Gaming You Won't Respawn Tomorrow

WTF.

That equates to more than 10 hours per day, every day since release. I think its for the best that this game ended before that guy died at his computer.

I was never interested in the game (no singleplayer/story/substance) so Im not bothered that its gonebut Im sure there are plenty of other reasons for those allergic to sunlight to stay at their pc

 

Not really, if you didnt delete the last 4 words of the sentence. "since the closed beta". Meaning 800 hours since whenever he started the beta, probably months and months before the retail release. At least thats how i read it. Still, 800 hours into a game is something i reserve only for diablo 2, unreal tournament and minesweeper.

 

Cheesecake!

 

I myeslf had 700+ hours since release though -Gobb-Rezistance

 

It's worth bearing in mind, regarding the hours, that it includes time spent in the editor and time spent just sat around in social AFK or whatever, as well as time actually spent in the combat areas killing stuff. But the game clocked your characters time in play on the loading screen to the nearest hour and that's what people use as a measure.

 

Im afraid to say but. Warcraft has it all. As much as we love to hate it .... Near 6 years on and as many characters as i have leveled over the YEARS i still absoloutly adore the game.

I think for an MMO to be sucsessfull these days you have to top it, you really do, and thats a very very big ladder to climb. Everything that has come before and after is just waiting. Im hoping the new Star Wars MMO is gonna blow WOW's balls off from 7 miles away - and to be good its gonna bloddy well have to!

Blizzard have taken my money for the past 6 years- to them i take my hat off because they have earnt it imho.

 

Very well written article!!

I'm sure someone is gonna buy APB on cheap from RTW, re-work it and re-release it in a more receptive fashion that will garner more players.

EA or Valve to the rescue maybe?

 

Hah, I read the article and wondered if anyone would mention this. Good old Daikatana, whipping boy of the games industry for what....10 years?

 

Comparing WoW to APB is like comparing Pac-Man to Space Invaders. Similar in principle, you have to keep chucking money in to play, but it's an absolutely different game style. Any game that is mostly or entirely centred on Player vs Player, particularly in a context of factions, has got an entirely different set of developmental challenges to deal with above and beyond your typical mob-swatter.

I think the lesson that APB should have learned from WoW though is that the secret to keeping players happy in the longer term is CONTENT. And it has to be CONTENT in block capitals, just mere content in lower case letters, that's not enough. I loved playing APB for ages, but there gets to a point, when you've got everything and killed everyone, that just changing the sound of your car's dump valve gets out. And that point comes way too early in APB. I mean WoW is a massive game, different places to see, things to do and so on, you can waddle around for days. APB had two combat zones, about two kilometres end to end at most, and you could cover that in a fast car inside a couple of minutes. That, for me, didn't stop the game being fun, but it did limit it's long term appeal.

 

It's a shame that it failed, it looked like a pretty good game to me. I applied to be in the beta but never got in, so I never got to experience it first hand. Having said that, I could not shake off the feeling that it looked a bit too much like GTA4 multiplayer and questioning why anyone would want to pay to play APB when they can do more or less the same in GTA4 multiplayer for free.

I think it would be very interesting if you were to do an article on World War 2 Online: Battleground Europe. It is a miracle that that game is still going after nearly 10 years despite one of the worst launches in history and being one of the biggest, most complex MMOs on the market and being developed by a tiny team of only 15 or so people. I think it has a lot to do with the developers, Cornered Rat Software, building such a strong bond with their customer base so that many of their customers are willing to put in a large amount of money, even when they don't play much, because they have so much faith in the game and it's potential, which is just coming into fruition after the latest big updates.

 

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I was really dissapointed by them both. They both could been awesome and they both failed spectacularily. The customization offered in APB seemed very good, and it had some novel concepts like a death-tone or whatever they called it that I thought would bode well in some other arcadey shooters like MW2 types. Unfortunately the execution was flawed and not in a recoverable way. I mean for context if WoW vanilla was re-released today, or people willfully remember the bugs and lack of features it had, they'd be shocked at how much the MMO genre and wow has matured over the years. I think it would take a special dev team to recognize those early defects and stamp them out before the game gets late into production.

Also if the core game play isn't fun, or isn't fun for a long time it spells doom.

 

I was actually invited to participate in the "family and friends" pre-beta trials of APB, however the trials kept getting postponed and when they finally took off I had managed to get addicted to WoW and had no time for APB.

Sitting here I can't help wondering, if the game had as many shortcomings as described in the final version..... what kind of nightmare it must have been in pre-beta.

I feel sorry for RTW and the people behind APB, but at the same time I can't help thinking about how they managed to spend that much time and money and not make a better product....

 

Be quick or loose out

Tyrone: May I know when did you purchased the game and from where ?
: I purchased from Game via download think it wa 07/07, let me just check quickly
: Date: 07/07/2010
Order ID: ******
Your order Status: Validated

Product Price
All Points Bulletin 24.99 GBP
Order Grand Total:
24.99 GBP

Tyrone: We can certainly understand the frustration you have experienced over the recent closure of the APB servers. We, alongside you, were saddened to learn of these recent developments.

: yea was a bit unfortunate
Tyrone: We at EA have worked to provide a working resolution for customers who recently purchased APB, either through the EA Store or a Third-Party Retailer.

: cool good to hear
Tyrone: As with all offerings, however, there is a limit to the length of time these compensatory offerings can be provided. In this case, we must limit the offer to purchases within 60 days of the game's closure date. As your purchase did occur before 7/15/10, we will be unable to provide further compensation in this regard.

Tyrone: Please understand that we do value you as a customer and as a show of our appreciation, we would like to provide you with a coupon good towards 25% off a future purchase from the EA Online Store.
EA Store 25%-off Disount Code ********