PAtch

[Huma]

is this game loki going to play like tq and lod?

if sales are not good for tqit it's because of no patch plus a very poor lack of comunication and if they "whoever" dose not patch it soon the sales will only go down hill from here and no one will trust IL and thq for future pc games.
like i said before i don't think thq cares about the pc game industry.

[Kardiophylax]

It is disappointing that TQ/IT is not getting the support is deserves. It is a great game, but after awhile you sort of run out of things to do. If they fixed some of the skill trees that aren't popular, such as the flame surge tree in Earth, the Ice Shard tree and Energy Shield line in Storm, etc, I would have a reason to try some new character variants. Diablo 2 was adding patches and new items even years after release, and we aren't even getting support a couple months after the expansion release.

is this game loki going to play like tq and lod?

Check out Loki here .

It is somewhat similar to TQ, but I have a few concerns, primarily because it is being developed by a small publisher and may have some of the same support issues TQ does. You can find out more about it in the off topic thread about ARPGs.

[Huma]

thanks for the link.
one thing about blizzard is they would at least tell you they are working on a patch they just woudn't tell you when it would be out.
loki looks like it may be a great game i like the way it looks, i am going to keep an eye on it.
hmm lets see now what will come first loki or the it patch.

[medierra]

Originally Posted by Kardiophylax

A good question might be, why didn't this game produce enough sales to deserve patching? Is the ARPG just a dieing breed of game, buried below the RTS, FPS, RPG, and SIM mainstream? It appears Gothic 3 and the rest of the recent ARPG released have been given low reviews by magazines.

I'd have to say that I believe the top-down ARPG market is probably dying out. I think top-down ARPGs could still make money if they were developed cheaply enough but I don't think they will ever again achieve sales like Diablo or even break a million copies regardless of quality. I think it is similar to the way that turn-based strategy games declined after the advent of real-time. It is hard to compare TQ screenshots to Oblivion screenshots. Even though I think a lot of our art is great-looking and actually "over-engineered" for our pulled out camera perspective where you can hardly appreciate the detail. The top-down fixed camera just gives the game a flat, outdated look. When we first concieved of TQ, we felt a fixed camera would be more accessible to the casual audience but it took us a long time to get a contract and by the time the game released I think the market had changed. Most people are used to controling a camera now and top-down games just don't look as appealing. Seeing a screenshot of the horizon in Oblivion with mountains and forest in the background and a beautiful sunset just gives you the perception of a vast, open, living world that you're exicted to explore. Seeing a flat top-down screenshot of TQ just doesn't invoke the same feeling. So, unfortunately, while I believe we succeeded in create some really fun gameplay, I think a lot of people who might enjoy the game will never buy it because it just doesn't look "sexy" enough. I'm sure the bright, happy, ancient world setting with no blood put some people off too. I guess it is a lesson learned much to our misfortune.

Hopefully sales will prove good enough to warrant a patch at some point. It is a vicious "what comes first" feedback loop though - if initial sales are low a patch won't be justified but without a patch sales will be low...

I think there is definately still a future for ARPGs though - but to really capture the market they will need to shift to a tighter-in over-the-shoulder 3rd person or first-person perspective.

[PinkFrog]

Very interesting post

When i saw the first screens of TQ i was knocked unconscious. It's hard to believe that the angle of the camera makes the difference. But on the other hand the game doesnt look as "in-your-face" as others, that is true.
I wish people would make more use of their brain, though. The top-down has so many advantages: better navigation, the overview, you can have much more detailed objects on the screen (and no stupid grey fog out which trees tend to plop).

Its hard to tell if the setting was economically well chosen or not, i guess. (who believes in marketing-research anyway?) I wouldn't have bought the game if it had been about orks, knights and skulls. (and i shudder when i see what Loki tries to do, setting-wise)
I use the blood-patch, true, but thats not the point The point is, that many liked the setting and many didnt. If you had chosen a different setting you would have lost other gamers.

May it be as it is with that patch, my life has been improved by TQ...

[Whisk33]

Originally Posted by PinkFrog

May it be as it is with that patch, my life has been improved by TQ...

LOL is that a good thing for the game or a bad thing... I definatly have spent tons of time in this game... did that make me better as a person?... well it certianly didnt make me any money!

I'm glad I still check this thread. I read a bunch of things to the point I want to see if I can hammer a nail through my ear and then I get something that actually intrieges me. I definately LOVED the over head view... these games today are becoming so complex and if you arent very active in the game (and the games that led to it) then you have a huge learning curve ahead of you. and the no blood feature (though I don't really care) is very respectable since I can relate to people who actually still understand that gore isn't healthy.
Medierra, Thanks for the post. gives me something chew on. Let the boys know I dig it.

Lets all petition THQ about the Briney Spears patch!!! simply say
"when is the Britney Spears patch for TQ:It going to be Released! I WANT IT NOW"
I think it would be funny.
I'm hungry now...

[balgy]

As usual these days chalk another one up to add to the PC dump for games!

Gothic3 got the official dump stamp and then they say hey buy our gothic4 coming out...what a **** joke!

I liked TQ and IT but I have a strong feeling we wont ever see a patch for it
either and end up a forgotten thing....

[Arkilae]

Hmmm.

I think that I'll add to this mess.

Anyway, when I frist got this game it was pirated, yes, I downloaded it and was pirating it for a sibling, after a bit, I noticed that there were a hell of a lot of updates being thrown out for this game, I was amazed that nearly every week I had to look for a new crack executable file so that I could by pass the disk check and play the game.

This is why I bought the game, after I had seen how much support was going into it I thought to myself, a brand new Diablo-esque like game (besides Sacred) with actual support and good gameplay?! No ******* way! Story is weak though, perhaps make it a bit more grander in the telling of the story then the story itself, no offense though.

But now, it seems that support has dropped off the face of the earth, I now firmly believed I doomed this game when I bought it, I was so happy to see a good relationship between the community and devs, and support, that I could've cried, and now THQ and poor sales of It it seems has ended the game and support for it, so, yeah, I'm crying.

One thing I don't understand though, is since there was such huge support for vanilla TQ, and I assume fairly decent sales, what the hell went wrong with IT?

[Kardiophylax]

Thanks for the post Medierra. I appreciate your candor and respect what Ironlore has done. I realize that people don't usually work for free, so I can understand that patches are only as good as their financial backing. I fear you are right about the first person view. I personally can't stand it. I always play Morrowind/Oblivion in 3rd Person. I like to see my avatar walking around, call me crazy. Anyway, TQ does not lag behind in the graphics/interface dept. at all in my book. I wish more people appreciated top down/isometric and TBS games like I do.

I can offer one glimmer of hope for those out there that think a patch will never happen. I also own a small game called Knights of Honor, created by a small company called Black Sea Studios. It is an RTS, but an odd almost TBS one, something more like Europa Universalis for those that have played it (What can I say, I like non-mainstream games I guess). The game had many weaknesses, particularly the AI, but was a lot of fun to play. A dedicated group of 10-20 followers kept their boards alive for probably a year or more without a patch. Finally, despite low sales and non-existant publisher support, the developer released a patch (more then a year later) which fixed a lot and opened up modding even further for its players. Like I said, no one USUALLY works for free, but sometimes things get fixed in spite of the publisher's wishes.

One thing I don't understand though, is since there was such huge support for vanilla TQ, and I assume fairly decent sales, what the hell went wrong with IT?

They had to support TQ in order to create IT sales. There are no further expansions, so there is no immediate financial need to satisfy IT owners. What they fail to realize is poor support from THQ now will lead us to be more critical of making future purchases with them; however, the downside for us as consumers if we do that is that we might miss out some excellent titles that just happened to be published by them (since they are such a massive publisher).

[mamba]

Originally Posted by Huma

hmm lets see now what will come first loki or the it patch.

Given that Loki is released on 4th of June here (Germany), I'd bet on Loki.