Scott Hartsman on Rift subs, Twinks and maybe cross faction play?

[Slipmat]

Seems an interesting interview with Scott Hartsman is in the April edition of "Game Informer" magazine, yes, those things printed on paper

Since there's no version online, just going to sum up the better points made

** When asked if the subscription base was larger now than before TOR, his reply was simply "Yes". **

** When asked about level locking creating Twinks, and what Trion thought of it, he replied that they are watching the situation and he doesn't feel it is a big problem atm. Not many folks doing it, and the gear in Rift isn't designed to make someone hugely overpowered at that level. However, if it did become a big problem then the way Rift's system is designed, they could split the brackets up by gear like they do 50 rank brackets **

** When asked about server population and possible mergers. The rest was basically "servers look pretty healthy right now"
and possibly alluding to cross faction gameplay? "I think some of the places that we can do better are communication across all players and letting all players play with other players, which are two of our big research projects over the next year.

In our perfect world, if I am a dude who is playing Rift and you are a dude who is playing Rift, we should be able to find a way to play together." **

**When asked why Rift didn't go Free to Play, he said that Rift is doing pretty well on its current system and basically they are happy where it's at. **

[Lathais]

Very interesting, especially about subs going up since SWTOR. I admit though I am one of those and know 3 others. 2 friends quit Rift to try SWTOR and went back, they drug me and my g/f with them. I am sure this happened to quite a few people as once they finally left WoW and decided they didn't like SWTOR they were looking at other options. Good sign for this game and hope it keeps up.

Obviously I cannot read the article but was wondering if it mentioned anything about a rumor I had heard. My friend told me that they are thinking about going public. Right now they are privately owned and is one of the reasons they are able to keep their sub numbers and things so tight, something I consider a good thing.

[Puremallace]

Obviously I cannot read the article but was wondering if it mentioned anything about a rumor I had heard. My friend told me that they are thinking about going public. Right now they are privately owned and is one of the reasons they are able to keep their sub numbers and things so tight, something I consider a good thing.

Massively had a article recently about them doing a possible IPO. Good catch Slipmat

[Acquiesce of Telara]

The Going Public bit was something discussed awhile back, and it's a fact. Don't remember if it was explained in the same post about them securing an additional 100 million bucks, but it was definitely a real thing.

[Edge-]

The Going Public bit was something discussed awhile back, and it's a fact. Don't remember if it was explained in the same post about them securing an additional 100 million bucks, but it was definitely a real thing.

Yeah, that was months ago. If I remember correctly, they said they were looking into it, but weren't looking to go public since they were doing very well and continuing to find additional investors.

Now I'm really curious as to what the sub numbers are. That and cross faction gameplay makes me happy, the more people to group with the better ^_^

[Tarien]

Are you a subscriber Slip? If so you can log into the gaminformer.com website, and maybe copy paste the interview?

[DeltrusDisc]

Yeah I too would like to see something more legitimate showing this. :P Maybe take a picture of the magazine and upload it or that may be against the law.... hmm. The sub #s part is really quite surprising to me, even considering how much I hated the game, we have to consider, it has three HUGE names backing it up: EA, Bioware, and oh, just um, STAR WARS.

[Puremallace]

Yeah I too would like to see something more legitimate showing this. :P Maybe take a picture of the magazine and upload it or that may be against the law.... hmm. The sub #s part is really quite surprising to me, even considering how much I hated the game, we have to consider, it has three HUGE names backing it up: EA, Bioware, and oh, just um, STAR WARS.

You can take my word. One thing that aggrivated the loving shit out of me since Rift launched outside of GW2 fans condemning this game to a certain doom was TOR fans trying to build their game on Rifts grave, so you better believe I was looking for clear evidence that they were wrong.

December 29th two weeks after TOR launched



February



Also lets look at the facts:
1. GW2 launch date still sometime Fall 2012?
2. No patch at all for WoW before August at the latest and no content patch between 4.3 to MOP
3. Mass Effect 3 was a dud
4. Modern Warfare 3 was shit and basically a map expansion pac to MW2
5. Rift content patches have not even remotely slowed down. If anything they are getting bigger.

[DeltrusDisc]

What happened to half the shards? =S

[Primalthirst]

They consolidated a few of the servers in mid January.
They're back down to the number they launched with, which was their original intent.

[DeltrusDisc]

5. Rift content patches have not even remotely slowed down. If anything they are getting bigger.

Frankly I get the feeling they have slowed down for new content, like lots of new content, but the patches are getting bigger. I may be wrong, but I mean, EI came out ages ago, nothing seriously huge has been added since really, like IA, sure it's cool, but it's not huge or anything. Perhaps I'm not looking deep enough. :P Still, it's definitely insanely faster than WoW's content updates, to be fair.

[Slipmat]

The sub #s part is really quite surprising to me, even considering how much I hated the game, we have to consider, it has three HUGE names backing it up: EA, Bioware, and oh, just um, STAR WARS.

I'm not sure if you're thinking it has more subs, apologies if i misinterpret

He just means Rift has more subs now post SW: TOR as opposed to pre SW: TOR, Gamebreaker TV are making some ludicrous claims that it's down to 700k, which i find very hard to take seriously, that would mean it lost 1 million subs in 4 months or so, ridiculous

[Primalthirst]

Is it so ridiculous?

All new MMOs peak at launch as people try the game and then rapidly decrease before either dying or flattening out and beginning moderate growth. Of the 20ish people I know who bought it, only 2 still play.

[DeltrusDisc]

That makes crap loads more sense Slipmat, but is the idea of losing 1 million subs so ludicrous? After all, in a period of 3 months, WoW lost numbers ranging from 600k-800k.... now consider a game that has even more issues, less customer service (arguable based on the customer service forums and in general what people have said), until recently a completely uncustomizable UI, and then any personal issues people have with the game.... I can honestly see it. The game sold how many originally and then didn't even retain how many subbers past the free month? i.e. folks like me. :P

[Begottenson]

You can take my word. One thing that aggrivated the loving shit out of me since Rift launched outside of GW2 fans condemning this game to a certain doom was TOR fans trying to build their game on Rifts grave, so you better believe I was looking for clear evidence that they were wrong.

December 29th two weeks after TOR launched



February



Also lets look at the facts:
1. GW2 launch date still sometime Fall 2012?
2. No patch at all for WoW before August at the latest and no content patch between 4.3 to MOP
3. Mass Effect 3 was a dud
4. Modern Warfare 3 was shit and basically a map expansion pac to MW2
5. Rift content patches have not even remotely slowed down. If anything they are getting bigger.

Lost all credibility when you called Mass Effect 3 a dud. Just because the ending was arguably crappy, doesn't constitute it a dud. The multi player while leaving a little to be desired is still fun and releasing new content already seems promising.

Continuing on the same trend, MW3 was not just a map xpac of MW2 there was some decent design improvements, followed by some crappy implementation.

But for the love of god, why do you insist on including not only at their base, single player games, but also games that are not a direct factor into subs of mmorpgs? Yeah a portion of those that play mmorpgs, play those single player games with multiplayer elements, but not enough to effect the numbers of a sub based game, never mind the fact that those that play both, actively play both! Like me and the people I know and have been in guilds with, yeah we might cut back our WoW/Rift/TOR time by an hour or two, but not completely unsubbing from the game.

Now I'll agree TOR sucked!!!! And I'm glad I only did the 7 day free trial.

[Lathais]

I'm not sure if you're thinking it has more subs, apologies if i misinterpret

He just means Rift has more subs now post SW: TOR as opposed to pre SW: TOR, Gamebreaker TV are making some ludicrous claims that it's down to 700k, which i find very hard to take seriously, that would mean it lost 1 million subs in 4 months or so, ridiculous

Just to clarify, since I play SWTOR as well. The ludicrous claims of 700k are actually probably not far from the truth. The 1.7 mil number, which is actually from Dec, not Feb, includes everyone who was on free time whether they had cancelled their sub or not. People who bought a game card due to CC issues and stopeed playing are also included in this 1.7 number. With 1.2 having come out, there appears to be more activity on most servers, but again, that's due to free time. They gave everyone who cancelled 7 days to play AND anyone who has not taken part in a trial or and active account got 2 more free weekends. Maybe some of these will come back or start playing but noone knows. With the 1.7 number being inflated due to these reasons, it is pretty reasonable to assume that the number of active subs planning on staying after free time was closer to 1 million. 700k now does not seen unreasonable looking at it that way.\

TL;DR The 1.7 Mil is artificially inflated and as long as BW keeps giving out free time and including those people in active subs we will not see a real sub number.

[Tarien]

** When asked if the subscription base was larger now than before TOR, his reply was simply "Yes". **

This is interesting, but without real figures I am still slightly skeptical. I could imagine however that many players switch to SWTOR (from RIFT or WoW or another MMO), are disappointed, and decide that they may try some other MMOs while they're away from WoW, and with RIFTs reputation being pretty good right now they land there.

** When asked about level locking creating Twinks, and what Trion thought of it, he replied that they are watching the situation and he doesn't feel it is a big problem atm. Not many folks doing it, and the gear in Rift isn't designed to make someone hugely overpowered at that level. However, if it did become a big problem then the way Rift's system is designed, they could split the brackets up by gear like they do 50 rank brackets **

I think Twinks are a bigger issue than they realise. While the number of twinkers may be small in terms of the population, it only takes 1-2 twinks in a warfront to completely change the outcome. I know, I've been that twink

** ...possibly alluding to cross faction gameplay? "I think some of the places that we can do better are communication across all players and letting all players play with other players, which are two of our big research projects over the next year.

In our perfect world, if I am a dude who is playing Rift and you are a dude who is playing Rift, we should be able to find a way to play together." **

Not sure if this is referring to generally getting people grouped up and into content (like Chronicles, 2man content, or IAs, a pug open world raid group, or PvP rifts, open world PvP) or cross faction gameplay. Not sure that I would want more ways to play with the other faction tbh. It's cool that we can talk to them for a bit of smack talk or some friendly banter or even some co-operation from time to time. I understand the necessity of having the mercenaries feature in warfronts, and could maybe even see that being extended to dungeon queues, but at some point you gotta ask why even have two factions?

Not that I am opposed to there being only one faction if the transition is done well (technically and lore-wise) and the benefits are worth it.

[Dhrizzle]

** When asked about server population and possible mergers. The rest was basically "servers look pretty healthy right now"
and possibly alluding to cross faction gameplay? "I think some of the places that we can do better are communication across all players and letting all players play with other players, which are two of our big research projects over the next year.

In our perfect world, if I am a dude who is playing Rift and you are a dude who is playing Rift, we should be able to find a way to play together." **

*Whistles to Blizzard* I found another idea I'd like you to copy!

---------- Post added 2012-04-18 at 11:12 PM ----------

Not sure if this is referring to generally getting people grouped up and into content (like Chronicles, 2man content, or IAs, a pug open world raid group, or PvP rifts, open world PvP) or cross faction gameplay. Not sure that I would want more ways to play with the other faction tbh. It's cool that we can talk to them for a bit of smack talk or some friendly banter or even some co-operation from time to time. I understand the necessity of having the mercenaries feature in warfronts, and could maybe even see that being extended to dungeon queues, but at some point you gotta ask why even have two factions?

Not that I am opposed to there being only one faction if the transition is done well (technically and lore-wise) and the benefits are worth it.

I think it makes a lot more sense for PvE than PvP although I'd rather see it kept to a RealID / cross-faction friendslist type feature than allow cross-faction group-finder.

[Tarien]

*Whistles to Blizzard* I found another idea I'd like you to copy!

Just to be clear I don't have an issue with Blizzard borrowing good ideas, if anything it reaffirms my belief that Trion are a great developer, but I recently spied some changes that are things RIFT has had for a while: Preview of high level armour during character creation, and gear vendor filters.

[Puremallace]

Just to be clear I don't have an issue with Blizzard borrowing good ideas, if anything it reaffirms my belief that Trion are a great developer, but I recently spied some changes that are things RIFT has had for a while: Preview of high level armour during character creation, and gear vendor filters.

The feature WoW recently put in that if someone in your LFG queue declines you get put in the front of the line with a message telling you that is from Rift. Blizzard and Trion are obviously trying to one up each other in creative department.

Looking for guild thing is a WoW feature that Trion put in. Leaderboards is something TOR was talking about and Blizzard is talking about in MoP.