Once upon a time there was a gaming site, where some poor textmonkey was forced to pour through boring surveys that different game companies put out — feelers, if you will — a task that would eventually result in temporary insanity and partial paralysis of the right half of his body. But lo! One day he finds a treasure in the depths of marketing questions! He shuffles up to his superiors, blurts out a few lines from the Canadian national anthem, slaps the survey on their desk, and falls to the ground twitching.
“Eh, it’s a boring Monday,” one of the editors says, cautiously avoiding spilling his coffee as the textmonkey thrashed nearby. “Let’s run it.”
Instantly, the lights go on in the Blogger Hall of Justice — it’s the rumor light! Doing what we do best, eager fingers start jamming keyboards in an eager attempt to be at least the 100th person to talk about this subject, nevermind how silly or farfetched it may be. Other gaming news sources, irked that their own textmonkeys have missed this juicy tidbit — textmonkeys who will now be getting a whipping – pounce on it with all the professionalism of a seven-year-old pontificating to his bored uncle about Pokemon.
And that’s why everyone is defying common sense and heatedly talking about the possibility of LOTRO coming to the XBox 360.
Nevermind that it’s about the most ridiculous prospect. Do I need to outline why? Let’s start with the interface — I have THREE full hotbars of buttons at level 28, and I’m pretty sure the XBox 360 controller doesn’t sport 30 buttons, advanced though it may be. Then, of course, is the slight problem of text chatting, which could be overcome by a keyboard peripheral, but then it begs the question of why you’re playing it on an XBox anyway instead of a computer. Maybe you like the decreased screen resolution? I dunno.
It’s not like MMOs have proved to be easy ports to consoles, anyway. EverQuest Online Adventures, Phantasy Star Online, Final Fantasy XI… these are not the testimonies you’d want to witness before a grand jury of the greatness of console transitions. Turbine has, up to now, never shown an inkling of an interest in console MMOs, and if they did, wouldn’t DDO’s semi-twitch action (and small party instances) work better?
What makes this incredibly tenuous rumor hold any ground is that, of all the MMOs in the world, LOTRO would be an absolute disaster on the XBox. Wait, let me rephrase. The XBox community would be an absolute disaster to LOTRO. I do not have a high opinion of the vulgar mouthbreathers that infest XBox Live, and to consider, for a second, that group stampeding all over the Shire, calling hobbits “gaywads” and demeaning the achievements of established LOTRO vets is a horror. One of the most mature online communities clashing with one of the most immature? Great for a sitcom, bad for gamers.
Happily, the survey place came out to clarify why we’re being silly bunnies for even considering this.
It looks like my original comment got eaten? Hope I don’t end up double posting.
Sorry to be unrelated, but I can’t find an email for you.
What email address would one contact to get permission to talk about Champions Online if one were in the beta? Let’s say that, theoretically, the address that gives out beta keys didn’t work.
bigbanana -at- hotmail -dot- com
It is not ridiculous at all for a MMO to be ported to consoles. If you’ve played a console MMO or even a more indepth RPG you know that holding one button opens a window (a radial menu) which you can then press a corresponding direction. Suddenly one button does the job of eight. Make the bumpers perhaps unlock 8 additional functions each and you have 16 hotkeys – more than you need active in most MMORPGs.
Text chatting is also becoming common place in consoles. There are keyboard peripherals that attach right into the Xbox 360 controller (in between the holders) but also full sized keyboards you can just plug in and use (that’s what’s nice about it being made by Microsoft).
EQ Online Adventures was fantastic on the console and so is FFXI. They were both great successes (Especially FFXI) which currently controls the market on consoles for MMOs.
LOTRO on the Xbox would probably be one of the fewer SUCCESSES on the Xbox. It’s largely based PvE game with a fantastic story (which console users want) and it has simplistic ai scripted fights. The PvP is like a giant battleground and the game in general is extremely simple (IE not like EVE). A port is not something we should at all be thinking they can’t do, but something we should be afraid of them being so easily able to do.
There are numerous ways that they can “dumb it down” to make porting LOTRO or any MMO to a console feasible. Microtransactions are the key. This will make the MMO far more accessible and they’ll be able to adjust the entire itemization of the game – and the method of obtaining that loot – accordingly.
You have to be careful that you’re not the blogger who “once upon a time” tried to come off as the cool guy and didn’t think something through completely.
Turbine tends to send surveys only to their current subscribers, and often pick specifically from each game. This one targeted LOTRO subscribers. If you notice from reading the actual survey questions, it says Lord of the Rings MMO, not specifically LOTRO.
Look at the sample specifics listed as well.
* Two epic storylines, one for the Free Peoples and one for the minions of Sauron. LOTRO does not, and will not, do this.
* Over 600 quests. LOTRO has well over that amount already.
* PvP maps. Not the Ettenmoors *zone* but multiple PvP maps. So, instanced PvP ala WAR’s Scenarios.
Turbine has stated many times the console title will be a new game. They did not, to my recollection, state it would necessarily be a new IP however, despite all the Harry Potter console MMO rumors from awhile back. So it’s entirely possible they’re working on a Lord of the Rings console MMO with more focus on PvP as well as letting players be “good” or “evil” but LOTRO is not that game.
In addition to Sapience posting his “whoah, put the brakes on!” forum post, Adam Mersky also made a similar comment, saying they’re working on a console MMO and working with *both* Microsoft and Sony, which throws out the whole “only for 360″ aspect. Adam also hinted they should have some news within the next few months. Some are expecting an E3 announcement but from Patience’s tweets last week it sounds like Turbine either isn’t going to E3 or will only have a small showing there because, in her words “PAX is where it’s at!” so perhaps PAX ’09 we’ll hear what they’re actually doing.
I’ve never been the cool guy… sounds wonderful, tho.
Radial menus are workable, but they’re a pain in the buttocks if you need to use a certain skill buried in them over and over and over and over again… kind of like in MMOs. People complain about radial menus in RPGs after a certain span of gameplay, I can’t imagine how that would exacerbate the fun in a MMO.
EQOA was fantastic? Huh. How many players did they get for that again?
I’ve thought it through just fine. MMOs can and have and shall be made for consoles, no doubt, but it’s a different story when it’s a port from an established PC MMO that wasn’t initially designed to function as a console game. LOTRO is not a game for consoles, and to “dumb it down” would be a major injustice to the title. Many commentators have noted that it’s also more impractical for studios to develop MMOs for consoles due to a lengthy development time and consoles’ shorter life span vs. computers. We’re still waiting on the proposed Age of Conan console version, despite large amounts of initial hoopla, and that was a title designed in mind to be for both PC and consoles.
I will retract one statement — apparently Turbine has thought and talked about console MMOs (http://lobby.loginconference.com/forum/topics/explaining-the-nuts-and-bolts). This was an interesting quote: “Developing from scratch is difficult but we firmly feel porting a PC MMO to Console is not viable for many reasons, since the game play pace, demographic and input devices are so different.”
how hard would it be for Microsoft to have a usb keyboard and mouse work for LOTRO on the 360?
It doesn’t seem that far fetched for LOTRO to be released on the 360 isn’t Champions getting a 360 release as well? I would guess they would just have separate servers for any MMO released on both a console and computer.
I’d be bloody amazed if LotR or its ilk end up on consoles.
I find it hard to see how the traditional PC MMORPG will translate to a console and remain on an even keel between the PC and console gamers. Surely it would just be like when console gamers on Quake first went up against PC gamers, which if I remember correctly didn’t last long as the gamers using limited and slugish console controls were massacred by PC gamers. Certainly PvP would be a bitch to get right on a PC/Console shared game.
Don’t see why future MMOs couldn’t work on consoles, but the whole play and UI styles we have on PC would have to change dramatically.
I played both EQOA (train wreck) and FFXI Suprising Success) on the PS2 and I can say console MMORPG’s can work.
For example I played FFXI for 3 years and although I would sometimes use a keyboard to significantly speed up typing the pop down UI keyboard was quite quick itself with a bit of practice.
There is of course the issue of translating hotbars into console format. Final Fantasy followed the traditional FF menu system so it’s not like they had to adapt much for a console controller but I can see how LOTRO would be a problem.
They can work, and they can be actually quite fun ( I still miss FFXI at time and what passed for PvP in that game). Unfortunately a game has to be tailored fro the ground up for a console, a simple port will be disastrous.
Console lifespans are getting longer with each generation, but even then… If I were in charge of a studio, I would not target the 360/PS3 for development. With a 3-5 year development cycle for your typical MMO, plus tons of consumer research coming up with a workable control scheme as well as solidifying a business model… No way. Microsoft has already said to expect the next Xbox (whatever it ends up being called) in 2012. We’re almost halfway through 2009 now. If AoC comes out in 2010, for example, they have possibly 2 years, 3 tops, before the platform is obsoleted from a consumer level. To date, the only console to ever continue superior sales was the PS2, which led the PS3 for a year or more. Most of the time, as soon as a new generation hits store shelves, studios are preparing their final title(s) for it and most of the higher-profile studios have already abandoned it for the newer generation hardware.
Turbine is still hiring for RMT and console development. It sounds like they have “something” in the works but it’s a ways off. 2010 or later, most likely. That isn’t giving the title much of a lifespan, but jumping on board the next generation of hardware certainly would. Assuming the next Xbox arrives in 2012, a year later when there’s barely any software to be found other than bargain bins in Gamestop, the 360 will be 8 years old. Are any of us using 8 year old PCs? Doubtful.
If Turbine has something they think will work and can release by 2010, I say go for it. If nothing else, box sales can help them a little bit and the lessons learned will be valuable for any studio considering a console MMOG. But if they’re looking at 2011 or later, I’d scrap the project and move it to the next generation.
This is the second blog post I’ve seen stating that MMeOw took this rumor as fact and I’m simply not seeing how.
In my post, I was very clear about it being a rumor. I was very clear about it being more information related to the rumor; whether you believe it or not, it is related.
I was also very clear that these surveys don’t really ever reflect anything that’s actually happening. They’re meant to get an idea of what various survey takers thing.
This is still the second or third time a rumor related to Lord of the Rings and Turbine on a console has come up. Do I seriously always have to write a huge disclaimer about how LOTRO being ported over exactly as is to consoles would be a mess? Do I seriously have to explain what a rumor is time and time again?
There were some interesting points in the survey (and I’d respond to even hypotheticals, such as the $12.99 price point — why not?). I read Sapience’s post on the subject before I even posted mine.
So, personally, I think this blog post is jumping to far more conclusions about people like me than I did conclusions about a survey I was completely noncommittal toward.
- Tony
I found FFXI almost unplayable on the computer, and much easier to play on Xbox.
I’ve got to agree with Syp that the majority of current LotRO classes have too many skills to be workable on a control pad. My Burglar has a modest number of skills compared to many classes, but I still use about 30 on a regular basis. Most of those would be skills I’d want to use now, not after I’ve navigated to them through a radial menu.
The one class that is the most intriguing regarding console development is the Warden. The majority of its abilities are produced by combining just 3 skills in different sequences, which would be ideal for a control pad. However, most of the classes would need to be rebuilt from the ground up in order to work like this, although it’s not infeasible that they might do this for a console version of the game.
It’s really not a bad idea when you think about it. Take the huge amount of content they’ve already built, produce a range of simplified control pad friendly classes to replace the PC versions, tweak the rules a bit to accommodate those new classes. It wouldn’t be the LotRO PC players know and love, but it could certainly work.
@ Tony – Hm, let me clarify the tone of the post… I was more surprised at how much everyone leaped at the “story”, especially considering how (in my opinion) unlikely this was ever to happen. I linked to you and Keen as a couple examples (of several concerning this story) of how we as bloggers (“we” including myself, natch) tend to promote these stories en masse, thereby perhaps giving the impression to readers that there’s fact behind the rumormill. Kind of a “if one person says it, it’s rumor; if twenty, it’s fact” sort of thing. There were lots of people who jumped on this right away and promoted it as news (TTH, Massively), which also gave it some credibility.
There’s nothing wrong with taking a look at these interesting connections and speculating about them — we all do it. And you don’t have to disclaimer yourself to death or even explain yourself, I just was taking a gander at how we as a collective whole handle these stories, and sometimes give them far more weight than they deserve.
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I am still of the mind that Age of Conan WILL work as I play AoC with an Xbox 360 controller and NEVER need to touch the keyboard unless I am chatting…and headset mic would eliminate that.
The way the skills are accessed is the key. LOTRO needs too much babysitting of the keys to be workable with the controller (thus one of the MANY reasons I lost interest in that mess)..
Guild Wars also works well with a controller!!
Cheers
@Syp: That’s fair. I really hope I didn’t come across rudely here or on my site, I certainly didn’t mean to… but I feel that I probably did. Although either way, your response was nice so maybe I’m being paranoid haha.
In any event, I guess we’ll see what happens. You are right in that this was kind of a RUSH to post this news. Sometimes things get slow and people jump at anything, I suppose lol.
I’d heard the rumours about LOTRO port to XBox and as they seemed to derive from questions in a survey I wasn’t too worried until last week when I received some more information which made it seem a port could be a reality.
So I posted a thread on the codemasters site just asking if they could just deny such rumours – not too much to ask you would think. So far no official response although the forums are moderated and replied to often. If you want to see what I asdked and the replies please look here
http://community.codemasters.com/forum/showthread.php?t=358534
Thanks for reading