That was a pretty bold (and stupid) claim for Trion to make, Rift at the beginning was pretty solid- it was fun, dungeons were interesting, the lore was okay despite a very generic starting area that will be the same no matter how many characters you make. The thing that hit me with Rift though- is none of it was very memorable. Everything about the overall atmosphere felt bland- start off in regular_forest, then move onto spider_forest (which was cool), then generic_totally_not_searing_gorge, and onto whatever that purple place was called.
The actual rift system was pretty cool, but it never felt like anything more to me than a WoW-clone with a gimmick. Not really trying to harsh on Rift- I had enjoyable moments in that game; and probably some of the better battlegrounds I've seen in modern MMOs, it just never felt like anything more than that. MMOs as we know it aren't exactly doing well in the test of time, outside of a company with literally millions of dollars to throw at their title (WoW/FFXIV) and games with a ravenous fanbase that will never stop playing them (EQ/EQ2), everything else is steadily dying off.
I don't get why everyone still gets so uppity about that shit. It's a jab at the top dog, welcome to what every a lot of brands coming from unknown companies do. They take swipes at the biggest dog to help get them noticed.
As you said, the threw the gauntlet. But I've never seen anyone outside the most obnoxious of hardcore rift fanboys and salty WoW fans call it a "WoW killer", and even the fanboys stopped that shit early on when it was very obvious that while Rift was a huge success for Trion, it was never going to challenge WoW in terms of success.
Alright folks, we're getting a bit off-topic. Let's keep discussion on Rift, and productive. Thanks.
Honestly I imagine Trove will become their new cash cow now since it's the most popular of the Trion library. Although even if they did shut down this game at this point it wouldn't be dying with dignity after how awful it's become.
Is it even possible for an MMO to "die with dignity" ?
I only see two ways MMOs shut down... either they fail to grab an audience at launch and cut bait and run when the costs outweigh any potential income....
or they DO attract an audience.... but after a point that audience dwindles to a point where it can only finance basic life support... and after a point, not even that.
I suppose Ragnarok Online ended up with a slightly different way, in that their owner decided it was a profitable "advertisement" for themselves even if it was "completely free"... but even then, isn't that pretty much the same as life support ?
Every mildly or better hyped MMO that has been released since WoW came out has been donned the WoW killer. Anyone with half a brain knows the only WoW killer will be WoW/Blizzard itself.
"A very generic starting area that will be the same no matter how many characters you make."
- WoW, still has generic starting areas and is the king of mmos. Practically every mmo out the starting areas are bland.
"none of it was very memorable."
- Well, that is one persons opinion while others like myself disagree. I remember back in Alpha seeing a rift for the very 1st time I was amazed at how awesome the graphics were and the cool solo challenge it was. The pretty cool puzzles you got to do were pretty memorable. I could run the raids/dungeons 24/7 and not get bored. I could go on and on.
"atmosphere felt bland..."
- Any mmo where the leveling path is linear falls into this category, not just Rift. WoW, each race had their own 2 starting areas or could go to another race' starting area and follow their path but, all in all it was pretty much the same. Once you leveled through the 1st couple zones it was the same zones to level in for each class. Sure, now it's different but, not for the longest time. Wildstar was somewhat linear which was nice. GW2 is really the only non-linear option out there and has dynamic events.
I still to this day love the talent system applied in Rift.
I'll love Rift even after it officially has it's doors closed.
Except in WoW you at least have racial starting areas and different cities, Rift is literally exactly the same.
It's actually the shared opinion of 45-50 people that all left Rift to play (some bad game, then ultimately) WoW. The game has a small wet spot in the bottom of the barrel that used to be it's player population. I don't think it's conjecture to say that most people have moved on past Rift to other games at this point, sure there's still a seemingly loyal fan base in there, but I hardly doubt it's concurrent user counts are breaking 100k, let alone 10k.
I've played damn near every MMO launched since UO/Ascheron's Call (I skipped Aion and Tera, just not my thing); I have very enjoyable memories from all of them. Except Rift. Yeah, this is just my opinion, but outside of that one expert dungeon with the spike floor that was the bane of pugs in the games early days and the toilet bowl boss in drowned halls. That's all I really remember.
It had potential, for sure.
It just kind of belly flopped as the game floundered between it's B2P => P2Win/F2P => B2Whatever stages.
Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed early RIFT, I did. I just don't remember anything separating it from the rest of games that never really made it.
Last edited by Mercane; 2017-03-16 at 01:18 AM.
Yes and those starting areas haven't changed, they're still the same bland leveling areas. WoW has too many cities as it is and they all have the same bs. It would be 1 thing if each city had a few niches to make people go to them but they don't. Vanilla (Darnassus/TB) were always ghost towns. TBC made you still go back to a major city for auction house & talent stuff until later in the game when they added those to Scryer/Darnassus Inn NPCs which by that time TBC was no longer current. WoTLK Dalaran was the same thing as Shattrath, you still had to go to a major city for an AH (except for engineers). You get my drift. You can have 5 million cities in a game, if they're never used they're a waste.
Pretty sure those 45-50 people don't make up the whole player base. Sure most people probably have moved on but, to try and say every one feels a specific way about the game is wrong. I feel the way I do and I haven't played the game in ages. I was heavily into WoW when Rift was in alpha then became friends with 1 of the graphic engineers and he got me into alpha and I veered away from WoW and was extremely immersed with Rift. I took quite a few breaks from the game but, my love for it has never depleted. It's like those that love WoW unconditionally while others hate it and quit like myself. If I were to say WoW isn't memorable anymore there'd be people that would argue for it just as I did with Rift.
Yep, that's just your opinion. I never once would be like "ugh, not this dungeon again" in Rift like I've done in WoW so many countless times for every expansion. Only mmos that I've played are WoW, FF, GW2, SWTOR, Rift and ArcheAge. I couldn't stand to play FF more than like 30mins. I played GW2 and AA a bit but, very casually. Rift a ton early on. SWTOR a ton early on. I only ever really kept going back to WoW due to friends but, once all my friends left I've drifted further and further from it. The mmo I seem to play the most solo nowadays is SWTOR just bc of how much of a Star Wars fan I am but, even that I don't play much anymore. My memorable moments from WoW are from the vanilla & tbc days. SWTOR as much as I love Star Wars I can't really pinpoint memorable moments, it's all been enjoyable for the most part. Rift I never really had dull moments either.
All in all opinions are like asshole, everybody has one.
Actually this advert is what got me into Rift.
Those banners popped up everywhere, and I was like 'how dare you mock MY game! Fine I shall test out your pathetic beta access and then we'll see...oh... this... this I actually like. Hey wow guild: cya later!"
And I was hooked until nightmare tide. Best raiding experiences I've ever had.
Oh, I wasn't insinuating that they were (yay for quick ninja edits)- my whole guild in Rift went to WoW a bit after Storm Legion came out.
The more I think about it, the more I remember- my favorite things about Rift were essentially the zone puzzles and a toss up between the simon says boss (name I don't remember) and the toilet bowl boss in DH.
"We're not in Azeroth anymore"
If an advertisement tagline from over six years ago is still stuck in people's minds, consider it a job well done, here you all are six years later still talking about it.
There's very few ads that stick in my head after even a few months but stuff like "this ain't Pepsi" or "where's the beef?" still stick somehow
Anyhow even the head hocho said it was designed to get a good laugh:
Source: http://www.alistdaily.com/media/warc...or-says-trion/Trion’s Rift launched with an ad campaign tagline of “We’re not in Azeroth anymore.” While this might sound standoffish, Trion’s Scott Hartsman claims it mostly designed for a good laugh.
“For starters, I loved the campaign. When I first saw the campaign pitch I laughed my ass off. Very bluntly. We saw it and went, ‘Wow there’s no way we can do that. That means we have to do that’,” said Hartsman. “If people take it too literally and don’t take it as the well-intended humor it really is, it does invite people to go, ‘Oh well, if they re going to say that, then I’m going to make a checklist, and I’m going to go ding ding ding ding.”
Also if you're too young to even know where the original idea for the tagline came from.....
You are saying that as if it was a good thing... and it used to be just that...
but then they failed to deliver and now it's just a reminder of the utter failure it turned out to be.
I mean; You don't get to go out of your way to challange the biggest player, fail at beating him and then get the luxury of saying: "oh yeah guys, it was just a joke, i wasn't really trying." (And yes, i get the irony of my avatar ;p)
Not too young to remember, but it always meant "this world is more exciting/dangerous" even in the initial form, which it turned out not to be.
How is people speaking negatively about the game which is a majority in this forum a fucking good thing?
Also no in advertising you want the tagline/product to keep a positive effect even in the future on people. Rift's recent lack of quality has not done that at all.
Example. The Hilltop ad for Coca Cola kept a positive effect on people for years because it gave the idea of people coming together in unity and happiness rather than buying a Coke. But it still sold it's product because it focused on Coke. Rifts advertising campaign consists of barely anything these days other than half of the time viewbotted trailers and barely watched livestreams. Rift doesn't need an ad campaign right now either. It needs to get itself together and polish it's content along with removing it's borderline pay to win stuff.
Last edited by Eleccybubb; 2017-03-16 at 01:15 PM.