fully playable, fun experience that is representative of the final game and worth the full price and the ingame currency.

 

Ugh, remember when in UO you could chill around Brit graveyard until like 7am (central) trying to milk being on and PKing people until the servers went down that day? And then you were rolled back to where you were before. So sad... yet so fun

 

Can anybody please explain me where this fear of another wipe comes from?
I honestly don't get it. Did i miss something?

 

People hate disappointment, so they use cynicism and negativity as a form of inoculation.

 

Or they know how it went with other games that only had a niche audience and rebooted to become successful in the end... Srsly another wipe cannot be ruled out... Read the EULA.

 

A giant care package full of goodies when I plop down my home on my forever lot I hope . Inside , a great big Welcome Banner and magic broom to sweep away all the dust bunnies.

 

theres gonna be resources to harvest in them, from what i understand. Perhaps without monsters guarding them, but that last part is speculation

These are schedualed before release, except for factions, but not before final wipe. PvP with risk vs reward is already in to a degree, and im not sure what you mean by more viable playstyles. You can currently play lots of ways successfully in-game. The only playstyle i've seen that's limited is solo-pvp because of the air magic bugs

 

Yeah that maybe true but...so waht?
Don't get me wrong, i really can't see tthe issue here.

 

I'd say there's a participation threshold that should be considered. If final wipe comes and goes and less than XX percentage of deed holders actually claim lots in-game... that gives Portalarium some wriggle room for another full wipe without much push back. Or maybe sets them up for an incremental wipe, whereas everyone that participated in the rush, groups 1-90, may keep their claimed lots... group 91 gets reset and we all rush again.