Page 1 of 2
1
2
LastLast
  1. #1

    Camelot Unchained, the Supposed Successor of Dark Age of Camelot

    I thought this game deserved a thread since I couldn't find one on this forum (I didn't look too hard).



    A rather vague presentation trailer, but I suppose it will have to do. Also linking this to help you understand better.



    So basically this game is meant to be the next Dark Age of Camelot. The best PVP or rather RVR game I've ever played, a game created by the same people or at least by some of the people who are making Camelot Unchained, City State Entertainment, formerly known as Mythic Entertainment.

    The very same people were also responsible for the tragedy that was Warhammer Online. A game that was, meant to be the next Dark Age of Camelot. It wasn't. It was a tragic failure that dragged on through the proverbial dirt until it's death - it's launch day. I won't get into too many details, but enough to say that the game was below mediocre from all perspectives including RVR and very much incomplete. The game has been shut down and I think there is one private server that still runs it.

    Now several people, including myself came to the conclusion that Dark Age of Camelot's very good RVR system was established through an act of blind luck that may never occur ever again and that Mythic Entertainment, was not as good as we thought they were. Some of their former (?) members designed the Star Wars: The Old Republic PVP system and that one is no prize donkey either, more mediocrity.
    We could blame Electronic Arts who were the "pimps" of Warhammer Online, for the failure of the game but to be honest I think there was enough blame to go around, if you felt like sticking around after Warhammer Online sunk in the mud, but perhaps Mythic Entertainment deserves the benefit of the doubt.

    Now I see their newest creation and I can't help but be hopeful that this time around they might live up to expectations and deliver that game every Dark Age of Camelot fan dreams about.

    The Camelot Unchained project is being funded through Kickstarter by the hyped up fans. So this is the part that is worth some debate, in my opinion. They have gathered a pretty handsome sum of money. They have no "sugar daddy" like Electronic Arts, which means they have free reign to design the game as they truly envision it.

    For my part, I was not inclined to contribute to their cause, simply because what I've seen, or rather part of what I've seen rubs me the wrong way. And believe me I'm pretty open to aiding kickstarter games. Anyway, given their past that they have to carry with them, wrongfully or not, remains to be seen, I decided to approach this with a clear head and so I did a little research of this game.

    I love the theme. Dark and mysterious, something several games attempted but never fully succeeded, I am very curious how the'll handle it. The races in he game seem to fit the ambiance, some of them, others are simply odd, but still likable. Their official page has a nice presentation and a pretty good back story for each of them.

    http://camelotunchained.com/v2/

    As for the rest, well there isn't much shown, except a few images and a few videos that are meant to shine the spotlight on the engine (which appears to be pretty damn good).

    But there's a lot being said and while I did say I would try to approach this with a clear mind, there's a little voice in the back of my head that reminds me of the Warhammer Online hype and the similarity it has to the hype surrounding Camelot Unchained.
    There were many things being said, many assurances being given and yet, by the time the game released we were given excuses. One thing I know for sure, is that if they don't deliver and present the players with more excuses, they won't be able to hide behind the benefit of the doubt any more.

    The asskissery, in lack of a better therm, is also the same, which is not unusual for a game in development. And of course, the fanboy-phenomenon. Things that you have to put up with. And the "show and tell" podcasts or whatever, that they do from time to time, however there's nothing being shown.

    And one of the things that worries me is that they claim to have a "traditional" approach to certain systems like the magic system and the combat system, claiming that the current MMOs don't do it right, that they over-simplify it, putting focus on the visual effects than anything else, which is partially true, especially when thinking about anime-themed MMOs, but over-complicating a system just to be "traditional" or to cater to the Hardcores is also a bad move in my opinion. Unless of course they manage to present it in a manner that is understandable to most people.

    But I guess the main thing that worries me is their claim that they are designing the game to fit a certain minority of payers and to be honest that in itself is a bad move. The game should be opened to anyone who is willing to try it instead of being discouraged from the start with a statement like that.

    That and the fact that, from what I understand they have 15 months to release the game and they have a handful of programmers working on it.

    My post may sound biased, but I am honestly looking forward to this game to see if it can truly fill in for Dark Age of Camelot.

    So what are your thoughts if you are interested in this game?
    Last edited by Evilfish; 2015-05-02 at 10:48 PM.

  2. #2
    Deleted
    I think its too early to have an opinion and I'm surprised people still throw their money at devs even if they released something like Warhammer Online, but then maybe it'll be good..

  3. #3
    I wouldn't touch this game with a 10 ft pole until it is a sure thing that it will actually get launched. Even then I don't have any expectations for this game. Trying to cater to a niche market by saying MMOs over-simplify things means following the Rift model of having 2 bajillion abilities that do mostly the same shit. If you make the game too complex in some facets you end up alienating one of the important things- the casual player. Now this might be a good thing for some games but take it from Wildstar and many other games that this isn't the ideal tactic of getting tons of people to buy and sub to your game.

    Also I won't touch anything from that streamer you linked. Just another one of the mercenaries of the twitch streamer variety that will pimp out anything like Towellie.

  4. #4
    Jacobs has been very clear he doesnt expect this to be a huge game. It is designed from the ground up knowing it will be a small niche game. You should go and read the foundation principles for the game, its a rather good read and basically describes the game and everything about it as being for the hardcore pvp RvR crowd. Most of the people on these forums wouldnt play the game for very long because its simply not the kind of game these forums embrace.

    http://camelot-unchained.wikia.com/w...ion_Principles

  5. #5
    Build a game for the hardcore niche and it'll fail. That niche is very vocal but also very small.

  6. #6
    Quote Originally Posted by Kyanion View Post
    Build a game for the hardcore niche and it'll fail. That niche is very vocal but also very small.
    Not true; it'll fail if it designed with the intent of garnering unrealistic subs, as Wildstar did.

    Jacobs had no illusions; this game will not gain millions, or hundreds of thousands. He's budgeting his game around that; around a tried and true proven base (See WAR and DaoC).

  7. #7
    Quote Originally Posted by Valyrian Stormclaw View Post
    Not true; it'll fail if it designed with the intent of garnering unrealistic subs, as Wildstar did.

    Jacobs had no illusions; this game will not gain millions, or hundreds of thousands. He's budgeting his game around that; around a tried and true proven base (See WAR and DaoC).
    tried and true proven base? Those games kind of closed due to lack of people to play. And I was around playing MMO's during the DaoC days. It was a well loved niche game but still not even close to EQ1 and other popular games at the time.

  8. #8
    Quote Originally Posted by Kyanion View Post
    tried and true proven base? Those games kind of closed due to lack of people to play. And I was around playing MMO's during the DaoC days. It was a well loved niche game but still not even close to EQ1 and other popular games at the time.
    DAoC is still alive and kicking, and has a healthly playerbase.

    WAR closed because it was designed for WoW's millions, but even when it closed it had more than enough players to support the game Jacobs is designing.

  9. #9
    Without a publisher to set deadlines I guess the developers can have the freedom to create the game at their own pace, but I see a lot of these Kickstarter games advance at snail's pace. How long are the backers willing to wait for the game's release? 5 years? 10 years? (especially considering even a AAA MMO with hundreds of staff working on it take 5/6 years). The game engine already looks dated now, it will look absolutely ancient 5 years from now and most importantly most players won't give a shit by then.

    That's the problem I have with these Kickstarter games, they take way too slow to develop. I just don't think MMOs are a suitable game genre for crowdfunding.
    When we looked at the relics of the precursors, we saw the height civilization can attain.
    When we looked at their ruins, we marked the danger of that height.
    - Keeper Annals

  10. #10
    That's the problem I have with these Kickstarter games, they take way too slow to develop.
    Kickstarter projects usually have to create all of their assets - including the engine - from scratch. AAA devs reuse their stuff, so they are already half way to the finish line.

    The engine isn't dated; it's still being made. It looks bad... because it's an alpha. Prettyness isn't priority ATM. They just want a game.

  11. #11
    Mechagnome Layuth's Avatar
    15+ Year Old Account
    Join Date
    Nov 2008
    Location
    North America
    Posts
    613
    Quote Originally Posted by Kyanion View Post
    I wouldn't touch this game with a 10 ft pole until it is a sure thing that it will actually get launched. Even then I don't have any expectations for this game. Trying to cater to a niche market by saying MMOs over-simplify things means following the Rift model of having 2 bajillion abilities that do mostly the same shit. If you make the game too complex in some facets you end up alienating one of the important things- the casual player. Now this might be a good thing for some games but take it from Wildstar and many other games that this isn't the ideal tactic of getting tons of people to buy and sub to your game.

    Also I won't touch anything from that streamer you linked. Just another one of the mercenaries of the twitch streamer variety that will pimp out anything like Towellie.
    You would not be alienating the "casual" player, you would be alienating the "stupid" or "lazy" player. WoW has catered to the casual and the stupid, CU will not and that makes it worthwhile right there.
    "If I recall correctly I just posted that this topic is not to be discussed any further." -Ensidia Fanclub Founder

  12. #12
    Quote Originally Posted by Valyrian Stormclaw View Post
    Kickstarter projects usually have to create all of their assets - including the engine - from scratch. AAA devs reuse their stuff, so they are already half way to the finish line.

    The engine isn't dated; it's still being made. It looks bad... because it's an alpha. Prettyness isn't priority ATM. They just want a game.
    Aren't most of them using Unity? Anyways it's commendable that CU is making their own engine, but when you have a small budget to begin with, I wonder if it's the right decision.

    Quote Originally Posted by Layuth View Post
    You would not be alienating the "casual" player, you would be alienating the "stupid" or "lazy" player. WoW has catered to the casual and the stupid, CU will not and that makes it worthwhile right there.
    Care to explain what is "stupid" and "lazy" about WoW players?
    When we looked at the relics of the precursors, we saw the height civilization can attain.
    When we looked at their ruins, we marked the danger of that height.
    - Keeper Annals

  13. #13
    Quote Originally Posted by corebit View Post
    Aren't most of them using Unity? Anyways it's commendable that CU is making their own engine, but when you have a small budget to begin with, I wonder if it's the right decision.
    CU's engine is being built from the ground up by the studio, its not licensed like most games these days are using including AAA games. The kickstarter also isnt the only funding, Jacobs is using $2m of his own money and $1m from from an investor. When you have a small studio with talented and driven people, you dont need $75m+ to make a game as proven by many other indie/small studio games.

  14. #14
    Quote Originally Posted by Valyrian Stormclaw View Post
    DAoC is still alive and kicking, and has a healthly playerbase.

    WAR closed because it was designed for WoW's millions, but even when it closed it had more than enough players to support the game Jacobs is designing.
    We don't know how many players it takes to support CU. Let's be honest here. MMOs today either do good or fail colossally. There is almost no middle-ground.

    Warhammer failed because they lied, they over-hyped the crowds with that fatso Paul dancing around the podcasts lying about how perfect everything was, how balanced it was and ending up with a bunch of angry mobs because it was neither.

    I hope they understood that PR does not translate into BS.

    Anyway, my personal opinion is that using nostalgia as a base attraction element is a very bad idea. That wears off fast, really fast in fact and what's left afterwards? Huge gaps that can only be filled by bending the rules they set themselves. I'm curious to see how willing they are to do that once the game starts losing people. Especially considering how much a game like this depends on healthy numbers of players on all sides to be what it was meant to be. That is why I am reluctant to support their kickstarter campaign.

    And so far their engine looks pretty good. I don't mean beautiful, but it's capacity to handle large scale battles makes it good. Still we've only seen what they wanted us to see, how good it is by the end, remains to be seen when the game releases or is close to release. Like I said, they start making excuses then you can pretty much forget about it because it failed.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by Layuth View Post
    You would not be alienating the "casual" player, you would be alienating the "stupid" or "lazy" player. WoW has catered to the casual and the stupid, CU will not and that makes it worthwhile right there.
    Oh please, don't start branding people by your own standards of gaming. Those are games meant to entertain people, not be a second job for them (or first). Everyone has a place if the devs are good enough to help them find it though the design of the game.

    Some people may find swinging a mining pick at rocks for 3 hours a day fun, others may find that very boring, others enjoy crafting things just as some don't enjoy that and so on.

    Everyone has their own idea of what entertainment means and it does not mean they are stupid or lazy if that idea does not coincide with yours, for fuck sake.
    Last edited by Evilfish; 2015-05-03 at 10:19 AM.

  15. #15
    i backed this one because it seems like a great idea. I dunno if I'll ever end up playing it though. I still think they don't have a strong idea about how the game will actually play. They have a lot of good ideas and I hope they do it justice. It's still a WAYS off though, so we'll see.

    I'm actually more interested in Crowfall now, which has sort of a similar plot, being a RvR (in a way) open world pvp-focused game. I'll be watching both games to see how they fall out. A big difference between the two, as prior posts have said, is that CU is using their own custom engine, which provides all sorts of pros and cons that I won't get into (and probably don't understand). But one big con is that it will absolutely SAP development time and resources. Whereas CF is using Unity, which again has pros and cons. But what I like is that they have not only been VERY forthcoming with information, but their alpha/beta tests have no NDA. They release updates twice a week, have extensive FAQs about how things will work (which is uncommon for a game that's still this early in development).

    I am considering backing Crowfall now for a substantial amount, because of their transparency, their plethora of information and regular updates, and their very clear vision for the game. While I applaud CU's developers for being open-minded, if you ask them a question it's almost ways "Well we aren't sure yet." which sort of scares me. We don't know for sure what the game will look like (which I suppose could be said for ANY game in development until it launches), so it's hard to have confidence in that the end-product will deliver.

    Either way, both games are worth watching IMO. I'm glad to see some indie MMO games that aren't WoW clones with a twist at least.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by Kyanion View Post
    Build a game for the hardcore niche and it'll fail. That niche is very vocal but also very small.
    Presumably these developers know that there will be limited players and will budget it as such. You also have to remember this game might cost $8M to make. If it retails for $50, that's 160k box purchases to break even on the development. That's not a huge amount. I don't know all the numbers, I'm just saying if you aren't spending $100M on a game, you can afford to cater to a smaller group. They aren't going for 3 million paying subscribers. I dunno what their break-even point is, but it's probably quite low.
    Last edited by Varabently; 2015-05-03 at 01:29 PM.

  16. #16
    Titan
    10+ Year Old Account
    Join Date
    Sep 2009
    Location
    In my head, where crazy happens.
    Posts
    11,562
    What the hell was with that "joke" about Lincon in the trailer? Was that supposed to be funny? Is humor and satire part of the franchise? What?

    Never heard of the game. Barely ever heard of the game that came before it. I don't see this having much success in any measure.
    They're also appealing to a small niche of players with no appeal to new players. Ontop of that, they're a kickstarter, probably because all publishers said the same thing.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by Layuth View Post
    You would not be alienating the "casual" player, you would be alienating the "stupid" or "lazy" player. WoW has catered to the casual and the stupid, CU will not and that makes it worthwhile right there.
    If this is the kind of attitude that their playerbase has, then it'll definetly fail.

  17. #17
    Quote Originally Posted by Gsara View Post
    Jacobs has been very clear he doesnt expect this to be a huge game. It is designed from the ground up knowing it will be a small niche game. You should go and read the foundation principles for the game, its a rather good read and basically describes the game and everything about it as being for the hardcore pvp RvR crowd. Most of the people on these forums wouldnt play the game for very long because its simply not the kind of game these forums embrace.

    http://camelot-unchained.wikia.com/w...ion_Principles
    Yeah I've read it and I asked the other former Dark Age of Camelot players I'm still in contact with and all of them, without exception weren't too fond of that long rant about how he's "different". We left Dark Age of Camelot because it was becoming limited, repetitive and non entertaining and this guy talks about being different by making the same game with slightly souped up graphics.

    But as I said, it's not my money he's spending on giving an old game a makeover and calling it a new game. I get it that he's looking for admiration but that is a fucking douchebag move, trying desperately to be so different. What you honestly think any of us (obsessive fanboys excluded) will stick around that game which is sub based if all we get is DAOC seen through a pretty-glass? No we won't. I won't.

    I don't doubt they'll have some people left, but let's be honest here, if you played Warhammer online it was clear that once the game failed to be what they thought it would be, they got all depressed started blaming the fans for not being "loyal enough" and eventually stopped trying. I'm gonna venture an educated guess that if the project fails then that is what is going to happen... again!

    Jacobs has had a lot of smoke blown up his ass and he loves that from what I've seen. The problem is he lets it go to his head and he fails to see the forest behind the tree, the big picture, until it hits him in the face and trust me, this is the last game he'll make because if this ends up being another piece of shit like Warhammer then he's done with game designing, because there won't be tat many people ready to back him up again for another failure.



    To make my point.

    So far he has been telling people what they want to hear, what many think they want to hear. Has he learned nothing from Warhammer? There are countless hardcore douchebags who touch themselves at the idea that a game focuses on them primarily, because that's what hardcores love to hear but take it from someone who has played enough hardcore games to get the problem. These people are the problem, because they are so fucking hateful they drive everyone away and once they do that, they fight among themselves. I've seen it in games like Darkfall and Mortal Online. And eventually they leave too. Because there's no point in staying because, well, when everyone is fucking hardcore, no one is.

    That's why I'm gonna do as someone said, sit and watch from a distance. And believe me, I want to be wrong about what I said, but I don't think I will be.
    Last edited by Evilfish; 2015-05-03 at 06:15 PM.

  18. #18
    Warhammer wasn't a bad game. They actually introduced something incredibly innovative called public quests. Which was the starting point for Rift's public groups and eventually open tap mobs to advocate players helping each other in the world.

    Warhammer got shut down because it was funded by the investors with the expectation it would become a 10m sub World of Warcraft. That didn't happen so they just pulled out. They didn't even give the game a chance to go F2P with microtransactions. I probably would still be kicking today if EA and company weren't so fucking greedy.

    That being said, I don't feel like they are showing enough for me to give them any money. It's just ideas. I recently did back Crowfall though and they seemed to have a much clearer direction.

  19. #19
    Quote Originally Posted by ro9ue View Post
    Warhammer wasn't a bad game. They actually introduced something incredibly innovative called public quests. Which was the starting point for Rift's public groups and eventually open tap mobs to advocate players helping each other in the world.

    Warhammer got shut down because it was funded by the investors with the expectation it would become a 10m sub World of Warcraft. That didn't happen so they just pulled out. They didn't even give the game a chance to go F2P with microtransactions. I probably would still be kicking today if EA and company weren't so fucking greedy.

    That being said, I don't feel like they are showing enough for me to give them any money. It's just ideas. I recently did back Crowfall though and they seemed to have a much clearer direction.
    Let's be fair as well. Warhammer WAS a bad game to many people. I and many others I knew tried the game and we didn't make it out of a month. Very poor optimized settings caused some major issues for people (and those issues weren't fixed until MONTHS later), One sided realms with no fixes on realm stability caused imbalanced PvP, some really early poor class imbalance made some of the battlegrounds pretty weak as well. I mean there was a fair amount of issues with the game.

    Do I think the game could have survived on a F2P model with micro transactions? Sure, but I mean there are tons of games like that all over and many of them aren't what you'd consider quality games worth your time.

  20. #20
    Quote Originally Posted by ro9ue View Post
    Warhammer wasn't a bad game. They actually introduced something incredibly innovative called public quests. Which was the starting point for Rift's public groups and eventually open tap mobs to advocate players helping each other in the world.

    Warhammer got shut down because it was funded by the investors with the expectation it would become a 10m sub World of Warcraft. That didn't happen so they just pulled out. They didn't even give the game a chance to go F2P with microtransactions. I probably would still be kicking today if EA and company weren't so fucking greedy.

    That being said, I don't feel like they are showing enough for me to give them any money. It's just ideas. I recently did back Crowfall though and they seemed to have a much clearer direction.
    I never said they didn't have good ideas. In fact they had great ideas. The problem was the sloppy execution and the lack of commitment. I was one of those guys who didn't get his class at launch, since some classes got delayed and I rolled a bright wizard. Do you remember what two bright wizards could do to an enemy raid back then?

    The point is Warhammer was shut down because it was shit and it was shit because the developers chose to lie through that fat bastard Paul, by assuring us everything was going perfect and everything was gonna be in a perfect state. It was shit because they focused way too much on RVR and left everything else in the shithouse. And it was shit because it attracted a type of player - the enraged fanboy - who had a nervous breakdown every time someone would point out a problem with the game and the worse part is that the developers listened to those people and now Jacobs seems to be doing the same cause they send him asskiss greeting cards.

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •